Here Comes Trouble Page 0,54
ruefully, amazed that she could still discover things that made her feel ridiculously stupid all over again. How had she ever been so blind?
And how had it taken a renegade professional poker player of all people to make her see that? She couldn’t imagine living under the same roof as Brett for ten days, much less ten years, and not have him know every last detail about her. And vice versa.
Crap. She was wasting precious time. She had—she glanced at her watch—twenty-five minutes to overhaul and find a balance with her internal psyche as well as her entire outward appearance. “Yeah. I’m not holding out much hope for that,” she muttered under her breath. She collected her clipboard, notes, and pens, and then headed back to the house.
Twenty-four minutes later, she walked down the front steps wearing freshly pressed, much nicer khakis, a pink-and-cream-plaid long-sleeve blouse, and had tied her hair back with a piece of gingham ribbon. She might have even made an attempt at mascara. Possibly there was a light smear of lipgloss as well. She felt like a complete idiot. It was the grocery store. Not exactly a date. And he’d surely seen her looking far worse. In far less. In fact, she’d always looked far worse.
She imagined him watching her approach, being highly amused at the trouble she’d gone to, possibly assigning all kinds of meaning to it that she certainly hadn’t intended. Was it wrong to not want to look like a garden troll when going shopping at the local food mart?
Then she rounded the path out to the parking area…only to see him standing next to his bike. He was wearing black jeans and what looked like a freshly pressed long-sleeve, dark green shirt, buttoned up over a short-sleeve white T-shirt. He was freshly shaven and smiling. At her. She found herself smiling, too. But more nervous than if he’d shown up in ratty jeans and a faded sweatshirt. Because now they were both being amusing. And she didn’t know quite what to do about that.
Then he held out a helmet.
She slowed her steps. “I—assumed we’d take my truck. Where would we put the groceries?”
Now his smile was amused, but she found she didn’t mind so much.
“We’re just feeding the two of us, right? We can fit whatever we get in the saddlebags.”
She glanced at the bike, remembering now the gear bag he’d stowed in one of the side compartments. “Right.”
He lifted the helmet in her direction. “Ever ridden on one before?”
She looked from the black helmet to him, then to the bike. The big, black, beast of a bike. “Uh, no, no I haven’t. Never had the opportunity.”
His smile spread. “Well, we can fix that.”
She took the shiny black helmet out of his hands and then turned it to see what was on the back. “Playing cards?” She didn’t really know much about card games, much less poker, but she knew enough that the two cards emblazoned across the back of the helmet didn’t seem to make any sense. “A queen of diamonds and a three of hearts.” She looked at him. “Do they mean something, or are they just symbolic?”
“Those are the cards I won my first bracelet with.”
She frowned. “What kind of bracelet?” She looked at the cards. “And what kind of game wins with a hand like that?”
His smile spread to a grin, maybe a hint of cocky there for the first time. Only it was kind of adorable on him. “Exactly.”
“I meant with only two cards, but you meant…oh, you bluffed, didn’t you?”
“Biggest one of my life.”
“And…it paid off. With a bracelet?”
“Super Bowls have big gaudy rings, boxing and bull riding have big gaudy belts. We have big gaudy bracelets.”
“Do you ever wear it? Wait, you said the first one. How many do you have?” She lifted her hand before he could reply. “Never mind. None of my business. No probing questions.”
“You can probe all you like. I’ll answer anything you want to know. But I’d rather you just get to know me. I’m more than what I do. Or used to do.”
“You don’t play at all anymore?” She smiled and shook her head. “Sorry, I can’t seem to help myself. But isn’t that how people get to know each other, asking questions?”
He took the helmet from her hands and stepped closer until she had to look up to keep hold of his gaze. “I can think of at least a dozen questions I’m dying to ask you, just