If She Dares (Contemporary Romance) (20 page)

Of course when she considered this situation rationally, a stranger’s opinion shouldn’t bother her.
You don’t live for others; you live for yourself.

Blah blah blah. Hayden understood all about the validation trap. That didn’t mean she could shake it off easily. It bothered her that Betty assumed Hayden had been apparently way too intent on the man in her bed last night to even employ the ten seconds it would take to grab a bag of donated clothes.

Nothing like that would ever bug the other young women in her engineering classes. But then, most of them hadn’t been raised by grandparents who seemed old-fashioned even to people of their own generation. In a word, she was mortified.

Betty’s voice lowered. “Sorry again about not being able to find a bra in your size, but there’s an extra cami in the pile so you can layer.” Then she flashed Hayden a comforting smile and the embarrassment and awkwardness churning inside her vanished.

Hayden loved Betty in that moment. The woman would be in her will. If she ever wrote a book, it would be dedicated to her. But coffee or clothes, which was more important?

“Thanks,” she gushed to their host as she took the basket.

Betty handed her the small mesh grocery bag with the clothes that had been left for them the night before. “Bill has your car down by our cabin. He’s gotten most of the smell out, but, you know, humans never win when they face a skunk.”

“Huh? Oh, yes, so true.”

“But it was so sweet of you to save the dog, although it wouldn’t have been the first time he’s lost a battle with a skunk, too.” Betty turned to leave. “Oh, and checkout was at noon. But since you guys didn’t get here until after ten last night, and we don’t have any other bookings, feel free to stay until two.”

Hayden closed the heavy oak door and leaned her head against the smooth wooden surface. Then she realized she’d missed the opportunity to find out more from the woman. “I was going to ask so many questions,” she mumbled.

“You still can,” Tony said as he emerged from the bathroom, still looking as gorgeous as when she’d woken up in his arms. Still same towel low on his hips. Surely that bag contained some sanity-saving pair of pants he could wear.

Still, she couldn’t handle any more conversations with Mr. Should Be a Model for
Pec and Ab Magazine
. She thrust the sack of clothes into his hands.

“You can get dressed first,” she offered, sounding way too cheerful and helpful.

A small smile played about those beautiful lips of his. Did he suspect she wanted, no
needed
him to be covered?

The attraction she had to this man was puzzling. Hayden didn’t believe in love at first sight. Not even love after six months. But she did believe in possibilities. And pleasure. And she knew the man leaning against the wall could give her both.

“Hayden?” Something heated and primal flickered in his dark gaze. Her heartbeat slowed. He pushed off the wall with his shoulder and crossed toward her.

Beat.

A shaft of sunlight blazed across his magnificent body, and she noticed the word
fearless
tattooed across his bicep.

Beat.

He stopped a foot away, towering over her. Big. Strong.

Beeaaatttt.

Her breath hitched and his eyes narrowed at her gasp.

“Do I frighten you, Hayden? Say the word and I’m out of here.”

She was all kinds of afraid of how he made her feel. But no, that wasn’t what he’d asked. She shook her head.

“Then give me your hand.”

Her hand balled up into a fist for a moment, then she lifted her arm. He clasped her fingers in his grip, strong and sure. His head lowered a fraction, as if he was going to kiss her. Hayden’s lips parted in anticipation, and the slow cadence of her heart flipped, now ratcheting up in speed. She spotted want and need in his gaze—and regret. He stopped.

Disappointment razored through her. He was going to give her space.

“Coffee,” she told him. “Everything’s better after coffee.” Tony didn’t drop her hand, and instead walked beside her toward the table where she’d stashed the breakfast from Betty. “Oh, I almost forgot. Apparently we lost a fight with a skunk last night.”

“That explains the burned clothes and bottles of apple cider vinegar.” Tony released her hand to rummage through the bag of clothes.

“I’ll unload our breakfast while you change. In the bathroom.” It was an act of self-preservation. She couldn’t handle Tony dressing in front of her after that near kiss.

“Yes, explains the clothes...but not the hot tub,” he told her as he shut the door, his voice low and setting off a chain reaction of awareness in every part of her body.

