Dare Me Once

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Dare Me Once Page 13

by Shelly Alexander


  His soapy scent and ridiculous good looks scrambled her thoughts. “Um.” There went her amazing command of the English language. She gave herself a mental slap and held up her phone. “It is. I just assigned him a room through the new system’s app.” She gave Trace a dazzling smile. “Standing right here on the dock. That’s how easy it is.”

  His jaw ticked.

  She looked around Trace and spoke to Elliott. “Please deliver Mr. Parker’s luggage to room 213.”

  She turned her attention to the new guest. “Would you mind if I got a picture for our social media?” He fit the new age demographic Lily was trying to bring into the resort.

  He fidgeted. “Yes, I would mind.” His words were terse, but then his demeanor shifted, and he gave her a friendly smile. “I’m not fond of cameras.” He gave Trace an unreadable look. “But you two would look great together on camera.” He held his hand out toward Lily’s phone. “Why don’t I take your picture for your page?”

  Lily took a step back. “No, but thanks.” She could not let her picture show up on social media.

  A wrinkle appeared across Trace’s forehead. Maybe he thought she didn’t want her picture taken with him, or maybe she looked as guilty as she felt. Didn’t matter. If her picture went public in connection with the Remington, it would only be a matter of time before the press showed up. And maybe even the unsavory characters who’d made it their life’s work to threaten the Devereaux family, even the members who hadn’t stolen a dime from FEMA or anyone else.

  “Mr. Parker, let’s get you a room key.” Lily led the guest and Trace up the path.

  Once they reached the front desk, she slid her glasses to the top of her head and programmed a card key.

  He cocked his head to one side. “Have we met? You look familiar.”

  “No!” she said too quickly. “No.” She smoothed a hand over a hip. Maybe the press had already found her. “I’m sure I would remember.”

  He gave her a suspicious stare.

  She wanted to return it in spades. Because there was no doubt in Lily’s mind that Ronald Parker wasn’t who he said he was. No question he had a good reason not to let his picture show up on the internet.

  Took one to know one.

  She handed over the card key. “Enjoy your stay.”

  “I’ll show you the way,” Trace said.

  She managed to keep smiling until Trace and Ronald Parker disappeared around a corner. Then she hurried to her office and shut the door to pace in private.

  When her eyes locked on her computer, she came to an abrupt stop. Frantic, she sat behind the computer and googled Ronald Parker. A few hundred names came up on various background check sites, but there was no way to tell which one was him.

  She brought up Facebook and typed in the name. Several popped up, and she quickly scrolled through them, none with his picture.

  When someone knocked, she jumped and stood up. “Come in.”

  Trace’s head appeared. “Mr. Parker’s all settled. He scheduled an aerial tour for this weekend.” He gave her the same curious look he had when she’d refused to take a picture with him at the dock. “Everything okay?”

  “Yes!” Ack! The adrenaline rush had her volume dialed up. “Yes.” She took a calming breath and walked around to the front of her desk. “I’m antsy to show you the new system and train the staff.” She reached behind her back with one hand and steadied herself against the desk.

  His mocha eyes swept over her. Finally, he sighed as if surrendering and pushed the door all the way open. “All right. If it’s got you this excited, then let’s do it.” A lopsided smile formed on his lips.

  This is about work. There was no innuendo in his words. There wasn’t.

  She slid one butt cheek onto the desk and kicked a leg to work off nervous energy. “When?” She pulled up her calendar and waited.

  “Seven o’clock? I’ve got more supply runs. My plane isn’t outfitted for cargo, so I have to make several trips.” He hooked a thumb in his belt loop.

  She typed it onto her calendar. “Great. I’ll get the rest of the staff trained this week. I’ll let you know when in case you want to be there.”

  “I’m starting to feel like you’re my boss,” he said.

  “Speaking of supply runs and cargo, there’s something else we need to talk about.” When his look turned skeptical, she hurried to explain. “I think you’ll like it.” Plus, talking about work might calm her racing heart. Mr. Parker had really spooked her.

  Trace pushed off the doorframe and eased past her to sit in the chair in front of the desk. “Okay, hit me with it.”

