Head Over Heels (The Bridesmaids Club Book 3) (27 page)

Sally blushed as she caught Todd’s gaze. Matthew had a one track mind and Todd wasn’t far behind him.

***

Todd didn’t know what was worse - waiting for Sally to change out of her coveralls, or trying to make conversation with her two brothers.

He’d given up on the conversation part ages ago. His suggestion about what to do with the trees had only earned him a slight reprieve. Sean wasn’t too bad. Matthew was terrible. It didn’t matter what Todd said or did, Matthew’s main form of communication involved lots of grunts.

He looked around the auditorium. The chaos he’d walked into a couple of hours ago had disappeared. The props were mostly painted, costumes had been fitted, and Winnie the Pooh had practiced his lines after overcoming a cold.

“Sorry for taking so long.” Sally rushed across to them. She’d changed out of her coveralls and done something with her hair. She looked cute, in an adult, sexy, kind of way that made him wonder why he’d left Bozeman.

The change in her appearance didn’t go unnoticed by Matthew, either. He narrowed his eyes. “Mom and dad are expecting you for dinner.”

“Not anymore. I called them from the changing room. They know I’m going out to dinner with Todd.”

“And dad was okay with that?”

Todd stepped in front of Sally. He wasn’t worried about Matthew losing his cool, he was worried about the gleam in Sally’s eyes. She looked as though she was on the verge of boxing her brother’s ears.

Sally stepped around him and grabbed his hand. “We’re going out for pizza. Dad’s more worried about you.”

Sean coughed into his hand, smiling at the red blotches on Matthew’s face. “You’ve done it now,” he said. “I haven’t seen Matthew blush in so long that it’s almost worth the bribe you paid me.”

It was Sally’s turn to get hot and bothered. “Next time you can buy your own pizza.”

Todd decided enough was enough. At the rate they were going he’d never get Sally alone. They had things to talk about. Things her brothers didn’t need to hear. “We’re going to dinner now. I’ll take Sally home afterward and make sure she’s okay.”

Sean picked up his jacket. “You don’t need to worry about making sure she’s okay tonight. I’m spending the night in her apartment. You can drop her at the door and I’ll look after her from there.”

Todd looked at Sally and she nodded.

“It’s true. When Alastair was assigned to another case, Matthew and Sean decided to move in with me. They won’t leave me alone.”

Sally didn’t seem particularly worried about her brothers’ babysitting duties. She pulled his arm. “Let’s go.”

He glanced at her brothers. They didn’t look happy, not that he could blame them. He hadn’t exactly made a good impression on her family. Drug Lords, murderers, and kidnappers weren’t the type of people you wanted to encourage. He’d brought them all to Bozeman and put Sally in danger.

“Come on. If we don’t leave now, we’ll never get away.” Sally let go of his arm and held his hand instead. “Quick…” She tugged his fingers and ignored the scowl Matthew sent her.

Todd followed her out of the auditorium. Call him shallow, but he enjoyed holding her hand. “You did that well…”

“What?”

“Ignoring your brothers.”

The smile on Sally’s face made his heart thud against his chest. “Thanks. I’ve had years of practice.”

They passed a wall of posters advertising the school production and made their way to the parking lot. “Did you bring your own truck?” he asked.

Sally shook her head. “Sean gave me a ride.”

He led her over to his truck and opened the door. “Excuse the mess. I came straight here after I’d dropped Max off at the ranch.”

Sally slid into the passenger seat and reached for her seatbelt. “How is he?”

“Glad to be home.” He closed the door and moved quickly around to his side of the truck. He was nervous, so nervous that his palms were sweaty and his heart was beating fast. He felt like he was taking Sally on his very first date. “Do you want pizza for dinner or something else?”

“Pizza would be good.”

Todd pulled out of the parking lot. He kept looking for vehicles that might be following them, including Matthew’s truck. “Did you really bribe Sean?”

