Ahead in the Heat

by Lorelie Brown

  The thing was, memories were crowding back. Partly because he knew she worked with underprivileged teenagers—and partly because he hadn’t been able to surf for almost a week now. Surfing always rinsed out his brain and made him better able to deal with new shit that came his way. There was too much old bullshit that tried to hang on to him, and the water was the only way to push it away.

  He had a beach house, for fuck’s sake, and no one was out there in the ocean. He just sat on the back stairs with his toes digging into the warm, abrasive sand.

  At least his big donation meant he got house calls from Annie rather than having to go into her office. Money did count for something.

  Except the downside of training at his house meant they were training by the beach. It was bullshit. He was still looking at the one place he’d kill to be. Surfing cleared his head to make him feel like something more than a dirty little kid.

  He’d lost that. He’d injured himself and lost that connection to the water.

  He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gone more than three days without hitting the waves. Even in January, he’d wear a full-body wet suit. Some of the best waves came when the weather was shitty and storms were rolling in offshore.

  “When do I get to surf?” It was still difficult for him to breathe, which was hard to understand. All he’d done were some arm lifts and extensions. Under normal circumstances, he could run five miles against the extra resistance of soft sand, then do forty-five minutes of weightlifting. But sweat had sprung up across his forehead. He wiped it away with the back of his hand and slugged back some Powerade.

  “When you can do five overhead lifts without breaking a sweat.” She was folding up the table she’d brought along with her. He’d had to lie facedown on it and swing his arm up and down as if he were a kid playing come-get-me with the monster under the bed. He’d felt stupid. Worse than that.

  His shoulder throbbed in a different way than it had over the past week. It was less sharp pain and more like a steady ache. “That’s easy. I just won’t drink any water the day before and there’ll be no sweat.”

  “Oh yay,” she said with a heavy dose of sarcasm. “Screw up your health in order to game the system. Good plan.”

  He capped his drink and put it down on the edge of the stairs. “I wasn’t serious.”

  She sighed. “I know. Sorry. You didn’t deserve that one. It’s just been a long day.”

  “It’s only eight. What could be wrong?”

  Her hair was pulled back in her short ponytail, complete with a thick fringe of bangs. But she’d left off the eye makeup, and purple shadows clung underneath her lashes. She shook her head. “You don’t really care.”

  He stood, his stomach giving a weird little flip. Was that what she thought of him? It didn’t say much about him, did it. He gently stretched his arm, letting the pain burn through his muscles. It wasn’t all bad pain. There was the sweet sting of muscles being able to do what they wanted for the first time in a couple weeks. The sun rose above the house behind them, streaking warmly through the air. The water called his name, but even he knew it would be foolish to grab a board and try anything stupid. “Maybe I won’t care, but give me a shot. Maybe it’ll be more like a distraction.”

  She sighed, but her hands stopped messing with the straps and struts of the table. She turned away from him. Her shoulders were narrow and her back even skinnier. She wore a T-shirt with shorts that showed off toned legs. Not surprising, considering how much she skateboarded. She had a skinned knee too, as if she were a kid. But the swell of her perky ass was all woman. “I’ve got this boy who comes by every now and then. Tim. He can grind for fucking miles. He’s got shockingly red hair and pale skin. Turns out, skin that pale—it shows bruises really well.”

  “Shit,” Sean muttered.

  “Yeah.” Her shoulders lifted and dropped as she sighed. “He came around at four this morning.”

  “His parents?”

  “Dad.” Her voice broke even on that tiny, simple word, but she stayed turned away from him. Her shoulders bowed in farther, almost as if she were trying to hide.