  She leaned in, unable to contain her enthusiasm. “Of course, the financial decisions are above my pay grade, but maybe we could consider using the money from the restaurant lease for a cargo plane.”

  He made a face that said he did indeed like what she had to say. He slouched down in his chair, getting comfortable, and his muscular thigh brushed against her swinging leg. She stilled but didn’t break the contact. Neither did he. Instead, he shifted, the friction of that powerful thigh massaging against hers.

  A current of electricity didn’t just shimmy up her spine. It scorched through her entire body.

  “I’ve spoken to Elliott about the budget.” The roughness of Trace’s voice caused Lily’s stomach to do a flip. “With all the changes we’re making, he doesn’t think we’ll be able to afford a plane right now. Not even with the lease money from the restaurant space.” Another small shift of his thigh, and that wonderful current shot through her again. “Maybe”—his voice turned to gravel, and he cleared his throat—“maybe if we have a successful summer we can reconsider.”

  She leaned back and shuffled through the papers on her desk, which pressed her leg harder into his. Heat steamrolled through her. She ignored it, found what she was looking for, and handed it to him. “If you knew how to use the booking system, you’d already know that our summer season is filling up.” She pointed to a number. “That’s how much our bookings have increased.”

  He studied the page.

  “Besides a few B&Bs, we’re the only major resort on the island, right?” She fiddled with a lock of hair.

  He nodded without looking up.

  “If more people stay on the island instead of the mainland, business will increase for everyone in Angel Fire Falls. The restaurants, the souvenir shops—they won’t be able to keep up with the new demand unless they’ve prepared in advance.”

  His eyes sparkled up at her. With a finger, he flicked the page. “I can use this to convince the island’s business owners to sign up for my delivery service, and open for business with a full client list.”

  Bubbling with enthusiasm, Lily kicked her foot again. The friction of their legs made her brain stutter. “It’s just a thought.” She stilled her foot. It was the only way she could think straight.

  He angled his head to one side. “At this rate, you’ll have a solution for global warming soon.”

  “Is that approval I hear? From the man who didn’t want to hire me?” She stood and tried not to stare at his mouth. That damned unholy mouth that had so much promise.

  He eased out of the chair, his eyes never leaving her. They stood toe to toe, him looking down at her from under shuttered lashes. His heat reached for her. Blanketed her.

  “See you at seven.” His tone went husky.

  So did her breathing. “Yes. Seven. I’ll be ready for you.”

  Dear Lord.

  “I’ll be ready to work,” she said in a small voice.

  He let his gaze drop to her lips before finally stepping away. At the door, he turned back. “I’ll bring dinner to your place.”

  Before she could protest that dinner at her place would be too much like a date, he was gone.

  She stared at the empty doorway. Waiting for seven o’clock would seem like an eternity. And Lily cursed herself for feeling like it couldn’t come soon enough.

  Lily got off work later than expected and hurrie
d home to freshen up before Trace landed on her doorstep with dinner.

  Then again, maybe she should make herself look worse. Mat her hair or smudge her makeup. Unless she’d misread the situation in her office earlier, his husky tone and sparkling eyes held a promise. A promise that was far too tempting.

  Noise drew her around to the rear of her cottage. Ben had the ducks in their outside pen. “Lily!” he blurted the second he saw her. “Megan was strong enough to eat with the rest of the ducks today!”

  Right. They still hadn’t renamed the duckling formerly known as Megan.

  “Awesome sauce.” She walked over to the pen and handed Ben her phone. It had become their evening ritual; he took daily pictures for his science project and documented their growth. “It’ll be dark soon. Want to bring them inside for the night?”

  One at a time, Ben scooped the ducks into a box so they could carry them back into the cottage.

  A Jeep rumbled down the lane. By the sound of it pulling to a stop in front of her cottage, Lily knew it must be seven o’clock.

  A tingle started low in her belly and seeped into her arms, her legs, her nipples, her . . .

  She shot to her feet. “I’ll carry the box.”

  They rounded the corner just as Trace propped a plastic toddler swimming pool on her front porch.

  “What’s that, Dad?” Ben lumbered up the steps.

