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  “I would have a more chaotic office, I suppose.”

  “You know I’m the best office manager you could ever have.”

  “Maybe.” I sighed. “And I do love you.”

  “I know you do.”

  Taylor dragged me along to the front door, pushing it wide as she pulled me into the heat and humidity of downtown Houston, Texas. I held my face up to the sky, thinking it would sure be nice to spend my two-week vacation on a beach somewhere. Just me, the sun, and soft, silky sand under my butt. What a lovely thing that would be! But I already knew I wasn’t going to get my wish—at least not the way I wanted it.

  These things I let the people I love drag me into!

  Chapter 2

  Valerie

  “It’s for a good cause, Val. And I’ve already rented a condo on the beach, so it won’t all be work.”

  “The beach? Really?” Taylor asked, leaning a little too close to Scott. “Will you be staying there, too?”

  “Of course. It’s my rental.” Scott barely glanced at Taylor as he turned his attention back to me. “Just a week. That’s all I’m asking. We should have a permanent doc there fairly quick, then you can take off and enjoy the rest of your vacation.”

  “The last time you said that, I ended up extending my vacation more than a month because the new doc got scared off and you couldn’t find anyone to take his place.”

  “That won’t happen in Mexico. Especially this part of the country. It’s far from all the gang stuff going on close to Tijuana and the Gulf. We shouldn’t have any of those kinds of issues.”

  “That’s what you always say.”

  I reached up and dragged my hair off my neck, my eyes moving over Scott’s face. He was a handsome man, a fact even I couldn’t ignore. He had blond hair and blue eyes, a dark scruff on his jaw and chin. He kind of reminded me of a young Ryan Phillippe. At thirty-two, he still had a little boyishness about his looks that was slowly beginning to fade in the new wrinkles developing along the corners of his eyes. I liked the wrinkles, thinking it gave him a new matureness that added to his all-American good looks. It surprised me a little that he was still single. A man who looked like him—and worked for a nonprofit bringing medical care to the indigent—was a walking dreamboat. But he was a busy man, and picky when it came to the women in his life.

  “You know I wouldn’t do anything to put you in danger, Val,” he said, dropping a wink in my direction that nearly made Taylor fall out of her chair.

  “Enough work talk!” Leesa announced, smacking her son’s hand lightly. “If I won’t let Jacob do it, then you two can’t, either.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Scott said, lowering his head in a respectful gesture toward his mother. “I’m sorry.”

  I caught a funny look on my father’s face as he regarded the two of them. I touched his arm, a questioning look on my own face. He shrugged, pulling his attention back to the plate in front of him.

  It wasn’t until later that I found out what that look was about. He pulled me aside in the living room as everyone wandered in for after-dinner drinks. Slipping a glass of brandy into my hand, he stepped close, studying my face.

  “Don’t go to Mexico with Scott.”

  “Why not?”

  He glanced over my shoulder to where Taylor was still working hard to get Scott’s undivided attention. “Because I’ve recently learned a few things that I think suggest that things are not as they seem with GME.”

  I glanced over my shoulder, too, watching as Taylor touched Scott’s arm, trying to keep him from walking toward my father and I. GME was Scott’s nonprofit: Generation Millennial Endowment.

  “What’s going on? Is he having problems with his donors? Legal problems?”

  “It’s more complicated than that. I just… Don’t go, Valerie.”

  There was such deep concern in my father’s voice that I couldn’t ignore it. I touched his arm, moving closer to him so that we could speak comfortably without being overheard.

  “Is it Scott? Is he in trouble?”

  “I just… I believe there’s going to be trouble in the near future. I don’t want you getting caught up in it. That’s all.”

  “If Scott’s in trouble—”

  My father made a motion, his face a sudden mask of caution. A second later, Leesa draped an arm over my shoulders.

  “What are we doing over here? Telling secrets?”

  “Like I could have secrets from you. The second I tell him something, he tells you.”

