Smitty stared at the hand for a moment, mistrusting that ten years could be wiped away that easily. Not sure he wanted it to be. Something important had just passed between them, but he wasn't yet sure what it was.
"Come on, let's shake on it." She waved her hand and her perfectly painted nails flashed. "Then let's get on the road. We can make it to the Seaquarium by morning."
He took her hand and held it rather than shaking it. "No fancy dinner for us tonight then? Not even to celebrate our new level of understanding and the end of our feuding days?"
She avoided his gaze. "I don't think so." But she sounded sad. Almost wistful. She slid her eyes to his, then away. "I've always valued our friendship, Smits, even when we've mostly been fighting. I don't want to endanger it by turning it into something ... else, okay? We tried that once and it didn't work. I value you too much to try again. I think we should just be ... friends, and leave it at that, okay?"
Tugging her hand away, she wrapped her towel around her waist as though suddenly self-conscious about the amount of skin her bikini revealed. She turned and headed for the locker area, calling over her shoulder, "I'll meet you by the front entrance in five. And I'm really glad we got all that sorted out."
She disappeared into the ladies' changing area, leaving Smitty standing near the nacho stand, shaking his head. His body was warm where it had touched hers. His hand tingled faintly, and he had the insane urge to chase after her and play this whole scene over again, differently.
Because as far as he was concerned, their conversation had raised as many questions as it had answered. And he'd be darned if he let her finish this road trip without answering a few more of them.
Like whether her blood heated when they were together. Or whether her heart pounded when they touched.
Whether she ever wished things had been different. And whether she had the guts to try again.
The refrigerator truck's engine hummed a steady monotone as they crossed the border into Florida late that night. Violet glanced over at her passenger and was relieved to see that Smitty had finally dropped off to sleep.
When they'd gotten back on the road, he'd tried to talk about what had happened at the water park, but she hadn't been ready. So they'd driven in silence for a time, with the questions humming between them, unasked.
Was it really so simple? Had she spent the last ten years blaming him completely for something that had been both their faults-or really nobody's fault at all?
She shook her head and changed lanes. Perhaps it was that simple. But it really wasn't simple at all, because during the course of their day at the water park, she'd realized she was in deeper trouble than she'd thought.
Every time Smitty had glanced at her, it felt like a caress. Every time he touched her-to help her onto a ride, or to draw her attention to a pretty scene-she felt like liquid fire had been poured through her veins.
Before, she'd blamed it on irritation. On Streaker's close quarters and the inevitable awareness that developed when two people worked together as much as they did. Now she acknowledged she was attracted to him. And that was a bad thing. There was no room on Streaker for another couple, and there was sure as heck no room for a breakup.
It had been weird enough when she and Brody dissolved their so-called relationship, when frankly there hadn't been much regret on either side. But she knew from experience that breaking up with Smitty brought forth very different emotions.
Wrenching, tearing emotions she'd rather not relive.
Ten years ago, she'd run away-straight to that research project on Puget Sound. But where could she go this time? Dolphin Friendly was her family, and they couldn't afford to have her gone just as the new stranding center was going on-line. Or could they?
No, she decided. She couldn't leave. And if she and Smitty started something again and it failed, she wouldn't be able to stay.
The man in question stirred in his sleep and muttered something. She glanced over and was rewarded by the play of streetlight over his familiar features. He was going to have a heck of a sore neck if he kept sleeping like that-all jammed between the uncomfortable edge of the bench seat and the smeared window. Violet debated moving him, but decided to leave well enough alone. She didn't want him to wake up now. In the dead of the night, cocooned in the cab of the humming truck, it would be too easy to say something she'd regret during the day.
He stirred again and mumbled, "Violet? Vi?" The words were thick with sleep and precious because of it. She dreamed of him sometimes and woke up feeling warm and loved. Other times, she woke feeling lonely. Maybe now he was dreaming of her.
She drove with one hand, reached over and touched his clenched fist with the other. "I'm here Smits. It's going to be okay. We'll find a way to get along so we can both stay with Dolphin Friendly. That's all that matters."
