Had to Be You: Bad Boys of Red Hook Read Online Free PDF

getting used to—and Patrice thanked the server by name.
    Patrice took a sip of her margarita and licked the salt off her top lip. “Bahrain.” She looked as if she were searching her internal database. He saw the spark the moment she retrieved the data. “Isn’t that an island in the Middle East?”
    Slater took a drink and peeled the edge of the label off the cold bottle, not meeting Patrice’s penetrating golden brown eyes. “That’s correct.”
    “What’s a guy like you going to do in an Islamic country?”
    “A guy like me? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
    “Dude, Patrice meant a single guy like you.” Frankie took a swig of his beer.
    Patrice interrupted. “No, I meant the girl-in-every-port kind of guy. I’ve heard all the stories.”
    “You have? From who?”
    “Storm and Logan.”
    Francis looked a little sheepish. “Patti has a way of dragging information out of anyone with a pulse. Still, isn’t it gonna be a bitch trying to get a date there?”
    “I don’t know. I really hadn’t thought about it.” All he thought about was getting away from Dominique, Seattle, and Red Hook. Oh, and making a shit-ton of money. So much money that after five years, he would make Dominique and her new fiancé look like paupers. “It doesn’t matter. The last thing I need is a woman to complicate my life.”
    Patrice pushed her long hair behind her shoulders and nailed him with her golden brown stare. “Complicate your life? Sounds to me as if you don’t have much of a life to complicate. You’ve been gone almost ten years, and all you’ve talked about is your job. Granted, it sounds as if you’ve been plenty busy and very successful, but do you have a life? A life outside work? It doesn’t sound as if you’ve taken much time to smell the roses.”
    “Patrice, there aren’t many roses in the middle of the Arabian Sea, and since I left the navy, I’ve been working my ass off to get through school. I’ve been busy. Smelling the roses hasn’t been an option.”
    A smile spread across Patrice’s pretty face, the kind of smile that made him wonder if she knew something he didn’t, and made the hair on his arms prepare to evacuate his skin. “Well, you have a month or so to just sit back and smell all the roses you want. And don’t think I didn’t notice how you watched my girl Rocki walk away. She was sitting here with you for her entire break, wasn’t she?”
    Shit. “Rocki seems very nice.”
    “Of course she’s nice. She’s one of my best friends and she’s single.”
    Yes, they’d established that. “She’s also Pop’s employee, and since I’ll be helping out here at the Crow’s Nest and plan to be out of here come the first of the year, it’s probably best not to complicate matters.”
    “Oh that’s right. You don’t need a woman to complicate your so-called life.”
    “Right.” Not unless Rocki was into some very uncomplicated, hot, explosive, mind-numbing sex and could keep it on the down-low. Still, the gleam in Patrice’s eye told him she already saw too much.
    “Hey, you’re both adults, and as far as I know, Rocki doesn’t like complications either. She dates, but she’s never had a long-term relationship in the three years that I’ve known her.”
    Francis wrapped his arm around his wife. “Now, Patrice, keep your nose out of his business.”
    Patrice waved away her husband’s warning. “What? So I want my friends to enjoy themselves. They’re both single adults and they’re both not looking for”—she held her fingers up to make air quotes—“complications. I think they’d be perfect for each other. Temporarily, that is, and from the sparks shooting between them while they were tucked into this booth earlier, they’re not going to be able to stay out of each other’s pants for long anyway.”
    Patrice slid out of the booth pulling Frankie along with her. “You know what I always say, if you can’t beat them, you might as well just cheer