by Tawny Weber
And what he saw was intriguing.
But he wasn’t in the market to be intrigued.
He was in the market to decompress. To make decisions. To figure out the rest of his damned life.
Once upon a time, he’d take the blonde up on the obvious interest on her pixie-like face. He’d have strode on over for a little conversation, a little flirtation. He’d gauge the ground, assess the heat level and if it felt right, he’d have swept her off her sexy little feet and into his bed.
But his sweeping days were over. Hell, all the fun was over. Despite the multiple offers he’d gotten from locals and tourists alike, he wasn’t in Puerto Viejo to score.
Travis shifted his weight, carefully balancing on his left foot to ensure he didn’t land on his face when he bent over to grab a towel. Pain exploded away, a lightning bolt of misery spearing out from his knee to his hip, down to his toes.
For twelve years, he’d served his country. For ten years, he’d been a SEAL. He’d served with distinction, with honor, with dedication. He’d been welcomed into two different SEAL teams, where he’d played an integral role of dozens of successful missions.
He’d served through pain, sweat, challenge and terror.
He’d freaking loved every minute of it.
He scrubbed the towel over his face, sopping up the moisture pouring off his too-long hair.
One nasty storm, one bad jump from a plane taking a flaming nosedive into the ocean, and his career was over. He was finished.
Freaking finished.
Travis’s jaw worked as he glared at the sexy reminder of what he’d lost still looking his way. He deliberately turned away from the blond temptation to stare out at the ocean.
Medical discharge.
Was it ironic or tragic that the ocean he loved, the sea he served, had ended the career he’d revered?
Probably both.
The biggest joke was that he, a man who thrived on contingency plans, had nothing. No backup career, no sideline jobs, not a single idea of what he wanted to do—or more to the point, could do—with the rest of his life once his measly savings ran out.
Once he’d gotten a handle on that, he decided, unable to resist glancing back at the blonde again, he’d be interested in enjoying the finer things in life again.
Because, damn, she really was fine.
* * *
Lila told herself she wasn’t thinking about the beach hunk as she stepped into the cool restaurant. But she knew he was there, hovering in the back of her mind. She’d figure out why, later. For now, she looked around the restaurant, assessing her quarry’s lair.
The place was empty but for one other couple, and the décor was enough to make her wince. Here they were in the Caribbean, and the owners had fitted this place out to look like an average bar in Anywhere, USA.
A long bar, complete with neon signs and shelves of bottles, covered the back wall. Posters—thumbtacked, not framed—advertised American beer and, for some reason she couldn’t figure out, a long-defunct sitcom. Three ceiling fans sent lazy shadows dancing over the dozen tables scattered around the room.
“Hola,” a woman from behind the bar greeted her, her black tee stating that Casa de Rico’s salsa was the hottest and her name tag reading Dory Parker. “Table for one?”
“Yes, please.”
“Have at it,” she said, waving one hand to indicate Lila’s varied choices before calling for service.
Lila slid behind the table closest to the kitchen with a nice view of the beach. Not the view of the sexy beach hunk, but that was just as well. The man had distraction written all over him.
“Hi,” she said as soon as the waitress came over. She was a pretty girl with dark skin and a lip piercing, dressed the same as the bartender except that her shirt proclaimed that their margaritas got you drunker. “I’d love a bottle of water and a menu.”
“Got the menu right here,” the girl said, handing over a laminated page. “I’ll be right back with that water.”
Lila glanced at the page only long enough to assure herself that it was the same as the one on their website.
“I’ve heard that your chef is wonderful,” she said as soon as the waitress came back. “Senor Rodriguez, right?”
“Sure, Chef Rodriguez is in the back, cooking up a storm,” the waitress said, her vigorous nod sending the bleached dreadlocks bouncing around her round face. “He’s good. You’ll see. You decide what you want?”
“What’s your favorite?” Lila asked, keeping it friendly.
Deciding to take the girl’s advice, and since early afternoon lent itself to tapas, Lila ordered a varied selection.
The menu was promising, but she wanted to see for herself if Rodriguez was as good as the Martins remembered. There was no point convincing them if he’d lost his touch.
An hour later—Casa de Rico obviously didn’t believe in rushing their diners—Lila had confirmed that Rodriguez was as good as advertised.
What she hadn’t figured out was why a chef of his caliber was working in a low-end restaurant like this one. According to her notes, he was in his midfifties, originally from Mexico City, single and childless. He’d worked in various high-end restaurants over the years, with excellent references from all of his previous employers.
It was definitely time to get a few more answers for her files.
“Everything was wonderful,” she told the dreadlocked girl when she came to take the last plate. “I’d love to personally thank the chef. Is that possible?”
From the look on her face, it was the first time she’d heard a request like that. But she shrugged and muttered something before heading back to the kitchen.
Since nobody else, including the bartender, was in the room, Lila took a moment to pull out a compact and check her makeup. She refreshed her lipstick, slid one hand over her tidy chignon to make sure no hair had escaped, and decided she’d hit the right note of professionalism. Not always easy when you looked like a blonde Kewpie doll.
