The waiter reappeared then, temporarily halting the conversation.
The food was as good as he remembered, the portions generous, and the company stimulating. Eve talked knowledgeably about foreign affairs one moment and in the next was passionately defending the rights of animals. She was as unpredictable in her opinions as she was in her choice of clothes. Her convictions might not always be politically correct—he grimaced at the term—but they were delivered with an intensity that made the listener sit up and take notice.
She was both rational and intelligent, emotional and passionate. He was discovering that both sides appealed to him. She was nothing like the society women he normally dated. She could charm one minute and offend the next, all without missing a beat.
"Tell me about this scholarship fund," he invited.
Always eager to talk about her favorite project, she launched into a description of what the scholarship program could be to a dozen children. She stopped, her eyes narrowing in an assessing glance. "You already knew all this, didn't you?"
He shrugged. "I did a little research today."
"Then why ask me?"
"I had the facts. I wanted more. What I couldn't find in a bunch of reports." He covered her hand with his own. "You really care about the kids, don't you?"
"Yeah," she said softly. "I do."
He'd known, of course, that she'd undercharged him for the gift for Carla and guessed at the reason. That she hadn't even bothered to glance at the check he'd handed her amused and exasperated him in turns. How did she expect to stay in business when she practically gave away her merchandise? He'd like to be around when she discovered that he'd ignored the ridiculously low price she'd named and paid what he hoped was a fair value for the garment.
On second thought, maybe it'd be just as well if he wasn't present then. He had a feeling the lady's temper was as unpredictable as her conversation. "…they just need a chance." She paused for a breath.
"What do you think?" she asked, drawing him back to the present.
"About what?"
"Aha." Her look of triumph had a smile sliding across his lips. "I knew you weren't listening."
"Guilty," he confessed. "I was wondering how you stayed in business when you give away your work."
"I don't…” She stopped, then frowned. "It's my business. I have a right to set my own prices. Besides, it was for a friend."
"Is that what we are? Friends?"
"I was speaking of Carla," she said primly, but a smile peeked out anyway, encouraging him to ask the question that he'd been wanting to ask all evening.
"What about us?"
He'd thought she might laugh it off or possibly give a glib answer like "There is no us."
All traces of humor vanished from her eyes. "Daniel, I like you…” She hadn't meant to say that. He knew it by the look of chagrin that crossed her face.
"Good. We're making progress."
"You don't give up, do you?"
"Not when it comes to something I want." The words were said lightly, but his eyes held a promise.
Her quick intake of breath told him she understood. The challenge had been issued.
And accepted.
He took her home early, content with what he'd accomplished tonight. She wasn't indifferent to him. He was satisfied.
For now.
At her front door, he took her key from her and unlocked it. He didn't expect to be asked in. Not yet. He'd say goodnight and go.
However, when she turned to him with a thank you on her lips and gratitude in her eyes, all his good intentions scattered like confetti tossed by the wind.
He moved closer. He heard—or felt—the quick hitch of her heart. He lowered his head. When he touched his lips to hers, hers parted on a soft sigh.
His fingers curled around her upper arms, urging her closer. When he lifted his head, he imagined that her eyes glowed warmly. It was too dark to see her face, but he felt the heat from her blush. Or maybe it was the heat of his own skin. Right now, they were so close it was hard to tell.
Another sigh shuddered from her, a soft ripple of sound that cut straight to his heart.
"Goodnight, Senator," she said and gently closed the door behind her.
Daniel knew he'd made a mistake. He'd rushed her. He'd known it when he'd kissed her. He'd known it when she trembled in his arms. He'd known it, and still he'd gone ahead.
Her fear hurt. He had yet to discover why. Why was she so skittish around him? It was all part of the puzzle, a puzzle he was determined to put together. The one thing he knew for sure was that he didn't intend on giving up.
* * * *
A steady stream of customers the following day kept Eve busy, but not too busy to think.
Daniel. He'd crossed her mind a dozen times during the day.
Okay, it was only noon now. She multiplied twelve by the number of hours left in the day and groaned. She wouldn't put up with it. She'd push him out of her thoughts, out of her dreams, out of her life. That resolved, she felt better.
And she succeeded. She managed to get through the afternoon and the evening with never a thought of him. Okay, an errant thought might have slipped past her resolve. Stray images of the way his dark brown hair slipped across his forehead, of the sudden flashes of humor that touched his eyes, of the warm taste of his lips might have found their way into her mind.
Since she'd been thinking about him for the better part of the day, she shouldn't have been surprised when he appeared at her door that evening.
"Can I come in?" Daniel asked.
She gestured him inside. The room seemed to shrink, his presence eating up the up-until-now adequate space. With the shrinkage of the room went a loss of air, and she struggled to breathe.
"I wanted to apologize," he said. "For last night."
"You don't have to—"
"That's where you're wrong. I promised I'd take things easy. I broke that promise. That's something I'm not proud of, not something I usually do."
She believed that. He was a politician, yes, but he was also a man of integrity. She'd sensed that within minutes of meeting him.
