After making the date with Parker—and looking back far, far too often at the incredible night she’d spent with him and Dean—Lynn had had a revelation of sorts.
She wasn’t very good at spontaneous or lighthearted. Not with anyone other than Suz, and nine times out of ten the hijinks she got into with her BFF were because she’d been strong-armed forward.
While she loved her folks, they weren’t very outgoing, or exciting. They’d had Lynn late in life, both of them in their mid-forties when they’d been caught off guard by a surprise pregnancy. Sedate was Suz’s word for them. Lynn had gotten used to sedate, which might be fine for two people in their seventies, but it wasn’t a word she should be using after five months together with a guy.
She and Phil had gone out for dinner or to the movies. During the dinners they talked about work, and during the movies they hadn’t talked at all. It was her fault for settling for someone who didn’t make her twitch with excitement just from holding his hand.
Well, she wasn’t about to make the same mistake twice.
She tilted her head to examine Parker for a moment, his green eyes firm on her as she studied him. Dating someone new meant a chance to do things better. And while maybe they’d done things out of order, hopping into hot and crazy sex off the bat, she truly wanted to get to know the man who’d managed to work such magic on her body.
“How about mini-golf?” she suggested.
A few minutes later, they accepted their clubs and balls from the assistant in the brightly colored kiosk.
Parker eyed his ball suspiciously. “It’s pink.”
“With green lightning bolts. Don’t forget the lightning bolts.” She pulled him to the putting area for the first hole. “Makes it easier to know which ball is yours. Or did you want to trade and use mine?”
His look of disgust increased as he scowled at the ball in the palm of her hand, which was also pink, but even more girly thanks to the red butterflies stenciled onto it. “Thanks, but I think I’ll stick with my superhero ball.”
“That’s the spirit.” Lynn accepted his offer to go first, tapping her ball down the green toward the first obstacle, her amusement at his expression easing the brief flare of nerves that had snuck in. “If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be? I mean you are a superhero already, with your military background, but what about now?”
She expected some glib response. Maybe a joke about being Mega-Orgasm Man, or something riddled with sexual innuendo. Instead, his expression turned serious as he took his time lining up his first swing.
“Might sound corny, but DreamMakers is my superhero job.”
Lynn considered. “Because you save guys from danger in their relationships?”
He shook his head. “It’s not just dealing with the emergency dates, although those are satisfying. Dean and I joked the other day about not being romantics, but picking up clues and finding ways to make people happy—it’s not a bad job. The biggest rush is when I see a guy get it. When we organize a special event, like for an anniversary, and it’s as if a light goes on over the guy’s head when he realizes he had known what was special to his lady. He just needed a shove in the right direction.”
His voice had gone gruff, his gaze averted, as if a big tough guy couldn’t talk about stuff like that.
Wow. “That’s a pretty cool superpower.”
Parker pulled her closer, protecting her as a large party of birthday kids shoved past them. She found her palms against his firm chest, and had to stop from sliding her hands around to his back and melting into his heat. From the flash of desire she spotted as their eyes met, he felt the same instinctive draw.
Only he brushed his lips over her forehead before releasing her. “What about you? You’ve already got the perfect secret-identity job.”
She laughed. “That’s right. Me and Spidey and Superman…”
“The media has a lot of power.”
Her nose wrinkled. “I like to think it’s the news that has power, and we’re just the delivery system. That’s why I—”
She cut off, embarrassed to have thrown herself straight back into talking about work when that was one of her relationship downfalls with Phil.
Parker tucked a finger under her chin, adding gentle pressure until she couldn’t help but stare into his concerned eyes. “Why did you stop like that? What were you about to tell me?”
“It’s a work thing, and I don’t want to bore you with it.”
He swept his thumb over her cheek, sending instant shivers along her spine. “Nothing about you bores me. Now spill.”
His caress not only turned her on, it reassured her. The expression in his eyes made the biggest difference, as if he really was interested.
“I don’t think I have a superhero power. Maybe I’m just the boring alter ego, but that’s okay. I’m using my gifts to make the newspaper more tech-friendly.”