by Leslie Kelly
“Oh, Lordy,” someone whispered.
“I wouldn’t mind trying a full body roll with him.”
Casting a quick look around, she wondered just what would make the other participants completely forget they were supposed to be working out. The faces of most of the women in the room wore the same titillated expression. And they were all looking in the same way. Toward the window.
She couldn’t restrain her curiosity, and glanced over. “Oh, shoot,” she muttered when she saw who had prompted the women’s whispers. Chief Fletcher. “What are the odds?”
She quickly looked away, refusing to let her eyes shift toward the window again. She knew he still stood there. Watching.
Of all times to bump into him, it had to be once again when she was at less than her best. This morning she’d been on her rear on the ice, wiping off dog snot. Now she was a hideous mess. Sweaty, working out in her loudest, most obnoxiously bright yellow neon workout clothes—tight shorts and a thong type bodysuit worn over them. Since she dressed so sedately at home, she enjoyed going all out with her clothes when she knew she wouldn’t be running into anyone from Derryville. So far, in the ten months she’d belonged to this gym in Margate, she never had. It appeared that tonight her luck had run out.
“I think we’re about done, ladies,” the instructor said. “Don’t forget to stretch out to cool down.”
“If I take this class twice a day, every day for three months, you think I can look good enough to get a man like him?” This from a fiftyish woman who, Sophie knew, was a divorced mother of four.
“Hands off, girls. I saw him first,” said a perky redhead. Her words were teasing, but her tone held an edge. She meant it.
Shocking. The women were acting like they’d never seen a man before. Then Sophie gave into temptation and peeked again. This time, she understood why the women were so…um…distracted.
“Whoa, mama,” she muttered, forgetting she was in the middle of a stretch. Her jaw dropped open at the sight of Daniel Fletcher, bare-chested, dripping sweat, pumped up, looking like he’d stepped out of the pages of a sexy woman’s magazine.
Pure, undiluted hunger made her dizzy. Which wasn’t a good thing since she was standing on one foot. Her other was tucked up under her bottom, her knee bent for a stretch. She wobbled. Groaned. Then, gravity kicked in full force.
It was almost karmic that the second time she interacted with Daniel it would be because she fell. Right there, on the mat, on her butt, in a roomful of gawking woman.
“Ow,” she muttered, not knowing whether it hurt more that she’d fallen. Or that he’d seen her fall.
“You okay, Sophie?” the instructor asked.
“Yeah, you okay, Sophie?” said a deep, slightly teasing voice.
Seeing his sneaker-clad feet and thickly muscled calves with swirls of dark hair, she groaned again. Had he really strode into this group of sweaty, panting females, dressed…or undressed…like that? The women in this place were probably lining up to collapse at his feet.
He’d probably like it. What man wouldn’t?
None of my business if he did. I wouldn’t care a bit. Maybe if she kept telling herself that, she might start to believe it. Because, though she’d only known the man for hours, it nearly pained her to think of him scooping some other woman up off the icy ground or the padded gym floor.
“I’m okay,” she muttered. Finally, she raised her stare up his body, gulping as she took in the loose nylon gym shorts. They clung to his lean hips. From this perspective—at his feet—she had a really good view of all the impressive bumps and bulges in the black nylon. Big bumps. Inspiring bulges.
Her breath escaped her lungs in one long, shuddery whoosh.
“We really have to stop meeting like this,” he said. She heard the laughter in his voice.
She continued her visual inspection, tilting her head back to see that, yes, he was still bare-chested. His stomach was washboard flat, rippled, and glistening. He’d obviously just finished lifting weights because she could see the quiver of his muscles under all that hot male skin.
She’d never, in her life, wanted to nibble on a man’s belly as much as she did right now.
He had a white cotton shirt slung over his incredibly broad shoulders. Even the muscles of his neck shone with energy, as did his dark, slightly bristled face.
