Return to Rose Cottage

by Sherryl Woods

  “Not unless it seems like you’re going to hurt her again. You and I are friends, Pete, but Jo’s family now. I have to look out for her.”

  “I respect that,” Pete said. “I certainly don’t want to hurt her again, but I’m wondering if we should start spending quite so much time together when there’s all this past history that needs to be resolved.”

  Mike’s expression turned thoughtful. “Okay now, it’s a given that I’m no expert on women, not even my wife, but it seems to me if Jo agreed to do this, then she’s ready to spend more time with you. Maybe this is your chance to make things right with her. A couple of jobs will give you plenty of uncomplicated time together.”

  “It gets complicated when we’re in the same room,” Pete said dryly.

  Mike laughed. “A whole lot of pheromones bouncing around?”

  “You have no idea.”

  “Okay, this is definitely a guy approach, but maybe you should just take her to bed and get all that out of the way,” Mike suggested.

  Pete gave him a horrified look. “Her engagement just broke up. She’s an emotional mess. And you want me to take her to bed?”

  “Just a thought,” Mike said.

  Pete shook his head. “How the hell did you ever land a classy woman like Melanie?”

  “I didn’t. She landed me.”

  “I hope you count your blessings every night,” Pete told him.

  “Believe me, I do. Every night and every morning,” Mike said fervently. “So, are you okay with this work arrangement? You’re going to let Jo do the design work?”

  “Yes,” Pete said. And he’d suffer the torment of the damned every single minute he was around her.

  It was nearly dark when Pete finally pulled up at Rose Cottage with a load of lumber. Jo heard the truck rumble into the yard, grabbed a jacket and went outside and around to the front of the house to meet him.

  “I was expecting you earlier,” she said as he jumped down from the cab of the truck.

  “Sorry. I got held up. I ran into problems on every job this morning.”

  “Anything major?”

  He shook his head. “Nope. Just time-consuming. I figured I’d drop this lumber off tonight, then come by first thing in the morning to get in an hour or two of work here before I head over to the house I’m building in White Stone. I thought maybe you’d like to go with me, since that’s one of the ones I’d like you to landscape.”

  “Sure.” She studied him curiously. He hadn’t once looked directly at her. “Pete, is everything okay? You seem a little distracted.”

  “Just one of those days, I guess.” He began pulling the boards off the back of his truck and stacking them neatly.

  Without being asked, Jo went to help him, but as she reached for a board, he scowled at her. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Helping.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “But I can, so why shouldn’t I?” she asked, meeting his gaze. There was something dark and dangerous in his eyes, a look she couldn’t quite interpret.

  “I’m getting paid to do the job,” he said, trying to nudge her aside.

  “And I imagine you’re being paid by the hour, so if I help, it will cost Ashley less,” she said, grabbing for another board.

  “Jo!”

  She bit back a grin at the frustration in his voice. “Yes, Pete?”

  His fierce look finally vanished and he sighed. “What am I supposed to do with you?”

  “Let me help,” she suggested lightly.

  “I don’t think that’s the answer,” he said, and took a step toward her.

  “Pete?”

  “Yes, Jo,” he said, a smile tugging at his lips.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Give it a minute and I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” he said softly, just before he lowered his lips to hers.

  She should have protested. She should have pushed him away. But his kisses had lived in her memory for so long, how could she resist a chance to see if she’d gotten it right?

  His taste was as familiar to her as her morning coffee. The texture of his lips was soft. His tongue was wickedly clever. A tiny spark turned into a full-fledged conflagration in a matter of seconds, just as it always had.

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. She was supposed to be over him, not putty in his hands. She wanted to mold herself to his body, wanted his hands to work their inevitable magic, but he seemed to be satisfied with the kiss. In fact, he seemed dedicated to perfecting it.

  Her head was spinning, her knees were weak and her body was on fire when he finally dragged his mouth away with obvious reluctance. No, no, no, she wanted to protest, but she couldn’t summon up the strength to utter a word.

