Her mother giggled. “Have you let the police know we’re having a party?”
“No…”
“Remember Kelsey’s party a couple years ago? They were all over her house like dung beetles on a cow pat when the neighbors complained about the noise.”
Sienna laughed. And people wondered where she got her sense of humor. “Hmm…maybe I’d better warn them.” Especially with Jack living next door.
“Maybe I could come round now? Help you plan. Have you got any more of that glittery booby paint in? Edith will love it.”
“Umm…”
“Right, I’m coming round. You kids don’t know what a real party takes to organize.”
Sienna’s smile faded. Once her mother was in a party-planning mood, even professional event planners ran for cover. “Mum, no. I—” Childish laughter tinkled somewhere outside the window, and Sienna froze.
“Hello? Sienna?”
Children. At her house. Sienna’s stomach knotted. “Mum, you can’t. I’ve got company.” Sienna scrambled to her feet. Rushing for the shop room door, she slipped through it and yanked it closed behind her.
When she then opened the front door, Jack’s hand fell away from the doorbell, and he smiled. “Hi.”
Sienna held up a finger, giving him an apologetic smile and refocusing on the job of getting her mother off the phone. “They’re here right now.” She stepped back and gestured for Jack and the twins to come in.
Her mother snorted down the line. “Ha, I’ll believe that when I see it. I’m coming round.”
Shaking her head, her eyes locked with Jack’s. “No, Mum. I mean it.”
“Why should I listen to you when—”
“I have to go.”
“Sienna Ann Lloyd, don’t you dare—”
She snapped the phone shut. “Hey, you two.” She forced a wide smile and kept her eyes on the girls rather than Jack. If she looked at him, she’d splinter. “What are you doing here?”
Katy held up a bag, the name of the local market emblazoned in green across its front. “We brought party balloons.”
Tears burned behind Sienna’s eyes like red-hot pokers. “Daddy told you I was having a party?”
She nodded. “Uh-huh, for grownups.”
“That’s right. Grownups.” Sienna turned to Holly, who stood beside Katy. “Have you come to help too?”
Holly scowled. “No. I’m going to play in the garden.”
Sienna fought the urge to laugh hysterically. As long as Holly never changed, maybe things wouldn’t be so bad after all. “Ah. Okay, well, you know the way. Why don’t you both go through the kitchen and out into the back garden? I’ll bring out some drinks in just a minute.”
As expected, they looked to Jack for permission. Sienna willed herself to face him. Insight lit his eyes to a vivid blue, and concern seemed to set his jaw. Sienna swallowed the lump that lodged in her throat like a boulder and turned to shut the front door.
Don’t ask me if I’m okay. Don’t make me cry and fall apart. What are we doing here, Jack?
“Sienna?”
Forcing a smile, she faced him. “Yes?”
“Is everything all right? You said to come over whenever we were ready, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
He stared for a moment longer before reaching down and taking the bag from Katy. “Go on, both of you, go in the garden. We’ll be right out.”
Katy moved toward the kitchen and the back door leading to Sienna’s back yard. Holly looked at them each in turn before huffing and following her sister. Sienna shifted from one foot to the other.
“What’s going on?” Jack’s gaze traveled over her face, then cut to the shop door and back again. “Is everything all right?”
The fleeting thought to lie, to spare him the weight of her indecision rose up inside her. The man’s life already teetered on the edge of a very wobbly precipice thanks to his ex-wife.
“Sienna?”
Her resistance to tell him the truth dissolved as she drowned in the care shining from his eyes. She relaxed her shoulders and said, “Bad day.”
“What’s happened?”
“I’ve been decorating.” She tilted her head toward the shop room. “In there.”
“And?”
“And it got me thinking. I don’t want to cause you more hassle, but I have to do this. For me.”
“And that’s why you’re standing there looking at me like I’m about to have some sort of breakdown?”
