Curiously Enchanted

by Leighann Dobbs

  “You can try.” Lindsay went into the kitchen to put her cup on the counter. “I have to run now, sweetie, but you know he's going to call me and ask if I came by and I'm going to have to tell him something.”

  “Tell him you came by.”

  “He is going to want to know if I delivered his message.”

  “So tell him you did.”

  “Are you going to call him, then?”

  “Not in this lifetime,” Emma offered sweetly and Lindsay growled in annoyance.

  “I swear, Emma, you're going to drive me insane.”

  “No, you're going to drive yourself that way if you keep trying to convince me to do things I have no intention of doing. I'm pretty sure you're going to be late, too. Didn't you tell me you have somewhere to be?”

  Glancing at her watch, Lindsay gasped. “Yes! Yes, I do and as bad as I hate to drink and run, if I don't get out of here now I'm never going to make it!” Gathering up her purse, she dashed for the door, calling over her shoulder to Emma, “Call Sam! Whatever it is he wants to talk to you about must be pretty important.”

  To him, Emma thought sourly as the door closed behind Lindsay. Still, her gaze skittered to her purse and she thought of the card inside. Maybe she should call him, if for nothing more than to demand he return her puzzle piece. But even the thought of speaking to him after what she had done was so mortifying she could not summon the courage to call. The mere idea of getting into her car to drive by made her break out in a nervous sweat.

  “Why are you doing this to me?” she demanded of no one because there was no one around to demand. No one other than Chloe, who was currently busy eyeing her with disdain while she waited to see whether or not Emma would give in to her fears or her fantasies. Emma's sullen glare should have been answer enough for the cat, but still she said, “Fear wins.”

  She didn't know why she was still so embarrassed over the kissing incident, though. Days had passed and the world had not exploded nor had it opened up a great, gaping hole with which to swallow her through. As for Sam Huntingdon, he had probably already forgotten what had happened … but if he had, why was he so adamant Lindsay talk her into calling him?

  “Probably wants to bother me about that quilt,” she decided.

  He knew she had it just like she knew he had her puzzle piece. Maybe he wanted to do a trade?

  Just thinking about the quilt and the dreams she'd had about Sam while sleeping under it made her cheeks go warm but despite her decision to the contrary, she still had the thing. Emma was fully aware she could have given the quilt to Lindsay days ago and asked her to give it to Sam but for some reason she did not want to explore right now, she was actually reluctant to get rid of it.

  “Meow,” she heard right before Chloe streaked across the room and onto the table by the door—and then Emma froze, her mouth half-open in a muted gasp of annoyed horror as her purse lost most of its contents during its free fall to the floor. Springing up from the couch, she stared at the cat in stunned dismay.

  “Chloe, why? Bad, bad kitty!” she admonished and hurried over to pick up the mess. On the top of the pile lay the card she had been avoiding. Looking over her shoulder, she glared at the cat and accused, “You're as bad as Lindsay!”

  Rocking back on her heels, she groaned. “I don't want to call him! I don't want to hear the rich timber of his voice or imagine the look in his eyes when I say hello or to think about how nice it felt to sink my fingers into his hair while his sifted tenderly through mine.” That was the way she imagined it, at least. He might have had any number of descriptions for what he'd been doing with his fingers in her hair in mind.

  “None of which I want to know!” she blurted to Chloe but she knew as well as the now primly posturing feline was a lie. Beyond annoyed with the whole situation, she stuffed her belongings back inside her purse—including the card—and then she pulled it back out again. “Fine. I will call him. And then both you and Lindsay can bug me all you want to because I won't be doing anything like this again!”

  Maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea to call, Emma thought, just because. If a woman answered, well, at least she would know. She stretched an arm toward the table to grab her cell phone and then quickly dialed the number that was scrawled across the back of the card.

  “One Stop. This is Sam. What can I do for you today?”

