A Rare Gift

by Jaci Burton

  "Hey there."

  Nothing. He didn't even acknowledge her. Then again, the television was turned up pretty loud, so maybe he hadn't heard her.

  "Wyatt, you forgot your clipboard."

  He finally turned his head, then frowned. "Calliope. What are you doing in here?"

  She slid the clipboard across the bar to him, then smiled at him. "Your clipboard. You left it at the center. Thought you might need it to work up those numbers for me."

  He looked at her like he had no idea who she was. Then he gave her a quick nod. "Yeah, right. Thanks."

  He used to be so full of life. He'd laugh and his face would light up when he smiled. Her toes curled remembering what he looked like when he smiled.

  "You want something to drink?"

  She shifted her gaze to the bartender, a heavyset guy with male pattern baldness.

  "Oh. Uh. You know, I don't know." She turned to Wyatt. "What should I have?"

  Wyatt stared at her. "How should I know?"

  "Well, I don't really drink that often, so I'm not the best judge of what's good. What do you suggest?"

  Wyatt raised his bottle to his lips. "Beer."

  She nodded and looked at the bartender. "I'll have a beer."

  The bartender flipped the top off the bottle and slid it to her. She reached into her purse for the money and paid him, leaving an extra dollar for a tip. Then she slid around on the stool to check out what was going on while she took a long swallow of the beer, shuddering at the taste.

  Soda would be better, but this would have to do.

  She slipped off the barstool and walked over to the pool table to watch the two guys play. She'd never played pool, either, though there'd been a table at her dorm in college.

  The cool people played. She'd never been one of the cool people. Now that she was a single adult, she should learn to do cool things instead of always being wrapped up with work.

  One of the guys--a burly, halfway decent-looking type wearing jeans and a plaid shirt, shifted his gaze to hers and grinned at her. "Want to take me on, honey?"

  "Oh, I've never played before. Can you teach me?"

  He took his shot and straightened, grabbed his beer and came over to stand beside her while his partner took a shot. "Honey, I can teach you anything you want to know."

  "Great. Then I'd love to learn how to play."

  They finished up their game, and the guy--who introduced himself as Joey Johnson--put the balls in the triangular thing. He called it "racking the balls". Once they were all set, he put the white ball in front of them.

  "Now we break," he said, leaning forward with the pool cue.

  She watched as he shot the white ball toward all the other balls. They scattered, some falling into the holes around the table.

  "We'll play simple eight ball," Joey said. "I'm solid, you're stripes. I shoot until I miss. Then it's your turn to get your ball into the pockets."

  "Seems simple enough."

  Except Joey didn't miss very often. He put four of his balls in one of the pockets before she had a chance.

  Of course that meant she'd gotten to watch his technique. It seemed easy enough. She bent over the table and tried to hold her pool cue the same way he did.

  She wasn't very coordinated, though, and couldn't quite remember the hand positioning.

  Joey laughed. "Here, let me help you."

  He aligned his body next to hers, his pelvis shoving up behind her.

  She might be naive about pool, but she wasn't dumb about men. Joey was hitting on her in the most basic of ways, and wasn't subtle about it at all.

  He could teach her to play pool, but she wouldn't be going home with him tonight.

  "Just do it so it's comfortable for you." He put the cue in her hands, showed her the proper positioning. And that wasn't the only positioning he showed her.

  Really? Sometimes men were so obvious.

  Her gaze drifted over to Wyatt, who had swiveled around on his barstool and glared daggers at them.

  He looked upset. At her.

  She rolled her eyes.

  And sometimes men were just plain dumb.

  She straightened, smiled at Joey. "I think I've got the hang of it now, and if you shove your--" she looked down at his crotch, "--assets at me again, I'm going to knee you in the balls. Understood?"

  His eyes widened, then he grinned. "Loud and clear."

  Now that they had that straight, she took her shot. And amazing thing, the ball fell into the pocket. She let out a loud whoop and the guys around her cheered and high-fived her.

