Cooper sure as hell was.
After he’d paid the bill, they’d walked the few blocks back to the hotel, talking about nothing at all. And it wasn’t until they reached her room that Cooper admitted to himself quite how much he didn’t want the night to end.
‘So, we’ll meet in the lobby as normal?’ Dawn asked, leaning against her door as she smiled up at him.
‘Yeah. Say, nine?’ Cooper hoped he managed to sound normal and unaffected by her presence. He definitely didn’t feel it.
It wasn’t her clothes, or her hair, make-up or even the soft scent of whatever products she’d been using that filled his lungs and made him want. It wasn’t even the conversation. It was her smile—the easy, happy, optimistic smile that told him that she didn’t want to be anywhere else, that she didn’t need anything from him, that she was just happy to be there.
That was the part that was going to ruin him.
‘Goodnight, Dawn.’ Leaning down, he brushed a swift kiss against her cheek, then turned away, heading back to his own room.
He needed sleep. And he needed to move past this strange connection he’d forged with his brother’s fiancée.
Even if he had no idea how to do that.
And even if he knew he would spend all night dreaming about pink lipstick—and wanting.
* * *
‘So, tell me about this lighthouse of yours,’ Dawn said as Chicago faded away into the background through Claudia’s back window.
Cooper had beaten her down to the lobby that morning for the first time all week, and had been waiting for her with warm and gooey cheese and ham croissants—always the sign of an excellent day, in her book. Following on from a great evening the night before, as it happened.
Dawn was glad she had picked out her bright-pink ‘truck stop’ tee shirt to wear again that morning. From the way Cooper’s eyes roamed over the logo on it, she figured it was basically a thank-you in clothing form for the croissant.
‘I wouldn’t call it my lighthouse,’ Cooper said with the nonchalance of a man who might actually own a lighthouse somewhere. His family certainly had the money, and Dawn had never been able to keep all their property straight in her head.
‘You were the one who wanted to stop there,’ she pointed out. ‘So what’s so great about it?’
Cooper shrugged, glancing away from the road to look at her. ‘I just saw a picture on the Internet and figured you might like it, was all.’
A warm feeling flowed through her at his casual words. However bad an idea her crush was, at least after the last day or so she was almost certain that Cooper returned it. Maybe they’d never be able to act on it, but just knowing that he’d picked out a place to visit because he thought she’d like it went a long way to making her feel a little better about the whole situation.
‘It’s still a good four hours’ drive, though,’ Cooper added. ‘If you wanted to get some sleep?’
‘Are you saying I look tired?’ she asked, eyebrows raised. Admittedly, her night’s rest had been punctuated by more dreams of him than she was willing to admit to, but Dawn didn’t think it was anything her concealer hadn’t hid. But, as she looked at him, she realised that Cooper looked exhausted. As if he hadn’t slept all night.
As if he’d been as disturbed by dreams and imaginings as she had.
Huh.
‘You look full of the joys of summer, as always,’ Cooper said with a mocking smile that suddenly didn’t seem so mocking.
‘Do you want me to drive?’ she asked bluntly. ‘I mean, if you need to sleep, I can drive to the lighthouse. You can take over afterwards.’
She could see common sense warring with pride in his expression. Clearly he was too exhausted to drive safely, but he was also equally unwilling to admit it.
So Dawn made the decision for him. ‘Pull over.’
‘I don’t need you to—’
‘And I don’t plan to die in a car accident before making it to the Hamptons, thanks. So pull over and we can swap seats.’ She stared at him until he did as she asked.
Dawn climbed out of Claudia’s passenger side first, moving swiftly around to the other side to open Cooper’s door for him. As he got out, he held her arm gently to stop her sliding into his vacated seat.
‘Thanks,’ he said softly, his mouth so close to her cheek she could feel his breath. ‘I...didn’t sleep much last night.’
‘Bad dreams?’ She stared up into his eyes as she asked and watched his pupils grow wide and black.