Mumbling something else, he opened his hand and tangled his fingers with hers, the way he used to when they were together, and she felt a dull ache under her breastbone.
Violet slid her hand free as the truck labored up a gentle Florida hill. She stomped on the clutch and muttered, "We've both got to stay with the group. Nothing else matters."
Then she changed gears.
Smitty woke up just as they eased into the back lot of the Seaquarium. From the looks of the sky, it was early morning. He wasn't sure what day it was, but he was convinced that he'd never been quite as sticky and sore as he was at that moment. In his opinion, which he'd shared with Violet when they'd stopped to brush their teeth with iron-tainted truck stop water, not even a four-day stranding rescue in a sludge-filled inlet could compare to the experience of riding in a non-air-conditioned refrigerator truck all the way from Cape Cod to Florida.
Violet was still driving, as she had been since the night before. She'd snarled when he'd offered to switch, so he'd given up and gone back to sleep. She'd apparently opted to head straight for the Seaquarium rather than stopping off at a motel to shower and change.
He glanced over at the driver's seat. Her brunette hair was long and lustrous, caught up in a casual ponytail that made her look about eighteen. Her nails were perfect, her khaki shorts neatly pressed, and the floaty blouse she'd tied over another of those clinging tank tops added just the right touch of girl.
Of course she hadn't wanted to stop and refresh herself. She was born refreshed.
He lifted himself off the passenger side window that had formed his pillow since Georgia, and tried to sit up straight like his mother had always badgered him to do when he was a boy. Every muscle in his body protested the action with howls of pain. He scrubbed a hand through his hair and wondered whether it was possible that he'd actually made his teeth dirtier by brushing them at that truck stop.
"We're here," Violet sang, sounding annoyingly happy. "And look, there's a welcoming committee."
Sure enough, there was a small group clustered around the back gate that led into the stranding rescue staging area of the Seaquarium. Smitty and Violet both knew their way around the place, since Dolphin Friendly had worked out of the Seaquarium several years ago, compiling stranding data for the Florida coast.
Because of the familiarity, Smitty was annoyed that he felt like such a mess when they arrived. These people are researchers, he assured himself, they understand that being rumpled-looking is part of the job ... even if your traveling companion looks like she just stepped off the cover of a fashion magazine.
He and Violet swung out of the cab to a chorus of hellos and welcomes, and Smitty tried not to notice that all of the Seaquarium staff members were dressed in perfectly pressed khaki shorts and logo polo shirts.
"Violet! Smitty!" A tall man stepped ahead of the others and spread his arms in welcome. He looked familiar in a slick, well-groomed sort of way. His dark hair was disheveled and probably trained to stay that way for the duration of the day. His teeth were perfectly white, his tan perfectly even, and the legs that stuck out of his perfectly pressed shorts were ... well, perfect.
S
mitty couldn't place him immediately-he hadn't been one of the staff members they'd dealt with at the Seaquarium before-but he was pretty sure the guy was going to irritate him, which was surprising, as Smitty wasn't one for snap judgments and he liked just about everyone. Except this guy.
That thought became a certainty when Violet whooped and jumped into the other man's arms. "Chaz! What are you doing here?" She hugged him and Smitty ground his teeth.
He was right. Now that he knew who Mr. Perfect was, Smitty knew for sure that he didn't like the guy much. Chaz Trowt-with a name like that, he should've gone into fisheries biology, not marine mammology-had been a year or two ahead of them at U.C. Santa Cruz. He'd been a straight-A student, president of half the clubs on campus, and had always had a pack of women on his heels.
Finished with his excessive welcome of Violet, Chaz turned and held out his hand. "And Smitty! I haven't seen you in ages. You look ..." he glanced up and down Smitty's rumpled, travel-weary form and finished with a lame, "good."
Smitty shook his hand because he couldn't think of a graceful way not to. "Chaz. I didn't know you worked here." He glanced between Violet and Chaz and narrowed his eyes when he noticed how close they were standing. "And I didn't know you two were so friendly."
