Page 6 of Rex's Honor
“Suit yourself.” He stepped into the galley, closing the door.
She heard the click of the lock.
It was going to be a long night.
2
The wind howled as it brought the first few raindrops that pelted the fiberglass yacht. It never rained long in Florida during the summer months, but when it did, it came down hard, fast, and with loud claps of thunder. The cruiser rocked with the waves of the Intracoastal Waterways.
Rex lay on the king-size bed that took up most of the single bedroom, staring up at the portal on the boat's bow. His stomach growled, but he didn’t feel like getting out of bed. It had been over an hour since he’d left Tilly sitting on the deck. He assumed she was long gone by now, considering the coming storm. He ran his fingers across his lips. Kissing her had been stupid, and he had no idea why he’d done it other than he wanted to know if she still tasted like honey.
Which she did.
He blinked, pulling up an image of his mother when he’d been a small boy. Her dark hair touched her shoulders. He had his mother’s whiskey-colored eyes. When he was a kid, he thought his mother was the most beautiful woman ever, always full of life. He couldn’t imagine what battling stage-four ovarian cancer was doing to her body.
The evening sky lit up with multiple lightning strikes. Thunder pounded as the rain came down in a continuous stream.
“Rex! Let me in, please.”
He sprang from the bed, racing from the room through the main cabin, eating area, and the galley, finally reaching the door. He unlocked the latch. “What the hell are you still doing here?” He stepped back, helping a drenched Tilly down the steps.
“Waiting for hell to freeze over.”
“Didn’t you see the storm coming?”
She nodded. “I thought you’d let me in when it started to rain.”
“I thought you’d leave,” he said, holding up his hand. “Stay there. I’ll get you a towel.”
He left her standing at the threshold, looking like a drowned rat. He should have known. The woman rarely took no for an answer. She had to be one of the most stubborn, pigheaded women he’d ever met. Glancing out the window, he searched for a break in the clouds, but all he found was more darkness.
After getting a towel, he ducked into his room and snagged a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. She’d swim in them, but it was better than the wet dress she currently had on.
“You can change into these.” He tossed her the towel and the clothes, ensuring he kept a safe distance. His heart pounded against his chest, reminding him of how she’d destroyed it.
“Thank you,” she said, ruffling her tangled blond locks with the towel as she breezed by, leaving a scented trail of honey and fresh pineapple. She’d been the hottest and most popular girl in high school, and it wasn’t because she was rich.
It was because she was as sweet as home-baked cookies and had a big heart. He’d known her his entire life, having grown up at the same country club. As children, they took swimming lessons and played paddle tennis against one another. For themajority of their lives, they’d been friends. Not close friends, since they didn’t really hang out together outside of the club, but close enough.
His stomach rumbled. “Tilly, have you eaten dinner?” he yelled toward the bedroom.
“No, but I wouldn’t want you to go to any trouble. I mean, you would have let me drown.”
He chuckled. “Trust me, I’m not bending over backward for you. But I have to eat.” He told himself he’d feed her while they waited for the storm to pass, and then he’d send her packing. He’d just have to make her understand there was nothing left for him at home.
He pulled out all the ingredients he needed to make a pan-seared grouper with asparagus, which she hated and that made him smile. God, he was an asshole. He took the knife and started chopping the garlic when she stepped into the galley wearing his T-shirt and shorts. They hid her perfect body with their bagginess, but she was still the sexiest woman on the planet.
Razor-sharp pain tinged his finger.
“Fuck,” he muttered, dropping the knife. He stared at his hand. A few drops of blood trickled from his index finger.
“Let me do that. You always put too much garlic in anyway.” She moved him to the side with her warm, sexy hands. Memories of them roaming his body pelted his brain.
He should have been a real prick and not let her in. He cleaned up his wound, put a Band-Aid on it, and heated up the skillet.
She stood next to him, slicing and dicing before reaching across him and dumping the onions, garlic, and other seasonings in the pan with a dash of olive oil. Her hair brushed his shoulder. In college, when they had lived together, they enjoyed cooking together. They moved in the kitchen, muchlike synchronized swimmers cutting through the water with precision.
“I’ll finish up. Why don’t you go sit down at the table?” He needed to put some distance between their bodies and clear the teenage hormones from his mind. Over the years, he’d run through various potential conversations he might have with her, none of which included cooking fish together.
