She’d happened onto what appeared to be a family baseball game at four in the afternoon. She walked over to join Corra and Tayler, who were sitting in lounge chairs under a big oak tree next to the house. Scattered around a makeshift baseball diamond in the backyard were Corra’s kids, Jamie and Katie, along with Kevin, Ben, Sean and one of the guests with her young son.
“Kyla, pull up a chair and relax a few minutes,” Tayler suggested.
“Who started this impromptu game?” Kyla asked, as she walked over and confiscated a chair from the flower-bed area.
“I told Chris about Miles, and he had Jamie up all evening talking about how good of a baseball player he was,” Corra said. “When I picked him up from school he practically begged me to bring him out here. Girl, I think he slept with that damned glove, he was so excited.”
“It’s nice of Miles to take the time to give him some pointers. He’s a really nice guy, isn’t he?” Tayler directed her question to Kyla.
Kyla nodded in agreement before sitting down and turning her attention back to the game. She watched them play for about thirty minutes, noting how Miles took the time to explain and demonstrate everything to Jamie and the others. The kids’ faces were lit up like Christmas trees.
Kyla smiled as she watched Miles do his thing. This reminded her of yesterday at the church when he spoke to the Color of Success group. He’d had those little girls eating out of his hands with the story of how he worked his way onto a professional baseball team. There was something about a man displaying his nurturing, softer side that turned her on. Maybe Miles was right, and he wasn’t all about chasing women.
* * *
After the impromptu ballgame, everyone cleaned up and prepared for dinner. As usual, the family ate in the kitchen after the guests were served. The baseball game was the topic of conversation.
“Kyla, maybe you can ask Miles for a picture of him playing baseball to—”
“No!” Kyla cut Tracee off. “I’m not about to ask him for another picture. He checked in under an assumed name. He doesn’t want the publicity.”
“That’s right, Tracee, we can’t put upon him again,” Tayler added, clearing her throat. “Besides, he’s here to spend time with Kyla. It was nice enough that he spoke to the girls on Wednesday evening, but we shouldn’t exploit the man.”
Kyla glanced over at Tayler, who winked at her.
Corra’s chin jutted out. “If anybody’s being exploited, it’s Kyla. He’s taking up all her time. She hasn’t been able to help me in the gift shop once since he’s been here.”
Kyla angled her body away from Corra, who was sitting next to her. “Corra, I didn’t know you needed my help. You never said anything.”
Corra gave a half-hearted shrug. “Well, it’s not every day that we have such a high-profile customer, so I’ve been managing, but I miss you popping in and helping out.”
“Oh, for the love of God.” Rollin smiled and tossed his napkin on the table. “Ladies, Miles is an entrepreneur and a philanthropist who partners with other nonprofits all the time. He’s here specifically to check out Kyla’s program, so let’s let him do that.”
“Oh, he’s checking out something, all right. But I’m not sure it’s her program,” Tracee speculated.
“There you go, Tracee,” Kyla uttered. “Your mind’s in the gutter again. You think every man is after one thing.”
Suddenly, all the women at the table were talking over each other as they discussed Miles’s interest in Kyla. She caught Rollin’s attention. He shrugged and gave her a helpless smile. She shook her head and lowered her chin into her chest. Her love life always seemed to be a topic of conversation. She’d had enough.
“You guys are too much,” she said, picking up her empty dinner plate and walking over to put it in the dishwasher.
Rollin stood at the same time. “Okay, ladies, that’s enough. Who wants to go for a bike ride? The bikes are fixed and waiting out back.”
A loud scuffling noise came from the card table where the children sat. Jamie and Katie hurried from the table out the back door. Corra called after them. “You guys had better not disappear on those bikes! We have to go. Chris will be home any minute now.”
Kyla laughed because those kids didn’t even slow down. “I’ll make sure they don’t go anywhere,” she said as she walked out after them. Anything to get away from these women who, no doubt, were plotting her future with Miles.
