“Elliot didn’t tell me anything. I watched your interactions with my sister.”
“What are you implying?”
“Just that I feel obligated to warn you,” Madison said. “She’s not into your type.”
“What type is that?”
“Love ’em and leave ’em.”
“That’s such a cliché.”
“It’s a cliché because it’s true.”
Fair enough. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
As they left the bedroom, he grabbed the handle of the rolling bag he hadn’t yet unpacked. To be honest, he probably wouldn’t before he left town again.
This time, Camila arched her brow as he swept by. “That’s a lot of luggage for one night at your parents.”
“No point in unpacking when I’m just gonna leave again,” he quipped because, damn it, it was true.
***
Once again, Camila sat in the front seat while her sister and Elliot hopped into the extended cab. She didn’t speak, though. Probably because her sister took up all the time firing off questions about Tommy and his brothers.
“How old were you when you figured out you wanted to go into motocross?” Madison asked.
“Five.”
He watched through the rearview mirror as she gave Elliot the side-eye. Which he studiously ignored.
“And Kyle? What’s he do?”
“He’s a mechanic.”
“When did he realize he wanted to do that for a living?”
Tommy was pretty sure he knew what she was getting at. “He raced motorcycles too, but he wasn’t as passionate about competing as I am. He’d rather figure out how to make them better and faster than actually race them. But yeah, he’s been tinkering with motors since he was, I don’t know, ten or so.”
“Philip’s your fourth brother. And he’s in security or something?”
“Yeah, or something.” Philip was vague about what he did for a living, even with his brothers.
“And when did he realize that’s what he wanted to do with his life?”
Unless Tommy was way off his mark, this line of questioning was a passive-aggressive way of pointing out to Elliot that he needed to get his shit straight and figure out what he wanted to do after college already.
“When Philip was in high school, he wanted to work for the FBI. But Dad lost his job about five months before he graduated. They had been living off Mom’s teaching salary, and even though they had a college fund set aside, he didn’t want to saddle our parents with the responsibility of paying for one of their kids to go through college when they weren’t even sure they would be able to pay the mortgage. So he joined the marines instead. Did six years, took an honorable discharge, and now he does, as you said, security. Or something.”
“That was very magnanimous of him,” Madison observed, crossing her arms and lifting her chin, like she’d just won a bet and was surreptitiously gloating.
“They could have handled it,” Tommy defended. “And I had been racing professionally for a couple years at that point, was winning, making money. I could have helped too. But Dad found a job by the fall, and they never missed a beat. In fact, Elliot’s the only one who used the college fund, since I didn’t go, Kyle ended up with a full-ride scholarship, and Philip went into the marines. They’ll probably have enough funds left over to buy a retirement home on a lake somewhere.”
It was a funny thing to say because his parents, for as long as he could remember, insisted the only way they would move from the home where they’d raised their four boys was if those boys moved far away—and provided grandkids.
The house on a lake fantasy was his own, if he were being honest with himself. A real house, one that was furnished and decorated, with a deck overlooking a crystal clear, pristine, all-sport (of course) lake. He could even imagine himself carrying a cup of coffee outside and sitting in a cushioned chair, slowing down enough to watch nature do its thing while he casually sipped his morning pick-me-up.
Hell of a fantasy for a thirty-year-old motocross rider who lived life on the edge each time he swept his leg over that bike.
When he glanced at Camila, she was watching him with a look he couldn’t decipher. Curious? Lustful? Annoyed?
He let out a sigh as he pulled the truck into the driveway at his parents’ house.
How the hell was he supposed to convince this woman to hop into his bed?
Without Mom scheduling cake tastings and picking out mother-of-the-groom dresses.
Chapter Four
Camila knew damn well that Tommy wanted to sleep with her. He flirted in that raunchy way of overconfident men everywhere, clearly used to women falling all over themselves for the opportunity to share Mr. Egomaniac’s bed for a night. She dealt with guys like him every shift she worked at the bar.
No, thank you.
To be fair, though, bits of a polite, funny guy peeked through here and there. Enough to stir Camila’s interest. If there was one thing she was a sucker for, it was a guy who could make her laugh. Bonus that he was made of solid muscle and looked like sex on a stick.
But she wasn’t interested in some guy who traveled all the time, who couldn’t even be bothered to unpack his bag when he got home after his latest tour. A guy who probably had a motocross fan club that called themselves Tommy’s Tinas or some other stupid name.
After they returned to the house and helped unpack groceries, Deanna shooed them all upstairs, insisting they change into their swimsuits and hang out at the pool for the rest of the day. It was exactly what Camila had been hoping for when her sister said she could stay for the week, except she hadn’t counted on