“I feel guilty, okay?” She brushed past him and strode to the shop door. Opening it, she said, “Why don’t you see for yourself?”
He quirked an eyebrow, a smile pulling at his lips. “Is it that bad?”
Sienna met his smile and expelled a heavy breath in relief. “No.” She stared at his profile as he strolled around the space.
“It’s looking good.” He faced her. “It looks great.”
“Wow. Then I’m hazarding a guess from this reaction, and the balloons, you’ve had a change of heart?”
He walked slowly toward her, and when Sienna saw the predatory look in his gaze, her stomach flipped.
Taking her hands, he said, “I’ve had enough worrying about what will or won’t happen. Why don’t we just see what happens with the shop and…us? If you want us, of course.”
His voice was a soft caress, and his breath warmed her lashes. As the smell of him drifted toward her and threatened to take her under, he brushed his lips against hers.
Sienna couldn’t move as his mouth covered hers, only stared at his closed eyes. What the hell had happened to him?
After a second, he pulled away. Her heart raced, her mind whirled. Oh, God. Having him look at her the way he was now was worse than having him mad at her.
“The twins,” she squeaked out. “Let’s go and check on the twins.”
She turned and rushed toward the kitchen. She needed air. Lots of air. Yanking on the back door, Sienna stepped out into the yard. She swallowed hard, steadfastly watching Holly and Katy play a game of tag. Half of her wanted them to leave. The other half desperately wanted them to stay.
As Jack’s footsteps sounded behind her, an odd loneliness crept over her shoulders and lay there heavy and uncomfortable. She should ring Kelsey. That’s whom she relied on…not Jack.
How could they start something? He lived next door. He was a father…
He came up beside her and leaned his forearms on the balustrade. “Sorry.”
Sienna swallowed against the dryness in her throat. “Don’t be.”
“I shouldn’t have kissed you. Shouldn’t have asked you about us. I…you were standing there looking like you didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I didn’t mean to—”
“I liked the kiss, Jack. I liked it just as much as the first time.”
“Good,” he said, smiling, and pulled her into his arms.
At first she resisted, then surrendered. She laid her cheek against his chest. His heart beat against her ear, matching the rapid thump of her own.
He tightened his arms around her. “I’m going to start taking control and do what I want with my life. I can’t keep blaming myself for Martina’s demise. And if she was coming here, she’d want me to know. She’d come to Potterford and knock on my door. Enjoy watching me squirm. But if she wants to see the girls, I’ll deal with it.”
Sienna breathed in the scent of him. Pine, fresh air, and solidarity flowed into her lungs and through her blood, making her want to stay that way forever.
Yet she pulled away, forcing herself to withdraw. He didn’t need another crackpot woman in his life when he hurt so much already. She was meant to be his strength, not the other way around.
“Then from now on,” she said, “we take everything—including us—one small step at a time. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
Sienna wrapped her arms around herself in an effort to gain the same sense of peace she’d found in Jack’s. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and looked across th
e yard. Side by side, the twins’ faces were etched in identical expressions of concern and shock. Well, kind of identical. Holly’s eyes were narrowed whereas Katy’s were wide.
“We’ve got an audience.” She pulled back her shoulders and plunged her hands into the front pockets of her jeans. “You’d better go.”
Right then, Jack’s phone rang. He looked at the display and pressed talk. “Hi, Mum. I’m just next door. I’ll be right there. Yep. Okay. I’ll be two minutes.” He snapped the phone shut. “My mum’s here. She’s taking the kids out for a burger or something and then having them overnight.”
Sienna stared dumbfounded. No kids for the night. Jack. Her. Alone…
She cleared her throat. “Right. Great. They’ll love that.”
He winked. “So will I.”
What does that mean? She gave a nervous laugh.
“So I’ll see you in half an hour or so?”
“But—” She tipped her head back to look at his profile as he pulled on a smile and waved at the twins.
“Girls, come on!” he called. “Grandma’s next door.”
