by Alison Paige
Just because he didn’t want the little ankle-biters getting caught in the crossfire of some freak stalker didn’t mean he actually liked kids. Not that he didn’t like them, but they were…well, kids.
Kate looked askance at him and smiled. “They don’t wet their beds.” Her brow creased in reflection and she looked away. “Probably. I think.”
She closed the distance to his little black car. He’d left the cloth top down. His duffle bag and gun case were in the trunk. Nothing else fit.
“Nice.” The way she said it told him she appreciated more than the aesthetic value. She braced both hands on the passenger door, leaning over, eyeing the interior.
“Thanks.” Male reflex had his gaze appreciating an eyeful of her. Damn, those stretch breeches did fine things for her ass, smooth and round, high with a firm curve at the base before flowing down over her thighs. Either she was wearing a thong or nothing underneath. Nice.
“You restore her yourself?”
“Yeah. You like cars?” he asked.
“I like this car. What is it, nineteen sixty-nine, seventy, Veloce? Not the original paint. Restored leather. Original dash. Love the wood steering wheel. She’s beautiful. How’s she under the hood?”
“1779cc. Purrs like a kitten.”
“I bet.” Kate looked up at him, a smile sparking her green eyes like gems. “Take me for a ride.”
His libido roared hell yeah and shot a hot rush of blood to his cock. Hot women, hot cars, might as well be crack to an addict. Made a man go stupid quick. “Where to?”
Kate opened the door and slid in. “To the boys cabin. Where’d you think?”
Joe dug his keys from his pocket, relieved to find he hadn’t lost them in his spill. He got in and started the car, shifting to reverse. “First, show me the ‘or’ you mentioned.”
“No point.” She looked too friggin’ good in his car. “I shouldn’t have said anything. The cottage hasn’t been used in years. It needs to be cleaned and aired out, probably a new mattress too. It’d take days to be ready.”
“Right. Point the way.”
Those cute little lines creased between her brows again, but she wagged a finger out toward the service road he’d driven in on, away from the stables. After a quick little maneuver that had her grabbing the door handle with one hand and digging her nails into his biceps with the other, Joe headed out between the arena and bunkhouse.
When they reached the service road, pastures on either side, he stopped to check which way to turn. Left would take them back out to main road. Kate nodded to the right.
The road was the same white gravel he’d seen on the other side of the stables and along the main drive to the house. But here the road led into a thick forest of trees blocking the view on all sides. If he didn’t know better he’d think they’d left the farm and entered the dark wilds of the Adirondacks.
“That’s the restroom and showers for the campers,” Kate said when a gray cinderblock building came into view on the left.
The road curved to the right just beyond it and Joe gave a grumble and nod as they passed. Mathers didn’t say shit about group showers.
Up ahead he spotted the large cabins, two on the left and two on the right, all four surrounded by seventy-foot pine trees. Any minute he expected to see a moose or a big lumbering bear stroll across the road.
“Those are the boys cabins on the left. The girls are on the right. Six bunk beds, a working fire place, personal shelves and a small bathroom in each,” she said. “You’d be comfortable.”
He gave a noncommittal nod, downshifted and kept driving. His hand on the gearshift brushed her knee. She flinched, dropping her gaze to his hand and moved her leg. The car was a tight fit, built that way. An accidental touch now and then was inevitable.
“Sorry,” they both said at once. Nervous laughs melted into silence.
Stupid. They were adults and she was wearing thick riding breeches—skintight, sexy-as-hell riding breeches. He couldn’t even feel the heat of her skin through the things. So why were they both acting like they’d brushed each other’s naked flesh?
And then it happened again, only this time she didn’t flinch, and he didn’t say he was sorry. They drove down the gravel road, hidden from the world by thick towering trees on both sides. He could stop the car right there and they could do…anything, and not a soul would see.
An illusion, he knew. The farm buildings were just beyond the wall of trees. Still, the thought made his chest tight and his throat dry.