Nope, it did not explain the hot tub. Nor that path of towels to the platform bed. Hayden felt her face heat for about the hundredth time. Her skin was probably growing all blotchy. She never handled embarrassment well.

Hayden opened the wicker basket Betty had delivered and pulled out a coffee carafe and mugs. She quickly poured two cups, and then took a long draw from the mug, so glad the brew wasn’t piping hot because she would have gulped it down, burned tongue or not.

She was reaching for the carafe to top off her cup when Tony emerged from the bathroom dressed in jean shorts and a T-shirt announcing I Do A Body Good.

“Oh, if only I could remember,” she teased, surprised she’d so quickly slid into a playful mood. Coffee did a body good, too.

“Don’t laugh. Your shirt is worse,” he said, tossing her a bright pink T-shirt with Too Hot To Handle across the chest.

“Betty and her husband must have an interesting sense of humor,” she said as she raced for the bathroom to change.

Fifteen minutes later, Hayden no longer had to walk with a bedsheet trailing behind her like a train. She dumped the sheet on the straightened bedding. Betty’s bag had also provided her a change of underwear, the promised cami and a pair of khaki shorts. After a quick finger comb to her hair, she joined Tony at the table. The enticing scent of pumpkin spice muffin was too much and she reached into the basket and plopped a piece into her mouth. Delicious.

They sat in silence for a moment. They needed to have a conversation, but what was the protocol here? She’d missed the How to Talk to the Stranger You Just Slept With etiquette lesson. Of course avoidance was the preferred course of action in any social situation. A lesson taken straight from her grandma. Hayden bit back a smile as she remembered the woman’s advice.
Hayden, dear, don’t force it. Things have a way of working themselves out, you’ll see.

Now people would call that “escape coping,” but sometimes Grandma was right and things did work themselves out.

In other words, just roll with it.
Yes, that’s exactly what she’d do.

But first, one piece of information was best not avoided. For both their sakes. “You don’t have to worry about pregnancy or anything. I’m covered there.”

Alarm flashed through his brown eyes. “Hell, I hadn’t even thought about that yet.”

“Too busy trying to figure out how to ditch me?” she joked.

“No. Too busy trying to figure out what kind of idiot forgets making love to the most beautiful woman he’s ever been with.”

She let out a small laugh, but Hayden was torn. Torn because she didn’t know how to feel. All her emotions warred with each other as if they were battling for the last brownie in the pan. She was mortified that she couldn’t remember last night. Thrilled that she’d connected with Mr. Amazing and Hot. She was a contradictory mess of embarrassment, satisfaction and chagrin. And Tony thought
he
was the idiot. “I guess I’m strangely flattered.”

Tony leaned toward her, his brown eyes intent. “We have two options. Go our separate ways and forget this ever happened. Or find out why we hooked up and why neither of us can remember it.”

“
How
we hooked up. I know
why
.”

A slow smile curved his gorgeous lips. Tony had mentioned he was a filmmaker. Cue the rainbow. And the birds chirping. Hell, bring in a unicorn because at this moment all the embarrassment and mortification vanished. “I don’t even know where we are,” she said, breathless.

“The back of that take-out menu says Broken Bow, Oklahoma,” he told her, nodding to a couple of menus stuck to a bulletin board with tacks near the kitchen sink. Yeah, the couples who stayed in this lover’s cabin probably didn’t plan to venture out during their whole stay. Drop the supplies at the door and go was more likely their approach once they spotted that heart-shaped tub and platform bed.

“Uh, the last place I remember is Texas,” she said.

“Dallas?” he asked and she nodded. “There’s a start. We must have met in Dallas. Of course, I can’t even figure out how to get back there because I still can’t find my phone.”

“Same. Do you have a map in your car?”

Tony flashed her an embarrassed glance, so Hayden knew the answer was no. Her grandparents had embraced technology as much as the next person, but when it came to navigation, Grandma Taylor insisted on paper. Every year, she gifted Hayden with a new and updated atlas in case technology failed. But Betty had only mentioned one car, and chances were that it was his.

“Maybe Betty can loan us a map,” he offered. “Or we can stop at a gas station on the way out of town. You in?”

Was she? Hayden could only do damage control if she knew exactly what she’d done last night. And that meant she had to stick with Tony. “Yes—we have a plan,” she said, hopeful for the first time that day.

