Gray swallowed the chuckle that rose in his throat at Ethan’s theatrical display, but Bella wasn’t as successful. The strangled cough she emitted sounded suspiciously like laughter.
“Good, I’m glad to hear it,” Bella said briskly. “Now go and wash your hands. Dinner is almost ready.”
Smiling softly, Bella cast a half glance at Gray. Some indefinable emotion glowed in her gaze, but she masked it before Gray could correctly interpret the look.
“P-perhaps you’d like to run upstairs and—”Bella’s wayward stare ran the length of his body and halted just above the waistband of his jeans.“—ch—change,” she finished lamely.
With supreme effort, Gray returned her smile and nodded. “Yeah, I think I will.” He pulled the wet, sticky shirt away from his chest, momentarily mourning the loss of one of his favorite henleys. “I think I’ll take a quick shower while I’m at it.
“Go ahead, you’ve got time.” She smiled drolly. “Bet you’ll be finished with your shower long before Ethan is finished washing his hands.”
Gray chuckled and took a couple of halting steps backward. “I’ll be back in a few.”
“Sure,” Bella told him. The odd look was back in her eyes again and her lips twitched curiously.
Chalking her behavior up to embarrassment, Gray turned and left the room. His sodden boots had reached the third step in the staircase when a hysterical peal of smoky, feminine laughter reached his ears, consequently drawing a chuckle from his own throat.
So Bella Valentine possessed the rare ability to laugh at herself, Gray thought, noting another intriguing facet of his landlady’s charming personality.
Funny what a turn-on he found that to be.
Chapter Six
As soon as the door swung shut behind Gray, Bella doubled over and let the laughter she’d been struggling to suppress stream out of her. Tears of mirth gathered in her eyes and her sides heaved with spasms of amusement. Instantly a vision of Gray, mouth agape, dripping with iced tea, morphed behind her eyes, sending into another fit of hilarity.
Oh, merciful heavens! When she’d seen that potholder burst into flames, her first thought had been to simply put out the blaze. Bella giggled again. She’d completely forgotten about Gray’s presence…until she’d hurled that glass of tea at him.
Bella laughed again, then made another vain attempt at calming herself. She knew that Maggie and Fayrene had harbored grandiose visions of a romantic dinner.
Even in their worst dreams, Bella knew the shameless matchmakers couldn’t have come up with a more ridiculous scenario than the one that had played out here tonight. A headline flashed through her mind. Inept Cook Sets Kitchen Aflame, Douses Hero With Iced Tea.
Another flashback had her giggling again. This time, however, the mini-movie continued to play on.
To the part where Bella had attempted to dry him off.
Bella stopped laughing and her cheeks scalded anew. To think that she’d been so focused on getting him dry that he’d had to grab her wayward hand to keep her from inadvertently stroking his groin.
“Ugh,” Bella moaned ruefully. Had she ever been so mortified? Her mind scanned back over every embarrassing situation she’d ever had the misfortune to encounter and instantly decided that, no, she definitely hadn’t. Even splitting her skirt in the middle of a pep rally in junior high couldn’t compare to this latest fiasco.
Still smiling, Bella shoved away from the counter and began to clean up the mess. She’d just tossed the charred potholder into the trash when Gray returned to the kitchen. The glance she spared him as she finished up was more than enough to discern several things.
One—it was a sin for a man to have hair that beautiful. Slightly damp, the midnight ends curled about his chiseled features in a fashion that made Bella‘s fingers literally itch to touch it.
Two—the color white, a hue one would normally associate with purity, didn’t soften the dark masculinity of Gray Cameron at all. Even without the trademark sinister black he normally wore, he still radiated danger.
And three—he apparently didn’t own a pair of jeans that didn’t have holes in the knees.
Bella swallowed. She was definitely in over her head. The had she intended to have examined first thing in the morning.
“Anything I can help with?” Gray asked.
“No, but thanks. Setting the table is Ethan’s job.” Bella grinned. “He’s real territorial about it. You might want to check your clothes though,” she told him as she transferred the chicken onto a platter. “I heard the rinse cycle kick in right before you came back down.”
