“How are you?” she asked him.
“Fine, fine.” He air-patted her general vicinity, as if loathe to soil her bright clothes.
She stepped back and looked him over with a practiced eye. “Really? I heard from Jolly that your arthritis is flaring up again.”
The man put his hands behind his back. “Jolly talks too much.”
“Well, I’m coming back this afternoon to do your laundry for you.”
“You don’t have to—”
“And I’ll bring my chili, too.”
The old guy smiled. “Cornbread?”
She laughed. “And cornbread.” On tiptoe again, she gave him another peck. “See you later.”
Knox hadn’t moved from his side of the car and now she hurried over to him. “Come on. Cass will help you with your motorcycle.” She pointed. “That’s Cass Cassidy, my dad.”
Her dad. Huh. “Not Mickey?”
“His older brother. Gone now, but my father took over for Uncle Mickey a couple of years ago.”
Damn. The date on the pink slip indicated Colin had owned the Indian much longer than that, meaning any information about his ownership of the bike had likely gone to the grave with Mickey Cassidy.
Erin nodded toward her father. “Tell him about your bike. I’m certain he can help you out.”
“Sure. Okay.” Knox hesitated, though, because Cass Cassidy was sending him a look so suspicious that it made Earl’s glare seem like a virtual love letter. Telling himself the man couldn’t know the dastardly and debauched designs Knox had spun around his daughter, he squared his shoulders. “Thanks.”
“And goodbye,” she said, her voice going soft. “I…well, I enjoyed meeting you. Happy trails and all that.”
He caught her hand and stroked his thumb over the top, a brief, final caress. “Happy life, Erin.”
“I’ll be right here hoping for it.” Then she slipped her fingers free and turned toward her father to wave as she tucked herself behind the steering wheel once more. “Bye, Dad! Take good care of this new customer.”
Cass Cassidy lumbered closer, his bristly brows drawn together over narrowed, flinty eyes as he looked between his daughter and Knox. “A new customer? Who is this exactly?”
Before Knox could introduce himself, Erin sent him a blinding, mischievous smile that hit him right in the solar plexus. Then she cut her gaze back to her dad.
“Just some guy I picked up in a bar last night!” she said, gunned the car, and was gone.
Knox sucked in a breath and turned toward the mechanic, noting his distrustful expression hadn’t eased, and that a massive lug wrench hung from the loop of fabric at his hip. The tool could take a man out with one swing.
So he reached for his most charming smile but stayed outside of striking distance. “Nice to meet you. Sir.”
Hours later he watched Erin’s cute ride toodle into the parking area of the repair business. Leaning on the push broom he was wielding, he watched her climb out of her car, surprise on her face. “You’re still here.”
“Yeah.” He couldn’t tell if she was pleased or disappointed. “By the way, I owe you for that little stunt about being the man you picked up last night.”
“Oh.” Her expression turned sheepish. “Sorry. I like to tease Dad sometimes.” She glanced around. “He nearby?”
“On the phone in his office.”
Erin nodded at the broom. “And you’re playing assistant?”
“Part of my plan to convince him not to kill me, cut me into little pieces, and throw me to his pack of vicious guard dogs.”
“He doesn’t have a pack of vicious guard dogs.”
“Good to know. But that’s not what he says.”
“Really, though. Your bike?”
“We retrieved it, and he’s been working on it.” Not for the first time, Knox wished he knew his way around an engine like he knew his way around a cocktail menu or a business plan. “Cass has yet to deliver a complete diagnosis, but I have hopes I’ll be on my way before dark.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.”
He watched her move to the rear of her car and pop open the hatchback. She half-bent to gather some canvas grocery bags. His gaze zeroed in on her ass.
His muscles drew tight, and the back of his neck burned. Her body…well, hell, it was nothing less than spectacular. She wore the same clinging outfit from the morning and he noted the mesh that marched up the side of the leggings, sheer enough that he could see a hint of skin beneath the long panel.
A hint of skin all the way from ankles to waist.
She couldn’t be wearing anything underneath that stretchy fabric, right?
God, he wanted to take her somewhere private and quiet where he could bury his face in the skin of her neck as he peeled away those maddening clothes. His movements would be slow, careful, even though just thinking about it made his heart thrum and his breathing turn ragged.
Be cool, Brannigan.
She doesn’t do one night stands, he reminded himself.
Even if you took a room in that motel down the road, she wouldn’t join you there.
As she struggled to gather more bags, he broke from his lust-induced stupor and hurried forward. “Here,” he said. “Let me get those for you.”
Toe-to-toe with Erin, he made to scoop his arms beneath the canvas sacks. The back of his hands slid up her torso and brushed the outside of her breasts.
They both froze. Erin’s gaze jumped to his, and he lost himself in their silver depths. Under her clothes, he could feel her skin heating. She trembled and he wanted to kiss her, run his tongue along the edge of her jaw, take a bite of her small earlobe.
But he didn’t move.
She doesn’t do one night stands!
And that’s all he had to give. Some fleeting passion, a little bit of carnal fun, and it was something he perversely both wanted to offer her and also shield her from.