  She smiled, blowing a kiss at her husband. “That’s the way it should be.”

  But that look of concern stayed on my father’s face the rest of the night.

  “Tell me you’re coming,” Scott said as he walked me to my car a few hours—and a few too many drinks—later.

  “You don’t need me.”

  “You are the only one I know who can help put this clinic together in record time.” He took my hands and pulled me toward him, that little pout to his full lips that he knew I couldn’t ignore. “You’re a brilliant doctor. Don’t these kids deserve the best?”

  “For a week?”

  “Better than not at all.”

  “Scott…”

  “It’s been six months since you and I have spent any quality time together. I have to leave for this place in less than twelve hours.” The pout came out again. “We could lounge on the beach, hit a few nightclubs, have a good time after the clinic’s running smooth.”

  “But will it be running smooth? Scott, I really need a vacation!”

  “I know. I promise this one will be different. My team is already down there, already putting things together. All we have to do is a little administrative stuff, and if you could see a patient or two…”

  “How can you say no to that?” Taylor asked, sidling up beside me. “He’s so sincere. And he said I could come, too.”

  “Sure,” Scott said, his eyes brightening at the thought. “Bring whoever you want. We’ll make a big party of it.”

  I glanced back at the house, thought I saw my father watching from the window of his study, but the curtains fell into place like they’d only been disturbed by the air-conditioning vent. I looked at Scott again, thinking of the people his GME had helped and the people it could help in the future, of all the good he’d done—that we’d done together. I sighed. What kind of person says no to helping thousands for the selfish reason of taking a little time off?

  “Okay. But I work for only a week.”

  “Thank you!” he cried, throwing his arms around me before I could finish speaking. “You’re the best!”

  I laughed as Taylor jumped in, squealing like a five-year-old who’d just been told she was going to Disneyland. This was my life. I was surrounded by adults who acted like they were five-year-olds on their way to Disneyland.

  Chapter 3

  Oliver

  “You’re a friend of Alejandro?”

  “We met in Huntsville, at the diesel shop.”

  The man studied me as he wiped his greasy hands on a rag that looked to be more greasy than his hands were. He was a stereotype of the Mexican gangbanger, with the droopy jeans, the white undershirt—a wife-beater—and the bandana around his forehead. The only difference between this guy and the movie-costumed character actor was the fact that this guy wasn’t part of any gang. He was a twenty-something business owner with a couple of small children running around his machine shop.

  “What’d you do to get into Huntsville?”

  “Vehicular manslaughter.”

  His expression remained neutral, but he continued to study me like I was some sort of bug under the toe of his shoe. “When’d you get out?”

  “Last year.”

  He nodded slowly. “Alejandro gets out next month. At least that’s what they’re saying now. This is the third date he’s been given.”

  I nodded, burying my hands in the front pockets of my jeans. “Yeah, I know how that is. I had four dates.”

  “State of Texas.�
�� He spat on the ground. “You know your way around an engine?”

  “Sure. They taught me real good up there.”

  He nodded slowly. “You on parole?”

  “No, man. Served all my time.”

  “No one’s going to come down here looking for you? Can’t have trouble around here. This is a legit business.”

  “No; no one’s coming to find me. No one gives a shit.”

  He nodded again, studying me with even more interest than before. “Okay. I’ll give you a couple of days. Do good work, and you can stick around. Screw up, and you’re out the door. Got it?”

  “Sure, man. I got it.”

  “I don’t need trouble here. As much as I love my brother, I won’t put my family in danger even for him. Okay?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He nodded once more, his eyes moving over me like he was trying to convince himself. Finally, he offered me one of his greasy hands. “Miguel Reyes.”

  “Oliver Winn.”

  “Welcome to Pochutla, Mr. Winn. Do you have a place to stay?”

  “I have friends.”