  She might yet get the hang of this game.

  Wyatt watched Calliope play pool. She wasn't very good at it, but maybe it was an act to gather an entourage of men who were all too eager to help her out.

  Within a half hour there were six guys hanging on her. And who wouldn't? She had a great ass, perfect breasts and the kind of hips a man wanted to grab on to and never let go. She looked you straight in the eye and smiled--a lot. And her laugh--damn, her laugh made his balls tighten. Deep and throaty, and she threw her head back and let it go for all she was worth.

  Cassandra had always been subtle. She only had to enter a room and the men would come running. And she loved the attention. She barely noticed Wyatt was in the room once the guys swarmed around her.

  He guessed the sisters were alike in that respect.

  Except after two games, Calliope put the pool cue down, waved goodbye to the guys she'd collected and headed toward him.

  She slid back onto the barstool and signaled the bartender.

  "Another beer?"

  "No, thank you. How about a diet soda?"

  She turned to Wyatt. "You don't play pool?"

  "I play."

  "Why didn't you join us?"

  "I don't hang out with the Johnson brothers."

  She quirked a brow. "Why not?"

  "They're competitors."

  She thanked the bartender for the soda and dug into her bag for money.

  "I've got this. Add it to my tab, Bill."

  "Thanks." She turned back and took a sip from the straw. "So because you and the Johnson brothers compete in business, you can't be friendly?"

  "Not with those guys."

  "Huh. Why not?"

  He turned his head and gave her a look. "Because they're assholes."

  She snorted. "Seemed like nice enough guys to me."

  "I'm sure you'd think that."

  "What does that mean?"

  He faced ahead again. "Nothing."

  "You're very irritable, Wyatt. Did you have a rough day?"

  Calliope--unlike her sister--wasn't subtle at all. "No, I didn't have a rough day. And I'm not irritable. I'd like to be left alone."

  "Being alone just makes you lonely. And that's not good for anybody. Is this what you do every night?"

  Now he was forced to look at her again. "What?"

  "Do you come here every night by yourself?"

  Mostly. "Sometimes."

  "And do what? Drink alone?"

  She had him pegged. He didn't like it. "Why do you care?"

  "I've always cared about you. You should get out and have some fun, not sit in this dark place and brood. You're like Heathcliff. Or the Beast from Beauty and the Beast." She laid her hand on his thigh. It made him want to groan. He didn't want to think about her being a woman--and a very attractive, sexy woman, at that. He wanted her to go away.

  "Who's Heathcliff? And the Beast? Thanks a lot."

  "I told you. Brooding. And really? Heathcliff? Wuthering Heights? Surely you've read that."

  "Heard of the book. Never read it."

  She leaned an elbow against the bar and put her lips around the straw, sucking up soda. His brain immediately registered lips and suck and there went the quivering in his balls again. She had a great mouth--a full bottom lip made to be tugged on.

  Dammit.

  He pulled out a couple bills and paid his bar tab, then grabbed his clipboard. "I gotta go."
>
  He headed for the door. She followed.

  "Yeah, I probably should, too. 6:00 a.m. comes awfully early. Thanks for buying me a drink."

  "It was just a soda, Calliope."

  It was dark outside. She zipped up her jacket and turned to him, gracing him with her beautiful smile again. "Still, you didn't have to and I really appreciate it."

  Cassandra had never thanked him for anything. She'd always expected men to do things for her--buy her things, hold the door open for her, worship her.

  He walked Calliope to her car. She grabbed her keys out of her bag, opened the door and quirked her lips up at him.

  A man could get lost in a smile like that. There was something so guileless and innocent about it.

  She laid her hand on his arm, then surprised the hell out of him by stepping in and wrapping her arms around him to hug him. The warmth of her seeped through his jacket, and every part of him that was a man felt every curve of her body as she pressed against him.

  It was a brief hug, likely nothing more than something friendly. She pulled back and said, "I'll see you tomorrow, then. Goodnight, Wyatt."

