Ethan restored the volume just as Tia released another yawn, this one full-on. Jeffrey Ritchie continued to sing in the background. While each song had a fresh beat, his client merely repeated two-word lyrics. Ethan had yet to hear a full sentence.
The song changed, and this time Jeffrey’s words of choice were 2-piece. Ethan rolled his eyes. He couldn’t determine if Wangs was singing about a chicken order or a woman’s swimsuit, but hoped it was the latter.
He looked over at Tia, whose chin was resting on her chest, and he heard soft snores coming from her direction. He immediately turned off the music, resisting the urge to eject the disc from the player and chuck it out the window. If Bat Tower Records was making millions off god-awful songs like these, then he was in the wrong profession.
Finally, a road sign emblazoned with a comic-book hero welcomed them to Metropolis, Illinois. Ethan used the touch screen on the GPS to pull up motels near the museum dedicated to the fictitious hometown boy.
Thanks to the time-consuming detour, it was nearly ten at night, so he wasn’t surprised to find the streets of the small town deserted. He drove toward the giant statue of the fictional hero looming over the town square.
Ethan slowed the car in front of the iron fence surrounding the spotlighted statue.
Deciding to let Tia sleep, he cruised through the parking lots of three nearby hotels searching for a Harley. He found one and then another and another. The lots were filled with the damn bikes.
Ethan decided to suspend his search for the night. He was beat, Tia was clearly exhausted and there wasn’t much else they could do tonight anyway. He made a three-point turn and headed back to the first hotel he’d checked, where he’d already reserved separate rooms.
They’d both get a good night’s sleep, then intercept his grandma and lover boy at the superhero museum in the morning. And if all went as planned, by this time tomorrow night he’d be saying aloha to the sandy beaches and tropical waters of Hawaii.
Chapter 6
“Come on, Carol, pick up,” Tia chanted into her cell phone the next morning, tapping her sandaled foot against the hotel room carpet.
Nothing. Just a repeated unanswered buzz in her ear.
Tia ended the call and began repacking the things she’d pulled from her overnight bag. She hoped to have an opportunity to try again before she and Ethan headed over to the museum. Otherwise, Carol would need superhero powers to keep her grandson from ruining her trip and, more than likely, wreaking havoc on her rekindled relationship with Glenn.
Still, Tia was torn.
Ethan’s words, among other things, had plagued her restless sleep. Trust I have my grandmother’s best interests at heart.
Tia truly believed Ethan thought he was doing the right thing. Trouble was, she also believed he was dead wrong. In reality, the best thing he could do for his grandmother was to butt out of her life and head back to Nashville this morning.
Fat chance of that happening, she thought, remembering his hard expression and strong jaw each time he’d stormed into her office. In his mind, his grandmother’s well-being was in jeopardy.
There lay another paradox. While she didn’t agree with him, Tia couldn’t help grudgingly admire a man who’d go this far to protect a loved one.
She picked up her phone to try Carol again, when she heard a knock at the door. Damn, too late, she thought.
Tia peered through the peephole, and sure enough, Ethan was standing on the other side of the door looking ridiculously handsome. Her pulse picked up at the sight of him dressed in black shorts and a red T-shirt that stretched across his broad chest.
Tia grasped the door handle and closed her eyes briefly. She did a quickie version of a breathing exercise to pull herself together.
Deep down, Ethan was a decent guy and Tia had enjoyed his company during the latter part of the drive, but there was another side to him, she reminded herself—a man who would ruin his grandmother’s adventure and, if necessary, ruin Espresso.
She had to figure out a way to stall or stop him.
Ethan knocked again, and this time she pulled open the door.
“Ready?” he asked.
Tia nodded, wishing she hadn’t inhaled that last big breath of air. The scent of his soap, tinged with the same hint of sandalwood as his aftershave from yesterday, filled her nostrils and head with notions they’d agreed to put on hold.
It was time for her to exercise some self-control. Today wasn’t about seduction. It was about sabotage.
Ethan dropped their room keys at the hotel’s front desk and pocketed the receipt for their overnight stay.
“There’s a coffee shop across from the museum. I thought we’d grab a bite to eat there while we wait for it to open,” he said as he loaded their bags into his car’s small trunk. “They’re both within walking distance.”
“Sounds good,” Tia said.
“You’re quiet this morning. Sleep okay?” Ethan asked as they walked down the street toward the town square.
It wasn’t quite nine, but the summer heat was already taking a foothold. The sign on a bank they’d passed flashed the time and the fact it was already eighty-five degrees.
“Your room comfortable?” he asked.
“Yeah, everything was fine.”
Tia was too nervous to talk. The closer they got to the giant superhero statue looming over the center of the square, the more anxious she grew about not being able to warn Carol. She had to stall Ethan, but how?
She stopped suddenly. “I think I left something back at the hotel!”
“What?” Ethan asked, stopping beside her.
“My phone,” Tia lied. It was the best she could come up with off the top of her head. “I made a call earlier and I left my mobile on the bed. We have to go back.”
“Are you sure? Maybe you should double check your purse.”
