He brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. “Are you hurt?”
* * *
Sam winnowed his fingers through silky black hair that clung to his fingers with static from the cold air. “Say something, damn it. Are you okay?”
Annalise’s glare could have melted a snowman at ten paces. She struggled to sit up. “I’m fine,” she said shortly. “Quit pawing me.”
Though her words were clipped and showed her annoyance, beneath his touch she was warm and soft and womanly. Resisting the urge to touch the curve of her breast, Sam scooped her into his arms and stood, mentally counting to ten. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t let her push his buttons. But she was so aggravating, his blood pressure went up immediately whenever they got within sight of each other. Not that such a reaction was anything new. As a friend of the Wolff family, he inevitably ran into her from time to time. Neither of them ever managed more than bare civility.
The animosity was his fault, no doubt. But it wouldn’t hurt her to let go of something that happened over half a dozen years ago. Thankfully, she didn’t squirm too much. She was a tall woman, and if he slipped on the ice, they’d both go down.
On the porch, he reached with one hand to open the door and stepped inside, ruefully aware that the house held a distinct chill. He sighed. “The heat and air guys will be here in a couple of days to overhaul the vents and put in new units. In the meantime, I hope you’ve got plenty of warm clothes. The old system is cantankerous.”
“Probably learned it from you,” Annalise muttered beneath her breath.
He knew she meant for him to hear.
In the kitchen, he lowered her into a chair. A cheery fire crackled in the fireplace, and his grandmother’s collection of Fiestaware in the china cabinet brightened the room.
He knelt in front of her. “Tell me the truth. Are you hurt?”
Big eyes stared back at him. And for an instant, he thought her bottom lip might have quivered. But if there had been even a moment of vulnerability, it was gone.
“No,” she said bluntly. “I’m fine.” She stripped out of her coat, revealing a thin silky blouse in a shade of blue that matched her eyes, and black linen trousers with a knife pleat. “But I’d kill for a cup of coffee.”
For a long second, Sam stayed at her feet. She could have stepped off the runway and come straight to him. Vincent Wolff had kept his baby girl locked up like a nun for much of her life, but probably out of guilt, he had indulged her passion for pretty clothes.
Sam sighed. “Don’t try to stand up yet. I’ll brew a pot.” In moments, the aroma of coffee permeated the air. Annalise hadn’t moved from the chair where he put her. But she was pointedly ignoring him, smart phone in hand as she scrolled through messages.
He found a china cup, filled it with hot, fragrant liquid and set it on a saucer at her elbow, along with a tiny pitcher of cream and the sugar bowl. He smothered a grin as she frowned at the add-ons and instead put the cup to her berry-colored lips and drained half of it, black and straight, the same way Sam liked it.
He turned a chair around and straddled it, facing her across the table. “How’s your dad?”
She paused, the cup halfway to her mouth. “Fine.” Her suspicious gaze scanned his face as if searching for a secret agenda.
“And your uncle Vic?”
Annalise set down the cup. “Also fine.”
“Lots of weddings in your family in the last year.”
Her face softened. “Yes. It’s been wonderful. Gracie, Olivia, Ariel, Gillian… I finally have sisters.”
“Your family deserves happiness more than any set of people I know. I’m glad the past is behind you.” When Annalise was a toddler, her mother and aunt had been kidnapped and murdered. It was a blow that had marked them all, and it had taken years for them to truly recover.
Annalise’s eyebrows lifted, a glint of defiance in her expression. “Thank God for that.” She laughed, but there was little humor in the sound. And the sideways glance she shot him said louder than any words that a certain moment in their past was definitely not forgotten.
He reached across the table and took her hand in his, stroking the back of it, feeling the smooth skin, the delicate bones. “Give me a break, Annalise. We can’t work together if we don’t hash this out. I’ll admit I could have handled things better back then. But I’d known you since you were in kindergarten. And you were still a kid as far as I was concerned.”
