She nodded at the wallet he was still holding out. “So, Deputy Gannon. You here on business?”
“Yes, ma’am.” And listening to her, he finally realized why she seemed familiar to him. “What makes you think I’m visiting, though? We have offices here on the island.”
She nodded at his Jeep. “Rental.” She smiled again when he nodded in appreciation of her deduction. “Nice tan, though.”
He chuckled. “Actually, I just got here. That’s from sun glare off the snow back in Denver.”
“And you were forced to leave the cold and the snow to come here. Tough assignment.”
“Yeah, it’s hard work.” He grinned. “But they let me out nights.”
“Which you spend rescuing damsels in distress. Don’t you know how to take time off?”
“Are you asking because you also need help in that department?”
She looked surprised. “What do you mean? For all you know, I spend all my time scootering around exotic islands.”
He gestured to her scooter. “Rental.”
She fought a smile. “So?” she challenged. “Maybe I don’t like the burden of ownership.”
He pointed to her blindingly white shoes. “Your sneakers…brand new.”
“Maybe I’m obsessive about dirt.”
He nodded in appreciation of her savvy defense. A shame it wasn’t going to hold up. “And you have a tag. Hanging from the back of your shirt.”
She reflexively reached behind her and the scooter swerved around her leg, about to roll to its side.
Sean closed the distance between them in two long strides and grabbed the Vespa before it could hit the ground. “Sorry,” he said sincerely, tugging the scooter away from her and balancing it upright again. “I should have just said ‘it takes one to know one’ and left it at that. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”
She eyed him closely—at least as best as he could tell through those large, dark lenses. “I almost believe you mean that,” she said.
He laughed. “How else did you think I pegged you?”
“Because you’re trained to be astutely observant?”
He laughed, enjoying her quick wit. “Oh, absolutely. That and the fact that, other than the official attire you see right now, everything else I have to wear while I’m here was bought either in the Denver airport or in the hotel lobby this morning. I probably have the receipts on me somewhere.”
Now she flashed another smile. “I guess flowered shirts and bathing suits aren’t necessary in Colorado.”
He looked at her in mock disbelief. “How did you know I favor tacky island wear? What gave me away?”
She laughed and he felt…He couldn’t put a name to it. Freer?
“Just a guess,” she countered. “Although, to be honest, you look more like a faded-sweatpants-and-ancient-college-T-shirt kind of guy.”
He grinned. He’d jogged in that exact ensemble this morning. “You win.”
“My father would be so proud.”
“Is he back home in Louisiana, I hope?” He lifted a hand as she stiffened and backed away. “It was the accent that gave you away. I have family in Baton Rouge.” He let the South back into his voice as he said it.
“Ah.”
She didn’t offer any additional comment and Sean spent a moment casting about for something else to say. Then he just came out and asked what he really wanted to know. “So, are you here with family?” Not as clumsy as blurting that he wanted to know if she was married, but it ran a close second.
“No,” she said, but once again didn’t elaborate. “You?” she asked after a moment.
“No. I’m solo. Here and in Denver.” Oh, great, how desperate and pathetic did that sound? But, if anything was going to happen—and he’d be a fool to say no, right?—well, he didn’t want any misunderstandings. So he braved it out. “You?”
She lifted a shoulder in a half shrug, as if it wasn’t of any consequence to her. “Solo. By choice.”
“Obviously,” he said with an appreciative smile, then winced when she merely rolled her eyes. “Too strong, huh? I’m a bit out of practice.”
That got a small snort out of her, which made him laugh.
“Honest,” he told her. “The workaholic thing. Makes dating and relationships a bit tough.”
“So you don’t make it down to the island office often then.”
“This would be the inaugural time, yes.”
“Hmm,” she said.
They both drifted into a short silence while Sean tried to come up with something clever and witty and unmoronic to say. It might have been a while since he’d done the verbal tango with a woman, but he usually wasn’t this rusty. “I’d be glad to take you and your scooter wherever you’d like to go.”
“Actually, I was only planning to push it until I came upon a place with a phone. The resort can come and get both me and this death trap.” She sent the bright yellow scooter a fulminating look.
“You two not getting along?”
She shifted the look to him.
He grinned. “I thought maybe you’d just run out of gas.”
“What I’ve run out of is enthusiasm for forced frolic.” She sighed. “I’m sorry. That sounds ungrateful and whiny. And though I’m feeling more than a little of both at the moment, neither is directed at you. I appreciate the offer of help. If you have a cell phone, I’d be in your debt if you’d allow me to use it to place a call.”
“Why don’t we pile this in the back of my Jeep and go find someplace that serves cold drinks and a hot meal? Then I’ll take you both to your hotel.” He lifted a hand when she began to protest. “It will allow me to meet my Good Samaritan quota for the day and it will keep you from committing scooter-cide.”
She laughed despite herself. “You have a point. I’ve listened to a lot of debate on the death penalty, but this is the first time I’ve considered administering it myself.”
“You haven’t listened to my dinner conversation yet.”
Her smile remained. “I’ll consider that fair warning.”
“Are you accepting then?”
