Stirring Up Trouble

by Kimberly Kincaid

  His mouth was fast and unforgiving in her mind as he skimmed a hot line over her shoulder, setting the edge of his teeth to the slope of it with just enough pressure to balance the sensation with more excruciating heat. He lifted his eyes, locking them on hers, and for one suspended moment, Sloane lost herself in the depths of imaginary desire.

  Until she connected the liquid brown gaze of her fantasy man with its real-world owner, and her breath slammed through her lungs in a hard gasp.

  Chapter Six

  Ten minutes after jerking the shower dial all the way into cold territory, Sloane was dry, dressed, and no less hot and bothered by the naughty images she’d conjured of the guy who was about to sign the only paycheck she’d seen in months.

  Emphasis on bothered.

  “Seriously . . . I’m losing my mind,” she muttered into a travel mug the size of a fishbowl and elbowed her way out the door, only to be blasted in the face by sunlight so bright, it bordered on cruel.

  “Gah!” Not even a full-bodied jerk-and-wince could save her completely, and Sloane had no choice but to shutter her eyes closed in an act of self-defense.

  Gavin’s smoldering glance popped back into her brain, as clear as a billboard on Broadway.

  Sloane’s lids flew back open to reveal the last remnants of a jewel-toned sunrise filtering through bare trees. Golden light played brightly on the frost-encrusted grass, sending sparkles bouncing in every direction like fresh-cut diamonds scattered on velvet. Surely, the view up here in God’s country should be breathtaking enough to eradicate any other mental image, no matter how attractive. Sloane settled her eyes closed once more, determined to replace passionate looks with pastoral landscapes.

  Good Lord, the man’s eyes were so sexy, it was just unfair!

  “Okay, that’s enough.” Sloane huffed her way down the frozen concrete pavers leading to the driveway, sliding a pair of huge Tom Ford sunglasses up the bridge of her nose. The now-bearable sunlight folded around the trees that formed a perimeter around her rented bungalow, creating that pastoral scene in her head like an epic showing of too little, too late.

  Oh, sure. The sun could do its best to turn her corneas to early morning toast, but ask it to do a little thing like help blot out a couple of ultrasexy images, and it just twinkled benevolently from behind a damned tree. Like racy thoughts of the person signing your paycheck were not only normal, but encouraged.

  Sloane put the Fiat in Drive and commanded herself to get a grip. The last thing she needed was to blow the tiny shred of focus she’d managed to work up, thinking of a guy who wasn’t even her type. The smoldering kiss he’d leveled at her last night—the one that was clearly wreaking havoc on her overeager neurons—had been a mistake, and she absolutely had to expunge it from her memory. Getting down to business was priority number one, and creating a paper hero who looked nothing like Gavin Carmichael topped that list.

  She jammed her eyes shut so tightly they tingled, forcing away the image of those deep brown eyes, fringed with lashes as warm and decadent as a tray full of cinnamon rolls. Instead, she pictured Gavin scowling and holding a plaque that read YOUR NEW BOSS, AKA THE ICE KING beneath his handsomely chiseled jaw.

  Well, that did the trick.

  When she pulled into the familiar gravel driveway a few minutes later, Sloane had adjusted her mental snapshot of Gavin to that of a regular guy with ordinary eyes and dime-a-dozen features. After all, she’d seen him a bunch of times at La Dolce Vita, and not one of those meetings had ever prompted illicit shower fantasies. She mounted the front porch steps with a decisive nod. Her imagination had just gotten the best of her, that’s all. No harm, no foul.

  “Good morning.” Gavin stood in the open doorway, wearing a perfectly pressed blue dress shirt that emphasized his deep brown eyes like an unfair advantage, and Sloane nearly choked on her tongue.

  “Bree’s still sleeping, so I figured I’d catch you before you rang the bell.” He held the door open, ushering her inside with a polite nod. Even though he looked like he’d sprouted from the pages of GQ, his tone was all business, and it gave Sloane’s composure a kick-start in the right direction.

