by Joanne Rock
With a thunk, Christine set down the tools she'd been lugging on the sealed concrete floor.
"Look. I don't mean to be rude, Vito, and I've had a surprisingly nice day hanging out with you, considering you're some sort of European playboy extraordinaire. But I have a really hard time accepting help and I feel a big sense of ownership on this project, so if you don't mind…"
"You want me to leave you alone." He set down his shovel, the only tool she'd let him carry. She'd given him loud and clear warnings about the whole independence thing, so he wasn't surprised there. But he was surprised to feel a twinge of disappointment. "Fair enough. I just wanted to make sure things were cool between us before I went inside."
"They're very cool." She straightened the tools in the corner of the half-empty shed and failed to meet his eye.
Too bad he didn't feel very cool at the moment. Watching her walk all over the yard, her slender hips in constant motion, had produced quite the opposite effect.
"Good." He didn't mean to move closer to her, but somehow he had. Just for a moment. "Because I wouldn't want things to be awkward for you, having to sleep under the same roof as me."
She blinked up at him, their bodies suddenly too close together, the pink bow of her mouth forming a round O of slight surprise.
He thought about taking that mouth, about tasting the lemony sugar of her kiss and putting an end to the mix of awkwardness and attraction between them. But given all her boundary-drawing and warning signs posted, Vito thought maybe he'd be better off letting her go this time. Saving that kiss for a moment when neither of them would find any reason to stop.
"'Night, Christine." Easing away from her and the raw temptation of her tanned, slender body, Vito took a step back. Her boundaries were safe for a little while longer. "Pleasant dreams."
And for the first time in a long time, he knew damn well that his would be.
* * *
4
« ^ »
Two weeks later, Christine was still cursing Vito Cesare's insistence that she have pleasant dreams.
Slumping into the ancient tire swing in the backyard after another endless day of working, she stared up at the dark house where Vito worked on his computer and wished she could get a good night's sleep for a change. But she'd been having so many confounded pleasant dreams of him that she dreaded going to bed lately for fear of the overly romantic plotting of her subconscious mind.
Wrapping her arms around the old tire, she rested her chin on her hands and kicked the swing into motion, every muscle aching from spending her day on her hands and knees finishing the hard-scaping, or structural work for the new landscape. She'd installed new patio blocks and pathways around the property, creating all new foundations and focal points for the colorful tropical gardens she had yet to develop.
But despite her bone-weary exhaustion, she couldn't help but fantasize about the man she'd shared a house with for the last two weeks. He'd been a perfect gentleman ever since that first night when he'd helped her put away the tools in the workshop. She'd been taken aback by his sudden proximity that night, and could have sworn he'd been about to kiss her. And then … nothing.
A reminder to have pleasant dreams, and then he was off to his own room, staying out of her way day after day while she worked sunup to well after sundown creating the kind of lush foliage and private terrain she and Giuseppe Donzinetti had discussed.
She'd made it her habit to work late every night. Not only because she needed to get a lot done, but also because she hoped she'd dream about him less often if she didn't run into him in the hallway before going to bed. She opted to clean up in the charming outdoor shower she'd found behind the outbuilding at the back of the property instead. An adorable latticework enclosure complete with wooden privacy screens, the shower stall had to have been built by the Cesare brother who had been into carpentry.
Not only did she avoid Vito that way, but she really enjoyed showering under the stars, sliding into some clean clothes, and then sneaking into the house after Vito was asleep. But tonight she was too exhausted even to make it back to her bed.
A warm evening breeze fluttered through her damp hair as she studied the dark house for some sign of life. It was only midnight and she'd noticed Vito sometimes stayed up until one or two. He left the house for long periods of time during the day, coming home at seven or eight and offering her dinner most nights.
Which she had always refused. Except for earlier in the week when he'd simply brought bags of takeout home and set them on the picnic table for her. Considering his idea of takeout had been Cajun-fried shrimp and jambalaya from a local specialty restaurant, she could hardly have refused. But even then, he'd left her alone to eat in peace.
