In his experience, nothing ever lived up to hype, never came close to meeting expectations. Immeasurable disappointment always followed swiftly in the wake of anticipation, even minor anticipation. Forget about anything major. Major expectations always brought major disappointment crashing down about his ears.
And yet, he wasn’t disappointed.
At least, not in his expectations. What he was disappointed in was himself. Because instead of backing away, instead of feeling nothing more stirring than a smattering of indifference when he kissed her, he wanted more.
Hell, he wanted her.
Here, now, with paint being transferred from his coveralls to hers, he wanted to make love with her on the floor, on the counter, against the ladder. Everywhere and anywhere.
A rush was traveling through him the likes of which he couldn’t begin to fathom.
He wanted no part of it, it would only serve to confuse and complicate everything.
And yet he wanted more.
Wanted to embrace this sweet, agonizing sensation and fall into it until it completely cocooned him.
His very lungs ached.
It was not unlike the way they had felt when he had run his one and only New York marathon at the age of thirty. Any second now his lungs were going to explode. They’d already put him on notice.
With effort, he pulled himself back, abruptly ending what he’d abruptly started.
Gloria looked up at him, her expression as dazed as he felt.
It was a full minute before there was enough air in her lungs for her to form even a single word. “So,” she finally whispered.
“So,” he echoed, his mind nothing more than a vast wasteland.
Gloria pressed her lips together, wanting to kiss him again. Wanting to make love with him. Grateful that he hadn’t pressed the advantage that was so obviously his. Eventually she gathered together enough breath to say, “It’s behind us.”
Not by a long shot, Jack thought, unless he exerted superhuman control. Still, for the sake of sanity he went along with the pretense.
“Guess so.”
Any second now she was going to do something very stupid and throw herself back into his arms. Desperation began to vibrate through her. Her eyes never leaving his face, she took a step backward. “Maybe we should get back to work.”
“Maybe.”
All he could do was utter a solitary word, perhaps two. The way his thoughts were all scrambling into each other, he didn’t think that he was capable of constructing a coherent compound sentence. Right now, every word in his vocabulary was on a fantastic ride inside the blender that was his brain, whirling around and making no sense whatsoever.
Her legs felt shaky, just the way they had when he’d pulled her out of the car earlier this week right after the air bag had threatened to separate her from her claim to being a rational being. Maybe she should lump him right up there with claustrophobia. Heaven knew he had the same kind of impact on her that she felt when she was confined to small spaces. Panic had been at the center of her reaction just now. The kind of panic that occurred when she found circumstances utterly out of control and beyond her reach.
He had done that to her.
So why did she want to kiss him again?
And why in heaven’s name did she want to take what was going on here to the next level?
The second she’d thought of making love with him, something snapped to attention inside of her, an iron resolve set in place to keep her sane.
No, damn it, she wasn’t going to go that route again, she wasn’t going to follow her hormones down that same hazardous, slippery slope. She was older, wiser—well, at least older. Wasn’t wisdom supposed to kick in at some point by now?
Willing herself back to some semblance of composure, she looked down at her overalls. The vivid splotch of paint she’d smeared across his chest when he had caught her had transferred itself onto her. Despite the seriousness of the situation she found herself in, Gloria could feel her mouth curving.
“Looks like we’re part of some club.” And then she cleared her throat, determined to give the performance of a lifetime. She fixed a bright, cheerful smile to her lips, the kind she summoned when dealing with a particularly trying customer whose account she wanted to acquire.
“Well, I’m glad that we got that out of our systems. Now maybe we can get down to work.” She pointed toward the far wall. “If you take that wall over there, I’ll finish up over here.”
She sounded glib, as if she was accustomed to being kissed by men all the time.
Given the way she looked, maybe she was, Jack decided. Women like Gloria were the object of a great many men’s fantasies and desires.
Something else stirred inside of him. Jealousy.
Jack banked it down, swiftly, firmly. There was no way he could be jealous. He hardly knew her. And it was going to stay that way.
He gratefully took his cue from the woman, relieved that she wasn’t asking to have some kind of a heart-to-heart about what he had just foolishly done. A lot of other women would have demanded to have it out, asking him where he thought “this” was going to go.
As if he knew.
He hadn’t a clue. He didn’t even know what “this” was. And right now, he wasn’t up to discussing anything except how many coats of paint she wanted to spread on her walls. Anything else would have required a more complex thinking process than he was capable of mustering at this point in time.
Nodding, he picked up the container of paint and took the roller she handed him. “Thanks.”
Her throat felt bone-dry as she replied, “Don’t mention it.”
“I won’t.”
It was a promise he was making her, she suddenly realized.
She stood and watched him for a second as he pried off the container’s lid, then poured some of the contents into a tray. Did that mean he had felt something, too? It would be nice to know that she hadn’t been alone during the blitzkrieg she’d just experienced.
“Fine,” she responded.
