Only when he walked her around to her door did he notice the other van had pulled up behind them, and the others were waiting inside their vehicle. Javi rejected his own impulse to offer his hand to Esperanza to help her up, just because he wanted to touch her. Once the door was closed behind her, he rounded the SUV to get them back on the road.
Espy’s tourgroup attempted to see one tornado a week, but the excitement never faded. She alternated watching the sky and checking the radar on her phone, and the texts Angelica sent to keep them on the right track.
“So who does all that checking for you when you’re driving?” Javi asked. “You don’t do both things, do you?”
“I usually have an assistant, but she couldn’t make this trip because her wife is about to have a baby. So in that case I would use one of the tourists to help me out. They like being a part of the hunt that way.”
Javi nodded. “Makes sense. As long as you’re not texting and driving.” He accompanied his instruction with a stern expression.
She held her hands up in surrender. “No sir. Never!”
“See that you don’t.”
She grinned, and rested her hand on her camera on her lap.
“So which came, first? Photography, or storm chasing?”
“Oh, photography, from when I was just in middle school. I was the photographer for both my middle school and high school papers. And then I started getting into weather, and I had my photographs featured on the evening news a few times, and it just kind of came together from there.”
“I always wanted to learn,” he said. “I can see things I think would make great pictures, but my phone doesn’t do them justice. One thing I’d like to be able to photograph is the moon, the night sky. It’s really beautiful out here, away from all the light pollution. The stars at night, and all that.”
She nodded. “I bet. I’ve attempted some pictures like that, but never as successfully as storms.”
“Maybe you just need some more practice.”
Was he inviting her to linger? Or to come back? She could just imagine a night out under the stars with Javi. He was so easy to talk to. She could imagine teaching him how to take pictures with her camera, which levers and buttons controlled which function. She imagined watching his fingers moving over her equipment, and how she might have to touch him to redirect—
Ahem. She had no business taking her thoughts down that road, especially not about a man who lived hundreds of miles from her home and business. Sure, he might be a fun distraction, but he didn’t seem like the man who wanted just a distraction. He was quiet and serious and as cute as he was, she didn’t think he was a player.
Which was fine, she wasn’t either.
Maybe she was reading too much into his words. Maybe he really just wanted to learn how to take pictures. That was much more likely, wasn’t it? Why was she reading romance into it?
Maybe because he’d already come to her rescue twice. Maybe he was just that kind of guy.
And maybe that attracted her as much as his looks.
Her phone rang, and she jolted in surprise. She picked it up to respond to her sister’s call.
“Northeast,” Angelica said. “Head northeast. It’s going to touch down just north of Belleview.”
“Belleview?” Espy echoed the name of the town as she looked over at Javi.
He nodded and craned his neck.
“What are you looking for?” she asked him.
“A place to turn around. The road to get there is behind us. Not another road that direction for a while.”
She repeated the information to her sister, disconnected, and held on as Javi made a u-turn in the middle of the highway.
The rain startedin earnest as they drove east. The windshield wipers could barely keep up with the big drops, and the rain pounded so hard on the roof of the Suburban that conversation was pointless. Beside him, Esperanza was leaning forward in her seat, her entire body tense. Her response did not make Javi feel better, because she she presumably did this all the time.
He was used to driving in the rain, now, since he was a DPS officer, and he had to drive in all kinds of weather. But he wasn’t usually seeking out bad weather.
The first hailstone hit the hood of the SUV with such force, he jumped, and lifted his foot from the accelerator. He was already driving slower than the speed limit, which was probably why Esperanza was leaning forward, to urge them forward, toward the storm.
“Javi, we need to catch up to it.” Her voice was sharp with her excitement.
