Flirting With Temptation (10 page)

The folks at White Sands might be rich, but most of them were still polite. Babette had the sudden recollection of Kathy Bates in
Fried Green Tomatoes
, when those two girls stole her parking space. If it weren’t for loving Sylvia, and for probably not having nearly as much insurance as Kathy Bates’s character had in that movie, she’d ram that Jag into oblivion too. Then she’d bet the valet guys
and
the brunette would notice. As it was, she did love Sylvia, and she only had liability coverage, so she simply glared at the woman’s back as she exited her car and entered White Sands.

And wouldn’t you know it, both valet attendants had suddenly disappeared, one in the Jag and the other with the brunette. So Babette waited for
someone
to notice the fuming redhead growing hotter and hotter every second, not merely because Sylvia had a pitiful excuse for an air conditioner and needed a serious Freon fix and not because the temperature outside was nearly a hundred, but because Miss Rude Jag Lady had thoroughly pissed her off.

Chapter 6

I
t was probably a good thing that it took a while before Sylvia was rather reluctantly taken by a valet attendant. By the time Babette had entered the White Sands lobby and checked in, the Jag woman was nowhere to be seen.

“Yoooohoooo!”

Immediately recognizing the owner of the shrill scream, Babette pocketed her condo key and turned toward the voice she remembered so well. “Hey, Ms. Nettles. How are you?”

“Good Lord, I don’t care if it has been a long time since you’ve seen me, you best call me Rose.” The elderly woman wrapped her shawl—a shawl, in one hundred degree weather—around her bony shoulders and quickly entered the lobby as though she actually resided at White Sands, instead of at Sunny Beaches, the retirement resort next door. Sunny Beaches wasn’t nearly as nice as White Sands, but then again, the places set up for retirement typically weren’t. But it was nice enough, and even nicer because of all of the sweeties living within its walls.

Rose’s knee-high stockings didn’t quite reach the end of her floral skirt, and one was two shades darker than the other. She had a seashell-embellished comb holding back one side of her soft white hair and her eyes twinkled as though seeing Babette had unquestionably made her day.

“Come on, let’s take a walk and chat in private,” she said, ushering Babette back out the door she’d just entered.

“Wouldn’t you rather come up to my room and visit there?” To Babette, an air-conditioned room sounded intriguing, particularly since she’d sat a while in Sylvia waiting for the valet guys to remember there were other customers besides the brunette in the Jag. Plus, Babette was curious to see the room Kitty had provided.

“Wouldn’t
you
rather walk on the beach while we’re chatting? You haven’t been here in ages, and I’m betting you missed it.”

Babette grinned. “Good point.”

Rose shuffled down the sidewalk, then glanced back toward the valet attendants. She took a few more steps, then cupped one hand around her mouth and whispered, “I was sitting on my front deck and saw that uppity bitch in the Jaguar cut you off. Of all the nerve.”

Babette snorted. Rose had to be eighty if she was a day, but Babette had to hand it to her; she was still pretty quick when it came to speaking her mind. Babette had missed her visits to Florida, and now she realized she’d also missed her visits with Rose.

“I thought you’d jump out and take her down, and I was coming to help,” Rose continued.

“I appreciate that,” Babette said, holding back the urge to laugh; the woman was dead serious. “But I decided I didn’t want to start a fight on my first day.”

“We could’ve taken her,” Rose said, lifting one shoulder as she made the proclamation, then readjusting her shawl when the motion caused it to slide down a notch. “I got all excited when I saw your car turning in, kind of assumed that’s what you came down here to do, start a ruckus. That is why you’re here, isn’t it? To finally take back what’s yours? But are you just going to start one with her, or are you down here to go after all of them?”

“ ‘All of them’?” Babette had no idea what Rose was talking about. All of the people at White Sands? No, she didn’t plan to start a fuss with the most affluent residents in Destin, because that was who stayed at White Sands, the top dogs. Babette suddenly realized how much more comfortable she had always been at Sunny Beaches than at White Sands. She’d spent quite a bit of time visiting with Rose and her friends. Maybe it was because many of the Sunny Beach residents reminded her of Granny Gert, or maybe it was just because she liked older folks, but in any case, at Sunny Beaches, she was in her comfort zone. At White Sands, not so much.

