Castaway Cove (18 page)

What the hell are they doing in there?
Women, Mac thought, as he tapped his fingers on the table, were dangerous enough by themselves. When they got together, well, it was time for a guy to be scared, because they were definitely plotting something.

He would have been scared. Hell, maybe he should’ve been. But the fact was, he was too freaking turned on by what she’d just said, right before Sedona had the bad timing to call her into the ladies’ restroom for some kind of girl confab.

The guy the cupcake baker had been having lunch with didn’t even appear to be missing her. Instead, he was busily drinking his fizzy water and typing away on a BlackBerry as if he was in some sort of bubble. Like the Cone of Silence in
Get Smart.

When Maddy had headed for the ladies’ room as well, Mac decided he might be in for a long wait. He glanced down at his watch, making note of the time, because although patience had never been his long suit, he was willing to wait as long as it took for Annie to return. But he damn well was going to deduct the time she spent in there with the other two women from the agreed-upon length of their lunch date.

Finally, Maddy emerged and headed back to her kitchen, while Sedona returned to her table, where BlackBerry guy didn’t even bother to look up. Which was proof that he was either blind or some sort of robot.

Since their table was the farthest from the small alcove leading to the restrooms, Annie had the longest distance to walk. Which allowed him to drink in the sight of her, the sway of that yellow gingham skirt, the crest of her breasts swelling above the dress’s neckline, those thin little straps that he’d discovered, while following her to the shelves in her shop, crossed on her smooth bare back.

Today’s cat-eye glasses reminded him of the ones Marilyn Monroe had worn in
How to Marry a Millionaire
, which he’d caught late one night on TV when his ghosts had kept him from sleeping. Although Annie might not have Monroe’s voluptuous curves, that didn’t stop her from being every bit as sexy.

“I’m sorry,” she said, as she sat back down across from him.

“No problem.” His only problem was that from the way his guy parts had gone on red alert, he wasn’t sure he was going to be able to walk out of this restaurant without giving the town a new scandal to talk about. “Is everything all right?”

She slid a glance over at Sedona, who was signing a credit card receipt. “It is now.”

“She deserves better,” Mac said.

“You’ll get no disagreement with me there.” She picked up the handwritten menu, which changed daily. “The raspberry crème brûlée certainly looks good.”

“Yeah. It does.”

“Though maybe the blackberries with the crème fraiche,” she mused. “Did you know that if you mix heavy cream with buttermilk and let it rest for twelve hours in the refrigerator, you get crème fraiche?”

“No. That’s not something they taught us in the Air Force.”

“I learned it in one of Maddy’s classes. We made a three-course French dinner.”

“Sounds great.” Telling himself that this lunch was all about getting to know each other, he stomped down the fantasy of ripping that dress off, spreading crème fraiche all over her body, then licking it off. “Did you mean it?”

“About the cream and buttermilk?”

“No. About what you said, just before you went off to the women’s summit. About wanting to kiss me.”

“I shouldn’t.” She was pretending a deeper interest in the menu.

“That wasn’t the question.”

“Yes.” She sighed heavily, then looked up at him. How had he never realized he had a thing for women in glasses? “I shouldn’t,” she repeated.

“Why not?”

“Because I was serious about not wanting to get into a relationship.”

“I think it’s a bit early to worry about that.” Though he was beginning to. Mac hadn’t decided how he felt about this complication. “And believe it or not, I’m no longer the party animal deejays are made out to be, so I don’t tend to sleep with women on the first date. But if you want to just use me for sex, hey, I’m okay with that, too.”

She didn’t immediately answer as those faint lines appeared between her brows again. “I’m trying to decide if you’re serious or not.”

“That makes two of us.” Then her big gray eyes dropped to his mouth, as if remembering that kiss she’d said she wanted, and all his good intentions to take things slow went south. Straight from his brain to below his belt.

“So,” he managed. “Which sounds good? The blackberries or the crème brûlée?”

He nearly groaned when she licked those lips he was dying to taste again with the tip of her tongue.

“I’m not really in the mood for dessert,” she said.

“How about a drive out to the beach?”

“To that place you told me about earlier?”

“Yeah. Or we could go to your place.”

“No.” Her response came quickly, giving him the impression that while she might be up for another kiss, or hopefully more, she wasn’t ready to jump into bed. Which was probably the wise, sensible decision.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t feeling either wise or sensible at the moment.

“The beach,” she decided. “But I really do need to get back to the store soon.”

“Deal.” He waved the server over for the check, and to save time, rather than waiting to go through the credit-card-charging routine, he tossed some bills into the lavender folder.

Playing the gentleman, he pulled her chair out for her. Then, with his hand on her smooth, bare back, they walked out of the restaurant together.

“You rea
lize we’ve probably just landed ourselves on the front page of the
Shelter Bay Sentinel
,” Annie said as they drove away from the restaurant and back toward town.

