Love Me if You Dare Page 6

  Nostalgia. It was a nice word for the way this area of Coral Cove made her feel. If the parking lots weren’t pockmarked with holes and the paint jobs a little crisper—and, say, the booths in the Hungry Fisherman a little newer—she could feel as if she’d stepped back in time to the early days of Florida’s beach culture. But the problem with that was . . . the parking lots were pockmarked, the businesses were empty, and obviously not everyone appreciated nostalgia or the area wouldn’t feel so rundown. “I’m not immune to nostalgic charm,” she told him. “Just so you’ll know I’m not an ogre.”

  His sexy eyes took on a hint of amusement.

  “What?” she asked. “What did I miss?”

  “Are you sure?” he asked. “Because I told Fifi something like that just this morning. But wait . . . maybe I said vulture. Or piranha.” He gave his head a short shake. “Can’t remember. But the point is that I’m probably not quite convinced.”

  “The bigger point, however,” she said sensibly, “is that this particular brand of nostalgia isn’t packing the booths. The same way the Happy Crab isn’t exactly lighting up the No Vacancy sign. People appreciate it from a distance. But to them, the tried and true is . . . the McDonald’s on Route Nineteen. It’s Applebee’s and TGI Fridays. It’s Marriott and Hilton.”

  “And Windchime Resorts?” he asked, eyebrows lifting.

  She gave a short nod. “What’s considered tried and true has shifted over time. It’s not my fault. It’s not anyone’s fault. But when you boil it down, my job is to ultimately give people more of what they consider dependable, tried and true. And while people might be filling their homes with refurbished furniture and decorating in shabby chic these days, for most people, when they travel, newer feels better.”

  “Just so you know,” he said, “I get that. I understand what most people want on a vacation and how the travel industry has changed over the years. But that doesn’t mean anything to me personally. And it doesn’t mean I’m gonna sell my motel.”

  Just then, the woman she’d identified as Polly came over, order pad in hand. “Evenin’, Reece,” she said with a smile, then shifted her gaze to Camille. “Who’s your lady friend?”

  “This is Cami. Cami, Polly. Polly, Cami. But she isn’t my friend. She’s with Vanderhook, the developer I told you about a couple months ago, the one who wants to buy the Crab.”

  Camille let out a breath of irritation and leapt into the business of trying to repair her instantly ruined reputation with Polly. This was getting old fast. She smiled up to say, “But I’m not a monster, I promise.”

  “So she keeps claiming,” Reece said with a dry smile he flicked back and forth between the two women.

  Poor Polly, thrown unwittingly into the middle of their animosity, looked more perplexed than uncomfortable. “Well, if she’s so awful, Reece, mind if I ask why you’re eatin’ dinner with her?”

  Camille couldn’t resist casting a smugly satisfied look to her attractive nemesis across the table since she thought Polly had made a pretty good point.

  “Just protecting my interests,” he replied, looking completely unruffled, which annoyed her. “If she insists on hanging around town, I figure I should keep an eye on her.” And a hint of humor graced his voice for that last part, but only a hint.

  “You both havin’ the buffet?” Clearly, Polly wanted to get down to business here. Which suited Camille fine.

  Yet Camille still glanced to Reece before answering, just to see if that was his recommendation. “Are we having the buffet?”

  “Yep, two buffets,” he said to Polly.

  After she walked away, Camille asked, “Are you going to do that every time you introduce me to someone? Because if you are, I’ll just get to know the town on my own, thankyouverymuch.”

  She’d hoped he’d respond to her pointed look with an expression that at least bordered on contrite, but it didn’t happen. Still, when he said, “Okay, you’re right—I’ll knock it off,” she was appeased. For the moment anyway.

  When the two of them proceeded to cross the room—a dark, wooded place that seemed designed to feel like an old fishing boat or ship—to the buffet, she realized the man filling his plate opposite them wore a fancy pirate hat, complete with fur trim. With khaki pants and a golf shirt. And perhaps the weirdest part was that no one seemed to notice but her.

