He laughed. ‘Most ladies would not be so generous, my darling.’
‘I’m not most ladies,’ said Elinor, pulling Lucius tightly against herself again.
‘No,’ he said. He angled his head to look at her. ‘No, you are not. You’ve never been “just another lady” to me, Elinor Crozier. I think you never will be.’ And the fervour of the kiss he placed on her willing lips made her think he was right.
Safe Haven
by Shanna Germain
Chapter One
‘YOU’RE FINE, YOU BIG lug. Quit your bitching.’ Kallie kept her voice soft and melodic, her tone a sweet-song of calm as she moved around the big gelding, one hand holding tight to his halter, the other making long, slow strokes along his mottled grey neck.
Toddy didn’t calm down much. Since he’d arrived at Safe Haven two weeks ago, he hadn’t quit any of his bad habits, not the wood chewing or the nipping, not the nervous prancing or the laid-back ears that were a clear threat to whoever came near, but he’d stopped trying kill her, which was an improvement. It had been a crazy couple of months. Three new rescues, stress about money and keeping the farm afloat, conversations with the bank, and, of course, ending things with Erik. She thought he’d been the man of her dreams – supporting her dream of a rescue farm, helping her make payments on the land, even asking her to marry him – but when she’d said no to the latter, he’d started pressuring her to sell the land to him. Which was where she’d drawn the line. She kind of missed having someone to help her out, and she definitely missed the sex, but it was better to be alone than to be with someone who wasn’t right for her. That’s what her nana had always said.
In the meantime, if she did nothing more than stand here brushing a nervous horse’s trembling flank all day, showing him that he was safe and loved, that was just fine with her. She swore the touch helped her as much as it did the animals. The farm, more than any other place, had always felt like home to her.
‘Yes, it’s your home now too,’ she sing-songed to Toddy. ‘Until you stop biting people, you big brat. Then we’ll find you a nice place, with someone who loves you. Not like those jerks who left you to starve.’
Toddy leaned his ears back, not in threat but to listen to her voice, and Kallie rewarded him with a bit more crooning.
That was the secret to working with animals, Kallie had discovered a long time ago. You could say whatever you wanted as long as you said it in the right voice. It was all about making them feel safe and loved. And most of the animals who ended up at Safe Haven, animals like Toddy, whose owners had left him locked in a barn for weeks with no food or water, they needed to feel cared for most of all.
‘You’re doing great, Big Guy,’ she said. Letting go of Toddy’s halter, Kallie slipped half a carrot from her pocket and held it out on her flat palm. Toddy eyed her with his big brown eyes. It always broke her heart a little when an animal was so scared they didn’t even come for treats. She kept herself still, willing him to come and take it from her, willing him to trust her enough to take the risk.
Down by the road, the other horses – six of them, all rescues like Toddy – neighed, one by one. She often joked about them being the farm’s warning system, but it wasn’t really a joke. They only neighed like that if a strange vehicle was coming up the driveway. And strangers were never a good thing at Safe Haven. It either meant an animal needed rescue or her Erik had sent one of his hired hands to try to talk her into selling the land. Again.
So much for her tiny moment of peace.
‘Shit,’ she swore, her tone sounding as grumpy as she felt.
In response, Toddy snorted and stamped his foot, throwing his head in the air, showing the whites of his eyes.
‘Sorry, big boy,’ she said, her voice almost back to its soft croon. ‘You lucked out this time. Me, not so much.’
She held out the carrot for another moment, hoping that the visitor would go away or that Toddy would come and take the treat from her. But he stayed in the corner with his ears back and the horses kept up their doorbell neighs. Sighing, she left the carrot in Toddy’s feed bin, then slipped out of the stall and went to greet whatever fresh hell was arriving on her doorstep.
It wasn’t one of the Eric’s hired hands. And it wasn’t, at least as far as she could tell, a new rescue animal. And if it was fresh hell, it was incredibly sexy fresh hell in jeans and black boots. A fresh hell of a tall, curly haired man pushing a motorcycle up her gravel drive. As he walked, the horses were following him, keeping as close to the fence line as they could, tossing their heads and snorting at him.
