Going Deep (Coastal Heat #1) by Maggie Wells Read Free Book Online Page B

disappeared.
    “Right away,” he replied with equanimity. He dropped his gaze to the basket of food in front of him then reached for his bundle of cutlery. Extracting a fork, he speared a chunk of mayonnaise-coated potato with practiced negligence. “Unlike those guys who make a living spewing jokes other people write for them, I do know the difference between an eruption and an earthquake. Too bad they can’t tell the difference between funny and not.”
    The tiny brackets of grim dissatisfaction she’d seen often in high school were back. Brooke tightened her grip on her pen, afraid she might give in to the temptation to reach across the sticky table and wipe them away. Remorse soured her stomach. She hadn’t planned on going there. As a matter of fact, her strategy had been to avoid all mention of the made-for-Hollywood scandal. But he made her tense and fluttery all at once. Decisively indecisive.
    He stabbed another hunk of potato salad and shot her a glance from under thick-fringed lashes. “I’d given you more credit, Brooke. I didn’t think you’d take the low road. Guess I was wrong.”
    “The low road?”
    “I thought you were a serious journalist. I mean, it seems a little sad to go from Pulitzer Prize quality reporting to tacky tabloid tactics.” He stared straight into her eyes, but his voice softened to a murmur. “I’m seldom wrong,” he mused. “Funny how it’s always when it comes to you.”
    How dare he imply he might only be fallible when it came to her? She couldn’t magically be what he wanted her to be. Disappointing the people who mattered to her was nothing new. But disappointing Brian felt different. It wasn’t the sharp, slicing pain of a knife in the gut, but an aching, inescapable agony she imagined might accompany of thousands of paper cuts.
    She wanted to strike out at him. Slap his handsome face for having the gall to imply her standards had slipped. “I couldn’t care less about the interview.”
    “Then what’s this all about?”
    “I told you, I have a story.”
    He continued to stare at her, an expectant eyebrow raised, his gaze challenging. And hot. Hunger rolled off him in waves and it had little to do with the basket of ribs in front of him. He wanted her. Sleazy tabloid tactics or not.
    Professional ethics be damned, she wanted him to kiss her again. Over and over. Everywhere. She wanted to melt into his arms again and give up the fight. She’d let him call the shots, say or do anything he asked, as long as he kept looking at her like he was in that moment.
    “It’s about the clean up,” she blurted, then clamped hand to her mouth, shocked she’d given it up to him so easily.
    Someone jostled her shoulder and she looked up, expecting to see their waitress back with another round of flirty smiles for Brian and a side of scowl for her. Instead, she found Jack Tucker grinning down at her.
    “Hello, sugar. Fancy meetin’ y’all here, huh?”
    He slipped onto the bench beside her and stretched one arm possessively across the back of the booth. The audacious move struck her dumb.
    “Byron,” Jack said with a nod in Brian’s direction.
    To her surprise, Brian laughed and reached for another rib. He saluted Jack with the slimy bone and smiled broadly. “Jackass,” he replied, mimicking Jack’s inflection to perfection.
    His teeth showed brilliant white as they sank into the meat. His eyes locked on hers, his gaze steady and unperturbed. He chewed lazily, the muscles in his neck and jaw flexing. His foot bumped hers beneath the table. The nudge somehow managed to be both annoying and reassuring, just like Brian.
    Brooke released her breath in a rush. Before he could pull back, she hooked the toe of her shoe behind Brian’s ankle and held him in place. Then she turned her attention to their intruder. “What are you doing here?”
    Without asking, Jack plucked the piece of Texas toast from her basket and started tearing it into pieces. “Why, I suppose I’m