  Calling herself every kind of idiot under the sun, Jo stepped away from him and grabbed onto the truck for support. At least, Pete looked a little dazed, she decided, taking some satisfaction in that. It would be hell knowing that he’d emerged from that kiss unscathed, while her whole world had been rocked.

  “Why did you do that?” she asked shakily.

  “Because I had to,” he said. “I couldn’t survive one more second without it.”

  Her lips quirked. “Really?”

  He laughed. “Don’t be smug, darlin’. It’s not becoming.”

  “I thought maybe you kissed me because I was annoying you,” she retorted.

  “And if that had been the reason, would you be on your best behavior from here on out?”

  Jo considered the question, then shook her head. “No. Actually I think I’d go right on annoying you.”

  “And damn the consequences?”

  “Pretty much.”

  He gave her a curious look. “You’ve changed.”

  “We all do.”

  “But this goes deeper than changing hairstyles or getting a college education.”

  “Oh?”

  “You’re obviously willing to play with fire.”

  Jo thought about that with a sense of shock. Was she? Ten minutes ago she would have sworn that the opposite was true, that she never wanted to take another emotional risk in her life. That kiss had changed everything.

  “Maybe I am,” she said slowly, then regarded him with an innocent expression. “Is that a problem?”

  Pete stared at her for a very long time before a grin spread across his face. “Not for me.”

  “Okay, then, let’s get the rest of this lumber off the truck and after that I’ll fix dinner.” She met his gaze. “If you’re free.”

  He hesitated then. “This is just about dinner, right?”

  She wanted to throw caution completely to the wind and say no, that it was about seduction, but some lingering shred of common sense crept in. This was the man who’d almost destroyed her, after all.

  “It’s just about dinner,” she confirmed.

  Pete nodded. “Good to know.”

  Because he looked so sweet trying to hide his disappointment, she couldn’t resist adding, “I’ll let you know about dessert later.”

  That ought to keep his hormones twisted in a knot all through dinner, she thought with satisfaction. Maybe she had a wicked streak, after all.

  If so, nobody deserved to see it in action more than this man, who’d left her questioning everything about herself seven years ago. Maybe they’d met again just so he could help her restore her self-esteem and move on with her life.

  5

  Pete was pretty sure if Jo so much as brushed up against him, he was going to go up in flames. That kiss had re minded him of the way they were together, and he knew he wasn’t going to shake the memory anytime soon. Hell, five years of marriage—some of it actually good—hadn’t dimmed the memory of the way she’d once come apart in his arms.

  Face it, he told himself, Jo was seared into his heart and his soul.

  Worse, though, than the stirring of old memories was that deliberate little taunt she’d uttered about dessert. They both knew she wasn’t talking
about apple pie. Sweet heaven, the woman had turned into a temptress. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He’d liked her just fine when she’d been a shy, inexperienced young girl. He had a feeling the woman might just turn out to be too much for him.

  He thought of Mike’s advice to take her to bed and get the whole sexual attraction thing out of the way, but he now knew better than ever that it wouldn’t be like that. Once they slept together again, there would be no turning back, at least not for him.

  That would be all well and good if they were on the same page, but how could they be? His life was chaotic. His son was his first priority, which shouldn’t be half as complicated as Kelsey tended to make it. How could he drag Jo into that, especially when it was the very situation that had hurt her so deeply years ago? Add in Josh’s warning that Pete not hurt her, and any involvement was bound to be risky business.

  And her life was no less complicated. Some other man had broken her heart, quite recently if Pete understood what she and others had told him. Much as he might like to believe that the man meant nothing to her, he doubted that was true. If Jo had given her heart to him, then she hadn’t walked away from his betrayal un scathed. The shadows in her eyes had been proof enough of that.