Which had been very gentlemanly. And, if she was completely honest with herself, maybe just a teeny bit disappointing.
Had she dreamed the mutual attraction of that first day? Or had the chemistry between them been so one-sided it had skewed her perceptions?
Yawning and stretching, she told herself to quit ruminating and just get her butt inside so she could snag some sleep. Then again, maybe if she closed her eyes out here, farther away from where Vito slept, she'd be able to catch a few Zs that weren't interrupted by sultry dreams. Surely even her romantic subconscious wouldn't plague her with sexy visions while she was perched in a ring of vulcanized rubber.
After two weeks, maybe she'd found the key to a few hours of sleep that didn't star Vito Cesare wearing nothing but a pair of gardening gloves and a wicked grin.
* * *
Feet sinking into the soft earth beneath his flip-flops, Vito walked across the yard at 2:00 a.m. to find Christine slumped in the old tire swing, her chin resting on her folded hands. He paused over her, wondering what she was dreaming about. He'd wake her in a minute and steer her to bed so she could get a good night's sleep. For now he simply indulged in the unique experience of watching her at rest.
Did she think about fire bushes and patio blocks even while she slept? Plants and landscaping seemed to be all she talked about while awake. The few times he'd tried to draw her into conversation over the last two weeks that he'd been back home, she'd quickly rerouted the discussion back to watering schedules and his yard's soil composition.
All business, in other words.
He studied her face in the moonlight. Swiping a thumb across her cheek, he told himself he was just brushing off a stray hair and not testing the softness of her creamy skin. Although if he had been taking note of what she felt like, he would have had to admit her skin was even softer than he'd imagined. More delicate.
Debating the best way to wake her, Vito skimmed a short brown lock of hair away from her face, exposing the full expanse of her cheek to the moonbeams, along with her tempting pink lips.
He'd been trying to give her space ever since that first night when she'd outlined her boundaries as concretely as if she'd laid her damn paver stones around them. He'd hoped that maybe with time and enforced proximity, the spark between them would develop into something even she couldn't ignore. But she was either too exhausted to look at him twice or she deliberately avoided him. He couldn't be sure which.
And since the out-of-town guests would start arriving for the wedding preliminaries in another week or so, Vito knew he didn't have much more time to make his move. If he wanted to woo Christine, he couldn't afford to sit back and wait for her boundaries to dissolve any longer.
Tomorrow, he'd pick up his pace for the full-throttle rush toward the finish line and break through those barriers of hers on his own. Tonight, he'd have to settle for cruising one more test lap.
"Christine?" He laid his hand on her shoulder, debating if he should just scoop her out of the swing and carry her to bed. She had to be dead to the world after all the hours she'd been putting in this week.
Then again, he didn't want to risk scaring her.
"Christine?" he called her name a little louder, looping an arm around her waist to test her reaction.
"Vi-to." She moaned his name in her sleep, stretching out the word into extra syllables as if savoring the taste of it on her tongue.
His name had never sounded more provocative. And although she still seemed to sleep deeply, with her chin resting on the back of her hand curved around the tire, Vito suddenly felt very, very awake.
Damn.
Unwilling to torment himself any longer, he simply scooped her up out of the swing and into his arms. Her head lolled against his shoulder like a rag doll's, her arms wrapping reflexively around his neck. Her whole body seemed to sigh against his, her hip curved alongside his waist while her breast molded sweetly to his chest.
As his body responded instantly to hers, he couldn't decide if carrying her had been a great idea or a really stupid one. She might sleep better tonight after he laid her in her bed, but he knew damn well his night wouldn't exactly be restful.
Toeing open the French doors that led to the dining room, Vito brought her through the darkened house to his brother Nico's old bedroom. Now that Nico was engaged to the CEO of the hottest resort on South Beach, the former NHL star lived on Palm Island with his soon-to-be wife. The room still bore a few of his old hockey posters and a signed puck from the first professional game he'd ever attended, but other than that, the room was purely Christine's.
