Marin County, Drew took the Marin Headlands exit, and they headed west, away from the main road.
It was the night before New Year’s Eve, and Drew had been acting kind of funny all evening, as though he had ants in his pants or something on his mind. She tried not to think about what it might mean.
Because, much as she enjoyed their sexual relationship, the looming complications were stressing her out, and she wanted out before things got too heavy. Drew was too sweet a guy to have his heart broken by the likes of Cass. She was just waiting for the right time to tell him that he had two options with her—strictly sex or nothing at all.
She had to admit that she got an uneasy feeling about this whole situation. She might already be too late in avoiding complications. Drew’s carefully selected outfit, his haircut, their well-thought-out evening together—on top of his antsy state of mind—all added up to trouble.
Drew navigated the car along the narrow road bordering the coast. Cass had been here once before, maybe as a kid. The city was visible across the bay, and as they headed farther out, she knew that even the Farrallon Islands could be seen on the horizon ahead on a clear day.
They passed a picnic area, and Drew stopped the car where the road ended at a scenic lookout point that was uninhabited by other people at the moment. It was one of those rare places near the city where a person could go and actually hope to be alone.
“Been here before?” he asked when he killed the engine.
“Maybe once. It’s been forever, though. What made you think of coming out here?”
He smiled and gave her an odd look. “Get out of the car.”
“You didn’t bring me out here to kill me, did you?”
“Not a chance.”
Outside the car, wind whipped Cass’s hair into her face, and she pulled her leather coat closed tightly, then fastened the top button. She wrapped the red wool scarf that had been draped around her collar a little tighter as she walked to the fenced-off edge of the gravel parking area.
Down below, waves churned against the rocks, and though the sky was a deepening blue as the sun sank lower and lower past the horizon, while the ocean, as always, looked dark and brooding. A couple of seagulls squawked nearby, while a third poked along on the ledge, probably waiting for them to produce some food.
Drew came up behind her and slipped his hands around her waist, pulling her to him and warming her backside. He kissed the side of her neck and nestled his face against her.
“You have any New Year’s resolutions?” he asked.
“Every year I say I’m going to work out six times a week or stop eating junk food or be nicer to my mother or all three, and none of it ever happens. This year I think I’ll go for simplicity.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning I want to make a resolution I can actually keep.”
“How about spending more time with me?” he asked, his tone teasing, though Cass got the feeling he was doing anything but.
Before she could answer he added, “Exclusively as my girlfriend?”
Cass’s throat seized up. Did people actually ask for exclusive agreements anymore? It seemed like such a quaint gesture, like offering her his class ring.
“Hmm,” she said, scrambling to think of an appropriately gentle response but producing nothing.
“What does that mean?”
“Oh, nothing. I’m just a little caught off guard. I mean, we only met last week.”
“I’m thirty-six. I can figure out pretty quickly by now if I like a woman or not.”
“I have no doubt we like each other. I just don’t think an exclusive arrangement is really…what I’m looking for.”
“You want to date other men?”
“No, not at all,” she said, turning to face him, wanting to make sure he saw her smile, fake as it might have been. “But what if your Miss Perfect comes along—”
Wrong thing to say. His expression turned hard. “I thought she already had.”
“I can guarantee you, I’m not your Miss Perfect.”
“Cass, I know what I feel.”
“You feel a fuzzy-headed, misguided sense of affection brought on by intense feelings of lust.”
“No, that’s not it.” He took her hands in his and gave her a look that said he was all business.
Damn it. She should have seen this disaster coming a mile away. She should have taken precautions to avoid it—acted a little flakier, not put so much of herself into the sex, not let down