A second later, she realised they weren’t snorting at the man. They were snorting at the wriggling bundle of fur that was bounding up the driveway after him. Great. So it was a random drop off. She wanted to stop them right there and tell them that Safe Haven was full. She didn’t have time or room for any more strays. Not even cute strays. Especially not cute strays. She had enough trouble on her hands.
But her voice, which had so recently been crooning at a huge horse, now seemed stuck in her throat.
‘Hey there!’ the man called as he got closer. He raised one hand off the motorcycle in something like a wave. He wore a thick silver ring on his middle finger, and her eyes were drawn first to its glint, and then to his long fingers and strong wrists, then to the length of his bare arm, the lightly tanned bicep that was offset by the blue fabric of his T-shirt. ‘Are you Kallie?’
She started to say no, even though she knew it wouldn’t do any good; someone had obviously sent him, even though everyone knew Safe Haven didn’t rescue dogs or cats, and it definitely didn’t rescue beautiful, curly haired men with motorcycles and fantastic smiles. But she started to deny her birth name anyway, because this was trouble walking up her driveway. She could feel it. Even the horses could feel it.
Then he lifted up his sunglasses, pushing them up on his head and any words she might have said completely disappeared.
He had blue eyes. Not just blue eyes, but poppy-blue eyes. Fall-into-a-dream blue eyes. Sky on the first day of summer blue. Almost surreal in their bright gaze, surrounded by small wrinkles as he gazed at her. She heard her own sharp intake of breath and felt stupid for its sound in the mostly quiet day.
‘Kallie, right?’ he asked.
She nodded. Look away from his eyes, she thought. Just ... look anywhere else. But she couldn’t. They were so blue, threaded with silver that shone funny in the sunlight.
‘Oh, good,’ he said. He looked away – she was so grateful for being released from his gaze that she could hear her heart thumping in her chest – and kicked his bike stand to settle it on the gravel. Then, he bent down and picked up the wriggling bundle of fur that had been stalking his boot laces.
In contrast to the man’s intense blue eyes, the puppy’s curious brown gaze was a hundred times easier to take. His tongue lolling to the side, he settled into the man’s arms and gave a happy yip. The puppy licked his fingers, and the man gave a quick, delighted laugh.
Kallie’s heart did something funny in her chest. She stuck her hand in her pocket, realised she still had half a carrot in there, and pulled her hand out quickly, trying to wipe the wet off on her jeans without being obvious.
The man didn’t seem to notice her movements. He reached for the puppy’s single white paw and made it move up and down in the semblance of a wave.
‘Hi, I’m Gauntlet,’ the man said, his voice a growled approximation of a puppy voice. Kallie choked back laughter, and ended up just coughing in the process.
‘Are you OK?’
‘Fine,’ she said after a moment, although she clearly wasn’t. She was the world’s biggest dork. She cleared her throat, and finally found her voice. ‘But ... Gauntlet?’
The man looked at the puppy in his arms as though he’d just seen him for the first time. Then the man smiled. Dimples. Wrinkles. Oh sweet heaven. She was in so much trouble. She thought her libido had dried up after Erik left – an event her friend Shar called th
e Double B, “the Big Breakup” – but clearly that wasn’t true. Go back to the barn, girl. Now. Before you get yourself in more trouble.
‘I’ve been calling him Gauntlet. You know, for the glove. Also ...’ the man leaned toward her and whispered, covering the puppy’s ears with one hand. ‘Because he’s kind of skinny. Like, Gaunt. But I didn’t tell him that part. Didn’t want him to feel bad.’
‘Uh.’ Kallie had no idea what to do with this. A man who named a puppy after a piece of armour, but who also covered his ears while saying something that might hurt his feelings. She felt like she was standing on uneven ground, something that threatened to cave away under her if she moved so much as a single step. Now she thought she knew how the animals felt, coming here, their whole lives changing in a sudden, quick shift.
The man’s cheeks pinked a little, just along the tops of his curved cheekbones, and he shrugged, lifting wide shoulders beneath the sleeves of his T-shirt. ‘Silly, I know. But I had to call him something. I found him abandoned on the side of the road. Down on … I forget, that stretch that follows the river.’
