She directed him away from the house and off the main streets. “Traffic is heavy until we get out of the city.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“Let’s go up Pacific Coast Highway. Eventually it clears out. Then I’ll try to drive it.”
“It’s not hard,” he told her. “You press on the right shifter to accelerate, the left to shift down.”
She leaned over the center console. “No clutch?”
“None. It’s a dual clutch system.”
She waved a hand in the air. “I just need to know how it works up here.” The tachometer revved past five thousand rpm before Zach shifted. He brought the speed down just as easily when they came to a stop sign. Karen didn’t realize how far in she leaned until the spicy scent of the driver wove its way into her system. She sucked in her lower lip and tried to act unaffected as she sat straight on her side of the car.
“It’s a sexy car,” Zach said as he eased into traffic.
“Yeah, sexy.” Oh, this wasn’t good. She couldn’t ignore the tingling, his scent, let alone what this man was doing to her system.
“Are you really going to make him take it back?”
Oh, good, a safe subject without the word sexy in it. “I don’t make Michael do anything.”
“Then what was all that talk about putting down his cell phone when he comes home to Utah?”
She sighed. “He needs a break. He won’t get that if Tony keeps calling and setting up the next thing.”
Zach seemed to chew on that for a moment. “You really do look out for him.”
“Isn’t that what friends do?” She glanced out the window, noticed the stares and pointing fingers. She pushed her sunglasses higher on her face and pretended not to notice the attention the car was getting them.
“And wives?”
“What? Oh, yeah…take the next right.”
He moved the car over and kept talking. “You’re really not interested in keeping it, are you?”
She shook her head. “He’d be better off giving it to you. You’ll appreciate it more than I would.”
“Driving this is right up there with sex,” he said with a laugh.
She groaned. She wouldn’t know. She’d yet to drive the car, and Lord knew it had been ages since she’d engaged in anything sexual outside of a battery-operated toy.
“Like I said, you’d enjoy it more than me.” Is it warm in here? She fiddled with the controls and lowered the air conditioner temperature.
“So, if cars aren’t your thing…what is?”
Good question. “I’m not completely sure.”
“Travel?”
She shrugged. “I’d like to see the world, but if I didn’t it wouldn’t be the end of my life.”
“Big house, fame?”
“You’re describing your brother. Not me.”
“You don’t like the stares?” He looked up at a car with a cell phone hanging out the window as the passerby took a picture.
“I’ve gotten used to them.”
“But you don’t like ’em?”
“It’s hard living life in a fishbowl.” She pointed toward the highway. “Go north.”
For several miles, they inched through traffic and red lights before the road opened up.
“Mike told me money didn’t mean anything to you.”
She glanced his way, noticed his frown. “He told you that?”
“Said you signed a prenup.”
“Oh?” Why would Michael give that information to his brother? What else had he told him? “I’m not interested in your brother’s money.” Well, not all of it anyway. Just the contracted amount set aside in their agreement.
“And as his friend, you want to see him slow down.”
She had said that, hadn’t she? “The best relationships start off as friendships. I will always consider Michael my friend first. It’s hard to find friends when you’re as loaded as he is. People flock to his side, but he can’t always tell who to trust. That’s where family comes in.”
Zach looked back at the road. “He’s ignored his family for a while now.”
“Which is precisely why I think it would do him some good to reconnect. Underneath his monstrous ego he has a need for someone to not take his shit.”
“Like giving expensive cars to people who don’t want them?”
“Right. I don’t know one person in his circle that says no to him. Ever. Family doesn’t work that way. They remember your lowest moments, your most comical, and they remind you that you’re human.”
Zach pushed the gas on a long stretch with a grin. “He’s lucky to have you.”
Yeah, he is.
“What about your family?”
“Oh, I only have my Aunt Edie and her new husband, Stanley.”
“No siblings?”
“Nope.” Thank God.
“So who keeps you grounded?”
She thought about that for a while. “I do.” It was hard to keep the sadness from her voice.
Mike was right. Karen was a good driver, and as much as she might not admit to liking the car the smile on her face proved she wasn’t unaffected by the raw power of the machine. They’d found a place to turn around several miles up the coast where Karen took over the controls. By the time they’d made it back toward civilization, they were both hungry and she was pulling into the valet parking lot of a restaurant.
The kid who opened the door for Karen had wide eyes and was practically salivating when she handed him the keys.
Zach narrowed his eyes at him. “You know how to drive this car?”
“Yes, sir. They come in here all the time.”
“It’s Malibu, Zach,” Karen reminded him.
They were seated in a booth in the back of the posh restaurant overlooking the Pacific Ocean. “I’m starving,” Karen admitted when she dug into the bread basket before the waiter approached them to take a drink order.
“Me, too.”
“So, when will you be going home?” she asked.
“Ready to get rid of me?”
She popped a piece of bread into her mouth and chewed. “No. But my guess is you have what you came for.”
“Oh, what’s that?”
“Recon mission. You’re here to find out about me.”
Busted. He looked away.
“Was I that obvious?”
“Let’s see…you’ve asked me about my family, about my lifestyle. You’ve quizzed Michael on his marriage. So, yeah…you weren’t subtle.”