She jerked her hand away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Her scowl would have deterred most men. But Sam was tired of being treated like the Ebenezer Scrooge of the romance world. “Your father would have neutered me.”
“You said I was like a sister to you.”
“Damn it.” His clumsy lie was going to haunt him. “Clearly, I didn’t mean that. I was trying to escape with some grace.”
“So you were a lily-livered coward. Is that what you’re telling me?”
This time he had to count to fifty. Standing abruptly, he tried not to notice the plump curve of her bottom lip or the way dark lashes made feathered crescents on her cheeks when she looked down at her cup.
“Yes,” he said, conceding defeat. If she wanted to hold a grudge, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. “I was a coward.”
His admission seemed to take the wind out of her sails. “Whatever.” She sniffed and crossed her legs, picking at a spot of lint on the cuff of one pant leg.
As a comeback, it lacked a certain vocabularic grace, but he was willing to let it slide. “Why don’t I show you your room?” he said, trying to live up to Gram’s notion of hospitality. “I’ll get your bags. Relax and make sure you didn’t do any permanent damage.”
Her small, wry grin disarmed him. “My butt bone is probably bruised, but I’ll live.”
Seeing her smile in his presence was such a novelty, he was momentarily stunned. He swallowed. “I’m glad.”
Unable to come up with any response more scintillating than that, he turned and executed what might be considered a hasty retreat, striding down the hallway toward the front of the house in order to give himself time to regain his footing. If Annalise Wolff was going to start smiling at him, all bets were off.
He flung open the front door and stopped dead. A string of heartfelt curses brought his lovely guest running. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
They stood shoulder-to-shoulder gazing out into a world of swirling snow. Already Annalise’s tire tracks were being erased. And her car was coated in white.
She punched his arm. “Did you know this was going to happen? Why didn’t you tell me not to come?”
His eyebrows reached his hairline. “I’ve been a little busy, damn it. Did you even bother to look at a forecast?”
“This is your fault!” They shouted in unison, with two identical expressions of dismay and disbelief.
Sam closed the door and leaned back, his arms folded across his chest. “I can’t tell for sure without checking The Weather Channel, but having spent a lot of years in Virginia, I’d say we’re in for a big one.”
“I’m sure it’s not going to be more than a few inches.” The unflappable Annalise Wolff was definitely rattled. A pulse beat visibly in the side of her swanlike neck.
The urge to make an inappropriate sexual comment was strong, but he squelched it. “You seem upset,” he said mildly.
It was her turn to do the eyebrow thing. “Seriously? Aren’t you the man who doesn’t leave the office until nine most nights? You could be stuck here. For hours…maybe days…” Her voice ended on a high squeak.
Oddly, the more she freaked, the greater his sense of amusement. “Don’t worry, Annalise. At least we have each other.”
Two
Glaring, she thrust out her chin and fisted her hands. “I absolutely will not be locked up in this house with you. No way, no how.”
He shrugged. “I promised Gram I’d stay the weekend and get you oriented. But if you’re wor
ried about being stuck and alone with me, we can leave right now. She’ll be really disappointed….”
He was goading her, and not even trying to hide it. Frustration knotted her belly, even as her recalcitrant imagination conjured up images of the two of them entwined beneath one of Gram’s handmade quilts. “I’m not worried about myself. You’re the one who needs to get back to work.”
“What do you propose we do? I drove the Porsche. You’re in a Miata. If we stay here any length of time, neither of us has a prayer of making it back out to the interstate.”
His expression was veiled, unreadable. Was this some kind of game where Sam waited to see if she would cry uncle? She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.
“Fine,” she said abruptly. “The weather doesn’t bother me. But I’d like my bags now, if you don’t mind. So I can get settled in.” She handed him her keys.
She was pretty sure his jaw dropped a millimeter. Clearly he thought she’d go running back to the city. But Annalise Wolff never backed down from a challenge.
He scowled. “Are you sure about this, Princess? If the power goes out, we’ll be roughing it.”
