Every Little Thing (Hart's Boardwalk 2)

“Fuck,” he muttered, his skin feeling flushed with arousal.

He was getting turned on walking down the goddamn street.

Thankfully his cell vibrated inside his suit pocket, distracting him. He pulled it out and saw “Dad Calling” on the screen.

Grateful for the interruption to his wayward thoughts, Vaughn answered it.

“I thought you might have seen the news about Caroline in the paper,” William Tremaine said without preamble.

“I did.”

“Are you okay?”

This, right then, this call was one of the reasons he should go back to New York.

After his mother died of a heart condition she’d had from birth that no one knew about until it just gave out one day, Vaughn’s dad had been there. He was only five when he lost his mother, and his father was a successful construction giant in New York. He didn’t exactly have the time for a five-year-old son.

But he made time.

Yes, there were nannies, but Vaughn had never felt unwanted or unloved, and as he grew older he realized how rare that was in the rarified world he’d been born into. He had no doubt that his friends were loved but that love was often crushed under the weight of expectation that was thrust upon them.

William reared him to work hard, but he never pushed his own agenda on Vaughn. Not like his friends’ parents. His father was his best friend. A man he admired and respected more than anyone else.

And he should go to New York for him.

He just couldn’t make his feet move in that direction.

“I’m fine, Dad,” Vaughn reassured him.

“I’m sure you are, just thought I’d check. You know . . . I was thinking I could stop in Delaware tomorrow. I have a business trip to London in a few days. I thought I’d make a pit stop.”

Vaughn grinned. “I’m really okay.”

“I’d like to see that for myself.”

“Then you know you’re more than welcome.”

By the time he got off the phone, his brain was whirling with thoughts of his father’s upcoming visit and his earlier encounter with Bailey Hartwell. He stopped in the middle of the street and realized he’d passed the sandwich shop he’d been on his way to, to pick up lunch.

The hurt in Bailey’s eyes flashed before his own.

He should have let one of the hotel staff get the damn sandwich for him after all but no . . . he’d wanted a stroll.

He could promise himself that it was the last stroll he’d take for a while but he knew he’d go nuts if he stayed confined to the hotel while he was in town.

Moreover . . . as torturous as it was seeing Bailey, it was the sweet kind of torture he’d become addicted to.

THREE

Bailey

There was something exciting, adventurous, and more than a little risqué about getting in my car wearing nothing but sexy underwear beneath a raincoat. I was positive if anyone saw me, they’d know what I was up to, and so I’d made a mad dash to my car, almost going over on my ankle in my red stilettos.

I’d laughed at myself as I pulled out of my driveway, and I’d giggled at the excited butterflies in my belly.

It felt good to be doing something out of the norm.

However, as I pulled up to Tom’s apartment, the butterflies took on a different flutter. The excitement was tempered by the reminder of my partner pushing me away the night before.