Summer By The Sea

She felt an uncharacteristic flutter in her chest. Her head was even dizzy. Yes, it must be the fumes from the cheap towel.

“Whoa,” Sam said in his rich, deep voice, then leaped forward to steady her elbow.

She hadn’t realized she was wavering on her feet. But the less this man touched her, the better. “To what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?” she asked, shaking his hand off her. “Do all your rescue targets receive such hands-on service?”

Now he was full-out smiling. She hated that he reacted to her this way, but it was as if he refused to be ruffled by her bad mood.

Worse, it was as if he saw straight through her offensive shield—over-the-top rudeness and all—and wasn’t intimidated in the least. He studied her as if none of what she said was real.

Nobody treated her this way. Except maybe Richard Lee, but she didn’t like Richard, and he didn’t like her. With Richard it was all business. With her high-tech, artificial-intelligence patents, she stood to make him a fortune, and at the end of the day, that was all he cared about.

Sam-the-lifeguard (yes, she would think of him like that—it was good defense for her), was back to peering into her eyes. Frankly, he looked worried for her health. Well, she was, too, but that wasn’t his business.

“I’m fine,” she insisted again, sounding unlike herself and too similar to a breathless sixteen-year-old girl, which was just irritating. She wrapped her cheap towel even more tightly around her body. If she could just put her armor back on—suit, expensive shoes, briefcase (even if it was full of meditation books)—then she would feel like herself again.

“Sorry to have to bother you,” he said to her, “but we’ve got unfinished business.” He shifted his gaze to Natalie. “I have to fill out an administrative report,” he said apologetically. “This won’t take a minute. Don’t sue me, okay?”

Sarah couldn’t very well be insulted that he was speaking to Natalie, not her, because she had told him that Natalie was her lawyer. “Leave my name out of your administrative report,” Sarah told Sam.

“Yes, please do,” Natalie agreed. “Sarah is a celebrity, and it wouldn’t do to bring that kind of attention down on her or Wallis Point.”

“I know who she is,” Sam said. “I didn’t recognize her, at first, but now that we’re at Cassandra’s cottage, I fully understand.” Both he and Natalie looked at her.

Whoa. Whoa, whoa, whoa.

“You know who I am?”

“Yes. But I didn’t know who you were when I rescued you.”

“You didn’t rescue me,” she clarified. “I rescued myself.”

“Right,” he agreed easily.

Why can’t my employees be so agreeable? she thought. Maybe he wasn’t that bad.

No. There had to be a catch.

“What do you want?” she snapped.

He gave her a sexy, lazy smile. He backed up a step so he was leaning his hip indolently against the beach buggy, the motor still idling.

She shook her head. She was practically forty. Over the hill, compared to him.

Sam tilted his head at her. “How old are you?” he asked.

She started. “Why?” Was this guy a mind-reader?

“For the report,” he said, still calm.

“Don’t put me in any of your reports!”

He shrugged. “It’ll be anonymous. No name given. Nobody will ever know that it was you.”

“Why don’t you just pretend it didn’t happen at all? Forget about it.”

“Can’t,” he said softly. “The chief of lifeguards knows about the incident. You’re lucky—it’s only because it’s early in the season that the medical team wasn’t called and ready for you by the time we brought you in—sorry, by the time you brought yourself in.” He gave her a teasing grin, showing a smile with really nice teeth. “Then you would be in the system—name and all. Police, fire and EMTs—they brook no nonsense.”

She crossed her arms. “You’re implying I create nonsense.”

“We’ve dealt with VIPs here before, Ms. Buckley. They never complained.”

She could feel her face growing red.

“You’ll be written up as female, aged whatever,” he continued. “That’s how our public reports always read. No other identifying information.”

“I don’t care what you put down,” she snapped. “Make something up.”

“Nope.” He shook his head. “Not falling into that trap. You tell me.”

“No.”

He pursed his lips. “How about twenty-one? You good with that?”

“Don’t be an ass.”

He grinned, showing a dimple this time. “You talk just like my middle schoolers. The ones with bad manners, anyway.”

“Excuse me?”

“He teaches middle school earth science,” Natalie chimed in. “In the local school system.”

“Ah. Very funny,” Sarah replied to Sam-the-lifeguard who was also a science teacher.

Obviously, he’d wanted her to know that. Wanted her to know he was serious of mind as well as body.

She licked her lips, trying desperately not to look at that body. Toned, sun-kissed skin. Welcoming chest. Really, really hot abs...

Stop. Just tell him you’re thirty-five. Not too much of a lie. Or go lower, thirty-two. It was a nice, round age for a woman. Not as preposterous as saying thirty, which was about the age that he looked.

He gave her a kind smile. “My daughter will be happy to know I’ve met you already. She idolizes you ever since Cassandra showed her the article in Business Roundup.”

Sarah coughed in surprise. She could feel her eyes bugging out, a blatant show. When she was younger, she’d practiced her “business” face in the mirror. An old mentor had suggested it as a necessity. He’d also suggested that she looked too vulnerable, which she’d been trying to correct, or at least to cover up, ever since.

This was a major fail.

“You think I’m too young to have a daughter, don’t you?” Sam winked. “Well, I had her when I was twelve.”

She couldn’t hold back a bark of laughter.