  Thankfully, it appeared he wasn’t going to have to re solve the whole dilemma tonight. By the time they were inside, Jo seemed to have lost that feisty edge that had scared him to death. Obviously she was beset by second thoughts, too. In fact, she was suddenly giving him such a wide berth, it was almost insulting, as if she feared he was the one who’d put moves on her she wasn’t ready to handle.

  After putting up with her undisguised skittishness for several minutes, Pete knew they had to settle things between them. He stepped in front of her and grasped her shoulders. Alarm immediately flared in her eyes.

  “What?” she asked, her voice shaky with obvious nerves.

  “Listen to me, Jo,” he said quietly. “Nothing is going to happen between us tonight.” He was pleased by the faint flicker of disappointment that registered on her face, but he stuck to his guns. “I’m going to stay for dinner. Then I’m going to give you a chaste peck on the cheek and go home to my own bed.”

  The declaration put some color back into her cheeks. “Oh, really? What makes you think you get to decide that’s how the evening is going to go?”

  Pete laughed at the show of feistiness. “Did you have another ending in mind?”

  As he’d expected, she faltered at that. “No,” she finally admitted.

  “Okay, then, let’s just agree to the ground rules, so you can stop looking like a deer I’ve caught in my headlights.”

  “I just wanted to prove how sophisticated I’ve become,” she grumbled, stepping past him and chopping an onion with a ferocity that gave him chills.

  He finally worked up the courage to ask her what the devil she meant by that.

  She gave him a helpless shrug. “I honestly don’t know. I suppose so you wouldn’t think I’m some basket case who’d jump into bed with you on the rebound.”

  He hid a smile at that. “So if you had jumped into bed with me tonight, that would have been the only reason—the rebound thing?”

  She nodded.

  “Oh, darlin’, don’t make me prove you wrong about that,” he said seriously.

  “You can’t prove me wrong, because it’s the truth,” she declared, her eyes flashing with defiance.

  Pete couldn’t resist calling her on it. “I’ve got five bucks and a kiss that says otherwise,” he said, slapping a bill on the counter.

  Her eyes widened with shock. “Are you crazy?”

  “More than likely.”

  She forced the money back into his pocket, then immediately stepped gingerly away as if she’d belatedly realized her mistake. “I am not going to kiss you and I’m certainly not going to make a bet that says you can’t seduce me.”

  “Because you know I’m right,” he said, satisfied with the admission.

  She frowned at him, and for a minute it seemed as if she might continue the debate until Pete was forced to kiss her to prove his point. Unfortunately, though, she finally drew in a deep breath and leveled a cool look into his eyes. “Would you prefer green beans or peas with dinner?”

  Pete knew better than to laugh at the quick retreat to neutral turf. She might have felt compelled to take him up on his impulsive bet and, truthfully, he wasn’t the least bit sure if he would have been able to resist.

  The kitchen was filled with the scent of onions and garlic and tomato as Jo’s spaghetti sauce simmered on the stove, but it was the pheromones swirling in the air that were getting to Jo. Somehow in the last few hours, she’d completely lost her mind. What she’d been doing ever since Pete had arrived rivaled the stupidity of waving a red cape at a bull. Did she want the man to seduce her?

  Okay, yes, of course, she did. At least she wanted to know that he wanted to take her to bed. And it was about the rebound thing, no matter what he said to the contrary. She wanted to prove to herself that she was still a desirable woman, and who better to prove that than a man who’d once walked away from her? If she could attract Pete now, wouldn’t that prove…something?

  She tried to figure out what exactly it would prove and couldn’t. Maybe it would only prove that she really was an idiot.

  “How about some wine with dinner?” Pete asked. “I found a bottle of merlot in the wine rack.”

  Not a chance in hell, Jo thought. She needed all her wits about her if she was going to negotiate the minefield she’d set up for herself tonight.

  “No, thanks, but you have some if you’d like.”

  He shrugged. “I’m okay with a beer. Are there any in the fridge?”

  “There should be,” she said, opening the door. There were half a dozen bottles of beer inside. She took one out, twisted off the top and handed it to him. “Want a glass?”