  Just the sound of his voice made her pulse throb, exactly the way she had feared it would do. Emma closed her eyes.

  “Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?” There was a long moment of silence, and then, “Press one if you can hear me.”

  Instantly, Emma recognized the line from one of those macho-type movies her brothers liked. She couldn't quite hold back her snort of laughter—or was it actually more a giggle? “Gone in Sixty Seconds,” she blurted the way she did with her brothers—guessing which lines came from what movies was a familiar game they played—but she instantly regretted the impulse.

  “Emma? Emma is this actually you? Finally! I've been trying to get in touch with you for a week now!”

  Ignoring the smirkish twist her lips automatically curled into, she said, “Yes. It's me, but I'm surprised you remembered I had a name. It's the quilt you wanted me to call you about, right? Well, I'm letting you know you can have the thing. Lindsay will bring it by tomorrow.”

  Without another word she ended the call and then tossed her phone onto the sofa before drawing up her knees to make a pillow for her head. Why couldn't she just be like her brothers, who never worried about this sort of thing? William or even Tyler would have done what they wanted and hang what tomorrow might bring. But not Emma. No, not sweet, shy little worry wart Emma.

  At that moment, she suddenly felt more alone and disconnected—from her family, from her friends, from anyone who might have loved her whom with the exception of Lindsay was absolutely no one—than she had in years.

  Beside her, the ringer on her cell phone pealed, jerking her out of her moment of misery. With hands gone unsteady, she reached over and flipped it to look at the caller id—it was Sam. Pressing the button to decline the call, she got up and went to the kitchen. She would eat, and then she would read. Or start to work on the puzzle again. But she hadn't gone a handful of steps before her phone went off again.

  It was him again and for a moment Emma thought about blocking his number. Instead, she slid her thumb across the screen, put the thing to her ear, and waited for him to speak.

  “Emma, I need to talk to you—not about the quilt though we can discuss that, too, but about the things you left on my table.”

  “They're yours,” she said. “I don't need them anymore.” Her voice was barely above a whisper.

  “Thank you. I appreciate your permission, but I really need a signature. Are you available right now? Wait. You don't have to come all the way out here. I will drive out and meet you—just tell me when and where.”

  “My signature? Why on earth would you need that? It was nothing but research and half a handful of drawings.”

  “Yes, all of which are valuable intellectual property, Emma, and yours specifically. Not mine, although I would love to—never mind that right now. May I have your address please?”

  No! she wanted to yell. The last thing she needed right now was for Sam to pop up on her doorstep but she had to admit she was intrigued. “Look, Mr. Huntingdon, you have my permission to use the documents and drawings. I don't need to see you to give that.”

  “That may be true, but—dammit, Emma! We need to talk about the papers, yes, but did you ever consider I might actually just want to see you?”

  Pulling the phone away from her ear, she stared at it as if it were foreign and poison for a second before slowly replacing it to whisper, “No, the thought never crossed my mind.”

  But even as the words left her mouth, she knew she was outright lying—to herself and to him because for him to want to see her again was the one thing she secretly had wished for. But every time Lindsay mentioned him she said only that S
am wanted her to call. Was it possible he had used the research as an excuse to see her again?

  Through the phone, she heard him sigh, and imagined he was rubbing muscles at his neck to relieve the sudden tension. “Well, I did and I do. I need to see you, actually, and not just for business reasons. I've barely thought of anything else since you left me the other night.”

  Since she'd left him? How did he manage to make it sound like she had done him some grievous injury? “It was late and I had to get home. Plus, your shop was closed, remember?”

  He was silent for a moment and Emma thought he might give up—and she knew she didn't really want him to. Thinking quickly, she glanced over at her mail and gave him the first address she saw and then twisted her arm so she could see her watch. It was almost six thirty. “I'm at 1423 Brecker Street but I'll only be here until seven.”

  “Got it. Thanks,” he said, his tone a bit distracted, and then he chuckled deep—it was an immensely pleasurable sound. “I'll be there in less than ten minutes.”