But being uncomfortable didn’t mean she would pick a fight with all of the place’s inhabitants. “Contrary to popular belief, I don’t think all of the people who stay there are snobs, and no, I don’t plan to fight them all,” she said with a grin.

Rose shook her head and frowned. “That’s not what I meant. I’m talking about her, and I’m talking about all of the other ones.”

“All of the other ones?”

“Jeff’s dates,” Rose said flatly. “She’s the most recent, but he doesn’t see any of them for long, so she should probably be gone pretty soon. A different one every couple of days, I’d say, and all of them hanging all over him like he’s their last chance to procreate.”

Babette’s stomach lurched.
All of them
. She inhaled, exhaled thickly.
A different one every couple of days
. There were two main reasons those statements bothered her. One, she was supposed to get Jeff back with Kitty, but Jeff had obviously moved on, and on, and on. And two, the thought of Jeff with
all of them
stung.

“That woman in the Jag,” Babette finally said, removing her sandals and opting to carry them, primarily to keep her hands occupied. For some reason, she had the wild impulse to fist them. “She’s with Jeff?”

“You’ll see in a minute.”

“How’s that?”

“His balcony, silly. And all those windows. I swear the boy should really use some privacy every now and then.” She paused. “But I do enjoy looking.”

“Rose!”

Grabbing her shawl at her chest, Rose shrugged. “I haven’t seen anything beyond kisses, and I’m mainly just trying to get him to quit.” She walked a little faster, scooting her black thick-soled shoes along the sandy wooden planks of the walkway that provided beach access. “He hasn’t got any business seeing so many females. I told him.”

“What did you tell him?” Babette walked beside the woman who had proven, once again, to be an endless fountain of knowledge regarding all things Jeff Eubanks. Rose really cared about Jeff, and Jeff had an affinity toward the older woman too. He’d told Babette as much on several occasions way back when. His own grandparents had passed on when he was young, and Babette suspected that Rose Nettles was the Granny Gert he never had.

All of them
. Why did that bother her so much, after all this time?

“I told him that he didn’t need the poodle and that he should get over her anyway.”

Rose’s comment took Babette’s attention off how thoroughly Jeff had moved on.

“The poodle?”

“Poodle, kitty, whatever. Always reminded me of one of those show dogs, pretty to look at and able to strut, but no spunk to complete the package.”

Babette laughed. Kitty would undeniably have issues with an eighty-plus woman spying on her when she was with Jeff and then referring to her as a real bitch.

“And I told him he needed to get back with the one he should’ve stayed with in the first place.” Rose pointed to Babette, and Babette knew better than to argue. “And then I told him that if he was actually sleeping with all of those floozies that I see on his balcony every night that he better be using protection. And then I bought him some, to make sure he did.”

“You—what?”

“Bought him some. I admit that I had a little fun with it, considering I went to the same pharmacy that fills my water pills. You should have seen the look on that young pharmacist’s face when I picked up my regular prescription and a case of condoms. Did you know they come in flavors now? And you can get different colors too. They’ve even got a camouflage one, and you know what it says on the outside?”

Babette was speechless, so she merely shook her head.

“So they can’t see you coming,” Rose said, then her cheeks flushed and she giggled. “Get it?”

“You bought Jeff condoms,” Babette said disbelievingly. She only wished she could have seen his gorgeous face when Rose presented him with her gift. “What did he say when you gave them to him?”

“Well, he said thank you, of course. He’s a polite boy, after all.”

“Rose, he’s thirty-eight.”

“Like I said, a polite boy.”

The thought of Rose presenting Jeff with condoms—a case of them—was hysterical. Laughing, Babette stepped off the end of the ramp to the beach, but her feet had barely sunk into the warmth of the sand before Rose grabbed her arm and yanked her off-balance, causing Babette’s calves to bank against the end of the walkway and her butt to drop to the sandy planks.

“Wait!” Rose said, her voice at an urgent whisper. “I wasn’t thinking. We need to go this way.” She pulled on Babette’s arm until Babette stood beside her, then she tugged Babette away from the walkway and into the shady area between the edge of the condominiums and a cluster of palm trees. “Under here.”