From the light in the hallway, he could see her clothes were everywhere except her suitcase. Clean cotton lingerie in a rainbow of colors draped over the desk chair while an assortment of shorts and T-shirts took up residence on a bookcase. A long pink tank nightgown reclined on the bed as if she'd yanked it off the moment she opened her eyes.
The image didn't do a damn thing to settle his already hyperaware nerves.
Knowing the smart man's course of action should just be to dump her on the bed and go, Vito couldn't help but think she'd sleep better without her shoes. Then again, he wasn't sure she'd thank him to undress any part of her.
"Vito?" Her voice startled him as his mind wandered off on a tangent about undressing her.
"Yeah?" He turned away from her feet to see her scooch herself up on the bed. Farther from him.
"What happened?" She blinked a few times as if to clear her vision.
Damn, he hoped she didn't clear it too fast because he was going to be giving her an eyeful if he stood up right now. How the hell could he carry her to bed without getting turned on? Willing himself into submission, he bought time by talking.
"You fell asleep on the tire swing so I brought you inside." And he hadn't even copped a feel while she was sleeping. Not really. "I figured you couldn't have been very comfortable out there."
She edged farther up the mattress to sit. "That's very nice of you, but I should probably go to bed now."
He recognized his cue to leave. Did she have to mention going to bed when he almost had himself back under control?
Down boy.
"You worked really hard today." He stalled. Reminded himself he was a thirty-five-year-old man and not a teenager. He could do this, damn it.
As long as he didn't think of her naked.
"I remember telling myself I'd only close my eyes for a few minutes and then—" She glanced at the bright green numbers on the clock display beside her bed. "I ended up sleeping for two hours."
Her voice took on that scratchy sleepy quality that made him think of staying in bed all day long.
An image that was no help to his current situation. Desperate for help, he glanced around the room, eyes lighting on a poster of his brother Nico that commemorated his first year in the NHL. Seeing Nico's ugly mug with his multibroken nose worked faster than a cold shower.
Vito sprang to his feet, welcoming a hasty retreat. "Then I guess I'd better leave you be. 'Night, Christine."
Hightailing out of her bedroom, Vito vowed to stay the hell out of there since he couldn't seem to stay in low gear around her. He wouldn't set foot in that bedroom again unless it was to fall into bed with the sexy garden goddess who'd taken up residence in his thoughts.
Although he'd be damn sure to yank down a few posters first.
* * *
Christine debated leaping out her first-floor bedroom window the next morning so she wouldn't be forced to face Vito before she began her work outside.
But that hardly seemed the mature course of action. Besides, it might unveil her as a scaredy-cat or let Vito know she'd been avoiding him. And while she didn't mind being viewed as slightly unsophisticated, she couldn't stand the idea of appearing intimidated.
Unable to stall any longer, she wrenched open the door to her bedroom and marched out into the corridor to face the music. So she'd fallen asleep in the tire swing and had to be carried to bed by the sexy race-car driver who dominated her dreams. So what? It's not like she'd crawled between the sheets with him or anything.
Even if he had made her pulse race like the engine on one of those damn cars he drove.
She didn't need breakfast. She'd just slip out the kitchen door into the garage and get started on the watering. Pretend things were business as usual even though Vito's strong arms had been wrapped around her last night, all that delicious male muscle flexed solely for her benefit…
"Morning." His voice in the hallway behind her stopped her before she reached the dining room.
So much for slipping out without him noticing.
Turning, she saw him sauntering out of the bathroom as steam wafted into the hall. His towel was slung around his neck, and his bronze chest loomed—bare and inviting—within arm's reach. Could she help it if her gaze darted south to check out the rest of him? A pair of black cotton running shorts rode low on his hips, providing precious little barrier between her and…
Her mouth promptly went dry.
"You feel better today?" he prompted, stalking closer.