He swallowed and did his level best not to look down at her knee, now resting heavy against his hand on the gearshift. It was just her knee, but dammit if he didn’t like the connection. Didn’t want to risk her pulling away. Stupid.
Joe shifted again as they came up beside another long building on the left. His knuckles chafed along her thigh and back up. They both pretended not to notice. His inner thigh muscles pulled tight though. His balls warmed and his cock gave a hard twitch. His arousal would show when he stood. He tried not to think about it. Embarrassing enough he’d gotten a boner from brushing her leg.
“That’s the mess hall.” Her voice was raspy, softer then it should’ve been. She cleared her throat. “They’re serving dinner now. We’ve got a little time before they close up.”
“Umm,” he said, not wanting her to hear the rasp in his voice as well. He glanced at the line of kids going in and caught a peek at the tall open space inside. Brightly lit, alive with people.
Toward the end of the mess hall, on the opposite side of the road, the thick wall of trees broke for the wide entrance to the long end of the stables. Joe stopped the car for a better look.
“The riding ring we were using is on the opposite end?” He asked.
Kate nodded. “Uh-huh. My office is right there on this end and the tack room is across from it. This service road loops all the way around the stables and connects with the main drive.”
Joe looked ahead along the road and realized he could see the garage of the main house through the trees. And as he drove to the front of the stables, the grand farmhouse, with two smaller cottages beside it, came into view.
He stopped the car between the stables and cottages. “This it?”
Kate caught her bottom lip in her teeth. She nodded. The woman didn’t look pleased with the turn of events. Joe almost felt bad about being a pain in the ass, but then he wasn’t here to make friends.
Bunkin’ with kids while on a job was a bad, bad idea. The whole point was to get between his principal and some wacko. Not a smart move with kids crowding around.
Best-case scenario, he’d have his own space with room to store his stuff, and privacy to come and go as he needed. Better still if that space was close to the principal and apart from other innocents.
“That’s my house.” She pointed to the small, one-story cottage nearest the main house. “The one next to it is empty.”
Better still. “I’ll take it.”
Kate shoved open the passenger door and got out. She didn’t bother waiting for Joe before she went to the footpath that followed along in front of the two cottages.
It shouldn’t be a big deal, but there was a reason she’d asked to move into the cottage from the main house five years ago. She liked her privacy. Honestly though, she knew that wasn’t the only reason behind the fluttering in her belly and the warm tingle all over her body.
Gawd, he smelled good, like leather and sweet liquor with a dash of raw masculinity underneath. Watching him slide into the driver’s seat of that hot little car, his big hands on the wheel, the finely tuned machine utterly under his control… Yeah, she’d never been jealous of a car before.
“Y’know, if you hadn’t lied on your application none of this would be an issue.” She stomped up the three short steps to the porch, throwing a quick glance at the identical porch on her cottage just a few measly feet away. Was it too close or not close enough?
“Your staff wouldn’t have let me come this week otherwise.” He must h
ave jogged to catch up, speaking from the base of the steps.
She looked back at him, narrowing her eyes. “Exactly.”
“Sorry, dollface. That wasn’t an option.”
Kate opened the screen door and tried the knob on the green-painted wooden door. Unlocked, just as she figured. “Why? What’s the rush? Got a date to play urban cowboy with your buddies?”
It took two tries throwing her shoulder into the windowed wooden door before it opened.
“Something like that.” He followed her, flicking the switch inside the door. A stout corner table lamp blazed, casting a hazy yellow glow across the small, furniture-poor living room.
Just like her cottage, the wall to the left was covered in river stone, floor to ceiling, end to end, with a small hearth and fireplace in the center. Straight ahead was a narrow hallway, right led to the bathroom and left led to the kitchen. Though she suspected the fridge was unplugged and the propane tank empty. The bedroom was off to the right. The door stood open revealing a room half the size of the living room.
There was a bed and a chest of drawers. The main room had a brown loveseat, a coffee table, an end table holding the only lamp, a wooden chair made of saplings and a small TV stand with a thirteen-inch black-and-white TV on top. Not exactly the Ritz. And definitely not her problem.
