LITMIR.BIZ

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and adorable, she bent to pick up the ugly frog.

      Daniel stood there in suspended silence…absorbing the pleasant scent of vanilla ice cream and summer that surrounded her…studying the endearing little cowlick that parted her hair with a swirl at her crown…considering touching the silky soft strands that looked baby fine and so touchable he had to shove his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching out and sifting it through his fingers.

      He didn’t get it. He didn’t get why he was so fascinated by her. She was as far from a siren as Dame Edith and yet she called to him. He should feel relief now that he’d done his duty. He’d delivered her safely to her door. He was free to go. So he sure as hell didn’t know why, when she turned that stupid frog upside down and slipped a key out of the compartment hidden in its belly, he felt a surge of tenderness that sent warning bells ringing in every rational part of his brain.

      Aside from general concern, it shouldn’t matter so much that the woman was being hounded by an ex-boyfriend with a whole lot of mean on his mind. It shouldn’t matter so much that she hid her house key in a frog and probably regarded it as a security measure.

      It shouldn’t matter so much that at first glance, he’d thought of her as ordinary.

      And yet it did.

      She was as far from ordinary as a dive along the outer reefs of a Micronesian atoll. As far from ordinary as the rare Lapp Orchid he’d had the pleasure of seeing in the wild in the mountains of Abisko in northern Lapland.

      Far from ordinary.

      Also, far from sophisticated. She wasn’t glamorous, wasn’t worldly. In fact, she quite possibly needed a keeper.

      He should leave before he did something really stupid and volunteered for the job.

      Instead of a quick goodbye, though, he shook his head and heaved out a sigh. Then he pried the key from her rigid fingers, inserted it into the lock and swung open her front door. Cool air gushed out of the house and into the heated night in welcome waves.

      She was in the process of stammering out an, “Oh, um, well, thank you again,” when he propped his hand above her head on the doorjamb and looked down into a face that made him think of a very cute, very sweet, very vulnerable baby owl about two wing-fluffs away from taking flight.

      “Exactly how nervous do I make you, Phoebe?” he asked with a twitch of his lips that was fast threatening to turn into another grin.

      The breath that escaped her was less sigh than surrender. “On a scale of one to ten?” She glanced up at him, then away, then back again before admitting, “About a fifty-five.”

      A dark thought had him narrowing his eyes in concern. “Because of that Jason guy? Because you think I might turn out to be like him?”

      “No. Oh no. You could never be anything like Jason Collins,” she said so adamantly that he smiled. “It’s not that at all.”

      “Because you don’t know me, then?”

      She tried to stall a small sound that could have been a groan or a squeak. “Just the opposite. Because I do know you. At least I know who you are.” Slender fingers rose toward her hair again.

      He snagged her hand midair, held it captive in his. Her hand was soft, graceful and trembling ever so slightly. He felt that tug again and, taking pity, let go with much more reluctance than was warranted.

      “I realize it’s not very sophisticated to admit it,” she said, clearly flustered by the contact, “but I don’t know quite how to act around a man like you. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to do…with my eyes…with my hands.” She stopped and lifted a hand in entreaty, her gaze landing everywhere but on him.

      Most women knew how to act, he thought cynically. At least most of the women who approached him did. Maybe that was why he found this woman so intriguing. She was a refreshing change from the women he generally tried to avoid when he returned to Boston. The Beacon Hill Beemer set generally wanted him because he had money or because they had money and he filled the bill as their equal. Some wanted to “snag” him. Some wanted to “tame” him. He recalled the ridiculous statements in the Boston Globe article with a grimace. Some, he knew for a fact, simply wanted to be seen with him. And others, for some sick reason, wanted to be used by him. He, evidently, represented their personal brush with adventure.

      It was all the more unsettling to realize that he appeared to be Phoebe’s personal brush with intimidation—unintentional on his part, but there anyway. The longer he stood here the less he liked knowing how he affected her. He could think of other ways—many other ways—he’d like to affect her. All of them involved something much more up close and personal than holding her hand.

      “When I was a little kid,” he said, “I got my foot caught in the toilet bowl.”

      Behind her glasses, her eyes, the color of apple cider, blinked, then opened wide and disbelieving. “Get out,” she said.

      He grinned at her reaction. “It’s true. I’d been running from my brother, teasing him with the last cookie, I think. I ran into the bathroom and jumped up on the stool to hold it out of his reach. Because he wanted it, that automatically meant I wasn’t going to let him have it. Long story short, he reached, I dodged. I slipped and fell in.”

      She lifted her hand to cover her mouth but not before he caught the grin twitching at its corners.

      “It was very serious. And I had some anxious moments, I’ve got to tell you.”

      “Oh, I would think so, yes,” she said, her tongue planted deeply in her cheek.

      “Yep. It was quite the ordeal. They had to dismantle the whole shebang, but once they got the toilet free from the floor, I was still stuck tighter than a wet suit on a diver.

      “So there I stood,” he went on, warmed by the sparkle of mirth in her eyes, “three paramedics, four firemen and a plumber all scratching their heads and trying to figure out how to get me out of the bowl. My dad was so angry at me that he threatened to make a harness and just let me carry the damn thing around on my foot for the rest of my life.”

      “You’re making this up,” she accused as she leaned back against the door frame, her hands behind her back now, cushioning her hips from the molding as she visibly dropped her guard and grinned up at him.

      “Scout’s honor.” He made an X over his heart with his finger. “I was ten years old and until they finally got me loose, I’d pretty much decided I’d be pitching Little League with fifty pounds of porcelain on my foot. The part I couldn’t figure out was how I was going to run the bases.”

      Her lips twitched again and her shoulders relaxed even more.

      “I’ll tell you another secret.” He leaned in, lowering his voice as if concerned someone else might hear his whispered confession. “I used to sleep with a night-light.”

      That earned him a full-fledged and gorgeous grin along with a skeptical, “Is that a fact?”

      “Yeah, but it’s been, oh, I don’t know, weeks now since I’ve felt the need to turn it on.”

      She laughed finally, all gentle, bubbling pleasure and silky sounds that warmed him in places a Bora-Bora sun never had. The smile that lingered was relaxed. And amused. And quite wonderful. So was the sparkle in her eyes. Suddenly the words turned on took a leap to another forum entirely.

      “I think, Mr. Barone, that you tell a very good story.”

      “Daniel. And I was just putting things into perspective. We’re not so different, you and me—well, except for the male/female thing,” he clarified with another grin. “And you’re looking much more comfortable now, by the way.”

      “I am. Thank you.”

      Okay. Mission accomplished. He could go now. A smart man would.

      He, evidently, was not a smart man.

      Had

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