  Okay, fine. So his eyes were definitely the color of satiny milk chocolate, shot through with just a hint of gold flecks around the edges. It didn’t mean she was going to get all swoony over him. Her energy and imagination were strictly for book writing. And, hello. Boss, boss, boss!

  “What kind of thirteen-year-old doesn’t sleep like the dead?” She shook herself the rest of the way back to Earth as she hustled past him into the cottage, mentally adding one last boss! for good measure.

  Gavin paused, shutting the door behind her and stepping into the entryway. The light, clean notes of his cologne filled her nose enough to entice but not overpower.

  It was way too early for this.

  “Sometimes she has trouble sleeping, plus she did all that work last night, so I thought I’d let her sleep in a little. Anyway, I put on a pot of coffee.” He tipped his chin toward the kitchen, light brown hair glinting in the sunlight coming through the window. “Help yourself to a refill.”

  His crisp tone nudged the rational side of her brain, making it easier to shake her impure thoughts about his melty eyes. “Thanks.” She toasted him with her travel mug, determined to duck past him without fanfare, but he stopped short, blocking her path.

  “I . . . ah, I just want to make sure everything is okay.” Gavin cleared his throat and examined his loafers, clearly uncomfortable as hell.

  Well, that made two of them. Not that Sloane was about to show it. After all, a girl had her pride.

  “Other than the fact that no human being should be up this early on a Saturday, life is grand.” She flashed a bigger-than-necessary smile in his direction, but he didn’t budge.

  “I meant between us.”

  Sloane resisted the urge to look at the door. “We got a little carried away and kissed, Gavin,” she said, forcing her voice to a breezy calm. “I can forget about it if you can.”

  He paused, and she sent up a fervent prayer.

  Please don’t dwell on it, because if we relive that kiss live in person, forgetting about it will be a complete and utter no-go.

  “Okay,” he said. Wait, was that relief or disappointment flooding through her veins? Clearly, she needed more coffee to keep her brain online.

  “You said there’s more coffee in the kitchen, right?” Sloane hauled in a deep breath, and was pleased to discover that it actually chilled her out a little.

  “Coffee. Right. Yes.” Gavin turned on his well-polished heel and moved through the entryway toward the living room. As she followed him farther into the cottage, the black and white prints on the living room wall snagged her attention again.

  “These are pretty,” she said, stopping to take a closer look. Gavin halted halfway across the living room floorboards, turning to lay eyes on her before sparing a glance at the photographs.

  “Thank you.”

  “Did you take them?” Sloane edged close enough to the photos to run her fingertips along one polished black frame. A few years had passed since the trip abroad that had fueled her unbridled creativity. All the places where she’d written—tiny trattorias in Venice, grassy hillsides in Tuscany, and then later in cafés in Provence and Madrid—they all cascaded together now, a series of blurry fragments rather than the solid outlines and crisp details she used to know by heart.

  She was losing her inspiration, bit by bit. And nothing short of being there was going to get it back.

  “Yes.”

  “Florence?”

  “Most of them.” Gavin kept his gaze fixed on her, his expression as blank as if they were discussing the weather rather than one of the most beautiful places on the planet.

  “Did you take them recently?” She was pushing, she knew. But as she stood there, grasping at the elusive memory of her own experience, Sloane suddenly ached so hard to unearth the spark again that she didn’t care.

  “Tw
o years ago.” Gavin’s clipped answer was a clear indicator he’d rather not talk about it, but rather than clam up like anyone else would, Sloane closed her eyes and let her words flow.

  “There are vineyards like this along the Via Francigena.” Her mind’s eye stuttered like an old movie projector, stirring up snapshotlike images of ancient stone-cobbled pathways and trees thick with the suggestion of summer turning into fall, but the pictures faded quickly, refusing to stay put.

  “You traveled the Via Francigena?” Gavin’s words were heavy with recognition and surprise.

  She nodded, letting a smile touch her lips before opening her eyes. “Only from Tuscany to Rome. Do you know the route?”

  “Of course. It’s one of the most well-known medieval trade routes in history. I’ve just never met anyone who’s traveled the actual path.”

  “It’s time consuming, but worth every second.”

  His eyes turned wary. “Wait . . . you didn’t walk it, did you?”