Sienna’s breath left her lungs in a rush. “Jack, you really don’t have to come back here, you know. Go out, have some fun. I’ll be fine.”
“I know you will, and I’d rather have my fun with you than anyone else right now.”
“Oh.”
Sienna’s nipples tightened as attraction tugged hard at her insides. Fear of losing control pushed her usual flirtation shield back into place—it clanked in her head. Coward.
The girls trundled onto the decking and stood beside them. Jack took their hands.
“I’ll see you in a while,” he said.
Sienna put finishing touches on the window and door trim, tossed the angled brush into a tray, and tucked the hair sticking to her face back into her ponytail. Now that she took a step back and studied her shop room, optimism lingered around the periphery of her mind. Her worries about making things harder on the girls and Jack had been unfounded—the touch of Jack’s lips against hers had told her he was going to try. Whatever try meant.
Did it mean with her? The shop? Their friendship?
She shivered as her smile broke. The heat between them was bordering on combustion. They were adults. They both knew what was inevitable.
That’s if she wasn’t just a nymphomaniac and he a good stand-up kind of guy, of course.
The front doorbell rang, and Sienna stood paralyzed. He’d come back.
Excitement skittering over her skin, she smoothed her hair back and walked—forcibly quashing the desire to run—to the door. She took a breath and pulled it open.
“Hi, Jack—” Her breath caught. “Holy mother…”
He quirked his eyebrow. “Told you I’d be back.”
Sienna smiled as she relished the bare expanse of Jack’s bronzed chest before meeting his eyes, shining like two blue crystals in the fading sun. She prayed her tingling nipples weren’t visible through her cotton T-shirt. “You did.”
Jack held up a screwdriver and small tool box. “And I’m at your service.”
“Then you’d better come in.”
He moved past her, his chest flat and strong, almost touching her breasts. Sienna stared wide-eyed at his denim-clad butt before it disappeared into the shop room. She shut the door and stumbled back against it.
“Oh, Lord, am I in trouble.”
When she entered the shop room, Jack’s hands were splayed on his hips, further expanding pectorals that screamed for a smothering of Champagne Lick.
Her turn to arch an eyebrow. “Is it hot out there or something?”
His grin added to the light that flickered on behind his baby blues and did little to dampen the rush of arousal warming Sienna’s blood.
“You could join me if you like.” He wiggled his brow.
“What?”
He nodded toward her chest. “Get rid of the T-shirt.”
Heat flared at her cheeks. What the hell had gotten into the man? One minute he thought of nothing except the safety of his girls. Now there was such a huge glint in his eyes, it was clear those girls were the very last thing on his mind. Her center twitched. May the devil punish her, but God, it felt good to have him look at her that way.
She grinned. “Who are you? What have you done with Jack Beaton? You know, the stuck-up pain in the ass who lives next door?”
He laughed and held up his hands. “Hey, I’m just making a suggestion. That’s all.”
“I’m serious. What happened in between you leaving the house less than an hour ago and now?” She panned her sight one more time over his phenomenal pecs and washboard stomach. The man was built. “Not that I’m complaining. Just concerned.”
He put the tool box and screwdriver down and took a step toward her. “Like I said before, I’ve come to a decision to take control of my life, and that includes not letting it plow over yours. You don’t deserve my worries becoming yours, and you don’t deserve me banging on about the twins like you’re going to strip their innocence the minute my back’s turned.”
Her entire body yearned with the need to touch him, to feel the weight of that rock-hard body against her. The look in his gaze was unmistakable. Dangerous. A look Sienna was pretty sure reflected in her own.
“Wow, I’m liking the new Jack.”
He looked around the room. “I want to help. For as long as you want me. I’m going to do everything I can to make it up to you for being an idiot.” He turned to her. “I like you, Sienna. A lot. I don’t want to throw more problems into your life.”
As he brushed some hair from her face, Sienna tried not to shiver—or even cry. Jack cared. She saw it in his eyes, felt it in his fingers.