Gray quirked a skeptical brow. A picture of indolent grace, he lounged against the counter and crossed his booted feet at the ankles. “You’re supposed to check them before they rinse?”
Bella tossed him a smile over her shoulder. “Well, yes, if you want to add fabric softener.”
“Oh. Then I have nothing to worry about.”
It figured, Bella thought. He didn’t particularly look like a man who cared if his towels were fluffy soft. Or if his clothes were wrinkled. Then again, Bella decided as she covertly scanned him again from head to toe, when you wore your clothes as tight as Gray did, who needed to worry about a few pesky wrinkles?
“All clean,” Ethan shrieked as he skidded back into the room. He came to a bouncing halt by the counter and looked up at Gray. “Hey, you’re clean! How’d ya do that so fast?”
“Practice, little man,” he replied, amusement in his velvety baritone.
“Ethan, would you go ahead and set the table please?” Bella asked her so.
“Yes, ma’am.”
With Ethan thus occupied, Bella attempted to get her oddly disjointed thoughts together. Between her little experiment in oven pyrotechnics and having a bonafide man back in her kitchen, her nerves were starting to show their wear.
No matter how many times she told herself that this was just a friendly dinner, she couldn’t quite convince herself of it. True, she’d always had new tenants down for a congenial meal…but she’d never been physically attracted to them.
And she couldn’t deny that she was physically attracted to Gray Cameron.
Bella found the knowledge to be both irritating and heartening. Irritating because she didn’t have the time, desire, or inclination to pursue any sort of relationship with a man.
And heartening because, since Dan’s death, Bella’d begun to wonder if perhaps that special part of her—that need—had died along with him. She hadn’t been remotely attracted to another man since her husband had died. Not one iota of desire, one smidgen of lust had hummed through her.
And yet, one man—one six-and-a-half-foot beast of a man with a voice like roughened silk and green eye to die for—and she’d become one giant pulsating hormone. Bella inwardly snorted in disgust. She might as well be revisiting her teens. In the morning she’d undoubtedly wake up with a zit.
The phone rang, momentarily interrupting Bella’s bleak musings. With a polite smile at Gray, she picked up the receiver.
“Hello.”
“Bella,” Maggie’s voice hissed across the line. “How’s everything going?”
Despite herself, Bella grinned. She cast a quick look at her intrigued guest, then quickly glanced away. “Fine, Maggie. We’re about to sit down and eat.”
“Glory Chalmers said she saw smoke coming from over there. Is everything all right?”
Bella frowned at her kitchen window, then marched across the oak floor and dropped the blinds with a definite click. Either Mrs. Chalmers had x-ray vision, or the old busybody had dusted off her late husband’s binoculars again. Bella would lay odds on the latter.
“A greasy potholder caught fire, Maggie. It was nothing. I’m about to set dinner on the table, so I’ve— Hold on, Maggie, my other line is ringing.” Bella simultaneously shot Gray an apologetic smile and hit the flashing button. “Hello.”
“Bella,” Fayrene’s distinct falsetto rasped. “Just called to get a status repo
rt. Got a little romance cookin’ yet?”
Bella swallowed a sigh. “No, Fayrene. I’m still working on dinner.”
“Drat,” Fayrene groused. “I should’a known better than to listen to ole Glory. Why, she said the two of you had already gone up in flames!”
Bella gritted her teeth and managed a tight-lipped smile. “It was a potholder, Fayrene. I assure you, nobody got burned.”
“Well, now. Don’t lose heart.” Fayrene tsked soothingly, misreading Bella’s sarcasm for dejection. “The night’s not a complete bust yet. I’m an old hand at this kind of thing. If you run into any trouble, just give me a call and I’ll coach you through it.”
Bella’s lips curled into a wry grin. “Thanks Fayrene, I’ll remember that.”
Bella ended the call with Fayrene and coaxed Maggie off the line as well. Heaving a mighty sigh, she replaced the handset. When the intensity of Gray’s stare became unbearable, she resolutely turned to meet his amused grin.