  Trace spoke to Ben but looked at Lily. “Dr. Shaw suggested it. I figured Lily’s tired of sharing her tub . . . with ducks.” Something glinted in Trace’s mocha eyes. Something sultry and seductive. Something that said maybe she should consider sharing it with him instead.

  The thought of water sluicing off him in the shower made Lily want to lick her lips.

  Having to live with that mental picture was so unfair. And uncalled for.

  Trace went back to the Jeep and pulled two bags out of the back seat that had VINCENZO’S RISTORANTE written across the front. “Anybody hungry?”

  “Yeah!” Ben hollered and threw open her front door.

  Lily climbed the steps with the birds. “Starved.” She went inside and set the box next to the duck habitat. “Ben, can you put the birds back in their house? I’ll help your dad with dinner.”

  Lily washed up at the kitchen sink. “Thanks,” she said to Trace as he pulled to-go boxes out of the bags. “It’ll be nice to soak in a hot bath.”

  Trace froze with a Styrofoam container in his hand. His expression clouded . . . like maybe he was picturing her in nothing but bubble bath suds.

  “I mean without having to scrub it out every time.” Her pulse kicked up a notch. She dried her hands on a dish towel and folded it. And refolded it. Twice. “I’ll get utensils.”

  Trace finished setting out the boxes. “You should’ve seen me trying to get that thing into the plane. I thought I might have to strap it to the top. I drove the Jeep down to the dock so I wouldn’t have to drag the damn thing all the way here.”

  She laughed. “Now that would’ve made great pictures for our social media advertising.” She arranged forks and knives on the table.

  “No way.” He put both hands on the back of a chair. “I draw the line at embarrassing social media pictures.”

  Lily had to draw the line at any social media pictures. “Same goes for me. I promise not to post any pictures of you if you’ll agree to the same.” She held out her little finger. “Pinkie swear.”

  He looked at her hand, his gaze traveling up her arm, across her neck, then raking over her face. Slowly, he hooked his little finger in hers, and all the air seemed to leave the room. He stepped closer. “I hope you know I’ve never pinkie sworn.” That husky voice was back, and it caressed her cheeks. “Ever. It’s not what guys do.” He didn’t untwine their fingers, holding on longer than the customary it’s-sworn-in-pinkies-if-not-in-blood length of time.

  When Lily’s phone rang, they broke apart. She checked her cell, and a tremor of guilt raced through her when her mother’s number popped onto the screen. Lily sent it to voice mail and flicked off the ringer.

  “Need to take that?” Trace extracted a can of soda and a bottle of wine from a bag.

  “Nope.” She squirmed.

  He held up the wine. “Got a corkscrew?” His eyes dilated on the last word.

  A shiver raced over her. Without a word, she hurried to the kitchen to search the drawers. “Here we go.” She held it up like a prize.

  “Ben, go wash up.” Trace’s gaze didn’t leave her.

  Lily got two wine glasses out of the cupboard and brought them to the table without making eye contact. She should declare a no-fly zone because her girl parts were waving him onto the tarmac with orange batons.

  Once Ben was ready, they sat down and opened their meals.

  Trace opened the wine and popped the soda for Ben, who dug in like he hadn’t eaten in a month.

  “Ben, slow down.” Trace gave Lily an apologetic look. “I don’t want him to eat like a caveman. It’s one of the symptoms of growing up with only guys in the house.”

  Lily’s heart squeezed because Trace hadn’t had a mom around and neither did Ben.

  “I distinctly remember getting stabbed with a fork by one of my brothers when I reached for the last pork chop.”

  Lily laughed. “Stabbing aside, I think what your family has is pretty special. I’m an only child, so I didn’t have that.” She twirled her wine glass in a circle.

  Trace’s brow knitted. “Are your parents gone?”

  Her head snapped up. “What?” Loneliness sliced bone-deep because her parents weren’t gone. At least not in the way he meant, but both her parents had been absent emotionally since she was a teenager. So she’d left them behind and hadn’t spoken to her father since the day he was convicted. “Why?”

  “You used past tense. I just thought—”

  “What if the other ducks aren’t named right?” Ben blurted.

