Page 55

Honestly, right now, all she cared about was that, while she enjoyed sleeping in Keaton’s bed and waking up next to him each morning, the man hadn’t laid a finger on her.
Granted, it had to be weird for him that her dad was sleeping a couple of rooms away, but if it wasn’t odd for her, it shouldn’t bother him.
Obviously, it did because he’d get all weirded out if they were kissing and her dad walked into the room.
Keaton Cole had some issues she hadn’t anticipated. Everything about him had been unexpected. Besides being romantic, sweet, gentle, and tender, he had his own brand of insecurities. He had trust and intimacy issues, something she had figured out the moment they’d met.
Only, she didn’t completely understand why.
Losing Petra had crushed him. That had destroyedhim in ways she couldn’t even imagine. But there was more, and she wanted the whole story.
She leaned back on the lounge chair, lifted her tea, and sipped. The sun had begun to settle behind the horizon. She loved nights like these. His little slice of waterfront was vastly different from hers, but she didn’t care. She loved this tiny lot of land. Being able to watch boaters as they returned from a long day of fishing or simply enjoying the ocean was so different from how she sat on her porch and stared at the open ocean.
She wondered how many times Keaton had watched her pull her boat down this stretch of water. He could see the marina in the distance and the canal mouth opening into the bay.
“Hey,” he said as he approached from the dock. He’d been tinkering with his small boat for the last half hour. The man struggled to sit still. He’d remodeled his cabin by himself, and there wasn’t much left to do. If he wasn’t working, he was giving airboat tours. If he wasn’t doing that, he was bothering Baily at the marina or helping Audra and Dawson at Harvey’s Cabins and B&B.
Hayes had a few projects that needed to be done around his place, so Keaton could often be found helping him with that as well.
The only time she ever saw him idle was when they all sat around the campfire. She lived for those nights.
“Hey, yourself,” she responded. “Have fun playing grease monkey?”
He laughed, wiping his hands on a rag. “It was something to do while you had your nose in that book.”
She lifted it and waved it in the air. “All done. The ending was so predictable.”
“It’s a romance. Aren’t they all?”
“Well, that part, yes,” she said. “I mean, we expect the hero and heroine to fall in love and live happily ever after. But sadly, the plot of this one didn’t have many twists and turns and not enough emotional baggage to make me care. I like to either sit on the edge of my seat because it’s so suspenseful or cry like a baby because everyone is so fucking broken.”
“You’ve been swearing like a truck driver lately.”
“You’re rubbing off on me,” she teased. “Or maybe it’s the lack of sex.” She waggled her brows.
He glanced at his watch, then at the door, and then at his watch again. But he didn’t say one flipping word.
“Um, Keaton. That was a hint. Or perhaps, a direct proposition. Either way, my dad’s working late. He won’t be back for at least two hours. We’ve got plenty of time.”
He waved his hand over his arm. “What about your shoulder? I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Are you going to make me beg? Because I’m not past begging, though you’re giving me a complex. I mean, I walked right out of your bathroom naked, and you didn’t even blink.”
“Oh, I blinked,” he said with a throaty growl. “Your father was in the kitchen eating breakfast. If I had acted on the thoughts going through my brain at the time, I wouldn’t have performed well because all I would’ve thought about was your dad…a bowl of oatmeal…and the fact my gun was only four feet from his fingertips.”
As gracefully as she could, she rose. “Are you seriously afraid of my dad?”
“One hundred percent terrified.” He looped his arms around her waist.
She rested her good hand on his shoulder, fingering the hair that landed on the back of his neck. “Why?”
“Because he’s fiercely protective of you. Much like my old man is with my sister Tilly, and if I thought my dad was bad, well, I’m worse. If anyone had ever even looked at my sister cross-eyed, I’d have decked them.”
“Are you telling me that you beat up Tilly’s boyfriends?”
“Unfortunately, I did. She wasn’t always happy with that.” He chuckled. “Nine out of ten times, she was downright pissed off.”
“Wait. You actually hit them?”