vacant and dark, the area out front overgrown with weeds.
Since the apartment listing read walk-up, she assumed she needed the second or third floor, and was sort of hoping maybe she’d gotten the wrong place altogether when the tree right next to her started to shake. It was an oak tree, full and majestic, one of many surrounding the building.
And it was shimmying and shaking like crazy.
In her next breath, a man dropped right out of the thing. And not some normal man either, but a tall, dark, leanly muscled man, and given his scowl, she could add attitude-ridden to the list.
Straightening his broad shoulders, she got a quick impression of wavy sable hair and deeply tanned features while he stared up at the tree. Still not noticing her, he shoved his sunglasses up on his head, then put his big hands against the huge trunk and…pushed?
Suzanne’s gaze dropped from the back of his head to his now straining body in shocked curiosity. For the life of her, she couldn’t look away.
He was beautiful.
Maybe beautiful was the wrong word, as it brought to mind female qualities and there was nothing feminine about this man and his superb form. Holy smokes, just looking at him, she needed a cup of ice to soothe her suddenly parched throat.
He wore faded Levi’s over legs that went on forever, and a white T-shirt that was sorely stressing at the seams against his working muscles, of which he seemed to have plenty. Not that he was overbuilt, no sirree, not like a bodybuilder, who in her opinion was usually over the top. No, this man was more like a long, lean boxer.
Not that it mattered! My God, she was so done with men. Had she forgotten she destroyed them on a fairly regular basis? She didn’t need yet another one on her conscience, thank you very much. But in spite of herself, her mouth dropped open a little as she took in his tough, sinewy back and shoulders, vibrating with power while he beat up this tree. He was quite determined about it, too.
But then he caught her staring. When he did, a smile crossed his face that transformed him from merely take-another-look to…wow.
“Sorry if I startled you,” he said and scooped up a discarded clipboard. And because she was weak, and he was so…yummy, she stared at his butt while he bent over, then jerked her gaze upward when he straightened.
Bad girl.
He had tanned, rugged features that spoke of an outdoor life, and dark, dark eyes, with the sort of laugh lines fanning out from them that would so horrify a woman but looked so sexy on a man. He made a quick note on the clipboard, and, whistling now, turned and entered the building.
What had he said? He was sorry to have startled her? Presumably because he’d dropped out of a tree like Tarzan.
If he only knew what had startled her was how he seemed to trigger everything feminine within her, despite the fact she wasn’t interested.
Not at all. Not even one little bit. She had a life to fix, and regimentation to put into it. Lifting her chin, she put Gorgeous Crazy Tree Guy right out of her mind and entered the building as well.
“Hello?” she called out. Her voice echoed and it appeared she was alone.
Not a gorgeous crazy tree guy in sight.
Taking the stairs to the second floor, she found two doors—both locked—presumably leading to apartments. From above she heard voices, so she took the stairs to the third and final floor, which opened to a loft apartment.
She stepped into what was probably meant to be a living room, but the room was empty and as filled with dust as the hallway had been. It was also small, yet the picture window facing the street somehow made it okay. Sunshine streamed in fully to the wooden floor, and as the dust bunnies danced through the air, Suzanne could see the place had potential.
Because the kitchen was separated by only a minibar, she could see two people standing in the cramped space, huddled over a set of blueprints laid out on the counter. The woman had a hand to her mouth, deep in concentration. As Suzanne’s sandals clicked across the floor, the woman looked up.
She appeared to be about Suzanne’s age, only that’s where the similarities ended. Unlike her own unruly Little Orphan Annie mop, this woman had glamour hair—blond and pulled back in a careful, elegant twist Suzanne could never manage to do for herself without pulling both arms out of their sockets. The woman also wore glamour makeup and glamour clothes to match. Surrounded by dust and the cramped loft, she looked as out of place as a princess on a frog’s lily pad.
Suzanne might have dwelled on that, and the fact that she always wrinkled whether or not she stood absolutely still, except that the man looked up, too.
It was him. Gorgeous Crazy Tree Guy.
He looked right at her, his big body dwarfing the small space. Wouldn’t you know it, his eyes were the perfect color of a double chocolate mocha—her favorite—and held an intensity that spoke of passion. She could have drowned in them.
If she hadn’t given up men. Which she had. A shame really, because he definitely had a face designed to tempt women—sort of saint and sinner all packed into one very well put together unit.
“Hi,” she said, a little self-consciously. “Is this the apartment marked in the paper as…” she unrolled the newspaper and quoted the ad, “Cheap, cheap, cheap?”
The woman laughed, not the snooty sound one might have expected either, and pushed at a nonexistent stray strand of hair with a long-fingered, well-manicured hand. “I hope that didn’t turn you off.”
“Are you kidding?” Suzanne pictured her own decidedly unhappy bank account. “It drew me here like a moth to the flame. How cheap exactly?”
“We’ll talk. But first…” She turned to the man. “Can we finish this later?”
“Later is going to be too late, Taylor.”
Suzanne should have guessed he’d have a tempting voice to go with that face, low and serrated and sexy. His face didn’t hide feelings, and at the moment he appeared to be highly annoyed as he rolled up the plans.
If the woman was annoyed back, she had too much class to let it show. “I need a tenant.”
“You need to fix those trees. Any one of them on the east side could blow over in the next good storm, which by the way, is due tonight.”
“Ryan.” She touched his arm, and Suzanne watched as the man gave in with a sigh.
Suzanne had never in her life tamed a man with just a touch, much less a man like that—a big hulk of a man who wouldn’t tame easily.
Was it the expensive clothes or the way the woman wore them, Suzanne wondered. Self-conscious, she ran her hand down her sundress, which was not only not in style with its long, flowing flowery skirt, but was wrinkled. She wore it because it hid her flaws, the biggest one being her fondness for her own cooking. A great fondness. As in ten extra pounds fondness.
“Relax, the weather channel is never right.” Taylor patted the man’s arm again. “Tomorrow will be soon enough to decide on the trees.”
He shook his head, his dissatisfaction showing in the tension in his big body, in the heat radiating in those riveting eyes.
Fascinated in spite of herself, Suzanne watched him. The men in her life—the only one at present being her father—never showed their real feelings. In the Carter household intense emotion was the source of great amusement, and all adversity was met with laughter. Footloose and fancy-free, that was the Carter family motto. Her fiancés had followed a similar pattern, hiding their emotions behind masks, even Tim with his big, teary eyes disguising his cheating, manipulative ways.
And until right this very moment she’d never once realized there was any other way for a man to be.
Gorgeous Tree Guy—Ryan—brushed past her with an acknowledging nod. Their shoulders touched, his mouth curving slightly in apology.
Embarrassing