Falling For Gracie

Riley. Just his name made her body tense and her heart rate quadruple. She was going to have to figure out a way to counter her reaction to him. They were only together to figure out what Zeke was up to. She had a feeling that given the choice, Riley would rather spend the evening with a known mass murderer than her. Any attraction on her part was a really bad idea.

She stuffed her feet into sandals and headed for the front of the house. The light patter on the roof told her the rain promised by the local news had arrived. She picked up a windbreaker and then searched out her purse and keys.

Seconds later lights swept across the front window. He was here.

She didn’t know if she should run for cover or boldly step into the night. She settled on waiting for him to knock on her front door.

“Hi,” she said as she pulled it open, then was grateful she’d done the speaking thing before seeing him.

God, he looked good. Like her, he’d dressed all in black, but his T-shirt didn’t advertise anything beyond the chiseled muscles of his chest and the narrowness of his waist. Raindrops winked from his slicked back hair as if bragging about their close proximity to the man himself.

“Ready?” he asked as he brushed off his bare arms. “You have a coat. Good. It’s really raining.”

She found herself more than tongue-tied. She felt frozen in place, as if her feet had somehow become completely stuck to the foyer tile. She might never move again. Centuries from now archeologists would unearth her and put her still upright body in some natural history museum with a little notice beside her on the wall saying they couldn’t explain what she was doing, either.

She forced herself to breathe and then to speak. “Are we, um, taking your car?”

“I’d rather.”

It was fine with her. She didn’t feel up to driving. She doubted she was capable of much more than involuntary bodily functions at this moment. She wasn’t just overwhelmed by her attraction to Riley, but also by the unfairness of the situation. She’d been gone for so long and had gotten on with her life. Was it too much to ask that she be able to come home for a few weeks and not make a complete fool out of herself?

No answer crashed through the heavens, so she grabbed her purse and her keys, turned out the living room light and stepped into the cool, damp, night air.

Riley led his way to his car—a sleek, silver Mercedes that still smelled of new car and high-end leather. She slid onto the passenger seat and tried not to think about the fact they were going to spend the next who-knew-how-long together. Confined.

In some circles this could be considered a date. Of course in some circles she would be considered a menace to society and in desperate need of counseling.

“Why aren’t you staying at your mom’s house?” he asked.

“I thought about it, but I need the space for my work. I tend to be a night owl and a lot of people don’t appreciate noise from the kitchen at 3:00 a.m.”

He backed out of the driveway, then glanced at her. “Do I remember something about cakes?”

“Wedding cakes. They’re very fancy. I also do cakes for showers sometimes, but most people aren’t willing to pay that kind of money except for the actual wedding.”

“How much are we talking about?”

She shrugged. “I’m working on a shower cake right now. It’s fairly ornate and will serve fifty. I’m charging a thousand.”

The car swerved slightly. “Dollars?”

“I’ve found it really helpful to keep my prices in U.S. currency. It saves confusion.”

“For a cake?”

“A really good cake.”

“But still.”

She smiled. A lot of people reacted the way he did. Those who wanted something incredibly special and totally handmade were willing to pay the price.

“How many cakes do you make a year?” he asked.

“Less than a hundred. Of course wedding cakes are more expensive, but they take longer. I do okay, but I’m not getting rich. I won’t until I decide to expand, which I’m not sure I want to do. I like having total control.”

As she talked he drove through Los Lobos. “You know where Zeke lives?” she asked.

“I’ve been there a couple of times.”

“I have his license plate,” she said, digging in her purse for the information Alexis had given her.

Riley nodded at the windshield. “If this rain gets worse, we won’t be able to read it from any kind of distance.”

He pulled onto a side street and slowed. Gracie had only been by her sister’s house once since returning to town, so she had to check out numbers to figure out which one it was.

Riley turned off his lights and cruised to a stop across the street. He pointed. “That’s Zeke’s SUV.”

She peered through the windshield. “Is it black?”

“Dark blue, but in this weather, anything dark is going to look black.”

“Okay.” She leaned back in her seat. “Now what?”

Riley glanced at her. “We wait.”

