Brock wasn’t that.
But Logan might very well be.
She couldn’t afford to miss the opportunity to get closer to Logan and see if he would be a good fit. That was the plan for the week. Not to lose her head—or, God forbid, her heart—over a Southern playboy with too much time on his hands.
Her control once again firmly in place, she gave him her professional smile. “Like I said, thank you for helping me out. Have a good rest of your evening.”
She snatched her iPod off the dock and made it nearly to the door before he came after her. “Whoa, hold on there. I’m only talking one drink.”
It was more temptation to say yes than she wanted to admit. Because damn it, she actually kind of liked him even though he drove her to distraction.
Get a grip, Regan. You’ve dated guys like him. Only a fool gets involved with a man expecting him to change. It doesn’t happen.
She wasn’t a fool. So she patted his arm. “Then go ahead and get one. I’m sure you’ll have plenty of opportunity for company, too, if it floats your boat.”
“There’s only one person whose company I’m interested in right now.”
Right now. Which just went to prove her point. Brock might prefer her right now, but that could change in an instant. She might wake up one day and realize his interest had shifted to some buxom blonde or a sultry redhead overnight. She didn’t need that kind of aggravation and uncertainty in her life. She couldn’t live with the fear that he’d get bored and leave just like he had every woman before her.
Which just reinforced that Logan was the better option. “I’m sure I’ll see you around.” As little as I can possibly manage.
If today had proved anything, it was that she couldn’t afford to spend any more time with Brock. He made her forget herself, forget what was important.
And that was unforgivable.
Chapter Seven
Brock showered and spent the rest of the evening flipping through television channels. He was tempted to cruise through the bar, get a drink and the scope of the land, but he knew it for the bullshit ploy it was.
He wanted to see if Regan was there.
It was pretty damn clear she wanted to be anywhere he wasn’t, but he couldn’t leave it alone. Because he knew she’d had a good time with him, when it came to both sex and verbally sparring. She just had her perfectly styled head all wrapped up in the idea of Logan.
So it came to that. Did he bow out? Let her throw herself at Logan, and watch them flirt for the next few days?
The thought turned his stomach. He didn’t want to see her in the arms of someone else. Not to mention Logan owned a goddamn outdoors company. The man spent as much time as he could outside of the city. He free-climbed mountains for Christ’s sake. What the hell did she think was going to happen the first time she followed him into the forest?
But she didn’t see that. All she saw was the man’s success and his charming smile and… Brock was not doing himself any favors sitting alone in his room thinking about this.
He threw on his favorite pair of jeans and a shirt and headed down to the bar. Even though he told himself not to, he scanned the room for Regan, coming up blank. There were plenty of gorgeous women and some of them even gave him clear invitations, but he made a beeline to the bar. There was only one gorgeous woman he wanted to spend any time with, and she wasn’t here.
He was so screwed.
As he cut through the crowd at the bar, he was a little surprised to find Colton there alone. “Hey man.”
“Hey.”
He took the seat next to his friend and signaled the bartender, a pretty blonde with the practiced smile of bartenders everywhere. “Coors Light.”
Colton laughed. “You can take the man out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the man.”
“Can’t help that I have superior taste.”
“If you like your beer to taste like flavored water.”
Brock smiled his thanks when the bartender slid the beer over and pretended not to notice the way she lingered, clearly willing to chat him up. “Dual purpose—I hydrate and drink at the same time.”
He laughed again. “It’s good to see you, Brock. We didn’t get a chance to talk much the other night.”
The last few days had been a hectic frenzy of planned activities with no end in sight. “You know me—same shit, different day. Napping in my office and hoping no one actually needs anything from me. Not like you, big shot. Getting married and snagging that casino contract in one fell swoop. I’m happy for you.”
“Don’t play the slacker role with me. You’re not just floating through life like you want everyone to think. If you’d just tell people about the foundation, no one in their right mind would see you as a slacker.”
He never should have told Colton about the Blue Boat Foundation, but he was the only person who would truly understand why Brock put his blood, sweat, and tears into the company. It was for Reed. So kids didn’t have to go through what their best friend did—a mother who couldn’t handle the abuse, so she left, and a father who drank too much and liked to knock his kid around.
Knock his kid around. That’s how Reed described it the one time they’d talked about it. As if it wasn’t that big of deal. And Brock, naive kid that he’d been, had believed him. Or at least he had until that night when he was watching his best friend bleed out from a slash to his stomach while Reed argued that he didn’t need a hospital. Until he’d realized exactly what “knocking around” really meant.
The memory still made him sick. If he could spare even a handful of kids that experience, he’d move heaven and earth to make it happen. It had nothing to do with proving something, and everything to do with the helpless victims. Maybe Reed’s mom would have made a different decision about leaving her boy behind if something like the Blue Boat Foundation existed back then. It could have saved his best friend a lifetime of pain and suffering.
It would have meant that a kid wouldn’t have had to watch his friend bleed and struggle to understand why Reed wouldn’t go to the hospital, while he did his damnedest to stop the bleeding.
“It’s not a big deal.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it. Have you told your family?”
And open himself up for what would no doubt be a lecture on how his time and effort could be better spent on McNeill-owned accounts? He was sick of it. McNeill Enterprises wasn’t a bad company by any means, but he was doing so much more useful work with the Blue Boat Foundation. “I think you already know the answer to that.”
“You do realize that you’re a little past the age of teenage rebellion, right?”
Brock laughed. “Say it isn’t so.” He sipped his beer. “I’m doing just fine. And this weekend is about you marrying that beautiful woman before she wises up and calls the whole thing off. Stop worrying about m
e.”
“Go ahead, turn it around on me like you always do.” Colton finished off his drink. “Thing is, we’re friends. That means I have license to worry about your ass. Me and Reed, both.”
“Just don’t be getting any crazy ideas like an intervention. That shit’s for the birds.”
“You would say that.” He laughed. “Now I’m going to go see what my beautiful fiancée is up to. Try not to have too much fun tonight.”
“I’ll attempt to restrain myself.” He raised his beer at Colton and watched his friend make his way through the small groups of people to the door. It was good to see him happy.
Brock turned around to face the bar and took another pull of his beer. Colton was wrong. He didn’t need to tell his family shit about what he was doing with the Blue Boat Foundation. If he did, it’d reek of him crawling to Daddy and begging for approval. He was better than that. Either his dad was proud of him or not, but he wouldn’t whip this out of his sleeve as evidence that he was a man of worth.
He wondered what Regan would say if she knew, and inwardly kicked himself. He refused to tell her for the same reason he refused to tell his family. Either she saw him for the man he was, or she didn’t, but he wasn’t going to trot out proof to try to convince her.
Disgusted with himself for even considering it, he finished his beer and paid his tab. Obviously he wasn’t fit company for anyone right now. He’d sleep off the mood and regroup in the morning.
Then he’d figure out what the hell he was going to do about Regan.
…
The minutes ticked away, dragging from one hour to the next while Regan watched the clock. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Brock’s face when he offered to let her run him into the ground so she could shake the fear dogging her steps. He hadn’t had to do that.
That didn’t mean she actually wanted to spend more time with the charming ass, but she could be grateful.
She glanced at the clock, cursing when only two minutes had gone by. “This is ridiculous.” The damn sun wasn’t even up and here she was, tossing and turning and losing sleep over a pretty man. It was like she’d transported herself back to seventh grade.