Because Erin Cassidy deserved serious, promise-filled forevers. Precisely what he didn’t have in him.
The office door screeched as Cass Cassidy threw it open. Erin leaped away from Knox, leaving him holding the bags and hoping like hell his stiff cock wasn’t making itself known to her father.
The older man studied his daughter a long, silent moment, then he shifted his gaze. “Well, young Knox, bad news.”
Knox knew it already. Erin Cassidy had bewitched him with her starry eyes and shy smiles. With her full mouth and her sleek curves. A spell that caused him to crave getting close while wanting to keep her distant at the very same time.
It didn’t make sense. Knox had never set himself up as any woman’s white knight. But he’d been off his game for weeks, and now he was beginning to worry he’d never be the same man again.
Erin threw Knox a nervous glance then cleared her throat. “What bad news is that, Dad?”
Cass turned to his daughter again. “The necessary part for the Indian has been difficult to track down. And I’d say it’ll be at least three days before this young man will be ready to ride out of town.”
Chapter 4
In the laundry room inside her father’s small home, Erin pulled another towel from the basket and folded it with precise movements, then added it to the stack on the counter. Her friend Deanne had always hated doing laundry. Marissa merely put up with it. Now both had turned it into a joint husband-and-wife chore.
Though Erin had no spouse with whom to share the work, she didn’t mind. In fact, she relished the simple task that resulted in stacks of fresh-smelling fabric and found it could calm her mind. Today included the added bonus that she was relieving her father of what he considered drudgery. His arthritic hands could really use the reprieve.
Plucking another still-warm length of terrycloth from the pile, she brought it to her nose, breathing in the clean scent. She closed her eyes and imagined a peaceful meadow, with clothes pinned to a line strung between two trees, the material swaying in a gentle breeze.
“Hey, the
re.”
She jumped, serenity fleeing at the sound of Knox’s voice. Clutching the cloth to her chest, she whirled toward the doorway.
He lingered there, wearing jeans, boots, and a navy waffle-weave Henley. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I’m not afraid,” she said, frowning at him.
“Right.” With his chin, he indicated a jumble of what looked to be more laundry that he held in his arms. “Your dad asked me to bring in these coveralls from the garage.”
“Put them in that basket,” she said, pointing.
He hesitated. “There’s a towel and washcloth, too. Cass let me use the spare bathroom earlier today to take a shower.”
“I know. I smelled your soap and shampoo.” Erin cringed, hating how she’d given away her awareness of him. But the scent had been impossible to ignore as she traversed the hallway.
“I hope you don’t mind.”
She spared him a glance. “Why would I? This is my dad’s home.”
“Ah. You didn’t grow up here?”
“When Uncle Mickey died, Dad moved in and left me the house where I am now.”
“I see.” He continued to linger.
Erin picked out a clean pillowcase and snapped it straight before folding. “It’s too bad about the part for your bike,” she said, glancing his way again. “I’m sorry for your inconvenience.”
“Can’t be helped.”
She swallowed, then asked the question that had been at the forefront of her mind since her father had emerged from his office. “What will you do?”
“You mean…?”
She shrugged one shoulder.
“Well…” he said, drawling it out. “Cass did say you had an extra bedroom at your place.”
Her hands jerked, an involuntary movement, which knocked one of the clean piles to the floor.
“Oh!” Face flaming, she bent to retrieve the scattered items. In her peripheral vision she spied the toes of his boots stepping up. “I can do it.”
“I can help.”
That clean fragrance of his was in her lungs now as they straightened, each holding some sheets and pillowcases. She snatched his share and arranged them into a new stack.
Knox touched her shoulder. “Erin.”
Biting her lip, she turned to him.
“I was just joking around,” he said.
“I knew that,” she lied.
“Yeah?” He tilted his head, gazing into her face.
The expression on his—a warmth, a tenderness—made her feel shaky inside, unsettled. Nothing like her normal serene, disciplined self. One of his hands reached to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, and the sensation of the pads of his fingers against the skin behind it made her nipples bud.
His voice lowered, nearly to a whisper. “Are you a magician? Because when I look at you everything else disappears.”
A flush of heat broke over her flesh, and the tips of her breasts tightened more. “W-what?”
His arm dropped and, looking away, he cleared his throat. “Just one of those cheesy pick-up lines I hear from behind the bar.”
She should tell him to go away, she thought, trying to pull in a cleansing breath of air. There was no reason for him to be hanging around the repair business, let alone hanging around her.
“Knox—”
“I like your dad,” he said.
Erin blinked. “Oh. Thanks.”
He smiled. “Though I think he’s still suspicious of me after your line about us meeting in a bar.”
The easy grin soothed her some. “Probably not. He let you shower here after all.” Her mind drifted away for a moment, thinking of that muscled body under the spray in the nearby shower, soap bubbles rolling down his pectoral muscles, his abs, over his—
“He reminded me of the dogs again before he let me inside his house.”
The image burst—thank goodness—like one of the bubbles. “I told you,” she said, half-exasperated. “He doesn’t have any dogs.”
“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “Maybe he keeps them chained up somewhere when you’re around.”
What a tease. But his grave demeanor gave nothing away.
