Sweet but Sexy Boxed Set (7 page)

She turned around and leaned her back against the railing. She faced Mitchell and looked him in the eye. This dangerous dance they were doing with each other kept on adding more complicated steps, but she was a fast learner. He would be a formidable foe, but she could dance the dance, too. After all, she knew who he was, and, as far as she knew, he thought she was someone she wasn
’t. Just thinking about having the upper hand, even a little, gave her stare-down a little more confidence.

Mitchell locked eyes with her for a moment and then smiled congenially.
“You should finish your breakfast,” he said. “We’ve got a big day ahead of us.”

Chapter Nine

A taxi dropped them off in front of an elaborate building just outside the downtown area of Key West. It was a brightly-colored caricature of what tourists probably thought buildings on this island should look like. Instead of being one cohesive structure, it looked like four long buildings joined together under one roof. The silver metal roof also covered a deep porch which ran the length of the whole front side. Each of the four buildings sported a coat of different and impossibly bright colors.

A small yellow storefront on one end advertised its offerings with a huge painted wooden cut-out of an ice cream cone out front. The next electric green part of the building was a t-shirt shop. Key West t-shirts and tourist trap souvenirs hung in the windows. A lady was putting shirts up outside, too, preparing for a hot sunny Saturday with tourists crawling all over the island.

Mitchell paid the taxi driver generously. He put his hand across Jackie’s shoulders again and steered her toward the building. They approached the third and, by far, largest part of the tourist-mall structure. It was electric orange with a moped suspended from the roof. A large colorful sign announced it as Hermanos Island Mopeds. Jackie wasn’t surprised by the name. She saw signs for it yesterday and noticed coupons in the tourist magazines at the airport. Coupons on the hotel desk and in their rooms advertised ten dollars off a day’s moped rental. It was apparently a local institution. And it had great advertising.

She stopped in her tracks before they reached the porch.

“Are we renting a moped?”

Her resolve to be a fearless match for Mitchell
’s machinations had strengthened by the minute in the taxi. She was playing along, matching his interest with a carefree spirit which emboldened her.

All well and good until she faced that moped hanging crazily at an angle just below the huge sign. She had never been on a moped or a motorcycle in her life. Didn
’t even own a bicycle. The last time she had been on a bike she was twelve and her parents still lived in the suburbs on a street quiet enough to ride. And she didn’t miss it. Inline skates she could do. A moped? No way. Her insides turned to jelly.

“
It’ll be fun,” Mitchell said. “Best way to see the island.”

“
That’s what all those Hermanos ads say,” she said.

“
I know,” he said.

He wore the same wicked grin he had at breakfast when he announced her friends were going out to sea with free tickets. They were probably sunning themselves on the deck of a sailboat sipping drinks offered by handsome waiters in deck shoes and shorts. Some friends.

“You’re not afraid of riding a moped, are you?”

“
Of course not,” she said quickly. Unless Mitchell was obtuse, she knew she wasn’t fooling him.

“
You’ll have to pass the test,” he said. “Just a formality.”

“
Test?”

“
Just some cones out back that you have to run the moped through. Safety course. Just makes sure you know how to drive one so you don’t end up road kill on the wild streets of Key West.”

“
Oh,” she said. All her plans of looking cool and beating him at his own game were going to come down to her desperate attempt to navigate a two-wheeled contraption with a powerful motor through traffic cones. With people watching. Maybe being road kill would be the least of her problems.

Maybe it was the feeling of panic, but Jackie could swear she heard dogs barking from somewhere. It sounded like a lot of dogs
. I should get out of the sun…or lay off the alcohol. Or both.

“
Hey, Mitchell.”

A tall man who looked like an untrimmed version of Mitchell leaned against a rough wood pillar on the shady porch. Floppy chunks of dark hair nearly shaded deep green eyes. He looked like he hadn
’t shaved in about three days, and his Canvas shorts were fringy around the edges. His bare feet were jammed into untied sneakers, and he wore a faded Hermanos Island Mopeds shirt that had once been red.