“You’re overestimating our importance,” he said. “We’ll probably land somewhere between the notice of the Taste of Shelter Bay festival and the police report.”

“Which last week consisted of a call about a suspicious car stopping at mailboxes, which turned out to be the mail carrier,” she said. “Another mailbox was vandalized when someone painted a yellow smiley face on it and a domestic disturbance reported by a neighbor next door to a home where the couple who lived there turned out to be engaging in ‘vigorous sexual role-play.’”

“Don’t forget the pool of blood on the pier,” he said.

“Which turned out to be spilled Pinot Noir.” She’d laughed when she’d read that one. “So, the top crime on the Shelter Bay police report hit parade was two cars stopping on a Forest Service road outside of town, some teenage boys getting out, having a fistfight, then getting back into their cars and driving away.”

“The first rule of Fight Club is never talk about Fight Club.” Mac glanced over at her. “And you don’t sound all that upset.”

Annie shrugged. “It was a little unsettling, since I’m not used to being in the spotlight. But everyone was already speculating about us. At least we’ve livened things up until the next excitement.”

“Someone’s bound to get drunk on the Fourth and do something stupid,” Mac said encouragingly. “That should take the heat off us.”

“I’m not sure. Especially since the mayor made that proclamation declaring Shelter Bay the ‘Romance Capital of the Oregon Coast’ and decided to add a matchmaking fair as part of the Fourth of July weekend festival.”

“That’s a plus. There’ll be lots of other couples to focus on, so we won’t be stuck in the bull’s-eye.”

Annie wished they’d be so lucky, but she doubted they would, especially once they showed up with Emma and Mac’s father. Wouldn’t that get speculative tongues wagging? She suspected Dottie and Doris, the elderly owners of the Dancing Deer Two boutique, would immediately start looking through wedding dress catalogs. With so many people getting married lately, their stock would have to be depleted.

“Though Sedona and her date didn’t exactly look as if they’re going to be part of those festivities,” he said as he turned onto Harborview, which ran along the bay. Most of the commercial boats were out to sea, though more sailboats were skimming across the water, sails raised to catch the wind.

“He’s some rich tech guy who was interviewing her for a start-up he’s doing,” she explained. “A matrix match-up service that supposedly fixes you up with your perfect partner. Like that’s going to work.”

“You never know.” He opened the sunroof, then rolled down both front windows enough to let the fresh air in. “Look at us.”

“We didn’t meet online.”

“No. But the situation was much the same. We probably talked more honestly because we
didn’t
know each other than if we had, at least that first night you called in.”

And wasn’t that what she’d been thinking herself?

“We did skip past all that early getting-to-know-you stuff,” she said. “Like favorite foods, music, top three fave movies—”

“That’s an easy one.
The Godfather
.
Platoon
. And
Die Hard
. Oh, and I’m adding a fourth.
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
.”

“Ah, the usual guns, guts, and glory.” She wasn’t the least bit surprised.

“I
am
a guy. We like that stuff.” The hot-guy look he shot her spurred a bone-melting desire that had her rethinking her moratorium on men. “Your turn.”

“It’s hard to pick just three. Or even four. But I tend to lean more toward the classics.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
.
When Harry Met Sally
.
Dirty Dancing
.”

“‘Nobody puts Baby in a corner,’” he said, quoting the famous line from her third choice.

“You’ve seen it?” Unlike his choices, that one didn’t have a single weapon in it.

“Since women usually end up choosing the video for movie nights, once you reach a certain age, odds are you’ve seen that one.” He made the right turn toward the iron drawbridge leading out of town. “Swayze was always pretty much a guy’s guy, even when he was dancing, which made watching it not that much of a sacrifice.”

Annie was thinking that she wouldn’t mind if Midnight Mac put
her
in a corner. Up against the wall, with her skirt hitched up, and her legs wrapped around his waist . . .

And she was totally losing her mind.

“Favorite ice cream,” she said, desperate to change topics.

“Vanilla.”

Which came as a surprise, since there was nothing vanilla about him. Then he flashed her a wicked grin. “With chocolate sauce and whipped cream on top.”

The way he was looking at her, as if she were a hot fudge sundae that he’d like to eat up, made her feel as if she were coming down with the flu. How else to explain her swimming head and the swarm of butterflies flapping their wings in her stomach?

Not to mention that tingling under her skin when he put a tanned hand on her thigh as if it had every right to be there.

“We’re just talking about a kiss,” she insisted. “Nothing more.”

“Agreed.”

“That first one was pretty good,” she admitted. Which was a major understatement, but it was important to keep this relationship, whatever it was, on somewhat equal ground. “But it could’ve been a fluke.”

“What happened wasn’t any fluke.” The loud blast of a warning horn shattered the air; a gate went down in front of the truck, and a moment later the bridge began going up to allow a ship to pass through. “Which I’ll prove to you soon enough.”