  Miguel’s eyebrows rose slightly, but then he clearly decided he didn’t want to ask. He gestured for me to follow him into the shop. “I’ll show you around. Then you go and get some rest. I open at seven and I don’t follow the old siesta rules, so you’ll be working hard, and you’ll be working straight through the day.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

  ***

  I walked down the old dirt road, watching some kids kick around what I initially thought was a ball but later realized was the remains of a goat’s head. The bones had yet to bleach white, the sinew their mother or grandmother hadn’t used for whatever stew she’d made with it still sticking to the thick bones, taking on the color of the red dust they were kicking it around in.

  This freedom to just walk down the street was still new to me. I kept glancing over my shoulder, expecting a guard in a gray shirt to come rushing after me, demanding to know what the hell I thought I was doing wandering around out here on my own. I’d done the two years that judge had given me, every minute of it. I could have gotten out after eight months and served the rest on parole, but I wasn’t interested in that. I wanted a clean break from the whole ordeal. I got that. But I hadn’t expected this mental prison I’d put myself into. It was a constant looking over my shoulder, an inability to deal with soft beds and total darkness; it was relearning how to make choices… Once you got used to being handed your meals three times a day, it was difficult to look at a menu and decide which would be better, steak or chicken.

  Damn good thing I had the money, and the appetite, to choose both.

  I saw a familiar face at the corner, his expression darkly serious. He backed away when he saw that I’d seen him, backtracking into the cantina where we were supposed to meet. I stepped inside, the cool of the room refreshing after the heat of the early-summer afternoon.

  “You get the job?”

  I nodded, taking a seat across from him at the small table. He pushed a beer in my direction, not handing it to me, but pushing it with just his fingertips. I picked it up and took a long swallow, closing my eyes as I remembered all the late-night discussions with my cellmate over the desire to taste this amber liquid again.

  “They arrive in Oaxaca tomorrow morning. They’ll be staying down at Puerta Angel, but working at the clinic here in Pochutla. She’s bringing friends: a blond woman and a man. And she’ll be in the company of the head of GME, Scott Powell.”

  “The pretty boy? I remember that part.”

  “Good. We don’t know when this will all go down, so you’ll have to keep an eye out.”

  “Not a problem. The shop is right across the street from the clinic and there are big windows that look right into the exam rooms. I should be able to see everything.”

  My companion nodded, glancing out into the street where the boys continued to kick around the goat’s head. “He needs this to go smoothly, Oliver.”

  “Tell him not to worry. I’ve got it under control.”

  He nodded, but I could see there was still concern on his face even though he tried to hide it from me. I didn’t know him well. We’d only met a few weeks ago, in fact. But I could read body language, and I could read in his body language that he didn’t trust me.

  Did it matter? It did. To me.

  “I won’t let him down.”

  Chapter 4

  Valerie

  The beach spread out in front of us like a Photoshopped dream. The sand was a lovely golden brown, the water so blue it didn’t seem real. The water moved gently, almost like a river licking the shore, the current so tame that I couldn’t wait to dive in. I couldn’t have found a more perfect beach in Tahiti or the Bahamas.

  “What did I tell you?” Scott asked, moving up beside me and rubbing his bare shoulder to mine. “Perfection.”

  “Where are all the people?”

  “They don’t get a ton of tourism down here. And the locals are all preoccupied with working for a living. You won’t see a ton of people on these beaches.”

  I studied the water, watching the birds play on the small waves, and sighed. “This is perfection. You were right.”

  “What? Is Valerie Cole actually admitting someone besides her is right? This must be a miracle!”

  I slapped his arm. “Shut up, Scott! I don’t always have to be right.”

  “Sure, you do. Don’t you remember the red-rose incident at Mom and Jake’s wedding? Or the lemon zest in that stupid chocolate pie? Or the—”

  “Okay, okay, I get it. I’m opinionated.”

  “Is that what you call it? I call it always-need-to-be-right-itis.”

