The Way You Look Tonight (7 page)

"You made breakfast." She looked as pleased as if he’d bought her a diamond bracelet.

"I couldn’t tell if you ate when you got up to make these—" He gestured to the bread rising on the kitchen sills. "—but it didn’t look like you had."

"God, no, who could possibly eat that early?"

She sat on one of the stools and immediately dug into her breakfast with a gusto he rarely saw in the women he dated. Not that he and Brooke were going to date, now or ever, of course.

After crunching through a piece of bacon, she said, "If you ever get tired of investigating bad guys, you should open a breakfast place. Promise me that once you’re back in your own house, you’ll still come over and make breakfast for me sometimes."

Rafe didn’t put much stock in promises anymore, not when he watched people break them all day long. But he had a feeling Brooke did, and that once she made one, she would never break it. No matter what.

"I can definitely do that," he told her, and when she smiled at him, it occurred to him that she looked a little tired. Had she had trouble sleeping, too? And, if so, were her reasons anything like his?

Thank God it was sure to be a long, exhausting day getting started on cleaning up his place. Best-case scenario was that he’d work so hard, and so far into the evening, that all he’d have the energy to do was fall into bed...and sleep without dreaming of Brooke.

"I was thinking," she said after she’d eaten half the food on her plate, "that while you’re hauling out furniture, why don’t I get going on cleaning? I have a feeling that just getting rid of the layers of dust and grime on the floors and counters and walls will make a big difference."

"You’re already giving me a place to stay. I can’t let you drop everything to clean my disgusting house, too."

"And I can’t let you deal with that place alone. Besides, I’ve already made the rest of my big deliveries for the week, so I can easily afford to take a day or two off."

She was still cute, not to mention sexy as hell, but also clearly stubborn enough that he knew he wasn’t going to win this one. Unfortunately, a full day of being near her wasn’t going to help him put the brakes on his attraction to her.

At the same time, knowing she would be there with him made the task seem less daunting.

"Thanks," he finally said. "But first I need to head out to the hardware store to pick up new locks for your doors."

She looked at her front door and then back to him with a confused frown. "What’s wrong with my locks?"

"Everything."

"I almost never lock the doors anyway. No one does around here. You know that."

"Maybe this was a safe place when we were kids, but I don’t want you taking any risks now."

Rafe was the one who could see through people, who with nothing more than a look could read secrets and lies. But as Brooke stared at him, he felt like she was the one looking too deeply into him.

"This is still a safe town, Rafe. Just like when we were kids."

"Just let me put the locks on your doors, Brooke."

She thought about it for a moment before finally agreeing, "Okay." Unfortunately, any relief he felt was countered by her honest admission, "But I’ll probably forget to use them, so I don’t know how much good they’ll do if some crazy person shows up in town to break in and attack me."

Rafe could barely bank his fury at the thought of anything ever happening to the too-trusting woman sitting across from him. "Don’t ever joke about something like that. It isn’t funny."

* * *

Coming out into her kitchen and finding Rafe making breakfast had felt like a dream come true, especially when he made the best scrambled eggs she’d ever had. With his big hands and rugged handsomeness, she could only imagine the way women must throw themselves at him...and how many he must have caught over the years to take to his bed.

It felt so natural to have him in her house—two friends who had been lucky enough to reconnect after so many years apart—that Brooke had found herself questioning everything she’d felt last night. Was Rafe truly darker and more intense now? Had she invented the frustration she’d seen on his face when he’d told her, ever so briefly, about his job as a private investigator? And had she imagined the hard tone of his voice when he’d told her flat out that he wouldn’t let her blindfold him for a taste test, obviously because he didn’t trust her?

Or was it simply that she’d been so surprised to see him—and had been so bowled over by his good looks—that her brain had spun off in ridiculous directions? Particularly the ones that had kept her up part of the night, dreaming of what it would be like to have his hands, his mouth, on her.

But just when she’d almost convinced herself that he was still the same carefree soul he’d once been, he’d brought up the locks and his concern that she was putting herself in danger by not dead-bolting herself inside. Even as she’d tried to tell herself it was just some guy thing, she knew it wasn’t.

Her parents had taught her to obey the rules and not to ask questions that might offend someone or shake things up. But Rafe was her friend, and she cared too much about him to worry about putting herself out on a limb.

"What happened, Rafe? Why are you so concerned about how secure my house is when you know as well as I do that virtually no one locks their doors or even their cars here at the lake?"

"People do bad things everywhere, Brooke. Even here." With those parting words, he was out the door and heading off to the hardware store on his motorcycle.

* * *

He came back thirty minutes later with what had to be the biggest lock the local hardware store had in stock—an ugly silver deadbolt that looked scary all on its own—and a brand-new loaded tool box. During his absence, Brooke had been trying to focus her attention on a second round of the new summer-with-a-hint-of-winter truffle recipe she’d been so happily working on the day before. But now, her recipe came a distant second to the beautiful enigma kneeling in front of her door, screwing in the ugly bolt.

"I’m surprised they even sell locks like that here," she murmured as she picked up the thick plastic packaging and put it in her recycling bin.

He hadn’t said a word to her since he’d come back, had simply walked in through her unlocked door and gotten to work. Now he informed her, "I ordered some new latches for your windows. They’ll be in later this week."

Brooke’s natural inclination had always been to let people do what they thought was best for her. But she ended up surprising them both by pulling the screwdriver out of Rafe’s hand in midair.

She took a step away from him so that he couldn’t grab it back. "Why, Rafe? Tell me why you’re being like this and then maybe, just maybe, I’ll let you finish putting this horrible, ugly lock on my door."

He moved so slowly, so carefully toward her, that she had no doubt that he was good at his job as a P.I., and that the people he investigated never even knew he was there watching them.