“Er…sorry about that,” Bella apologized.
“No apology needed, he assured. “I, uh, take it those were a couple of your geriatric guardians?”
Bella nodded. Sometime during her phone interrogation, he’d taken a seat at the kitchen table. Something about the way he’d sprawled in the chair made Bella’s chest feel light with some unnamed emotion. He looked relaxed. Comfortable. At home.
“How did they know about the fire?” he asked, his brow creased in confusion.
Bella shot a wry look at her drawn blinds, then returned her gaze to Gray. “It would seem that Mrs. Chalmers next door has taken to using her binoculars again.” She winced as a thought occurred to her. “You might want to keep that in mind when you’re in the living room. Just in case, you know, um…” she trailed off weakly.
“I decide to walk around in the buff,” he supplied. Gray’s smile had broadened and a twinkle danced in his pale green eyes.
Bella gulped as her wayward mind instantly disrobed him. A magnificently naked Gray prowled lazily through the private cinema of her imagination. A coil of warmth unfurled within her. Mercy, was she in trouble.
“R-right,” she managed at last. “Shall we eat?”
***
Pleasantly full, Gray leaned back in the spacious wicker chair located on Bella’s screened-in back porch and signed with contentment. Crickets chirped, their staccato song an enjoyable counterpoint to the softly gurgling fountain of Bella’s small goldfish pond. A few feet away, Ethan happily played in his own personal mud puddle. When Gray’d asked Bella if it was all right for Ethan to play in the mud, she’d told him that she’d personally built the mini-mud bath for Ethan.
“I still can’t believe you let him do that,” Gray told Bella as she returned with their cobbler and coffee. She deposited the tray on a table, then went about divvying up the mouthwatering dessert.
“Why not? He’s a little boy. Boys like to get dirty.” She smiled fondly at her increasingly filthy child. “Besides, it’s no big deal. Nothing a little soap and water won’t take care of.” She shrugged. “I’ll just hose him off before we gone in.”
Gray took a sip of his coffee, surprised to find it as strong as he preferred. “My mother would have preferred to be drawn and quartered to building us a mud hole.”
“Us?” Bella asked. “You have siblings?”
“Sibling. A brother, Eli.”
“Oh, how nice,” Bella murmured. “I always wanted a brother or sister.” A faint smile, almost sad, tinged her lips. “Mom and Dad were never accommodating.”
Intrigued with knowing more about Bella’s life, her family, Gray loaded his spoon with cobbler and ice cream and asked, “Why not?”
“Well, I’ve never known for sure,” Bella confided solemnly. “But I suspect it had something to do with the fact that I was a horrible child.”
Mouth full, Gray’s eyes widened, and he looked at her askance.
Bella chuckled. “No, really,” she insisted. “I was truly horrible.” She hooked her finger toward the kitchen. “That little disaster in the kitchen? Humph. That was mild compared to some of the pranks I pulled growing up. Think Dennis the Menace in pigtails.”
“Surely you couldn’t have been that bad.”
“No,” she remarked sagely. “I was worse.”
Gray chuckled softly under his breath. It was certainly hard to reconcile the angelic picture Bella presented now with the demon child she claimed to have been.
Take now for instance. The glowing afternoon sun backlit her cornsilk hair and alabaster skin, giving her an almost ethereal appearance. Were he so inclined, he could almost imagine a halo hovering about her head.
Nevertheless, upon further inspection, there was a certain mischievous look about her, Gray conceded. The wry tilt of her lips, a little twinkle in her eye. He supposed he could imagine her getting into a few scrapes. But Dennis the Menace in pigtails? Nah. No way.
“Hey, Momma!” Ethan called, knee deep in mud. He held up a large glob and giggled happily. “Wanna mud pie?”
“No, thanks I think I’ll pass,” Bella replied.
Ethan held his gooey offer up for Gray’s perusal. “What ‘bout you? You want some?”
“I’m not finished with my cobbler yet. Maybe later.”
