She laughed despite herself. “Only when I’m out of my depth.”
He nodded. “Okay. You’re a control freak. I can work with that.”
“I haven’t hired you.”
“No,” he said, pointing out to where Hope was sitting on the deck, reading. “She did. Makes it harder for you to fire me in a fit of rage.”
“I’m not going to fire you. I might use you as a coffee gopher, though.”
“Good plan.” He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. He laced his fingers together, drawing her attention to his hands. Long, blunt, thick fingers. Like he knew hard work. Like he might squeeze a little too hard if he didn’t like the person whose hand he was shaking. “Is that all I’ll be doing? Fetching you coffee?”
The blast of unexpected heat that surged through her at the perfectly innocent question was definitely dangerous. It was worsened by the fact that Liana didn’t really drink coffee. She fidgeted in her seat and opted not to answer, because she wasn’t sure what would come out of her mouth.
“What else could I maybe do to help you out? Maybe on the fourth of July?”
“Right. That.” He wasn’t wrong. She needed a barrier of sorts, and this six-foot-plus solid, steady, unflappable man would work in that regard.
“Are you thinking about not going to the concert?”
That was the million-dollar question. She opened her mouth, then closed it again.
He laughed, and it worked its way into her chest, loosening some of the tightness there.
“I don’t know,” she said with a sigh. “No. Not really. Of course I need to go.”
“But…”
“But I can’t bring myself to book a ticket.”
“Ah.” He shrugged. “Can I do that for you? Sounds like a gopher task.”
A flippant no was on the tip of her tongue, but then she stopped herself.
He raised one eyebrow. “The look on your face right now is pretty entertaining. You really don’t want my help, do you?”
“I don’t know what I want.”
He nodded. “I know the feeling.” He exhaled and leaned in, his eyes glinting. “Look, I’m coming with you because Hope wants me to. So I might as well book the tickets for both of us. What you do with me when we get there can be decided later.”
He needed to stop saying it like that. She could feel her cheeks heating up and she ducked her head to hide them. “Okay.”
Hope came back inside while Dean was booking flights, and she gave Liana a searching look.All good?
Liana nodded in response to the silent question. Her stomach was a jumble of nerves right now, but she wasn’t freaking out.
“I’m going to head back into town, then, if you’ve got this,” Hope said to Dean. “And there’s lots of food in the fridge if you run into dinner.”
He slid a sideways glance at Liana before shaking his head. “I don’t think we’ll be that long. I’ll be back at the BBQ before too long.”
She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Good. She didn’t know how much more she could take, although she understood there had to be some…briefing, or something.
It was theor somethingthat was distracting her.
She knew she used sex as a coping strategy. Not frequently, and not unsafely, but like the other day when she’d hit on him because she was scared, she knew there was a solid chance here that she was turning her nerves into an overblown attraction to the cop.
That was dangerous, and not just because he’d already turned her downbeforehe knew she was a hot mess.
“Email address?” Dean asked, yanking her back to the present task.