‘Sharpsteen,’ she said automatically. He didn’t know where he was. Which meant he wasn’t from around here. Just passing through on his way to wherever he belonged. She was safe. However sexy this man was – and he was sexy in all the right ways for her, she could admit that now – he wasn’t going to stay. He wasn’t going to ask her to give up the thing she loved. He wasn’t going to shake her world up and send her spinning.
‘The fire chief told me you take strays,’ he said.
‘Bill told you that, did he?’ Hmph. She would have to “thank” him for that later. If her best friend’s husband wasn’t trying to set her up with one of his fire deputies, it appeared he was sending stray ... creatures her way.
‘He did,’ the man said.
That smile again. Oh, for the love of God. Who was allowed to have both blue eyes and a smile like that? It wasn’t right. Transient or not, she wasn’t going to let him get any closer than this. He could take his motorcycle and his cute bundle of fur right back down the driveway back to wherever they’d come from.
‘No, uh … puppies,’ Kallie said. She tried to keep the tremor from her voice, but mostly failed. It came through loud and clear, a little squeak of something. What the hell was wrong with her? She swallowed and tried again. ‘I don’t take puppies. But I can get you the number of the shelter if you like. Come into the barn.’
Where had that come from? What about him going back down the driveway on the bike he rode in on? Everyone knew you weren’t supposed to ask a total stranger into your barn. Not even – no, especially not – a stranger who was sexy six ways to Sunday, with cerulean eyes that just about knocked her out. A stranger with a fantastic smile, and the potential for a fantastic laugh, if his response to the puppy was any indication. And that was just as dangerous for her right now. No relationships, no sex. That’s what she’d promised herself after Erik had left. Just her and Safe Haven.
Except that suddenly Safe Haven didn’t feel all that safe any more, did it?
She hoped he’d say no to her to offer.
Instead, he said, ‘That would be great.’ And started in the direction of the barn without her.
He had long legs and a longer stride, and she felt herself nearly running to catch up with him. The barn door was still open, where she’d left it. He stepped inside and Kallie followed, the scent of hay and horse hide filling her nose as it always did. Home, she thought, as she always did, and took a moment to let it swirl around her and fill her.
Toddy bent his long neck to peer through the wide slats of his stall, snorting his alarm at the strange man and the even stranger bundle he was carrying.
Trust me, I know how you feel, big boy. Kallie laid a hand on the stall to remind Toddy she was there, that she had everything under control. It didn’t help; Toddy stamped his forefoot against the stall, as though to tell her what she already knew: nothing about this was under control.
Oblivious, the man bent toward the rabbit hutches hanging from the wall. ‘Cute,’ he said, conversationally, as the farm’s resident rabbits – two white angoras – came bounding forward, ears high, putting their fuzzy paws on the wire in the hopes of getting treats. Traitors, she thought. I bring a cute guy in here once and you’re all over him, despite the fact he’s even got a puppy in his arms.
He bent down farther, the pup still wigging in the crook of one arm, and held out a finger to the rabbits’ noses. His jeans did that wonderful thing that jeans do, where they hugged the good curves of ass and thigh, and it took her a moment to realise that she wasn’t just noticing. She was staring. At his ass.
She turned away, blinking. What was wrong with her? If he’d turned around and seen her doing that ...
‘I have the number in here, give me a second,’ she said as she began digging through the desk drawer where she kept farm odds and ends.
‘Why don’t you take puppies?’ he asked, turning away from the rabbits to face her.
She’d found the number and was tearing off a piece of paper to write it down. Digging for a pen. Trying not to look at him, mainly.
‘What?’ she asked.
‘Why no puppies?’
It took her a moment to remember, and in that second she forgot her promise not to look at him. ‘Because someone else will.’
He gave her a questioning look. She looked down at the puppy, unwilling or unable to meet his gaze again. Reaching out to touch the pup’s ears, she stopped herself halfway. Don’t touch, she thought. But on the heels of that, her passing glimpse at his hands revealed a tiny tattoo: a single word written across the top outside of his pointer finger. She couldn’t read the cursive, the letters cut off by one of the puppy’s paws.