  His breath caught in his throat. "Yeah. Goodnight."

  He went to his truck and climbed in, laying the clipboard next to him while he watched Calliope pull out of the parking lot.

  He could still feel every part of her body that had touched his, could still smell the faint scent of vanilla.

  He shouldn't have taken this job.

  Chapter Three

  Tori brought the bid by the next morning. She explained that Wyatt had to finish up a project on another site. Calliope signed off on the bid and Tori told her they'd start on it right away, but it would likely be a while because they couldn't do anything until they filed the permits and the cement floor was poured.

  It took a week for the whole permit and cement thing, and through it all she didn't see Wyatt again. He'd sent a cement crew out to lay the foundation, and then trucks came to drop off materials. Tori had called saying Wyatt would start the project today.

  Not that she'd been counting the days until she saw him or anything.

  Not that she'd spent any time thinking about that ridiculously impulsive urge to hug him that night a week ago outside the bar.

  What had she been thinking? They were about to enter into a business relationship. And she might be a touchy-feely type of person, and maybe she did hug just about every person on the planet, from her kids at the center to their parents and everyone who worked for her, but that didn't mean she had to go and hug Wyatt.

  But oh, he'd been a solid wall of muscle, his body a hot furnace of steel that she wanted to climb onto and never let go of, once again reminding her of how incredibly lucky her sister had been.

  He hadn't hugged her back--not that she'd given him any time to. As soon as she realized what a bad move that had been, she'd taken a step back and said good-night. He hadn't looked at her like she'd grown two heads or anything, but he hadn't exactly been swept away and put his arms around her, either.

  Then again, she wasn't swayed by rejection. Wyatt had a big gaping hole in his heart from the way his marriage had ended, and it was about time he healed. She figured she was the right person to help him with that. The fact he'd been married to her sister didn't factor in to her way of thinking.

  And she'd been doing a lot of thinking about Wyatt, so while she was in her office doing financials, she heard the trucks pull up. She grabbed her jacket and walked outside.

  Wyatt was there along with two other guys. She stayed out of sight and watched as he directed his employees.

  If she thought he was gorgeous before, seeing him strip off his jacket and strap on a tool belt nearly made her knees buckle. There was something about a man who worked with his hands that was downright devastating to a woman's libido--or at least her libido.

  She walked over to him, and just seeing him put a giant smile on her face.

  It was already noisy, his two laborers setting up the frame with hammer and nails. Wyatt was inside the small trailer he'd brought with him hitched to his truck. She stepped inside, knocking on the open door as she entered.

  "Hey."

  He straightened, turned to her, frowned. "What are you doing here?"

  "Checking in to say hello. How's it going?"

  "It's not going at all yet since we're just getting started."

  He was good at pushing women away. Tori had told her he hadn't dated at all since the divorce. It was time to put a stop to that.

  "If you or the guys need anything, come on in to the center and the staff or I will fix you right up. There's coffee or soda or--"

  "We have everything we need right here."

  "Okay. I'll let you get to work."

  He didn't say anything, so she stepped out of the trailer and got back to doing her job. Other than listening to drilling and hammering, she mentally tuned him out. Kids were excellent for that. They commanded your attention and didn't let you think of anything but them. By the time the last kid and the last of her employees left the center, it was six-thirty. She figured Wyatt and his crew would be long gone by then, but she was curious how much work they'd gotten done in a day, so she put on her jacket, closed and locked the doors and set the alarm, then headed around the corner to see what had been done.

  It was dark, but the streetlight shed enough light on the project. They'd made a good start on the framing. She was impressed.

  And Wyatt's truck was still parked on the street, a light on inside the trailer. She went over and knocked on the door. No answer at first, then Wyatt opened the door, his typical frown on his face.

  "What do you want?"

  She stepped up and came inside. "I thought I'd stop by to take a look. You did a great job today."

  "Thanks."

  He stood there, arms folded. She skirted around him to see what he was working on at the table. "Are these the blueprints for the room?"

