All A Man Can Do. Virginia Kantra

threw her an annoyed look. She smiled back, both challenge and apology bright in those wide gold eyes. Why had he thought life would be simpler in Eden?

      Do the job, he told himself. “You were responsible for closing up?” he asked Mark.

      “Not last night, no. I clocked out around one.”

      “Also alone,” Jarek said.

      The gleam again. “If I’d been in the mood for company, I could have had some.”

      Okay, that was probably true. The DeLuccas were a good-looking family. “So, you weren’t in the mood. Did you drive?”

      “Are you kidding? I live five minutes away.”

      “But you do have a car.”

      “Sure. Right over there by the boathouse.”

      Jarek followed his nod. Parked beside Tess’s tiny compact was a black Jeep Cherokee with dings in the side and mud on the tire guards. Very macho.

      “Mind if I take a look?”

      Tess cocked her chin. “Do you have a search warrant?”

      Jarek understood family loyalty. Hell, he admired it, and the stubborn angle of her jaw, but he wasn’t going to let either one get in his way.

      “Do I need one?” he asked Mark.

      “If I say yes, will you go away and never come back?” Mark met Jarek’s eyes and smiled slightly. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” He gestured toward the Jeep. “Be my guest.”

      Jarek waited for Mark to pull out his keys and slouch ahead along the dock. Tess fell in beside them. The wind flattened her shirt against that amazing chest and plucked at her hair. Jarek caught a whiff of her shampoo, musky and incongruous against a background of diesel, woods and rising water.