Page 3 of Rainwater
He was at least part Apache, she speculated, with his sharp, high cheekbones, and his full sensuous mouth and strong firm chin. Long, tousled hair in differing lengths was pushed off his forehead, blue-black and gorgeous—a dead giveaway to the fact that he had Native American blood in him. A hint of a wild, untamed nature glinted in his astonishing eyes. A warning?
One she intended to heed.
He canted his hip slightly in an arrogant display of male cockiness, indicating that he knew she was looking and he didn’t mind. In fact, she had the feeling that he welcomed her appraising eyes on him.
Dangerous.
She had never met a more blatantly sexy man since Sonny, and even he paled by comparison.
“What brings you to Silver Creek?” she managed to ask, trying to conceal the evident wonder he evoked in her.
He didn’t answer but strode away. He shucked the worn mackintosh and stowed it in the pocket of the saddlebag he had strapped to his gleaming motorcycle. She shouldn’t have, but she did notice the way his tight black jeans molded to his very nice backside.
She must have been so caught up in her argument with Jay that she hadn’t even noticed the noise of the sleek motorcycle’s powerful engine.
Even through the coating of dust, she could tell the bike was well taken care of. He’d probably put it together himself, she mused. He looked like the kind of man who was good with his hands.
“Where’s the nearest hotel?” he asked with his back to her.
Thank God, he couldn’t see her eyes. She took a deep breath. “No hotel. We’ve only got one motel and it’s at the end of town, but it’s really clean. Ellen Beaumont runs both the motel and the diner and she keeps everything spic and span. She even tries to dry the sheets outside if she can manage. We call her Mrs. Clean.”
He chuckled softly without real mirth. “If it has a bed and a shower, I’ll be ecstatic. I’ve done my share of sleeping on the ground.”
An unexpected catch of pain stabbed her heart at the disheartened tone of his voice. Hadn’t anyone ever shown him alittle kindness? He seemed so alone and so sad. “Just keep going down this road.” She pointed down the main street of town when he turned around, leaning his backside against the seat of the motorcycle. “It’s next door to the diner.”
“I have always wondered what the difference is between a hotel and a motel.” He raked his hands through his hair and it fell back around his shoulders like a dark waterfall. She wondered what it would feel like between her fingers, against her heated skin.
Realizing that she was staring at him again, she shifted and stuck her hands in the pockets of her straight denim skirt. “A motel wants to be a hotel when it grows up.”
His lips twitched. His eyes traveled over her, and even though the humor glinted in them, she could still see the anger burning in their depths.
“Ah, a woman with sassandbackbone. A volatile combination,” he said huskily, his voice doing strange and amazing things to her insides.
His eyes moved slowly over her, causing that warm tingle in her stomach to radiate to her skin. The appreciative look in his eyes made her so nervous that she instantly looked away.
Softly he said, “Look at me, Jennifer.”
Her eyes flew to his and her face flamed. His eyes lingered with intense force on her lips.
Self-consciously she licked them and the appreciative look swiftly changed to one she recognized immediately. Her breath fisted in her lungs. God, she’d never had a man look at her like that. It weakened her knees to jelly. It wasn’t lustful, exactly. It was the intense look of a man who admired a good-looking woman and made her feel intensely beautiful.
Unfortunately, the look made her remember what it was like to be held by a man, made love to—it brought heated visions of a hard, muscular body, legs wrapped around hers and warm,supple skin. For a silent moment, she savored those memories with a hunger that had grown over the thirteen long years since she divorced Sonny.
“So, are you visiting?” she managed to say around the knot in her throat.
“No.” He folded his arms over his chest and tilted his head with a self-indulgent expression on his face.
“On vacation?” She thought that possibility unlikely and noticed how his eyes became distant, wary and closed.
“No.”
“Just passing through?”
“You’re very inquisitive, Jennifer Horn.”
And you are very guarded, Corey Rainwater. Yet regardless of the shield he had erected, she could see the pain in his eyes. This man was scarred and battered by life. He was running, she thought silently. “And you’re being polite. My father would have called it nosy.” She could hear her father’s voice.That inquisitiveness is going to get you into trouble one day, girl. That devil-may-care attitude will, too. He’d been right. The fact that she was raising a child alone showed her how her impulsiveness had gotten her into trouble. “My father always told me I was as curious as a cat.”
A smile warmed his face and twinkled in his eyes. “Well, darlin’, cats have nine lives. You only have one.”