  She barked out a quick laugh, watching Gavin’s expression morph from doubt to outright shock. “The ancients walked the entire path from Canterbury as a pilgrimage,” she said. “Getting from Florence to Rome on foot isn’t as hard as it sounds. Really, it’s just one step at a time. Plus, it’s not like I did it in a day or anything. I was there for six weeks.”

  “Still, there’s what? A hundred and fifty miles between Florence and Rome? And you just walked it?”

  Jeez. You’d have thought she’d just told him she was a celestial being from the planet Insanity rather than copping to some extended sightseeing. Then again, it wasn’t like she was unused to people thinking she was unorthodox. “Actually, I think it’s closer to a hundred and seventy-five.”

  “You think?”

  She shrugged. “I was a little distracted by the whole gorgeous landmark thing to count.”

  Okay, so walking the beautiful path of the Via Francigena might seem a little crazy in hindsight, but the sheer awe she’d felt following in the literal footsteps of so many people seeking enlightenment of their own had set her creativity on fire. She’d outlined and drafted her entire first book with her feet on that path. Crazy or not, there was simply no substitute.

  “So you spent over a month of your life wandering the Italian countryside on foot, rather than hitting the major cities to vacation like pretty much everyone else?”

  The fact that she’d surprised him felt oddly satisfying. “Oh, I spent time in Venice and Milan, too. But the whole point of the trip was to find inspiration. What better place to do that than a pilgrimage route, really? I mean, you thought it was beautiful enough to take these pictures, right?”

  She paused, sweeping a gesture at the photographs lined up on the wall with all the austerity of the Queen’s Guard. “All I really wanted to do was take things in, at my own pace, so I’d never forget it.”

  And yet, she had. Just like that.

  God, this whole thing was stupid. All the tiny villages, every stone church and garden courtyard, all of it had been reduced to memories she could no longer bring forth with any sort of clarity. Gavin clearly didn’t want to skip down memory lane, and anyway, all the reminiscing in the world wasn’t going to bring her inspiration back. Sloane buttoned her lips, determined to drop it.

  “There are a couple of incredible vineyards along the VF stops in Tuscany. I took these first two photographs in Barberino Val d’Elsa,” Gavin said, so quietly she nearly missed it.

  “What?” Surprise spurted in her chest.

  “Barberino Val d’Elsa, just south of Florence.” He pointed to the photographs closest to the entryway. “The chianti is unreal.”

  “Wait a second.” Sloane leaned in so close that her breath fogged the glass, her pulse jackhammering through her veins. “I remember this village! There was a little hillside chapel, with a courtyard garden in the back, and a low wall, made up of these really old stacked stones I was sure would topple at the first sign of a stiff breeze.”

  Gavin nodded, his eyes going a shade warmer. “Definitely Val d’Elsa. That chapel is a couple hundred years old. Last I saw, the wall is still standing, but barely.”

  The memory of the courtyard, with its heavy slab benches and dark, flowering vines, flitted back to Sloane’s mind like the soft cotton of a whisper, and she tackled it with glee. “God, how could I have not made the connection? It’s just past this grove of trees, right here.” She tapped the edge of the frame. “I must’ve outlined the first eight chapters of my debut novel sitting by that wall!”

  Gavin cleared his throat in a masculine rumble. “So, ah, that’s what you were doing last night? You know, with all the crumpled-up papers?” He indicated the floor with one hand, and the stark reminder of Sloane’s failed attempts brought her squarely back to the present.

  “Yeah. Obviously the process works better in some places than others.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring up a sore subject.” He looked so truly remorseful that she had no choice but to smile. This pity-party crap was totally overrated, and anyway, she’d be back in Europe again, scribbling away before she knew it.

  “No worries, boss. The next book always comes from somewhere.”

  Sloane’s eyes dashed over the photograph one more time, where dappled sunlight filtered through the curling fingers of the grapevines and the weatherworn stakes securing them tightly into the ground.

  She’d found inspiration plenty of times before. She’d find it again, no problem. Just as soon as she landed in Greece, she’d be as right as a cocktail on a Friday night.