  Sean turned toward the water. She obviously wanted a minute of privacy. A breeze on its way offshore tickled the back of his neck. At least his mom had never raised a hand to him. He’d been lucky in that respect. It had been part of why he’d never had a way out, which was the downside too. He’d always made the best of his circumstances, so the few times he’d been able to say something, no one had really believed him. He’d told a counselor in middle school. Mrs. Logan hadn’t been dismissive, but she hadn’t exactly moved heaven and earth to get anything changed. Sean had been put in foster care for a week while his mom had made the bare-minimum improvements. Then he’d been back again. He’d been hopeful for all of two days, until he’d come home from school to find out that his mom had been shopping at the Goodwill while he was in sixth period social studies. Bags of clothes they’d never wear covered the table where he was supposed to do homework.

  He’d left that behind. Literally and figuratively. His house was clean. He had the life he’d dreamed of.

  He stuck out a hand. “Come on.”

  She turned, but looked at his hand in the air between them as if he were offering her a handful of spaghetti. Not dangerous, but completely inexplicable. “But . . . where?”

  “Down the beach.”

  She shook her head. “No swimming. You’re not ready. You’ll do damage.”

  “We’re not going swimming.” He flashed a shiny, cheeky grin. Distraction was a graceful weapon when wielded correctly. “You’re not dressed for it.”

  “Like you’ve never talked a girl into skinny-dipping.” She was wavering. A single step brought her close enough that she could put her hand in his if she wanted to.

  He kept himself locked down. Fingers open. Stance easy. This was no big deal . . . but for some reason it felt like it was. He liked Annie. She was sharp and funny, and this morning she was hurting. He hadn’t meant for them to have any sort of friendship, but he wasn’t opposed to it either. “Sure I have. But we’ve always done it after dark. It’s morning. You’re totally safe.”

  She laughed. “No woman is safe around you.”

  He didn’t mean to, but he took a step closer to her. They were shrinking the distance between them. He felt his spine tilt, his chin come down just a fraction. “Why, Baxter, does that mean you like me some?”

  “A woman would have to be dead not to think you’re hot.” Except she said it with more of that disdain of hers. Like his attractiveness was a fact, but not one that mattered. “You know that. Of course you do, or you wouldn’t have been in ads for those expensive watches. There’s surfing sponsorship, and then there’s wider appeal. You’ve got it in spades.”

  “I like money.” He’d never considered that a bad thing. He did what he needed to do in order to build his portfolio. The sport of surfing and his own corporate image could become something bigger. Better. Surfing was fucking awesome. If he could make money and help other people realize that, no one lost. There was the chance that his split focus was the thing holding him back from the top ten, but he’d calculated that as an acceptable risk. He still had to stay in the game, however. “I also like the water. Come on. Come sit with me.”

  He could practically see the internal battle she waged. Her eyes were the same chocolate brown as the stripe down the surfboard he’d had his senior year of high school. That had been a good year, when he’d first entered Prime events.

  “Fine,” she said with a decisive nod, almost as if giving herself permission. She tucked her hand in his.

  He closed his fingers around hers immediately. Her hand was smaller than the hands he was used to. Smaller than he liked, honestly. It took some thought to realize that all the vibrant personality he dug was packed into a tiny capsule. If she were as big as she lived, she’d have been si
x foot five.

  They walked to the edge of the water in silence and sat below the tide line. The damp sand immediately soaked through Sean’s workout sweats. He stripped off his shoes, tossing them behind him to the white dry sand. She followed suit, ditching her tennis shoes. Her toes were elegant, with navy-painted nails.

  He didn’t say anything. He knew from experience there was no point in pushing if someone didn’t want to tell a story. He hadn’t known Annie long, but she seemed like the ultimate in determination and control. The cold white froth of the very edge of the waves tickled their toes. When a particularly large surge swept beneath them to lick at the sand they sat on, Annie squealed. Sean laughed at her, but only a little bit. He had a feeling she didn’t mind.

  There weren’t many surfers out, mostly because conditions were predicted to go off later in the day. They’d double the surf in the afternoon, so most people were probably getting other shit done so they could have free time when the surf was banging. Not Sean. He had all the free time in the world. Lately that had chafed him, but at this moment, it was something of a relief.