“Don’t tell me you need help getting up again. This mat’s not as slippery as the ice.” He bent down next to her, lowering his voice. “Not as slick. Definitely not as hard.”
No, no, no. No sexy word games with the chief. Once a day was quite enough. Once a lifetime was enough with a guy who could make her this tongue-tied and brainless.
“I’ll be fine.”
He raised a brow. “Just sitting out a set?”
She nodded.
He tilted his head and quirked a brow. In a low voice, he said, “But everyone else is gone.”
Jerking her head up, she saw he was right. The other eight or ten women from the class had scooted out of here, probably the minute this hunk of man had come in. Heaven forbid any other woman be caught looking sweaty and un-made-up after a grueling workout. No, that was Sophie’s job.
One woman—the giggly redhead—was standing right outside the door, so obviously eavesdropping Sophie had the urge to say something salacious, just go give her something to stew over. Aww, hell, admit it, Sophie. She had the urge to say something salacious because, dammit, that’s how this man made her feel!
“You certainly know how to empty a room,” she muttered, taking her own mortification out on him.
“Must be because I haven’t showered yet.” A grin played about his lips, telling her he knew full well the reaction he’d gotten from the other women.
“Yeah, you’re pretty ripe. Hit the showers, big guy.”
He drew an offended hand to his chest…oh, that chest. “The human banana is telling me I stink?”
She looked down at her bright yellow workout clothes and chuckled. “Help me up since you’re the reason I fell.”
“At least I’m not as slobbery as Cujo.”
Charmed against her will by his teasing, she put out a hand and let him pull her to her feet.
Then it was his turn to stare. He cast a long, assessing look over her, from head to toe. And suddenly, Sophie realized it wasn’t necessarily such a bad thing to have a man see you in workout clothes. Particularly when the spandex was scooped deep to make the most of meager bustlines. And when the bodysuit did remarkably saucy things to her hips and tush.
He noticed. Whew, judging by the way his jaw clenched and a pulse started ticking in his temple, he definitely noticed.
“So, why do you come all the way here to work out instead of staying in Derryville?” His casual tone did nothing to ease the thick tension between them in the empty room. Sophie glanced over and saw that even the redhead had given up and left, apparently realizing Daniel and Sophie knew one another.
But not as well as she’d like to know him.
“For the same reason you do?” she finally replied.
“Because the equipment at the Y was purchased when Roosevelt was in office?”
“No, I meant because I don’t want to work out with someone who will report to the woman under the dryer next to them at the beauty parlor how many reps I did or how I look in spandex.”
He glanced down. “Not a problem.”
She liked the way he said that. With quiet certainty and a boatload of masculine appreciation.
“So you don’t really like the Derryville grapevine? I find it kinda charming that the waitress at Ed’s Diner knows how I take my coffee and that I like my eggs over easy,” he said.
Mental note: eggs over easy for breakfast. Just in case she ever, um, needed to know. Then she thought about what he’d said and smirked. “Deedee? Oh, yeah, she knows how you take your coffee.” Crossing her arms in front of her, she tilted her head and gave him a pitying smile. “She also knows you wear a 34 pants, under which
are some nice tight-fitting boxer briefs.”
His jaw dropped.
She ticked off the rest on her fingers. “You don’t wear pajamas, you don’t go out much at night, you don’t eat enough vegetables, and you sleep in a queen-size bed, which she’d very much like to see up close and personal.”
He gawked. “Wha…”
“Don’t you get it?” She almost felt sorry for him because he looked so stunned. “You’re living in a small town, Chief. Everybody knows, everybody tells.”
“But….”
She knew what he was asking. “Mrs. Pearce, your landlady?”
“Yeah?”
“Her sister is Tina Laudermilk, the bank teller.”
He blew out a puff of air in visible impatience. “So?”
“Mrs. Laudermilk was maid of honor for Joanie Simmons.”
“Sophie…” he growled.