  Lily polished off her wine, trying to steady her shaking hand.

  Ben rocked gently and moved food around his plate with a fork. “What if Sir Walter Raleigh is a girl? And Belle is a boy?”

  Trace refilled Lily’s glass. “Why don’t we focus on renaming . . . Megan . . .” It seemed painful for him to speak the name. “And soon we can take the rest of the ducks to Dr. Shaw, if you want. He can tell us their genders.”

  “It might be fun to figure it out on your own,” Lily said to Ben. “And you’d be learning something in the process that you could include in your science project.”

  Trace’s brow wrinkled again. “The ducks are your science project?”

  Ben rocked harder.

  Lily knew a guilty face when she saw one. How could she not, when one stared back at her every time she looked in a mirror? And didn’t that just suck, because the Remingtons had already become the kind of people she didn’t want to keep secrets from. Especially the two sitting at her table.

  She lowered her voice. “He was supposed to tell you.”

  Trace dragged a hand over his face. “I’m sorry, buddy. I’ve been so busy with work, I forgot all about your project. We never talked about it, did we?”

  Ben shrugged. “It’s okay. Lily helped me.”

  Trace turned a heart-stopping look on her. “Thank you. I’ll have to find a way to show my gratitude.”

  Her throat closed. “Let’s think up a name,” she said to Ben with an unnatural amount of cheer. “How about Captain Quackers?”

  Ben belly-laughed.

  Trace joined the fun. “Or Count Quackula?”

  The rocking stopped as Ben laughed harder.

  “I’ve got one.” Lily held up a finger. “Firequacker.”

  All three of them burst out laughing.

  Trace slid a hand over until his little finger brushed hers. The thrill of his touch rushed up her arm, and her breath hitched.

  Their eyes locked, and time seemed to stop.

  “What else?” Ben obviously didn’t want the game to end.

  Lily moved h
er hand away, using her fork to pick at the rest of her lasagna. “Since you and I named all the ducks, I think it’s only fair to let your dad name this one.”

  Ben nodded.

  Trace rubbed his chin like it was a life-changing decision. “I think Waddles fits because of his injured leg. He still limps a little, so what do you think?”

  Ben giggled and cheered.

  “Perfect.” Lily gave him a warm smile.

  “Hey, Ben, why don’t you spend time with them while I help Lily clean the kitchen?” Trace’s chair scraped along the wood floor as he got up and took his dish to the sink.

  Lily stood and gathered up the silverware. “You brought dinner. I’ll clean up.” She forgot to breathe when he came up behind her, his chest brushing against her back. Heat arrowed through her, striking at her core.

  He reached around her and took her dish. “I don’t mind. It’s the least I can do after you’ve been so kind to my son.”

  When they were done cleaning the kitchen, Ben was curled in a ball, watching the ducks through the plastic wall of the habitat. She grabbed a throw pillow from a chair and put it under his head. Then she got a blanket and tucked it around him.

  Trace took a seat on the sofa and watched.

  She got out her iPad and phone and sat next to him. “Ready to learn the system?” His scent wrapped around her, and his firm thigh pressing into hers played tricks on her concentration.

  “I was worried about Ben handling the changes you’d make at the resort.” He adjusted his position, the leather under his large frame squeaking as he moved closer to look at the screen of her iPad. “It seems I’m the one having trouble adapting. We’ve never taken reservations online before.”

  She brought up the program. “Once you learn, you’ll see how much easier your life will be.” She held out her hand. “Give me your phone, and I’ll download the app.”

  His sigh was heavy as he pulled it from his pocket and handed it over.

  A few minutes later they huddled shoulder to shoulder as she led him through the new system. “I’ve added the family members as admins, and I’ve put in phone numbers for the entire staff.” She gave him a tutorial, reminding herself this was work. His presence, his scent, his body touching hers as they sat was not personal. Not exciting. Not in the least. “Everyone will know when a new guest is checking in and scheduled to leave.” She tapped on the calendar to show him the bookings. Several weeks were already blacked out, which meant there were no vacancies. “You’ve seen the stats, but here’s the daily calendar. It’s very useful.”

 

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