The Santini Collection 1-4 (19 page)

“
No. I was going down to the beach a few days ago and he showed up. Then, I was potting some impatiens on my lanai and he helped. I got a little kiss.”

He chewed his food as if coming up with some great advice. God, she hated when he got like this. Colin was her best friend, but he was horrible at advice. He gave it to her even if she didn’t ask for it. “A little kiss?”

“
Like a peck.”

Colin studied her for a moment or two. “Have you made any advances?”

“
No.”

She had never been that sexually aggressive, and she hated to admit it, but her time with Pete made it tough to take the chance again. He had been laughing at her behind her back all the time.

“
I want to beat the hell out of that bastard.”

She snorted again. “I think you would end up with…how do people say it? Oh, you would end up with your ass handed to you. I wouldn’t mess with Marco if I were you.”

“
I wasn’t talking about him. I was talking about Pete. I should have done it before he was chased off the islands by his creditors.”

“
You’re so sweet. Why didn’t we end up together?”

“
Because the last time we tried to kiss like boyfriend and girlfriend it felt like I was kissing my sister.”

She laughed. “That’s true. It was…kind of gross.”

“
I think you’re going to have to make your move.”

“
On Marco?” She shook her head. “No way. I can’t do that.”

“
Why not?”

“
He’s a SEAL for crying out loud. He should be the one to launch a maneuver.”

Colin laughed as he sat back and studied her. Then, he sobered. “You haven’t told him about your family, have you?”

She shrugged. Other than the brief discussion on their date, she hadn’t said anything else and he hadn’t asked.

“
He’s waiting because you aren’t open with him.”

“
First of all, men don’t care if you are going to tell them your background.”

“
They do if they are serious.”

She waved that away. “Marco Santini isn’t serious about me.” Colin opened his mouth but she shook her head. “No. He’s not. And, I don’t know much about him other than the fact that he’s a SEAL, his family all serve in the military, and he will be an uncle in less than a year. That’s about it.”

“
Well, you need to quit tiptoeing around it. I might die an old man without children to spoil if you don’t hurry up.”

She rolled her eyes. “I guess you haven’t heard from Sara?”

“
Nope. She called. I ignored her.”

“
Hmm.”

In a moment of rare seriousness, he said, “I couldn’t go on like that any more. I’m sick of her treating me like a dirty little secret.”

Alana leaned forward and studied him for a second. “You mean it.”

“
Yes, I do.”

“
Good. You need to get away from her.”

“
And you need to make a move on Santini. He kissed you, now you need to up the ante.”

“
I don’t know about that.”

“
Tell you what. You go talk to him tonight. I’ll pick you up for breakfast in celebration or as a pick me up.”

She smiled. “You were always the best friend I ever had.”

“
Well?”

She drew in a deep breath and nodded. “I’ll try my best.”

Alana figured at this point it would be better to know than to be wondering if he was still interested.

* * * *

Marco was having a crappy day. A long crappy day at that. He had been late for PT in the morning, and that had pissed the commander off. It went downhill from there. Now, dealing with his brother on the phone was starting to piss him off.

“
How is my future wife?” Gee asked.

Marco ground his teeth. He hadn’t told any of them he was going on a date with Alana, but apparently his mother did and Gee wouldn’t let it go.

“
Alana is not your future wife.”

He was so fucking frustrated being a nice guy with her. He got the idea that she didn’t want to rush things and he knew she was a little inexperienced. Being the situation they were in, it was probably best that he didn’t push her. If he screwed this up, living there would be horrible.

“
You don’t know that.”

He glanced out the window and noticed that her car was back. “Yeah I do. I have to go, Gee. Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

“
It’s only ten here on a Friday night. I’m young enough to stay up later, old man.”

“
So, a single man, one who claims to be full of vigor, is sitting at home on a Friday night talking to his brother on the phone. Sad, Gee, really sad.”

There was an ominous beat of silence, then he said, “I’m being deployed. Nothing huge, but I’m going over to Afghanistan for the next few months.”

That stopped Marco’s pacing. “You were there not too long ago. I thought they gave you more time between deployments.”

He sighed. “One of the guys has a mother who is pretty sick. They needed a volunteer.”

“
When?”

“
Not sure. Within the next two weeks. Haven’t told anyone else.”

It was common for the two of them. Gee was the youngest and Marco was the closest to his age. From the time they were little, Gee followed him around like a lost puppy dog. It had been aggravating at first, but since they had matured, they had grown closer. “But at least you’ll be back soon with the drawdown.”

“
That’s the way I looked at it. I’m one of the few single guys around right now.”

Even though many people would peg Gee as shallow, he wasn’t. He understood what military families went through, and he knew what volunteering to go meant also. It wasn’t something everyone would do. Sure, he would earn a little more money, but to help a fellow PJ because of family was more important. Joey Santini had raised them right.