“
Jimmy,” said Mitchell. “Didn’t think you’d be up yet.”

“
Gonna be busy today. Besides, I think I got more sleep than you did.” Jimmy looked at Jackie and grinned. “And now I see why.”

His glance swept over her and left a warm glow. His smile was friendly. When Mitchell
’s glance swept her, his look was predatory.

“
This is Jackie,” Mitchell said.

“
I figured. I’m Jimmy.”

“
Nice to meet you, Jimmy,” she said.

So, Jimmy and Mitchell had already talked about her. No doubt they were related. Brothers? Probably. Jackie was in over her head, but she was still a quick study. Of course. The light dawned on Jackie and high school Spanish class supplied the missing piece. She glanced up at the sign over her head.

“Hermanos. Brothers,” she said, as she glanced from Mitchell to Jimmy. It should have been obvious from the start. This was the business in Key West that Mitchell owned. It seemed like an unusual choice. It was totally unlike any of his other businesses and it couldn’t even come close to the profit margins he expected from his holdings. Why would he waste his time with such a small time operation? Was it because of his brother?

“
It’s a family business,” Mitchell said.

“
More or less,” Jimmy added.

Mitchell
’s jaw tightened and he shot Jimmy a look.

“
I’ll get you started,” Jimmy said and jerked his head to indicate they should follow him.

As Jackie entered the cool shop with Mitchell only an inch behind her, she heard dogs barking again. Maybe it was the moped panic again, because she could see all the way through the shop to the large blacktopped lot behind it. In the lot, shining rows of mopeds waited for tourists to rent them and careen madly around the island, thumbing their noses at convention and traffic laws. It was almost as reckless and unlike her as her wild night on the sand with Mitchell last night. But this could really be deadly.

Mitchell winked at her and squeezed her hand as he walked confidently toward the back door. No doubt those rows of shiny machines were just waiting to terrorize people like her, but she matched Mitchell’s brisk pace as they headed right for them. This game was not for chickens.

Jimmy leaned over Jackie as she sat on the hot vinyl seat. The cute red sundress was one more obstacle she didn
’t need. How was she supposed to know she’d be on a moped today? She tucked the skirt under her on the seat, but it wasn’t going to stay there for long.

At least her sandals had straps on the back, so she probably wouldn
’t lose them in the horrible disfiguring accident ending her young life somewhere on the streets of America’s southernmost town.

“
Here’s the gas,” Jimmy said. “You just turn this knob.”

Gas. Right.

“Brakes are here. That’s pretty important,” he said sagely.

Stopping. Good idea.

“Turn signals here,” he said, “Gotta use those. Cops aren’t too fond of mopeds on the streets anyway. Don’t wanna give ‘em a reason to pull you over.”

Getting arrested. Hmm. Jail sounded pretty safe, all things considered. She wondered if Mitchell would bail her out. From what she had seen so far, he
’d probably ask for conjugal visits. It might be worth it.

Jackie looked over at Mitchell leaning against the orange wall, watching her every move. Smiling.
He’s enjoying torturing me. I know it.
She tried to conceal her panic at the thought of piloting a Moped, but she doubted she’d pulled it off. The way he was smiling at her, he either wanted to hear her beg for mercy, or pull her off the seat of the Moped and do things to her body that would have her begging for mercy anyway.

She dragged her attention back to Jimmy who was now pointing out the orange cones and instructing her on the details of the course. She had the uncomfortable feeling she
’d missed something while she was distracted by Mitchell. Jimmy patted her encouragingly on the back.

“
Piece of cake,” he said. “Let’s see you do it.”

Jackie glanced over at Mitchell once more. She wasn
’t looking for reassurance from him necessarily, but it wouldn’t hurt. He still wore that Cheshire cat smile. It irritated her enough to inspire her to take one foot off the ground and give the gas a little twist.