She’d known that, of course. That’s what stakeouts were all about. Waiting. But thinking about it and actually doing it were two different things. Not only did Riley make her nervous, she found it really difficult to sit still. He sat there, immobilized, watching the house, while she shifted in her seat, stretched out her legs, fussed with her jacket, then tugged on her Dodger cap.

“You going to settle down anytime soon?” he asked, never taking his attention from the house.

“I’m settled. I just can’t get comfortable.” She sat up straighter in the seat. “I’ve been accused of fidgeting, but I don’t understand how people can sit there like lumps. It’s not natural. It’s—”

“There,” Riley said, cutting her off and pointing.

Sure enough Zeke hurried out of the house toward his SUV. Gracie instinctively sank down in her seat and shielded her face.

“I doubt he can see you through the rain,” Riley said dryly.

“I want to be sure,” she said. “Keep your voice down.”

Riley grinned. “You’re taking this too seriously.” He started his engine and waited until Zeke pulled out before shifting into gear and following him.

Riley might think they were safe, but Gracie stayed slumped in her seat until it became obvious Zeke was heading directly to the freeway and not trying to lose anyone.

“Where do you think he’s going?” she asked as she shifted into a more comfortable position. “And what’s he up to? If he’s not seeing another woman, the possibilities are endless.”

“Please don’t list them,” Riley said.

She glanced at him. “I wasn’t going to.”

“One never knows with you.”

She bristled. “Excuse me,” she said, turning toward him as much as her seat belt would allow. “You don’t know me at all. Your impressions and assumptions come from my actions when I was barely fourteen years old and whatever you picked up reading that stupid series of articles. Until yesterday you’d never had a conversation with me or spent any time in my presence.”

“We talked when you threw yourself in front of my car and begged me to kill you if I was going to marry Pam.”

She felt heat flare on her cheeks and was grateful for the darkness. “That wasn’t a conversation. I talked, you got in your car and drove in the other direction.”

“Good point. So you’re saying I should give you a chance.”

“I’m saying you shouldn’t judge me or assume anything until you’ve gotten to know me better.” Then, suddenly aware he may not want to get to know her better, she pointed. “He’s getting on the freeway.”

“I can see that.”

Riley accelerated smoothly, keeping up with Zeke’s car. When they were on the freeway, he backed off a little. Unfortunately another SUV moved right in front of them, blocking Zeke’s vehicle from view.

“There’s so many of them,” she said as she looked out the side window.

Sure enough, they were surrounded by SUVs. Sort of like a weaker force being taken by a bigger enemy.

“Keep his license plate number handy,” Riley said. “We’ll need it if we get separated for very long.”

She waved the piece of paper she held. “I have it right here.” Another SUV cut them off. “Maybe we should have bought one of those homing devices. We could mount the little display thingie and then just follow the red dot to wherever he’s going.”

She felt Riley’s gaze on her.

“What?” she demanded. “I’ve seen it in the movies. It’s not as if I own one and use it on unsuspecting prey.”

“I can’t be sure with you.”

She leaned back and deliberately turned away from him. “That’s what I meant about not judging me. I made a reasonable suggestion and you jumped on it.”

“You thinking putting an illegal tracking device on someone’s car is reasonable?”

“You really think it’s illegal?”

“If it wasn’t raining so hard and I didn’t have to watch the road, I swear I’d be banging my head against the steering wheel.”

Genuinely baffled, she blinked at him. “Why? What did I do?”

He made a whimpering sound she wasn’t sure she’d ever heard before.

“Are you married?” he asked. “Do I have to worry about some burly guy showing up and trying to beat the crap out of me?”

“I’m not married, although I’d like to point out that anyone I did marry would completely understand my need to help my sister.” She liked the faint touch of indignation in her voice, then nearly passed out as a thought occurred to her. “Are you?”

“Nope. Pam cured me of wanting anything long-term. Since her, I’ve kept my relationships strictly superficial.”

Gracie wanted to ask more questions, but she spotted something. “Is that his car? Look. That dark SUV is exiting the freeway.”