Sally glanced quickly at him, then stared out the front window. “I knew Matthew was going to be a pain, so I told Sean I’d buy him a pizza if he kept him busy.”

“It didn’t work.”

“That’s because Matthew’s only half human.” Sally grinned across the cab at him. In that moment, he knew everything was going to be okay. “He knows when you’re going to trick him almost before you’ve decided to do it. It’s like he’s got a weird ESP thing going on.”

Todd wouldn’t have minded some of Matthew’s weird ESP thing himself. He wanted to know what Sally thought about him, about them. He wanted to know if they could spend time together, give her brothers something to really worry about.

He was tired of living his life with the single purpose of finding his wife and son’s murderers. How he’d been living his life was killing him. He’d locked himself away from the world, created a wall around his heart that had kept him safe, but lonely.

Mitch Zambezi wouldn’t be making another appearance in his life for a long time. Maybe never. If any of his minions came visiting, he could take care of Sally and himself. He needed to live again, learn to enjoy each day and all it had to offer. It was time to give back to someone else.

“Turn right here.” Sally pointed to the intersection they were approaching. “Antonio’s has the best pizza in Bozeman. It’s there, on the left.”

“Where?” Todd looked at the signs in front of the red brick buildings, hunting for anything that might have the word pizza scribbled across the front.

“Take the first parking space you see.”

Todd looked down the street. It was a busy night. The stores were all open late, restaurants and cafés were full. If Sally’s pizza place was half as good as she’d said, he didn’t like their chances of having a quiet conversation.

He pulled into a parking space and turned the ignition off. “Is this okay?”

Sally unbuckled her seatbelt and nodded. “Antonio’s is across the street and down a block.” She started to open her door.

He needed to do something fast. This might be the best chance he’d get all night to talk to her. But damn, he didn’t know where to start.

“Wait.” He put his hand on Sally’s arm and she turned to face him.

“Have I got paint on my nose?” She pulled the windshield visor down and looked at her face in the mirror. “I can’t see anything?”

“No…there’s no paint.”

She flipped the visor up and frowned. “What’s wrong, then?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I wanted to explain…why I came back.”

“Oh.” Sally sat back in her seat and closed her door.

He took a deep breath. “I missed you.”

Sally’s big green eyes filled with hope. “You did?”

“I did.”

“My bossy personality must have made an impression.”

The wobbly smile on Sally’s lips was almost the undoing of him. “You’re not bossy. You’re assertive. I like assertive women.”

“What about assertive women with lots of animals?”

“I could learn to love them.” He could see the cogs of Sally’s mind working overtime. “But only after an intensive consultation phase that involved massive amounts of bribery and corruption.”

Sally grinned. “I’m good at bribery and corruption. What were you thinking of?”

What Todd wanted to say wouldn’t have worked. Not yet. They needed time to get to know each other, find out if what he felt was what she felt, too. “I’m still waiting for the chocolate cake lesson you promised.”

The relaxed smile on her face disappeared. She bit her bottom lip and he nearly groaned. She was unsure, just as nervous as he was. “Do you want to try it now?”

His breath caught, held spellbound by the shy question she’d asked him. “Umm…” He cleared his throat and tried to focus on chocolate cake instead of Sally’s mouth. If baking lessons came in an x-rated variety, he’d be the first in line. But he didn’t know if what she was offering matched his not so healthy fantasy. “I don’t know if I’ve got the right ingredients.”

Sally leaned toward him, unclicked his seatbelt, and lifted her hand to his chest. He could have handled that. But when her fingertips started making small circles against his cotton shirt, he nearly leaped out of his skin. He hoped like crazy she couldn’t feel how fast his heart was beating or read his mind.

“You’ve got the right ingredients,” she said softly.

She leaned forward and Todd threw every reason why this wasn’t a good idea out of the window. He met her halfway, sinking into her mouth like a man starved of oxygen.