“You make me laugh,” he continued with a warm smile. “You make me look at things differently. You make things better.”
The words stuck. She didn’t know what to say. In that moment, she knew Jack was a man with the potential to sweep her up and have her beg for mercy. That notion terrified the hell out of her, yet her body screamed for him. She opened her mouth to respond, searching her deadened brain for a witty comeback, a smart reply to get him to step back and open the space sizzling like a frying pan between them.
“At last, no words.” He winked. “I guess I’ve finally left you speechless.”
Sienna tried and failed to drag out a single syllable as Jack walked across the room. He glanced at the shelving on the floor and then surveyed the walls. Where the hell was he going? If he thought he could wind her up, making her all hot and ready, only to walk away…
“Are you going to just stand there?” he threw over his shoulder. “The sooner we get started, the sooner we can get to the good stuff.” He opened his tool box and picked up a level and a carpenter’s pencil. “You ready to mark the walls for the shelves? We work together and we’ll be done in no time.”
She gawked at his tanned, broad, and ridiculously muscular back before licking her lips. Her body vibrated.
And for the first time in a long time, Sienna did what she was told. She handed him a layout of the room she’d drawn, showing where she wanted the shelves to be, as her father’s told-you-so laughter rang inside her head. Sienna grinned. Jack Beaton wouldn’t know what hit him when she found her legs again.
Chapter Twelve
JACK STRAIGHTENED AND SURVEYED HIS HANDIWORK. Two walls of shelving were complete and ready for merchandise. He looked at Sienna, and his body instantly responded. She’d twisted her ponytail up into a messy knot at the back of her head, revealing her slim neck and its perfect curve to her shoulders.
Despite the drop in temperature and the breeze coming through the windows, she’d lifted her T-shirt and knotted it beneath her full breasts. The sheen of perspiration glistening on her skin added to her sexiness. The blatant challenge made his jeans feel tight. Damn, she was good.
He smiled. Hadn’t he started this particular game? Maybe—and he’d make damn sure he finished the winner too.
�
�Ready to call it a day?” He kept his eyes on her as she lifted her head; the knife she used to cut open boxes glinted in her hand.
“Sure. I feel like I’ve gone ten rounds with a heavyweight boxer.” She rubbed her free hand over the back of her neck.
“Then it’s time to close the door on this lot and start again tomorrow. We’ll have everything done and ready for your party in no time.”
She put the knife on top of a stack of boxes and came to stand beside him. When she placed her hand on the small of his back, Jack tensed. And when she smoothed it in a soft circular motion over and over, he nearly exploded. Electric. That was the word that popped into his mind as his skin burst with goose bumps and his cock pulsed.
He dipped his chin to her, and she stared up at him, her deep brown eyes shining. “You’re a good man,” she said. “Thank you.”
Jack swallowed against the dryness in his throat. “You’re welcome.”
He tried to look away, tried to refrain from touching his finger to her jaw, tried not to draw an invisible line from there to the curve of her neck down to her collarbones—but did it anyway. She shivered.
“Let’s go through to the back garden.” She tossed him a flirtatious glance from beneath lowered lashes before hurrying out of the door and into the hallway like she had power flames on her shoes.
Jack grinned. There was something entirely wrong but so damn right about spooking her. And she was spooked—no matter how hard she tried to hide it under her façade of self-control. He was a journalist. He’d seen through more practiced masks than hers.
With his heart beating hard and his libido working overtime, Jack gathered his tools and put them by the front door. Then he picked up the dirty paintbrush and tray and walked out of the room. When he reached the kitchen, it was empty. Heading for the sink, he ran the water and cleaned off as much paint as he could in case more touch-ups were needed in the morning.
The sink colored with diluted paint, and he watched it spiral down the drain, his mind filled with Sienna, his girls, and the whole new turn his life was taking. A bang on the window made him jump and look up.
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