The air was thick and warm after a season or so being trapped in the closed cottage. She turned to the nearest front window and tugged the spring-roll blind so it shot to the top with a thwap-thwap-thwap.
“You could stay at a hotel,” she said.
“I prefer staying on the farm. Maximize my training time.”
The place smelled musty, like old dirt and wood. It tickled her nose and made her chest heavy. She jerked the bottom of the window, then again with both hands. Nothing. It was stuck.
“Maximize, huh?” She gave the window another hard tug. “I’m curious what exactly is so important you felt justified stealing two weeks of fun from a needy kid?”
Suddenly Joe was beside her, nudging her out of the way with his elbow, making the oppressive hard-to-breathe sensation even worse—but for a whole different reason.
He flicked the lock and yanked open the lower pane. “Business,” he said. “Client loves horses. Wants to meet on his ranch in Arizona. What the client wants, he gets. I’d prefer not to look like a fool in the process. And like I said, I didn’t know about the City Camp thing. So how ’bout we get past it?”
Past it? Ha. Tell that to the kid sitting on his stoop back in the city. She moved to the other window and opened the blind, unlocked the window—duh—and jerked it up.
She brushed her palms together. “What kind of business?”
“What’s that?” He propped his hands on his hips, his wrist holding back the edges of his jacket.
“Your business. What do you do?”
“Oh, I…” His dark gaze darted around the room. His face was tight, and his brow sank low over his eyes. He scrubbed his hand down his nose, mouth and chin, then scratched the beard stubble on his neck.
He dropped his right hand to his side, his thumb flicking the gold ring around and around on his ring finger. Either the man didn’t know what he did for a living or he didn’t want to tell her.
“It’s, umm, complicated.”
Or he thought she was stupid. “Try me.”
“Airplanes,” he said in a rush. “Engines. Jet engines. Parts, actually. Yeah. I buy them, he sells them. Someone else puts them together. You wouldn’t be interested. It’s boring.”
And not that complicated. “So you travel a lot…buying engine parts?”
She caught his nod, his gaze tracking her as she went into the bedroom and opened the window. “Some. Yeah.”
She came back into the living room. “How’s your wife handle you being gone so much?”
“Not married.”
“Divorced?”
He shook his head.
She glanced at the thick gold ring on his right hand, his thumb still flicking it. He’d slipped his left hand into his pants pocket. Not an old wedding band. “Girlfriend?”
He chuckled and dropped his chin, then looked up at her through those yummy long lashes, a coy smile lifting his shadowed cheeks. “Nope. No girlfriend.”
What was that look for? Uhck. He thought she was fishing for his stats? Puhleeze. Or wait. Was she? Crap. She turned on her heel and went through the hall into the kitchen.
Kate had to stand on tiptoe to reach the window over the sink. She unlocked it and felt Joe beside her, nudging her out of the way with his hip. Her eyes closed and she took a deep breath before moving. Lord, he smelled good. She let the scent of him ooze through her body, warming her insides like a fine brandy. A girl could get drunk on the smell of this man.
“What about you?” He glanced over his shoulder at her while he pushed up the window and watched her unlock and open the back door. She could almost feel his gaze fondling her body. She held her tummy in, shifted her shoulders back.
“Me?”
“Yeah. You and Clayton.” He turned and leaned his backside against the sink, twisting the ring with his other hand. He stopped after a few seconds and slipped both hands into his pants pockets.
“There is no me and Clayton.” She crossed her arms under her chest and leaned her shoulder against the fridge. Warm. Unplugged like she figured and so not her problem. “I told you, we’re like brother and sister.”
“Y’know that only works when you both feel that way. Wasn’t exactly getting a brotherly vibe from him before.”
She shook her head. “He’s just worried about me. Clay can be a little overprotective. We’ve known each other for like fourteen years. I’m the closest thing to a sister he’s got.”
Joe snorted. “Right. So what’s he worried about?”
