Dreaming of Love (33 page)

Amy looked down at the slinky black dress the girls had put her in earlier that evening. They were always trying to sex her up.
One look at you in this dress with these fuck-me heels and Tony’s gonna be all over you
, Jenna had said while Jessica and Bella shimmied the dress down Amy’s pin-thin body
. Fits like a glove. A sexy, slither-me-out-of-this glove,
Leanna had added
.
They’d pushed her into a chair, plied her with wine, and sometime later—Amy had no idea how long, because the alcohol had not only made her body go all loose and soft, but it had turned her brain to mush—they were in the bar with the men, and with her friends’ confidence, she’d actually begun to believe that she might be able to pull off being übersexy for a night. Her mind might be foggy, but she’d caught a few words while the girls primped her into a hot, racy woman she didn’t recognize. Her friends had thrown out words like
sexy, hot, take him
as if they were handing out doses of confidence.

Now she tugged at the hemline of the dress that barely covered the thong they’d also bought for her and insisted she wear. She wiggled in her seat, uncomfortable in the lacy butt floss. She should probably give up even trying and just let the new job change her life. Move to Australia, where she’d be too far for any relationship with Tony, and be done with it, but every time she looked at Tony, her stomach got all fluttery. It had done that since she was six years old, so she was pretty sure it wasn’t going to change.

 Caden, Pete, Jamie, and Kurt must have taken Jenna’s whispers and hot stares as a cue, because they headed up to the bar, and Jessica, Bella, and Leanna scooted closer to Amy and Jenna.

“How about you put those puppies away before the guys over at that table drool into their drinks,” Leanna said to Jenna while glaring at the three handsome, leering men sitting at the next table. They finally looked away when Bella shot them a threatening stare.

Jenna wrestled her boobs into submission with an annoyed look on her face. She always acted annoyed about her boobs, but Amy knew it was a love-hate annoyance. Jenna wouldn’t be Jenna without her boobs always trying to break free.

“Look at our men up there at the bar.” Bella wiggled her fingers at Caden. “Pete has his eyes on the drooling men. Kurt and Jamie are eyeing Leanna and Jessica like they’re on the menu, and Tony...”

“
Your
men,” Amy corrected her. “Tony’s not mine, and he looks mad, doesn’t he?”

“Sexually frustrated, maybe. Not mad.” Bella took a sip of her drink. “But you’ll fix that tonight. I mean, be real, Amy. Who tells a girl to
behave and be careful
whenever she goes out if he’s not interested? Why would he care? And not just that—he always adds that you can text him if you need him and he’ll come running. Just. Like. Always.”

Amy couldn’t stop the exasperated sound that left her lips. “You read my texts?” That was the only way she could have known that Tony always offered to be there if she needed him.

“Duh. Of course I did. Consider it a recon mission. I had to know what we were dealing with here from his side.” Bella had been pulling for Amy and Tony to get together as long as Amy had been in love with him, which was just about forever. She stood and dragged Amy toward the dance floor. “Come on, sweetie. Time to have some fun.”

The other girls jumped up and followed them. Amy sensed Tony’s eyes on her before she caught sight of him watching them. It made her nervous and excited at once. The music blared with a fast beat. Amy’s head was spinning from the alcohol, and as Bella and Jenna dirty danced up and down her body, gyrating with their hands in the air, Amy tried to ignore the rush of anticipation mixing with nervous energy inside her. Leanna and Jessica danced beside them in a far less evocative fashion that was more Amy’s speed, but she could no sooner disengage from being the target of Jenna’s and Bella’s sexual dancing then she could ignore Tony as he moved to the edge of the dance floor. His eyes raked slowly down her body, making her insides twist in delight. His jaw muscles bunched as he slid his eyes around the bar and leveled the leering men at the table a few feet away with a dark stare.

The sexy dancing, the alcohol, and the way Tony was guarding her like she was a precious treasure—his precious treasure?—boosted her confidence. Amy rocked her hips to the beat. She closed her eyes, lifted her hands above her head, and let the music carry her into what she hoped was a plethora of tempting moves.

“You go, girlfriend,” Jenna encouraged her. “He’s not going to be able to resist you. You’re drunk, sexy, and ready for action. What man could resist that?” She wiggled her butt against Amy’s hips.

