was. They would date. Sleep together. Then he would move on like all the other guys, and she would whistle as she walked away, heart intact and body happy for a while.
Not that she’d ever engaged in a wild, steamy affair before. Men didn’t see her that way, and she was more inclined to pack a man’s lunch than to grope him. She was modest to a fault when it came to her body, and maybe this was what fate had in mind for her. Sensual liberation. Just looking at him made her feel pretty darn liberated.
Dang, that sounded like a good plan. For once, to just let it all go, to be the sexy one, to have a man look at her and want, want, want.
“That’s true, there are plenty of weirdos running around. And I do feel just terrible.” Then she added in a breathless rush before she lost her nerve, “So how about dinner, then?”
He studied her for a second, his blue eyes darting down to her chest and back up again. She wished she had worn one of those body-clinging dresses that Allison favored, but instead she was covered in one of her standard loose-fitting, draping, no-waist dresses.
When the silence drew out, a sudden horrifying thought popped into her head. “Unless you’re married, or dating someone or something. That’s fine. I just thought that I could, you know, make it up to you, because of what happened when I tripped. I wasn’t implying anything…”
Shut up, shut up, shut up, she told herself. Babbling was never a good thing.
“What’s your name?” His hand was still gripping her arm, only it loosened and relaxed, until he was stroking her skin.
A shiver ran through her. “Jamie. Jamie The Klutz.”
He grinned again, little lines forming in the corners of his very close, very moist, very kissable lips. “Well, Jamie The Klutz, I’m Jack. Jack the unmarried and unattached.”
Stroke, stroke on her arm.
She struggled to control herself.
It would be very embarrassing if she fainted on the subway. Her dress would probably slide up, and everyone would see her underwear, which was unbleached cotton. Environmentally responsible, but majorly unsexy.
“And I would like to go out to dinner with you, Jamie The Klutz. Tomorrow? Neutral territory?”
“Sure. But what’s neutral?”
“Times Square. If I’m weirder than you thought, then you can ditch me in the crowd of tourists.”
She laughed. As if. He would probably need a fire hose to get her off of him. “That sounds good.”
“Seven? Mama Luigi’s on Forty-fourth? They have a patio, so if you need to escape you can leap over the fence to get away from me.”
“Okay.”
He looked around her. “This is my stop.”
“Okay.” Nothing brilliant, witty, or original came to mind to say, so she smiled again as he let go of her and stepped off the train.
“See you tomorrow.” He waved, clutching his leaky pasta bag and grinning at her.
Jamie gulped as the doors closed, then turned in search of a seat to sink into. She needed it before she collapsed in a heap of tangled legs to rival Jack’s spaghetti.
She had met him.
The One.
Chapter 2
Jack watched the door close in fascinated silence.
What the hell had just happened?
He sucked at this spy thing. The point of following someone was to stay incognito, which he hadn’t exactly done. Garlic was more subtle than he was.
But he hadn’t wanted her to crash into Free Love, the aging hippie.
He had thought to save her discomfort and embarrassment. Now he was standing on the platform with a giant red stain on his shirt, staring at Jamie The Klutz as she smiled shyly at him.
It was a smile that went straight to his groin.
Damn, she was hot.
She glowed.
It was true. There was a rosy, peach color to her everywhere, from the rich auburn of her curly hair to the blush of her cheeks, to the riotous flowers on her dress.
She was just…peachy.
Which made him hungry. And made him want to see what she looked like naked. See where else she might be peaches and cream.
He came close to groaning out loud at the thought.
The door had long since closed, the train pulled away, and he was still standing there, like the horny idiot that he was. He checked his watch. Only twenty-five and a half hours until he saw her again. He could survive.
Maybe.
As long as he didn’t think about her chest, hiding behind that loose floral dress, but glorious nonetheless. It brought to mind all sorts of metaphors about flowers and fruit, with words like ripe, budding, and juicy rising up and tormenting him.
He took the stairs to the street two at a time and ordered his hormones to lie down and play dead. It didn’t work. His sister owed him an explanation. Never once when talking about her roommate had she mentioned Jamie was a sexual goddess with breasts that could stop traffic, war, and obliterate the need for Jack to hang on to the Victoria’s Secret catalog that had been accidentally delivered to his apartment.
Ten lust-filled minutes later he stepped into his grandfather’s room at the nursing home and found him sitting in his recliner, watching a game show. “Hey, Pops, how are you?”
“Stuck in this hell hole, but other than that, no complaints.”
“Come on, Pops.” Though Jack could sympathize with his grandfather. Living in a nursing home must be an anti-climactic ending to life. It was a rehabilitative facility, but Jack got the impression Pops felt this was the beginning of the end. One stay led to another until you never went home. “It’s nice here. It doesn’t smell or anything.”
“Hah. You haven’t been here on taco day.” Pops turned and studied him. “What’s all over your shirt?”
“Your dinner.” He’d bought it for his grandfather in the first place, being more of a pesto sauce, lean chicken kind of guy. But he wasn’t sure how appealing it was going to be now that it had bounced around the inside of the bag. “Spaghetti. It got shoved against me by this woman on the subway.”
Pops narrowed his eyes as his gaze dropped. “You’ve got a hard-on, Jack.”
Though shocked at his grandfather’s words, Jack took a quick glance down. “Jesus, you’re right.” Just the thought of Jamie leaning against him was having an immediate and painful reaction. Or maybe he had been like this from the very first second she had collided with him.
“Spaghetti always does that to me, too.” Pops reached for the bag. “Give me the food, don’t just stand there.”
“It wasn’t the spaghetti.” Not by a long shot. “The woman who fell against me, well, she was…Pops, there was something…she had…” He couldn’t find any words to describe Jamie and her soft skin without sounding like a jackass.
Wait. Too late.
“That good, huh?” Pops took the bag and started ripping it open. No sign of his stroke there. Pops tore with fury, his left hand a little limp, but the right one compensating.
Jack shifted painfully. “Oh, yeah.”
He suddenly realized that Pops was lifting noodles out of the exploded plastic carrying container with his fingers. “What are you doing? That fell all over the inside of the bag.”
“So? Didn’t fall on the ground, did it?” Grabbing another handful, Pops jammed the noodles in his