  “So . . .” she began after they returned to their torn orange booth, “did you see the guy in the pirate hat, too, or did I just imagine that?”

  The question barely made Reece look up from his food. “That’s just Abner.”

  “Abner . . . as in the owner? Polly’s husband?” She felt her eyes go wide.

  Reece simply gave a short nod while forking a hush puppy into his mouth.

  “But . . .”

  “He likes hats.”

  She tried to weigh this, yet still failed to understand. “But . . .”

  “Nobody really knows why he wears them, and nobody really questions it anymore. In fact, if anybody has a problem with Abner, it’s more that he tends to be a little surly, not that he wears weird hats.”

  “Hmm,” she said, taking that in.

  “See,” Reece said, “we accept people the way they are here, eccentricities and all. That’s why it’s a nice place to be.”

  “That’s . . . well, lovely really,” she said, meaning it. But maybe it’s also why . . . this town is dying. Though she kept that part to herself. Eccentricities just didn’t play great to the masses, to the vacationers who saved up all year to come to the beach and wanted to know what to expect, wanted places that felt dependable and safe. Tried and true. The new kind of tried and true.

  “So,” she said, when Reece didn’t reply to that—probably refusing to acknowledge she could be nice—“your handyman seemed very pleasant. Much more than the motel’s proprietor, I might add.” She popped a scallop into her mouth in conclusion, as if that would emphasize her point.

  “Riley isn’t technically my handyman,” he explained. “But you’re right—nice as the day is long.”

  Camille lifted her gaze to him. “What’s the deal then, if you don’t mind my asking? You can’t afford to pay him? So he works for free?” She imagined the old man being retired and bored enough to help Reece out. Though something didn’t add up in the thought—maybe it was the way he’d been dressed, in mismatched clothes that seemed dirty. Dirtier than a retiree volunteering a few hours a day as a handyman would wear. Or the fact that Reece seemed to have plenty of time on his hands and could probably do his own handyman work if he couldn’t pay someone else to do the job.

  “I can afford to pay him,” Reece said easily, wiping a napkin across his mouth.

  So Camille just squinted her confusion. “Then . . .”

  Reece tilted his head, gave her one of his usual critical looks. “You’re really nosy.”

  “Curious,” she corrected him pointedly.

  He cocked his head back in the other direction and flashed a frank expression. “Okay—this isn’t really anyone’s business but Riley’s, so if I tell you, you have to swear you won’t treat him any differently or act weird to him.”

  What on earth . . . ? “Of course,” she said. “I promise. What’s the big secret?”

  He shrugged. “It’s not a secret from most people—and he probably wouldn’t mind me telling you. I just want you to keep being nice to him.”

  She widened her eyes impatiently. “Of course I will.” Then motioned with her hand for him to get on with it.

  “Riley’s homeless.”

  Something in Camille’s heart shifted, dropped a little.

  “So I let him stay at the Crab for free. And he insists on helping me out on handyman stuff—stuff I’ve always done myself until recently—as a means of paying his way. It’s about his pride, so I let him do it. He doesn’t have much else, so I figure if it lets him keep his self-respect, why not? And he does good work, as good as I’d do myself.”

  Camille took all that in but tri
ed not to have a visible reaction.

  Because she didn’t want to be softened. And maybe she already was in some way, but if that was the case, she sure as hell didn’t want to let it show.

  Still, how many people would do that? How many people would give a home to an old man who didn’t have one? Granted, it wasn’t the same as taking someone under your own roof, but still . . . you didn’t see Riley living at one of the resorts up the road. And she knew he would never be able to live at a Windchime Resort, either. Because . . . resorts just didn’t do that.

  “Is . . . that why? Why you won’t sell?” It had just hit her. Now, to tear down the Happy Crab would be to tear down Riley’s only home. It would be tearing down Reece’s home, too, but that was different, because it would come with enough cash to live in a beachside mansion if he chose. But Riley obviously didn’t have as many options.