“Joanie Simmons is Deedee’s aunt. Well, not her real aunt, but her step-aunt, because Joanie was once married to Deedee’s Uncle Rufus, who used to get drunk as a skunk and pee in the streets before he crashed up his motorcycle and died.”
“Sophie!”
She chuckled. “You don’t follow me?”
He blinked. Then it began to sink in. “Excuse me, did you just establish a chain of evidence on the rumors about my freakin’ underwear?”
Ahh…he got it.
“Yep.”
He ran a hand over his eyes, then swept it through his sweat-dampened hair. The movement highlighted every powerful flexing muscle in his arm.
Sophie gulped, then drew in a shuddery breath. “Gym’s closing soon. We’d better get out of here.”
He didn’t move, still appearing shocked to learn just what the sweet little old Derryville grapevine could do. For someone who hadn’t grown up in this kind of community, it probably was a shock. She suddenly felt badly for being amused by his reaction to learning just where his new job had landed him: Derryville, or, as Sophie liked to call it, Peyton Place does Mayberry.
“Chief…”
“Daniel,” he murmured.
She cleared her throat. “Daniel, are you okay?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Unsure where she got the courage to actually do it, she reached out to give him a comforting pat on the shoulder.
Only, oh, goodness, that shoulder was warm. And hard. And slick. And for some reason her hand didn’t comfortingly pat so much as it seductively caressed. She couldn’t seem to pull her fingertips away from his skin.
Sophie couldn’t say she was mindless, lost in a haze of lust. Oh, she lusted all right. That was definitely lust, not post-workout stress, making her legs all wobbly and her tummy roll over. But she wasn’t mindless. She knew what she was doing, could see the whiteness of her own fingers and the pink polish on her nails so startling against his golden brown arm.
He finally seemed to realize. The look of consternation on his face was quickly replaced by one of awareness. Heat.
Remove your hands and step away from the hunka-hunka burning man, Sophie. But she didn’t.
“Checking my pulse?” he asked, his voice a thick growl.
Her fingers were close to his throat. He’d practically issued an invitation. Or was it a dare?
Without giving it too much thought, Sophie followed his implied order and moved her fingers to his neck. She easily found his pulse; it was raging against her touch, as if his heart had suddenly begun to race. Like hers had.
His breath grew choppy and he nearly growled. “Sophie…”
“You must have worked out pretty hard,” she whispered.
He stepped closer, sliding one foot between hers, until their legs were nearly touching. “It wasn’t the workout.”
They were both sweaty, hot and panting. And Sophie suddenly knew exactly how he felt. She would be feeling the same way with this man even if she hadn’t just worked out. “I know.”
He moved again, until this time she felt the heat and crisp hair of his legs brush against her bare skin. Their calves touched, their knees too. And it was the simplest thing in the world to slide her arms around his neck and pull him close.
Just one kiss. Just one simple, tiny brush of the lips to get it out of her system so she’d stop all this wondering.
But her good intentions fled when she finally felt the man’s lips against hers. Pure desire, insistent and demanding, erupted between them. Their mouths opened, tongues tangling in a quick, hot exploration that raised more questions than it answered.
His flimsy shorts did nothing to conceal his reaction, and Sophie moaned as she felt him grow hard and insistent against her belly. He pressed harder, answering her moan with a low growl. When he dropped his hands to her hips, making a delicious detour against the side of her breast, she nearly fell to the floor.
No, kissing him hadn’t answered a damn thing. Particularly because she now had a new question. God, if that feels this glorious through clothes, how would it feel skin to skin?
He finally pulled away and they both sucked in a few deep breaths. “You’re killing me here. I’m not going to be able to walk out of this place for a good ten minutes.”
She raised a saucy brow. “You’re telling me it would only take ten minutes?”