  “He’s not a perfect kid, of course. It all started because he’d been drunk and out until two on a school night. Plus I bet he mouthed off when his dad tried to get onto him.” She spoke without looking at Sean, but that was fine. At least she was speaking.

  Sean knew what it was like to hold on to something important and have nowhere to vent. “Still, that doesn’t make it okay.”

  “God, no.” She sighed. “His father hauled off full force, and he’s got at least fifty pounds on Tim. He’s lucky he doesn’t have a fracture in his orbital socket. It was a really hard blow.”

  “Plus he’s lucky he had you to come to.”

  She shook her head. Her hands dangled between her upraised knees. “Sometimes I don’t know about that.”

  “I’m sure of it.” Sean would have killed for someone who gave even half as much a shit about him. But there was no point in heading down that road again. It only caused pain.

  “I should get going. I have an appointment in less than an hour, and I still have to get all the way across town.”

  He liked the way sand felt under his feet. Comforting, even when it was cold and damp. Sand was home. Sand shifted; it could always be swept away by the ocean and cleaned before it was dumped back on the beach. “Go ahead.” He winked. “It’s not my fault you feel the need to check up on my clean living.”

  “Clean living.” She gave a derisive snort. “Sure.”

  “I swear it. Like a Boy Scout or something.” He crossed two fingers over his heart.

  Suddenly, an idea hit him that was brand-new and ridiculous, but he’d never had a better one. “You know what? You should go with me to an event I have Friday. Just so I can prove how good I’m being.”

  “I’m not going anywhere with you,” she replied immediately. She shoved up from her seat and brushed off the clumps of damp sand from her ass and the backs of her legs. “Don’t be silly. It wouldn’t be professional.”

  “I disagree. In fact . . . I think it would be entirely professional. These are the types of movers and shakers who are always looking for new charity projects to support. It’s a red-carpet event for the opening of a new magazine. It’ll probably shutter in less than a year, because who the hell buys magazines anymore, but that’s not your worry.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “What is my worry, then?”

  “What to wear.”

  Chapter 6

  Annie didn’t do parties. Not the way Sean did parties, at least. He had his fancy on, that was for sure. His suit was an indefinable gray, and he’d paired it with a pale pink shirt with the faintest plaid pattern. His brighter pink tie should have looked awful. The combination should have made him look slightly effeminate or unmanly.

  It didn’t. God, it didn’t.

  Annie wanted to wrap his pink-dotted tie around her fist and haul him six inches down so she could kiss him.

  The colors made his tan stand out, the darkness of his hair even stronger. All of it was contrasted by his bright, neon, unfairly blue eyes. That wasn’t even counting the blade-sharp cheekbones and jawline. He had lines around his mouth that only men could pull off and behind them, his cheeks were barely hollowed.

  It was unfair. He was too beautiful.

  At the moment, he was talking with a perfect blonde who had the whole package down pat as well. Sean had introduced the woman as Gloria, Nate Coker’s girlfriend. They obviously knew each other quite well and Sean kept things to a perfectly honed level of pleasant conversation. He never dipped into flirtation territory with his teammate’s girlfriend.

  And yet . . . Annie could tell something was off between Sean and the other woman. She kept touching him, for one thing, despite the way that Sean was practically waving a no-swim flag above his head.

  Gloria swatted Sean’s shoulder. “We’re going to miss you in France. What was the name of that bar you took everyone to last time?”

  “Chanteclair.” He gave it the perfect French pronunciation. “But I’ll be competing by the time the circuit gets to France.”

  He was so coolly collected that Annie felt like digging her toes into the dirt and ducking her head whenever she was around him. Standing at his side while he charmed the event’s coordinators made her feel about as gauche as a terrier at the opera. She was so out of her depth.

  Her dress had seemed like a good idea when she was in Nordstrom. The handkerchief hem flirted around her thighs, and she’d loved the fabric’s gold shimmer. But now that she was the three-foot-tall munchkin surrounded by seven-foot beauties in sleek black dresses, she regretted her pick.