Concern creased his handsome features, and Tia suppressed the twinge of guilt she felt over the lie. “If it were in my purse, I’d know it. I definitely left it back at the hotel.”
Ethan exhaled. “You go back and get it, then meet me at the coffee shop.”
“But you have to come with me,” she said. “The rooms were in your name. They may not let me back in.”
Ethan looked down the street at the coffee shop and back toward the hotel. “Okay, but let’s hurry. The museum opens in twenty minutes.”
Just as they turned to start off in the opposite direction, a familiar buzz sounded. It was coming from her purse.
Damn! Tia bit the inside of her lip to keep from saying the word aloud.
Ethan halted in his steps. He cast a pointed look at her ringing handbag and arched a brow. “Told you to check your purse.”
“That you did.” Tia smiled sheepishly as the phone continued to buzz.
“You answering it?” he asked.
Tia needed to talk to Carol, but not now. Not with the woman’s grandson staring right in her mouth. She retrieved the phone from her purse and exhaled in relief when she saw the caller.
“Max,” Tia said into the phone.
Her assistant’s early-morning flight had landed in Albuquerque, and he was in a rental car en route to Lola’s hotel. Thank goodness something was going right, Tia thought, falling into step beside Ethan as they walked to the diner.
“Thank you, Max, and thank Ashley for me, too. There aren’t many wives who’d agree to her husband’s babysitting supermodels,” Tia said.
“Ash told me to tell you that you owe her big-time, and at her next spa appointment, she wants both her hair and makeup done by you personally,” Max said. “I tried telling her you rarely did hands-on with—”
“Done,” Tia interrupted. “I’ll make an exception. It’s the least I can do.”
She wrapped up the conversatio
n just as Ethan opened the front door of the coffee shop. The mouthwatering aroma of cinnamon rolls and coffee greeted them, along with the sounds of murmured conversation.
Tia immediately scanned the tables for Carol. No sign of her. She silently prayed it stayed that way and that her friend and Glenn were having their morning coffee elsewhere.
A few minutes later, a waitress seated her and Ethan at a window table offering unobstructed views of both the front and back entrances of the comic-book-superhero museum and souvenir shop.
“There’s no way we’ll miss them sitting here,” Ethan said, looking across the street at the redbrick building trimmed in bright blue, red and yellow.
Tia followed his gaze, staring up at the second floor, where a superhero figure was perched as if it were about to take flight from a window ledge. Just from the exterior, she could tell the museum was good kitschy fun, but she couldn’t appreciate it. Every time she spotted a person walking along the street or a motorcycle roared past, she worried it might be Carol and Glenn.
A waitress in a faded red uniform brought Ethan the coffee he’d ordered and Tia’s cup of tea. Despite missing dinner, both of them passed on the cinnamon rolls. Tia was too anxious to eat, and she was sure Ethan skipped the pastries for the same reason.
He dumped the contents of three sugar packets into his coffee and returned his attention to the window.
“It’s open,” he said.
Tia sipped her tea. She’d also seen someone inside the store flip the closed sign to Open. She glanced across the table at Ethan. There was no way he’d abandon his watch post, so she had to try again to talk him out of his plans.
“Cool place,” she said, staring out at the museum’s exterior. “Seems completely harmless, don’t you think?”
“Maybe.”
“Then why not let your grandmother and her friend,” Tia said, not daring to use the word boyfriend, “enjoy it?”
Ethan’s expression remained unreadable as he removed his phone from the front pocket of his shorts. After a swipe and a few taps with his forefinger, he turned the screen around so she could see it.
Tia’s eyes lit on a scanned copy of Carol’s bucket list.
“While a visit to a museum is harmless, zip-lining and skydiving aren’t. Nor is getting here on the back of a stranger’s motorcycle.”
“He’s not a stranger to Carol, who I believe has good judgment.”
“Well, this Glenn is a stranger to me. I don’t even know his last name.” Ethan pocketed his phone. He glanced over at the museum before turning back to her. “For all I know, he could have a criminal record or, at his age, cataracts.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” Tia said, hoping to keep his eyes on her and not the entrance to the museum.
She knew how she would’ve really liked to divert his attention. If she’d let her libido have its way, she would have answered Ethan’s knock at her hotel-room door this morning wearing nothing but a smile.
Heat crept up Tia’s neck to her face as she remembered the naughty things she’d done to him in her dreams last night and the extra-naughty things she’d imagined him doing to her.
She cleared her throat. “What makes you think Glenn is old?” she asked, forcing her attention back to helping her friend. “Carol could be getting her cougar on with a hot, young twentysomething.”
She watched Ethan’s mouth drop open before his full lips pursed into a frown. Well, at least he wasn’t looking across the street.
“I almost said that my grandmother had better sense than to do something like that, but after your makeover and putting this bucket-list business into her head, I have no idea what she’s capable of anymore,” he said. “However, her next-door neighbor described Glenn as a ‘silver fox,’ which would make him closer to Depends than Pampers.”
Tia coughed, nearly choking on her tea.
Ethan’s frown morphed into a smirk, and he cocked a brow. “Tea go down the wrong way?” he asked.
“Something like that,” Tia replied.