  He ended the call leaving Emma confused. What had he found so amusing? Frowning, Emma snatched up the envelope and immediately felt like an idiot—first class. Oh, no. Did I really? I couldn't have! But she had—she had given him the address for the shop where she occasionally ordered lingerie and now Sam was on his way there. To meet her.

  Remembering he'd said he would be there in ten minutes, she snatched up her purse and her keys, and looked over her shoulder to find Chloe curled up in her now vacated seat on the sofa. “Have to go out for some underwear, Chloe! Keep that seat warm for me, sweetie!”

  Chapter Nine

  Sam was waiting for her in the lot outside of Angelica's Delicate Secrets, one hip indolently propped against his front fender and a whimsical smile on his lips, when Emma pulled up and got out of her car. He hadn't been sure she would come even though she had made out like she was there already but he was glad she had. He wanted to see her again, to talk to her about her ideas for the coffee shop.

  He also wanted to ask a few questions about the research she had done. The information in the document she had given him would make for a great general interest book and he was hoping he could talk her into allowing him to put it into print. Right now, he envisioned placing copies on each of the tables at the One Shot—a bit of a conversation piece his customers could thumb through and talk about. A coffee table book was a super idea but he couldn't do a thing with it without Emma's permission.

  If he were honest with himself, he would admit he wanted to kiss her again, too. And he was honest to a fault—usually—but this time he was a bit suspicious of what had happened the night she'd stopped by the shop after closing time and he was afraid whatever might be going on between him and Emma was happening because of the items they each had picked up at Seville's Antiques. Crazy as that sounded.

  He blamed Jordan and Kaylee for making him wonder whether or not something supernatural was involved even though he found the whole idea of magically infused objects a little silly. No, it was downright ridiculous, actually. He didn't believe in magic. Power? Yes. Magic? No. He had his reasons for believing the way he did and none of them involved today's generally accepted rational motives of society.

  But, according to Lindsay, something definitely huge and really powerful would have been the only thing to motivate Emma to kiss him before she got to know him—at least a little. He was barely more than a stranger, after all, and Lindsay had said it was very odd for her to have deviated from her normal behavior.

  Of course Lindsay had tried to make it sound like he must be some super special guy but Sam knew he was just a regular ol' Joe. Or Sam, rather, but the point was he was no one special, unless you factored in his net worth. Emma hadn't seemed like the type of woman to make a move on a guy because of the size of his bank account, though. She was quiet, but he refused to believe she was scheming. She seemed shy and although he was a loud mouth most of the time who loved the company of other people, he found Emma's more modest traits adorable. It just worked—for her.

  Couple her timidity with the intelligence he saw swimming in her gaze every time he'd looked into her eyes and you had a winning combination for inciting interest. Sam was definitely interested. Especially after their kiss. Or maybe he was interested in her in spite of it? The question had been driving him mad for days. He needed to know if he was drawn to her naturally, or if there was something supernatural—thanks to the Seville sisters—in play here.

  Sam wanted his attraction to Emma to be natural.

  He believed it was, too, and his curiosity where she was concerned was a thing which begged exploring but Emma was not being cooperative in the least. Three times he had asked Lindsay to have her call him and three times she had not. Had she thought his kisses bad then?

  Oh, come on, Sammy, the voice in his head drawled in a tone loaded with sarcasm. You barely know the girl. There's no need to let your ego get involved.

  His mental voice was right. Ego wasn't needed at all. Just some good old fashioned, straight up conversation was all it should take to clear up the “will she, won't she” conversation in his head. He needed to talk to Emma and if she hadn't called when she had, he would have found another way to get in touch with her.

  As she made her way across the parking lot toward him, he could see she was going to pretend she was fine with precisely where they were meeting. But the tinge of high color on her cheek bones declared otherwise. Clearly, she was embarrassed by their current location, and despite his genuine effort to try, he couldn't seem to keep his lips from twitching.