Five minutes later they stepped out together on the wooden planked porch. Two rocking chairs swayed in the breeze. In the distance, the trees loomed tall and lush, so different from the flat terrain of Texas where she’d grown up. Two hawks flew a lazy pattern above her head and the sound of locusts filled the air.

She pointed out two squirrels chasing each other around the trunk of a tree. “You know what’s strange? I’ve lived in Texas all my life, and have never been to Oklahoma. You’d think at least once I would have crossed the border.”

“I’ve never been to Oklahoma, either. Something we have in common.”

“Tony, I bet’s that’s how we ended up here,” she told him, gripping his arm. The muscles beneath her fingertips bulged. “I can’t believe how excited I am to realize that.”

“It sucks not feeling in control. Not knowing what you’ve done.”

Something dark and regretful lurked in his tone—as if he’d weathered a similar situation in his past. She gave his arm a squeeze before dropping her hand down to her side. Until this moment, Tony had been teasing or reassuring. But since waking up, she’d only been concerned about herself. Hayden hadn’t given a second thought to how he must be feeling. Instead, she’d pegged him as
that dude
—the kind of man who congratulated himself on getting lucky. But there was more to him than that.

“I’ve been kind of a bitch to you, haven’t I?” she asked as they approached a larger cabin marked Office.

He gave her a wink. “It’s okay—I can handle a few knocks.”

Hayden laughed as the front door opened and Betty walked out to greet them. “Hey, you two lovebirds. That’s just the way you were last night. Covered in stink but still laughing. Although you smell so much better this morning, but it’s nice to see the smiles are still there.”

“Thanks for helping us out. We didn’t seem, uh, strange to you last night?”

Betty just laughed. “Honey, you were covered in skunk, of course you seemed strange. But no odder than any other high-on-love couple.”

High on...what?

“We didn’t leave our phones with you?” Tony asked.

“No, just the car. Mike’s bringing it around now. Maybe you left your phones in the car. By the way, I used my homemade air freshener in it last night and again this morning. Lilac and pine. Between that and the breeze, I think you’re good.”

Car tires crunched on the gravel and they all turned to watch a bright red car with black polka dots painted on it—it was a ladybug on wheels. “That’s your car?” she whispered.

“I was hoping that was yours,” he groaned.

Oh, crap.

She’d had about a million questions to ask Betty and Mike and every single one of them vanished the moment a ladybug car neither of them owned rolled toward them. Mike slid out of the car and handed Tony the keys. Ugh, as if the keys belonged in Tony’s hand.

“That’s a tight squeeze, Tony. Not sure how you’re comfortable wedged behind the steering wheel. But anything for the ladies, huh?” Mike asked as he draped an arm around Betty’s shoulders and kissed her temple.

“Oh, well...” Tony mumbled.

Get out of here.
Now.
Before Mike and Betty began to ask questions that would lead to 9-1-1, handcuffs and a single phone call. Hayden didn’t know which was worse. The prospect of that jailhouse phone call or that she really had no one to phone. She might as well dial the HR person at Hastings Engineering because she definitely wouldn’t be working there after she was arrested.

She swiped the keys from Tony’s hands. “Actually, I do most of the driving. He’s the navigator.”

The other couple laughed.

“Speaking of navigating, you wouldn’t happen to have an extra map?” Tony asked.

Mike nodded. “Follow me. I think I might have one in the garage.”

Betty handed Hayden a small bag as they watched the two men walk away. “Some homemade cookies for the road.”

“Thanks,” she told her, distracted by Tony’s muscular legs and firm—

“Uh-huh.” The other woman smiled.

Had she just been caught staring at a man’s ass? By someone who could be her grandma?

“Glad it goes both ways between you two. That boy is enchanted by you. He’s a keeper.”

Hayden didn’t know which was more startling. A six-foot plus man being referred to as a boy or that he’d appeared
enchanted
by her. What a sweet word. How would it feel to have a man like Tony enchanted by her? Very agreeable as long as they were using words Jane Austen would write.

“Yeah, he’s something.”

Hayden slid into the driver’s seat as Mike and Tony rounded the corner, map in hand. At least that was one problem they’d been able to solve.