Those wickedly clever fingers slipped beneath the hem of her dress, continuing upward, making little circles that were leaving sparks on her skin.

“We’re going to be stuck here for a while,” he said as a gleaming white yacht headed toward the bridge. “Let me give you a sample. To help you make up your mind.”

He unfastened his seat belt.

“Driving without a seat belt is illegal,” she felt obliged to point out.

“I’m not driving.”

To accentuate his point, he twisted the key, turning off the engine. Then leaned toward her, and with unnerving sensual intent, took off her Marilyn Monroe glasses and put them carefully on the black leather dashboard.

With that out of the way, and radiating testosterone, pheromones, and a dangerous male vibe that, instead of making Annie want to run, had her holding her breath, he inched closer to her.

He cupped his warm hand at the back of her neck, then closed the gap between them.

This wasn’t their first kiss. She should have known what to expect. She’d
told
herself that she could handle Mac Culhane. After all, as the song lyrics from
Casablanca—
another movie she would’ve added if she’d cheated like he had and gone for four instead of three—went, “a kiss is just a kiss.” Right?

Wrong.

The instant his mouth claimed hers, hot, hard, demanding, she realized she’d miscalculated. And even as she told herself this was crazy, that she barely knew him, she lost her ability to think and was clinging to him as if he were a lifeline in a storm-tossed sea, which it felt like as their tongues tangled and her heart started beating so hard and fast she wouldn’t have been surprised if it had burst out of her chest.

She had
so
miscalculated.
This
kiss was not just a kiss. And the rough male groan that rumbled from his chest as his open mouth moved down her throat was definitely not just a sigh.

Oh, wow! The man could kiss.

Really, really kiss.

A blaring sound reverberated through the roaring in her ears.

“Damn,” he muttered against her mouth, “the bridge is going back down.”

Now
that
was a sigh as he pulled away, refastened his seat belt, and started the engine. A deep, ragged sigh that, as she shoved her glasses back onto her face (which didn’t do a whole lot of good because her vision seemed to still be blurred from rampant lust), assured her she was not the only one who’d felt on the verge of drowning.

“Okay,” she said after they’d crossed over to the other side, when her head had stopped spinning and she was pretty sure she could speak again without sounding like Minnie Mouse. “You win. That kiss in the store? It wasn’t a fluke.”

“I’m taking that as a compliment,” he said. “But it takes two. And, sweetheart, you are one hot babe.”

She knew women who would have taken offense. There’d even been a time, when she was struggling to become a proper Washington Junior League matron, that she would have at least attempted to pretend annoyance.

But not today. Because today, for the first time in her life, she actually
felt
like a hot babe.

“We’re still not having sex,” she felt obliged to warn him.

“That’s your call. But may I ask a question?”

She didn’t entirely trust him. Oh, she knew she was in no physical danger, but she’d already heard the way he had of getting people to say things they’d never told anyone else. Hadn’t she done exactly that herself when she admitted to at least partially blaming herself for the breakup of her marriage?

“All right.”

“Are you talking about a sex moratorium for this afternoon? Or no sex ever?”

“Ever. I told you, I’m not into the idea of a friends-with-benefits relationship.” At his arched, disbelieving brow, she said, “All right. You’re right.”

“Did I say anything?”

“No. But you were thinking that if we keep this up, we’re going to eventually end up in bed.”

Or on a floor, or up against the wall, like in that flash of a fantasy, or on the beach, beneath a sky of whirling stars . . .

“I sure as hell wouldn’t object if you take me up on that offer to use my body for sex.”

“I’ve given up men.” She wasn’t sure which of them she was trying to convince. Him or herself.

“Not that I want to get into an argument on such a nice day, but I don’t think you’re doing real well with that game plan,” he said easily.

“It’s you,” she muttered. “You mess with my mind.” Not to mention her body.

“Join the club. And, just in case it’s slipped your mind,
you
called
me
. I was just sitting there in the dark, in a shitty mood, trying to do my job on the radio, when Sandy from Shelter Bay gave me a reason not to hate that Saturday night.”

In the hormonal fog that had clouded her mind, Annie had forgotten that he’d sounded depressed and all alone that night when he’d asked the question. The same way she’d been feeling when she’d picked up her phone and made the call.

“It’s complicated.”

“Someone once told me life’s messy. And often random. Which, by the way, I’d pretty much figured out for myself. Before you had me feeling like a sixteen-year-old with a perpetual boner.”

“I didn’t like you at first,” she said, still struggling for a lifeline to avoid getting in over her head. “I don’t mean when I called in. I meant when I ran into you at Still Waters.”

“You didn’t
want
to like me,” he corrected as he turned onto a narrow, sandy road. “But, like we’ve both already discovered, you don’t always get what you want.”

And wasn’t that the truth?

But today, for just this stolen moment in time, Annie wanted Mac.

And for now, she decided, as this time
she
was the one who reached across the console and put her hand on his jeans-clad thigh, it would be enough.