Secret Admirer: Secret Kisses / Hidden Hearts / Dream Marriage

Annie looked up at Matt, her sweet face uncertain now.

He nodded.

“As good as gold,” Annie replied sweetly.

“I guess that settles it then,” Matt said. With the swiftness of a swooping hawk, he grabbed her hand. “You’re mine, darlin’.” His green eyes darkened possessively as he pulled her closer.

Usually she applauded people who were clear about their goals, but he was too much, and she was drowning.

“Starting tomorrow,” he persisted, “I want breakfast in bed every day until the Spring Fling.”

She yanked her hand free. Speechless and quivering from too many overwrought emotions, she turned to walk away.

“And, oh, Jane—”

She whirled. “What else?” she demanded in a contemptuous breath.

His fathomless eyes were boring holes into her. “I can’t wait,” he purred, “until tomorrow morning.”

Her nerves leaped. Her heart beat faster. She was slow to answer, but when she did, her mouth curved seductively and she could see she’d surprised him.

“Neither can I,” she whispered. “You’re in for quite a surprise.”

“Good. It’s about time you decided you have a right to have some fun. We’d be good together.”

Chapter 7

Jane got to Matt’s ancient, blue trailer about 7:00 a.m. It had rained during the night, but the sun was up and bathing the trees and his horrendously ostentatious, three-story mansion with a magical sparkling peach light.

For a moment she stared at the tasteless house that was obviously being built to impress. The man was too much. There were gaudy turrets and too many rooflines, but doves were cooing around an enormous birdbath. A gray cat lurked underneath a bush nearby. Jane liked the trees and the quiet, and the way the woodsy, warm air smelled sweetly of cedar. She liked the fact that he had a cat, too.

What was she thinking, coming here? Well, there was nothing for it but to deal with Mr. Harper as fast as possible so she could check him off her to-do list and get herself safely to work.

Quickly she got out of her Honda. With an apprehensive smile, she picked up the breakfast tray stacked with covered plates she’d prepared and picked her way across the rocky ground to his trailer.

Scared as she was at facing the devil in his lair, she couldn’t help noting that except for the trailer and the house, it really was pretty out here. Dewdrops sparkled on the leaves and turned a spiderweb into a carelessly tossed diamond necklace clinging to the branches of the live oak that shaded his trailer.

Curious, the gray cat followed her and leaped onto a large cardboard box with a picture of a window air-conditioning unit on it. The big box looked too wide to go through the door. Maybe that’s why it had been shoved to the side of a rickety set of stairs.

When she placed her foot onto his first flimsy step, the wood sagged, and her heart began to beat with alarm. The trailer was dark and silent and uninviting. Hesitantly, she lifted her hand to the door, but before she could knock, a deep, sleep-slurred voice that made her nerves vibrate said, “Come on in, darlin’.”

The cat dashed expectantly up to the door and me-owed. For a second or two Jane lingered, studying the fat black spider resting in the center of its web. The spider had several victims already. One was a pretty, blue butterfly still struggling to get loose.

Jane swallowed. She’d dressed carefully in a high-collared white blouse, long blue skirt that brushed her ankles, and white cowboy boots. The better to stomp into his trailer and kick him if he got fresh, she’d thought. She’d worn her glasses, and her hair was snug against her nape and secured with even more pins than ever. Some vain, rebellious part of her regretted that the hairdo, glasses and understated makeup had succeeded in making her look so severe and icy.

Cautiously she stuck her head inside his door while the cat scurried past her. The shadowy trailer was hot, but the coast appeared to be clear to the sink and stove, so she was inside before she realized he’d been asleep on the couch, which meant he was right beside her and close enough to grab her.

When he sprang to a sitting position, white sheets fell to his waist. Even in the semidarkness she could see that he was lean and nut brown—everywhere. Which meant he wasn’t wearing much. If anything.

His broad shoulders, wide chest and powerful arms were made of sculpted muscle. His drowsy green eyes, and his heavy, tousled black hair made him look so adorable she had to fight for her next breath. With an effort, she pretended to ignore the funny little darts of excitement zinging through her stomach. She knew she should glance away, but then he looked up at her and blushed shyly, and his gaze seemed full of longing. Was the blush a trick? Did he feel shy and vulnerable around her too? It was strange to think such a thing, that he might not always be as sure and cocky as she assumed he was.

Whatever he felt, he was not to be trusted.

Suddenly, maybe because he was so near and looked so male and dear, the trailer felt stifling, and she was burning up. The longer she looked at his wide shoulders and dark chest while she imagined those other more exciting male parts of him under the sheet, the hotter and damper she got.

“You’d better not be naked!” she squeaked when his cat jumped onto the couch and began to purr.

“You’re welcome to rip the sheet off and see.”

“A dirty trick like that from the likes of you wouldn’t surprise me. Well, I’m not afraid of you.”

“I don’t want you to be.” His white smile charmed her.

Shaking a little, she went over to the couch and carefully laid the tray in his lap.

“It wasn’t a dirty trick. It was just awful hot last night, darlin’, and you’re a little early this morning…like always. You had me so busy building those booths for you and then taking them down, plus working for your fund-raiser, that I was too tired to install my blasted window unit last night.”

The cat walked over to inspect the tray she’d brought.

“Get down, Julie Baby.” Gently he pushed the cat off the couch and lifted the cover from the first plate. Several slices of wet, blackened pieces of toast lay on the plate. She’d cooked them last night and left them out in the rain. When he removed the cover from a second plate, his black eyebrows arched warily at the smell of fermentation.

“Creative. Resourceful. Where’d you find the rotten apples on such short notice?”

“In my compost heap.”

“And you accuse me of dirty tricks. Looks like we’re made for each other, darlin’.” His quick grin as he shoved the tray aside was disarming. “But, hey, no time like now to find out, is there?”

Before she could run, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her down onto his lap.

He was definitely naked. She could feel him under the thin folds of the sheet.

“Our deal didn’t include anything but breakfast,” she said primly, struggling to free herself until she realized the slightest movements of her hips against his only heightened his arousal.

“You didn’t fulfill your part of the bargain, darlin’,” he whispered, nuzzling her neck while yanking pins out of her hair. “I bid five thousand dollars for services you have yet to render. Now you have to pay.”

Her hair cascaded to her shoulders in skeins of shimmering silk.

“Much better,” he said. “And now off with the glasses.”

“What do you want?” she asked weakly as he removed them.

“The same thing you do,” he replied huskily.

“The position of director of market research?”

“Among other things.” He used both hands to pull her snug against his body, which made her achingly aware of how hard and muscular his thighs were against hers.

“Let me go.”