Then, to keep him from saying anything else, Gloria turned up the radio. A love song filled the air. She was quick to switch stations. But the next one belonged to a call-in talk show. The host was venting about a proposed tax bill. Muttering under her breath, she switched around until she found a country-and-western station.
With a smile, she left it on.
Roller raised to begin, Jack groaned as he looked at her over his shoulder. “Oh, God, you actually listen to country music?”
Good, they were back in their corners again, she thought. On opposite sides of an issue. She waited for the safe feeling to return, the one that told her she had nothing to fear.
This time, the feeling didn’t come.
Maybe later, she thought hopefully. “Every chance I get.”
Jack frowned, turning back to the wall. Trying to block out the music. “I didn’t think you were the type for crying-in-your-beer songs.”
“I’m not.” She loved music and country and western was her favorite kind. “And they don’t cry in their beer. There’re a lot of good words, a lot of good sentiments to be garnered from country-and-western music.”
“If you say so.”
“Yes,” she said cheerfully, dipping her roller in the tray, “I do.”
She began to hum to the tune on the radio, doing her best to silence the tune her body was humming as she remembered that kiss.
Chapter Nine
T here was a pizza between them on the back room desk. Because they’d badly needed a break after three hours of painting, Gloria had ordered a pepperoni pie from the pizzeria at the other end of the mall. Large, half-finished containers of soda stood like frosty sentries on either side of the opened box, standing guard over the more than half-consumed pie.
There was a great deal more than dough, cheese, sauce and pepperoni shimmering in the air between them, though.
Tasting a bit of sauce along her mouth, Gloria wiped her lips before continuing to
work on her slice. She still didn’t know what to make of Jack, or even if she should try.
But Jack Fortune wasn’t the kind of man you could just write off or walk away from.
Especially after he’d kissed her in a manner that would have burned off a woman’s socks.
Better just to go on eating and not say anything, Gloria told herself, even though the aftereffects of his kiss were lingering a lot longer than she’d thought they would.
That was only because she’d been celibate so long. Even plain tap water tasted like sparkling wine if your thirst had gone unquenched for two years.
Trouble was, she thought, watching Jack beneath hooded eyes, she hadn’t realized she even was thirsty until she’d taken a sip.
Annoyed that she couldn’t stop her mind from wandering down a path she didn’t want it to go, she took a healthy swig of her diet soda and then leaned forward to take another slice of pizza.
At the same time that he did.
Both reaching into the box, their hands brushed against one another. It took effort not to pull back her hand. When he raised his eyes to hers, she said the first thing that popped into her head. “You lasted longer than I thought you would.”
What the hell was that supposed to mean? Was she talking about his staying here after he’d kissed her? “Come again?”
“Painting,” she explained, picking up her slice. “I half expected you to make a U-turn at the door when I suggested you put on the coveralls and pitch in.” And I would have stayed feeling a whole lot safer if you had, she thought. “Thanks to you, we’re almost done.” She flashed a grin, pausing to take a bite of what amounted to her fourth slice. “At this rate, I’ll be ready to open in another week. The man who does the lettering is coming tomorrow.” She watched as he took another slice himself.
Jack raised a brow in mock surprise. “You mean, you’re not going to do that yourself, too?” Where was she putting all this food? he wondered. So far, the woman had consumed more than his last three dates put together and she looked fantastic doing it.
Careful, buddy, he warned himself. You’re on dangerous ground here. You start admiring the way a woman eats, you’re lost.
Gloria shook her head and laughed. “No way. I’ve got terrible handwriting. No one would know what the name of the store was.”
He was vaguely aware of nodding in response, hardly hearing what she was saying. His attention was riveted to the way her mouth moved as she spoke. To the way she breathed. Because it was warm inside, she’d unzipped her coveralls down to her waist when she’d sat at the desk. Beneath the bland garment with its paint splatters she was wearing a tank top that adhered to her like a hot-pink skin. It molded itself to her breasts, softly hinting at cleavage while it brought out the deep black of her hair.
She’d loosened her hair, as well. It was skimming along her back now like a black velvet cape.
One hand holding his slice, the other wrapped around the soda container, Jack could still feel an itch working itself across his palms.
He wanted to touch her. To run his palms along her body. He wanted to see for himself if it was as soft, as firm, as it appeared.
In a desperate attempt to mentally backpedal before he found himself in too deep, he searched for something to use as a barricade between them. Something official. “What kind of insurance are you going to be carrying?”
It took her a moment to absorb the question. He’d been looking at her with a gaze hot enough to burn away her coveralls and everything else, as well. She was grateful to talk about something as bland as insurance. Even so, she took a sip of the cold soda to quench a thirst that only partially resulted from the spicy slice of pizza she was consuming.
“Same as before,” she told him. Then, in case he hadn’t come across that when he was conducting his intrusive research into her life, she added, “I went with Gibraltar Insurance when I opened up my store in Denver.” Before he could ask, she gave him the reasons behind her choice, enumerating them on her fingers. “Reasonable rates, accessible agents. They were right there for me after the robbery.”