"I'm sorry," he said.
She was unsure of her response. Because she wasn't sorry.
She wasn't sorry at all.
He leaned against the wall. "We need to talk."
"About what?"
"Dating."
"Dating?" The air in the room seemed to evaporate again.
"Dating. As in a man and a woman who're attracted to each other, seeing each other, going out, having fun."
"I told you—"
"We'll take it slow." He held up a hand as if he anticipated her response. "I promise. Slow and easy. You set the pace."
Something in his tone didn't give her a choice. And she realized she didn't want to refuse. Heaven help her, she wanted to spend time with him.
"Okay," she said, hating the breathless, tentative note in her voice, hating the weakness in her knees, hating the blush she could feel stain her cheeks. Trying to hate him—and failing—because he knew her better than she knew herself.
The relief she saw in his eyes told her he wasn't half as casual about the whole thing as she had first supposed. And that gave her confidence. Her breath steadied, her knees straightened, she was in control once more.
That hard-won control scattered like dust motes caught in a summer breeze at his next words.
"I like flirting with you. And I really like the way you blush." He skimmed a finger down her cheek.
As expected, Eve blushed. Again.
The man was entirely too sure of himself, entirely too attractive, entirely too everything for a woman's peace of mind.
One beat of her heart tripped madly over the next, the rhythm picking up and destroying her short-lived confidence. She felt strange, shimmery, and very much alive. All because a man told her he liked flirting with her, liked the way she blushed.
Not just any man, she silently amended. One man in particular.
How was she supposed to combat the kind of appeal he gave off so effortlessly? How was she supposed to keep her sanity when one look from him, one touch, sent her over the edge?
"Will you see me tomorrow night?" he asked.
Thinking with her heart—no, that wasn't right, she wasn't thinking at all—she agreed.
* * * *
Daniel struggled over where to take Eve. The knowledge annoyed him. He, who was known for his definitive decision making, couldn't make up his mind on such a simple matter. Eve had done that to him. She'd turned him inside out and upside down. That she'd done it without even trying only added to his irritation.
In the end, he decided on a Native American exhibit at a local art gallery, reasoning that there was bound to be a crowd which would forestall any chance of intimacy. He regretted that.
But his first concern was putting her at ease. Slow and easy would be his hallmarks, though his every instinct urged him to declare his feelings, to convince her that what they had together was too special, too rare to be ignored.
But it was too soon.
Chapter Four
Eve slipped into a long vest and matching skirt, fashioned out of silky yarn. She twisted her hair an intricate knot at the nape of her neck and secured it with a pearl clip. Daniel had told her to pull out all the stops in dressing but had refused to tell her where he was taking her.
A dozen times she'd picked up the phone to call him and cancel. A dozen times she'd replaced it. She stepped outside. Perhaps the cool air would clear away the cobwebs that had taken up residence in her mind.
Stars spangled the sky. Candles in heaven's windows, Carla had once told her. Looking at the glittering night, Eve believed it. The night promised magic. The only question was, did she want to share it with Daniel?
Yes.
The answer came so swiftly that she had no time to doubt it.
How could the wrong man feel so right?
When Daniel materialized out of the darkness, she took a step back. "I didn't hear you drive up," she said, hating the breathless note in her voice.
"You were too busy star-gazing."
Without a word, she put her hand in his.
Two nights ago he'd disarmed her with a quiet evening at a local cafe. Tonight she expected him to try to dazzle her with dinner a five star restaurant.
Once more he'd succeeded in surprising her. When they arrived at an art gallery, she hardly dared believe it.
"I thought you might enjoy this," he said, taking her evening wrap and checking it at the door.
She looked about at the people dressed in their finery. Invitations to the gallery's Native American show were practically impossible to come by. She'd tried and failed to secure one. Now she was here.
The exhibit was magnificent. Hammered copper belts, turquoise and silver squash blossom necklaces, brightly woven blankets, and beaded leather dresses were only the beginning. She ignored the hovering waiters with their trays of champagne; she didn't need the artificial high.
She was already high—high on the display of beauty before her. She hurried between one display and another, anxious to see, to touch, to experience everything.
A hand on her arm halted her rush. She looked up to find Daniel grinning at her.
"Slow down," he said. "It's not going anywhere."
Impulsively, she hugged him. "Thank you."
"You're welcome."
"How did you know?"
"I didn't. I hoped." Not giving her a chance to reply, he kissed the tip of her nose and steered her toward a collection of pottery.
The simple designs held a classic grace that she found instantly appealing. Her own attempts at pottery had produced adequate results, perhaps even more than adequate, but they lacked the classic elegance she saw before her now.
"They're beautiful," she breathed.
"You're beautiful."
His words stayed with her for the rest of the evening. When he took her home, she invited him in.
Eve unlocked the door and, for the first time she could remember, wished she'd spent a few minutes straightening up her home before she left. Her housekeeping skills—or lack of them—had never bothered her before. Instinctively, she knew Daniel's home would reflect the same orderliness that he brought to the rest of his life.