“
Mom won’t take it easy, that’s for sure.”

Gee sighed. “I thought maybe you could call her and tell her.”

Marco laughed. “Yeah, no. Not unless you’re going to tell her when I get called up next time.”

“
Well, damn. Maybe I should let Leo do it. He’s giving her a grandchild, so she’s all happy with him.”

“
I bet he won’t want to lose that buzz he has going with her.”

“
He owes us. Mom is all over me about Alana and you, just so you know. Ever since Leo found MJ she’s been crazy for more women in the family. I can’t believe we’re going to be uncles.”

Marco laughed. “Yeah. Even harder is to believe that Leo is going to be a father. His kids will be crazy.”

“
Not too crazy. MJ will make sure they’re raised right. Like Mom did with us.”

He knew that Gee was in the mood to talk, but he saw Alana walking his way. His heart was suddenly in his throat and his palms started to sweat. She was wearing a pair of board shorts and a T-shirt. He was so used to seeing her in a dress, every time he saw her dressed casually, his brain shut down. The fabric of her top clung to her breasts. He’d spent the last week imagining just what they looked like. He sighed as his gaze moved lower. He had more than one daydream about having her long legs wrapped around his waist as he thrust—

“
Marco?” Gee said.

He shook his head trying to get it back to the conversation, but he kept his attention on Alana. “Sorry, what did you say?”

“
Nothing. I’m going to go. I have to get enough sleep to get the nerve to call Mom tomorrow.”

“
You’re in the US military and you’re afraid of one little woman.”

“
And you’re not? You’re a SEAL and I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t want to call Mom.”

“
Point taken. Night, bra.”

Gee chuckled. “Listen to you getting Hawaiian with me. Night.”

He hung up the phone just as Alana knocked on the door. He set his phone down on the counter and slowly walked to the door. He had to fight every instinct to run to answer it. He couldn’t help it. He wanted to spend every free moment he had with her. Every day he found himself hurrying home to see if she was free. It was worse than when he had his first crush.

He opened the door and lost his train of thought. She’d picked up a flower along the way and slipped it behind her ear. He noticed she did that a lot. Just like he could imagine the way it would feel to have her beneath him.

“
Hey,” she said, her lips curving. “I didn’t know if you were busy tonight or not.”

He shook his head and said nothing else. He was still trying to get his head wrapped around the idea that she had walked to his house. With barely any clothes on. For Hawaii, it wasn’t that strange, but…

“
Uh…Marco?”

“
Oh, no, not doing anything. Do you want to come in?”

The smile she offered hit him harder than a ton of bricks. “Sure.”

He stepped back ordering his body that this meant nothing. She was just stopping by to chat, just like they had been doing for the last week. She walked past him and he caught the light scent of flowers and sensual woman. It was something he would always associate with Alana for as long as he lived. He shut the door and watched as she walked into his kitchen.

He followed her in. “Gee says hi.”

She leaned against the counter. “That’s nice. Wait, he’s home on a Friday night? For some reason, that seems odd. It’s odd that any single Santini man is home on Friday night.”

“
I’m home.”

“
Yeah, I find that strange. As I have for the last few months.”

He shrugged. It was hard to admit that the dating scene had been boring him for the last year. It made him sound like Vince, and he didn’t like that. Vince
was
old.

“
We went out last Friday night.”

She tilted her head to the side and studied him. “We did. But, then you backed off.”

“
No I haven’t.”

“
Yes, you have. You haven’t…you know.”

He couldn’t seem to follow the line of questioning. It was probably because all the blood had moved from his brain southward. Just being in the same vicinity as the woman had him rock hard. “No, I don’t know.”

“
You haven’t really kissed me since Friday night and I want to know why.”

He could only stare at her. Right now his fingers itched to touch and his mouth was dry at the thought of tasting her. Did she really not understand how attracted he was?

From the blank stare on her face, she didn’t.

“
I didn’t want to rush you.”

She snorted and rolled her eyes. “Okay, Marco. I’ve got some work to do, so I’ll see you around.”

This was wrong. Very wrong. He knew women didn’t like to be rushed, especially women like Alana. Plus, there was a part of him that wanted to take it slow because something felt very different with Alana. She was already walking past him when he grabbed her wrist. She stopped and looked down at their hands, then back up at his face. Confusion and pain darkened her green eyes.

“
I told you before you have the wrong idea about me.”

She gave him a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “No. I had the wrong idea. It’s just best if we let it go. I have lots of guy friends.”

He didn’t like the sound of that. He didn’t know what bugged him more: The fact that she put him in a category of friend already or the fact that she had a lot of male friends.