It's in His Kiss

Becca was watching every single movement with avid interest.

Tanner stopped stripping and grinned at her. “Hey, sweetness, how did your day go?”

“Good,” she said. “We made a killing today when a group of twenty stopped to kayak. Oh, and as for the Summer Bash, I’ve looked into some advertising, both online and print for your web presence. You could do better there. I’ve emailed each of you a suggested plan to up your visibility. I’m not as familiar with Lucky Harbor as I’d like to be, yet, but I’m pretty confident you could also do much better in print ads as well.”

Cole smiled. “Are we paying you enough?”

“For now,” she said sweetly.

Sam thought about how many different ways she could have answered that, and had to admit it impressed him. She impressed him. She was nosy and curious and frustrating. She was sweet and warm, and sometimes, when he was very lucky, she looked at him like he was the only man on her radar.

And thanks to the intriguing phone call with her brother, he knew she protected her secrets well.

Which only made him want to know all the more what they were.

Chapter 20

Becca found herself enjoying Lucky Harbor more every single day. Twice she’d realized she’d missed another call from Jase, and twice she’d tried to call him back but he’d ignored her return calls.

Not a good sign.

But she couldn’t try to live his life for him anymore. Instead, she immersed herself in life here. Lucky Harbor was different from any other place she’d ever lived. She was used to people keeping to themselves. She was used to passing someone on the street and, if accidental eye contact was made, you nodded or smiled briefly and kept moving.

That’s not how things worked in Lucky Harbor. People stopped her, wanted to know how her day was, how the jobs were going—and they really, genuinely wanted to know. They also wanted to know how she handled working for the three hottest single men in town.

And yes, that actually happened. But it’d been Lucille asking, so maybe it didn’t count.

She spent lots of hours at the rec center with the kids. Just yesterday they’d graduated to putting their five newly learned chords together to make a song.

Of sorts.

They were working on “God Bless America,” working being the key word. But the hours spent in that classroom were some of her favorite hours ever.

“Think we can have a concert?” Pink asked one afternoon. Her front teeth were starting to grow in, while her twin Kendra’s were not, which made it easy to tell them apart. Well, that and the fact that Pink wore only pink.

The truth was, they were about as far from being able to handle a concert as Becca herself was, but who was she to dim their enthusiasm? “Who would we play for?” she asked instead.

“The whole town!” Pink yelled. She yelled almost everything; she couldn’t seem to contain her own energy.

“You want to play in front of everyone?” Becca asked, surprised.

Pink nodded vigorously.

Becca looked at Kendra. Kendra nodded vigorously.

Becca looked at the rest of the gang. They all nodded equally as vigorously.

They couldn’t play one line of “God Bless America” without breaking up into giggles or a fight, not to mention they had no real skills, and yet they wanted to play in front of the entire town. It was the most awesome show of confidence Becca had ever seen, and suddenly she wished she were a kid again. “Well, I—”

Someone cleared his throat behind her. She turned and caught Sam, Jack, and Jack’s cousin Ben standing in the doorway, each wearing a badass smile. Becca knew that Ben taught “craft hour.” He’d been the one to bring in Jack and Sam. The kids raved about them all the time.

Becca didn’t know much about Jack or Ben, but the sight of Sam standing there all sexy-cool in jeans and a T-shirt advertising Lance’s ice cream shop altered her heart rate. She decided she had to just not look at him anymore. Mature, she knew, but this was not a time to visit Lustville.

“How about us?” Jack asked. “Maybe you guys can play for us.”

“Oh,” Becca said. “I don’t think—”

But the kids had all burst out with hopeful “Yays!” and “Yes!” and “Oh, please, Ms. Teacher!”

Becca sneaked a peek at Sam, who gave her a two-hundred-watt grin, damn him.

“Let’s hear a few songs,” Jack said.

“We only know one,” Pink said, and flung herself at the big, bad, silent Ben, wrapping her arms around his waist, giving him a bear hug. Kendra did the same. Ben surprised her by gathering them in and hoisting them up so that their feet dangled above the ground—much to their squealed delight.

Jack ran his fingers along the classroom’s xylophone, making a racket that had the rest of the kids giggling.

“Can they play with us, Ms. Teacher?” Pink asked, still hanging from Ben’s arm.

“If they want,” Becca said, unable to imagine that they did.

But the guys made themselves at home. Pink divvied up the instruments, thrusting a marching drum at Sam.

Shocking her, Sam sat down with the drum. The seats were made for kids, and as a big guy, he should’ve looked ridiculous stuffed into one. But he didn’t look anything close to ridiculous. Actually, he looked pretty damn fine, not to mention sexy-adorable, and she wanted to gobble him up.

He caught her staring at him. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said, not looking bothered by that fact one little bit. It probably never occurred to him to worry about feeling ridiculous or making a fool of himself.