She shifted her weight and he just knew she was going to turn him down. Hell, considering how dorky he was acting, he’d turn himself down. You’d think he’d never flirted with a beautiful woman before. Something about her though…just left him tongue-tied.
She paused just long enough in answering that he suspected she might actually want to say yes despite whatever reservations she had. He was surprised at how badly he wanted to sway her to a yes. Even more surprising was that he wanted her company and yet wasn’t already picturing them naked and sweaty. In fact, he doubted very seriously this would lead to anything of the sort. It was clear she wasn’t the one-night-stand type. And, frankly, a few brief flings aside, neither was he. Or he would have hit the bonfire.
But, at the moment, an attractive companion who would make dinner a lively and fun occasion sounded pretty good. And if there was a little spike of sexual tension to go along with it…well, he wasn’t going to quibble.
“Did you have other plans for dinner? Or did the Scooter of Death ruin that, too?”
“No,” she said. “No plans.”
“Then say yes.”
Her lips parted slightly in surprise. Maybe he’d said that a bit more commandingly than he’d intended.
“Please,” he added with what he hoped was a winning smile. Brett was the Gannon who’d been blessed with all the easy charm, although Clay ran a close second. Sean had always been a bit more serious by nature, had always had to work at the charming part.
“Would it be asking too much to head to where I’m staying first?” she asked.
He could have told her he’d take her to the moon and back first if she’d agree to dinner.
“I’d just like the chance to change. I’m a little—”
She broke off when Sean reached out. She instinctively pulled back, but he reached anyway…and tugged the tag off the back of her shirt. “There. Now you look perfect.”
“Oh, you’re such a liar. But my ego thanks you.” She shook her head and laughed a little as she contemplated what she was about to do. “I really shouldn’t do this.”
“Give me one good reason why we shouldn’t rescue each other from our own inability to relax. We’ll force each other to sit and watch the world go by without being active participants in it for a whole hour or two.”
“Just one good reason?”
“What, you have a list? Am I handling this that terribly?”
Her laugh was fuller this time. “Just badly enough to be endearing and to make me less self-conscious.”
“Thanks. I think.”
She smiled. “You just strike me as someone who is way too used to getting his own way.”
“Oh?”
“Rusty flirting skills notwithstanding, you have this…commanding way about you.”
Any other woman would have said that and it would have sounded suggestive as hell. Not with her. She’d simply sounded…honest. Maybe it was the quirky way her brows furrowed when she said it, as if she couldn’t quite decide if she liked commanding, rusty flirts or not.
So why his body reacted the way it did…he couldn’t say. Dinner. This was just about dinner.
“I take it you don’t respond well to commands,” he said when she let the silence spin out. He shoved his hands into his pockets. Mostly because he had this absurd need to reach out and snatch her sunglasses off to get a better look at her eyes…and what was going on behind those glasses. “What about a humble request?”
She laughed lightly. “Somehow I’m thinking you didn’t make it into the Marshals Service by being humble and unprepossessing.”
“I didn’t say anything about being unprepossessing.” He slid his hands out, then shifted a little as he realized the fit of his trousers was being compromised by more than just his hands stretching the confines of his pockets. “Just a nice simple rescue and dinner.”
“And if I just want to be rescued?”
“I’ll be forced to eat alone, which probably means I’ll end up working to pass the time.”
“Ah, so now I would be doing you a favor in return for helping me get rid of this junk heap. And given as how I’m not all that keen on finding myself in need of rescue in the first place, this does make your case stronger.”
“If you decide against me, is there any hope for an appeal?”
She grinned. “Oh, I think you have a very good case for appeal.”
His grin widened. Maybe charm came more easily with the right inspiration. “Do I?”
She smiled, lifting her shoulders in a helpless shrug. “The court finds in your favor, Deputy Marshal Gannon. You are awarded one dinner—in which both parties will make equal payment,” she added with emphasis. “And a rescue, to take place prior to said meal.” She lifted a finger when he began to argue. “You’ve already pleaded your case. In exchange for the rescue, you will be prevented from overwork and exhaustion, which should be against the law anyway in such a gorgeous tropical setting.”
“Thank you, Justice—?”
She stuck out her hand, her smile a bit smug now. “Justice Laurel Patrick, of the Ninth Judicial Court of Alexandria Parish.”
“And here I was only kidding.”
She sighed lightly. “Sometimes I wish I was.”
But before he could ask her to follow up on that interesting little comment, she had taken the Vespa by the handlebars and was rolling it toward the rear of his Jeep.
He managed to haul it into the open back and wedge it, albeit somewhat awkwardly, in between the rear spare tire and front seat back. He motioned to the passenger side. “I’d open your door for you…but there isn’t one.” He’d never owned a Jeep before and was definitely enjoying the free feel of it. Having her beside him would just make it perfect. Which was when it struck him that, for the first time in he couldn’t remember how long, he was actually enjoying himself. And it had nothing whatsoever to do with work.
She got in as he slid back behind the wheel.
“Where to?” he asked.
She didn’t speak for a moment, then shook her head and, very quietly, almost too quietly for him to hear, said, “The Resort.”
He looked at her. “The Resort. As in…The Resort? The private club out on Flamingo Cay?”