She glanced around for a sign and saw they were coming into Santa Barbara.

“What could he be doing here?” she wondered aloud.

“We don’t know that it’s him. I can’t read the license plate, can you?”

She squinted. “No. You’ll have to get closer.”

Riley tried, but they missed the signal at the bottom of the off-ramp and had to hurry to catch up with the other vehicle. They shot through the intersection only to see it turn left up ahead.

“Go, go, go!” she yelled.

“I’m going.”

They followed the other car through a residential neighborhood and watched it pull up in front of a two-story house.

She couldn’t believe it. What was Zeke doing here?

The front door opened and a young child dashed out into the rain. “Oh, my God. He’s not just having an affair. He has a whole other family. It’s just like those Lifetime movies.”

“Not exactly,” Riley said as he pointed.

The driver had stepped out of the SUV and walked around front. Gracie relaxed as she saw a small, curvy woman reach down and pull the child into her arms.

“Oh. I guess we lost him,” she said, feeling both foolish and relieved.

“You think?” Riley turned around in the narrow street and headed back the way they’d come. “I should have let you drive. You’re the professional.”

She raised her eyebrows and looked at him.

He had the nerve to grin. “It’s true,” he told her. “Okay, I’ll back off. It’s nearly seven-thirty and I haven’t had dinner. Want to grab something before we head back?”

She couldn’t have been more surprised if he’d morphed into a leopard man. Okay, that would have surprised her more, but not by much.

“You mean dinner?” she asked, trying not to sound too stunned by the invitation.

“It’s the generally accepted meal for this time of day, but if you’d prefer something else, I’ll see what I can do.”

Her stomach clenched and for once it had nothing to do with acid. Her big eating plan had been her usual tuna salad that she generally had five nights out of seven.

“I, um, yeah. That would be great,” she said calmly.

She wanted to open the window and scream out into the night, but instead she contented herself with a little inside shimmy and a very big smile. Dinner with Riley. Talk about a great ending to a good day.

* * *

RILEY CHOSE A restaurant on the water and, despite the rain, Gracie found it far too romantic. If only she’d worn something different. Something sexy and flirty and... Oops. As they were shown to a booth by the window she had to keep reminding herself that this wasn’t a date and that Riley wasn’t interested in her in that way.

They were, um, friends, maybe. Former acquaintances brought together by a common goal—to find out what Zeke was doing when he stole away at all hours.

“You’d think she’d just ask him,” she said as she was seated.

Riley settled in his chair and raised his eyebrows. “What?”

“What? Oh, sorry. Thinking out loud. Just my sister and the problem she’s having with Zeke. Why doesn’t she just ask him? She says it’s because she doesn’t want to know, but isn’t knowing better than not knowing? I’d want to know. At least then you have something you can handle. But this nothingness is just too much like being left in the dark. Don’t you agree?”

He shook his head. “I lost the thread somewhere.”

“It doesn’t matter.” She picked up her menu but instead of looking at it, she stared out into the storm.

Rain pounded against the windows. Below she could see the angry surf smacking into the shore. Lights from the restaurant offered a feeble glow that quickly bled into the darkness.

“What a fabulous night,” she said.

He raised both eyebrows. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No. I love storms. Hey, I live in Los Angeles where we get all of nine inches of rain a year. So when there’s some exciting weather going on, I like to enjoy it.”

He glanced out the window. “This is nothing. I’ve been on an oil rig in a typhoon. That’s weather.”

His statement made her instantly want to ask a thousand questions. Was that where he’d been? How on earth had he gotten there when he’d started out in Los Lobos? But she settled on, “I thought they evacuated rigs during bad storms.”

“Oh, we’re supposed to go, but who’s going to enforce the rules? I worked for a small private company. Everyone on board was a little crazy.”

“Including you?”

He grinned. “Especially me.”

The waiter appeared and told them about the specials.

“How about some wine?” Riley asked.

“Sure. You order.”

“What are you going to have?”

She scanned the menu and picked a grilled salmon dish with a house salad. Riley chose a surf and turf, then surprised her by ordering an Australian Shiraz.