In the backyard, the kids were circling the bikes, trying to select the ones they wanted to ride. A bike path ran along the back of the house, past the vegetable fields, down to a creek several miles away.
“Whoa! What do we have here?”
Kyla turned around to see Miles walking her way. He’d changed into another pair of cargo shorts and a T-shirt displaying his company logo. Despite all the work they’d done that day, he looked relaxed, refreshed and extremely handsome.
The kids gravitated to him like bees to a wildflower. You would have thought he was the ice-cream man. She didn’t have to explain a thing as the kids filled him in on the bicycles that were provided for guests. Each one grabbed a bike and started to climb on.
The back door swung open. “What did I tell y’all?” Corra called out in a firm, hushed voice as she descended the stairs. “You can come back and ride this weekend. Right now we have to go home.” Corra joined them, all five congregating around the bikes.
“Miles, I’m glad I bumped into you before we left. Chris is still expecting you and Rollin out at the house later this evening,” she said before glancing at Kyla. “That is, if you don’t have other plans?”
Kyla quickly shook her head. How many times did she have to tell them this man was not there for her? Once their work was done for the day, he was free to do whatever he liked.
Miles smiled. “I guess I’ll be there. Tell him I’m looking forward to it,” Miles said.
Corra smiled. “Great, then we’ll see you later.” She gave Kyla a hug and whispered in her ear, “Enjoy him while you can.” Then she rounded up the kids and headed for her car.
“So, these are for anybody?” Miles asked, taking a silver bike off the rack.
“They are. We have a bike path that runs down by Miller’s Creek.”
Miles positioned himself on the bike and rode around in a little circle. “Man, I can’t remember the last time I was on a bicycle. At least, one that wasn’t stationary.” He stopped the bike next to Kyla.
She held out her hand, thinking he was a little too close and might ride over her foot.
“I bet you don’t even know how to ride a bike, do you?” he asked.
She crossed her arms. “Of course I know how to ride a bicycle. I grew up in the country, remember?”
“Somehow I don’t see Ms. Kyla leisurely riding around on a bicycle. Prove to me you know how to ride.” He kept the bike in motion, continuing to circle her.
The nerve of him challenging her to ride a bike. Did he think she was so academic that she didn’t know how to have fun? “I don’t have to prove anything to you.”
“Yeah, just what I thought. You can’t ride. Besides, it would be too much like having fun.” He grinned and kept circling.
Kyla surprised even herself when she walked over, jumped onto a red bike and took off down the path. Before dinner, she’d showered and changed out of her work uniform into a pair of stretchy jeans and her favorite T-shirt that read Runs on Veggies. On her feet were a pair of flip-flops. Not exactly bike riding gear, but she couldn’t resist his challenge.
“Oh! Okay, I see you Ms. Kyla. You can ride!” Miles announced as he turned his bike in her direction and followed her.
* * *
Miles hadn’t expected Kyla to jump on a bike and take off. For the last couple of days, he’d wanted to see the fun side of her. Maybe today she was ready to show it to him. He pedaled faster to catc
h up with her.
The bike path was flanked with large trees, which should have shielded them from the summer heat. However, it was late and the sun was setting. He slowed down to pedal alongside her.
“I don’t know what made you think I wouldn’t know how to ride a bike,” she said, smiling at him for the first time that day.
“Maybe because it’s hard to see you having fun. You’re a pretty serious woman, Ms. Kyla.”
“Just Kyla, please. It’s not like I’m your elder or anything.” She smiled, throwing his previously used words back at him, and then she pumped faster, moving ahead.
Miles liked her sassy attitude. He liked it a lot. “Okay, Kyla.”
He continued to follow her down the path, enjoying the views—both around him and the luscious one moving as one with the bike ahead of him. He needed to move his focus from her body if he was going to make it through the rest of the week. In the quiet of this path, with Kyla only a few feet away, he could now admit to himself that he was attracted to her.
