Home to Stay (9 page)

The entire table seemed to exhale at the same time. Randy felt a weight lift off his chest. Sam would be relieved as well. They all had a lot to lose, but if this article didn’t turn out well, the blame would fall to Sam for bringing Rebecca to town in the first place.

The conversation went well from there, with Rebecca asking about the two pirate festivals, one held in early summer, the other toward the end of the season. The Dempsey brothers and Sid talked about what it was like to grow up on the island, and a truce seemed to have been reached. Leave it to the lawyer of the bunch to pave the way for peace. Score a point for his future brother-in-law.

CHAPTER 9

A
n hour later, Randy and the reporter were gone. Sid and Beth now sat at the bar, filling Will in on the unforeseen changes in the reporter’s demeanor.

“The woman is actually nice. Who knew?” Beth said, sounding more relaxed than she had in days. “We should have put Lucas on the case before now. He can bring anyone around.”

“She’s lucky she didn’t try to flirt with him,” Sid said, unwilling to pay the woman a compliment.

Beth turned on her stool, laying an arm across the back. “He had his arm around you the whole time. There might as well have been a sign over your heads that said ‘This Man Is Taken.’” A light laughter accompanied the words. It was nice to have the old Beth back for a while.

“She’s leaving on Sunday, right?” Will asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” Beth answered. “And tomorrow you’re heading up to Kill Devil Hills with Randy, so you probably won’t see her again.”

Will had managed not to dwell on her impending day with Randy. Between the fittings and working a full service, she’d had plenty of distractions. Beth’s reminder set the butterflies loose again. She’d wanted to believe they were from fear, but Will recognized anticipation when she felt it.

And she was feeling it all right. Against her better judgment, the man’s patient prodding was working. Will didn’t tense when Randy was around anymore. Not from fear or distrust, anyway. That was at least going to make spending the day with him easier. Which was the problem.

She didn’t want things to be easy with Randy. Will needed to keep him at a distance. Letting her guard down would jeopardize too much. Reveal too much. So she was lonely. That was no reason to give into the temptation that was Randy Navarro.

“Did I hear my name?” said the giant of a man as he joined them at the bar. Will hadn’t realized he’d planned to return.

“You did,” Beth said. “I was reminding Will that you two are headed up to the tux place tomorrow. Thanks for doing this, by the way.”

“My pleasure.” Randy took the stool next to Sid, sending Will a smile that revealed he was looking forward to the trip more than she was. “That conversation with the reporter went pretty well.”

“Thank Lucas,” Sid said. “He’s the one who brought out the woman’s decent side.”

“Speaking of,” Randy said, looking around the room. “Where are Lucas and Joe?”

“Back in the poolroom.” Sid grabbed her beer and hopped off the stool. “We’re headed that way. You coming?”

Will pretended not to be listening, but with the rest of the bar empty, it was tough to look busy. Then Randy said the last thing she wanted to hear.

“I’m going to stay here with Will for now. You two go ahead.”

As her friends walked away, Will wanted to yell for them to come back. She didn’t know what Randy thought they had to talk about. Maybe he wanted to set up the details for their trip the next day. That shouldn’t take long.

Before he had a chance to ask, she set a green tea on the bar.

“Thanks,” he said, the smile still in place, though now he was looking at her more intently. As if trying to read her mind. “What did Beth have to do to get you on this trip with me tomorrow?”

The man lacked any ounce of pretense. Something she found unnervingly sexy.

“What makes you think she had to do anything?”

He raised one brow, the smile shifting to a sexy grin.

“Fine,” she said. “There might have been a threat involved. I can’t tell if it’s wedding stress or wacky hormones, but that woman can be scary when she wants to be.”

“Maybe she’s been spending too much time with Sid.” Randy leaned his elbows on the bar, revealing a small tuft of hair through the collar of his polo shirt. Will’s hand itched to see if it was as soft as it looked, which would be ironic when he was so hard everywhere else.