“I thought you would have gone fancy and French with the wine,” she said.

“I like Australian wines. Spanish as well.”

“There are some great local vineyards around here. The whole Santa Ynez valley is covered with grapes.” She started to say they could go on a tasting trip sometime, but stopped herself before the words formed.

This was Riley, she reminded herself. This wasn’t a casual dinner with a guy she liked. This was...dangerous.

“So,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “How did you get into wedding cakes?”

She smiled. “The basic need for transportation. I was sixteen and I wanted a car. My aunt and uncle insisted that I contribute to the gas and insurance part of the equation, so I had to get a job. There was a local bakery a couple of streets over and I applied there. When they hired me, it was late May and wedding cake season was in full swing. I received a baptism by fire. But it turns out I had a real talent for making and designing cakes. Instead of college, I apprenticed with a master baker, then went out on my own.”

She shrugged. “I tried to be a little well-rounded. I’ve taken some night courses on running a small business. I’ve been playing with the numbers as far as expanding. I’m at that awkward place where I’m having trouble getting everything done, so I’m turning away business, but I’m not sure I would have enough to support a whole other person.”

“Maybe you could get by with just half of one.”

“There’s a thought.”

They were practically alone in the restaurant. The only other couples were seated on the other side of the dining area. With the storm still raging outside, there was a sense of isolation. Between the lashing rain and the flickering candles, it was pretty darned romantic.

Gracie found herself wanting to rest her chin on her hands and stare dreamily at Riley while he talked, just like in those really old silly teen movies she’d loved as a kid. The dim light suited him, bringing out the shadows in his face and emphasizing the strength of his jaw and lines of his cheekbones. But it was more than that.

All those years ago she’d loved him from afar, but she’d never really known him. They hadn’t had a single conversation. Her affections had been based on her own rather twisted feelings and fantasies, not the man he was. After all this time, it felt good to know that so far, she liked the person inside.

The waiter brought the wine and a basket of bread.

“Why do they do that?” she asked when he opened the bottle and poured them each a glass.

“Open the wine?” Riley asked. “Someone has to pull the cork out. I’ve tried simply breaking off the top of the bottle, but then there’s the whole shards of glass issue. Not very inviting.”

Gracie rolled her eyes. In the soft lighting the color changed from medium blue to the color of a warm, shallow bay in summer.

While the image was accurate, it made Riley want to give himself a good beating, then go watch sports. A shallow bay in summer? Where the hell had that come from? This was Gracie, the terrorizing stalker. Not a woman he found attractive. And even if he did think she looked pretty hot in her tight T-shirt, she wasn’t for him. The list of reasons was endless, but the three F’s were the most important. Gracie didn’t qualify.

“Not the wine,” she said, ignoring her glass and staring longingly at the basket of bread. “That. Death.”

He frowned. “Bread is death?”

“Not technically, but do you know what a couple of slices can do to a woman’s hips and thighs? That’s where the bread goes. There’s a route directly from the stomach to the fat pockets where hungry little cells scarf up bread and grow round and full.”

“Okay, now you’re scaring me.”

She licked her lips. “You’re a guy. You wouldn’t understand about deep burning hunger for something so incredibly bad for you. Your metabolism allows you to eat the contents of an entire grocery store without gaining an ounce.”

He might be a guy, but he knew all about hunger. If she licked her lips like that again, he was going to have to forget his rules in favor of simply taking advantage of the situation. The three F’s be damned.

“Oh, forget it,” she said and reached for a piece of bread.

He watched her smooth on the tiniest wedge of butter, then bite into the slice. Her eyes fluttered closed, her body relaxed and he would swear she actually moaned. Was it just him or had it gotten hot in here?

When she swallowed, she opened her eyes and smiled. “Excellent.”

“What else don’t you eat?” he asked.

“Bread’s my thing. Okay, and chocolate. I can take or leave most junk food. Jill and I had lunch today at a Mexican place and while I ate a few chips, I could go months without them. But bread....”

She started to take another bite. He had to look away because watching her eat it was too erotic. Bread. What was it with women and food?

“What about your cakes?” he asked, careful to keep his attention on the windows.

