She crumpled up the shirt and tossed it into the backseat. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I’d rather stick with the crabs.”
“Whatever you want, cupcake.” He slid his shades down over his face, but she spotted his laugh lines at the corner of his eye.
Reagan sighed and pulled her notebook out of her purse to fan herself. Twelve more hours. That would put them in Miami around four o’clock in the morning. Better line up the boat now. She pulled up the Internet on her phone and searched for a charter that could take her down the coast, far away from Zach Anderson, self-proclaimed stud muffin.
Zach stifled a grin and turned on the radio. He didn’t have to choose the obnoxious shirt, but damn, it felt good to unspool her a little bit. She was wound so tight. Reagan needed something to loosen her up. Or someone.
His hands gripped the steering wheel, causing his knuckles to go white. Obviously it wasn’t a task he would be up to. Actually, he’d be up to it, but it wasn’t worth the hassle of opening the wounds of the past. Yes, they’d dated senior year. And he’d been all-in on making it a long-term, long-distance thing, at least until Jimmy used those damn pictures to try to blackmail the senator and pulled Zach into the fray.
Zach denied having any involvement in the whole ordeal, but the senator didn’t care. He’d threatened both of them that if they ever went near Reagan again, they’d regret it. Jimmy didn’t take it seriously, he didn’t have to. But Zach’s dad was a government employee whose pension was the only thing he had going for him. Senator Campbell went so far as to imply if Zach didn’t break it off with Reagan, his dad would lose his pension along with the job he’d held for twenty-five years. So Zach did the hardest thing he’d ever done in his life—he made up some story about how he didn’t want a long-distance relationship and let Reagan go.
Years later he realized Senator Campbell probably couldn’t have messed with his dad’s job. But by then it was too late. If they’d stayed together, Reagan sure as hell wouldn’t have a giant stick up her ass…he would have made sure of that.
He cast a side glance her way. Her fingers tapped non-stop over her screen.
“Figuring out last minute details?” he asked.
She didn’t raise her head. “Just lining up a charter to get me down the coast when we get to Miami.”
A charter. So the wedding was probably taking place on one of the many islands down in the Keys or off the coast. Damn. Good for her for coming up with such a private location. Bad for him if he wanted to stick with her. She didn’t seem to realize her slip up. Still hopeful he could satisfy Scazzoli with a shot of her dad and his possible mistress, he tried to pump her for a tiny bit more info.
“How far do you need to go? I can drive you down to the Keys if it’s easier to get a boat from there.”
“What?” She looked up, distracted.
“How far do you have to go in the boat to get to the island?”
Her fingers continued to tap on the phone. “It’s about a hundred and twenty nautical miles.”
Zach smiled to himself. Yep, definitely down in the Keys.
“Wait. I can’t believe what you do to me.” Reagan looked over at him, her eyes wide. “You can’t tell a soul. Promise?” Her hand clutched his arm.
“Who would I tell?” She relaxed her grip but before she slid free, he covered her hand with one of his. “Now let’s talk about this ‘what you do to me’ comment.”
Her lips pressed into a thin line then she opened her mouth to speak. Nothing came out.
Zach let out a laugh. “That’s what I thought.”
She yanked her hand away and refocused her attention on her phone. One step forward and two steps back. That’s how it went with Reagan. Just when she started to give in a little, she pulled back twice as far.
All signs directed him to stay away, avoid the ice princess like the swarms of jellyfish he’d seen while scuba diving in the Bahamas. They were beautiful to look at from afar, but if he got too close, he’d find himself scraping a stinger off his skin or maybe even facing an injection with an Epi Pen. He’d only been stung once, barely brushed against a tiny moon jelly. But that was enough to make him cautious when diving. Maybe he ought to start calling her Jelly instead of Cupcake.
Reagan was just protecting herself. He understood her resistance to letting anyone get too close. He’d seen firsthand what kind of jerks people could be around her, always trying to get on her good side so they could get in tight with her dad. One of the guys he used to hang with in high school had asked her to the junior prom. Said he didn’t even like her, but his dad had paid him a hundred bucks to do it in the hopes he could get a private meeting with Senator Campbell to talk about some tax code he wanted changed. Zach had laughed when Reagan turned the guy down flat. She was good at reading people. Would she still be able to get a good read on him?
The dull ache throbbed again. Dammit. He shouldn’t let it get to him.
The photography job in Big Pine Key started on Friday. If he didn’t want to burn that bridge, he’d have to call and let them know if he wasn’t going to make it. That only gave him another twelve hours or so to figure out what he wanted to do about Scazzoli’s threat.
The pros and cons of taking the job battled back and forth in his head like an angry game of ping pong. True, she was a royal pain in his ass. But she had a lot on her shoulders right now. At least they were making progress. He’d get her to Miami and see how he felt then. No more distractions. No more detours.
Feeling more settled than he had since he first set eyes on her back in Chicago, he flipped on the radio and searched for something with a little rhythm. Something to distract him from the prickly blonde doing her best to ignore him in the low bucket seat to his right.
10
Reagan kept her eyes trained on her phone, although she’d stopped scrolling through pages of Miami charter boat rentals. How could she be so stupid to let the bit about the island slip? Even someone half-cocked could figure out she was headed somewhere down in the Keys. And Zach had never operated at half-cocked. She squirmed in her seat as she remembered how it felt to wake up next to him this morning. Fully cocked, for sure.
How easy would it be to give in to the attraction? Let everything go for an hour or an evening? She’d gotten so used to keeping the walls up, protecting herself from any perceived threat, that it had become second nature. Zach might have hurt her back then but they were kids. He was being a nice guy. She could trust him. He was safe.
Her eyes shielded by large, oval shades, she slid her gaze over to him. Large, capable hands wrapped around the steering wheel, thumbs tapping in time to the classic rock floating out of the speakers. The late afternoon sun glinted off his tanned forearms. A fresh pair of jeans encased his muscular thighs and an olive-colored T-shirt set off a deep, golden tan.
She inhaled deeply and let her breath out on a long sigh then peeled her shirt away from her skin, trying to get some air to her chest. Zach’s attention turned toward her and his damn, dark chocolate gaze melted against hers.
“Everything okay over there?” he asked.
She adjusted her butt in the seat. “Yeah. Fine.”