  He thought about teasing her for inviting the strange man she had spontaneously kissed to shop for underwear just so he could watch her flush and squirm beneath his gaze but he had a feeling he might get a slap or worse for his effort. Instead, he said, “It only takes you thirty minutes to shop for sexy underwear? It always takes me at least a few hours.”

  Emma cocked one brow at a haughty angle and speared him with a look. “I don't think I needed to know your proclivity toward ladies underwear, really. Now what is it you need me to sign?”

  Ignoring her attempt to get this meeting over so she could turn around and leave, he said, “I'll bet a rich, opulent blue is your color. A nice jewel tone, like the sea.”

  Refusing to allow herself to be drawn into such an intimate conversation with him, Emma hitched her bag higher on her shoulder. “And I'll bet I'm leaving again if we don't finish this soon. I've someone else waiting for me.”

  “Chloe, perhaps? Your foofy white cat?” Her blush gave her away and he grinned. “Lindsay told me about her. Hey, looks like we have something besides memories in common! I have a cute little Husky myself, a pup named Jabez who likes to run. We should introduce them to each other someday.”

  The thought of doing anything with her after today made him feel surprisingly wistful. He knew he had to do something now or this was going to end badly—for both of them.

  “You have some papers for me?”

  Unable to draw her out of the shell of determined aloofness she'd retreated into, Sam finally reached through the open window of his car to collect a thick stack of papers which he flipped through before handing them over to her, his eyes lingering on her lips before he once more started to speak. “It's just standard percentages and a standard term but I'm willing to negotiate.”

  Without bothering to read the papers to see to what she was specifically agreeing, Emma clicked the end of the pen she'd brought with her from her car with her thumb, flipped through the pages directly to the one at the end and quickly signed her name before handing them back to him.

  “There you go. You have my consent to use the research and drawings in whatever way you'd like. Now if you will excuse me, I really have to leave.”

  She turned to go but he caught her shoulder, halting her almost desperate flight. “Emma, wait.”

  Pausing, Emma turned to look back at him to see what else he had to say, and immediately wished she hadn't. />
  “You've absolutely nothing to be embarrassed over or ashamed of, you know,” he told her. “I very much wanted to kiss you, too—from the moment we crossed swords over that quilt in Seville's, I believe.”

  Don't do it, Emma. Don't listen to him. You're too emotionally eager right now to believe him. But, oh, did she want to believe. He had enjoyed the moment as much as she had? The warmth filling his eyes said he wouldn't mind doing it again, either, if only she would agree.

  Making a slashing motion with her hand, she shook her head no and said, “Stop it, Sam. Just stop it, please. I know you can see that my cheeks are already on fire from inadvertently sending you here, and this—”

  She had been about to say all this talk about kissing wasn't helping matters at all but he interrupted.

  “Would it help if I admitted that I'm burning too, Emma? Just not anywhere you can see.”

  To think that Sam was burning with need for her made her suddenly go weak in the knees. Gasping in surprise at his admission, she again shook her head no. “I told you—kissing you that night was a mistake. A big one, mine, and so something I don't intend to repeat.”

  “Even if I'd like you to?” His gaze burned into hers and it was hard for her to remember she was supposed to just come here and sign his papers and leave. “Emma, what we shared was, well, better than nice, and it sure didn't feel like a mistake to me.”

  Turning away from the heated desire in his gaze, Emma started toward her car, muttering to herself every step of the way. “Oh, I don't understand any of this. What is going on with me?”

  If she thought her actions were odd, there was no telling how strange to Sam she seemed. Suddenly it occurred to her that she didn't want him to think her strange. She'd barely made it to her car before she stopped and spun on one heel to stalk back to him and explain.

  “Look, I'm sorry I let things get way out of control the other night but it was only because of those dreams.”

  Sam frowned. “What dreams?”