“Oh, please. He’ll probably
never
reciprocate my feelings, which is why I’m seriously considering the job offer from Duke Ryder.”
Never again, anyway
. Her chest tightened with the thought.

“No, you are
not
.” Bella’s eyes widened as she froze and pointed her finger at Amy, right there in the middle of the dance floor. “You are not going to move to Australia for two years. You’ll never come back to Seaside in the summers if you’re in
Australia
. Can’t you tell Duke you’ll consider nine months out of the year instead of twelve?”

Duke Ryder was a real estate investor who owned more than a hundred properties throughout the world. He was also Blue and Jake’s older brother. Blue Ryder was a specialty carpenter who had renovated Kurt and Leanna’s cottage and built an art studio for Jenna and Pete. He’d since become one of the gang and hung out with them often. Jake was an Army Ranger and mountain-rescue specialist. Amy had dated Jake briefly last summer, but he was younger and too wild for her. And…he wasn’t Tony.

“No, I can’t,” Amy answered. “It’s a full-time position heading up the creation of the new Ryder Conference Center. The conference center is going to be the focus of international meetings with major corporations. I think I need to be on-site full-time.” Amy had worked with Duke on a consulting basis for several years. When Jessica and Jamie had said they were getting married at the Ryder Resort in Boston, Amy had jumped at the chance to help plan the event and work with Duke and his staff again. Amy had known that Duke was negotiating on a property in Australia, but she hadn’t realized he’d sealed the deal until she’d arrived at the resort two days ago and he’d offered her a full-time job as director of operations for the Conference Division Center. She’d never been to Australia, and between all of her friends getting engaged and summer after summer of wasted energy spent on a man who treated her more like an adoring brother would than a potential love interest might, she decided it was high time she made some changes in her life.

Amy tucked her straight blond hair behind her ears and moved her shoulders to the slow beat of the music. “I’m not sure being here for the summer is smart anyway. It’s like torturing myself.” She stopped dancing at the thought of not coming back to Seaside for the summers. Could she really do that? Would she even want to? Could she survive not seeing Tony even if she knew for sure he didn’t want her?

This
was why she had to figure out her life and make a change. She was becoming pathetic.

She sensed Tony’s eyes on her again and forced her hips to find the beat as Bella and Leanna danced closer. “It might be time I move on,” she said more confidently than she felt.

“Move on from Tony?” Bella took her hand and dragged her back toward the table with the others on their heels.

Amy saw Tony’s eyes narrowing as they hurried past. Why was he so angry all of a sudden?

“He’s so into you, he won’t let you go.” Bella elbowed her as they took their seats. “He texts you almost every day.”

“Yeah, with stuff like,
Won another competition
and
Check me out in
Surfer Mag
next month!
He texts me when he’s going to miss an event at Seaside. He doesn’t text me because he misses me or wants to see me.” Tony had started texting her during the summers when they were teenagers, because Amy was the only one who checked her cell phone when they were at the Cape, and at some point, those summer texts had turned into a year-round connection. He’d stopped texting her for a few years when she was in college and he was building his surfing and speaking careers, although she knew the real reason he’d stopped, and it had nothing to do with either. After she’d graduated from college, he’d begun texting again. She hadn’t known why he started up again, and after losing that connection for so long, she didn’t ask. She was just glad to have him back. Since then, she’d become his habit, but not exactly the type of habit she wanted to be.

“It’s not like what each of you have. I want that, what you have. I want a guy who says I’m the only woman for him and that he can’t live without me, like your guys say to you.”
I want Tony to say that
.

Seeing her girlfriends so much in love was what really drove home how lonely Amy had become over the past few summers.

“I think he takes care of you like you’re
his
. I mean, how many guys text to say they saw a kitty pajama top you’d look adorable in if they aren’t gay or interested?” Bella shifted her shoulders in a
Yeah, that’s right
way.

“I’m probably the only woman he knows who wears kitty pajamas. He was teasing me, not being flirty or boyfriendish.”
Was he?
No, he definitely wasn’t. There had been times when Amy had thought Tony was looking at her like he was interested in a more intimate way, but they were fleeting seconds, and they passed as quickly as he’d taken his next breath. She was probably seeing what she wanted to see, not what he really felt, and she’d begun to wonder if she’d really loved him for so long, or if he’d become
her
habit, too.

