Jameson felt nothing but outrage on her behalf. “Don’t talk like that. Your ex was the one with the problem.”
“As in, it’s not me, it’shim?”
He stuck to his guns. “That’s right. You’re way too much woman for Trevor.”
She sipped her drink. “Just hypothetically...”
“Hypothetically, what?”
“Well, say we went home together...”
“I’m liking the sound of this.”
She bit the corner of her ripe lower lip before asking sheepishly, “Would you tell me if I was bad in bed?”
Where the hell did that Trevor guy get off, making her doubt her desirability? Mr. Nice Guy was nothing but a jerk. “It’s not an issue. You aren’t bad in bed.”
“Jameson. Get real. You have no way of knowing that.”
They were leaning into each other again, close enough that his sleeve touched hers. It was a simple matter to lean in the necessary fraction closer.
Their lips met.
Her mouth was even softer than it looked, and the scent of her was driving him a little bit crazy. He kissed her slowly, his body heating with sexual need, though he exercised care not to take it too deep. “That proves it,” he whispered, his lips still brushing hers. “You are amazing in bed.”
Her slow-blooming smile foreshadowed really good things. “Tell me you live alone.”
“I’ll go you one better. I’ll show you.” He signaled the bartender for the check.
Van’s butterflies had butterflies as Jameson settled the bill, helped her into her fleece-lined coat and led her outside, where a light snow was falling.
Wrapping a strong arm across her shoulders, he pulled her in close to him. “Ride with me.”
No way. Tonight would be her first—and most likely only—one-night stand. She intended to do it right. And that meant sober, with her own vehicle to get her there and, when the night was over, back to her brother’s house, where she was staying alone while Evan stayed at Daphne’s.
“I’ve got snow tires on my SUV,” she said. “I’ll follow you.”
Jameson didn’t argue. He walked her to her Subaru, opened her door for her and closed it with care. She watched as he jogged through the thin layer of snow to a black quad cab. Starting her engine, she waited for him to take the lead.
He led her out of the parking lot and down Center Street to the intersection with the state highway, where dirty snow had piled up on the shoulder, but the road itself was clear. The snow came down sparsely, not really sticking.
After maybe ten miles, he took a side road. A few minutes later, they turned onto a wide, well-tended gravel driveway and passed under a rough-hewn sign for the John family ranch, the Double J. In the distance, she could make out the shadows of barns and outbuildings and a big log house. Jameson led her past the turnoff to that house.
The long driveway curved up the gentle slope of a hill and then down to another house, one not quite as large as the log home they’d passed earlier. Of gorgeous, weathered wood and stone, the house had lots of windows and a more modern style than the usual sprawling log homes that most of the wealthy local ranchers favored.
Two of the four garage doors rumbled up and Jameson drove in the first stall, jumping out and signaling her to take the next stall over.
She rolled down her window. “I’ll just park out here.” When it came time to leave, she wanted a clean getaway, one that did not include asking him to please shut the garage door behind her.
He went in through the garage, and she parked in the driveway, meeting him at the front door.
Inside, he took her coat and hung it in the entry closet. “Drink?” he asked, leading her down a wide hallway with a skylight overhead. The hallway opened onto a sprawling, gorgeous combination kitchen and great room. The kitchen end had a stone floor, counters of black granite and warm wood, the appliances the kind any top chef might envy. A wall of windows looked out on the dark, shadowed peaks of the mountains in the distance.
“Nothing for me, thanks,” she said, setting her leather shoulder bag on one of the stools at the granite island.
He pulled her over to the rough-hewn trestle table and moved in close. Really, he was such a gorgeous man. She’d always admired his thick, dark gold hair and celestial blue eyes. He smelled so good, like saddle soap and clean leather—a healthy male in his prime, the kind that lured a woman to mate.
And that reminded her. “I’m on the pill,” she announced, “and really hoping that you have condoms.”