The thought spiked her temperature up several degrees. What was wrong with her? She’d been chewing this man out earlier in the evening; now she wanted to chew on him. Maybe
her
hormones were the ones out of whack. The plan was to be a bitch to keep him at a comfortable distance. Going doe-eyed was completely counterproductive.

Desperate to focus on something other than the man before her, Will checked the tape running on the register. “Yeah, maybe that’s it.”

“By the way,” he said from behind her. “You look really good tonight.”

Surprise made Will jerk the register tape, resulting in a nasty paper cut along the side of her finger. “Shit,” she said, before sticking the injured digit in her mouth. How the hell could such a tiny cut hurt so damn bad?

“What happened?” Randy asked. “Let me see.”

“I’m fine,” she said around her knuckle. “It’s nothing.” Will pulled her hand away and watched the puckered slice fill with a line of blood. To stop the bleeding, she pressed her bar rag against the wound.

“Don’t use the rag. It’s probably filthy from whatever’s been on this counter.” Randy walked from in front of the bar to behind it and gently took hold of her wrist while prying the rag out of her fingers. “Let me see what we have here.”

The man had missed his calling as a paramedic. Though she’d never met a paramedic that smelled this good. Will closed her eyes and breathed in. When she opened them, Randy’s face lingered only inches away, one corner of his mouth hitched up in a grin.

Good Lord, what was she doing? And what was he doing? His warm fingers were gentle on her skin. A thumb massaged her palm, making her want to melt into him. Some part of her brain was sounding the alarm—
Danger, Will Parsons! Danger, Will Parsons!
—but her body ignored the message.

“Where’s the first aid kit?” he asked, his mouth close enough for her to feel his breath on her lips. “This is going to need a Band-Aid.”

Will tried to answer. Tried to break the spell he was weaving in her brain. But her body didn’t care about Band-Aids and paper cuts. About secrets or self-preservation. Her body wanted one thing, and that was the man standing beside her.

“Will,” Randy said, his eyes dropping to her mouth.

“Yeah?”

“If you don’t stop looking at me like that, we’re going to give the diners quite a show.”

Someone whistled from a booth near the windows, jerking Will back to her senses. With a shake of her head, she pulled away from Randy’s warm touch, putting enough space between them for her to think more clearly. Though his scent seemed to have permeated her brain, making it impossible to clear the fog completely.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t know what happened.”

Randy cleared his throat. Maybe he’d been as affected as she was. “No need to apologize. I hope it happens again in a more private setting.”

Again? Private setting? That sounded like an excellent idea.

No it does not
, screamed the one sane brain cell she had left. This was not supposed to happen. Will wasn’t sure when she’d dropped her guard, but now that it was down, she didn’t know how to put it back up. She wasn’t even sure she
wanted
to put it back up.

Which was absolutely ridiculous. She’d definitely been alone too long, considering where her mind was going. But who could blame her? Will was a woman after all, with all the needs that any other woman experienced. Needs Randy looked ready to fulfill.

Damn him.

“You need to get back around the bar,” she pleaded. Randy didn’t move. “Please,” she added, keeping her eyes on the tiny paper cut. The bleeding had stopped, but a slight burning pain still pulsed in her finger.

Randy stepped back, but only turned his back to the dining room. “I’m going to need a minute.”

Will glanced up to his face, then down, spotting the problem right away. That was quite a problem. Wow. He had definitely been affected.

“Right. Take all the time you need. I’m going to get a Band-Aid from the first aid kit in the kitchen.”

Will leaned against the wall inside the kitchen, taking several deep breaths as she waited for her pulse to return to normal. With shaking hands, she managed to apply the Band-Aid, but gave up on a normal heartbeat and aimed for anything better than beating out of her chest. She hadn’t been aroused like that in longer than she could remember. The sensation felt foreign and familiar all at once.

This was bad. So, so bad. Even now, she wanted to walk into that bar and jump his bones. All rationale seemed to have left her body. How in the world was she going to spend an entire day with him? What if she snapped and jumped him right there in the truck? Or maybe in the tuxedo store fitting room?

That sounded kind of fun.

