Fisher wasn’t the type to settle down with one woman. Why would he when he had dozens panting after him everywhere he went?
And she had too much pride and self-respect to allow herself to become just another notch on his bedpost. So she kept her feelings to herself, and every day she searched for ways to fall out of love with him.
After Fisher escorted Cesar to the front door, she trotted to the bottom of the stairs and yelled up at Ozzie, “What can I do to help?”
Whitesnake blared from the second floor, David Coverdale wailing,“Here I go again on my own!”Eighties hair bands worked on Ozzie the way pacing worked on her.
“Coffee!” he hollered above the music. “Lots of it!”
“Copy that!” When she turned, she saw Fisher bent over in the doorway.
A gust of frigid February air had blown a dead leaf into the shop. He picked it up to toss it outside and after closing the door, he caught her staring. Or…oglingwas probably a more apt description.
“See something you like?” He grinned that Fisher grin that was all charm and male magnetism and so, so much sex appeal.
Shedidsee something she liked. Very much.
He had one of those high, round asses that begged to be squeezed. And his jeans were tight enough that she’d seen the delineation of the muscles in the backs of his thighs when he’d been bent over.
Oh, how she wanted to straddle those thighs. How she wanted to grab that ass. How she wanted to drag him up to the third floor and take him up on all the pleasure he’d been promising her for years if she’d just agree to sleep with him.
He’s a lady-killer,she staunchly reminded herself.He’d bed you and leave you in the dust just like he does all the others.
Considering she’d spent six years in therapy working through her abandonment issues—even though her father would never see shipping her off to school after her mother passed as abandonment—she knew being slammed-bammed-and-thank-you-ma’amed by the man she’d lost her heart to would crush her. Would make all that childhood trauma rear its ugly head and set her back to the beginning on her healing journey.
So she tamped down the lust that fired low in her belly, batted her lashes, and fell back on her only two weapons of defense against Fisher. Derision and sarcasm. “You know what they say about big egos, right, Fish?”
“No.” He shook his head and sauntered toward her. Fisher saunteredeverywhere, his natural gait all loose-limbed and confident. “But I’m sure you’re goin’ to tell me.”
“It’s said big egos are big shields for lots of empty space.”
He stopped a foot in front of her. Far enough away not to invade her personal space. But close enough that she could feel the heat coming off his big body.
“Ya sayin’ I got no substance?” His eyes bored into hers.
She hated when he did that. Reallylookedat her. She always feared he mightsee.
See the truth of her feelings for him. See that all her sarcasm and cynicism was just a smokescreen for what she really wanted to say, which was that she’d never met a man who’d made herwantthe way he did.
She avoided his question by brushing past him. “I need to make a fresh pot of coffee for Ozzie. You know he’s at his best when he’s hopped up on caffeine.”
Escaping down the hall and into the kitchen, she tried to force her brain away from BKI’s resident playboy and toward the task at hand. But focusing on the task at hand was impossible when he stopped in the doorway.
His black T-shirt—he wasalwaysin black—pulled tight across his shoulders and chest when he hung onto the top jamb so he could casually lean into the room.
The hem of his shirt lifted enough to reveal a couple of things. One was the glinting chrome top of the harmonica he carried with him in his front pocket. The other was the two inches of tanned flesh beneath his belly button. It sported a line of curly hair that was a good three or four shades darker than the wavy, light-brown mop crowning his head.
She had the nearly overwhelming urge to walk over there, kneel down, and follow that line of hair with her tongue.
Her nipples hardened without her permission. They were a mutinous pair, to be sure. So she turned toward the sink, glad for the excuse of needing to fill the coffeepot with water.
“Why are you following me around like a puppy dog?” she asked over her shoulder as the water flowed into the insulated carafe. She usually preferred to use a French press. It made the strong coffee taste richer, creamier, and less acidic. But it took time for the grounds to steep, and Ozzie needed liquid lifestat.So the industrial-size Bunn coffee maker the Knights kept in the corner of the kitchen for caffeine emergencies it was.
“Just wonderin’ when you’re goin’ to call your daddy and let him know the president’s personal henchmen are about to run afoul of the Federal Bureau of Investigations.”
“I hate it when you refer to the Knights that way.” She frowned as she poured the water from the pot into the coffee maker. “You’re not henchmen. You’re…guardians of democracy, protectors of American interests, the president’s first line of defense when it comes to the missions the military can’t touch with a ten-foot pole.”
“You say tomato; I say mercenaries.”
