Scandal on the Sand (The Billionaires of Barefoot Bay #3)(11)
Author: Roxanne St. Claire

“Wow!” Dylan slowly climbed out of his car, staring at the vehicle like it was a UFO. It was…different.

No, it was the sleek, space-age car she’d ridden in yesterday to the harbor.  There couldn’t be two cars that looked as if they’d been dipped in platinum and cost a million bucks.

Damn it all.  He’d found her.  Worse, he’d found Dylan, who walked toward the car parked in front of her mailbox.

Nate emerged like a god stepping out of his chariot, his hair streaked bronze in the sunlight, a loose white linen shirt accentuating his size and breadth.

Liza stood as dumbstruck as Dylan, her heart lodged firmly in her throat, denying her any chance to talk or breathe or demand to know what the hell he was doing here. But why bother asking that? She knew.

In two steps, she was behind Dylan, reaching a protective hand for his shoulder, but he shot away, running to the car.

“Car! Car! C-A-R.”

A slow smile spread across Nate’s face as he slipped off his sunglasses to get a better look. “You like it?” he asked Dylan.

“So pretty!”

Nate laughed, a low rumble of amusement that reached Liza’s ears like a screaming alarm. He was already in love with Dylan, who, oblivious to any drama about to unfold, ran to the car and slapped his two hands on the curved spoiler in the back with a loud thwack. “Wow!”

Finally, Nate looked over to Liza, who had managed to swallow, find a shred of composure, and get to the end of the driveway.

“Hey,” he said, the single word so simple and sexy and intrusive and intimate, she almost reeled.

Hey. Hey? Like it was no big deal that he’d hunted her down and come to her home and invaded her world uninvited?

“What are you doing here?”

“Aunt Liza!” Dylan answered for him. “Look!”

“I am looking,” she said, her gaze flat on the car’s owner and not the object of Dylan’s fascination. “How did you find me?”

“Your address was on the paperwork you left.”  He turned his attention to Dylan, while Liza mentally kicked herself for the oversight. “You like cars, son?” he asked.

Son? Already? She must have choked a little, because Dylan turned to look at her, his eyes bright and his smile loopy.

“I love cars,” he said.

So not fair. She’d told him that already. So, of course, he shows up in his one-of-a-kind classic something that someone with a Y chromosome could smell as special from a mile away.

“Well, maybe you can drive this one,” Nate said to him.

This time, she choked loud and hard and purposefully. “Excuse me,” she said, lifting her chin and refusing to be the least bit distracted or deterred by his size and looks and overall hunkiness. “He’s four and he can’t drive.”

“I see that.” He angled his head. “But he likes cars.”

Didn’t he see that kind of ridiculous logic was why she was trying to keep Dylan from him?  What else would he let a child do?  “If you suggest my little boy drive a…whatever that is—”

“Aston Martin. I usually have one shipped to me when I’m staying somewhere more than a few weeks.”

She closed her eyes, just letting that simple statement sum up everything about Nate Ivory. He had an Aston Martin shipped to him when he stayed somewhere.

“How is that even normal?”

He laughed at the question and jutted his chin to Dylan, who was prancing around the car, leaving smear prints on every window as he tried to see in. “He thinks it’s normal. Will you, uh, introduce us?”

She considered refusing the request. She could. She was Dylan’s legal guardian and, as such, she could determine who even talked to him, but… No, she wasn’t that scared of Nate Ivory. And not that cruel. Plus, Dylan would have a full-out meltdown if that car suddenly disappeared.

“Dylan, honey, come here.”

He slowly lifted his little face from the driver’s window, where he’d been pressing so hard he probably had licked the glass by now.

“Come and meet Mr. Ivory.”

Nate shot her a look. “You can call me Nate,” he corrected as Dylan came forward. Nate crouched down to his size. “If you give me knuckles.”

He held out his fist, and Dylan knew exactly what to do. The fist-bump came with that sweet smile and childish giggle. “Who are you?”

And that pure and honest curiosity.

“I’m…” He struggled with the word, and every cell in Liza’s body seized up in fear of what he’d say next. She couldn’t talk or jump in or even move as time stood still and she waited for…your father. “I’m a friend of your Aunt Liza’s.”

She let out an audible breath, and he stood slowly, his expression saying what his mouth wasn’t. Don’t worry.

But she was worried. How could she not? “So you just, what, decided to cruise into Blue Landing for fun today?”

He looked around. “I could tell you’re conservative, Liza, but I wouldn’t have put you quite in the middle of Disney World.”

“We’re living with my mother right now,” she said. “We’ve been staying here for a year.” Did she have to explain her personal situation to him? Well, he was Dylan’s father. “My mom lived alone in this big house and so, well, you know what they say.”

“There’s no place like home with your mother?” he suggested with a teasing smile.

“It takes a village to raise a kid.”

He glanced around. “Pretty sedate village.”

Irritation skittered as a need to defend the little development rose, but he was right. “It’s also safe, secure, and comes with a backup babysitter who loves Dylan almost as much as I do.”

“Car! Car! C-A-R!” Dylan had returned to his inspection, bored by the adults talking.

“I told you he’s kind of obsessed with spelling.” Liza tried to shift her attention to the little boy, but it was hard to stop looking at Nate. He looked different today, somehow. Calmer and more in control—but then, he’d ambushed her this time instead of the other way around.

“That’s cute,” he said, stepping closer to the car.

“Dwive!” Dylan insisted.

So Dylan had heard Nate suggest that.  “Why would you plant that idea in his head?” she asked.

“Because it’s what I’d want to do.”

Dylan kept banging on the window and jumping up and down, until Nate opened the door. Little legs and arms scrambled right in, just as Mom came out of the front door.