So much for slowing her heartbeat. Will lifted the lid on the ice machine, extracting one large cube and running it along her warm neck. She closed her eyes and let her head fall back, the cold, dripping water bringing her temperature back down.

When she opened her eyes, Vinnie, the head cook, and Chip, his sous-chef, were watching her with mouths agape. Great. Now she was putting on a show for the staff. This was not her night.

“Hey, guys,” she said, tossing what was left of the ice cube in the sink. “Good shift tonight. Food was great.” With that lame remark, she headed back to the bar, hoping Randy had returned to half-mast, so to speak, and joined their other friends back by the pool tables.

Randy had managed to return to his bar stool, but only seconds before Will returned. When she stepped out of the kitchen, he watched a drop of water travel down the length of her slender throat and disappear behind the V-neck collar of her Dempsey’s T-shirt.

His entire body clenched at the thought of licking that drop off her skin. Son of a bitch, this had not been his intention when he’d returned to the bar. Yes, he’d wanted to talk to Will. To break more ground on getting to know her, making her more comfortable around him. Randy hadn’t expected her to melt in his hands, then look at him with that kind of desire in her blue eyes.

As if she’d take him right there behind the bar.

All that from one compliment. One touch. If he ever got more of her, she might burn him alive. There was something exciting about playing with this kind of fire. The adrenaline rush was better than jumping out of a perfectly good airplane.

“Band-Aid on,” she said, holding up the injured finger but not making eye contact.

He let her shuffle some papers beside the register, then tear off the tape and fold it neatly before sliding it into a ledger book. Letting her take the lead, he kept quiet, watching her stilted movements. Once she’d run out of busy work, her shoulders rose and fell, as if she’d taken a steadying breath.

Will turned to face him, stepped up to the bar, and said, “About what just happened…”

Randy considered apologizing but waited to see what she would say next. He didn’t expect the words that followed.

“I’m not sure what that was, but it can’t happen again.”

At least she hadn’t apologized, which meant she wasn’t sorry it happened either. He could work with that. “Why not?”

Will’s pretty mouth opened, then closed. Opened, then closed again.

“I can’t think of a reason either,” he said.

“It would not be good.” Will was shaking her head, still not meeting his eyes. “Definitely not good.”

On that she was wrong. “It would be better than good. But you’re probably right.”

What the hell was he saying?

“There’s too much you don’t know about me.” Blue eyes faded to a deep gray as she held his gaze. “Too much I can’t tell you.”

“I’m not asking for your secrets, Will.” And he wasn’t. Randy could guess at enough to know he wanted to help her forget whatever kept her so on edge. Take her out of the past, if even for a little while. “It’s been a while for me, that’s all. Maybe too long, judging from how hard it is to sit on this stool right now.”

He’d planned on complimenting her. Getting to know her a bit. Jumping into bed with her hadn’t been on his immediate list of things to do. Though he
was
a guy. Sex was
always
on the list.

Will looked around as if to make sure no one could hear them. “It’s been a while for me, too.” The blush that colored her cheeks made him want to touch her even more.

“So we have something in common. Couldn’t hurt to help each other out.” Right now, not following where that brief encounter was leading was the painful part.

“You make it sound too easy,” she said, doubt and need warring in her eyes. “It can’t be that easy. Not for me.”

“You’re right,” he said. Of course she was right. She’d only recently begun to relax around him. What the hell was he doing bringing up sex?

“This won’t make tomorrow awkward at all, will it?” The smile she flashed was unexpected, but encouraging.

She seemed to be considering the offer, and he enjoyed watching every thought travel across her face. The arguments for and against. What she wanted versus what she feared. When she shook her head while a tiny smiled crept across her lips, he knew which way she was leaning.

Meeting his eyes, she asked one question. “Why did you stay out here with me instead of going back to the poolroom with your friends?”

“Because I like you,” he said, going for the truth. “I like the way you look, the way you move. Your confidence and capability. But honestly, because I can’t resist the challenge of trying to wipe that hurt and fear out of your eyes.”