“Me? Never! He’s arrogant and rude, and besides, I’ve half sworn off men anyway.”
“Did I tell you that I like you already?” Teri asked, as she wrapped her arm around Allie’s shoulders and squeezed. “Don’t forget to come by the salon! We’re right next to Hula Coffee.” Teri spotted a young man, barely older than a teenager, crossing the yard. “Oh, there’s Mason. I have to talk to him about the paint job he’s going to do next week. Will you be all right here on your own?” Teri had a mothering quality about her. Allie thought it was kind of nice, being looked after.
“I’ll be fine,” she said.
“If you get lonesome, come on and find me.” The sincere look in her eyes couldn’t be missed. “I only moved here five years ago. I remember how it feels to be the new girl on the island.”
Allie felt surprisingly glad for the offer. “Thanks, Teri.”
Allie took another big swig of her mai tai as she turned her attention back to the girls still swooning over Dallas. He didn’t do much to discourage them, she thought. Maybe the rumors were right. She watched for a few more seconds and then decided it was impolite to stare. She’d hate for Dallas to get the impression she cared one way or another.
She still couldn’t believe he’d cheated on his fiancée. Then again, part of her could. Unfortunately, her opinion of men had gone downhill since Jason. She pretty much thought any of them were capable of severe disappointment. Especially the dangerously handsome ones.
It was as if they were too sexy to have to learn the difference between right and wrong. Walking toddlers, the lot of them, using their charisma carelessly on anyone who stumbled into their path.
She took another drink and glanced around the yard. It was spacious and wide, and didn’t have a fence. Kai’s aunt’s house boasted a sliver of an ocean view, the same as Dallas’s half of the estate, and the water sparkled darkly under the light of a big full moon.
A mature mango tree grew near the house, and Allie recognized it as the one with a low V of branches, the one she and Kai would climb all the way to the near top. She realized it was probably all of fifteen feet tall, but then, when she was just five, it seemed like ten stories high. She saw Kaimana suddenly walk near the tree, paper plate heaped high with smoked sausage from the grill.
“Kaimana!” Allie called, just in time to see the older woman turn and stare. She quickly chewed the remainder of her bite and then bustled off toward the back door, as if trying to escape. Maybe she was. “Kaimana! Wait!”
But she sure could move fast for a seventysomething woman wearing a muumuu and orthopedic sandals. Kaimana had ducked inside the house before Allie had made it halfway across the backyard. When she got to the patio door, she found it locked.
That tricky old lady! She’d locked her out!
Unbelievable. First the fake language barrier and now this. Allie got the distinct impression Kai’s aunt really didn’t want to talk about Misu’s land. Well, it didn’t change the fact that she was the only one standing in the way of selling her share. Allie needed to talk to her whether she wanted to or not. Allie whirled on her foot, ready to stomp around to the front, when she nearly ran into a wall.
She looked up in time to see the broad chest she’d almost hit belonged to Dallas McCormick.
“Looking for someone?” Dallas’s lip quirked up in a knowing smile, and right then, Allie thought he and Kaimana might be conspirators working together to keep her little paper unsigned.
“Uh, no. Just looking for the food.”
“As it happens, I’ve got an extra plate.” Dallas was carrying two full plates of barbecue, potato salad and something that looked like sliced mango. “I thought you might be hungry.”
Allie glanced around, wondering where his throng of admirers had gone, and that was when she saw a few of them standing by the barbecue pit, eyeing her with interest. Had he really just ditched his fan club to offer her a plate of food? She looked at the potato salad with suspicion. Why was he being nice? The man who shut off her shower wasn’t nice.
“Why? You trying to poison me?” Allie glared at him with suspicion.
“Ouch. Maybe I deserved that,” Dallas admitted. “It’s a peace offering. I promise. No poison.”
She looked at the food suspiciously and then back at the ladies near the barbecue pit, who were trying not to outright stare.
“Come on, Allie,” Dallas coaxed. “I’m trying to say I’m sorry.”
“You shut off the water to the shower!”
“I turned it back on right away.”
He had? That took Allie completely off guard. She’d just assumed it was off, which was why she’d been bathing with bottles of water in the kitchen sink for two days.
“You did?”
“You didn’t notice?” Dallas threw back his head and laughed. “I wouldn’t be such a bad guy that I would seriously not let you shower. I just wanted to make a point. Besides, as I recall, you did say please.”
Allie’s face burned with embarrassment. Why hadn’t she checked? She’d...just assumed the worst. God, what a fool!
“You should have said something!” Allie folded her arms across her chest and glared.
Dallas just laughed more. “How? You weren’t talking to me!”
Touché.
Allie’s anger faded a bit. So Dallas hadn’t left her stranded without water out of spite like she’d thought. She’d been the one who assumed he had.
Allie glanced again at the ring of girls watching them and whispering. She suddenly felt like the new girl at school talking to the star quarterback.
“Look, let’s agree to a cease-fire, okay?” Dallas offered. “You can go back to stomping on coffee cherries tomorrow. But right now, let’s just eat and pretend we’re not going to kill one another.”
Dallas’s warm smile softened Allie a bit, but not enough.
“I’m not all that hungry,” Allie said, and then her stomach growled loudly.
“You’re a terrible liar.” Dallas chuckled. “Either you take the plate or I feed it to Poi, and I’m not sure that pup can handle all this potato salad. Not to mention, Kai and Jesse will be pissed if I tell them you fed their food to the dog!”
“How do I know you didn’t spit in it?” Allie eyed the plate with some disdain.
“Honestly. You go shut off a girl’s water for fifteen minutes and she starts to think you’re a criminal. You stepped on my coffee plant first.”
“You deserved that.”
“Maybe I did.” Dallas shoved the plate toward Allie. “Eat, would you, woman? Kai’s awesome barbecue is getting cold. That’s a crime against...barbecue.”
Kai gave her a wave from the grill, and Allie realized she was trapped now. Reluctantly, she took the plate. The smell of the food wafted up to meet her, hearty and good. She took a bite, and the barbecue melted in sweet goodness on her tongue. She almost forgot that Dallas was watching her every bite, his blue eyes studying her mouth. She felt a charge of tension between them, but chalked it up to the fact that she wanted to sell her share of the land, and he didn’t. Tension would be part of everything until that was settled.
“So how do you and Kai know each other?” Allie asked.
“Everybody knows Kai, but he’s a good friend, yes,” Dallas said. “He was the very first friend I made on the island. I had this crazy idea to go surfing, though I’d never been. I headed into some pretty atrocious