“Hola,” called out a big voice. It matched the man, who lumbered through a door barely wider than he was and strode across the room. His thick black hair was sprinkled with the same gray that dusted his mustache. Instead of the traditional white chef’s attire, he wore blue with a white apron tucked under a gut that proclaimed him a man who loved to eat as much as cook.
“I’m Chef Rodriguez,” he greeted, his accent light and musical. “And you must be the woman of excellent taste who enjoyed my food, yes?”
“I am, Chef Rodriguez,” she said with a wide smile, rising from her seat to take his hand in hers. “The meal was delicious. I particularly enjoyed the ceviche tico.”
“Gracias,” he replied, bending so low over her hand that his bushy mustache tickled her knuckles. “It’s a pleasure to serve you, senorita.”
“Everything was wonderful. Imaginative, delicious and beautifully plated,” she told him, laying on the flattery thick and widening her smile in a way she knew highlighted her dimples. Professionalism was still the byword, but with his Old World manners, she figured a smile would go further than a crisp handshake. “And your food is exactly why I’m here in Puerto Viejo.”
His dark eyes flashed with curiosity.
“I’m Lila Adrian. We spoke on the phone last week. I’m here on behalf of the Martins.”
The friendly smile disappeared, and something that looked like panic burned away the flirtatious ease on his face. He gaze shifted left, skittered right before returning to her face. His smile reemerged, much stiffer and less friendly.
“This is a bad time, senorita. And the wrong place for a discussion such as the one you’re inviting.”
“Okay,” Lila said agreeably, despite her surprise at his extreme reaction. Especially given that during their phone conversation, he’d been the one to suggest she come to the restaurant to negotiate the em
ployment terms.
Over the years, she’d seen plenty of people who didn’t want their current bosses to know they were being scouted, but most usually used it as a bargaining tool. For better money out of her client if they left, or better conditions from their boss if they stayed. He’d given a different impression over the phone, but she could play the game.
“That’s fine,” she said agreeably. “Would you prefer to meet elsewhere? Perhaps Luca’s, in the Hotel Azure? I’d be happy to take you to dinner and discuss the Martins’ proposal.”
They both glanced over as a party of four came into the restaurant with a woman who stationed herself behind the bar. They all appeared harmless enough to Lila, but Rodriguez looked like he’d seen a group of ghosts. His eyes widened so much that the dark circles beneath almost disappeared. He wet his lips before calling out a command that had the waitress scurrying out to seat the newcomers.
“Excuse me,” the chef murmured, snagging the tray holding her check and credit card off the table and hurrying to the small station by the bar. His eyes kept bouncing between the new diners, the bartender and Lila as he ran her card.
Curious, Lila watched along with Rodriguez as the newcomers were seated, menus handed out, but none of them glanced their way or yelled boo. But Rodriguez sure looked spooked when he came back with her credit card and receipt. He was so focused on watching the new diners, he almost hit her in the face with the tray.
“Chef?” she finally said, drawing his attention back to her. “Would it be convenient to meet at my hotel?”
“No, no. Nowhere else.” Swiping the back of his hand over his sweating upper lip, Rodriguez looked over at the bartender, then at the new diners again, then shook his head. “Here is fine. Here is better. Come back later.”
“Okay...”
“The restaurant closes at 1:00 a.m., but the bar is still open. Meet me then.”
For the first time, Lila hesitated. Traveling around the world to chase down unique employees for eccentric clients might not be considered the safest career ever heard of. But meeting anyone in a strange town in a foreign country in the middle of the night was pure stupidity.
“How about tomorrow morning instead? Perhaps before the restaurant opens, around 8:00 a.m.?”
His jaw worked, the grinding making his mustache flutter. Finally, Rodriguez gave a jerky nod.
“Make it six. We open early. Go to the office, though. Not the kitchen.”
There was something in his voice that sent a shiver up and down her spine. Which was silly. Lila had been traveling—and doing damn near everything else in her life—alone for a decade without any problems.
But spine shivers weren’t to be discounted, so she’d take precautions, she decided. And everything would be fine.
“Tomorrow at six, then. Here’s my number. Please, call my cell if you need to change anything,” she requested, folding the receipt and putting it and her credit card in her bag before handing him an embossed ivory business card.
“Yes, yes, fine.” His face creased with worry, he made a shooing motion with his hands. “Go, now. Go.”
Okay, then.
Lila went.
Right down to the beach in search of Mr. Muscles, the hottie she’d like to get up close and personal with.
Lila wasn’t sure if it was still lingering irritation over word of her father’s nagging, or if it was frustration over Rodriguez playing hard to get.
But she suddenly wanted a drink. And having it with a sexy hard body would have made that all better.
But while there were plenty of hard bodies and bare skin lounging on the sand, riding on the surf, the hottie was nowhere to be found.
Figured.
Chapter 2
Stars scattered over the night sky like buckshot against black velvet. Music rolled out of Casa de Rico’s doors, blending with the crickets’ serenade to the fall of night.
Another day over and done with, and not a damned thing to show for it. He hadn’t even come up with a freaking hint of an idea of what to do with the rest of his damned life.
