Twice the Chance, page 10
Jazz leapt to her feet, loathe to spend the rest of the night in her apartment fearing the phone might ring.
Within minutes Jazz was headed to the apartment pool, dressed in a bathing suit, flip-flops and a cover-up, and carrying a beach towel.
A middle-aged woman who’d moved in next door to Jazz a few months ago came toward her carrying canvas grocery bags. Jazz had seen her leaving for work at odd hours in a white uniform, so concluded she was a nurse of some sort.
“Nice evening for a swim,” the woman—Jazz didn’t know her name—remarked.
Jazz stepped to the side, making room for her neighbor to pass. “Yes. The weather’s perfect.”
The chlorinated water was also ideal, even though the pool area could have used updating like the rest of the apartment complex. The chain-link fence needed repair and some of the chairs were missing slats. The pool itself was large enough to swim laps in but only if no one else were present. Luckily, Jazz was alone.
She dove into the pool and cut through the water with practiced strokes, keeping her head down and taking rhythmic breaths.
Banishing Bill Smith from her mind was easy but Brooke and Robbie were tougher. The twins had occupied a corner of Jazz’s heart long before she found out their names and developed a troublesome attraction to their uncle.
She concentrated on clearing her mind and enjoying the silky sensation of the water sliding over her. She swam until her arms and legs grew tired and her lungs burned, then she swam some more.
She slowed down for the last two laps until, finally, she reached out her hand to touch the edge of the pool. Lifting her head, she shook back her wet hair and saw Matt Caminetti leaning against the fence, watching her.
“Hey, Jazz,” Matt said. “I thought that was you.”
“What are you doing here?” Jazz blurted out.
He held up a set of keys. “I brought your car back.”
“I thought you were going to leave the keys in the glove compartment.” She was slightly out of breath, she wasn’t sure whether from the exercise or his surprise appearance.
“I wanted to see how you’re feeling,” he said. “But it looks like you’re good.”
Shame coursed through Jazz. Matt had done nothing to deserve to be treated so rudely. On the contrary, he’d been an absolute gentleman.
“Thanks. I’m fine now.” She was in the shallow end of the pool but kept submerged up to her neck. “And thank you for bringing back the car.”
“Think nothing of it.” Matt unlatched the door and stepped into the pool area. “I’ll put the keys with your stuff.”
He set them down near her beach towel but seemed in no hurry to leave.
“Isn’t someone waiting for you?” she asked.
“Nope,” he said. “We came in three cars. I drove yours. My cousin drove mine. And his wife drove theirs. They’re already gone.”
“I hate that you went through so much trouble,” Jazz said. Especially because she could have driven her own car home.
“I was glad to help,” he said.
She shouldn’t prolong their encounter. It seemed rude, however, not to ask him about the party. “How did everything go after I left?”
“Great,” he said. “The caterer who baked the cake did a terrific job. It was a big hit. She’s really quite talented.”
Jazz felt heat tinge her skin even though she was still in the water. “Thanks for saying that.”
“Hey, next time you want a compliment, just feed me. I’ll be happy to oblige.”
She ignored that comment. There wouldn’t be any next time.
“How did things go with your dad and brother?” Jazz hadn’t meant to ask that question. Once she had, she realized how much she wanted to know the answer.
“About the same.” Matt sat down on the end of one of the lounge chairs, leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees. “Danny didn’t talk to me. My dad talked too much.”
“Your father should trust your judgment,” Jazz said.
Matt laughed without humor. “My dad only trusts his own judgment. You know, it’s funny. I thought he’d be happy about me and this A.D. job, but he always finds something to criticize.”
“I could say a few critical words about him,” Jazz retorted, then covered her mouth. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“That settles it,” Matt said. “You have to go out with me.”
She didn’t understand. “Because I was about to bad-mouth your father?”
“Because we’d be good for each other.” His gaze was unwavering. “And because I can’t stop thinking about you.”
With the pool lights shining down on him, Matt looked as golden as when she’d first seen him bathed in sunlight at the park. Now that she’d gotten to know and like him, he was even more handsome.
Her heart hammered. “I wish you wouldn’t.”
“Don’t you think about me?”
“No,” she said instantly.
“Now, why do I think you’re not telling the truth?” he asked softly.
If she were on dry land, she could put a quick stop to the conversation by returning to her apartment. In the pool, she was a captive audience.
She straightened and instantly realized it was a mistake. The water came to just below her chest. Although she was wearing a modest one-piece bathing suit designed for swimming, Matt’s eyes caressed her body. She felt her nipples harden.
“You think I’m lying because you’re a man and have a hard time believing a woman isn’t interested,” she said, striving for flippancy.
She waded through the water, annoyed at her body’s response. Matt stood up and approached the ladder with her beach towel. She hesitated, then climbed out of the pool and reached for the towel.
He circled behind her and wrapped her in the towel, bringing his mouth close to her ear.
“I don’t find it difficult to believe a woman isn’t interested,” he whispered, sending a shiver cascading down her neck. “I just have a hard time believing this woman isn’t.”
