Copyright © Kate Richards, 2017
Drake closed the lid on his laptop and stuffed the device in its bag. If he’d had any doubts about taking on the summer job rather than staying in town to work on his book, the name of his assistant director solidified his decision.
Karen Barrow. His office neighbor.
The beautiful, curvy, copper-haired professor whose jade-green eyes never settled on him long enough to acknowledge he was alive. Perhaps a little time on an island where the only other adult was the elderly cook would get her to notice him.
The schedule called for the director and assistant to arrive a week before the campers, the teen counselors, and the cook. A romantic getaway with a little work, and writing, thrown in. If he couldn’t make an impression on a crowded campus, perhaps the atmosphere at Dolphin Paradise would make the difference. Either that or he was going to be taking a lot of cold showers. Every time she strolled past his office, he had to turn around and adjust himself. No other woman caused him to lose so much control. Not to mention during the course of his first year at Oleander College, he’d gradually ceased dating anyone at all. Somehow, the pretty secretaries and junior professors no longer held his attention. The playboy professor of his previous institution who’d rolled into town and dated half a dozen Oleander faculty had faded by November. His focus narrowed.
Professor Barrow was not only beautiful, she was popular with her students, her classes filled to capacity, and her work with the less fortunate in the community had earned her the respect of the dean and even a special award from the president of the school. She was everything he’d never wanted.
A keeper.
You didn’t go out with a Karen Barrow unless you had the best of intentions, and, so far, his had always been less than long-term. His dates knew that…he never pretended to want more than a fun evening. He paid for dinner or whatever the activity was, opened car doors, listened when they spoke, and they seemed to find him attractive. Most evenings ended up in the woman in question’s bedroom. Never his. And he never stayed overnight.