Chapter 12 #2
“You suspect that someone is deliberately trying to make you believe you’re being haunted and you let yourself be lured into a creepy cellar with no way to escape?”
“I had a knife,” she retorted, not about to admit that she’d been acutely aware she was acting like an idiot. “I had to know.”
His jaw tightened. “A knife? You think that’s going to protect you?”
“I wasn’t going to cower under my bed while some jerk tried to gaslight me.”
“Fine, don’t cower. But also, don’t go down into creepy cellars alone,” he protested. “All you had to do was lock the door and wait until someone could go down there with you.”
For whatever ridiculous reason, his rational suggestion scraped against her raw nerves and she glared at him in frustration. “Who? Who would go with me? The sheriff ?”
“Me.”
The word was soft, but it slammed into her with shocking force. With a blink, she stared into his dark blue eyes, knowing she should step back even as she swayed forward.
“You have enough on your plate without worrying about me,” she said in a husky voice.
His gaze lowered to her parted lips. “You’re the only thing that I’d actually enjoy having on my plate right now.”
The sound of something heavy thumping against the wood-planked floor sounded as loud as a gunshot, shattering the dangerous sense of intimacy.
“Am I interrupting?”
With a gasp, Jesse jumped back, her gaze swinging toward the open door where a man was standing.
“Parker,” she breathed, for a second wondering if he were an illusion.
Caught in a shaft of late afternoon sunlight that emphasized his delicate features and glowed in his satiny halo of curls, he appeared more ethereal than usual. As if he were a fantasy, not a flesh-and-blood man.
The black eyes, however, were all too real as they swept from Jesse to Noah with a searing intensity.
“So you do remember me,” he said in a tight voice.
“Don’t be silly.” Jesse felt a heat stain her cheeks, immediately followed by a pang of annoyance. She hadn’t been doing anything wrong. Besides, she was too damned old to be blushing. She squared her shoulders. “What are you doing here?”
“I thought my girlfriend might be missing me.” Parker stepped over the backpack at his feet. She assumed the canvas bag hitting the floor was what had caused the loud thump. “Now I’m not so sure.”
“Of course I’ve missed you.” With a click of her tongue she moved to meet him, as much to keep him away from Noah as to make sure he realized that he had nothing to worry about.
Once she was close enough, she wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him.
“Desperately,” she whispered against his lips.
He returned her hug, but his gaze remained locked on the man standing near the cellar door. “Desperately?”
Jesse heaved a sigh. Parker had never been irrationally jealous, but there was no doubt he was protective. She’d assumed it was because they worked in an environment where men were constantly hitting on her.
Swiveling until she was facing Noah with her back pressed against Parker’s chest, she made the introductions.
“Parker, this is an old friend of mine, Noah. Noah, Parker Moreau.”
Noah casually ignored Parker, clearly blatantly indifferent to Parker’s jealousy.
“I should be getting back to the lumberyard.” There was a deliberate pause, his gaze locked on Jesse’s face. “If you’re sure that everything’s okay?”
“Yep, it’s all better now, thanks.” Her tone was ridiculously chirpy, but she just wanted the tense atmosphere to go away.
“No problem.”
Noah walked past them with a slow stroll, as if emphasizing the fact that he was several inches taller than Parker. Jesse rolled her eyes. Men.
Waiting until she heard the back door snap shut, Jesse turned to meet Parker’s smoldering glare.
“An old friend, eh?” he demanded.
Jesse tilted her chin. She was willing to make allowances for Parker’s mood. He’d walked in to find her standing suspiciously close to an attractive man. But she hadn’t done anything wrong and she wasn’t going to apologize.
“I do have a few,” she informed him.
“What was he doing here?”
“He owns the local lumberyard and I hired him to take care of some repairs on the bar before I put it up for sale.”
Her explanation did nothing to ease Parker’s annoyance. In fact, his brows lowered and his eyes narrowed. “Repairs? Why are you paying for repairs if you’re going to sell the place?”
“Because I want to get top dollar.”
He swept a disbelieving glance around the shadowed bar. “Top dollar?”
Jesse forced a smile to her lips even as she squashed the stab of betrayal. Of course Parker wouldn’t feel her intense loyalty for this place. To him, it was just another run-down building. For her … well, it’d always been home.
“Hey, this is prime real estate. Or at least that’s what my real estate agent keeps telling me. All it needs is some TLC.”
Her tone was teasing, but Parker must have sensed he’d stepped over a line. With a visible effort, he relaxed his tense expression.
“What about me? Do I get some of that TLC?”
She met his smoldering gaze, a spark of desire igniting in the pit of her stomach. She arched until she was pressed against his slender form.
“Do you want some?”
He lowered his head, his lips finding the spot behind her ear that made her toes curl in anticipation.
“Desperately.”