will want me to finish that job now.” He chuckled, inviting her to laugh with him.
It was good to see him lighthearted. She chuckled, too, but after a moment the laughter died away and she was left replaying those frantic, fearful moments when she’d thought they weren’t going to make it out of the church in time. Thad was holding her gaze with his. His face sobered, and she knew he was sharing the memories.
“Thank you,” she whispered as her lower lip began to tremble. If he hadn’t come after her, she wouldn’t be here now, feeling the heat from his body—
“Don’t think about it.” Thad raised one hand and covered her mouth with his palm, pressing firmly for a moment. “We made it. That’s all that counts.” Then he dropped his hand, reaching for her palm and lacing his fingers through hers.
She stared at their joined hands. His curled around her fingers, almost hiding them. His skin was hot and dry, the palm tough from the work he did. The very center was wet where it had pressed against her lips, and a strange sensation tickled the pit of her stomach as a mental image of those lips sliding onto hers slipped into her head.
“So. Did you drive out here just to thank me, or do you have something else to do in the area?” Thad was speaking to her but he wasn’t looking at her eyes. Instead, his gaze was fixed on her lips. Sensation magnified. She was conscious of her breath rushing in and out over those lips, of a quivering excitement in the muscles of her stomach. Belatedly she remembered that she had come only to thank him, that her father would be expecting her for dinner any moment.
“I have to leave.” Her voice sounded strange to her, low and strangled, but he must not have noticed. He stepped off the stoop, her hand still firmly gripped in his, and led her toward her car.
In her mind she could still feel the rough, warm press of his palm across her lips. She’d wanted desperately to lick them, to taste him so she could carry the taste with her when she left. But a combination of shyness and common sense had held her back, and she knew she would have been asking for trouble.
And of course, the last thing she wanted was trouble. Thad Shippen was trouble with a capital T and if she had any sense she’d get out of here right now. She’d done her duty and proffered her thanks. Her obligation was ended.
Too bad her fascination wasn’t.
When Thad stopped beside the driver’s door of her car she looked around, surprised. She wasn’t entirely sure how she’d gotten here, but she had the awful suspicion that she might have floated. All she could think about was the way his hand cradled her much smaller one; the rough, callused warmth of his fingers where they were linked with hers; the way that hand and its mate would feel exploring her smooth, sensitive skin.
She couldn’t look at Thad, afraid he might read her thoughts. Then her flustered senses jangled a warning, and she did glance up at him. He was smiling down at her as he lifted her hand to his lips. His lips. She was riveted by the sight of those chiseled male lips forming a kiss. Then he lightly pressed his mouth to the very tip of her middle finger. She wanted to jerk away—no, she wanted him to keep touching her like that. Never in her life had she been around a man who drew her as this man did. As she stared at him, she felt her heartbeat speed up. The tip of his tongue whisked across her fingertip, moistening the pad, and her breath caught in her throat, then rushed out on a sigh. Her knees felt weak. At the apex of her thighs, a warm throbbing awoke. She longed to press her body against his and...and what, Chloe?
Thad raised his other hand and gently lifted her chin with his index finger. She raised her eyes to his and found in them an answer to her longing.
“Would you like to stay for a while?” His voice was a low growl that made her toes curl inside her shoes.
She knew what he meant, and she knew that she shouldn’t be giving this man the impression that she was the kind of girl who would—would stay. She shook her head. “I can’t.”
Thad smiled as if he’d expected her answer. “Then you’d better get out of here while you still have a choice, sweet thing.” He dropped his hands away from her and stepped back, hooking his thumbs in the back pockets of his jeans.
Chloe stood dumbly for a minute, then mentally shook herself and reached for the handle of her car door. She wasn’t interested in a fling with Thad Shippen. There was a big difference between thinking someone was attractive and deciding to engage in premarital se—oh, my goodness! Chloe’s eyes widened. Her gaze had wandered down his body involuntarily until it reached the faded blue jeans that fit him like a second skin. The bulge distending the zipper shocked her silly, leaving no doubt in her mind what he was thinking. Her gaze flew back to his face and she could see the smirk beginning.
“Like what you see?” Thad was openly laughing now.
Hastily she yanked open the door and slid into her car, slipping it into gear and reversing out of his driveway. As she drove away, she tried to work up outrage, anger, disgust...but all she could think was that if he had taken her inside that trailer she’d be learning right now what would assuage this anxious yearning within her.
Three
Every time he came through town the following week, she was in his way. He couldn’t avoid her if he tried.
At least, that’s what he told himself as he drove at a snail’s pace past the storefront on Main Street where the church had set up a temporary office in the donated space. He tapped his brake, slowing a little more. She’d been seated at her desk all morning, intent on some sheaf of papers. Sure would be nice if she’d get up and sashay over to the filing cabinet so he could watch her.
The guy behind him honked his horn impatiently, and at the sound of the horn blaring, Chloe glanced up from what she was doing at the desk that looked out toward the street.
Quickly he slouched down in the rental truck, turning his face away. He hoped she hadn’t seen him. She was liable to think he was watching her or something. It wasn’t his fault that he’d had to make four trips to the hardware store this morning. And it sure wasn’t his fault that the hardware store was two doors down from where she was working.
No, he didn’t want her to get the wrong impression. He found her attractive, but she wasn’t his type. No, his type wasn’t afraid to show off feminine charms. He liked women with bold eyes and tight clothes, women who knew the score and the rules of the game. Jean had been the only exception to that, and she’d fooled him when he’d first met her...a nice girl posing as a party babe.
Still, he’d been interested when he first laid eyes on Chloe through that window at the old church. Very interested. She’d been watching him, and when she’d seen him looking back, she’d become all flustered and turned five shades of pretty pink.
Pretty. It was a good word for her. Chloe was pretty in an old-fashioned, quietly elegant, peaches-and-cream way that was rarely seen anymore, a ladylike prettiness that was distinctly less than fashionable in today’s world of carefully rumpled, clumpy-shoes-and-shapeless-clothes glamour. If there was one thing Thad knew about, it was women. Courtesy of his mother, he’d been raised around women who spent big bucks and long hours trying to achieve beauty.
He could spot mascara at fifty yards and knew exactly how much time and mousse it took to create a headful of tousled curls that invited a man to dream about what they’d look like spilled across a pillow while he ravished their owner. He knew what a petite size in women’s clothing was and if a perfume was musk or floral based, whether nail polish was frosted or crème and when a woman was wearing a push-up bra to help enhance what Mother Nature had skimped on.
Mother Nature hadn’t skimped on Chloe, he remembered. Beneath those modestly buttoned blouses she wore with her prim suits was the figure of a goddess. The day she’d come to see him, she’d left her suit jacket in the car. He’d been so distracted by the firm mounds beneath the ivory silk of her short-sleeved blouse, he’d barely heard half of what she’d said.
For a few insane moments, he’d actually contemplated asking her out. But a few minutes into