“Nothing, really. It’s silly. Just some kid with a crush sending me…” Shoot. It was none of his business. What was she doing spilling her guts to him? Geez, it’s a good thing he didn’t ask for her social security number.
“It’s nothing. Never mind.” The way Clay was overreacting about the stupid secret admirer love notes and poems and stuff was embarrassing enough. If Joe found out how the Thorndikes were blowing it all out of proportion he’d laugh his ass off.
The Thorndikes treated her like a princess. She was the daughter they no longer had. They made a production out of everything she did, throwing big parties when she showed at district competitions, a ball when she made it to nationals.
Clay and his parents, Bill and Wanda Thorndike, showered her with attention. She loved it. They were the family she’d wished for all her life. They gave her what her real family, her father, wouldn’t. Attention, overt love.
To the outsider though, their adoration, especially Clayton’s, might seem a little over the top.
Joe shrugged. “Whatever you say.”
The movement drew her eyes to his shirt collar and the dark…something, sticking out of it. She moved toward him but hesitated when he tensed.
She smiled, almost laughed. “Relax. You’ve got something…” She closed the remaining distance between them and reached her hand under his dark fall of hair. The side of her hand brushed against his warm neck. His scent filled her every breath.
He didn’t move, and she didn’t look, but she knew his gaze was on her. She could feel the heat of his attention on her face, washing hot down her chest, tingling her skin. His suit jacket brushed her breast. Her nipples tingled at its touch as she pulled the little clump of dirt and grass from inside his collar.
Her belly quivered. Liquid heat washed through her body, warming between her thighs. She swallowed and forced a shaky smile showing him what she’d found. “You weren’t planning on saving this, were you?”
His dark eyes locked on hers. His mouth stayed as it was, soft, relaxed, full lips lightly closed. The small scar at the corner of his top lip drew her gaze. How had he gotten it? Would she feel it on her lips if they kissed?
Sh
e dropped the clump into the sink behind him and meant to hook her thumbs on the tiny coin pockets of her breeches.
He caught her wrist, moving so fast she jumped. His other hand slipped over her hip, fitting her in the palm of his hand. His fingers tightened around her, nudged her closer. A deep breath would make their bodies touch. She stared into those dark, onyx eyes.
“So Clayton wouldn’t mind if I…kissed you?”
She licked her lips, couldn’t help it, and his gaze tracked the movement. She swallowed, sweet anticipation humming through her body. “No.”
“Would you?” His voice was low and intimate, the smooth sound doing delicious things to her body.
“No,” she said, just as soft, just as intimate.
He tugged her closer, her belly brushing his groin. Though they weren’t pressed together, she could feel the harder line of his cock straining his slacks toward her. Her body answered, warming further, muscles pulsing, trembling.
He brought her hand to his chest, below his shoulder. Her other hand held his biceps, her fingers too small to span the full breadth of his muscle.
“Do you want me to kiss you, Kate?” he asked.
She pushed to her tiptoes, her gaze focused on his soft full lips, on the tiny scar she wanted to taste. “Ye—” Her cell phone rang. Crap.
Kate stumbled back and Joe made no attempt to stop her. “Sorry.” She fumbled in the breast pocket of her shirt for the credit-card-thin phone.
She brought it between them and flipped it open, too frazzled to notice the number. “Hello.”
“Where are you?” a man asked.
“Clayton.” She flicked her gaze to Joe’s. He smiled, dropped his chin and chuckled silently, shaking his head.
Kate stepped back, and Joe braced his hands on the sink behind him. His tan jacket gaped open, and the buttons of his white stretch shirt strained over his chest. Lord, she could make out every muscle, every hard line all the way down to his stomach. From this angle she could also see the obvious bulge beneath his pant’s zipper.
She’d barely gotten a peek before Joe shifted, crossing his arms over his chest, which drew the edges of his jacket closed across his groin. She looked to his face and he gave her an impatient expression, one brow high on his forehead, his mouth a crooked slash halfway between a smile and nothing.