Clutching the towel so it covered her, Jazz turned to face him. Another mistake. This close to Matt she could smell the warmth of his skin and see the faint beginnings of his beard and the tawny color of his eyes.
“Why is that?” She tried to make her voice haughty but it came out breathless.
“Because you want to kiss me as badly as I want to kiss you.” His voice was as soft and sensuous as the water had been against her skin.
Anger roiled inside her, at him for being right and at herself for being weak.
“So what if I do?” she retorted.
He laughed and pulled her into his arms, pressing his mouth to hers before it registered what she’d admitted.
Matt kissed like a man who knew what he wanted. His mouth slanted over hers, the taste of him heady and exciting. The towel dropped away, hitting the cement with a soft thud so only the bathing suit covered her. His body felt warm against her pool-chilled skin. He coaxed her into opening her mouth and he deepened the kiss, his tongue sliding against hers.
Her mind grew hazy, the reasons she shouldn’t be kissing him beyond reach. She tried to summon them, knowing they were important, yet she was helpless to fight the feelings that swamped her.
Jazz could try to fool herself into believing the reason Matt had gotten past her defenses was because it had been a long time since she’d let anyone kiss her. That wasn’t it. She hadn’t been tempted by other men, only by this man.
One of his hands was at the small of her back while the other caressed the nape of her neck. The kiss drove all thoughts from Jazz’s mind except the need to be closer to him. She felt him grow hard, and excitement raced through her that she’d had that effect on him.
Without warning he pulled back, disengaging his mouth from hers and placing his hands on her shoulders to keep distance between them. She almost cried out in protest.
“We’d better stop.” Matt’s hair was mussed from where she’d stabbed her fingers through it. He sounded out of breath. “Anybody could see us.”
Jazz blinked and clarity slowly returned. Matt was right. They were in clear view of a half-dozen apartments. She’d forgotten herself so totally that being discreet hadn’t occurred to her.
Neither had it sunk in that she was kissing the uncle of her twins, a man she’d decided earlier tonight was off-limits. Like the rest of his family.
She yanked away from his touch, picked up the towel and secured it around herself. She couldn’t let him know that she still felt vulnerable. “I’m not inviting you inside my apartment.”
“Okay.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. She got the impression it was so he wouldn’t reach for her again. “We can take things slow.”
Jazz closed her eyes, wondering how she’d gotten herself into this predicament. She accepted her fair share of the blame but he was at fault, too. He was far too forceful, too used to getting what he wanted. She snapped her eyes open. “Why can’t you take no for an answer?”
“That kiss didn’t seem like a no,” Matt said, sounding far more reasonable than she did.
She shook her head, desperate to get him to understand. “Listen. I can’t go out with you. I can’t see you anymore, period.”
“Why not?” He looked confused. Why wouldn’t he be after the way she’d reacted to his kiss? She needed to accept that he wasn’t going away without a good explanation. She could tell him part of the truth, she realized. That might be enough.
“There are things you don’t know about me,” Jazz began.
“I know you’re a good person,” he countered.
“That’s just it. I’m not.” She sucked in a breath to fortify herself for the rest of the confession. “I spent five years in prison for armed robbery.”
Matt threw back his head and laughed. “Yeah, right. And I’m a mass murderer.”
“That’s the reason I work at Pancake Palace,” she continued and watched the humorous light in his eyes fade. “Not many other places will hire ex-cons.”
Matt’s brows drew together. “You’re serious?”
“Yes,” she said.
His mouth hung open, his shock evident.
“Now you understand.” Jazz needed to get out the rest of it before she lost her nerve. “I’m not somebody you should have introduced to your mother.”
She grabbed for her cover-up and car keys before heading quickly from the pool area, not waiting to hear his response.
Jazz blinked back tears. The stunned look on his face had said it all: Matt wouldn’t be pursuing her anymore.
A tear slid down her face. She didn’t bother to wipe it away. More were coming.
SADIE PLOPPED DOWN next to Carl Rodriguez on the wooden bench a few doors down from Pancake Palace on Monday, in the spot where Carl liked to take his late-morning break.
“So what do you think is up with Jazz?” She asked the question that had been on her mind all morning, the reason she’d taken a break at all. Sadie usually worked straight through, not because she got off any earlier when she did but because she needed to maximize her tips.
Carl screwed the cap back on his bottled water. Sadie had noticed he did everything with forethought, whether it was answering a question or filling an order.
For the hundredth time, she wondered how such a deliberate man had wound up in prison. She’d never ask, though. She liked Carl. She didn’t want to risk feeling differently about him if she found out his crime.
He looked her straight in the eyes, a big point in his favor. Most men’s gazes dipped to her D cups. Although Sadie was pleased that nature had endowed her with such bounty, after a while the leering got old.
“I think Jazz is okay,” he said.
“C’mon!” Sadie cried. “She’s been quieter than a mime in church!”
One corner of his mouth lifted, an expression typical of Carl. She wondered what he’d look like if he let his smile break completely free. With his dramatic dark coloring, he’d probably be hot.
Sadie blinked back her surprise at the direction her mind had gone. She’d never once thought of Carl in those terms before.