Ethan shrugged and resumed his enthusiastic excavation of the soggy earth. There were few places left on the boy’s little body that were visible beneath the mud. Smears and clumps of the stuff covered him from head to toe. Pale blond tufts of hair sprouted haphazardly through the dark brown ooze on his head.
And the child was utterly thrilled.
Why did parents spend so much money on children’s toys, when a mud hole was free? Gray wondered absently. After all, why—
“Need a refill on your coffee yet?” Bella asked, interrupting his thoughts.
“No, thanks. I’m fine,” Gray replied. “Dennis the Menace in pigtails, huh?”
“Oh, yeah. What about you? Were you a good kid? No, let me guess.” Bella gazed at him consideringly, a small smile teasing her lips. “You were one of those model children who never got into any trouble...until you were out from under your parents’ roof. I’ll be your senior photo shows a gangly guy with a slight skin problem, a perfect side part without a single hair out of place and braces.”
Gray laughed. “You get an A for imagination…but you couldn’t be more off the mark.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.” Gray’s gaze caught and held hers. The little back porch seemed to shrink around them, became more intimate. “I was the guy your mother warned you about. The one that smoked, skipped school, and wore a leather jacket day and night. The only thing that kept me from being totally naked at my graduation was the gold sash I took off and strategically draped across my—“
“I get the picture,” Bella hastily interrupted. Wearing a disbelieving smile, she gazed thoughtfully across the backyard. “Bet that made one interesting yearbook photo.”
“Oh, it was. In fact, I’ve got it upstairs if you’d like to—“ Gray started to get up.
“Bella chuckled and stayed him with a light touch to his arm. “That’s quite all right. I think my imagination will have to suffice.”
“If you’re sure…”
“I’m sure.”
Smiling, Gray settled back in his seat. “What about you,” he asked. “What sort of girl does your senior picture show?”
Gray heard a wistful sigh slip past Bella’s lips. Her smile didn’t slip, but dimmed. Rather than look at him, she continued to watch Ethan play. “What does my senior picture show?” She repeated softly. “Hmmm. A girl who had the whole world on a string and who guilelessly believed that bad things only happened to bad people.” She paused. “Oh, and I was the only girl who didn’t have big hair.”
Since she’d finished on a lighter note, Gray didn’t dwell on the previous remark. He’d ponder that in the privacy of his apartment.
“Ah, well. A definite sin in the south back then. But—“Gr
ay studied the light golden strands of Bella’s gorgeous hair and felt a spark ignite in his veins. His voice lowered of its own accord. “I think this look suits you.”
“Thank you,” she murmured softly, a seemingly embarrassed flush tinting her cheeks. He wondered how long it had been since a man had paid Bella a compliment and silently vowed to correct that injustice whenever the opportunity presented itself.
Gray was suddenly hit with an almost overwhelming need to kiss her. Which was odd in itself because, while kissing is one of the more traditional means of foreplay, it wasn’t necessarily his favorite. Kissing was an art any man who wanted to be thought of as a competent lover got good at, but it wasn’t anything that he’d ever felt inclined to do for the simple pleasure of the act. It had always been a means to an end.
Until now.
He couldn’t take his gaze from her moist lips. The urge, the desire to plumb that succulently beautiful mouth and taste her was an almost irresistible urge. The intensity of it of his desire stunned him.
He felt himself lean forward, though he didn’t think he’d commanded his body to act. Bella had drawn closer too, a look of mind wonder on her face. Her eyes left his and strayed to his mouth, then her pink tongue darted out and swept over her full lower lip.
Had he ever entertained the notion of drawing back—which he hadn’t—it would have been lost now.
Gray brought his hand to the nape of her neck and—
“Momma! Somebody’s here! Somebody’s here!” Ethan’s happy shout rent the night air, effectively breaking the spell which had bound them. Bella and Gray both sprang apart, looking guilty.
A colorful four-letter word ricocheted through Gray’s brain. He passed a hand over his face and added another hot oath to the growling litany in his mind. Logically, he knew he should be grateful for the interruption.
Funny how instead he felt he’d just been cheated out of a taste of heaven.
My Funny Valentine Page 5