"I already told you why," he said in a low voice that rumbled up her spine and made her feel hot all over.

"No," she countered, "you haven’t. The last time I saw you, you were a fourteen-year-old boy who laughed all the time. You were wild and happy."

"We’ve both grown up, Brooke."

Even though he all but growled the words at her, instead of taking another step back as he likely intended her to do, she moved closer. Close enough to put her free hand on his face so that she could lightly stroke the stubble on his square jaw as she whispered, "Yes, we definitely have." Close enough that she could have gone up on her tippy-toes and pressed her mouth to his in the kiss she’d been dreaming of since the moment she’d seen him.

But even though she thought she read a similar desire in his eyes, before she could act on it, he moved away from her...and finally started telling her what she wanted to know.

"I started on the police force after college, on the traffic beat along with the other rookies. They let me shadow a couple of detectives, and it turned out I had a knack for tracking crooks. After I solved a high-profile tech fraud case, I struck out on my own and started the agency."

"Tech fraud wouldn’t have you worried about the lock on my door, though, would it?"

"Pretty early on I took on a client who was convinced her husband was cheating on her, even though she couldn’t prove it. He was a very wealthy CEO of a
Fortune
500 company and she said no one else would take on her case because they were afraid of him. She also told me that the only way she and her kids would be able to survive financially after a divorce would be if she could prove he’d cheated on her. Something about her reminded me of Mia. And I hated to think of my little sister stuck in a crappy relationship with a rich creep who held all the cards."

"He
had
been cheating on her, hadn’t he?"

Rafe looked disgusted as he confirmed, "With any woman he could get his hands on."

"That’s great that you helped her get out of the bad relationship."

"All of her friends felt the same way. In the past seven years, I’ve caught nearly every wealthy man on the West Coast with his pants down in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Being a P.I. had sounded so exciting when he’d first told her about it, but now she could see just what a difficult job it would be, if only because you’d have to constantly make it a point to remind yourself that not everyone was bad.

"That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? To get away from the dark side of human nature for a while." When he didn’t respond, she moved closer to him again and reached for his hand. Despite the fact that he stiffened at her touch, she told him, "I’m really glad Mia found you the house."

She thought about everything he’d said, everything he must have seen in the past seven years, and wanted nothing more than to erase it all for him.

"I know it’s going to need a lot of work, but I think it’s even more important that you have fun here." She smiled up at him, determined to see him smile back one day soon. "Who better to have fun with than an old friend?"

* * *

What the hell was Rafe supposed to say when Brooke looked up at him with those big, innocent eyes and such sweet determination to try to make him feel better about everything? It was his own twisted brain that kept spinning out into X-rated territory, not hers. By "fun" she meant swimming and hiking and roasting marshmallows over a bonfire...not licking each other all over and rolling around together on her bed until they’d both forgotten what a rotten world it could be.

Yesterday he’d been stunned by what a beauty she’d become. Today, he was surprised all over again by the way she’d grabbed the screwdriver out of his hand and demanded answers to her questions.

She was still the cute, sweet girl he’d known a decade and a half ago, but she was also a heck of a lot tougher than he’d given her credit for.

She was still holding his hand, and he wanted to tug her closer to find out if she tasted as sweet as she looked. Instead, he said, "Fun sounds good, Brooke. But I’ve got to know you’re safe." He looked pointedly at the screwdriver.

"Thank you for answering my question," she said as she handed the tool over without any reluctance, as good as her word despite the fact that he knew she didn’t like the look of the deadbolt. "How about I head over to your house and get started with cleaning while you finish up here so that we can get to the fun stuff quicker?"

Fun.
He couldn’t think of the last time he’d focused on having fun. Hot sex with a stranger. The thrill of driving one of his cousin Zach’s race cars. The pleasure of tasting one of his other cousin Marcus’s new vintages from his Napa Valley vineyard.

But fun?

Rafe wasn’t even sure what that was anymore...

"Sure," he said as he knelt back down in front of the door lock, "that sounds good."

And the truth was, just knowing he’d get to spend the day with Brooke, even if they’d likely end up spending all of it cleaning and clearing out his house next door, sounded better than it should have.

Almost like fun.

Chapter Six

They were a good team, Brooke thought several hours later, as she looked around Rafe’s now spotless kitchen with satisfaction. He still needed to buy new appliances, fix the flooring, and put up new cabinets and countertops, but at least you didn’t need a face mask to enter the room now.

Immediately after he’d finished putting on her new lock, he’d joined her to dig into the mess the renters had made. She’d mopped and swept and scrubbed everything in her path, while Rafe cleared the way for her, taking out old chairs and broken tables and linens that had holes burned into them.

She’d left his house only long enough to make them a plate of sandwiches and had literally had to hold them beneath his nose to get him to stop working long enough to eat. Before she was even halfway through her own sandwich, he’d finished both of his and was digging into one of the dusty, beat-up cardboard boxes he’d brought down from the attic.

"I didn’t think my family had left anything behind when we moved out," he told her, "but look what I just found."

It was a frame with a faded picture in it. "Oh, Rafe, this is great!"

His whole family was in the picture, and all of them were smiling, clearly happy to be at the lake for another summer. Of course, she immediately zoomed in on Rafe. There was that easy smile she remembered, the carefree way he held his tall, lanky frame…compared to the way his big, strong muscles fairly vibrated with tension now.

"And there you are, just like you always were."

The warmth in his voice had Brooke turning her gaze to his face instead of back to the picture. "I’m in the picture, too?" She quickly looked down again and realized what she’d missed the first time. All the Sullivans were there, but so was she, tucked in between Rafe and Mia, smaller than everyone else, but beaming up at the camera because she’d been with her favorite people.