He tsked and shook his head, looking amused by her naughty wit. “I meant, it’ll take me that long to calm down.” Lowering his eyes, he stared at her mouth, then further down her body. Her chest heaved with ragged breaths, and her spandex clothes did nothing to hide the taut tips of her breasts. “Believe me, sweetheart, if we were in a more private place, it’d take me hours to finish what I want to do with you.”
Good Lord.
Then she realized she really had engaged in a passionate embrace with this man, who was practically a stranger, in a public place. “This was crazy.”
“No, just inevitable.”
“That too,” she admitted.
“So why’d you freeze me out of your office this morning?”
She didn’t pretend ignorance—that’s exactly what she’d done. “It’s…complicated.”
He shook his head in visible disapproval of her reply. “Nothing this instinctive can be too complicated, Sophie.”
He didn’t have to elaborate, she knew what he meant. There was something between them. There had been since the minute their eyes had met through the drugstore window on Christmas Eve.
It just remained to be seen what they did with that something. And when. And where.
Not here. Not yet.
And though she hated to think it, since reality had set back in, she had to concede the truth. Maybe not ever.
Somewhere a door slammed and women’s voices echoed from down the corridor. She pulled away, wondering where she’d found the strength. “I think it’s time to leave.”
“Let me take you home.” It wasn’t a request.
She shook her head. “I have my car.”
“Let me follow you home.”
That almost wasn’t a request, either. He’d handed her an opportunity to finish exploring what was happening between them. A woman would have to be stupid, committed or frigid to turn it down. She was none of the above. She was just plain chickenshit.
A kiss was one thing. Inviting into her home, into her bed, would mean inviting him into her private life, which required more thought. “No. I’m sorry, I can’t. Not…not yet, Daniel.”
He studied her face searchingly. Finally, apparently realizing she meant it, he gave her one brief nod. “All right, Sophie. Not yet.”
She focused on the “yet,” knowing he meant to collect on the implied promise.
Hopefully, by the time he did, she’d be ready to make good.
4
DANIEL KEPT HIS eyes out for Sophie on Friday, but didn’t see her all day. He even cruised past the parking lot of the church once or twice, just in case she needed rescuing from a slippery sidewalk.
If he’d been stupid with attraction for the woman the day before, t
hings had gotten downright ridiculous after their encounter at the gym. Just remembering the softness of her lips against his and the sweet but spicy way her skin had smelled had left him smiling. And the thought of how her curvy little legs, hips and rear had looked in that tight, unforgiving spandex had him shifting in his pants more than once today.
He wanted her. He’d known her thirty-six hours and he wanted her like he’d never wanted anyone in his life.
“Ready to call it a day, Chief?” Carol, the dispatcher he’d inherited along with the scratched, solid oak desk and the cluttered office, had stuck her head in through the open door. “It’s quitting time.”
Quitting time. Five o’clock. Another surreal aspect of his new life here in Derryville. He really did go home at five o’clock, even on a Friday. Sure, he remained on call pretty much 24/7, but so far, in two months, he’d never been called in by the night dispatcher.
“Yeah. I guess.” Then, before Carol could duck back out and go home to her truck-driving husband, Daniel figured he might as well take advantage of the Derryville grapevine that discussed such things as a man’s underwear preferences. “Carol, what do you know about Sophie Winchester?”
Carol smiled. “Sweet little Sophie? She’s just about the nicest girl in this town. Good family, too.”
Sweet. Good family. Yeah, tell me something I don’t know. There was more to her than sweetness. Much more. That’s what he wanted to learn about. “What else do you know about her?”
Carol wagged her eyebrows. “She’s a pretty little thing. You interested? I know she’s single, doesn’t date anybody, keeps to herself most of the time. One of the best students Kennedy High ever had—went to college on a scholarship. She’s gentle, quiet, shy. Just the kind of girl you’ve been looking for.”
Daniel raised a brow. “I haven’t been looking for a girl.”
Carol smirked. “Well, it’s about time you did. And since she’s the first one you’ve mentioned, I gotta guess she’s exactly what you’re looking for.”
