Lorelie Brown - Riding the Wave

Except he’d seen it. The quick flash that gave her away. “Holy crap, you have.”

Then she genuinely laughed. “God, not like that. Don’t make it any more than it is. You’re Sage’s brother and I already have to keep up-to-date for market research. That’s it.”

He tucked the towel a little more snugly around his hips and looked out at her from under his brow. Was she really so relaxed, or was that her pulse fluttering wildly at the base of her throat? “You sure about that?”

In half a second, her eyes went wide and her lips parted on a quiet gasp. “Oh gee, Tanner. Don’t make me say it. How I’ve always felt.”

He couldn’t help but step forward, close enough to smell her sweet fragrance. “How’s that?”

“I’ve felt—” She rose up on her toes. The wash of her breath sent goose bumps down his neck. “I’ve felt like you were a huge jackass with an ego too big for your own good.”

With a giggle, she patted his cheek, then swished her way out of the room. Her ass twitched with each step she took, laughter echoing along behind her.

Tanner couldn’t help but chuckle as she walked away. Yeah, he’d deserved that one.

He tossed the towel onto the rack by the shower and stepped into the glassed enclosure. Water struck him from both sides, steaming away the stiffness of a morning of surfing. More proof he wasn’t as young as he used to be.

Hell, maybe he even needed to think about settling down. Damned if he’d hook up with a chick as smart-mouthed as Avalon, though. He knew what was good for him, and it wasn’t listening to crap like that for the rest of his days.

Not once since she was fourteen had Avalon been nervous walking up the front path of the Wright residence. They’d been her second home, her saviors. The very first time she’d spent more than two nights in a row had been when she’d been sixteen and her mom took off for Bakersfield. No one in her right mind willingly went to shitty, landlocked Bakersfield, never mind to follow a boyfriend who had to be back in time to make a parole check-in. But Candy took off with barely more than four hours’ warning. The fact that Avalon had midterms the next week hadn’t meant anything to her.

So she’d crashed on Sage’s floor.

Eventually the “guest” bedroom had morphed into hers. First a spare toothbrush in the upstairs bathroom, then extra clothes for after surfing.

The whole time she kept expecting her mom to raise a fuss. Claim the life she’d made and was supposed to raise. But Candy hadn’t.

Avalon had become part of the Wrights in everything but name. When things had gone wrong with Matthew, her postcollege boyfriend, and Avalon had found herself without a place to live after she’d been dumped, she’d been welcomed back without even a question. She’d luckily been close enough to help when Hank died. Hell, she’d been there last night, left this morning. It was only that she was arriving in time for Tanner’s party that made anything odd.

Which meant that standing on the front stoop smoothing down her skirt with damp palms was ridiculous. Asinine.

Unavoidable.

Her heart seemed ready and willing to thump its way out of her damn chest, never mind her need for it. She really had to get her mind off Tanner’s body. The man had no shame at all.

God, she was fucked up, but she was beginning to like him for it.

He was completely and totally assured of his place in the world. She could do with a little of that. Though most of the time she was sure she hid it well, it felt like she was scrambling. Trying to grab at what she could get, not what she deserved. Like she’d snag scraps while no one else was looking.

Even she knew it was what was wrong with her photography. That missing spark had to do with her. She couldn’t get too mad at Tanner earlier today because—while she’d hoped he’d adore her photos—she hadn’t been surprised at all when he hadn’t.

That train of thought killed the frothing waves in her stomach easily enough. Walking into the house became nothing. So what if she saw Tanner? It was his welcome-home party; he was bound to be there eventually. Instead she found Eileen and Sage bustling around the kitchen, putting together trays of vegetables and pitchers of drinks.

Eileen dropped baby carrots and opened her arms to Avalon. “Baby! I heard, I’m so proud of you.”

Stepping into Eileen’s hug was one of the easiest things in Avalon’s world. She smelled faintly of patchouli from a holistic antiarthritis cream that she swore by but it wasn’t enough to be overpowering. A tiny reminder that Eileen wasn’t always the businesswoman she’d had to be to run a surf store for twenty years.

She closed her eyes and sucked up the comfort. Let her bones unclench for a moment. When she’d hugged Candy the other day, it hadn’t felt like this. They’d been all inflexible angles and stiff shoulders. That almost made her more sad.

Chasing Tanner all over Southern California meant she hadn’t had a chance to talk to Eileen about the assignment. “You don’t mind?”

“Mind you following my handsome son around for over three weeks? Not at all.” She leaned back, her smile lit with easy relaxation. Tiny wrinkles fanned out from the pale eyes both her children had inherited. “Slip me a few that I can put up on my walls and I’ll make that chocolate turtle pie you like so much.”

“Pinkie swear?”

“Of course.”

Sage poured blush wine into glasses, then pushed two across the counter. “Celebration time.”

She smiled past the prickle at the back of her eyes. This was home. These were the people she’d do anything for. Even if it meant coping with Tanner or, more specifically, not letting him get under her skin. Tanner would eventually leave for the circuit. She needed this family.

“I probably shouldn’t,” she protested but a glass of wine might relax the knot of nerves between her shoulder blades.

Eileen kept trying to teach her how to relax and let go. She wasn’t exactly the type. Three hours later, when the house was crowded with people and her cheeks were tired from holding a smile, she’d had enough.

She’d been following Tanner around—of course—and he’d been completely working the room. Chatting, laughing, talking surf conditions with old buddies. Some of the guests had been on the pro circuit with him for years, and some he hadn’t seen in almost a decade. He treated them all with the same strangely empty surface cheer.

Framing him between the targets of her lens, it was almost like she saw him differently from everyone else. She wondered if anyone could see the odd buzzing within him, the way the corners of his eyes tightened every time he looked away from whomever he was talking to.

When he walked by a cabinet filled with his father’s old surf trophies, it was like a low-level bomb went off under his skin. His shoulders went sharp and hard, the back of his neck flushed faintly red.

She snapped off a few shots.

Tanner was back to ignoring her again, but that was fine too. She liked it better that way. At least then she wasn’t picturing the heavy sweep of his muscles, the sleek tendons that dove down his ribs to his waist. A vein to the left of his hipbone. God, that had been a yummy view, one that had made her mouth water. Inappropriately. Her mouth watered inappropriately over a photography subject.

She had to keep that line up. Somehow.

People were used to her buzzing around parties with a camera in hand. Hardly anyone even asked about the fact that Tanner was her target. She didn’t mind that. There’d be enough fallout and behind-the-back whispering once her spread hit SURFING .