When they finished, Parker staggered to a fallen log and sat. And because that wasn’t enough, he lay flat on his back in a patch of overgrown wild grass, sweating, shaking, and unable to move.

Christ, Sharon was right. He wasn’t in lean, mean fighting shape yet. Not even close.

“Aw. Need a nap?” Wyatt asked.

Remaining still, not even opening his eyes, Parker flipped him off. He wasn’t going to move, not a single trembling muscle, for a good long time . . .

The scent of coffee roused him and he opened an eye.

A feminine hand waved an iced coffee—God bless her—in front of his face. He opened another eye and met Zoe’s sunglasses-covered gaze. “Marry me,” he said.

“Huh, you’re right,” she said to someone over his head. “That did revive him.”

“Told ya,” Wyatt said. “And I bet vodka would’ve done the same thing.”

Zoe’s eyes were still on Parker, and he watched as the memories of the night before flitted through her mind, making her lips twitch.

“It’s too early for vodka,” Parker muttered. “You,” he said, pointing to Wyatt, “are an asshole.”

“Sticks and stones,” Wyatt said, and walked off. “Dinner tonight,” he called back over his shoulder. “I’ll introduce you and your potty mouth to the woman I’m going to marry.”

“Is she a sadist, too?”

Wyatt flipped him off, and Parker let out a low laugh. “Shit. She is, isn’t she?”

“Ready?” Zoe asked him.

He looked at her, taking in her long, slim-cut black blazer and skirt—blessedly short and revealing her mile-long legs. Was he ready? Ready for what? Because several really great possibilities were running on repeat through his mind, none of which could be done in front of her brother. Not to mention he’d need a shower first. And maybe another nap. “For?”

“A ride.” She narrowed her eyes. “What did you think I was offering?”

He just stared at her.

She flushed and squirmed a little bit. “Do you have to make everything sexual?” she asked.

“As much as possible. What are you doing here?”

“Wyatt called me. Said you needed a ride. Something about you being an idiot and . . . some other things I’m not going to repeat.”

He found a smile. “Aw, come on. Talk dirty to me.”

She snorted. “You want a ride or not? My first flight was cancelled but I have a lesson later that I can’t miss, so . . .”

Parker looked at the building, knowing her car was on the far side of it, both of which seemed like a million miles away. “How about you sit and talk to me for a minute?”

She huffed out a breath but sat right there in the wild grass next to him. Her long legs folded beneath her, she settled without a care for if she got dirty.

And he nearly fell in love with her right then and there.

Nearly.

Ten

“What do you want to talk about?” Zoe asked Parker warily, her eyes covered by her dark sunglasses.

That was Zoe, more afraid of trusting someone than of getting dirty. “Do you like teaching people to fly?” he asked.

“I like flying,” she said. “And in the beginning, lessons were an additional way for me to get hours in the air.”

“You needed so many hours for your license, right?”

“Yes.” She paused, clearly carefully considering her words. “You can’t accept payment for flying with a private license, but you can be paid to teach. In order to fly for a living, I had to get a commercial license, which is mind-bogglingly expensive. It required—at least in my case—loans.”

“How expensive?”

She turned to the sun and tipped her face up to it. “I’ve got about a hundred K in student loans,” she murmured.

He let out a low whistle.

“Yeah. And getting that commercial license required a minimum of two hundred fifty hours in the air. Teaching got me to those hours, and I didn’t have to pay for plane rentals or fuel.” She shrugged. “Win-win.”

“Nice,” he said, impressed. “And you kept giving the lessons after you got your license.”

“Yeah, I still get more lessons than flights compared to say, Devon, who’s been working for two years less than I have.” She lifted a shoulder. “It’s the twenty-first century, but female pilots are still few and far between, and not always a client’s first choice. Even though women have been flying as long as men, it’s still very much a boys’ club. Jobs are a lot harder to find. I’m lucky to get to work so close to home, but I don’t always get a fair share of the flights.”

Reaching over, he pulled off her sunglasses and waited until she met his gaze. “I’d hire you over a male pilot any day of the week,” he said.

She snorted. “Shock,” she said, not taking him seriously.

Which was for the best.

“Anyway,” she went on, “for now at least, teaching brings in more money, and more money helps me to pay down my loans.” She shrugged again, philosophically. “So I teach.” She looked at him. “Now you.”

“Me what?”

“Tell me something about you.”

“Well, for starters, my world is a man’s world, too. In my field, men outnumber women five to one.”

“Would you work with a woman as a partner?” she asked.

“In a heartbeat,” he said.

She smiled. “That was quick. You did realize I didn’t mean sexual partner, right?”

He grinned. “Either way. Women are smarter, sharper, more interesting, and far more fun to be with. No matter what we’re partnering for.”

Rolling her eyes, she got to her feet. “You coming?”

“Think you can go get the car and bring it over here to get me?” he asked hopefully.

Some of the annoyance left her face. “That bad?” she asked, her voice softer, her eyes softer, too, as she offered him a hand up.

Liking that, not above using that, he accepted her help but then groaned at the movement.

“What the hell did Wyatt do to you?” she murmured, slipping an arm around him. “Here, lean on me.”

Hell, yeah, he’d lean on her. Slipping an arm over her shoulders, he turned his face into her hair—which smelled grade-A amazing—and let his lips skim her ear.

She jumped a little and whipped her face toward his.

Their mouths brushed.

He groaned again—not in pain this time—but she pulled back with a frown. “Why did you push yourself so hard?” she demanded.

“Gotta get better,” he said. “Get back in the game.”

“What game?”

“Game of life.”

“That’s ridiculous,” she said. “Life’s not a damn game. And you’ve got to give your body time to heal. What better time than now while you’re on a break from work?”

A break indeed . . . They walked through the animal center. Peanut was undead and telling off a cat, who was sleeping through the whole thing, curled up next to the printer. Gertie was snoozing in a sunny spot, a puddle of drool beneath her face.

Out front, Parker slid into Zoe’s passenger seat and set his head back. Zoe shoved her car into gear and hit the gas. Parker enjoyed watching her handle the road, but mostly he enjoyed how when she worked the clutch, her long legs shifted, forcing her skirt up higher on her thighs.