Annalise gulped inwardly. Her idea of rustic was not staying on the concierge floor at the Four Seasons. “I’m sure there’s a generator…right?”
“Of course. But it won’t run forever. Did you even bring any warm clothes besides your coat?” His gaze felt like a caress as he did a visual inventory of her silk blouse and thin slacks.
“I have everything I need. Do you want me to help you retrieve the suitcases?”
Her snarky question deepened his frown. “I think I can manage.”
She watched through the window and grinned as Sam opened the trunk and did a double take. Hiding her smile, she stayed out of the way while he made three trips in a row, grousing audibly at the mounting pile of luggage.
When he was finally finished, he closed the door behind him and locked it, looking for all the world like a sexy abominable snowman. He shrugged out of his thick jacket and ran a hand through his hair, sending droplets of water flying as melting snowflakes dampened the floor.
Annalise leaned against the wall, trying not to go weak in the knees when his muscles flexed beneath the fabric of a thermal weave shirt in a deep rust color that complemented his eyes. “Thank you.”
He tossed the wet jacket over the back of a chair. “Does the term high maintenance mean anything to you?”
She shrugged. “I plan to be here for several weeks. Am I supposed to write you a check for excess baggage?”
He stared at her, a long, intense clashing of gazes that was unmistakably sexual. “You have a smart mouth.”
“You have an arrogant attitude.”
The ruddy tinge that colored his cheekbones gave her more satisfaction than it should have. “What’s in all those bags?” he asked, his stance combative.
“Books, laptop, snacks, lingerie…” She gestured toward the pieces of her Louis Vuitton matched set. Uncle Victor had given it to her as a graduation present. She was spoiled, she freely admitted it. But that didn’t give the insufferable Sam Ely a right to criticize.
“Snacks?” He leaned against the opposite wall, adopting a pose that mirrored hers. Barely three feet separated them, and although the foyer was definitely chilly after Sam had been in and out the door several times, Annalise was not cold at all.
“I have a weakness for chocolate. So sue me. The stuff I picked up in Lucerne after Christmas is better than sex.”
“Then you’ve been having the wrong kind of sex.”
This time it was her jaw that dropped. Her thighs tightened, and she was pretty sure her nipples were playing peek-a-boo through the silk of her blouse…though she wasn’t about to check. Surreptitiously, she lifted her folded arms. “Is flirtation your default setting? Or do you really expect me to argue the point?”
“You’re right,” he said smoothly, his voice slow as syrup. “That was an inappropriate remark between colleagues.”
“I’m not your colleague,” she shot back. “I work for your grandparents.”
Sam straightened and closed the distance between them. “You have to forgive me for the past, Annalise. Otherwise we’re going to be at each other’s throats forever.”
She looked at the tanned skin of his jaw and below…saw the way warm, masculine flesh disappeared into the neckline of his henley shirt, revealing a faint dusting of hair where the top two buttons gaped open. Her heart thudded in her chest and her palms were damp.
Licking her lips, she looked past him to the antique grandfather clock that held a place of honor flanking the foot of a curved staircase. “I’m surprised you haven’t ever found that paragon of womanhood you described to me. You know, all meek and quiet and docile.” Saying the words aloud revived the awful memory of that evening. Her chest hurt.
She heard him curse and felt big, warm hands settle on her shoulders. “Look at me, Princess. I’m sorry. All that crap I said to you that day was just that. I was babbling. Trying to get myself out of a sticky situation. Yes, I was attracted to you. But you had a crush, that’s all. That guff I spouted about waiting for a man to make the first move…well, I guess I wanted to make sure you’d never try that stunt again. I didn’t want you to end up hurt because some jerk took you up on your offer and then dumped you.”
His breath was warm on her face. She dared not look into his eyes. She felt far too fragile, and that really pissed her off, because Annalise Wolff was not fragile. She’d grown up in a monster of a house with two brothers, three male cousins, an uncle and a father. Any girly ways had been hammered out of her at a young age.
