“Anytime. I’m always available.”
“I can imagine.” She suspected he did remember that night when she had been eighteen.
“Shall we?” He motioned toward an adjoining sunroom that overlooked the lit veranda and pool area. As she sat, he pulled his chair close to hers to sit beside her, getting out his phone. “Here is my Dallas home,” he said, leaning closer so she could view the picture on his cell phone with him.
“Your Dallas mansion looks as large as this place, if not larger,” she said, aware again of their shoulders and arms touching. She looked up to meet his gaze as he flipped to another picture.
“Might be. It’s what I like, so I don’t view it as huge. It’s more appealing to me than this place. This one has a cold, remote look to it.” He switched to the next picture. “Here are the rooms.”
She agreed about the cold appearance of the gray mansion, but she didn’t mention it. They went through some pictures of rooms in his Dallas home, and then he switched to pictures of a lavish ranch home in Wyoming.
“I think the best I can do for you is get everything inventoried and perhaps make some suggestions. I’m not an interior decorator, but I can try at least. I’ll need pictures of these rooms to study more thoroughly.”
“Sure. Now I’d like to go through the house with you and tell you which things I like and what I want to keep. Actually, what I’d really like to do—”
Smiling, she bent forward quickly to place her forefinger lightly on his lips to silence him. The instant she touched him, she removed her finger as a current sizzled to her toes. It had been a mistake to touch his mouth, but she couldn’t take it back.
“So would I, but it would be unprofessional and not the smart thing to do. Let’s stick to business,” she said breathlessly, lost again while looking into his eyes and besieged by memories.
Looking amused, he nodded. “Maybe I don’t have on my mind what you think I do,” he said.
“Maybe not, but just in case you do, prevention is better.”
He grinned. “We can have fun.”
“Stick to business,” she said, wishing she could sound positive and forceful.
“You’re all grown up. No flirty college girl now.”
“I’m trying not to be,” she answered, thinking that was the last thing she needed, if she was to work with him the next several days. “So we’ll stick to getting items you want to sell separated from the ones you want to keep and get all the contents cataloged. We can start as soon as you want.”
“Start which?” he asked with a twinkle in his eyes.
“C’mon, Jared. Let’s stick to business.”
“All right. I guess that’s the wisest course for both of us, but it’s definitely not the most exciting or the most fun.”
She couldn’t help feeling a bit disappointed that he had stopped flirting with her. She wondered whether they would be together constantly. The whole prospect of this job had changed, turning everything topsy-turvy, with work becoming a secondary consideration.
“Perhaps we should start now,” she said, smiling at him and taking a long drink of tea. She set down the glass and stood. “I’ll work downstairs this afternoon,” she said, wanting to avoid the bedrooms anytime he was around.
“Sure.” He rose to walk with her. One of the front rooms was a library, where he stopped in front of the painting nearest the door. “Here’s something I want. I think this can go in the Wyoming ranch house.”
She looked at the oil painting of a mountain stream with horses nearby. “You’re not a contemporary fan. You like the traditional. That’s a marvelous painting,” she said, making more notes. While she placed a small sticker on the back of the painting, Jared strolled slowly around the room.
“I like that table,” he stated, pointing to a Queen Anne–style mahogany table.
“Again a good choice in my opinion, but I love the sort of art and furniture here,” she stated, making her notes and tagging the underside of the table.
He rolled back his sleeves, and they worked together. She took pictures and narrated descriptions, which Jared typed into her iPad. As they moved around, Jared told her what he wanted. When they finished the library, they moved to a study.
She lost consciousness of time, but never of him. She was too aware of his proximity, too filled with vivid memories that tormented her. He picked up a porcelain figurine of a hunter and dog. Turning it in his hand, he looked at it for seconds and then held it out to her. “Is this piece old? Valuable?” Her fingers brushed his as she accepted it, feeling the warmth of his hand yet the cool, smooth touch of the porcelain. The physical contact with him, while slight, stirred a shower of sparks. She remembered his hands, their texture, the calluses, their magic touches as they moved over her.
Jared worked through the rest of the afternoon with her, finding treasures, discarding things he didn’t care for. He kept everything as professional as possible, just the way she had asked.
Finally he glanced at his watch. “Enough for today. Let’s take a break, meet in thirty minutes in the family room for a drink and then we’ll have dinner.”
She was startled to see it was already six o’clock. “That’s fine.”
“I told my housekeeper to take you to your suite of rooms, and I hope you had a chance to get a little settled in.”
“Mrs. Tarkington did show me my rooms. I can settle in after dinner.”
He smiled. “I can help if you’d like.”
“Thanks. I’ll manage on my own.”
“Maybe after dinner we’ll sit and talk a little.”
“Perhaps,” she said, aware that socializing with him would be difficult to avoid.
“I’ll go change now, too. And show you where I’m staying.” He took her arm, another light touch that caused a deep reaction. Would these volatile reactions fade or grow more intense the longer they were together? She suspected the latter.
“Have you already sent the information you gathered today to your dad?”
“Yes, most of the information and pictures. Not all. I’ll go over the rest tonight after dinner.”
“You have a small desk in your suite, and you have Wi-Fi and a laptop if you should need one.”
“Thank you. I have my own,” she said, climbing the steep, straight staircase beside him. When she reached the suite she had been given, she turned and looked into his green eyes that continued to keep her pulse racing. His thick lashes made his eyes irresistibly seductive.
“My suite is next to yours, so I’ll be close should you need anything.”
“I’ll be fine,” she said, turning to enter her suite.
“Meet you on the veranda,” he said before she closed the door.
Were they going to eat together often? For some reason she remembered him saying he wasn’t engaged. Or even verging on it. “It doesn’t matter,” she whispered to herself. He still had the wild lifestyle he always had. She had heard her brother talk about the reckless things Jared liked to do—mountain climbing, skydiving, hang gliding. Unfortunately Jared made her heart pound and her breath catch, and no other man ever had.
She needed to finalize this inventory and get back home. Too much time with Jared was a temptation to danger.
Just seeing him brought back memories of their night together. A night that still stirred her desire and made him far too appealing. A night that remained vivid and held too many scalding memories. Jared was as sexy as ever. He didn’t flirt as much and