“In my own defense, I didn’t pick it. My father did.”
“Your father? I have to meet this guy.”
“No. You don’t.”
She’d said it so emphatically, he had to laugh. “You’re only making me more curious, you know.”
She sighed. “He knew I needed a break. He probably had no idea about the resort’s…reputation. Neither did I, until I got here. The brochure looked totally tame.”
The Resort sat just off the south shore of St. Thomas on its own tiny spit of land. It was one of those private, all-inclusive clubs, like they had in Jamaica or Mexico, where certain rules of decorum were a bit more…relaxed. In this case, extremely relaxed, at least if the local island ads he’d spied in the morning paper were anything to go by.
He glanced at her and decided he didn’t want to risk losing his dinner companion. So he let the titillating subject of Flamingo Cay drop. For now, anyway. “Do you like seafood?”
“What?”
“Seafood? Stuff caught under water and cooked up for people to eat.”
She shot him a long-suffering look, which for some reason made him grin all the wider. “Yes, as it happens, I do. As long as someone else does the catching.” She wrinkled her nose. “And, for that matter, the cooking.”
“Fine, then we’ll go and ditch the Scooter of Death and head to a little place I heard about back closer to Charlotte Amalie.” He was already heading down the coast road as he spoke.
“Why do I get the feeling that I lost complete control the moment I got into this Jeep?”
Sean laughed. “I don’t know. Maybe the same reason that I feel like I lost all control the moment I swerved around that bend in the road…and found you.”
3
LAUREL LET THE WARM, early evening wind snatch and tug at her ponytail…and tried not to think too much about what she’d just agreed to do. A woman alone on an exotic island had no business standing on the side of the road talking to—okay, flirting with—a strange man…much less getting into his vehicle and riding off with him!
He’s a deputy marshal, for God’s sake, she reminded herself. He was hardly going to attack her. Yeah, but he’s still a man. And she knew quite well just how capable they were of causing a great deal of trouble, no matter their job description.
She shook that train of thought from her head. She’d given Alan far too much of her precious time back at home. She’d be damned if she’d let him ruin any part of her precious break. Break. She squelched the urge to laugh. So far she’d been on the island a grand total of twenty-four hours and this was the first time she’d felt remotely relaxed.
She’d wandered down to the pool just after checking in, but the sight of all that young, fit, taut and mostly naked skin—and dear Lord but there had been a never-ending sea of it—had dampened her enthusiasm for revealing her pasty-white, bench-sitting, thirty-two-year-old body. She’d spent her first evening in her room, sitting on her balcony with a glass of chilled wine, trying to pay more attention to the setting sun than to the somewhat startling goings-on in the club below. She didn’t consider herself a prude by any means but, for heaven’s sake, the nightclub in the center of the resort resembled something more of a Greek orgy than the open-air dance floor the brochure had purported it to be.
But not to be daunted, this morning she’d gamely pulled on her newly purchased vacation clothes and taken the water taxi over to the mainland, deciding to rent a scooter to see some of the island. And we all know how well that went, she thought wryly. From the engine conking out when she was miles from anywhere, to leaving the tags on her shirt, one would think she needed a keeper.
She skimmed a glance sidew
ays, then hid the private little smile. Okay, so things were looking up. But she wasn’t sure, despite the badge and his claim to being a workaholic, that having Sean Gannon as her keeper was going to prevent her from getting into any more trouble. In fact, he made her think about all kinds of trouble she could get into. If she let herself go there. Which, of course, she would not.
It was just a nice dinner. And that alone was a heck of a lot better than the evening she’d envisioned just an hour earlier. Which had basically involved making it back to the resort, on her knees if necessary, showering off the road dust and sweat, then collapsing facedown on her bed. With maybe a room service meal later on, if she revived herself in time.
Dinner with the deputy was definitely a step up. Not that she planned on sharing that particular sentiment with him.
He wasn’t the kind of man one encouraged. He was quite bold enough as it was, without any provocation from her. Though for some reason she couldn’t quite name, he’d managed to provoke her a deal more than most men. It’s only dinner, she reminded herself yet again, firmly shutting out images of what she could be doing back on Flamingo Cay with a man like Sean Gannon. Suddenly the club’s atmosphere seemed a lot less sleazy…and a lot more sensual.
Not that she’d ever encourage that kind of lascivious behavior. Because, after all, she was a judge. And a Patrick. If her father knew where he’d sent her, he’d surely be horrified. At least she hoped he would be. So dinner it was. And nothing more would come of it, although just the realization that something more might made her body zing.
It had been a long time since she’d had zing. A really long time.
Sean turned at the sign indicating The Resort’s water ferry dock and Laurel shut out any and all trailing thoughts about Sean and Flamingo Cay…and zing.
“Everything okay?” Sean asked. “That was quite a sigh,” he added when she looked at him questioningly.
“Oh,” she replied. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t the company. Promise.”
He still looked concerned. “Just how far did you have to push that thing anyway?”
“Not all that far.” It had felt like a million miles. On the surface of the sun. “I’d love a quick shower, though, if you don’t mind.”
Sean Page 3
