“So, what do you do?” she asked, scrambling to find a safe topic. She didn’t want this big, beautiful beast of a man to grow bored and wander into the trees.
He answered the oh-so-innocuous question with a husky chuckle. The smirky smile made another appearance as he cocked his head and peered down at her. “I’m a partner in a security company. Trident Security. What do you do, Monica?”
She chose to ignore the taunting edge in his tone. “I’m in commodities.”
“Commodities?”
He didn’t bother masking his confusion, so she launched into the canned spiel she usually saved for alumni events. “I advise people on what futures to buy and sell. Like stock investments, but I deal more with livestock, grain, and currency futures.”
“Yeah, I know what commodities are. Cornering the orange crop like in Trading Places, right?”
“Don’t forget the pork bellies.” She grinned. “Sexy stuff, those commodities.”
He ran his hand over his jaw, and Monica found she was as pleased by the rasp of his stubble against his palm as she was the note of wonder in his voice.
“You don’t...” He trailed off, dropping all pretense of subtlety as he let his gaze travel over her. “I didn’t peg you for the high finance type.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and swung her weight onto her right leg. “I didn’t peg you for the type to let his boy play with dolls.”
Her assessment scored an honest-to-goodness laugh. When she spotted the dimple, all hell broke loose. Heat flared in her cheeks and her heart did a girly flutter she’d swear she hadn’t felt since Jeremy Lansford asked her to go to the Spring Fling dance in eighth grade. She didn’t want to think too hard about the effect the perfect little indention was having on some other bits of her anatomy.
“You have to pick your battles, right?” He gave his head a rueful shake. “I admit I fought it to start, but you realize it doesn’t matter. I mean, girls play with trucks and Legos and stuff, right?”
“Were you trying to sound less sexist?”
He had the good grace to wince. “Came out better in my head.” Rocking on his heels, he cast her a sidelong glance and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I haven’t done this in a while.”
She turned her most innocent gaze on him. “Engaged in conversation?”
“With a woman.”
His blunt answer chased away the impulse to tease. “Any woman? Don’t you have to talk to Aiden’s mother?”
“No, I don’t. She’s dead.”
Her hand flew to her mouth. “Oh! I’m sorry.”
Cringing, she felt her ears go up in flames as she let her palm slide down her throat until her fingers came to rest in the hollow at the base. All in all, a much better position to choke off any other embarrassing assumptions.
Clearly regretting his blunt answer, Colm grimaced apologetically as he slipped his hands into his pockets once again. “She passed a long time ago.”
“I am sorry, though. What I said was a stupid…I was trying to be all cool and clever,” she admitted, wrinkling her nose. “Never works for me.”
He shot her a sly look from under thick lashes. “Really? I’d bet you do okay with your husband.”
She grinned at his not-so-gentle probing. “Yeah. No husband.”
“Boyfriend?”
“Nope.”
“Good.” Colm chuckled and gave a helpless shrug. “Okay, well, now that we’ve got the ground work laid...If we’re going to keep trying this flirting thing, one of us has to pretend to be good at it.”
Always quick on the uptake when she saw something she wanted, Monica pounced. “I think, you being the man and all, you should do the heavy flirting. You need the practice, right?” She answered her own rhetorical question with a nod. “So, you go on and flirt, and I’ll do my best to fall for your lame lines.”
He lifted his head, skepticism hardening the planes of his face. But instead of agreeing right away, he scanned the play area until he spotted the kids, then heaved a resigned sigh. “Okay, well, you’ve been warned.”
* * * *
He couldn’t stop staring at her. Which was crazy, really, because she wasn’t at all his type. She was all sharp angles and straight edges. Not like Carmen, who should have had a “Dangerous Curves Ahead” sign hung around her neck. But, the last thing he needed was another woman like his late wife. Monica Rayburn with her pointy chin and ruthlessly straight brown hair were strangely appealing. She was so unlike Carmen. Plus, there were those amazing blue eyes. No way could anything dark or mysterious lurk there. They were as clear as the autumn sky. And drilling holes right into him. Holes so big all his brains seemed to leak right out. Knowing he had to say something, anything, he clutched at the only info she’d fed him so far.
“Do you like working in, uh, commodities?”
She smiled. The tiny tilt of her lips should have told him he’d failed spectacularly, but for some reason it didn’t feel like he had. Dark lashes brushed her cheekbones but did nothing to sweep away the sparkle of amusement in those vivid eyes. “Yes, I enjoy my work very much.”
“Why?”
A smooth fall of light brown hair cupped her cheek as she slanted her head to look up at him. A hard fistful of lust and longing landed right in his gut. He wanted to brush the wispy strands away from her face, his fingers all but itching with the need to know if they were as silky as they looked.
“Why do I like my job?”
Shocked by the inanity of his own question, but too far gone to backpedal, he pressed on. “Yeah. What makes you want to buy and sell...pork bellies, was it?”
“I’ve loved bacon since I was a little girl,” she answered with exaggerated sincerity.
Instantly defensive, he flexed his shoulders and straightened to his full height. “It’s not a stupid question, you know. Why people do what they do says a lot about them.”
She blinked. “Oh, I agree. Tell me, what made you decide to open a security company? A burning need to see how many five-digit passcodes your clients could come up with?”
“I was a cop,” he said bluntly. “I quit the force not long after Aiden was born. Couldn’t take the chance of leaving him an orphan.” A surge of masculine pleasure raced through him when her pretty pink lips parted with what he hoped was admiration. “My buddy, Mike”—he nodded toward the tree where his friends congregated—“is a genius with the business side, as well as equipment and those pesky passcodes, but he needed someone with some street smarts and credibility.”
“And that’s where you came in,” Monica supplied with an understanding nod.
Colm nodded as he watched his