“Rose, what are you doing?” Babette asked, and to her shock, Rose put her palm over Babette’s mouth to shush her the same way Babette’s mother used to do in church, when she was talking too loud during the sermon. The scent of Rose’s lilac lotion suddenly overpowered Babette’s senses. It might have been pleasant if it wasn’t so solidly pressed against her airways. She moved away from the intrusive hand, then sputtered, “I have to breathe, Rose.”

“Shh, he’ll hear you.” Rose, looking every bit the elderly spy woman now, jerked her head to indicate the resort next door, or more specifically, the man lounging on his balcony.

“What”—Babette’s words stilled in her throat. It’d been a long time since she’d seen Jeff, and even seeing her brother-in-law on a fairly regular basis didn’t prepare her for his twin, sitting on the balcony, a laptop resting on his thighs as he worked with his feet propped up on the rail. The breeze from the Gulf teased his sandy waves, which had a few more sunstreaks than she remembered, and his skin was a bit darker than before too, with a richer, surfer’s tan that made those highlights in his hair stand out even more.

He straightened a bit, and Babette wished she could see his eyes, but he was too far up for her to know whether he was looking in her direction or at the computer screen. However, from the way he was sitting, and the way his hands didn’t move on the keyboard, she’d guess he was looking right at her.

She backed against the building. “Rose, he’s looking.”

“Nonsense,” Rose said. “He’s working. He doesn’t know we’re down here. Trust me, I do this all the time.” She put her weight on one foot and leaned forward. “That is one fine tribute to the male gender. I swear, if I was fifty years younger . . .”

Babette grinned. Rose was right; the only way he could have been looking directly at them is if he were actually watching for them, which he wasn’t. He was working. Besides, even if he saw them, chances are he wouldn’t recognize Babette. It’d been a while since he’d seen her, and she’d had a black bob then. He wouldn’t be expecting her in Florida, nor would he expect the red hair. She was safe to stare.

So she did.

He wore a royal blue pullover with khaki shorts, and his feet were bare. He looked like he’d been plucked out of a Kenny Chesney video, one of the muscled, too-good-looking-for-his-own-good guys hanging out on a sunny day at the beach without a care in the world, except for the laptop saying that this guy was no beach bum; he was a beach businessman, and he was still the sexiest one Babette had ever laid eyes on.

His hands moved over the computer, long fingers tapping against the keys, and Babette relaxed a bit more. He definitely wasn’t looking at them, and she undeniably wanted to stare a little longer. His jaw was set as he looked at the computer monitor, and his mouth quirked to the side as he typed, as though he were pondering the next thing to enter on the screen. It was a sexy quirk, and it reminded her of how good those lips had felt, nibbling intoxicating kisses against her mouth, and her neck, and . . .

“Here she comes.”

Rose’s words coincided with the appearance of the brunette on the balcony. She said something, and Jeff turned toward her. Even though Babette could no longer see his mouth, she had a side view of his jaw, and it relaxed as though he were smiling.

She felt cheated. She wanted to see that smile too. That smile had always held the power to make Babette forget—forget what she was saying, forget what she was doing, forget everything but how much she wanted that smile, and that man.

The brunette moved closer, ran her fingers through his hair, then leaned toward him and whispered something in his ear.

Babette wasn’t used to playing voyeur, but she was used to reading people, and the brunette’s body language said one thing. She wanted sex. Or, more specifically, she wanted sex with Jeff. Babette didn’t like all of the emotions going through her at the moment. Rage at the woman for cutting her off this afternoon. Irritation at herself, for allowing Rose to take her into her little spy hollow. And finally, another emotion that really didn’t suit Babette’s traditionally apathetic mentality toward relationships. A very green emotion that she couldn’t deal with at all, because if she were jealous over the brunette touching him, what would she do when she convinced him to go back to Kitty—for good?

She’d deal with that when the time came.

He turned slightly away from the smiling woman on the balcony, and Babette thought that their free show was blessedly ending.

She was wrong.

He placed the laptop on a nearby patio table and then stood, leaning his back against the railing and simply waiting for her to move toward him, slowly, like a tiger sizing up prey, and smiling as she progressed. Again, Babette couldn’t see his face, couldn’t even see his jaw now, but she knew he was giving the woman that sexy smile.