“Robbery?” The slice halfway to his lips, Jack stopped and looked at her incredulously. “You were robbed?”
Gloria bit her tongue, but it was too late. She should have done that before she’d said anything.
Big mistake, her mind taunted.
She shrugged as carelessly as she could, dismissing the incident, and then smiled at him prettily as she held up her thumb and forefinger barely three inches apart. “It was just a small robber.”
“Bullets are the same size no matter how tall or short the shooter,” he pointed out.
Damn, she wished she’d kept her mouth shut. “Yes,” she said patiently, “I suppose they are. But no one was hurt,” she was quick to add. “The guy who robbed us looked more scared than anything.”
“You saw his face?”
“His eyes,” Gloria corrected. “And he was terrified.” She just knew he’d had to have been driven to do what he had by awful circumstances. “If my customer hadn’t started hyperventilating just then, I think I might have had a shot at talking the robber out of what he was doing.”
Just what kind of a nutcase was his father backing? The woman was certifiably insane. “Or a chance at getting shot—”
She finished off her piece and picked up a fresh napkin, wiping her fingers. “You know, Jack, you really have to do something about that upbeat outlook of yours.”
There was nothing funny about the situation she was telling him. “I’m a realist.”
Collecting a handful of used napkins from the desk, she dumped them into the garbage can, then cocked her head, studying him. “Maybe that’s your problem.”
He resented what she was implying. “I don’t have a problem.” Other than dealing with you and these weird feelings.
Gloria looked him in the eye, sensing that he was a soul in turmoil. More or less just the way she was right now.
“Are you happy?” she suddenly challenged.
Where the hell had that come from? “Ecstatic,” he told her through clenched teeth.
Gloria laughed, the sound rippling through him like rings in a lake marking a disturbance. Which was exactly what the sound of her laughter created inside of him. One hell of a disturbance.
“All right, then maybe you don’t have a problem,” she allowed glibly.
“Thank you,” he replied icily before getting back to the topic they were both pretending to discuss with interest. “What are you paying for insurance?”
One corner of her mouth rose in a teasing, provocative smile. “That’s a little personal, don’t you think?”
“A kiss is personal.” Now why the hell had he said that? He’d promised himself not to think about or make reference to what had transpired earlier. The less time spent on that, the better. It was almost as if he was doomed to repeat it.
Jack quickly tried to distract her from his error. “This is business.”
She gazed at him, all wide-eyed innocence. “Then you didn’t mean business before?”
His eyes narrowed. “When?”
“When you kissed me?”
He stood by his original reason, no matter how flimsy and paper-thin it seemed. “I was just trying to get it out of the way.”
“Oh. Yeah. Right,” she murmured, the words emerging one at a time in slow motion. “Okay, then.”
She quoted him the price she was paying. He looked at her in surprise.
“And that covers it?”
“Two million dollars’ worth of coverage. I don’t expect to have more than that on hand at any one time. Less, most likely. I provide a service,” she explained. “Creating something to match the customer’s personality rather than selling them something out of my inventory because I over-ordered sapphires last month.”
It was an interesting philosophy, but he doubted its validity. “How can jewelry reflect a person’s personality?” he scoffed.
She studied him for a long
moment, then said, “Yours would be reflected in a gold ring. With a panther carved out of black onyx embossed on it. And maybe one small eye that seemed to watch you no matter where you moved. An emerald.”
“Is that how you see me?” He wanted to know. “Flashy gold with embossed onyx?”
He was trying to throw her off. “Nothing flashy about gold,” she informed him. “All the kings wanted it. And the ring would be in the image of a panther,” she said pointedly. “That’s how I see you. A panther. Sleek, deadly. Showing your opponents no mercy.” That was the way she saw him, she insisted silently. Cold, removed.
Nothing cold about the way he kisses.
She banked down the stray thought. It had no place here.
Gloria forced a smile to her lips. “I’ve done a little homework on you, too.” He looked surprised. And not pleased. “In the age of the Internet, no one’s safe.”
He dropped the last slice he’d been nursing back into the box. It was there alone. Between them they’d polished off almost an entire large pizza. “Apparently.”
For some reason the space around her felt as if it was getting smaller, she realized. She could feel her claustrophobia kicking in. But for once, she almost embraced it. It allowed her to block out the other sensations that were swirling through her, the ones that worried her a great deal more than an attack of claustrophobia did. She knew how to deal with that: get out in the open again as fast as possible. Dealing with this attraction to Jack Fortune was another matter. And she wasn’t going to be free of it until he went back to New York.
Rising, she brushed off her hands. “I’m going to go finish up,” she announced.
Jack nodded, then looked back at the slice he’d just dropped. He picked it up again, using it as an excuse. He needed to regroup. “I’ll be out in a minute.”
She gave him a meaningful look. “Don’t hurry.”
Jack sat back in the straight-backed chair she’d rustled up, watching her walk out of the small office. Watching the way her hips moved from side to side like a lyrical song.
Her Good Fortune Page 10