She looked over, all clear blue eyes and windblown hair, and despite her secrets and her father’s potentially career-damaging conviction, Nick felt something raw and primitive and protective release inside his gut, but he shoved the instinct aside. He needed to stay focused on his goals, his long-term, worked-his-ass-off-to-get-there goals.
“Oh, turn here.” Marianne pointed toward an entrance half hidden by the tall sea grass and he made a hard left onto a pristine pebbled driveway. They drove a short distance along the shoreline to the water’s edge where, surrounded by wide expanses of manicured lawn, stood an exquisite beach house. Strike that, a beach mansion.#p#分页标题#e#
“Holy shit.” The hits just kept coming. He sure as hell wasn’t in Brooklyn anymore.
Her fingers twisted the skirt’s hem into a knot. “Six bedrooms, seven baths, every room with a view of Gardiner’s Bay.”
“Even the bathrooms?”
“Even the bathrooms.”
“Holy shit,” he said again—for emphasis. Definitely not Brooklyn.
“Lord, here she comes.” Marianne glanced up the driveway, exchanged the sunglasses for her spectacles, and straightened her shoulders as if expecting a hard line tackle from a Giants defensive back. Nick wondered why the hell she looked so uptight until…
“Oh, sweet baby chicken, you made it.” A petite redhead waved at them, her heels crunching on the pebbled driveway as she approached. “Come here and give your mother a hug.”
Rooted to the passenger seat, Marianne’s eyes rounded at the words “sweet baby chicken,” and her everyday blush turned raging scarlet.
“Mom, please, this is so not the time,” she said, smoothing the line of her skirt.
Paying no attention, the woman pulled Marianne from the car and enveloped her into a bear hug that lasted a full two minutes. Finished, she gave the ring on Marianne’s left hand a quick glance and trained her sights on Nick. “And this must be your new fiancé.”
Nick plastered on his most charming smile and extended his hand. Her new fiancé. What the fuck. What the hell happened to her old fiancé?
“That’s me,” he said, with a pointed look at Marianne. “The new guy.” His one and only fiancée was full of more secrets than Al Capone’s vault.
“I like him,” her mother said, accepting his hand with a sly smile. “A vintage Spider, a sapphire engagement ring, smart enough to propose to you—the man’s a keeper.”
A six week kind of keeper. He cocked an eyebrow, wondering how her family would react when fiancé number two hit the bricks.
Releasing his hand, Mrs. McBride linked her arm through her daughter’s and started toward the house. “The barbecue starts at seven. Cocktails at six.”
“But where’s Dad?” Marianne asked, stumbling in her sneakers alongside her mom, her gaze searching back for Nick.
“With his parole officer.”
Nick shot her a reassuring smile, pulled three suitcases from the back end of the car, and shut the trunk with a swift, solid crash. Welcome to the Hamptons.
…
A carnival.
Marianne stood under the twilight sky in the midst of a literal circus and sipped her vodka-laced frozen rainbow. While she wasn’t much of a drinker, if there was a time to start drinking seriously, it was when your parents threw a welcome-home-from-prison carnival, complete with flamethrowers and funnel cake. If she could melt into the shimmering flagstone patio and leave her peep-toe heels behind, she would. Instead, she’d have to be content with retreating to the edge of the party until she could face down her ex, show off her sexy side, and make him eat his words. One by one. But where was her impeccably charming date?
She took a sip of the multicolored drink as her gaze scanned the crowd until she saw him—not Nick. Her ex, her proverbial nightmare, her Jason—and not like sexy-soap-opera-hero Jason, more like Friday-the-13th-mask-wearing Jason. Yes, that’s who he was—her nightmare on Ocean Avenue. She wanted to stab him with her cocktail umbrella. He caught her eye and started toward her. She bit down hard on her bottom lip.
Where the heck was Nick?
In a moment of weakness, she considered bolting until she could find him, but blushing and bolting were the old Marianne’s habits. While having Nick stand beside her all sexy and spectacular would have been ideal, he was…currently out of range. And while another two weeks of practicing her seductive skills would’ve been helpful, her dad’s early release had made the additional practice impossible. But she was ready. She reached for her cardigan draped on the back of the wrought iron chair, but her fingers stopped short of picking it up. Cardigans were no longer required. She didn’t need a cotton suit of armor. She needed confidence.#p#分页标题#e#