‘Quite the opposite, actually.’ Cooper’s voice, rough, low and dark, rang through her body until she felt as though every cell of it was vibrating at the sound.
God, she wanted him. And it looked as though he wanted her every bit as much.
She swallowed and looked away, fumbling for the steering wheel as she climbed into her seat.
‘We should get going,’ she said.
Cooper nodded, making his way round to the passenger seat. ‘Long way to the lighthouse,’ he agreed.
And an even longer way to the Hamptons. And her ex-fiancé.
* * *
When Cooper awoke again, Dawn was singing along to Elvis on the radio—it seemed to be the only music Claudia would consent to play—and they were just passing a sign for Marblehead Lighthouse State Park. Dawn’s phone was set to the sat nav app, and calling out periodic directions.
‘How long was I out?’ He straightened up in his seat, rubbing at the back of his neck to try and ease the ache there.
‘Felt like for ever,’ Dawn quipped as she turned onto a smaller road. ‘Any more dreams?’
The look she gave him told him that she had a pretty good idea what his dreams had been about. Hardly surprising, given the heat that had radiated between them when he’d told her the reason he hadn’t slept.
Thankfully, he’d been too exhausted to dream during his car nap, because otherwise things could have got very awkward, very fast.
‘Totally dreamless,’ he said with relief.
‘Glad to hear it,’ Dawn replied, although her tone said something different.
Did she want him to dream about her? Had she been dreaming about him?
Cooper stared out of the window and bit back a curse. Apparently, ignoring the attraction between them wasn’t working any longer—if it ever had.
Which meant they were going to have to talk about it.
Damn.
Dawn parked and together they made their way into the state park, both stretching as they walked to work out the kinks that four-plus hours in a car gave a person.
On the shores of Lake Erie, the park was strangely peaceful, even in the summer high season. As they followed the trail towards the shore, the red-tipped lighthouse, white except for its cap and the red railings lower down, stood proudly against the water. He’d read something about tours, Cooper thought vaguely, and about climbing the steps to the top of the lighthouse and looking out. But he was content just to look at it from the outside. To soak up the atmosphere and the calm of the lake and park.
To relax, for once.
At least, until Dawn said, ‘So, are we going to talk about it?’
* * *
It was just like pulling off a sticking plaster, Dawn reasoned. Obviously there was something between them—something distracting, awkward and potentially difficult. The sooner they talked about it, the sooner they could move on.
Even if her heart was pounding in her chest as she asked.
‘Talk about what?’ Cooper asked, his expression blank. Then he sighed. ‘Never mind. I know what.’
He sank down to sit on a nearby bench, the summer sun glinting off his dark hair, and his legs stretched out in front of him as he stared down at his hands.
Dawn perched beside him, her own hands clasped too tightly in her lap as she tried to figure out what she wante
d to say.
Cooper beat her to it. ‘Here’s the thing—I don’t have friends. I never really noticed until this week, but I don’t. I have colleagues and business contacts, maybe even a few acquaintances I know well enough to meet for a drink if I’m in town. But not friends. Not until this week.’
‘You think we’re friends?’ Dawn asked, surprised.
‘I think we could be.’ Cooper looked up at last, meeting her eyes, and she almost gasped at the sincerity in them. ‘I think that spending this week with you in that stupid car, stopping at ridiculous roadside attractions and eating junk food for every meal, has been the most fun I’ve had in years.’
‘You need to get out more. Meet more people,’ Dawn joked, but Cooper didn’t laugh.
‘Maybe you’re right. Maybe it is time to get back out there. Meet people.’ And by ‘people’ Dawn assumed he meant women.
In fact, he sounded as if the thought was a revelation. As if he’d just realised a universal truth—probably the same one men had been realising all through her life.
Dawn’s spirits took a nose dive. Talk about backsliding. Her last relationship had made it all the way to the altar, even if it hadn’t got any further. This one—if you could even call it a relationship—hadn’t even made it to the first kiss.
‘The thing is, I don’t think it’s people,’ Cooper said. ‘I think it’s you.’