Chaz looked surprised by Smitty's scowl. He took a step back towards his coworkers. "Violet and I worked together on the Puget Sound project. We got to know each other pretty well, but fell out of contact after. You know how it is." His eyes darted back and forth between Smitty and Violet and one eyebrow lifted in silent question. "I didn't know you two were back together. Brody didn't mention it when he called to say you were on your way."
Violet shook her head in quick denial. "Oh no, we're not together, Chaz. We're just friends, right, Smitty?"
He felt her elbow in his ribs and nodded, irritated with himself that he was annoyed. That's what they'd decided on at the water park, wasn't it? Friends. They'd called a truce and agreed to leave their past behind. So why did the idea of her snuggling up to Chaz-the-Perfect irritate him so much?
"Oh good! Then I'd love to take you out to dinner tonight, Vi. For old times' sake." Chaz smiled dazzlingly and Smitty wondered whether he had ever tried to jump off the side of a research vessel with his swim fins glued to the deck.
"Sorry," Smitty said without a trace of remorse. "We've already made plans for dinner tonight."
Violet looked up at him in surprise. "We have?"
"Of course. Remember? We have to spend the specimen jar money." They'd added to it the night before when he'd wanted to stop and buy Georgia peaches and she hadn't, and again when she'd needed a bathroom break a half hour after they'd stopped for gas. They were up to almost a hundred and fifty dollars now. "There won't be time to do it on the way home, and by the time we get back to Smugglers Cove things will be in an uproar, getting ready for the big opening."
She nodded and Chaz looked handsomely crestfallen. Then Violet snapped her fingers. "Chaz! Why don't you come to dinner with us? We can all catch up on old times, and there's more than enough money in the fight jar to pay for all of us. Please say you'll come!"
Smitty couldn't very well argue with her logicexcept that he'd wanted Violet all to himself for one dinner. Just to test their new truce, of course, not like it was a real date or anything. But it seemed that she was bound and determined to spend her evening with Perfect Chaz.
It was funny. He didn't remember having disliked Chaz this much when they'd all been in school together.
Clearly sensing a dangerous undercurrent, Chaz glanced from one to the other. "Are you sure?"
"Of course," Violet answered for both of them. "We'd love to have you along. Meet us in the Seaquarium Hotel lobby after the park closes-say seven-and we'll go from there, okay? And if you don't mind driving, that'd be great. Our wheels are less than stylish."
Chaz nodded, Smitty grumbled, and the welcom ing committee-some of whom had started shifting restlessly during this exchange-ushered the newcomers into the Seaquarium to meet their new passenger.
Jasper the sea lion was huge and very, very friendly.
Violet discovered this when she leaned down to examine his feeding chart and he poked his whiskered nose through the mesh of his holding pen and gave her a wet, fishy kiss on the cheek. "Ugh! Um ... I mean, thanks, Jasper."
Smitty snickered and she glared at him. He'd been easier to deal with when he'd been fast asleep in the truck. Then at least she could glance at him from time to time and indulge in bittersweet memories of the good times they'd had together. Now that he was awake-and looking as devastatingly rumpled and unshaven as she'd ever seen him-he was bothering her again on a very deep, very primitive level.
She'd thought that once they talked about their grad school breakup and put it in the past, her characteristic twitchiness around him would be gone. She'd always blamed it on leftover anger from the way he'd married Ellen right after she'd turned him down. But if anything, it seemed worse. She was aware of his every motion. His every mood.
That's why she'd been so glad to see Chaz. Like Brody, he could provide a badly needed buffer.
"Hork! Hork!" Jasper applauded himself for the kiss and Violet grabbed a corner of Smitty's shirt and used it to wipe her face off.
"Hey!"
She shrugged. "Like anyone will notice another smear on your ensemble."
She had a fleeting thought that maybe she'd borrowed his shirt to warn the circling vultures away. The women who worked at the Seaquarium were already giving Smitty the once-over ... and his filthy shirt was the last thing they were looking at. Violet bared her teeth at a particularly interested-looking blond whose logo polo shirt was a wee bit tight.