  “Nope. The bottle will do.” He kept his gaze locked with hers. “Anything I can do to help with dinner?”

  “The sauce is almost ready. You can drain the pasta, if you want to.”

  He put his bottle on the table and picked up the heavy pot, held it over the colander and dumped in the boiling water and pasta. More of the angel hair slithered down the drain than into the colander.

  Jo chuckled as he tried to grab a handful. “Let it go,” she said. “I made more than enough. We won’t starve if some of it gets away.”

  He gave her a frustrated look. “You didn’t warn me how slippery it would be.”

  “Haven’t you ever cooked pasta before?”

  “Sure,” he said. “From a can.”

  Jo rolled her eyes. “Please don’t ever let Maggie hear you say that. You’ll absolutely destroy her respect for you. She thinks it’s disgusting enough that I don’t own a pasta machine so I can make my own.”

  “If Davey wants spaghetti, we go out,” Pete said defensively. “I like the stuff in the can.”

  “See if you can still say that after we’ve eaten tonight,” Jo said. “Of course, Maggie is right about one thing. This would be even better if we’d made the noodles from scratch.”

  He regarded her with surprise. “You can do that?”

  “If you’re asking if it’s possible for a person to make pasta in his own kitchen, the answer is yes. If you want to know if I personally can do it, then, no. I’m hopeless at anything complicated—piecrusts and pasta are be yond me. The prepared stuff suits me just fine.”

  He grinned. “Nice to know there are some principles you’re willing to compromise.”

  “Not the important ones.”

  She watched as he expertly wound some of the angel hair onto his fork, then took his first bite of the homemade sauce that was one of her Italian father’s specialties. He’d insisted all his daughters learn the recipe. “It’s a family tradition,” Max D’Angelo had told them. “I won’t have it dying out with me, so no matter what else you learn to cook, you’ll learn this sauce.”

  Maggie wa
s the only one who’d inherited his love of cooking, but the rest of them at least had this one dish they could use to impress guests. Pete was no exception. He regarded her with an expression bordering on awe.

  “I think I love you,” he said after his first bite.

  Jo’s pulse jumped, but she ignored it. “That’s the sauce talking,” she assured him…and herself. “I’ll send some home with you. You can freeze it and try it out on your son next time he visits.”

  “If you think I’m sharing this with a kid who eats peanut butter and mayo sandwiches, you’re nuts. It would be wasted on him.”

  “I’m sharing it with a man who likes spaghetti from a can,” she reminded him.

  “Not anymore,” he said fervently. “I’ll be here once a week for spaghetti. I’m writing that clause into whatever terms we set up for working together.”

  They ate for a while in silence, but Jo finally worked up the courage to bring up the one topic they’d avoided from the moment Pete had turned up on her doorstep. She figured he’d opened the door by mentioning his son’s love of spaghetti.

  She swallowed hard, then asked hesitantly, “Tell me about your son.”

  Pete’s eyes lit up at once. “He’s something. Sometimes I look at him and marvel that I had anything to do with creating such a great kid.”

  She swallowed the envy crawling up the back of her throat. “Does he look like you?”

  “He looks a lot like I did when I was his age, the same dark hair, dark eyes and the exact same stubborn chin.”

  Jo smiled, thinking about the handful of pictures she’d once seen of Pete as a kid. He’d had a snaggle-toothed smile and a dimple that wouldn’t quit. She hoped there was no trace of the sadness she was feeling in her eyes when she asked, “Do you have a picture of him?”

  “Sure.” He pulled his wallet out of his pocket and flipped it open, then handed it to her. “That’s his school picture. He’s in first grade. Believe me, he’s not normally that neat. I’m sure five seconds after they took it, his shirt was tugged out of his pants and probably torn. He reminds me of that kid in the Peanuts comic strip, the one who’s always going around in a cloud of dust. That’s Davey. Five minutes out of the tub and he looks like he’s gone ten rounds in the mud.”