They both ordered the fish and chips, and then spent some time staring out the window as they ate in silence, basking in the residual enjoyment of a busy place full of people having fun. Eventually, Jenna decided to forgive Cade for the dig at her age and lack of drinking experience, and finally spoke. “So, you mentioned earlier that you don’t have a job. Are you looking for one, or do you just ride around on your bike, wooing women in every city you come across?”

Cade peeled his gaze from the window and raised an eyebrow. “First of all, I don’t make it my mission to ‘woo’ anyone. If it happens, it happens by accident. And secondly, I have a job waiting for me back home, if I want it, but I don’t yet have the inclination to settle down.”

Jenna tossed a fry into her mouth and chewed thoughtfully. “Huh. So, you’re not looking to date anyone right now? Why not? That ‘free spirit’ thing again? Don’t want any ties?”

Cade looked down at his plate and tore a chunk off his fish, seemingly nonchalant, but Jenna didn’t miss the slight tightening of his shoulders. He was uncomfortable being asked about his love life. “Guess you could say that. I left Florida a little over two years ago. Just wanted to get away from the same old patterns, get a breath of fresh air, see some new and exciting things, before I fell back into the fold of the family business.”

She knew he was lying—or perhaps just omitting some key truth—but she let it slide. “Oh, so your family owns a company? Is that why you majored in finance? So you could join up at the management or executive level?”

“That was the plan,” he admitted, his voice not quite as strong as before. “My dad was grooming me to take over as the vice president of finance one day, because the current VP, a long-time friend of his, will be retiring in the next four or five years. I was supposed to start in some management position after I graduated from college, but…” He tried his hardest to hide it, but Jenna still caught the quick flash of pain that dimmed his hazel eyes.

Suddenly, she wondered if the girlfriend topic and the job topic were connected—perhaps he had a nasty breakup or something right around graduation?—and if she had accidentally stumbled into some dark piece of recent history Cade wanted to avoid discussing at all costs. Jenna understood that feeling perfectly; every time she even thought about Dylan for more than a few seconds, she swore her heart started to wither and die, anguish hammering her chest, spreading like a poison through her veins.

She definitely didn’t want to steer Cade in that sort of direction, especially after he was so nice to her tonight, driving her to the pier, buying her dinner, giving her the LA experience she couldn’t afford on her own. He’d definitely made up for the crap she had to deal with earlier. So it would be wrong of her to upset him intentionally by pressing on with this conversation.

Jenna switched tactics. “You know, I think I’ve only ridden a Ferris wheel once in my life.”

Cade perked up, banishing the gloom that had been growing across his face. “Really? You want to take a ride up on this one? It looks like it might have some great views.”

Jenna nodded. “If the line’s short enough, then yeah, I’d love to go up.”

They finished their dinner quickly and exited the Albright, swinging around the pier to find the line for the brightly lit Ferris wheel. Unfortunately, the line was indeed too long—the pier was packed tonight—so they opted for a ride on the merry-go-round instead.

It wasn’t the most exhilarating experience, but the lights and the sounds and the prettily painted horses moving around and around made Jenna recall better days. Childhood days. She had a distinct image of her mother helping her onto a horse on another merry-go-around, hundreds and hundreds of miles away from here. Jenna had been terrified she was going to fall off and hurt herself, but her mother reassured her that she would be just fine. And she was. As soon as the ride started up, lights blinking, music thrumming through her heart, she felt as if she’d started a magical journey that would never end.

It had ended, of course. Those moments always ended.

Jenna tightly clutched the horse’s pole as this merry-go-round on the pier a world away from her past began to slow to let them off, to let the beginning of yet another dream crumble away, still recalling her mother’s smiling face, the little wave of encouragement, the assurance that Jenna was a “brave girl.” That day had only been a year or two before her mother got the cancer diagnosis. Funny how quickly those bright situations could fade to gray.

Yeah, she thought as the ride stopped, real funny.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder.

Jenna looked up to see Cade standing next to her. She’d nearly forgotten he was here.

“Oh, hi,” she said, heat creeping up her neck.

“You okay?” He offered a hand to help her off the horse. “You had this serious look on your face the whole time.”

“I’m fine,” she said curtly, giving away the fact she was the exact opposite. She accepted his hand to placate him and climbed off the painted horse. “I just remembered something.”

Cade nodded, as if he understood.

Perhaps he did.

They checked the Ferris wheel again, but the line still stretched a ridiculous distance, so Cade redirected them to an arcade. It had been a long, long time since Jenna had played any arcade games, but she remembered being rather good at some of them. So she challenged Cade to a Skee-Ball match—winner would buy the other a prize with the combined tickets won—and he accepted the challenge with a haughty gleam in his eye, like he thought he would totally wipe the floor with her and come away victorious with nary an ounce of effort.

Joke was on him.

Jenna made every single shot in either the fifty- or forty-point holes, and actually managed to land a couple in the hundred-point holes, putting her way, way ahead of Cade’s score early on. Cade, on the other hand, could barely hit the thirty-point holes, and didn’t even manage to get one fifty for the entire match. When all was said and done, Jenna was bent over, laughing, because her score was almost three times higher than his, and he was staring at his scoreboard like he thought the universe was playing a cosmic joke on him.

Before he could complain, Jenna snatched the pile of tickets that had gathered at his feet and added it to her own stash. “I do believe you owe me a prize, good sir.”

He puckered his lips. “I suppose you are right.”

“Don’t give me that look. You lost fair and square.” She poked his arm. “Seriously though, did you never play sports? No basketball or football or anything that required aim? Because that was one of the most pitiful attempts at throwing balls I have ever seen.”

Cade cracked a grin and said, “You, on the other hand, are quite the expert at handling balls.”

She stared at him for a second, open mouthed, and then smacked him with the stack of tickets. “Hello! This is a family friendly environment. Censor yourself.”

Her words probably would’ve had a bigger impact if she hadn’t been stifling laughter.

Cade took her amusement and ran with it. “What? Balls are family friendly. They’re how families are made after all.”

Jenna lost it and started cackling. “Are you for real? That joke was almost as bad as your pickup lines.”

He slapped his hand over his heart. “You wound me. And here I was, thinking I had a long, illustrious career as a comedian ahead of me.”

“I think you should stick with the middle management job, pal.” She swatted his arm again, then walked off toward the prize counter to exchange her tickets. She had just enough tickets to buy a small stuffed bear, which was pink like her favorite backpack. As the man at the counter bent down to grab the bear from its spot in the glass case, Jenna caught sight of the clock behind him on the wall, which informed her it was after ten. It was a pretty lengthy drive back to the motel, and they still had the biker gang to maneuver around to get back to their rooms. They wouldn’t be able to stay here much longer.

Oh well, I suppose I can find a different Ferris wheel to ride some other time.

She took the bear from the man and swiveled around to wave it in Cade’s face—a victory dance.

“Isn’t that a little stereotypical?” he said. “A woman getting a pink stuffed animal?”

“Says the ‘bad boy’ with the leather jacket and aviator glasses.”

He rocked back on his heels like she’d physically hit him. “Touché.”

She ran her thumb down the soft faux fur of the bear’s back and sighed. “All right. Enough playing around for tonight, Mr. I-punched-a-biker-in-the-face. I really do need to get some sleep, so we have to figure out our ‘attack plan’ and then head back to the motel. If I pass out while trying to organize stuff with the conference staff tomorrow, Marvin will actually fire me. In a heartbeat. He’s an obsessive freak with no tolerance for mistakes, so…” She tucked the bear under her arm and planted one hand on her hip. “Let’s see how smart you really are, with your fancy college degree. What’s the game plan?”