Page 24 of Dangerous Lover

No, her heart rate and breathing speeded up because he had the most magnificent male body she’d ever seen. Her knees trembled at the sight of his hands—large, elegant, rough, strong. His deep voice set off vibrations in the pit of her stomach.

Oh, this was bad. Jack Prescott was her boarder. He was paying her an above market price for life in her very beautiful but at times fiercely uncomfortable home. She couldn’t afford to be breathless when she spoke to him, or for him to catch her sneaking admiring glances at the breadth of his shoulders or the size of his biceps.

Caroline had to get a grip on herselfnow.

She had to put this back on a landlady-tenant basis. Cordial and impersonal.

She pasted a polite smile on her face and made polite landlady-talk. “Would you like some more roast beef”

“No, ma’am,” he said, unsmiling. “I’m fine.” His eyes never wavered from hers.

They were so dark. She’d rarely seen eyes that dark, with only a hint of a distinction between the pupil and the iris…

She shook herself.

“I hope you saved some room for dessert. I made chocolate mousse. We can take it in the living room with the coffee, if you’d like.”

He became, if possible, even more still. His eyes probed hers, as if she’d said something compelling.

“Yes, ma’am. I’d like that very much.” He rose before she did, in a smooth graceful motion, and pulled her chair out as she stood up. When was the last time a man had done that?

Caroline pointed at the living room. “Go on ahead, I’ll bring in the coffee and the mousse.”

When she walked into the living room carrying a tray with two bowls of mousse and two cups of coffee, she saw him crouching beside the fire, feeding a log, stoking the wood with the poker. Sparks flew up the flue. A log fell, bursting into red-hot flames, outlining his broad back in a rim of fiery red. The tight black jeans showed the long, massive muscles of his thighs, flexed in the crouch. He rose easily and turned.

“Here, let me get that.” He took the tray from her hands and put it on the coffee table.

The fire rose, renewed, great rolling flames greedily licking at the wood, filling the room with heat and the friendly crackle of the flames. It was like a third person in the room with them.

Caroline sat back on the sofa, sipping her coffee. As so often in difficult times, she tried to count her blessings. She was in good health. January’s bank payment would be made. February’s—well, that was in the future, wasn’t it? Jack said he was staying. He didn’t look like the kind of man who’d run screaming from a temperamental boiler. She might make it through February. She might not. One thing the last six years had taught her was not to sweat the things she couldn’t influence or change. And to make the most of things, thinking resolutely positively. She’d trained herself to do it.

Unfortunately, frantically thinking happy thoughts didn’t always work as well as she wanted. Tomorrow was Christmas day, when the world as she knew it had come to a crashing end. Christmases were always so hard.

There were so many memories of happy Christmas Eves in this room. Mom and Dad and Toby, music and laughter and firelight. She remembered a Christmas Eve with Sanders, before the accident. Toby’d been, what? Seven? She’d started dating Sanders—the first of their many stop-and-go affairs—and she’d invited him over for Christmas Eve. Her parents had been charmed by Sanders’ good manners and adult conversation. That was before they got to know him. Later, her father had grown to despise him. But that first evening they were all smiles.

She—well, she’d been blindly infatuated. So blind that she lost her virginity to him a couple of months later.

That evening, Mom had filled the living room with candlelight. Her mother had loved candles. She lit them on every possible occasion, and sometimes just because she felt like it.

The memory of that evening could warm her still. She could even remember the sharp smells of that evening melding together—Mom’s Diorissimo, hot candle wax, wood smoke, the cook’s cakes and scones, Earl Grey tea and Dad’s bourbon. A heady scent of joy and celebration.

She’d played the piano and they’d sung Christmas carols. She’d played?—

“… play?”

With a wrench, Caroline brought her mind back to the present. Her boarder was sitting next to her. Not so close itmade her uncomfortable, but close enough so that she could feel his body heat and feel the air move and the sofa dip as he leaned forward to put his cup on the coffee table. Seeing him this close up, she felt slightly overwhelmed by the sheer size of him. It seemed his shoulders took up half the sofa.

Her perfectly normal-sized coffee cup looked tiny in his hands. His hands were compelling, unlike any other male hands she’d ever seen. Though they were huge, the skin visibly rough, as if he worked with them a lot outdoors, they were also naturally well-shaped, long-fingered, elegant and strong, with a light dusting of black hairs on the backs. The nails were clean but clearly unmanicured, so very unlike Sanders’ hands, which were pale and soft, with perfect, buffed nails.

Oh my God. She was doing it again—drifting with her thoughts. He’d said something. “I beg your pardon?”

Jack inclined his head towards the piano. His voice was patient. He was a strong guy—a soldier. Presumably that gave him extra patience not to roll his eyes and shout at the crazy lady who drifted away in her head at the drop of a hat. “I see you have a piano. I imagine you play. I’d love to hear you play something.”

No, absolutely notwas her first instinct and she had to clench her jaws tightly closed to keep from saying the words.

No way could she play. She hadn’t played since before Toby died. Not enough time had passed. Her feelings were too close to the surface, the memories too bright, the pain still razor-sharp…

“Please,” he said and waited, watching her patiently.

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