Chapter 14 #2
Maybe she could just close her eyes and forget everything that had happened so far tonight.
She tried…for a whole five seconds she tried.
Ultimately, the contents of the manila envelope in her hand kept flashing though her mind.
Then the spiky, barbed sweet gum balls poked through her blouse, prickling her flesh with stings of pain.
Where was her coat? In the car? No. The coat along with her purse and hat and gloves and sanity were back across town at Peyton’s.
If only she’d headed on home and waited till tomorrow to get the mail, things would have been different.
No, things would still be the same, except it would be daylight.
She didn’t like the dark. The dark could hide a million things. And people.
Staring at the sidewalk leading to Cain’s front porch, she slowly pushed to her feet. He might have most of the people in town believing his return was the best thing to happen to Crayton, Missouri, in years, but she would not be fooled.
Rubbing her bruised backside, she limped to the front door and punched what appeared to be a new doorbell.
No doubt part of his remodeling. She listened to the rolling chime from inside.
No footsteps. She punched again. Still no footsteps.
She glanced at the time on her phone—7:14.
He wouldn’t be in bed yet. Of course, technically it was the weekend, maybe he’d gone out for the evening.
She pressed long and hard on the doorbell. Then punched and punched and punched with every ounce of mad she could muster.
What if he wasn’t home? What if he’d got wind that someone had made him and already left town? She’d hunt him down. Make him pay for using her place as a cover to deal.
“Cain Connery. You better answer this door. You hear me?” She punched the button one more time.
“If you want to keep that finger, you better ease off the buzzer.” Heavy, to-the-point footsteps echoed through the door along with the words. The lock jiggled. Handle turned. “This better be damn important.”
The door jerked open along with a jerk to her senses.
She blinked at the scowl on Cain’s face, the flash of his blue eyes and the rigid line of his lips.
Jeans riding low on his hips and shirtless.
She struggled against the ease of her shoulders, the stretch of her neck, the part of her lips.
She knew her body’s reactions to mind-crashing need all too well. She clamped her lips back together.
Still her gaze scanned down from the width of his shoulders to the narrow of his waist to, heaven help her, even further. It was as if she were still seventeen and had no control over herself, not the levelheaded woman she knew herself to be.
Rivulets of water trailed from his espresso-colored hair downward, hugging the contours of the pulsing veins in his neck, spreading across his chest, tracing the swell of his abs and…
The streams finally merged with the hair trailing beneath his waistband.
Her imagination filled in the rest, and she struggled not to reach out and let her fingertips trace the path of one of those little drops of water.
Guess she’d interrupted his shower.
She sucked in a stutter of air and felt the heat rise in her cheeks. Returning her eyes to his face, she tried to focus enough to remember why she was standing on his porch in the first place. At this point she didn’t care.
He braced his hand against the doorframe as the corners of his mouth quirked. “What’s up, Betsy? Glad to see you got back okay.”
With his I-take-care-of-business attitude, he impressed her. With his pure, rock-hard-and-knowing-it masculinity, he flustered the hell out of her. Plus, his expression floated somewhere between glad to see you and mad as hell. Good. She was mad, too.
She shook the manila envelope in his face. “Who do you think you are? I’ve worked long and hard to turn Peyton’s into a place known for honesty and good deals.”
He stared at her like she wasn’t making sense.
Lightheaded, she wobbled, then reached out to steady herself on the side of the house. She should have grabbed a sandwich after she got off the plane back in St. Louis. “What made you think you could…”
If the world would just come back into the spotlight from its double-shadowed nauseating haze, she could continue her tirade.
Maybe if she lowered her head, she’d be okay.
Confused over why she was having such an intense hypoglycemic reaction, she stepped toward the swing on the porch to sit down, but her legs folded like pudding.
Cain grabbed her around the waist, holding her up.
Where had she seen him do that before? Photo…the photo of him and the woman. Now, he lowered her to her knees on his front porch.
“What’s the matter, Betsy?” Kneeling beside her, his voice was soft, like an echo.
Desperate to stay alert, she pushed to get away from the scent of sandalwood and testosterone his closeness held.
Her stomach grumbled. Her mind fuzzed again.
Giving up the fight, clammy wooziness permeated her skin with a chilly tingle as she leaned against him.
Her body screamed its need for food like squealing tires firing against the go-line at the racetrack.
Cain smoothed her hair, held her close. “Are you okay?”
“It’s…it’s nothing. I just haven’t eaten since this morning.” She hated the loss of control over her body. Her emotions. But most of all, she hated being in a position where she needed to depend on someone else.
“What’s got you so riled up?” His hold eased.
“You will not use my dealership to sell drugs. Got that? Take your operations elsewhere.” Her voice resonated as if in a haze deep inside her head.
Two little frown lines scrunched between his eyebrows. “What are you talking about, Betsy?”
She shoved the manila envelope at his chest, and for a split second her fingers touched his skin. Her skin tingled with the feel of him while he didn’t even seem to notice her touch, instead he undid the flap and let the papers and photos slide out into his hand.
His nostrils flared while he fanned the papers out like playing cards. When he got to the last page, his eyes narrowed. “Where’d you get this?”