“Never touch ’em,” she said. “I used to sample all the time. There was an ugly ten pounds. But once I perfected my secret recipe, I didn’t bother anymore. Sometimes the fillings give me a little trouble, but I do my best to be strong. What about you?”

He returned his attention to her and was pleased to see she’d finished her slice of bread. “I don’t bake.”

“Aren’t you the comedian? I meant what about your life? How did you get from your oil rig to here? And why are you running for mayor?”

“Jill didn’t tell you?”

“You mean my closest and oldest friend for years? Spill a client secret? You have to be kidding.”

He reached for his wine. “Did you ask?”

She smiled. “I know you dated a lot in high school. I was there. Gee, Riley, didn’t you learn anything about women back then? Of course I asked.”

Her complete honesty and good humor intrigued him. All those years ago, he’d never given much thought to Gracie, except to wish her far, far away from him. It wouldn’t have occurred to him he could like her.

“I’m running for mayor to meet the terms of my uncle’s will.”

She tossed her long blond hair over her shoulder and reached for her wine. “That doesn’t make any sense. His dying request was for you to be mayor?”

“Something like that. He’s left everything to me, the bank, the house, his estate, on the condition I prove that I’ve become respectable by running for mayor and winning.”

“And I thought my family was twisted. But it’s a lot of money, right? I mean that’s why you’re doing it.”

“Excluding the bank, the estate is worth about ninety-seven million dollars.”

She’d nearly finished swallowing her wine when he spoke. Even so, she gasped, then started to choke and cough.

“You okay?” he asked, half rising from his seat.

She waved him back. “I’m fine,” she said in a low croak. She coughed again, then reached for her water and took a sip.

“Did you say ninety-seven million dollars?”

He chuckled. “Yes. U.S. dollars. I use them, too.”

“That’s an incredible amount of money. I love my uncle more than I could say but all he left me was a small three-bedroom house in Torrance.”

“With no strings.”

“True, but for that amount of money, I’d jump rope with the strings if necessary. So, wow. You’ll be the richest mayor in Los Lobos history. I guess you’ll only want to serve the one term. Then what?”

“I haven’t decided.”

In truth, he wasn’t planning to stay past the election. The will had stated he had to win, but had said nothing about serving out his term.

The waiter came with their salads. When he’d left, Gracie said, “You’re running the bank, too, right? Is that weird?”

“It’s my first desk job. While I was gone, I did a lot of studying in my spare time. I earned a bachelor’s in finance, which helps. Still, I’m constantly on the verge of screwing up. My secretary, Diane, is a big help.”

Gracie’s expression turned knowing. “Diane, huh?”

“She’s a treasure. In her sixties, still wears tweed suits. Bosses me around like crazy.”

“I would never have thought you were the kind of man who enjoyed being dominated by women.”

“Diane is very special.”

The light turned Gracie’s hair to the color of gold. He liked how easily she laughed and how she seemed to take very little seriously. Her body moved in such a way that he could easily imagine her naked and wet. Just thinking about it...

But he couldn’t think about it or do anything about it, he reminded himself. Under other circumstances, with him clearly explaining the rules, maybe. But not here. Not in Los Lobos where everyone knew everyone else’s business and he had an election to win. She might be sexy and pretty and completely charming but there were ninety-seven million dollars on the line. For that price, he could keep his horny thoughts to himself.

“What are you thinking?” she asked. “You’ve gone all serious.”

“That we could never do this in Los Lobos.”

She glanced around the restaurant. “Agreed. People would talk about nothing else for weeks. My life, our lives, would be a living hell.”

“I’m getting the better deal, though.”

“What do you mean?”

He smiled. “I’m the one dining with a legend. The infamous Gracie Landon who knows how to love with her whole heart.”

Her gaze narrowed as her hand shot forward. She grabbed a roll and threw it at him. Riley laughed as it bounced off his chest and tumbled to the floor.

“If they could see you now,” he teased.

She picked up her fork and stabbed a piece of lettuce. “You’d better watch yourself. You have a very nice car and I still know where that skunk lives.”