Chapter 7
Peyton
Grace’s gaze flicked between the two of us as a smile formed.
My cheeks heated with a blush. “Sorry.”
“Grace,” March said, stepping to the side. “I didn’t want to embarrass Peyton by asking her to do her concussion check in front of everyone.”
“No problem,” Grace said. “I’ll show Mrs. Yang out.”
“I can,” I offered, stepping forward.
Grace waved me off. “Your health comes first.” She closed the door, and we were alone again.
Very close now to March, I crossed my arms defensively. “Z…Y…X…” Finding it hard to ignore the dimple that formed when he smiled, I closed my eyes and continued down the alphabet. I didn’t open them again until he stopped me after P.
He waved his finger in a circle for me to turn around. “That’s very good. Now your balance routine.”
Embarrassed that his praise so easily affected me, I spun around. With my arms still tightly crossed, I almost lost my balance.
Strong hands caught me. “Easy there.”
Strong, warm hands that I will ignore.
“Are you okay?” Concern tinged his voice. “Do you feel dizzy?”
Sparks of desire radiated from his hands all the way up my arms. “No. I’m naturally clumsy is all.” And incredibly affected by you. I was trying too hard to resist him and screwing up in the process. I couldn’t afford mistakes.
In the romance novels I read at night, the heroine in this position would have turned and kissed him. But I was no heroine. No, I was a scared-out-of-her-wits woman on the run, hoping to live another day, another month, another year.
His hands fell away. “If you say so. Go ahead.”
Holding my arms out, I did the heel-to-toe balancing exercise across the office to the desk and turned. “How’s that?”
“Great.” He backed to the door. “I need to get back to work.”
“Lunch?” I asked, stepping toward him. “You didn’t give me an answer.”
“Sure.” With a smile, he opened the door and walked out.
I followed to my desk and watched his fine ass as he continued on to his.
A cough came from behind me.
I turned to find Marci. “That was too quick.” She cocked her head toward the open office door. “You should make that stud take more time.”
The implication arrowed straight to my core. “He was giving me the concussion test I’m supposed to do several times a day.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, sounding unconvinced. “And he stayed at your house last night, didn’t he?”
Damn Grace. Did everybody know my business? “Those were my doctor’s orders.”
“To give cognitive tests?”
“Concussion tests.”
“Whatever. I’ll volunteer for any test he wants to give me.”
“He’s all yours.” Suddenly, I saw the way out of my predicament, and her name was Marci.
March eyed an outside table near the windows and cocked his head. “What about that one?”
We were at Bella’s Steakburgers, a quaint place I’d tried once when I first arrived in town. They grilled their tasty burgers over charcoal and loaded on the extras. Plus, it was far enough away from work that we wouldn’t run into anyone.
I strode to a different outside table, nearest the street. “This one has nice shade.” The other table had close neighboring tables, and we could be overheard more easily.
He shrugged and set his tray down across from the chair I’d selected.
I patted the chair next to me, so we’d be sitting at a right angle to each other rather than across the table. “I’d like you closer.”
This table and the seating were both techniques I’d read about to avoid being overheard. How strange was it that I now combed the internet for techniques to avoid being noticed while on the run?
He smiled. “Now those are words I’ve been waiting to hear.”
Not what I intended, but it would work with what I was about to propose. “Calm down. I just want to be able to talk without yelling.”
He held my chair out for me before taking his own. Then he scanned the sky for a moment. “It’s nice to be able to spend some time outside in the fresh air and sunshine, isn’t it?” He dipped a French fry in ketchup—a lot of ketchup—and downed it.
“Absolutely,” I agreed. “It is nice in this part of the country.” I was more dainty in my approach, but devoured the first of my fries as well.
“Thank you for agreeing to lunch,” he said. “Sub sandwiches with the guys was getting pretty boring.”
I laughed. “I’m glad you consider me an adequate replacement.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, Angel.”
That dangerously sweet nickname surfaced again.
“Dig in.” I pointed at his burger. “The food here is pretty good.”
He added more ketchup to his plate. “I love these fries,” he mumbled.
“They’re so good, I call them conveyor fries. You can’t stop eating ’em, and they become a ketchup conveyor to your mouth.”
He nodded as he dunked another two in the red sauce.
I picked up my burger and realized how much I’d missed this. I hadn’t had lunch like this with anyone since leaving Boston, except for two times with Grace.
He finished munching. “I would like to know a lot more, but at least I learned one thing about you today.”
I lifted a French fry. “Really?”