  “Well, if you don’t make it, we’ll have a round in your name,” Gloria promised, ignoring Sean’s potent determination to be surfing in time for that competition. Then she flicked the shortest glance possible at Annie. “Nice to meet you.”

  Sean waved as the other woman slipped away between the closely packed bodies dressed in tiny scraps of silk and cotton. Oddly, more than one person was wearing a scarf wrapped around and around the neck, as if the sixty-five-degree spring weather in Southern California actually necessitated extra warmth.

  “You look like you could use a drink.” Sean leaned toward her, ducking his head to create a private space between them.

  “Make it three drinks and you’ve got a deal.”

  Sean threw his head back to laugh, and she was mesmerized by the strong line of his throat. He was all strength and sinew. Leanly attractive. When he hooked an arm around her shoulders, his thumb came to rest at the cap of her shoulder. “You’re in luck. It’s an open bar.”

  “In that case, I want six.”

  They worked their way through the crowd toward the equally packed bar. People were . . . people. Everywhere. Laughing and chattering and talking with flying hands. They were all the fancy people too. Annie had barely made it through med school with all these Type As and the big way they lived.

  “You like keeping a low profile,” Sean said once they’d squeezed in at the bar. It was made of opaque white Plexiglas lit from behind to make clouds of color that gradually shifted through the spectrum.

  Annie faced the bar, tucking her elbows in close to herself. The guy to her right was a dapper man wearing a tailored three-piece suit, but he kept rocking back on his heels as he told a story about a gardener, a pool boy, and his ex-boyfriend’s coke habit. His suit jacket brushed Annie. She scooted closer to Sean. “What gave me away?” she asked dryly.

  He braced his left hand on the counter, carving out breathing room for her. He sheltered her, and though she’d buck up against that sort of male-female protection most of the time, for the moment, she needed it. Her chest was closing in, and she had those awful tingles down the back of her thighs—the ones that said she was getting way too wound up way too fast.

  “I dunno,” Sean sai
d. His cheeks hollowed as he tucked away a smile. “Maybe the fact that you’re a millimeter from plastering yourself to me.”

  She waved for the bartender. “I’m not that close.”

  Half a step between them. Not even that. A shift. He took one deep breath and was touching her, his chest against her shoulder and his hip against hers. Her lips parted. She sucked in a breath. Then another.

  No. This wasn’t going to work. She couldn’t do this. Couldn’t be that kind of therapist. He was her patient. She’d worked him through a round of mobility exercises that very morning, having him hold one end of an elastic band to work on resistance.

  The tingles down the backs of her thighs turned into full-blown shivers. Her chest was tight. “Who’s Gloria?”

  “I thought I said during introductions?” Sean replied blandly. “Nate’s girlfriend?”

  Annie shook her head. Tendrils of hair skimmed her temples. “No, who is she really?”

  Sean’s mouth tweaked into a subtle smile. “My ex-girlfriend as well, Ms. Observant. Points to you.”

  If Annie had thought her chest was tight a moment ago, it was nothing compared to the wrenching pressure on her lungs. Gloria looked right for Sean. Tall and beautiful and polished, they’d be like the surfing world’s Barbie and Ken equivalent.

  “What can I get you?” the fresh-faced bartender said, popping up in front of her. She smiled blankly back at him, glad for the sudden distraction.

  “Two vodka gimlets.” She might have been teasing about needing three or six, but this was definitely a multiple-drink moment. She really wished she’d renewed her Ativan prescription. But years of therapy after Terry and that disastrous night had finally helped her work through the need for antianxiety meds. Or so she’d thought.

  “And a Corona with lime for me,” Sean added.

  “No, he’ll have a cranberry and soda.”

  The bartender pursed his lips. His gaze flicked from Annie’s, up over her shoulder, to Sean. He had both hands spread, wiry shoulders leaning into the bar. When he tilted his head, his short Mohawk didn’t move. “Sir . . . ?”