He glanced down at his watch. “The museum’s been open awhile,” he said. “I’m thinking we should go over there. Just in case we somehow missed them going inside.”
“That’s not a good idea,” Tia blurted out.
“Why not?”
“We’re right here. There’s no way they could have slipped in without you spotting them,” she said, scrambling. “I was thinking I’d try one of the cinnamon rolls. They are the shop’s specialty, and we didn’t eat dinner last night.”
Tia ended up tossing the BLTs she’d made upon their arrival at the hotel last night, the hours-old wrapped sandwiches retaining little of their freshly made appeal.
Ethan appeared to be considering her suggestion, but he rose from his chair. He pulled a ten from his wallet and tossed it on the table.
“Later,” he said. “Time for us to check out the museum.”
* * *
Find Grandma and get out of here. Ethan silently repeated his mission in his head as he and Tia crossed the street.
The mantra was supposed to keep him focused on his goal, but he was finding it as useless as the one about sticking to his game plan had been outside Tia’s condo. Tia’s long, shapely legs in that short pink skirt could not, would not, be ignored.
Part of him itched to toss her over his shoulder and march right back to the hotel he’d just checked out of. He’d book a room for a week and spend every minute of it finishing what they’d started on her sofa.
Tia said something, drawing his eyes to those glossy peach lips.
Hell, make it two weeks, he thought. Once he started making love to her, it would take at least that long to act out every fantasy he’d concocted last night involving those incredible legs and those full lips. His cock stirred and Ethan yanked his gaze from Tia’s mouth.
A bell sounded as he opened the door to the museum and walked in behind her.
“Morning, folks.” A gray-haired man peered over a glass case, where he was busily arranging trinkets boasting the logo and likeness of the fictional red-caped superhero the town claimed as its own. “Be with you in a sec.”
Ethan glanced around. They apparently were in the museum’s gift shop. Every kind of superhero item you could think of crammed the tight space, from the souvenir standards of key chains, mugs and T-shirts, to king-size bedding.
“What grown man sleeps on superhero sheets?” Ethan mumbled.
Tia laughed.
“You’d be surprised,” the old man said, still crouched behind the case on the opposite side of the room.
“He must have superhuman hearing,” Tia whispered.
The man adjusted his thick glasses. “Eyesight isn’t what it used to be, pretty lady, but I can hear a conversation two blocks away.”
“Hmm, that far. Are you sure your name isn’t really Clark Kent?” Tia winked at the elderly man and smiled.
It was a genuine grin filled with warmth that lit up her entire face. Ethan couldn’t help feeling envious of the shopkeeper, longing to be on the receiving end of one of Tia’s smiles.
Today, she’d paired the short pink skirt with a sleeveless white blouse, and her hair was swept off her face in a low side ponytail tied with a pink scarf. The old man was absolutely right she was a very pretty lady.
Find Grandma and get out of here. Ethan stopped gawking at Tia and walked over to the counter.
“Sir, I’m hoping you can help me with something.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and scrolled through until he found a photo of his grandmother. “Has this woman been by here this morning or possibly last night?”
In a flash, Tia was by his side. “Thousands of people come through here every year, probably hundreds a day.” Tia laughed, but it sounded strained. “Of course he wouldn’t remember one.”
“That’s Carol,” the old man said casually, surprising both of them. “She and Glenn were by here this morning. Talked to them last night, too. Good people.”
Ethan exhaled a relieved sigh. Finally. “Where are they?” he asked, looking around. He could care less about Glenn; he just wanted his grandmother. “You opened not too long ago, so they’ve got to be around here somewhere.”
He couldn’t help noticing the playful Tia of just moments ago had vanished. She looked stressed and anxious.
“You okay?” He touched her arm.
She nodded and he turned back to the elderly shopkeeper. “Are they in the museum section?” Ethan asked, having seen the sign leading to it.
“No, son,” he said. “They’re gone.”
Gone. The word was starting to become synonymous with his grandmother, and Ethan didn’t like it one bit.
“But how? You opened at nine and I’ve been watching the entrance.”
The older man scratched his head. “They were long gone by nine. I opened the place up early and gave them a special tour. Glenn certainly knows his comic-book-superhero history. Told him to come back next year to help me out during the town’s annual superhero celebration. We have it every June, you know.”
“A special tour?” Ethan asked, trying to get him back on track.
“Oh, yeah, they were here around seven-thirty. Glenn was real eager to see memorabilia from the old black-and-white television series, back when George Reeves played the one in the red cape, but I didn’t think it was a good idea for them to hang around town. Not after the way Carol cleaned out everyone at the poker tables over at the casino last night,” he said. “Old Jessie Plummer’s a sore loser, not to mention a rotten poker player. My guess is once his wife finds out how much money he lost, he’ll be out looking to take it back.”
Ethan stared incredulously at the old man, unable to believe what he was hearing. “You must be mistaken. My grandma doesn’t play poker, or even cards, for that matter.”
“Well, she played like an old pro last night.” The elderly man chuckled and winked at Tia, who suddenly busied herself looking at a pair of sparkly red superheroine flip-flops. “Your granny walked away with a five-thousand-dollar jackpot.”
Every Road to You Page 8