He took his time, dipping a fry in the ketchup before answering. “You’re not a vegetarian.”
“True.” I ate the fry.
“So you chose two lunches instead of a dinner.”
I shook my head. “You didn’t win, so this isn’t one of two.”
“Not yet.”
“Pretty cocky of you.” I took a bite of the burger to slow down the conversation.
“I can be pretty cocky, if the situation calls for it.”
I chewed slowly. Flirty banter was not what I was aiming for.
He downed another three fries covered in ketchup while I worked on my single bite of burger.
“You know,” I started. “Someone in the office has her eye on you.”
He smiled at me as he devoured another fry. “I see you watching me, but you don’t need to talk about yourself in the third person.”
Danger. Danger. “You’re so funny. I mean Marci.” I kept an eye on his reaction as I picked up my burger for another bite.
He shook his head. Not a good sign. “She’s a nice girl, but not my type.” He picked up his burger and bit into it.
That gave me a few seconds to pivot. “I have a proposition for you.”
“I’m wearing you down, huh?”
“We can have lunches if—”
His eyes lit up. “I like the idea of multiple.”
I shook my head. “Let me finish. On the condition that you stop asking me about my past.”
His face screwed up in confusion. “I’m worried about you. I can tell you’re in trouble.”
“No questions, and just lunches, nothing else. I’m not dating. I have a no-men rule.”
He put up a finger for me to wait. “I have a condition of my own.”
I sensed I was close to getting his agreement. “What?”
“You answer one question, and I won’t use it against you.” He waited until I nodded. “Are you on the run from the law?”
“No,” I answered emphatically. “Do I look like a criminal to you?”
“You’re not an escaped convict, or have a warrant out for your arrest?”
“You had your one question.”
“Don’t be a smartass. You know what I mean.” He’d completely stopped dealing with his French fries, but he did lift his burger.
“I have never been tried, convicted, or even arrested for a crime, so no, I am not on the run, as you put it, from the law.” Boston PD wanted to talk to me. They thought I could provide help, but that was a different thing, so I could sleep well knowing my answer was truthful.
He nodded. “Okay then, you have a deal.” He put his burger down, wiped his hand off, and offered it to me to shake.
I did, feeling joy that I’d averted a disaster, and I got to stay working at SpaceMasters. “No more poking into my past,” I added.
“I’ll stop,” he agreed. “I already know that Peyton Smith is not your real name, and I look forward to the day you trust me enough to tell me what it is.”
I swallowed hard and deflected by pointing at one of the tattoos peeking out from his sleeve. I knew that arm had writing on it. “What is that about?”
He pulled the sleeve up to show the entire saying.
If Knocked Down,
I Will Get Back Up,
Every Time.
“Duke has the same one. It’s a part of the SEAL Creed,” he explained. “We don’t ever give up. That’s who we are. It’s how I behave. If I say I’m going to do something, I won’t stop because it’s hard. That’s the SEAL way.”
That was a good reason to be glad he’d agreed to stop trying to figure out my past.
He showed me another one. “I have these to remind me every day who I am and who I need to be.”
I Serve with Honor and Integrity,
On and Off the Battlefield.
Yes, he took pride in being a good man, just as Serena had told me. I stared at the tattoo contemplating its significance.
“Angel, what’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?”
“Don’t call me that.”
“I can’t lie. I saw you this morning, backlit by the sun, and that’s who you are to me now, since you won’t trust me with your real name.”
There was that word again, trust. I struggled to keep from crying. “Maybe not at work, okay?”
“No promises.”
“Then I can’t promise to not kick you in the balls if you do.”
He laughed. “Good luck trying that.”
I picked up my burger and answered his question around a mouthful of food. “Rocky Road.”
“Me too. See? We already have more in common than you thought.”
We got back to enjoying our meal. True to his word, his questions did not touch on my past.
After a while, March challenged me to a game of guessing what a person walking down the sidewalk on the other side of the street did for a living. It was fun, with some of the answers verging on ridiculous. Was there such a thing as a dog surfing instructor?
By the time we’d finished off the extra basket of fries we’d ordered, I’d so thoroughly enjoyed myself with March that I’d lost track of time. It was past the end of my lunch hour, and I hurried us back to work.
Like an old-school gentleman, he insisted on paying as we approached the counter. Knowing it would get ugly if I fought him, I agreed. The lunch had been a success. He’d agreed to stop asking about my past, and I’d sleep easier, knowing I could keep my secret.
“I pick the place next time,” he announced as he paid with his credit card.