“You know, he’s never brought another woman to Seaside.” Leanna’s loose dark mane was wavy and tousled. With her golden tan and simple summer dress, she looked like she’d just come from the beach. Her gaze softened in a way that made Amy feel like she wanted to fall into Leanna’s arms and disappear. “And look how he treats you. He’s always got an arm around you, and when you drink too much at our barbecues, he always carries you home.”

Amy wanted to believe them and to see what they apparently saw when he looked at her, but she never had. It was the secret memories of being in Tony’s strong arms that long-ago summer, feeling his heart beat against hers, feeling safe and loved, that made her hopeful there would come a day when they’d find themselves there again. But then her mind would travel to the
end
of those recent nights when she’d had too much to drink and he’d carried her home. When he tucked her into bed and went along his merry way back to his own cottage across the road, quickly dousing her hope for more with cold reality. Whatever they’d had that summer, she’d ruined.

“Exactly, Leanna. That’s why she’s not making a decision about Australia until
after
this weekend,” Jenna said. “Right, Ames?”

“Yes. That’s my plan. I’m going to talk to Tony, and if he looks me in the eye and says he has no interest in anything more than friendship, then I’m going to take the job. It’s pretty stupid, really, because how many times has he had the opportunity to…you know?” She dropped her eyes to her glass and ran her finger along the rim. Amy was as sweet as Bella was brash, and even thinking about trying to seduce Tony and find out where his heart really stood had her stomach tied in knots. When her friends had come up with the idea of seducing Tony, she’d fought it, but they’d insisted that once he kissed her, he’d never look back, and she’d grabbed that shred of hope as if it were a brass ring. Now her fingers were slipping a little.

“Talk? That’s not the plan,” Jenna said.

Jessica shook her head. “So, seduction? You’re going to try?”

“If I can muster the courage.” Amy drew in a deep breath, hoping she wouldn’t back out. As much as she wanted closure, the idea of actually hearing Tony tell her that he didn’t see her as anything other than a friend made her almost chicken out. But she didn’t want to chicken out. She had a great job opportunity, and at thirty-two, she was ready to settle down and maybe even start a family. But that thought was even more painful than Tony turning her away.

Tony set a disconcerting stare on Amy as he moved confidently across the floor with the other guys, heading for their table. Her pulse ratcheted up a notch, as his eyes went dark and narrow. She broke the connection, grazing over his low-slung jeans and short-sleeve button-down shirt, afraid to try to decipher if it was an angry or an interested look in his eyes. She’d probably see only what she really wanted to see anyway.

Big mistake. Now she was even more nervous.

Several women in the bar turned and watched the four gorgeous men crossing the floor, but Amy knew they had to be looking at Tony. She was held prisoner by his sun-drenched skin, sandy hair that brushed his devilishly long lashes, and squared-off features that amped up his ruggedness and made her pulse go a little crazy. She reached for a glass of liquid courage, having no idea whose it was, and drained it as Tony slid in beside her. His thighs met hers, and his goddamn scent made her hot all over again. She grabbed another glass and drained it, and another, until the glasses were all empty and the nervous stirrings in her stomach stilled.

“Since when did you become Beyoncé?” Tony grumbled.

Beyoncé? Was that good or bad? Amy couldn’t form an answer. All she could think about was that no matter what the outcome, after tonight her life would never be the same.

TONY HAD SPENT the last three hours watching men ogle Amy in that damn skimpy dress of hers. What was she thinking, dressing like that? He worried about her when she drank. She was too small to protect herself against unwanted advances, and she exuded sweetness like she was made of sugar, making her an easy target for a savvy guy. And he knew for a fact that Amy Maples was made of sugar—and spice and all things in between that were delicious and worthy of being savored. But that was a long time ago, and he’d spent years making sure Amy was treated as she deserved to be and putting his own desires on the back burner. Or trying to, anyway. He didn’t think anyone else noticed that he could barely hold his shit together when it came to Amy, and he was grateful for that.