Closer? Christine backed up a step before realizing he only wanted to edge past her toward the kitchen. She sucked in a breath as he passed, determined to keep a few of her cranky boundaries around this man.
And although they managed to cross paths without touching, a hint of sporty aftershave sneaked past her defenses to tease her senses.
"I'm feeling just fine," she assured him. Despite the persistent weak-in-the-knees affliction that only struck when he was around. "Thank you for hauling me indoors last night."
She at least owed him that much, right? Somehow she'd neglected to thank him last night. Probably because she'd been too busy fighting off all those hormones.
He tossed his towel on a kitchen chair before pulling out the already steaming coffee pot and two mugs.
Two? She faltered on the perimeter of the wide-open, sunny kitchen.
"It was my pleasure." He met her gaze, his hazel eyes lingering on her until her temperature cranked up a few degrees and her skin tingled.
Oh, no, he didn't. He couldn't pull the Joe Suave act on her now and make her feel all awkward and turned on at the same time. She'd learned to deflect all the romantic BS men used when they wanted to pull a fast one on an unsuspecting female.
She might not have a superhero's fancy gold deflector bracelets, but she knew how to ignore loaded comments. Barreling through the kitchen toward the door, she chose to simply ignore the pleasure remark.
"Well, I'm off to work." She waved breezily, not bothering to make eye contact. "I'll take full responsibility for dragging my own tired butt back into the house tonight."
After the debacle with Rafe the bogus fiancé she'd made a promise to herself not to give her heart away just because her inner romantic began to sigh dreamily. And God knows, Vito Cesare could wrest a dreamy sigh from the most hardened of hearts.
She almost tasted freedom. The kitchen door was already cracked, her fast-moving feet barely pausing on the mat as she made her getaway.
Then Vito's hand covered hers, his big, male body moving even closer than it had in the hallway as he inserted himself between her and her escape.
"Hold up a minute. We need to talk." He held himself there, so clo
se she could feel his breath on her cheek.
"We do?" She didn't particularly want to converse with a man so good-looking he ought to have the word Hearibreaker stamped across his world-class pecs. Possibly on his very cute butt, as well.
A girl could use all the help she could get when faced with this kind of temptation.
"I spoke with my uncle again last night." He inched back a step, giving her enough space to breathe again. Think.
Slowly, information began to process in her head again, proving she wasn't controlled by her hormones. At least not all the time.
"You did?" She moved back toward the kitchen counter where he nudged a cup of coffee toward her.
Vito had been trying to have a long discussion with his uncle ever since he'd arrived in the States, but apparently Giuseppe was very good at wriggling his way out of any extended conversations. The only thing Vito had managed to clear up the day after he'd arrived back home was that Giuseppe had definitely hired Christine and that he was sorry for any inconvenience it caused, but he wanted it to be his gift to Giselle.
Fine.
But as soon as that much had been settled, Giuseppe had come up with one excuse after another not to chat with Vito, including—most recently—a trip to the Florida Keys. Any time Vito began a conversation about his uncle's matchmaking problem, Giuseppe was off the phone before he could blink.
"I didn't get to talk to him for long because he was getting ready to leave on a snorkeling trip." Vito rolled his eyes. "He did confirm he wanted a hummingbird garden in one corner of the lawn because apparently hummingbirds are Giselle's favorite. But when I tried to explain the problems he'd created by having us both staying in the house and asked him if he was up to his old tricks, he pretended to have no idea what I meant."
Christine bristled even though her first sip of Vito's coffee was like the nectar of the gods. Fantastic.
"Maybe he hired me for my great portfolio after all." Vito's uncle had seemed really impressed with her pictures of other jobs she'd completed in California.
"He wouldn't have hired you if your work wasn't fantastic." He glanced out the kitchen window overlooking the yard. "I'll admit I was worried when I first came home and saw the whole place torn up, but I'm beginning to see what you're going for now and I think it's going to look great."
