‘Hi, you’ve reached Justin Edwards. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you.’
Except Cooper knew he wouldn’t. If Justin wanted to talk to him, he’d have responded to one of his messages already.
Cooper pressed the end-call button. His brother was avoiding him every bit as much as he was avoiding Dawn. Which meant that leaving a message telling him they were coming was a sure-fire way to send him running off somewhere else. Somewhere Claudia might not be able to follow. Cooper—and especially Dawn—couldn’t risk that. They both needed to see Justin.
Which meant they were just going to have to surprise him.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
DAWN STARED AT her reflection in the mirror. Cooper had said they’d go somewhere nice for dinner, but the problem was she didn’t really have anything in the way of nice ‘going out for dinner’ clothes in the meagre wardrobe she’d managed to put together over the last few days.
Sighing, she gave up pretending that the denim skirt and white tee shirt she was wearing would ever be anything approaching a slinky cocktail dress and dropped to sit down on the bed. Honestly, those people who wrote articles about the joy of capsule wardrobes had clearly never tried to look good in the same skirt for a full week, while travelling in a vintage convertible whose seats creased everything.
Not that it seemed to bother Cooper, who looked perfectly pressed every minute of the day regardless. And he didn’t seem to care about her limited wardrobe, either. She’d assumed he just hadn’t even registered her clothes—most guys she knew wouldn’t have. But then she’d seen his expression when she’d put on her new ‘World’s Biggest Truck Stop’ tee shirt...
Justin had only ever looked at her like that when she’d worn designer dresses. Cooper appeared to have tastes that were rather easier to please.
Not that she was going to read anything into it. The top had been slightly tighter than she’d thought it would be, that was all. Most men would have stared, right? It didn’t mean anything.
Just like him letting her share his chips didn’t mean anything.
Or the fact that he’d finally opened up a little bit about his wife.
All any of it meant was that they’d been spending a lot of time together and were getting to know each other. Which seemed a bit of a waste of time, now she wasn’t going to marry his brother.
But somehow that didn’t stop her wanting to know him even better. Or wishing she had a slinky dress to wear for dinner with him tonight.
Dawn sighed. At some point, she was going to have to acknowledge that she might have developed a tiny bit of a crush on her ex-fiancé’s brother. She was just hoping it could wait until after this road trip was over. Admitting to anything now could only make the rest of the trip excruciatingly awkward.
Either Cooper would be horrified that she was thinking about him that way when she was technically still engaged to his brother—she hadn’t returned the ring yet, so she guessed it still stood—or he’d admit to feeling the same, and then what? They’d kiss, avoid each other’s eyes for the next few days, she’d go and talk to his brother about their failed relationship and then she and Cooper would part ways and never see each other again.
It would have to be some kiss to make that kind of awkwardness worthwhile.
Still. Her limited wardrobe choices and ridiculous crush aside, that didn’t mean she couldn’t make a bit of an effort. It wasn’t as if she got asked out to dinner in Chicago every day. Or ever before, actually.
There wasn’t much she could do about her clothes, but she did dig out the gauzy, hot-pink scarf she’d picked up from the bargain bin at a convenience store attached to the diner where they’d bought doughnuts one morning. Wrapped around her neck twice, with the ends hanging loose, it at least made her boring outfit look a little more interesting.
Taking her hair down from its ponytail, she brushed it out over her shoulders, fluffing it a bit so it fell in gentle waves. With the addition of some simple make-up and the bright-pink lipstick she’d bought on a whim in Sacramento—because a girl never knew when she might need a confidence-boosting lipstick—she almost looked as though she might have come prepared for a night on the town.
Cooper knocked on the door moments later, and Dawn steeled herself before opening it. What had it come to that she had to prepare herself for seeing him, knowing that if he looked too good he’d take her breath away? She felt like a teenager with a first crush, rather than a woman who’d been through the relationship mill too many times to count.
Maybe that was the appeal. She knew anything with Cooper could never be a relationship—he hated the idea of marriage and she’d already been engaged to his brother, for heaven’s sake—and that made him safe. She could lust from afar, flirt over chips, have fancy dinners out and never worry about it meaning a thing.
She grinned to herself as she pulled open the door. Maybe she’d do exactly that.
‘Wow,’ Cooper said, eyebrows raised. ‘You look...’
‘Exactly like I’ve done every other day of this trip?’ Dawn finished for him. ‘Because I still haven’t got round to buying a second skirt.’
‘I was going to say great. Or beautiful. Or something better than that.’ Cooper’s gaze seemed to be fixed on her lips.
Score one for the lipstick.
But her moment of triumph faded as she took in his appearance. He hadn’t dressed up much either, for the same obvious reason, but still the jeans that moulded so perfectly to his legs, the collared tee-shirt that highlighted his throat and those broad, broad shoulders, the stubble that made him look just that little bit more devil-may-care than she’d ever imagined he could...all added up to a truly delectable picture.
One that really made her want to smudge her lipstick.
But, no. Flirting. Dinner. Fun. That was all.
Anything else could never end well.
She just had to keep reminding herself of that.
‘Shall we go?’ she asked, smiling brightly. And hoping against hope that she could hold off kissing her fiancé’s brother until they hit the Hamptons.
* * *
Dinner was a hit. As he’d predicted, Dawn loved the steak place he’d picked for them to eat at, happily trying everything he suggested, as well as everything he’d ordered for himself.
‘I spent too long eating boring food,’ she explained after moaning around a mouthful of steak and sauce béarnaise. ‘I’m making up for it.’
Simply watching her eat, those bright-pink lips closing around her fork, was making Cooper hungry. Just not for food.
He
was hungry for her company, her conversation—the easy way they tossed thoughts and comments back and forth without needing to read too much into them.
Although he had to admit he might have missed some of what she was saying because he was too busy staring at her lips. Imagining how it would feel to kiss them. To be fair, though, Dawn had trailed off a few times mid-sentence too. Which only made things worse, because he was almost certain she was imagining the same things he was.
Which meant he was in really big trouble.
He wanted her.
He wanted his little brother’s fiancée in a way he hadn’t wanted anyone since the ex-wife who’d broken his heart and taken half his fortune.
And he knew the only reason Justin had called things off was because he thought Dawn was a gold-digger—something Cooper was almost certain wasn’t the case. In which case...he had to take Dawn back to his brother. Give them another chance at happiness together.
Except they were wrong for each other, damn it! Having spent four days talking to her, and a lifetime knowing Justin, he could tell that instantly. She wouldn’t be happy with him, and he’d want her to be things she wasn’t. Or at least, things that didn’t come naturally to her.
Justin was a caviar-and-champagne guy. He always had to have the most expensive of everything, just because it cost more.
Dawn, he’d established, appreciated the best things, whatever the cost.
No, Cooper was absolutely convinced that Dawn and Justin together would be a mistake.
The only problem with that was that he was hugely, ridiculously biased, and he knew it.
What if he only saw these problems because he wanted them to be true? Because he wanted Dawn for himself? He’d only seen them together as a couple for twenty-four hours before Justin had run out. What did he know about their life together? Maybe Justin was a different guy with Dawn.