Finding Our Forever (Silver Springs #1)(28)

Or maybe he just pretended to.

“I try to leave the women alone,” Eli said.

“Because...”

“Because I’ll wreck their life. I should come with a warning label.”

“It’s only sex, man. As long as it’s consensual and doesn’t get too crazy, sex never hurt anybody.”

“You forget,” Eli said drily. “This is a small town. There’s no way not to run into the same woman over and over.”

“You can’t do that sort of thing here,” Gavin grumbled in agreement.

“Then you both need to get off that ranch a little more often. Drive to LA.”

“If we slept with as many women as you do—” Gavin started, but Dallas cut him off.

“You’d have some fun for a change.”

Eli rolled his eyes. “Or wind up with a disease.”

“Not if you’re careful.”

“I don’t get the impression you’re as careful as you should be—about anything,” Eli joked, but if Dallas answered, he didn’t hear it. He felt his smile wilt the second he glanced up and saw Cora walk into the bar with Darci Spinoza.

She didn’t notice him, not at first. But it didn’t take long. Those wide, innocent eyes of hers, busy scanning the tables along the periphery of the dance floor as she looked for a place where they could sit down, stopped the second they encountered him—and recognition dawned.

To her credit, she and Darci walked over to say hello. Actually, Cora didn’t really have any choice—neither one of them did. He was their boss, after all. It would’ve been rude to ignore him.

Fortunately, Darci didn’t seem to know anything had ever happened between him and Cora. “Hey.” She grinned at Dallas. “Look who’s in town—trouble!”

“You know me already,” Dallas responded. “It’s great to see you again. You’re Darci, right? The English teacher?”

They’d met at the school Christmas party. Aiyana insisted that the entire family get together for the holidays—no matter what they had going.

“Yes,” Darci replied. “It’s great to see you, too.”

Dallas slid off his stool and stood, his gaze shifting to Cora. Eli could tell he found her attractive. “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you before.”

“I noticed you at the football game last night, down on the field with Eli.”

“If only I would’ve known you’d be in the stands,” he said.

Darci introduced Cora, and Cora smiled politely as she shook first with Dallas and then Gavin. “Nice to meet you both.”

“You must know Eli,” Dallas said.

“Yes. Eli hired me.”

“I can see why.” Dallas pulled over a stool and began looking for a second one. “Any chance you’d like to join us?”

Cora started to decline. She looked as though she couldn’t get away fast enough. But Darci didn’t seem to be paying any attention to her discomfort. She overrode Cora’s response with an eager, “Sure. Why not? We were looking for some entertainment.”

Gavin pulled over another chair while Dallas gave her a bow. “We’re happy to provide that, aren’t we, boys?”

Darci took the seat closest to Dallas, which left the stool between Eli and Gavin for Cora. She sat down, but Eli got the impression she was being careful not to touch him, even incidentally.

Darci and Cora ordered a drink. Then they all talked for an hour—about Dallas’s climbing, the places he’d visited, that he’d be leaving in three days, the fact that Seth, another brother who was a sculptor, had secured a gallery showing in San Francisco, one he’d been working hard to parlay into a second and third showing in Chicago and New York, which was why he hadn’t visited this summer as he’d originally intended.

Darci brought up her kids and her divorce and how much better she was feeling now that she was getting beyond it, but Cora didn’t say much. She mostly listened—and focused on Dallas or Gavin, anyone but him. When Dallas asked her to dance, she agreed, but Eli had a difficult time watching. He didn’t care to consider the reason.

Eventually, while they were having a second drink, she mumbled something about having to go to the bathroom and crossed to the far side of the bar, where the restrooms were located. Eli held off for a few seconds, so it wouldn’t appear as if they were going together. Then he followed her and waited in the hallway until she came out.

She took one look at him and stopped.

“Have I done something to offend you?” he asked.

“Of course not.”

“Then why haven’t I heard from you?”

“No reason,” she said. “I’ve been...busy. I figured you were, too.”

He shoved a hand through his hair. He was so confused by her abrupt reversal. “You didn’t get back with your boyfriend when you went to LA last weekend...”

She shook her head. “Didn’t even see him. I went to my folks’.”

“So...what is it?” he asked. “Something’s different.”

“Nothing. Not really. I just... I think you were right.”

A trickle of foreboding went through him. “About...”

“You’re my boss. It isn’t wise to get so intimately...involved when we work together.”