Sally groaned, deepening their kiss until he couldn’t think of anything except pulling her close. He wanted to make love to her, drive her as crazy as he felt.

A sharp rap on his window scared him half to death. He leaped back from Sally and reached for his gun.

Matthew’s scowling face turned white when he saw what Todd had in his hand.

“Oh my God,” Sally said.

Matthew threw his hands in the air and stepped back. “You’d better put that away before you get arrested.”

Todd put the gun away. Fast. He rolled down his window and glared at Sally’s brother. “What are you doing here?”

With the Glock out of sight, Matthew’s courage returned. “I could ask you the same thing. Kissing my sister in broad daylight isn’t allowed.”

Todd looked at the late afternoon sun. “It’s practically evening and we’re not living in the Dark Ages. A man and a woman are allowed to kiss.”

Matthew’s eyebrows rose about a foot off his face. “I know what that sort of thing leads to. You’d better…”

“Matthew, be quiet,” Sally growled from inside the cab. “You’re acting like an idiot. Go away.”

Todd winced. He agreed with Sally, but he could see Matthew’s point of view. He looked at the mutinous expression on Sally’s face, then back at Matthew. “We’re going to Antonio’s for pizza. Where’s your date?”

Matthew’s face lost all of its pissed-off look. “I got dumped for a billionaire.”

Todd blinked. He must have misheard what Matthew had said.

“Nope. You heard right,” Matthew said miserably. “Jacob Green is back in town. If he wasn’t such a nice guy, I’d be pretty ticked-off about now.”

Sally leaned across the cab, resting her head against Todd’s chest as she looked at her brother. Todd’s body headed straight into love-me mode. He just hoped Matthew had lost his impressive powers of observation.

“I can’t believe Linda canceled your date because of Jacob.” Sally wiggled closer to her brother. “How shallow can you get?”

“And get this…” Matthew leaned forward, speaking to his sister as if it was perfectly normal to be having a conversation on the side of the road with a man between them. A man whose jeans were getting mighty uncomfortable. “She told me not to take it personally. She likes me better, but she’s happy to overlook Jacob’s issues with the money he’s got.”

Sally’s mouth dropped open. “She
didn’t
say that.”

“She did.” Matthew looked as though he was settling in for the night. “And you won’t believe what else she said.”

Todd had heard enough. “We’re going for pizza, Matthew.”

“Oh.” A cloud passed across Matthew’s face, and then he smiled. Todd knew the question that Sally’s brother was about to ask. It wouldn’t bode well for a night of baking lessons. “Can I join you?”

Sally didn’t say anything.

Matthew’s green eyes, the exact same shade as Sally’s, widened. Todd had a feeling he’d used the same puppy dog look before. “Come on, Sally. Todd doesn’t mind, do you? It would be a great chance to get to know each other, mend fences, all that sort of stuff.”

Todd didn’t care about mending fences, bridges, or anything else Matthew had in mind. He wanted Sally alone, happy, and preferably naked. Sally buried her nose in his chest and that need got a whole lot harder.

He heard a snuffling sound, almost as if someone was… “You’re laughing?”

She bobbed her head up and down, then looked up at him. Her eyes were as bright as a full moon, laughing at the awkward predicament he’d found himself in.

He sighed. “You want him to come to dinner with us, don’t you?” She nodded her head again and a smile started forming deep in his chest.

He glanced at Matthew. “Looks like you’re having pizza tonight.” The relief on Matthew’s face made Todd feel slightly guilty.

“Thanks. I’ll buy the first pizza.”

There was one thing still bugging Todd. “When did your girlfriend call you?”

Mathew looked a little uneasy. “When I was on my way into town. But don’t worry, I was using the hands-free option on my phone. My life and limbs weren’t in any danger.”

Todd had a feeling they might be soon.

“She called you when you were driving to your date?” Sally sounded annoyed that anyone would treat her brother so badly.

“Not exactly.” Matthew moved away from Todd’s door.