  I kicked a little sand on his legs as I walked off. “Maybe you have a little of it yourself and that’s why I irritate you so much.”

  “Or maybe it’s just the whole being-bested-by-a-girl thing. I am a man, with a man’s ego, after all.”

  “Isn’t that the truth.”

  I dropped my towel and yanked my shirt over my head before heading out into the water. I sighed as my feet sank into the cool sand. I closed my eyes, my thoughts flowing to memories of summers with my dad in Galveston, of trips to California and Hawaii, to other beaches and other moments of summer bliss. I’d always loved the beach more than anything else in the world, always loved vacations that included cool ocean water. My dad understood that and we’d made some incredible memories on some of the best beaches in the world.

  It’d been a long time since I’d visited a beach.

  “I think I’ll get married on a beach!” Taylor announced as she ran into the sea, splashing water up onto my sun-warmed legs. “This beach. It’s amazing!”

  I opened my eyes and watched as TJ rushed up behind Taylor and lifted her into the water, hefting her out into a deeper part of the bay. I laughed as she yelled at him for messing up her hair, then tried to trip him in return.

  “Children!” I called. “Don’t hurt each other.”

  “Hurt? Hell, that looks like fun,” Scott said near my ear just before he picked me up and thrust me into the water.

  “Oh, you’re dead!” I cried the moment I got my feet under me again. Scott laughed as I ran after him in the thigh-deep water, splashing and kicking up sand and water. He turned a few times, tossing handfuls of seawater at me as I chased him, dodging his attacks. When I finally caught up with him, I jumped up, wrapping my legs around his waist as he fell sideways, dragging us both down into the water.

  “You’re vicious, Val,” he said, rolling so that I was pinned underneath his body in the water, my ass sinking in the sand. I picked up a handful of sand and smeared it over his chest, laughing at the horrified look on his face. “You’ll pay for that,” he said a split second before he shoved my head under.

  When he let me up, he was on his feet and nearly back to the beach. Taylor was laughing, chasing after him, trying to get him to come back and play some more. Scott ignored her, snatchin
g up his towel and marching across the sand back to the parking lot where we’d left the rental.

  “What’s that all about?” TJ asked, coming to plop down beside me.

  “Scott doesn’t always play well with others.” I leaned back and wet my hair, slicking it against my skull. “He doesn’t like it when someone else gets the better of him. Been that way all his life.”

  “Seems a little childish. Not quite the guy Taylor’s been bragging on all these years.”

  I rolled my shoulders. “I let it go a little too far, that’s all. I’m sure he’ll get over it.”

  TJ frowned as he watched Taylor gather her things and head to the car too. “Should we go with them?”

  “Why does it have to ruin our fun?”

  I got up and held my hand out to him. The moment he was on his feet again, I yanked, trying to tip him off balance. He saw it coming, turning my momentum on me in a little maneuver that allowed him to pull me into his chest and lift me up, tossing me over his shoulder. TJ was a lot stronger than I’d ever given him credit for. A second later, I was flying out into the deeper section of the bay, laughing so hard that I nearly swallowed a gallon of salty water.

  There was childish and then there was childish.

  ***

  Scott brought a glass of wine to me, slipping it into my hand as he went to the rail to look out toward the ocean. The condo he’d rented was about a mile from the beach, far enough away to want to drive to the beach, but close enough that the gentle sound of the waves would reach our open windows.

  “We okay?”

  He glanced back at me. “We’re always good.” He came over and sat beside me, taking my hand between both his and kissing my fingertips. “I’ve just… I’m sorry about earlier. I’ve been under a touch of stress.”

  “Work?”

  “Lots going on.”

  I turned toward him in the Adirondack chair, my light blanket falling over the side as I did. “Talk to me, Scott. What’s happening?”

  “There’s been some trouble at GME. Something about missing money and misappropriated funds… I don’t know all of it, but the powers that be are talking about investigations and possibly legal trouble.”