He laughed. “You have her phone number to report that I dropped it off?”
She nodded. “Afraid of her?”
“My father didn’t raise an idiot.”
They stood like that for a moment or two, the odd silence filling the air around them.
“Well, I guess I should let you get back to…” He glanced in the kitchen. “You just got here and you’re baking?”
A light blush stained her cheeks. “I am little out of sorts. Thought I would work off some nervous energy.”
“Well, I hope you enjoy the goodies. I’ll see you around.”
She set the basket on the small kitchenette table. “Oh, please, could you take some of these cookies home?”
Without waiting for an answer, she hurried into the kitchen. He followed her, but not too closely. He apparently made the woman nervous and she was offering free cookies. He didn’t want to miss out on that especially as the smell grew the closer he got to the kitchen.
She was sealing up a plastic baggie by the time he reached the entrance. She handed them to him.
“Thanks again for bringing the basket all the way out here.”
“No problem.” He turned to leave then stopped. “You wouldn’t be interested in going out to dinner would you?”
A look of something akin to panic moved over her face before she hid it behind a mask. “I just got here, so I am not really sure…”
“I understand.”
“No. It’s…I just got out of a really, really bad relationship. I can’t…” She closed her eyes and pulled herself together. When she opened her eyes, he saw regret and embarrassment. “I just don’t think I am ready for a date of any sort.”
“No problem.”
By the time Kai was on his way back down H-3 he realized there was something really off about Chris’s sister. She had been through a bad break up, but there was more to it than that. There were women who wanted nothing to do with the locals. Of course, it could just be that soured relationship. And that made her off-limits. He was sick of being the guy who helped women through breakups. The last one had left him bloodied and a little bit more cynical. He definitely wanted to make sure to avoid any woman who was trying to mend a broken heart.
With that, he punched the gas and headed into Honolulu. He had an early morning.
Jocelyn went through the basket trying to ignore the fact she had made an idiot of herself. God, did she have to act like the frightened little kitten that couldn’t take care of herself? It was embarrassing. Where was Queen Jocelyn, the head bakery chef who scared the hell out of the lower staff members?
She’d turned into a crumbling mess in Atlanta, that’s where.
She closed her eyes and held herself in check. She would not cry. It was her first night in Hawaii. The first night of the rest of her life. Greg wasn’t here, wouldn’t be here. He couldn’t hurt her. And dammit, she refused to let the memory of what he had done to her ruin her first night.
The first real interaction with a man and she had acted like a virgin, afraid to even touch him. Hell, she had been scared to let him in the house. Even after she knew who he was, remembered May mentioning him, she had been frightened.
He wasn’t as tall as Greg. He’d been just an inch or two over her five-foot-eight frame. But he was big. What was it that May had said he did…worked on the docks. And it showed. Sinewy muscles and an alertness that told her he watched everything around him. Oh, he gave off the vibe of a lazy guy, but that was the deception. Her brother Malachi was like that. And he was a Navy Seal.
Kai Aiona was a gorgeous man, who apparently was afraid of his sister, and had been so nice as to ask her on a date. And she had freaked.
With a sigh, she lifted the basket and carried it into the kitchen. She would have to take that step when she could, but she knew she wasn’t ready.
But at least she still had some kind of sexual desires. Kai had proven that. She had always had a thing for Asian or Polynesian men. She knew he was Hawaiian, but May said their mother had been white, and there was a little Chinese somewhere in their bloodline. Damn. Whatever his genetic makeup, it was one hell of a tasty mix.
And if she was still Jocelyn the Queen, she would have jumped at the chance of a date with him and would have gladly jumped his bones. She could just imagine how those large hands would feel over her skin, or how that fast mouth of his would work magic on her…
Regretfully, she pushed those ideas out of her mind and set to getting the fruit stored. She needed her rest and there was no use in thinking about a man she would never have.
Chapter Two
By midafternoon the next day, Kai was ready to crash. It had been a bitch of a morning and now that there was a threat of a nasty storm, he had called it a day and brought in the ships. In the tourist and fishing business, it wouldn’t be smart to even mess with it. One screw up, one injured or stranded tourist and your business was gone. The storm clouds were already rolling in and for the first time in months it looked like Honolulu was about to get hit with a pretty nasty storm.