Being celibate for the past year had helped his business and done wonders for his focus. Fewer distractions of the female kind had made him a better businessman. But this decision to spend a week close to Kyla Coleman no longer had anything to do with business. He wasn’t sure when things had changed, but he was experiencing pure, selfish lust, and he had to face up to that—and the consequences.
After several minutes of steady riding, Kyla’s bike slowed down, allowing Miles to pull up next to her.
“Are you having fun yet?” she asked.
“I am. What better way to unwind after a long day on the farm?”
Kyla laughed. “You sound like you’ve been working on a farm for years. What’s it been? Four days now?”
“Four really long days, I might add. But I don’t mind, because I’ve had the opportunity to spend them in the company of a very beautiful woman.”
Kyla glanced behind her to insinuate he was talking about someone else.
He laughed. “Yeah, I’m talking about you. Kyla Coleman. Accept it.”
She bit her bottom lip and blushed.
They rode along for a few minutes in silence. The path cleared on the left side, opening to the vegetable fields and revealing a beautiful sunset on the horizon. The farm looked larger from the seat of a bicycle.
“We’re about halfway to the creek now,” she informed him.
“How big is the farm, anyway?” he asked, concerned about making it to the creek and back before dark.
“About thirty acres. But the creek’s not that far. Let’s see how much of it we can cover before we have to head back.” She picked up speed, taking off again.
“Oh, you want to race, I see.” Miles stood up on his bike to pick up speed. He sped past Kyla and continued down the path.
“It’s supposed to be a leisurely ride!” she called out.
“You’re the one who wants to race!” he yelled back. Within minutes they were under the cover of large trees again. Miles looked back over his shoulder to see Kyla hot on his heels. The big smile of joy on her face was one he hadn’t seen before. Her ponytail swung in the wind behind her, and he knew he was falling for this woman...maybe harder than he had for any other woman.
For the first time in a long time, Miles grinned from ear to ear for no reason as the wind whipped across his face and body. The last time he’d gone cycling with a girl, he’d been in junior high. He glanced back over his shoulder again, and Kyla was right behind him.
“Relaxing isn’t it?” he yelled as he pedaled harder to pull away from her.
He heard Kyla’s laugh—right before he heard her scream.
Chapter 10
Miles jerked his head around in time to see Kyla’s bike pitch right, sending her flying over the handlebars. A flush of adrenaline ran through his body. He slammed on his brakes and jumped off the bike. He ran back to Kyla, lying in the gravel, moaning in pain.
“Don’t move.” He squatted next to her and ran his hands along the back of her head and neck.
“Oh, my God! That hurt!”
“Did you hit your head?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think so. Ouch! But my arm,” she grunted.
Miles helped her sit up before holding up her arm and seeing blood dripping from her elbow. She pulled her arm back and winced in pain. She twisted her arm around for a better view.
“Aww, man, look at that,” Kyla said before checking the other arm.
“Can you stand up?” he asked.
She took a deep breath. “I think so.”
He held her by the other elbow and helped her up. “What, we weren’t going fast enough for you, so you decided to try to fly?” he asked, attempting to keep his voice light.
Kyla bent over, trying to stifle a laugh. “Don’t make me laugh, it hurts.”
Miles looked down at her flip-flops. “I see what happened,” he said, pointing to her feet. “Your foot must have slipped, then you landed on a sharp rock.”
One flip-flop had flown off in the fall. She stepped lightly over and slipped it back on. “I hit something and I tried to stop, but when I hit the brake my foot slipped off the pedal.” Still holding her arms out, with the blood oozing from her wound and now dripping to the ground, she searched herself for any other wounds.
Miles walked over to her, pulling his T-shirt over his head as he moved. He folded the material and held it against her bloody arm. “This should stop the bleeding. Are you hurt anywhere else?”
She hesitated before reaching across her body to rub her side. “I think I skinned my hip, too.”