She could climb trees, play football, talk cars and quote sports statistics with the best of them. And if the need arose, she knew how to fell a man with one quick move.
What she hadn’t quite mastered, though, was how a woman could resist when the man she’d wanted for years was so close you could lift your lips and touch your mouth to his.
With every fiber of her being, she yearned to move against him, rest her head on his shoulder and feel his big masculine arms enfold her. But that was exactly why she couldn’t.
She was weak when it came to Sam Ely. Weak and dreadfully predictable. So he was handsome, so what? The fact that he was sexy and Southern and so damned funny and smart shouldn’t be an issue.
Any notion she’d ever had of snagging Sam had disappeared when she’d embarrassed herself with a youthful, impassioned declaration that was ill-timed to say the least. Sam might pretend he’d only been letting her down easy, but she had a hunch that in their charged encounter way back then, he had been speaking the truth.
Sam’s perfect woman was not Annalise. Not by a long shot.
With a strangled mutter of protest, she eluded his embrace, picked up two small bags and headed toward the kitchen. Refusing to look at him, she raised her voice as she walked away. “I’d like another cup of coffee, and then I’d appreciate it if you would show me my room.”
* * *
Sam grabbed up most of the rest of the bags and followed her, grinding his teeth in frustration. He’d apologized, damn it. What more could he do? He wasn’t about to crawl. Especially since he hadn’t done anything wrong. In fact, he ought to get a medal for doing the right thing. Annalise was one of the most sensual, beautiful women he had ever known. If he’d been a different kind of man—or not suitably intimidated by his father and hers—he would have said to hell with it and taken her up on her offer.
He’d certainly thought about it often enough over the years. But he’d been raised to adhere to a gentlemanly code of conduct, and that code precluded a thirty-year-old man from having sex with one not-quite-mature college graduate who’d been sheltered more than most.
He wasn’t the bad guy in this scenario. So why did he get the distinct impression that Annalise Wolff would like to consign him to the devil?
Striding through the kitchen and into the hallway beyond, he tried to avoid looking at her. The s
cent of her perfume, something light and beguiling, mingled with the smell of coffee.
The bedroom that had been prepared for Annalise was as cold as ice. He rolled his eyes in disgust and opened all the vents. Evidently the housekeeping service his grandmother utilized had missed a few key points about dates.
Annalise startled him when she appeared at his side, her arms wrapped around her waist protectively. “It’s like a meat locker in here,” she said. “Are you sure the heat’s working at all?”
He hefted her large suitcase onto a large cedar-lined chest at the foot of the bed. “For now? Yes. But I’ll kick the thermostat up a few notches to be sure. It wouldn’t kill you to put on a sweater.”
“The cold doesn’t seem to be bothering you.”
“I have a fast metabolism. And quite a few more pounds of insulation than you do.” He paused, uncharacteristically uncertain. Of himself. Of her. “Last chance,” he said. “If we leave now, I think we can still make it back to town.”
Annalise stared at him, eyes wide. “I’ve cleared my calendar,” she said quietly. “This project deserves my full attention. Even with bad weather, there is a lot I can do to keep the ball rolling. Measuring and sketching alone will keep me occupied for several days. But I understand if you need to go back to Charlottesville.”
He couldn’t read her expression. Weak late-afternoon light, muted by the snow, filtered in through lace sheers, casting dappled shadows on the hardwood floor. “I can’t leave you here alone,” he said, not really wanting to. “Anything could happen.”
She shrugged, glimmers of something disturbing in her eyes. “I’m more resilient than you think. You’re not responsible for me.”
He allowed himself to touch her briefly, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “I promised Gram I’d get you started. There’s a lot of info I need to share. So I guess we’re staying.”
He was shocked that she allowed the fleeting touch without protest. A tiny smile kicked up one corner of her mouth. “I guess we are.”
At that moment, the lights flickered. Annalise looked at him with apprehension. “Already?”
All Grown Up Page 2