The first ten feet went okay. She gave it a little more gas and considered planting the other foot on the footrest instead of hovering over the ground with it just in case. It might even have gone okay if she hadn
’t forgotten she was supposed to go left around the first cone and then swerve right around the second. She got wrapped up in deciding which way to go and then ran squarely over the first three cones.

She couldn
’t tell if the laughing was from Mitchell or Jimmy, but it was loud enough to hear over the engine of the moped. Spurred by their laughter, she concentrated hard, gave it more gas, and headed for the next series of cones. She was going too fast. She knew it. Still, it might have been okay, but the hem of her sundress suddenly broke free and the full skirt flapped up in her face.

Jackie jerked one hand off the handle bars to grab her dress, and that
’s when it happened. She remembered looking up and seeing nothing but orange. She recalled seeing Mitchell dive out of her way, and then she was lying in something soft that tickled her legs. Her head was in someone’s lap and she could hear voices talking to her.

She struggled to open her eyes, hoping maybe she had fallen asleep watching television and this was all a silly dream.

“Jackie,” Mitchell said urgently. “Tell me you’re alright.” It was a command, but she could hear the tension in his voice.

She snapped her eyes closed. Tight. Was she alright? With her eyes closed, she reviewed all her body parts. A slight stinging sensation on her right knee and left elbow, maybe a little bruise popping up on her shin. Something about it hitting a handlebar as she flew over… a dull ache on the side of her head. Had it hit the electric orange wall in midflight?

The only agonizing pain she felt that was possibly emergency-room material was her pride.

If she kept her eyes closed, maybe would they give her up for dead and eventually go away. She could crawl away under cover of nightfall and go back to Chicago where no one would ever know.

“Call 911,” she heard Mitchell say. His tone brooked no opposition and she could hear someone’s voice assenting and then footsteps walking quickly away.

“
No,” she said. She opened her eyes and raised them to meet Mitchell’s worried ones. “I think I’m okay.”

Mitchell gathered her up in his arms and held her close. Her ear pressed against the hard wall of his chest where his heart raced. He held her for a minute until she heard his heart slowly return to a normal, reassuring rhythm.

There was something wonderful about being held by the man who set her world spinning since she met him just last night. How could she have only known him one day and yet be so affected by him? Last night when he held her, it had been about the magnitude of their attraction for each other. A dizzying consciousness of needing to see how their bodies would fit and to what heights they could take each other. Breakfast this morning had been a test to see who would cave first and reveal more than they wanted to.

Now, in his arms, surrounded by the touch of him, the smell of him, Jackie started to feel different. Something she hadn
’t experienced in a long time. In his eyes, she saw something echoing her own thoughts.

He cared about her, at least a little. She could see it, if only just for a few minutes. She wanted to close her eyes and savor how good it was to be held like this, but she was afraid he really would call 911 if she did.

“Uh, Jackie,” said Jimmy.

She looked over to where Jimmy was sitting cross-legged between her and a mangled looking moped.

“I don’t think I can rent you a Moped.”

****

Mitchell wanted to kick himself clear back to Chicago.

As he sat there holding Jackie
’s still body in his arms, he replayed her accident a thousand times and it was his fault every damn one of them. Since he met her last night in that bar on Duval Street, he hadn’t been able to do one rational thing.

This morning, he was desperate to convince himself he was not interested in her as anything other than a fantastic memory of physical pleasure on the sand. One visit to her hotel room, and it would put his mind at ease and he could forget about her. But when he got there and saw her again, even for just the brief moment before her roommate slammed the door, he knew his feelings from the night before weren
’t going to go quietly.

On the way downstairs in the elevator, he made a plan to get the whole day with her all to himself. Bribing her friends with a sightseeing tour they believed was coming from Jackie was probably a bad idea. There was no doubt she
’d know he’d lied about that part before the sun went down tonight, but he didn’t care. He was used to getting what he wanted. And he knew he wanted at least another day with Jackie.