“Your usual?” he asked. “Or the house special?”

“What would that be?” she asked.

“Tonight it’s a watermelon mojito. I could make it virgin-style for you.”

He saw God knew how many people day in and day out, and on top of that the two of them hadn’t spoken much more than a few words to each other, but he remembered what she liked after a long day at work out on the water.

And what she didn’t. He’d noticed that she didn’t drink alcohol. Hard to believe that when he had a pub menu, a regular alcoholic beverage menu, and also a special menu dedicated solely to beer, he could keep it all straight. “You kept track of my usual?” she asked, warmed at the idea. Warmed and a little scared because she shouldn’t be doing this, flirting with him.

“It’s my job,” he said.

“Oh.” She laughed at herself. “Right. Of course.”

His eyes never left her face. “And also because your usual is a hot chocolate, which matches your eyes.”

Her stomach got warmer. So did some of her other parts. “The virgin special would be great, thanks.”

The guy on the barstool next to her swiveled to look at her. He was in a suit, tie loosened. “Hi,” he said with the cheerfulness of someone who was already two drinks into his night. “I’m Ted. How ’bout I buy you an Orgasm? Or maybe even”—wink, wink—“multiples?”

Finn’s easy, relaxed stance didn’t change but his eyes did as they cut to Ted, serious now and a little scary hard. “Behave,” he warned, “or I’ll cut you off.”

“Aw, now that’s no fun,” Ted said with a toothy smile. “I’m trying to buy the pretty lady a drink, is all.”

Finn just looked at him.

Ted lifted his hands in a sign of surrender and Finn went back to making drinks. Soon as he did, Ted leaned in close to Pru again. “Okay now that daddy’s gone, how about Sex On The Beach?”

Finn reached in and took Ted’s drink away. “Annnnd you’re out.”

Ted huffed out a sigh and stood up. “Fine, I gotta get home anyway.” He flashed a remorseful smile at Pru. “Maybe next time we’ll start with a Seduction.”

“Maybe next time,” she said, picking one of the sweet, noncommittal smiles from her wide repertoire of smiles that she used on the job captaining a day cruise ship in the bay. It took a lot of different smiles to handle all the people she dealt with daily and she had it down.

When Ted was gone, Finn met her gaze. “Maybe next time?” he repeated.

“Or, you know, never.”

Finn smiled at that. “You let him down easy.”

“Had to,” she said. “Since you played bad cop.”

“Just part of the service I offer,” he said, not at all bothered by the bad cop comment. “Did you have to cancel your last tour today?”

So apparently he knew what she did for a living. “Nope. Just got back.”

“You were out in this?” he asked in disbelief. “With the high winds and surf alerts?”

His hands were in constant motion, making drinks, chopping ingredients, keeping things moving. She was mesmerized by the way he moved, how he used those strong hands, the stubble on his jaw . . .

“Pru.”

She jerked her gaze off his square jaw and found his locked on hers. “Hmm?”

A flash of humor and something else came and went in his eyes. “Did you have any problems with the high winds and surf out there today?”

“Not really. I mean, a little kid got sick on his grandma, but that’s because she gave him an entire bag of cotton candy and then two hot dogs, and he wolfed it all down in like two seconds, so I’m not taking the blame there.”

He turned his head and looked out the open doors facing the courtyard. Dusk had fallen. The lights strung in pretty ribbons over and around the wrought iron fencing and fountain revealed sheets of rain falling from the sky.

She shrugged. “It didn’t start raining until I was off the water. And anyway, bad weather’s a part of the job.”

“I’d think staying alive would be a bigger part of the job.”

“Well yes,” she said on a laugh. “Staying alive is definitely the goal.” Truth was, she rarely had problems out on the water. Nope, it was mostly real life that gave her problems. “It’s San Francisco. If we didn’t go out in questionable weather, we’d never go out at all.”

He took that in a moment as he simultaneously cleaned up a mess at the bar and served a group a few seats down a pitcher of margaritas, while still managing to make her feel like he was concentrating solely on her.