Millionaire on Her Doorstep

“Oh, I’m sure you have,” she replied dryly, then walked back to where he stood. “Tell your parents I really appreciate their thoughtfulness, but I—”

“What about my thoughtfulness?”

She cast him a doubtful frown. “Somehow I really don’t believe you want me in your home.”

“It’s my parents’ home,” he reminded her. “I just happen to be staying there, too, for the time being. Besides, I invited you, didn’t I?”

She shrugged. “Yes. But you also accused me of trying to kill you.”

“I can forget about that if you can.”

By nature, Maureen was a forgiving person. She’d never been one to harbor grudges, and even though Adam had said plenty of things to anger her, she wouldn’t continue to hold it against him. No, forgetting their past quarrel would be easy. It was the other things the man did to her that had Maureen worried. Spending more time around him than was necessary would be deliberately asking for trouble.

“As far as I’m concerned, our first meeting is over and forgotten. I’m sorry you were hurt and I can understand and forgive your anger toward me.”

Her head was tilted downward, her eyes veiled by thick, dark lashes. He took advantage of the unguarded moment to feast his eyes on her smooth skin. Beneath the golden tan, a faint dusting of freckles sprinkled the bridge of her nose and the ridge of her cheekbones.

Adam had the strongest urge to lean forward and press his lips to her cheeks and nose, to taste each little brown Beck. “I’m not angry anymore.”

The huskiness of his voice lifted her eyes to his, and in that moment Maureen knew he was seeing her not as a co-worker, but as a woman. The idea was both terrifying and thrilling.

She nervously moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. “I’m glad. But I’m still not sure....”

“How are you moving your things up from Houston? Or have you already?”

She shook her head. “I sold some of my furniture. What’s left I’m going to have shipped with my clothes, household goods and other items in a moving van. As soon as the paperwork on the house is finalized,” she added.

His expression turned incredulous. “The house! You mean you’ve already bought a house?”

Maureen refused to be chagrined. “Yes. I found one yesterday. Of course, it’ll be at least a couple of weeks before the abstract can be read by a lawyer and everything can be signed.”

“All I can say is, you don’t waste time, lady.”

She’d wasted...no, she swiftly corrected herself, she’d lost the past ten years of her life. She hadn’t wasted them. But things were going to be different now. Last night, she’d vowed to put her ex-husband and their dead baby behind her once and for all. She was going to move into her new house, focus on building herself a different life and forgetting everything that she’d lost.

“I can’t afford to waste time.”

One brow arched curiously at her remark. “You have a date to keep?”

Her face grew stiff and devoid of emotion. “I don’t have dates.”

His slow perusal of her brought a tinge of color to her cheeks. Adam didn’t let her discomfiture stop him. “You’ll probably think I’m impertinent,” he said. “But I’m going to ask why anyway.”

She turned her head away, but not before Adam spotted the faintest tremble at the corner of her lips. “You are being impertinent, and my personal life—or lack of one—is none of your business.”

Yesterday, her clipped words would have put a smug smile on his face. He would have found enjoyment in the knowledge that she could be wounded. But today, all he could feel was an overwhelming urge to reach out and touch her.

“You’re right,” he said quietly, then cleared his throat and jammed his hands into the back pockets of his jeans. “It is none of my business. So let’s get back to the initial question. Would you like to come stay at the ranch?”

She glanced at him, and for a split second he saw a flash of raw hunger in her eyes. The brief sight of it stabbed him right in the breastbone.

“It is tempting. I hate motel rooms.”

Latching onto the uncertainty in her voice, he said, “The Bar M is beautiful. We have a swimming pool, there’s always plenty of good food to eat, and you’d have a room off to yourself. You wouldn’t have to see me or anyone else, unless you wanted to.”

She did want to see him. That was the whole problem. But it wasn’t as if she was going to throw herself into Adam Sanders’s arms. Since David had walked out on her, she’d developed a willpower as strong as steel. She could resist any man.

“You make it sound very appealing.” She looked at him with sudden resolution. “I think I’ll accept your invitation, Adam.”

He didn’t know which pleased him more—her calling him by his first name or the fact that he’d won her over and she was going to be staying on the ranch.

Resisting the urge to grab her hand and smother the back of it with kisses, he said, “Good. After work this evening, I’ll help you get your things from the motel and then you can follow me home.”

Follow me home.

As Maureen watched him leave the lab, she tried her best not to take his words literally. This brief stay on the Bar M with Adam and his family would only be a glimpse of what she would never have.

The more she reminded herself of that fact, the safer her heart would be.

Chapter Three

Adam glanced in his rearview mirror. She was back there. Just as she’d been when he’d checked five minutes ago.

He’d really done it this time! What the hell had he been thinking? It would have made much more sense to simply reimburse Maureen for her motel expenses instead of inviting her to the ranch.

But that was the whole problem, he argued with himself. The Bar M was only his temporary home. He had to consider his parents’ feelings in the matter. And he knew how pleased they would be that he’d been able to persuade Maureen to stay the next few weeks with them.

Chloe and Wyatt had always been generous people. Not just with their money or the things it could afford them to give, but generous of themselves. Adam had long wished he possessed at least a fraction of their generosity.

But now as Maureen followed him closely up the pine-lined lane to the ranch, he wished when he’d looked into Maureen’s warm brown eyes this morning, he’d been a bit stingier with his hospitality. In spite of the physical attraction he felt for her, he didn’t want to get involved with her. Or any woman. And he was going to make damn sure he didn’t.