‘Someone else will what?’ he asked.
‘Take puppies,’ she said. ‘They’re cute and young, so they’re easy to find a home for. He’ll get snapped up before you can say a proper goodbye.’
How true that was. In so many ways.
At her words, she could have sworn he hugged the puppy tighter to his chest. His lovely, wide, oh-my-God-stop-looking chest. That lovely flat space hidden beneath fabric and arms and puppy.
‘Why don’t you want to keep him?’ she asked.
‘It’s complicated.’
Of course it was. Handsome guys who walked up your driveway holding cute puppies were always complicated.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said suddenly. ‘I just realised I don’t even know your name. I’m Darrin, Darrin Daughtery.’
Handsome guys with unusual names who walked up your driveway were even more complicated.
‘Kallie Peters,’ she said, and it was almost a whisper, caught in there, unwilling to come out.
The silence stretched between them. He was looking at her, really looking, like he either wanted to paint her or steal her away. She couldn’t tell which. It was uncomfortable, under that beautiful blue gaze, but it was also like being lifted somewhere high and pure. Appreciated. Seen. With a suddenness that surprised her, she had a mental image of him, naked next to her, looking over at her with that same intense expression, his fingers following the curves of her body, teasing lightly before they grew stronger and reached to push her thighs open ...
‘Is that for me?’ he asked.
For one brief, bright moment, she thought he meant her. Or something of her.
Then she remembered the piece of paper in her hand. Right. She was supposed to be getting him out of here, not inviting him in. ‘The number of the shelter,’ she said. ‘And the directions. It’s only a few minute’s drive. Or, bike, in your case.’
She held the paper out by its very corner, giving him lots of room to take it. She wasn’t going to touch his absolutely adorable puppy. She wasn’t going to touch him. She wasn’t.
Darrin leaned forward to take the paper. She could feel the heat of his body, hear the puppy’s soft breath. They were that close. Darrin’s back to Toddy’s stall. Her ba
ck to the open door. Only the wriggling puppy and a little bit of air between them. Air that was suddenly becoming hard for Kallie to catch hold of in her body.
He came toward her. For a second, a tiny split second, her brain thought he meant to kiss her and her body reacted as though her brain was right, her lips doing that thing they did before a kiss, the sense of anticipation slivering through her stomach like cool water.
And then Darrin was howling, shoving the puppy into her chest. She had no choice but to open her arms and take the wriggling creature into her grasp and hold it tight, letting it lick her face. Even as the strange man in her barn started swearing at her, his yells scaring even the rabbits to the very backs of their cages.
Chapter Two
KALLIE PETERS WAS THE most beautiful thing Darrin had ever seen. And he’d spent a lot of time around beauty in his time as an LA fashion photographer. Men and women with perfect proportions and the kind of hair and faces that took hours or sometimes even days, the kind of beauty that drew the eye to it with a kind of magic, but which was as false as the people inside it. He’d never seen anyone who looked as naturally ... alive as this woman did. She’d stepped out of the barn in her dark jeans and butter yellow tank top, her hair lifting off her neck in the slight wind, and the first thing he’d thought was that Gauntlet had just peed on him. A second later, he realised, gratefully, that it was just the heat in his chest from watching her walk toward him.
He’d got used to talking aloud to the puppy and he nearly did so now, but caught himself just before his lips moved. So he kept up the banter in his head instead.
Please don’t pee on me in front of this woman, G. Promise me, and I promise to let you lick the grease from my fingers next time I have bacon.
The puppy, content in Darrin’s arms, had merely raised a baby puppy eyebrow without a sound and waggled his little white paw
Darrin took that as a yes.
Either way, Gauntlet hadn’t peed on him, not one little bit. And Kallie had invited him into her beautiful barn and he’d wanted nothing more than to touch the curl that kept escaping next to her ear. To make her laugh. To look into her hazel eyes, the way the green was split with little rays of yellow that reminded him of the woods on a sunlit day. To lean in and press his lips to hers, to see if she tasted as alive as she looked.
One Long Hot Summer Page 14