  He sighed. "Yes."

  She leaned over the table. "Looks complicated." She lifted her gaze to his. "I could never figure this out."

  His gaze met hers. "It's not that hard. Look. This is the frame of the room. This is electrical..."

  He outlined everything in the blueprint for her, not that she was paying attention. She was close to him and he smelled like sawdust and sweat, a lethal combination. She leaned closer and breathed him in, her shoulder brushing against his.

  "Calliope."

  "Yeah."

  "What are you doing?"

  Fantasizing. "Trying to get a closer look. My prescription is old and I probably need to see an eye doctor to get new glasses, but I haven't had time." She bent closer to the blueprints--actually shifting closer to Wyatt.

  "Any closer and you're going to be on top of my desk."

  Wouldn't that be fun? She wondered what Wyatt would do if she climbed on there? Would it give him ideas? She wished she had something sexier on--like a dress--instead of jeans covered in spilled chocolate milk and a sweatshirt baby Ryan had spit up on. Not an alluring ensemble at all.

  Still, she wasn't about to give up on him. She had her jacket zipped up to hide the spit-up and it was dark enough he might not notice the milk stain.

  She turned around and leaned against the desk.

  "Wyatt, do you ever date?"

  His eyes widened. "What?"

  "Do you ever date? You know...women?"

  Wyatt damn near swallowed his tongue. Where the hell had that come from? He'd thought she'd left and he could spend an hour or so going over the blueprints to make sure they were on track with this project. But then Calliope knocked on the door of the trailer, forced herself inside and then threw herself all over his blueprints, practically draping her body over him. Her scent drove him crazy. He was sure if he'd walk her through the outline of the project she'd be satisfied and leave.

  Instead, her curls brushed his cheek, and her hip nudged his, and then she flipped around and leaned against his table, making him think thought
s he had no business thinking, like bending her over his drafting table.

  Her green eyes mesmerized him, and then she asked him if he ever dated?

  She was driving him out of his mind and it was only the first day of the project.

  "Calliope..."

  "No, really. I know we haven't seen each other in a long time, but you don't seem very happy."

  "Calliope, you need to leave."

  She didn't look like she was going anywhere. She crossed her arms under her breasts. "Have you been out with anyone since you and Cassie divorced?"

  "That's none of your business."

  "That means no. Why not? It's been three years."

  "Don't you have somewhere you need to be?"

  "No. Why, do you?"

  He wished he did.

  "If you don't, we could go out."

  He had no idea what to make of this woman. She was like a bulldozer. "What?"

  "You know, go out. That thing you do when you're single."

  "I know what it means. Are you asking me out?"

  "Well, I wasn't, but sure. Would you like to go out with me?" She wasn't teasing or playing a game with him. She was honest to God asking him on a date. And she was beautiful and made his palms sweat and she was Cassandra's sister and no way in hell was he going anywhere near her.

  "No."

  He figured it would crush her. Instead, she cocked a brow, brushed an errant curl away from her cheek and continued to stand firm. "Why not?"

  "You know why not."

  She took a step forward. He took one back, but the trailer was small and there wasn't much room. He bumped the wall. She moved forward again and he was reminded of playing checkers with his brothers. He was backed into a corner with no place to go, and if he moved, he was going to be jumped by his opponent.

  He suddenly couldn't remember why that was such a bad idea, especially when Calliope moved into him, tilted her head back and stared him down with her deep green eyes.

  "I can't believe a big tough guy like you is afraid of a little thing like me, Wyatt." Then she stepped back, her gaze traveling halfway down and staring at the part of him she had no business staring at. When she lifted her gaze again, she grinned.

  "I know you have balls in there. Why don't you try and find them? When you do, it's your turn to come ask me out."

  She stepped out of the trailer and shut the door behind her.

  Wyatt had never been so confused, confounded and downright irritated with a woman in his entire life.

  No balls, huh? A man didn't take an insult like that from a woman.