"That's Candi with an `i'," Chaz murmured in her ear, noticing the direction of Violet's gaze. Then he raised his voice. "And I've got a great idea. Candi, why don't you join us for dinner tonight as well? You can be Smitty's guest and I'll be Violet's. Four is a much more comfortable number than three, don't you think?"
Violet winced at the idea, but her protest was drowned out by Candi's squeal of glee. Smitty just glowered, which seemed to be his fallback expression of the morning, and the arrangements were made.
"Can we please," Violet said through clenched teeth, "get on with this? We're going to load Jasper first thing tomorrow morning and drive him round the clock until we get him to Smugglers Cove right before the opening ceremonies. That's the way Brody has it planned. So we're going to need to know how to work the commands you've taught him for the ceremony. Chaz, I'd like you to run us through his routine, please."
"Of course, Vi." One of the other women produced an enormous pair of fake scissors, a dog whistle, and a bucket of fish. Chaz hopped into Jasper's holding pen and gave three short peeps on the whistle, which brought the enormous creature out of the water and up onto a floating dock.
At sixteen years old, Jasper was a full-grown California sea lion, and looked much like the wild ones off the Monterey coast. She might have been saddened that the twelve-hundred-pound animal lived in captivity, even though his accommodations were large and well designed, but she could also see the gnarled white scar running down his flank, and could tell that one of his hind flippers-which sea lions use for steering-was damaged.
The Seaquarium was primarily a stranding rescue center. Its seal, dolphin, and manatee educational programs were populated with animals that had been rescued and were too badly hurt for rehabilitation. Its sea lion show was made up of animals who'd been rescued from their native waters off California and shipped to Florida for placement.
She watched Chaz run Jasper through a warm-up routine of spins, jumps, and ball balancing, and she felt herself relax. The sea lion was obviously enjoying his work. As the behaviors grew more complex, Chaz provided a running commentary on the cognitive research that was also taking place at the Seaquarium, using the sea lions and a few rescued dolphins. Violet soon found herself nodding and asking questions.
It wasn't quite the open seas that she
loved, but she decided it wasn't bad either. The research done at the Seaquarium provided information that would help Dolphin Friendly with its new stranding research center.
"It's all based on targeting, see?" Chaz demonstrated by cueing Jasper to place his nose on a ball. Wherever he moved the ball, Jasper's nose followed. "Just say `Jasper, target' and he'll latch on to the prop." He demonstrated with the fake scissors and Violet saw Smitty nod.
He didn't seem to be frowning as hard as he had been. Maybe he was looking forward to dinner with Candi.
Now Violet scowled.
"Why don't you two come in here and practice with him?" Chaz handed over the props and ushered her and Smitty into the pen. "Just do what I showed you, and if he gives you a behavior that's even close to what you want, reward him with a short blast on the whistle and a piece of fish. Once he's got the idea, you can shape the behavior until it's where you want it. That's called `modeling,' or `shaping.' "
Smitty took the trainer's place, and Violet felt incredibly foolish holding a piece of ribbon and an oversized pair of fake scissors. They ran through the behavior a few times until Jasper was taking the scissors in his mouth and using them to `cut' the ribbon on Smitty's command.
"Okay, now switch so he's heard the cues from both of you," Chaz suggested. "That way you'll be all ready for Brody's show the day after tomorrow."
Violet was happy to relinquish the ribbon, but with her, Smitty, and Jasper all on the float at once, it was difficult to swap places. She tried to edge around Jasper's rear end so she wouldn't have to go near Smitty, but a couple of low, annoyed-sounding grunts from the sea lion let her know that wasn't going to work.
She reversed direction and tried to slide past Smitty without touching him as he tried to do the same, but her foot slipped on a fallen piece of fish. She squeaked as she fell towards the water, grabbing for Smitty, who tried to catch her. He snagged a handful of her shirt ... and they both pitched into the water of the sea lion's tank.
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