She angled her chin. She wasn't one to waste her time on regrets. Besides, it wasn't like she wanted to impress the man.
That was the last thing she wanted, she assured herself. The last thing.
Still, she found herself kicking a shoe under the sofa as she walked through the living room.
"Hey, you don't have to clean up on my account."
"Okay, so I'm not the happy homemaker."
"I always believed you could tell a lot about a person by where they live."
"Okay. I'll bite."
"You love books."
"So you've got twenty-twenty eyesight," she said with a glance at the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that lined a full wall. "What else?"
"You put people above things." He slanted her a knowing glance. "How am I doing?"
"Not bad."
"You surround yourself with color."
"Colors are my business."
"They're more than that." He touched the multi-colored shawl that fastened at her waist. "They're part of you."
She took a step back.
His perception was unnerving. Yet one more piece of evidence that he knew her better than wanted to admit. For the sake of her sanity, she had to keep her distance. Her heart, though, urged her to close the space she'd so recently created.
Her heart won the struggle.
Daniel took the choice from her as one step ate up the space between them. He was now but a heartbeat away. She guessed his intent as he lowered his head. She could have objected, could have moved. She did neither. Instead, she waited for the kiss she knew would make the world stop.
When the kiss came, she was ready.
Or so she thought.
The kiss was light and quick. Surely, it wasn't enough to send sparks snapping down her nerve ends. Yet that's what happened. Warmth suffused her as she melted into his embrace.
She'd forgotten. All she knew for one wonderful moment was that she was being held in strong arms, by a man who made her feel very much a woman. When memory—and reality—returned, she pulled away, her breath coming in rapid puffs.
Reality slammed into her, and she took a step backward.
Daniel was a politician, everything she'd sworn to stay away from. His smiles shouldn't make her pulse race faster or her heart do somersaults.
When he kissed her again, she knew she hadn't been mistaken. If anything, she'd underestimated his effect on her. The world didn't just stop; it tilted off its axis before coming to that stop.
With his lips centered on hers, she was grounded. She needed no other support. Still, her hands moved to his shoulders, then around his neck. So close were they that she couldn't tell where her heartbeat stopped and his started. And she knew this was what she'd been waiting for all of her life.
She knew she was playing with fire, knew he was taking her heart places she wasn't ready to go, knew she should put an end to it.
"You promised," she reminded him, wishing she didn't sound so breathless, that her heart didn't pound like a sledgehammer in her chest.
"So I did." He drew in a shuddering breath, as if he, too, had been shaken to the core. Then he took himself off, leaving her to stare after him.
Beautiful. He'd called her beautiful. Had he really meant it? Or was he one of those men who handed out compliments as easily as they breathed? Somehow she didn't think so.
Annoyed at herself for even thinking about it, she shook her head. She didn't want to feel pleased at his compliments. He'd be here a week, two at the most, and then leave for Washington.
She didn't want to feel anything but relief when he disappeared from her life. Then why did this attraction to him persist? The question plagued her into the night,
disrupting her sleep and turning her dreams into nightmares.
No, not nightmares, she scrupulously reminded herself in the morning. No dream that held Daniel Cameron looking at her with those serious gray eyes could be called a nightmare.
Eve had learned early in life not to pin too much on dreams, especially if those dreams depended upon other people. Still, a few secret hopes that she'd hugged in the secret places of her heart persisted, undiminished by the realities of life.
Pushing away the memories, she concentrated on updating her books. Accounting wasn't one of her strengths. For that reason, she was determined to master it. When the books balanced, she gave a relieved sigh.
Her mind unoccupied, her thoughts returned Daniel. She'd always hoped that someday she would meet a man who would stir her in a way too powerful to resist, too commanding to ignore.
So why was she thinking of that now? That she'd recently met Daniel Cameron had no bearing on it. None at all, she assured herself. It was coincidence. Nothing more.
She didn't want to be breathless around him, to feel weak-kneed and tingly just because he was near. She didn't want to, but she did.
* * * *
Spending the evenings with Eve was becoming a habit. A very pleasurable habit, Daniel thought with a smile. He hadn't expected to be able to get away tonight. Meetings with local party members normally lasted far into the night. That this one hadn't was a bonus, one he hoped to share with Eve.
When he knocked at her door, no one answered. The shop door was unlocked, and he pushed it open. He walked through the kitchen on his way to the workshop.
Jasmine and lavender. She'd taught him enough for him to recognize the scents that greeted him. With bunches of weeds hanging from the ceiling and a pot of herbs simmering on the stove, it resembled an old-fashioned apothecary. The smile that touched his lips was one of tenderness. She'd made herself a nest here, full of colors and scents and textures, as far removed from his Washington townhouse as it was possible to be.
Strange. He felt at home here. The style wasn't one he'd have chosen for himself. His tastes ran more to classic lines, the smell of leather, the feel of rich fabrics. He'd carved out a place for himself amid the tinsel and phoniness that composed so much of the nation's capital.
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