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PANDA HAD FIGURED SHE’D FORCE a confrontation, but he’d hoped to buy a little time before it happened. He should have known better. Shit. If he didn’t get away from this place soon—away from her—he was going to lose it. He’d tried to talk Temple into letting him out of his contract, but she’d refused. When this was over, he was getting back to doing what he did best, protecting clients from real danger.
The wind flipped up the collar of his jacket. “I wouldn’t advise firing me,” he told her. “I’ve got a sex tape.”
She didn’t smile. In a yellow slicker, with a black-lined hood pulled over her ridiculous hair and three inches of black cuffs turned up, she looked like a wet bumblebee. “You’re lying,” she said. “Tell me why you had your little freak-out when you saw Bree.”
“Would I lie about something as serious as a sex tape?”
“In a heartbeat. I know Bree’s family owned the house. She told me all about it.”
He should have made the connection between the woman named Bree that Lucy visited at the cottage and Sabrina Remington West, but this asinine assignment had dulled his thinking. “Video cameras are small,” he said. “I’m exceptionally good at hiding them.”
Again, no smile. She meant business, and he didn’t like that. “Bree told me she’d never met you,” she said. “So why did you run off like that?”
He came up with the most plausible explanation. “She reminded me of an old girlfriend.”
“What old girlfriend?”
He ignored the slick of raindrops on her cheek to work on his sneer. “I don’t ask about your lurid past. Leave mine alone.”
“You don’t ask about my lurid past because you know you’d fall asleep if I told you about it.” She paused. “Something I intend to fix.”
He frowned. “You told that woman who you are. Do you really think she’s going to keep it to herself?”
“She has for a month. And other than Temple’s dubious companionship, Bree is the only friend I have on the island.
What did that make him? “Who needs friends here?” he said. “We’ll all be leaving in a couple of weeks.” He ramped up his argument. “You’re getting way too cozy with people. You ride into town whenever you like, talk to whoever you want. It’s not smart.”
“I like talking, and this conversation isn’t about me. It’s about you, and if you don’t tell me the truth, I’ll start digging around. Believe me, my resources are a lot more powerful than Google.”
He wished she hadn’t moved so close to the edge of the bluff, but if he told her to step back, she’d bite his head off. He yearned for the quieter, more compliant woman he’d first met. “Why do you even care?” he said.
“I don’t like mysteries.”
“Leave it alone, Lucy.”
Her hood blew back. “Here’s what I think. I think you have some kind of connection to the Remington family. That’s why you bought this house, and that’s why you don’t want anything changed.”
“The house has roots, and I don’t. It’s what I like about it and why I’m not getting rid of the table you’re so obsessed with.”
Fortunately she moved a few steps away from the edge. “Could be true,” she said. “Now tell me the rest.”
Like hell he was telling her the rest. As he watched the wind slap that yellow slicker against her small body, he couldn’t imagine spilling his guts about any of it. Curtis, the army, how it felt to be a cop walking into some rat-hole apartment to tell a mother her kid was dead. How it felt not being able to trust yourself. He’d rather tell her how beautiful she was. Even her messy hair and fake tattoos couldn’t destroy the sweet feistiness of that face or the allure of those green-flecked eyes.
He reminded himself that all this sweetness, that spirit, was destined for somebody else. Someone who hadn’t spent so many years mucking around in the shadows. Someone who could never hurt her.
“There’s no rest to tell.” He reached out and pulled her hood up, sending rainwater down the back of her neck. “You laid out the terms for this affair. Don’t tell me you’ve gone soft and fallen for me.”
He watched her closely—not sure what he wanted to see—both relieved and disappointed that her expression remained unchanged. “I’ve fallen for your body,” she said, “even if you are starting to look like a warning poster for illegal steroids. The body is definitely spectacular—all but the part between your ears.”
She was so full of life, so smart, so screwed up. For years, she’d been pushing herself into a mold that didn’t quite fit, trying so hard to be the perfect daughter, and now she was floundering. As for the two of them … For all her big talk about her asinine reverse bucket list, she wasn’t cut out for a dead-end affair. She needed real intimacy, something he couldn’t give her, and damn it, if she wouldn’t look out for herself, he’d do it for her.
He turned his smile into the facsimile of a leer. “You’re a hot number, babe. Hell on wheels when you’re naked, but a pain in the ass once you’ve got your clothes on. If you want real communication, pull down your pants.”
She blinked at his crudeness. His stomach twisted, but he was doing what he needed to. Still, he had to will himself not to take her into his arms and kiss the raindrops from her cheeks.
“Interesting.” She pushed her hood back and lifted her chin. “Keep your secrets, Panda. I really don’t care all that much.”
She disappeared, sending him into the foulest of moods.