A beer tucked between his thighs, the braided cotton strands of the hammock digging into his flesh, Travis waited for the tension to leave his body. He’d been waiting so long, he considered it a miracle that he still believed it could happen.
Maybe he should have tried a little harder with the blonde on the beach earlier. A bout or three of hot, sweaty sex would have relaxed him a little.
Maybe it was time to give up the beach and head somewhere else. He just couldn’t quite work up the enthusiasm to figure out where.
“Yo, Hawk.”
“Yo, Manny,” Travis returned laconically, lifting a hand to greet the beanpole of a man so dark that he blended with the night. All but the brilliant white of that smile he was always flashing.
“You had phone calls. I took messages.”
“Thanks, man,” Travis said, taking the scraps of paper he didn’t want.
“One is from Paulo. Others are your SEAL friends. I know their names from times they visited, fished here. But nothing from family,” Manny said in sad tones, as if not having a family calling to add their nagging to his teammates’ was something to mourn.
“No family to be calling,” Travis said, tucking the messages into the front pocket of his cutoffs. “Only child, parents gone before I was twenty.”
“That’s a bummer, man.”
It’d been a decade, but the sympathy hit him hard. He’d thought he was long over the loss. But being around people like Manny, with an extended family so big that he had cousins in every other house in town, really brought it home how alone he was. For years, he’d had his SEAL team for family. But while they weren’t dead like his parents, they weren’t there anymore either.
But all Travis could do was shrug. Nothing else to do, and absolutely nada to say.
“You didn’t have to deliver the messages. I would have come by your place tomorrow.”
Manny ran a small produce market with his brothers. Not quite a store, not quite a stall, it did brisk business with the locals and tourists alike.
“Now’s fine,” the skinny man said before lifting a covered plate. “You want fish? I caught it this morning. Glory cooked it nice.”
Rich spices escaped the dish, its foil glinting in the moonlight as Manny plopped it onto Travis’s bare belly.
Travis grunted. He really didn’t want the fish. Just like he hadn’t wanted the gallo pinto Boon had brought by an hour ago or the cacao fresco that Senora Miguel had forced on him at breakfast. But the upside—or downside in his opinion—of crashing at a friend’s place was the friend’s friends.
“Thanks, to Glory too,” he said as he lifted the plate and, bending at the waist, leaned over to set it on the battered crate that served as his table.
“So what you doing for a job now? I’ll bet you get bored recreating, right?”
Right. There was no appeal in forced recreating. But Travis only shrugged.
“I know the perfect job for you. You should be a private investigator. Or the police. But joining the police means you follow a bunch of rigid rules, that’s no way to get the job done.”
Debating whether to point out the plethora of rules he’d lived by in the military, Travis opted to keep silent. He’d learned in his first week in town that Manny and logic weren’t real close pals.
“You become a PI and solve all the crimes around here. Like I heard yesterday, that a bunch of turistas, they were hit on by two hookers.”
Not surprising. Since it was legal, prostitution was a way of life in some parts of Costa Rica.
“The men, they do the grab and feel, but didn’t like the merchandise. Happens all the time in my market. Everyone squeeze the melons but not everyone want to buy. But these men? When they don’t want a guy, some big bruiser come out and rough them up. Says, ‘Y
ou touch, you buy.’ He put one in the hospital.”
Travis frowned. Prostitution might be legal, but pimping wasn’t. Neither were prostitution rings, which was what it sounded like Manny was describing.
“My cousin Luis, he says that a bruiser was the one who came around his store last week. He said Luis pay for protection or there will be trouble. Next day, Luis’s little girl Lupe got lost.”
“She’s missing?”
“Was missing until nighttime. The whole family, we went looking, but nobody could find her. She turned up at the market after dark. Said a big man stole her, tied her up and said she had to give a message. If her papa didn’t pay, she’d get hurt.”
Damn.
Travis grimaced.
Helpless women and children, they’d always been his hot buttons. He was tempted to offer his services. But the reality was that he had no services to offer. Who needed a cripple slowing them down? So Travis forced himself to unclench his jaw and relax instead.
“Sounds like a job for the cops.” He leaned back in his hammock again.
“The cops, they are no good here. That’s why we need you, Hawk. You can be a PI, you can help with the crimes.”
“Thanks for the food,” he made himself say.
Manny’s face fell, but he didn’t push the subject.
“You eat. It’s good. Then you go have fun.”
Travis grunted, hoping Manny would take that as an affirmative and go.
No such luck.
Instead, the other guy squatted in the sand next to the hammock and grinned.
“You gonna party like a wild thing, yes? Lots to choose from tonight, Hawk. There’s a bonfire at the big hotel, a band tuning at Lolo’s and the dancing is already kicking over at the Catfish bar.”
Not too long ago, he’d have hit all three party spots in a single night. All three and more.
But that was then.
“No, thanks.”
“You really should have some fun. Loosen up and have a good time.”
“I’m close enough to Lolo’s to hear the music,” Travis pointed out, gesturing to the bar on the other side of the small dune. “I’ll join in if I feel like it.”