But why hadn’t she?
“Hell,” Mel said heavily, and took the envelope and note with her, vanishing back into her office.
Dimi went to work entering the receivables. Not exactly rewarding work. In fact, she could have saved Mel the trouble of reading all these worksheets and simply told her it was same as always-that is, shaky-but she never had the heart to break Mel’s.
Mel, who tried so hard to keep them all together, Mel for whom this place meant everything, Mel who kept Dimi on the straight-and-narrow path.
Mostly.
Dimi thought about her little transgression with Previously Gorgeous Guy, and sighed. So she still made the occasional bad decision. Sue her. A leopard couldn’t change its stripes. Or spots. Or whatever it was.
Bottom line, she wasn’t perfect.
And neither, she thought, as she watched the pretty flickering vanilla candle on the corner of her desk, was Mel. Mel could have, should have, kicked Bo’s excellent ass for touching her. But she hadn’t.
Interesting. And telling.
Dimi could see Bo on the tarmac now, looking over an aircraft that belonged to a customer he’d brought in. Since he’d gotten here, he’d been bringing people, helping customers, booking them charter flights…generally upping their business without effort.
Damn, he was good. Bastard.
A mug was set down on the desk before her, and then a lemon muffin-her favorite. She looked up.
“You were talking to yourself,” Danny said. “Maybe sugar and caffeine will help.”
It wasn’t often she felt self-conscious with men, or revisited past actions, but ever since Danny had had to intervene with that idiot, she’d had a hard time looking him in the eye.
It wasn’t as if he’d said a word about it, either. In fact, Danny was a man of very few words, but she felt off her footing nonetheless. “Thanks.”
Perching a hip against her desk, he sipped at his own mug. He wore another baseball cap today, on backward, his blond surfer-dude hair brushing his shoulders, which were encased in his mechanic’s overalls. The sleeves were shoved up, revealing corded strength in his forearms from all the heavy lifting and work he did. On his left wrist were two black leather bands. He had clean hands for a mechanic. Work roughened, but clean.
“You okay?” he asked quietly, bringing her gaze up to his.
They’d been friends forever, but this was something she couldn’t talk to him about. “Are you kidding?” She busied herself with the paperwork spread before her. “I’m fantastic.”
“Yeah.” He shook his head. “Don’t you ever get tired of lying through those pretty teeth of yours?”
She went still but refused to look at him, instead started hitting keys on her computer, which brought the screen to life. Unfortunately the last thing she’d been doing was playing Solitaire, and it started beeping at her, and she got herself good and flustered before she managed to lower the volume. “Maybe I am always fantastic.”
“Uh-huh, and I’d buy it off your looks alone,” he agreed. “But I’m not much an exterior kind of guy.”
Again she lifted her head and found her eyes locked on his dark, melting ones. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’m more interested in what you have going on in here.” Reaching out, he touched her temple. “And here.” Shocking her with his nerve, he tapped her chest, just above her left breast.
She caught his hand and pushed it away. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
Don’t…hell, she didn’t know, but her heart was doing some funny, jumping thing, and she stood up. “Look, I’m really busy here.”
“Right.” A single nudge of his finger and the file covering her book fell to the side. The cover revealed a guy wearing a loincloth with a woman on her knees in front of him in a ragged ball gown.
Dimi’s dirty little secret-exposed. She devoured historical romance novels, the sexier the better. As for why…Well, it didn’t take a shrink to figure that out. She knew exactly what drew her, and it wasn’t just the fabulous, amazing, jaw-dropping sex-but the happily ever after.
But so what? Everyone was entitled to their occasional vice.
Or three.
Danny cocked his head. “Interesting work.”
She shoved the book in the drawer. “Listen, if you don’t have something you need done, beat it.”
“Oh, I need something done.”
She felt herself flinch at the sexual innuendo, and faced him, jaw jumping, head high, eyes oddly burning because this was Danny, and she’d not expected it of him. “Look, just because I slept with that idiot,” she said tightly, “and just because I read romance, does not mean I’m easy-”
“Whoa.” His smile faded as he rose to his feet. “I don’t think that. I’ve never thought that.”
Her heart was still pounding, her eyes hot with embarrassment. She didn’t want to do this. God, she didn’t. In fact, she needed a drink. Now. “Go away, Danny. Just go.”
He stared at her for a long beat before letting out a jagged, frustrated breath.
“Please.”
Clearly unhappy about it, he turned away.
Dimi let out a sigh of relief, but it backed up in her throat when he suddenly pivoted back, hunkering down at her side so that she had no choice but to look right at him.
“What?” she asked with the haughty tone that had sent lesser men running.
“You’re keeping a dangerous pace, Deem.”
“Yeah? And what would you know about that?”
His eyes held secrets. “Plenty.”
She closed her eyes, then heard a twin-engine plane approaching right before the radio crackled, and felt shamefully grateful for the diversion. “I’ve got to-”
“Yeah.” He held her gaze another moment, then rose and walked away.
Damn it. To give herself a minute, she sniffed at the mug he’d left her.
Earl Grey. Not quite the alcohol she craved but instead, her favorite tea. She swallowed past the odd lump in her throat and sipped as she watched him go, that long rangy form moving with the ease and confidence she imagined he’d honed from years and years on the waves.
To have even half of that belief in herself…with a sigh, she reached for the radio. The incoming customer was Wayne White. Wayne had a woman in every port in the world, and as Dimi sipped her tea, she opened her purse and checked her reflection in a small compact.
Because-something no one else knew-Wayne had a woman in this port as well.
Her.
It’d been going on and off for years, since the day she’d turned eighteen and he’d bought her a gold and diamond tennis bracelet to celebrate. Now as his plane circled and lowered, she wondered if he was alone.
You’re keeping a dangerous pace, Danny had said.
No doubt. But it was that pace that made her feel alive.
“We got it under control?” Mel’s voice asked Dimi via radio.
“It’s covered,” Dimi assured her, applying lip gloss as she watched the tarmac. “Ritchie’s out there right now.”
Still holding her radio, Mel stuck her head out of her office and looked at Dimi from across the expanse of the lobby. “Why are you primping?”
“I always primp.”
“There might be passengers with Wayne.”
“So?”
“So…Maybe one of them is a wife.”
Yeah, Wayne had a habit of collecting those. “Let me repeat myself. So…?”
“So a new wife is going to take one look at you and be jealous as hell. We want him to loiter, buy gas, maybe some maintenance hours…”
Dimi tossed her compact aside. “I hear you.”
“Do you really?”
“Don’t worry, Mel. I don’t have to act impulsively.”
“Huh. Didn’t know that.”
“Funny. I’ll make sure he keeps his pants on, okay? Does that make you happy?”
“I’m dancing in the hallway,” Mel said.
“Fine.”
“Fine.”
“Killjoy,” Dimi muttered, and sipped her tea.
“Yeah, I live to kill your joy,” Mel muttered back.
That night Mel stayed late catching up on paperwork, and when she was finished being unable to pay all the bills, she walked through the lobby, restless. She ended up in the employee break room, eyeing the dart board. If only she’d been able to talk to Sally, if she’d heard from Greg on the legitimacy of the deed, if, if, if…she’d feel better. Or at least not tense enough to shatter if someone so much as looked at her cross-eyed. She reached for the darts, thinking maybe a game with herself was just what she needed.