Against his better judgment, he raised her elbow up. “Let me see.”
With her opposite hand, she grabbed her T-shirt on the side of her injured elbow and pulled it up. For a nanosecond, Miles stared transfixed at the sight of her smooth brown skin. Then he slid a thumb into the waistband of her jeans, carefully pulling the fabric away and then down a little. She winced and sucked in a breath. Miles held his breath, too, as he inspected the oasis of lovely skin.
“It’s sore,” she said.
“But the skin isn’t broken,” he added with relief.
Miles wanted to place his hand next to hers, caressing the spot to make it feel better. Instead, she dropped her T-shirt, and he lowered her elbow. He gently removed his T-shirt to see that she was still bleeding, so he repositioned the shirt.
“I’m sorry about this,” she said.
He shook his head. “It’s not your fault, it’s mine. I shouldn’t have challenged you in the first place. Then I should have slowed down. Like you said, this was supposed to be a leisurely ride.”
“Well, no harm. I think I’ll live.” She cradled her arm against her side.
“Here, let me tie this up for you.” He rewrapped his T-shirt around her elbow and tied it so neither of them would have to hold it. He hoped she couldn’t feel the slight tremble in his hands as he touched her. That’s when he realized she was staring at his bare chest.
“How did you do that?” she asked.
His heart raced as her hand reached out for his chest. He looked down at the jagged scar across the right side of his chest as she brushed it with her fingertips. No, don’t do that! He took a deep breath. “I, uh...fell off a motorcycle in high school and landed on a piece of glass.”
She nodded and slowly stared her way up his chest to his eyes. He could hear his heartbeat pounding in his ears.
“Did you have to get stitches?” she asked in a soft voice.
He bit his bottom lip, unable to speak. He only nodded. The sweet scent of her skin was like a magnet, pulling him toward her. Her lips were plump and ripe for kissing. He couldn’t wait to taste her; he knew it was coming, and it would be, oh, so sweet. His heart raced as he leaned forward—
Just as she lowered her head and examined the shi
rt around her elbow. “Thank you. But I’m afraid you’ll be mosquito food if we go anywhere near the creek.”
He ran a hand behind his neck and squeezed. What the hell am I doing? He’d wanted to kiss her, but he knew he shouldn’t. Why was he torturing himself like this? He turned his head and looked up toward the darkening sky. “Yeah, maybe we’d better head back.” He let out a deep breath as he walked over and picked up her bike. He immediately noticed the chain had come off.
“You wouldn’t happen to have a wrench in your pocket, would you?” he asked, as he knelt down next to the wheels.
“No, I don’t. You can’t just pop it back on?” she asked.
“Afraid not.” He fiddled with the wheel to see if he could get it off with his hands, with no luck.
She squatted next to him. “I’m so sorry. I should have been watching where I was going.”
Miles let go of the bike and wiped his hands on his pants. At the moment, Kyla was talking fast and more than she had since he’d been there. She sounded nervous as she rattled on, apologizing again and again. He couldn’t hold back any longer, so he leaned into her, getting her instant attention. She stopped talking. Miles placed his hand against the back of her head, pulling her closer to him. And kissed her.
Her lips were soft and her breath warm. Her body froze at his touch. She didn’t pull away, so he closed his eyes and kissed her again, this time running his tongue across her lips. He’d never been surer than he was right now that he wanted this woman. Her mouth opened a little and her body loosened. Greedily, he went for the gusto and dropped to his knees while reaching out with his other hand to steady her face. He kissed her like a man who’d been celibate for over a year. Too much, too fast.
Kyla placed a hand against Miles’s chest and pushed back. He released her head and she fell backwards, flat onto her butt.
“Damn! I’m sorry,” he said as he quickly stood up, pulling her with him.
She looked flushed as she accepted his hand. He reached down to help brush the dirt from her butt.
Something About You Page 8