  “No,” he said simply, scooping some macaroni and cheese onto his fork. “That’s not it. If I had to go somewhere else, I’d make sure Riley was taken care of in some way or another. Even if his pride took a hit in the process. I’m not selling because I don’t want to, that’s all.”

  Hmm. Who’d have expected Reece Donovan to be this good of a guy? And did it change anything about her quest here?

  No.

  Same answer as his.

  Because it couldn’t.

  This wasn’t a game where nice guys were treated differently than non-nice guys—probably most of the property she’d acquired over the years had belonged to relatively nice people. This was just about business—first, last, and always.

  Still, she wondered aloud, “How did you meet Riley?”

  “Found him sleeping on the beach early one morning when I was out for a walk about six months ago.”

  “And . . . ?” There had to be more to the story, after all.

  “Well, it’s against the law to sleep on the beach around here,” Reece explained, “so I figured I had two choices. Either call the police . . . or buy him a meal and offer him a place to stay while he gets back on his feet.”

  Her chest expanded with the kindness she felt radiating from him in that moment. A kindness that, again, she just thought most people wouldn’t extend—out of fear or worry or lots of other perfectly reasonable emotions. And he’d stated it so simply—like it was nothing. “It was good of you,” she said. Not that she liked paying him a compliment under all the circumstances. But it moved her so much that she couldn’t . . . not.

  And she thought maybe he’d eat that up, given the nature of their relationship so far, but instead he just shrugged it off. “Sometimes people need a hand.”

  Deciding maybe it would be a wise time to switch to a lighter subject, she said, “Mind if I ask you something else?”

  “We’ll only know if you ask it.”

  “Where on earth did you get that giant—”

  “Dinosaur?” he interrupted.

  She tried to hold back her slightly embarrassed smile, but it snuck out a little anyway. “Yes. Where did you get your giant dinosaur?”

  A faint smile traced his lush lips. She realized it was yet one more thing she found attractive about him—his mouth. But stop being ridiculous. And keep digging. After all, the answer to convincing him to sell could come from anywhere.

  “I found her on the side of the road when she was a baby,” Reece replied. “She’d been dumped off by someone who didn’t want her, and then hit by a car.”

  Camille held in her gasp, but it was like a tiny knife to her heart. And—oh crap. Did this man’s decency never end? And why was she suddenly seeing Fifi in a whole new light, as this tender, needy creature who craved love the same way a kitten or a puppy might? “Was . . . was she badly hurt?” Camille asked, trying like hell not to really care.

  He gave a small nod and a certain darkness passed over his face that she hadn’t witnessed before. “Pretty bad,” he told her. “But I took her straight to an animal hospital, and they fixed her up, and I nursed her back to health. And we’ve been together ever since—eight years now. What happened to her when she was young made her so she’s still sensitive at times—but I can usually calm her down pretty easy.”

  Camille flashed back on the sounds of the iguana thrashing about in her bathtub—and of Reece soothing her. She’d thought it was silly at the time; she’d not imagined something that looked so . . . prehistoric could ever need to be soothed. “Times like when a woman is leaping around screaming her head off?” she inquired gently.

  He looked a little amused, but unexpectedly kind, as he quietly answered, “Yeah, times like that.”

  Without quite considering the consequences, she said, “I’m sorry I scared her.” She meant it.

  And the look on Reece’s face told her he believed her. “On behalf of Fifi, thank you,” he said.

  Although he then used the piece of shrimp currently between his fingers to point at her across the table. “But don’t think going soft on Fifi changes anything. In case that’s part of your evil plan.”

  “I don’t have an evil plan,” she lied. And she didn’t feel bad about that because going soft on Fifi really had nothing to do with her evil plan. She really did think Reece was a much better guy than she had an hour ago, and her reactions to the things he’d told her were sincere.

  But she still had a job to do. So I’m going to keep digging. And pray to God he doesn’t keep giving me answers that make him look like an overgrown beach Boy Scout. “So you’ve lived here all your life?” she asked.

  “Yep, born and raised in Coral Cove.”

