Island Affair (Keys to Love #1) - Priscilla Oliveras Page 0,7

you gave him.”

“You heard that?”

An embarrassed blush heated Sara’s cheeks at Luis’s, “Sure did.”

“Here’s the thing,” she explained, trying to lay the groundwork for her request. “No one in my family has met Ric. Or seen a picture of him. They all live back home in Phoenix. I’m the one who flew the coop, once I graduated university. Now I’m based out of New York. Ric and I met last December when I was in Miami for business, and we’ve been sort of dating long-distance since then. This trip was supposed to be his introduction to my family.”

Along with his being a buffer for her if her mother or sister’s pushy personalities risked setting off any of Sara’s disorder triggers.

She paused, letting the information she’d shared sink in. Luis scratched the light scruff on his left cheek. His hand slid around to rub the back of his neck, eyes narrowed as if he were contemplating her story. Eventually he folded his arms again and leaned against his truck. All with only a mumbled humph as his response.

Apparently, he was the living, breathing version of the strong and silent type. That could actually work in their favor. If he agreed to her admittedly bizarre plan.

Uncomfortable, Sara toed the gray chunks of gravel with her right foot as she continued. “My family’s . . . different from me. High achievers. Type A, to the extreme. All successful doctors busy saving lives. While I . . . I’m . . .”

Her ability to form words failed her as her old nemesis self-doubt poked its head out of the dark hole where she doggedly tried to keep it buried. Its beady eyes bore into her psyche like a mangy prairie dog refusing to stay underground.

Luis’s dark gaze slowly traveled from her head, down to her toes, and back up again. Heat spread through her as if he’d physically touched her.

She was used to people watching her, taking pictures at conferences and speaking engagements. Some were looking to find fault. Plenty others were awed. In her line of work, she invited the interest. The more likes and shares and followers, the better.

And yet, with Luis, his perusal felt different. Personal.

Her request would make it even more so.

“While you, what?”

His deep, warm voice rumbled over her. It reminded Sara of lazy mornings snuggling in bed after a night that left the sheets tangled and bodies sated.

She shivered at the seductive image. Then quickly reminded herself she had no business entertaining such thoughts. Not when she was about to make him what she hoped to consider a business proposition.

Well, crap. Proposition wasn’t quite the word she wanted to use. It sounded suggestive. Too lurid. Too—

Doubts screamed like banshees in her ears. Pressing a hand to her forehead, Sara squeezed her eyes shut, grasping for one of the tools she had learned in therapy when her mind threatened to spin out of control. Positives. Think about the positive angles here.

She ran a successful small business. Hired people for short-term contracts all the time. Granted, they were typically photographers or stylists, but the role of a fake boyfriend could potentially be considered along the same lines as an extra in a photo shoot. Couldn’t it?

Oh my god, what the hell was she thinking?

“Sara, how are you different from your family?”

Luis’s soft question broke into her mental downward spiral. The kind of spiral that had gotten her into trouble in the past.

Lowering her arm, she peeked at him through her lashes.

He’d crossed his jeans-clad legs and relaxed against his truck’s front bumper. One dusty black work boot rested heel to toe on top of the other. A man with time on his hands, if what he’d said earlier was true.

In spite of her undoubtedly odd behavior, his whole demeanor remained calm, patient. It vibrated off him, weirdly quieting her misgivings.

“How am I different?” she repeated his question, keeping the let me count the ways to herself when he nodded.

For someone who projected confidence and poise to those who followed her career, it was uncanny how easily talk of her family could suck those traits right out of her. It didn’t, however, mean she couldn’t fake them when needed. She’d had plenty of practice with that over the years.

Tossing her head so the humid breeze would comb her hair out of her eyes, Sara answered, “Let’s just say, unlike my family, the closest I ever came to being a doctor was the Halloween I dressed up as a sexy physician for