“Jazz, she not as noisy as you.” Carl delivered the line with a charm that made it impossible to take offense. She pretended to, anyway.
“Hey! I’m not noisy,” Sadie teased. “I’m effervescent.”
His eyes crinkled at the corners. “That a big word. Who tell you that?”
“A conceited jerk who said he was trying to improve my vocabulary.” Sadie rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe he dumped me first.”
Carl’s brown eyes turned serious. They reminded her of melted dark chocolate, the kind that dripped over hot-fudge sundaes. “You need more confidence,” he said.
“I have tons of confidence,” she shot back.
“Then why you date these…what do you call them? Jerks.”
“Well, it’s not like I know they’re jerks when I agree to go out with them!” Sadie said. “They don’t go around with Jerk Alert signs on their foreheads.”
“But you still date them after you find out they jerks.”
She couldn’t deny that, not when she’d spent the better part of the last month complaining to Carl and Jazz about Ace. Except, how had the subject turned to her? She’d sought out Carl to discuss Jazz.
“I think something happened this weekend with Matt.” She kept talking before Carl could object to the change of subject. “Something bad. Or else Jazz would have told us about the party.”
“She didn’t want to tell us,” he said. “When you ask what happen, she say nothing.”
“Exactly!” Sadie pointed at him. “That’s why I think something’s wrong. She really likes this guy, I can tell.”
“How you can tell?” Carl asked.
Sadie thought of how Jazz’s entire body seemed to go on alert whenever Matt’s name was mentioned. But that wasn’t something a guy would understand. “I just can. And I really want things to work out for Jazz with Matt.”
“Why?”
She blew out a breath. “Really, Carl? You have to ask that?”
“Sí,” he said, the Spanish affirmative somehow making him seem more intriguing. What? Carl? Intriguing?
“I like Jazz. Can’t you tell there’s something missing in her life? I think it’s a man.”
Carl started to say something, but Sadie preempted him. “You’re going to ask why I think that, aren’t you?”
He nodded.
“She keeps to herself way too much. It’s like she doesn’t know what it is to be happy. I think Matt could make her happy.”
Carl didn’t respond for several seconds, as was his habit. “How about you?” he asked finally. “Do you look for a man to make you happy?”
She met those melted-chocolate eyes for long seconds and felt something stir inside her. Something she didn’t exactly know how to handle.
Damn Carl for making that comment a few days ago about being a nice guy. If that was what he’d said. She still wasn’t sure of it.
“I’m happy already.” Sadie stood up, extended her arms above her head and executed a twirl. “Sometimes I even spontaneously break out in dance.”
Carl threw back his head and laughed, showing even white teeth and that unrestrained smile she’d been wondering about.
And now Sadie knew she was right.
When he smiled, Carl Rodriguez was smokin’ hot.
“Are you busy Friday?” he asked.
Her heart nearly slammed to a stop. Carl was going to ask her out!
“My nephew, he play football,” Carl continued before she could respond. “I go always. Benjy might like to go. Maybe you and Benjy meet me there.”
Not a date. At least, she didn’t think so. But what if it was? Sadie needed to have more than a six-year-old on hand for emotional support.
“I’ll get Jazz to come, too,” she said airily.
Carl raised a dark eyebrow. Sadie chose to believe it was because he didn’t think she could convince the other short-order cook to do anything.
“I’ll talk her into it,” she assured him. “A woman who can dance like this can do anything.”
Sadie shimmied all the way back to the restaurant, with Carl’s laugh trailing her. Sadie herself wasn’t laughing. In her attempt to help Jazz, she’d complicated her own life.
She knew hardly anything about Carl except he’d been in prison—and that her newfound attraction to him wasn’t going away anytime soon.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE DRIZZLE FALLING on the soccer field Tuesday night had turned into a steady rain, which hadn’t prevented Matt from giving in to his players’ pleas to continue the end-of-practice scrimmage.
“C’mon, Coach,” one of the thirteen-year-olds had begged. “We’ve barely been practicing an hour.”
That was because Matt had been late. Again. This time he’d been dealing with a scheduling mix-up with the girls’ volleyball team. Since Matt had taken over the A.D. job from Carter, there was always something. He’d already had to line up the father of one of his players to help him coach the soccer team, starting with the next practice.
“A few more minutes and we’ll call it quits!” Matt shouted to be heard above the drum of the rain. He wasn’t scrimmaging with his players because the teams had even numbers.
“But we’re having fun, Coach!” one of his hardest-working players countered.
Matt was usually the one who didn’t want to leave the field. Not so tonight. He had a burning need to discover the details of the incident that had landed Jazz in prison.
He’d surfed the internet both Sunday and Monday nights searching for answers but had come up blank. Tonight he planned to call his brother-in-law for guidance about how to access public records, leaving Jazz’s name out of it.
“Get off me!” The angry shout came from Alex Price, the team’s top goal scorer, who everyone called Lex.
A tall, lanky defender named Dylan had been shadowing the speedy forward as Lex raced down the sideline with the ball. Dylan had probably thrown one too many elbows.
“You get off me!” Dylan shouted back, following up his comment with a shoulder shove.