  “How long have you owned the motel?”

  “Always, in a way,” he told her. My grandfather built it in the late fifties. My dad was just a kid then, but he helped, too. He and his brother took the place over eventually, and then I took it over from them later.”

  Aha! It was a family thing. A family legacy. Finally! That explained a lot. At last she was getting somewhere, getting some insights on this situation.

  “So . . . your family would be upset if you sold it, if it was torn down,” she said. Digging.

  “No,” he said, “nothing like that.”

  And that was it. Nothing more.

  Hmm. So much for digging. Maybe I’m not really getting anywhere after all.

  And just as she was trying to think of another angle, a way to pry without being ridiculously obvious about it, Reece locked gazes with her, leaned slightly forward, and turned the tables on her. “So,” he said pointedly, “what’s your deal, Tinkerbell?”

  She chafed inside at the stupid nickname, but tried to be cool about it. As cool as he was most of the time. “My deal?”

  “You’re from Michigan. You live in Atlanta. You work for a big conglomerate and your job is doing their dirty work. That pretty much sums up what I know about you. Well, and you have a smart mouth and fill out a bikini real nice. So tell me something else about you.”

  She lowered her chin, narrowed her gaze on him. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were actually interested in me as a human being.”

  He offered up a typical Reece shrug. “I just thought we were playing twenty questions, that’s all.”

  And she smiled. Because she’d just seen a tiny chink in his armor now—he was interested in finding out more about her and didn’t like admitting it. “What would you like to know?”

  “How’d you get into this line of work?” he asked.

  “I studied real estate and hospitality—that’s the hotel business—at Michigan State, and got a job at Vanderhook right after graduation.” She stopped to take a sip of her soda. “Over time, it was discovered that I’m skilled at negotiating, and as a result, I get to travel to a lot of waterside locales. And for being only thirty-two, I’m pretty high up in the company. That answer your question?”

  His gaze narrowed. “Sort of. How’d you pick up these negotiating skills of yours?”

  She thought back. Perhaps back a little too far, too fast. To being an insecure little g
irl who got bossed around, who let other people’s expectations define her. She could still hear her father’s booming voice now, all these years later, could still feel his obvious disdain for her shriveling up her insides.

  Odd that her parents’ deficiencies, which she resented as much now as ever if she was honest with herself, had ultimately made her who she was, someone who she actually liked. Even if her job might not always make her seem all that likable. But for her, being tough was a lot more likable than being weak, and she was proud of all she’d overcome, all she’d achieved.

  “Let’s say it was a life skill born of . . . wanting to have more than I did growing up.”

  “Sounds like a story there,” he said, baiting her.

  But she wasn’t biting. “Too bad it’s late and I’m tired,” she told him with a knowing smile. “Shall we get the check?”

  He just laughed in reply. “Sure, Tink,” he told her. “Whatever you say.”

  She’d expected him to pry a little more. But she was glad he didn’t.

  She’d promised him a meal, so as soon as Polly turned their bill facedown on the table, she smoothly scooped it up.

  “Thanks for dinner,” he said easily. And she thought the words might have come out a little grudgingly, but under all the circumstances, she appreciated any gratitude at all.

  When they stepped up to the cash register, Reece excused himself to go to the bathroom. And as Camille passed a credit card across a low counter to Polly—who seemed to be a one-woman show here—she noticed the entire place was empty but for them. And only a few tables had been filled during their entire visit. A shame because the food had been good—better than she’d expected.

  “Shoo.”

  She’d been putting her card away, but looked up at the whispery sound, which she thought had come from Polly. Polly met her gaze, smiled a bit nervously. And she went back to tucking her card into the spot where it belonged.

  “Shoo.”

  Camille looked up quicker this time—fast enough to follow Polly’s eyes to an orange-striped cat who sat on the floor next to the counter, as still as a statue. Camille flinched and—for the second time since coming into the Hungry Fisherman—wondered if she were seeing things. What on earth was a cat doing in a restaurant?