Chasing Forever(39)

“I like looking at your legs, particularly in those shoes,” he commented as he opened his car door. In fact, those shoes were giving him all sorts of interesting ideas. Maybe if she wanted to do more than play Pictionary after dinner, he could persuade her to indulge in some of his ideas. “Your legs may be the only interesting visual the entire time we’re here.”

“I’m glad my safety comes second to your visual comfort,” Regan commented with an amused look.

“Never.” He grabbed her hand and helped her out of the car.

She inhaled deeply. “I love the mountains in the summer. I don’t think anything smells better pine needles, clean air, and dirt.”

Lucas laughed.

“What?” she asked, her hands on her hips as she cocked her head to the side. “Are you laughing at me?”

He put his hand on her back guiding her forward. “Of course not. I know better than to make fun of you. The comment about the smell of dirt reminds me of something you would have said in college.”

“Is that an insult?” she asked, raising her eyebrows.

“No.” He leaned into her, brushing his shoulder against hers. “Actually, I think you might have said something similar on one of our hikes to Barton Creek in college.”

“I love that place. I haven’t been back there in years.”

“Remember when we hiked to the Mopac Bridge swimming hole and we took turns swinging from that rope?” He smiled at her.

“Yeah and then you forced me to jump from the rope into the water.” She shivered. “The water was freezing, and I had to hike back to the car in wet clothes.”

“Whatever. I jumped in too. We had fun swimming and getting warm afterward.” Actually, that was one of his favorite memories of spending time with Regan. He’d liked to say he hadn’t thought about that day in the last six years, but he had…many times. When they finished swimming, they stripped down to their underwear, hidden from view by a couple blankets he had strategically placed in the shade of a large pecan tree. They spent the better half of the afternoon behaving like two overeager teenagers, necking and kissing, completely unable to keep their hands off each other.

“Getting warm?” she questioned musingly. “Is that what we were doing?”

Chuckling silently, Lucas squeezed her upper arm. “Behave.”

She glanced at him. “My memory is kind of foggy. It was over six years ago, but—”

“I don’t like the idea of your memory being kind of foggy,” Lucas murmured, his voice husky. “Maybe when we’re done here, we can wander off into the woods, and I can spend some time refreshing your memory on exactly how warm we made each other that day.”

Regan leaned toward him, almost involuntarily. “Do you think it will work?” she whispered. “I’m not so sure. You’ll have to prove it to me.”

“I’m up to the challenge if you are.”

“Lucas, Regan.”

Lucas turned at the sound of Jack’s voice and lifted his hand in greeting.

Jack stepped out his car. “Thanks for meeting me here. I hope you haven’t been waiting long. I had to call my wife and let her know I arrived safe and sound. Unfortunately, she had a long list of grievances, and I couldn’t get rid of her easily.”

“No problem,” Lucas responded. “We just arrived a few minutes ago and we were looking around the area.” Lucas glanced at Regan and smiled playfully. “We were just discussing whether there are any good hiking trails around here.”

“Oh, not many that I know of, but I’m not much of a wilderness guy. Golfing is about as close to roughing it as I like to get.”

Once Jack caught up with them, he started talking about the mine, when he and his former partner purchased it, what they originally planned to do with it, business plans for his other investments, and the status of the case. Lucas took the lead in fielding Jack’s questions while Regan trailed behind them taking notes. Lucas mentioned the firm was investigating a social connection between Peterson and the principals at North Relief.

“It’s possible,” Jack commented. “Peterson and I weren’t very friendly in the last couple years. When Peterson divorced, my wife didn’t like his new girlfriend, so we stopped doing things together socially.”

As they neared the front of the mine again, Jack waved his hand in Regan’s direction. “It’s nice seeing you again. How are things going with Lucas?”

Regan clasped her hands behind her back and rocked on her heels. “Good, thanks for asking.”

“I wasn’t sure about you two working together when we went to lunch after the deposition, but when I pulled up today, you two seemed to be getting along well.”