  Gavin scratched his head, and the slightly ruffled look it left behind struck her as oddly endearing. “Well, it might not be ideal, but you’re welcome to use the breakfast nook in the kitchen if you think it’ll work better than the couch. The printer is right there in the kitchen, too. You could link your laptop to our wireless if you ever needed to use it. Then you’d at least have a little bit more workspace. Maybe it’ll help.”

  She bit back a full-blown laugh so as not to wake Bree. The simplicity of the offer was ironic enough to overwhelm her, as if moving a few feet and having a little more room to stretch out would give her a whole new perspective. Hell, she’d moved her writing spot from one end of Pine Mountain to the other for a whole year, and it had given her nothing but stale ideas she couldn’t use. Sloane opened her mouth to deliver a sarcastic response, something to the tune of if-only-it-were-so-easy, when the look on Gavin’s face stopped her cold. His expression flickered with genuine niceness, not the cool indifference she’d seen for much of yesterday, and without thinking, she replied, “Thanks. I’ll definitely give that a try.”

  There were a couple of tried and true places to catch a quick nap in between Saturday shifts at La Dolce Vita, provided you weren’t claustrophobic or terribly picky. At his current level of sleep deprivation, Gavin was neither. Not only had he tossed and turned trying to burn the slideshow of Sloane’s exotically golden skin and pouty lips from his short-term memory, but Bree had had a nightmare, her third one this week.

  Hearing her cry from across the hall in the middle of the night was hard enough. Her refusal to talk about it, not even to let him comfort her, was nearly unbearable. But no matter how hard he tried, she uttered the same terse “I’m fine” before cranking her mouth shut and turning over in bed, and he had no choice but to give in to her silence and walk away. He’d given up even asking, simply padding across the floorboards to stand in her doorframe whenever he heard her sharp cries, waiting for her to acknowledge him and hoping her words would change.

  They never did.

  Gavin shook himself back to reality with a groggy blink. If he didn’t get some sleep in the ninety-minute lull between his lunch and dinner responsibilities, he was going to end up making Night of the Living Dead look like a frigging beauty pageant. He maneuvered past the swinging doors at the pass, through the hushed quiet of the industrial kitchen and past the office where he heard the indistinct murmur of Carly’s voice
. With a silent prayer for solitude, Gavin made a beeline for the small but usually quiet staff lounge.

  Mercifully, the lights were off, and he made his way into the lounge with an exhale of relief. Only fragments of muted daylight filtered past the blinds, and even those had turned a heavy gray with a cold front he’d heard some lunch-goers talking about. Not that the daylight mattered. He would probably fall asleep ten seconds after his head hit the throw pillow on the couch even if the sun itself showed up in the room for a song and dance.

  Gavin bit back a groan as his frame sank to the cushions. His body was so overjoyed at no longer being vertical that he didn’t realize he wasn’t alone until the gruff sound of a throat being cleared interrupted his bliss.

  “Oh, sorry.” He levered himself up from his halfway reclined position on the couch, squinting at the well-muscled figure sitting in the far corner of the shadows.

  The hulking outline could only belong to one person on La Dolce Vita’s staff. Adrian Holt might wear chef’s whites and whip up elegant meals with one tattooed arm tied behind his back, but the guy could easily pass for a pro wrestler turned lumberjack. Not the kind of person whose space you wanted to invade.

  “It’s cool. I was just trying to catch some quiet.” Adrian’s eyes flickered, barely visible in the low light of the lounge but for the stainless steel piercing marking his dark brow. “Chef’s driving me nuts with down-to-the-wire wedding plans, so I came in here to escape. I’ll be glad after next Saturday, when she’s back to normal again.”

  “Yeah, a guy can only take so much discussion about bridesmaids’ dresses and chocolate fountains before he’s tempted to lose his mind,” Gavin agreed.

  “Planned a wedding recently, have you?” Adrian’s response was laden with sarcasm, but it arrowed into Gavin’s chest all the same. Damn it, he’d said too much. The thought of airing out those memories, even in a vague admission to a gruff coworker who probably wouldn’t ask questions anyway, still made him uneasy.