“I have a solution,” Mac said. “I don’t like it—in fact, I hate it. I need to be here, working with you on the deal to purchase the team. But it’s all I can think of...”
“Well?” Quinn demanded, impatient.
“I need to get out of the city.”
Kade tapped his finger against his chin. “Yeah, but any fool can see you are more badly injured than we say you are. We got away with lying once, only because the injury was brand-new, but we can’t keep shoveling that story. Your eyes are dull, you can tell you are on hectic painkillers.”
“I’ll stop the drugs,” Mac insisted.
“Now who is being stupid?” Quinn demanded.
“Last night you hadn’t taken the proper pain meds and you looked like a walking corpse,” Kade said. “The point is that people will notice and that will lead to complications. I think your instinct is right. It’s best for you to leave. We can tell Myra, the press, anyone who cares that you are taking an extended vacation.”
Mac swore. “I have no idea where to go. There’s nowhere I want to go.”
“The chalet in Vail?” Quinn suggested.
“No snow, and even if there was, I couldn’t ski. Torture.”
“An African safari?”
“Done that.” God, didn’t he sound like a spoiled brat?
“What about the Cap de Mar property?” Kade persisted.
He’d already considered Puerto Rico and he’d immediately dismissed that idea. Too hot, too isolated, too sexy...
“Are you nuts?” Mac rolled his eyes.
“No,” Kade replied, his voice calm as he ticked off points on his fingers. “Not big on ice hockey so you’ll be able to fly under the radar. Two, there’s sun, sea and beaches...where’s the problem? Three, you love it there. Four, Rory will go with you and she’ll do her treatment there.”
A vision of Rory dressed in nothing more than four triangles flipped onto the big screen of his brain and he shuddered with lust. This wasn’t a good idea. The property was empty, the cove would be deserted, he and Rory would be alone and living together. Whenever he thought of Cap de Mar he thought about sunny days and sensual nights, warm, clear seas and sex...
“You have to go, Mac,” Kade said, deeply serious.
Mac knew it was a reasonable option. Hell, he’d brought up the idea of leaving. But he couldn’t help feeling like he had as a kid. Powerless over his situation.
“My life sucks,” Mac grumbled.
“Yeah, poor baby. You’re heading for a luxury house on a Caribbean island with a hot chick.” Quinn mocked him by rubbing his eyes like a toddler. “Boo hoo.”
Mac still had the use of his good arm. A well-placed punch to Quinn’s throat would relieve a lot of his frustration.
Kade ignored Quinn. “I like the idea of you heading to the beach house for all the reasons I mentioned and one more.”
“Uh-huh?”
“Nobody will know where you are so you’ll be free of the media.”
“Always a bonus,” Mac agreed.
“And if something happens between you and Rory then they won’t pick up on that either,” Kade added.
Mac held Kade’s mocking glare. Okay, yeah, of course that was a factor. He would try to resist her but his willpower where she was concerned wasn’t a sure thing.
“It’s not going to happen,” he said, but he wasn’t sure whether he was trying to convince his friends or himself.
Quinn laughed. “You’re going to take one look at Rory in her bikini and be all ‘let me show you the view from my room.’”
A punch to the throat would definitely shut Quinn up and would make Mac feel so much better, he mused.
“Sorry, I’m late.” Rory picked up her e-reader from her coffee table and shoved it into her tote bag.
“We’ve got time.” Mac, standing by the window, looked at his watch. “Not a lot but some. And if the jet misses its time slot, we’ll just request another.”
Private jets and time slots. Rory tried not to look impressed. But she was. She was traveling to the Caribbean in style. Rory tried to think calmly. She’d done most of her packing last night but she’d thought she’d have time to finish up this morning. Thanks to Troy’s mom going walkabout from her nursing home, that hadn’t happened. She and Troy had spent three hours looking for her and had eventually tracked her down in a garden center sitting on a bench between two cherry trees. Rory was glad Troy’s mom was okay but her temporary disappearance had put a serious dent in Rory’s schedule.
“Passport and credit card,” Mac told her. “You can buy anything else you need there.”
So spoke the man with far too much disposable income, Rory thought. She held up her hand in a silent gesture for him to be quiet. She needed to think, and him standing in her little apartment, looking so hot, wasn’t helping. All she could think about was that she was leaving the country with a sexy man who just had to breathe to turn her on.
Her eyes dropped to his arm, which rested in a black sling. He was injured, she reminded herself.
You could go on top...
Rory slapped her hand across her forehead.
“Tell me about Puerto Rico,” Rory said, hoping the subject would distract her from thinking about straddling Mac, positioning herself so that...argh!
“It’s an island in the Caribbean,” Mac replied.
“Don’t be a smart-ass. Tell me about the house where we’re staying.”
Mac leaned his shoulder into the wall and crossed his legs at the ankles. It was so wrong that he looked at home in her apartment, like he had a right to be there. “The house is situated about thirty-five minutes from San Juan, on a secluded cove near only two other houses. It’s three stories, mostly open-plan and it has glass folding doors that open up so you feel like you are part of the beach and sea.
“The owners of the other two properties are off-island at the moment so we’ll be the only people using the cove.” Mac added.
Rory swallowed at the low, sexy note in his voice. She’d be alone with Mac, on a Caribbean island, with warm, clear water and white beaches and palm trees. Utterly and absolutely alone. She wasn’t sure whether the appropriate response was to be thrilled or terrified.
Or both.
Sex and business don’t mix! He’s your patient!
Sun, sea, sexy island...sexy man.
Get a grip, Kydd. Not liking the cocky look in his eyes, the glint that suggested he knew exactly what she was thinking, she lifted her nose. “Well, at least we won’t disturb the neighbors with your screams of pain when we start physio.”
“Or your screams of pleasure when I make you fall apart in my arms,” Mac replied without a second’s hesitation.
Rory’s heart thumped in her chest but she kept her eyes locked on his, refusing to admit he rattled her. Instead of making her furious, as it should, his comments made her entire body hum in anticipation. Her body was very on board with that idea.
Rory folded her arms and rocked on her heels. “I hate it when you say things like that.”
“No,