2. Noah
2
NOAH
I loved Tuesdays, even though most people I knew thought Tuesday was the worst day of the week.
Monday offered the opportunity for a fresh start.
Wednesday was the middle of the week.
Thursday was Friday eve, and Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were the weekend, which left Tuesday with nothing going for it.
But for me, Tuesday meant the late afternoon dive tour followed by Taco Tuesday at the Ice House, my friend Magnus’s bar.
There was nothing better than spending three hours leading a dive around the reef and one of my favorite midlevel wrecks and capping off the night with chorizo tacos and a key lime margarita.
I could almost taste the spicy heat of the meat and the creamy coolness of the cocktail as I turned the boat back into the marina, heading for the slips owned by my family’s dive company, Captain Cove’s Dive Charters.
My brother, Caspian, jumped off the bow of the boat and grabbed the mooring lines as I slid us into the slip.
He started gathering and checking the gear while I thanked our customers and answered any last-minute questions.
They’d been a good group tonight, more experienced than some of the tourists I took out, and we’d been able to go to a slightly deeper wreck than I had originally planned.
But the conditions had been right and we had the appropriate gear, and the divers had loved it.
One of the women had brought an underwater camera and was exchanging information with several other divers so she could share the pictures she’d taken.
“Thanks, Noah. That was a great dive.” One of our regulars, a young guy named Sean, held out a hand for me to shake.
He was some kind of investment banker from New York or something, and he traveled to Miami a lot for work.
Whenever he was in Florida, he made the drive down to dive with us.
“My pleasure.”
“I’ll see you next month when I’m back in Miami for work.”
“Sounds good, man. See you then.”
He picked up his gear—he usually brought his own, everything but the tanks—and started up the dock.
Cas was unloading the gear from the deck onto the dock.
“Noah, can you give me a hand with the cooler?”
“On my way.”
On our longer dives, we always brought a huge cooler with water and snacks.
Today, no one had partaken in the offerings so the cooler was still fully stocked and heavy.
Cas hoisted it up onto the side of the boat, and I grabbed it from there, lugging it back up the dock while Cas went ahead of me with the gear.
The sun was just starting to set, and like it always did, it took my breath away.
The water sparkled in shades of crimson, gold, and orange on the water, the masts of several sailboats shadows in the distance.
The view belonged on a postcard and never got old, and I was so distracted, I didn’t realize there was someone else on the dock until the cooler collided with them and they let out a small yelp.
I looked up in time to see a gorgeous man I didn’t recognize windmilling his arms as he tried to keep himself from falling off the dock into the water.
“Oh, shit!” I dropped the cooler, water bottles and ice flying, and reached out to grab the man, grabbing his arm before he could hit the drink.
The second I touched him a spark of awareness jolted through me, and I took a stumbled step backward, making the already unsteady man fall against my chest, and his scent filled my nose.
He carried the lavender notes that marked him as an omega, but beyond that there was a woodsy green scent that made me think of pine forests and mountain springs.
It was so clean, and crisp, and pure that I wanted to bury my nose in the stranger’s neck and never come up for air.
I could live all the rest of my days inhaling his scent and never get tired of it, and if I could smell him while I watched the sunset, I would never want the evenings to end.
And, what the actual fuck.
Where the hell had any of those thoughts come from?
Tuning back into my body, I realized I had my arms wrapped too tightly around the stranger, and even though I didn’t want to let go, he was steady on his feet again.
Reluctantly, I let my arms drop, then bent down to pick up the scattered water bottles and stuff them back in the cooler so I wouldn’t be tempted to pull the stranger against my chest again.
I wanted to know his name so we could get started on not being strangers anymore.
Standing, I brushed my hands off on my T-shirt.
“Sorry about that. I wasn’t watching where I was going.” I held out my hand.
“I’m Noah. Noah Cove.”
He stared at my hand, then looked up at my face, and my breath caught in my chest.
Until that moment, I’d thought the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen was the Key West sunset, but I’d been wrong.
The stranger’s eyes were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
They were light gray with the tiny brush of copper brown right around the pupil.
The only time I’d ever seen eyes even close to his were on the panther shifters that lived in a protected compound out on the very edge of the key.
While his eyes were similar enough to mark him as a big cat shifter, the color was completely unique and not something I’d ever seen before.
I had a feeling I could live a million lifetimes and never see anything as captivating as the man who stood in front of me.
Besides his eyes, he had a wide slightly flat nose, high sharp cheekbones, and ashy light brown hair that had dark almost gray-looking lowlights.
He was tall but thin, his frame lithe and fit, his muscles compact and rangy.
And then there were his lips—full, pale pink, and so soft looking I had the insane desire to pull one between my teeth to see if it tasted as sweet as it looked.
Until he finally took my hand in his, I’d forgotten I had even offered the handshake.
The touch of his skin against my palm felt like an electric shock to my heart.
“I’m Milo Frost.”
Milo.
Even his name was perfect as I rolled it around on my tongue.
“I haven’t seen you around before. What brings you to town, Milo?” Mentally, I crossed my fingers, praying he wouldn’t say he was just passing through.
I didn’t think my heart could take it if he was just here for vacation.
“Oh, I just bought a building on Caroline Street. I’m opening an art gallery.”
“So you’re new in town?”
He nodded, his hair ruffling in the breeze.
“I moved in last week.” He lifted the hand that had shaken mine to brush his hair out of his face, and I watched as the multihued strands fought back, flopping back over his forehead in the most adorable way as soon as he dropped his hand.
“And how are you liking Key West so far?”
“Besides my building and what I can see from the windows, I’ve only seen the grocery store and now the marina.”
I shook my head.
“Well, that won’t do.”
“I’m sorry?” He cocked his head to the side, studying me like I’d said something that confused him.
“You need to get out and see the city. There are so many hidden gems in Key West.”
“You’re the second person to tell me that today.”
“Then it must be true.”
He shrugged.
“I have a lot to do to get the gallery in shape. I don’t have a lot of time.”
A long beep from a car horn broke the moment between us.
“Noah! Are you coming?” Caspian shouted and waved from where he was waiting by his Jeep.
Milo shook his head.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you.”
“It’s fine. You’re not.”
He looked back at where my brother was leaning out the side of his car, not that that was particularly difficult to do since he’d taken the doors off.
“Ignore him. That’s my brother.” I waved him off.
“I’ll meet you there.”
He plopped into his seat and started his car, pulling out of the parking spot followed by a spray of gravel.
“Now, where were we? Oh, right. You were telling me you haven’t seen much of the city yet, and I was about to offer my services as a local guide.”
“You were?”
I nodded.
“Indeed I was. No one knows Key West like I do. I’ve lived here my whole life.”
“Oh.”
“Are you free tonight?”
Milo looked down at his feet, and I had the sinking suspicion he was going to say no.
I wanted to spend more time with him, to get to know him better, and I wanted to start right now, so I hurried to add, “It’s Taco Tuesday at the Ice House, and Magnus’s food is good and his drinks are better. If you haven’t eaten, you should come with me. The Ice House is the best shifter bar between here and Miami.”
He glanced up at me from under his lashes and my heart started doing the conga in my chest.
“Okay. Dinner sounds good.”
“Excellent. Let’s go.”
I grabbed his hand and he let me take it, and dragging the cooler behind me, I towed Milo up the dock and to the marina parking lot, trying to ignore how right his hand felt clasped in mine.