Knox leaned his back against the folding counter and crossed his feet at the ankles. “Have any potential boyfriends reported similar threats?”
Surely he didn’t consider himself “boyfriend” potential! But the notion—however ridiculous—that he might, settled under her heart, nudging it up toward her throat. “You’re such a kidder.”
“Just saying that your dad seems like the kind of man who’d look very closely at guys hanging around you.”
“There haven’t been guys hanging around,” she said shortly. Anything to put an end to the conversation and get him out of the laundry room, its dimensions seeming to shrink by the second. “No guys—like you mean—for a long time.”
His brows jumped. “Odd,” he murmured.
She wasn’t “odd,” she was careful. But Deanne’s voice echoed in her head. It’s time to put yourself out there. Open up. Loosen up.
Instead of looking at Knox, she applied herself to folding again, even as she was hyper-aware of his close regard. For a few minutes she ignored it, then she shot him a sidelong glance. “What? Do I have dryer lint in my hair or something?”
“Or something.” And in a quick move, he yanked on the pony tail holder holding her coiled hair in a bun. The strands tumbled from the top of her head over her shoulders. Then he was combing through them with the fingers of one hand, as if he couldn’t help himself. She froze, everything still but her scrambling pulse.
“Damn it, Erin,” he said softly, though he sounded as if he was cursing himself. “Damn it all.”
She wanted to turn into his touch. Press her face into his big hand, press her body against his tall one and take the strength and heat he offered.
It’s time to put yourself out there. Open up. Loosen up.
But she couldn’t seem to move. Thankfully. Or no.
Knox left off playing with her hair to move back to the entry. She risked a glance at him. He gripped the jamb on each side as if to anchor himself. “I booked a room at the motel down the road. But Cass invited me to stay and eat dinner with the two of you before checking in.”
“Oh.” She kept her expression carefully blank, fully aware she should want to see the last of Knox. Not feel this gladness that they’d have yet more hours together.
“I’m convinced he’s still in the process of checking me out.”
“You could just tell Dad you’re not interested in me.”
“No can do, darlin’.” Knox shook his head. “I’m certain that he, if not those dogs, can sniff out a lie.”
She frowned at him. “You say the most disconcerting things.”
He shrugged, his gaze trained on her face. “You can tell me not to stay, Erin. I’ll make up an excuse for Cass.”
She hesitated, not entirely surprised by her father’s kindness to a stranger, but unsure of it, too. What was his agenda? Could Knox be right, and her dad had sensed something between them?
A something that wasn’t to be, she reminded herself firmly.
The simplest solution to the problem was to encourage Knox to white-lie his way out of dinner. They could say yet another goodbye, and she’d steer clear of the repair business until she was certain he’d turned his bike northward.
“Your call,” Knox said.
Her mind warred with that other part of her that he’d awakened at the Moonstone Café the night before. The woman in her who suddenly remembered what it was like to flirt, to laugh, to feel desired.
To kiss.
“Erin?”
Instead of answering the question at hand she posed her own. “Your dad. Does he want to approve of the women you involve yourself with?”
“My dad.” He dropped his head to study the toes of his boots. “We weren’t close.”
Weren’t close. A new emotion entered the small room. Erin tried to sense
what Knox wasn’t saying. She drew closer to him. “He’s…he’s passed away, then?”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “A few months back, from a rare cancer. I have six brothers, but he didn’t tell a single one of us he was dying. Though our mother has been gone for years, we just got a call from her sister after he died. He didn’t want a funeral. He didn’t want anything from us to recognize his passing.”
“That’s hard.”
“I’m okay with it, though.” One hand ran through his dark hair. “It’s fine, all of it. We weren’t close, like I said.”
Without thinking, Erin reached for Knox’s hand and held it between both of her own. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
He stared, unseeing, at their clasped fingers. “He left me the motorcycle, but not a word about why. I’m only guessing he wanted me to go on this ride.”
“Well, in any case you need to build up your strength for the open road in your future,” she said, certain of her decision now. “Stay for a hot meal. I make amazing chili. My cornbread will break your heart.”
“I have this odd premonition that something’s going to do that,” Knox murmured, still not looking at her.
She wanted to kiss him, hold him, take all that latent hurt she sensed inside him away. “C’mon,” she said instead, and began tugging him in the direction of the kitchen. “You can set the table.”
The mood lightened as they took their seats before steaming bowls of chili—she didn’t tell either man it was vegetarian—and a napkin-covered basket of cornbread. Softened butter waited in another dish.
Cass, never a big talker, was the first to dig in. But he seemed to be listening as Erin probed Knox about growing up one of seven brothers.
“All a success at what they’ve chosen to do,” Knox said. “Lots of competition between brothers contributed to that, I suppose.”
“And you?” Erin took her father’s napkin from the table and put it in his lap. Knox, she noted, had much better table manners. “How do you fit in with them?”
He shrugged. “I’m not as driven as the others. I’m the most accomplished surfer. Absolutely the most easy-going. The very best at having fun.”
There was a bitter tinge to that last sentence that had Erin’s antennae on the rise. But before she could delve deeper, her father joined the conversation.
Knox KOBO Page 5
