saw that Max Monroe had just ambled through the open door. She moistened her lips and then frowned at her grinning assistant. “Would you stop it? How would Jack feel about you ogling the customers, hmm?”
Lynn giggled. “He’d approve if he knew I was only doing it for your benefit.”
“Yeah, right.”
Max didn’t pause, but continued to the counter, where Lynn and Ryan waited on customers. “Hi again,” he said.
“Looking for a present for another niece, Mr. Monroe?” Ryan asked as Lynn moved discreetly away.
“No.”
Glancing around to make sure no one was listening, he leaned a bit closer to her. “Actually, I’m here to ask you for a date. Maybe we could see a movie or something?”
“Max—”
He touched her hand as it lay on the counter between them, giving her a look that made her voice fade. “I don’t mean to annoy you with my persistence, but I thought I’d try this one more time. I like the way you smile, Ryan Clark. I’d like to get to know you. I guess that sounds like a line to you—”
“Yes,” she admitted a bit shakily. “It does.”
“Sorry. But it’s true. Will you go out with me?”
“I—it’s such a busy time for me,” she said, wondering why she couldn’t just tell him no.
For some reason, she kept hearing the voice of the mall Santa Claus. “All you have to do is open yourself up to possibilities and be ready to act when the opportunity presents itself,” he’d said.
Maybe she’d leapt to conclusions about Max Monroe. Maybe she’d written him off as a “possibility” without giving him a fair chance. Maybe he wasn’t really a heartbreaker, after all.
And maybe pigs would fly, she thought, eyeing the devilish twinkle in his blue-gray eyes.
“Just a movie,” he said again, his fingers tightening on hers. “There’s a nine-twenty feature in the theater downstairs. I can meet you here at nine when you close your shop and we can see the film without even leaving the mall, if that makes you more comfortable. C’mon, Ryan. It’ll be fun.”
She felt something give inside her. “All right,” she heard herself saying cautiously. “I guess it would be fun to see a movie. I haven’t had a night off in a while.”
His smile was blinding. “Great. Afterward, maybe we could have a cappuccino or something?”
“Let’s just wait and see about afterward, okay?”
He nodded, accepting her equivocation without protest. “Then I’ll meet you at nine?”
“Fine,” she said, hoping she wasn’t making a big mistake. But how bad could it be? If he’d been trying to put her at ease by choosing a safe, very public setting for their first date, he’d succeeded.
She suspected that he was entirely too good at this sort of thing. She’d have to be on her guard against him. But, still, she found herself looking forward to the evening.
It really had been too long since she’d had a night out, she reminded herself. That was all there was to it.
Max didn’t linger, but left the shop looking quite satisfied with himself.
A plump matron with improbably red hair set a Barbie doll and several accessories on the counter in front of Ryan. “If a man like that had flirted with me that way while I was young and single, I know what I would have done,” she murmured to her shopping companion with a wistful sigh, making no effort to keep Ryan from overhearing. “I’d have latched on to him before he’d known what had him.”
Ryan flushed, busying herself immediately with ringing up the woman’s purchases.
“Not many like him come along,” the woman’s friend agreed heartily. “Did you see that smile? If I were ten years younger, I’d chase him down right now.”
The red-haired shopper snorted. “Fifteen years, maybe,” she muttered.
Business quickly became brisk again, to Ryan’s relief. She didn’t want time to dwell on the evening ahead.
SHE THOUGHT OF little Kelsey at a quarter to nine that evening. Ryan was straightening the shelves, returning merchandise to its proper position, setting out a few new items in inviting poses, preparing for the next day’s business, when she spotted the dark-haired doll. Smiling, she picked it up and fluffed its full blue skirt.
It was a pretty little thing, a numbered, limited edition from one of Ryan’s favorite sources. It was the only one like it she had received, and she had actually expected it to sell before this.
She wished Kelsey’s mother would come into the shop so Ryan could mention to her how much the little girl seemed to want the doll. Maybe Kelsey had already told her.
And then Ryan remembered the children’s shabby clothing. She frowned. It was entirely possible their mother couldn’t afford the doll.
Ryan set it back in its place, telling herself that if Kelsey’s mother did come in, she would give her a very good deal. In this case, for Kelsey’s sake, she was willing to forgo her profit.
There was something about that child that had gotten to Ryan. Pip, too.
When she looked up, she saw that Max had arrived for their impromptu date, and everything else left her mind.
IT WAS SOMETIME DURING the latter half of the movie that Ryan realized she’d been right to be suspicious of Max’s seemingly innocuous manner in asking her out.
Oh, he’d started out casually enough. Escorted her into the theater as easily as if they’d known each other for years. Bought soft drinks and a huge tub of popcorn for them to share. Chatted about trivialities during the few minutes they waited before the feature started. Laughed along with her at the antics of the mixed-up couple falling in love on the screen.
He’d waited until she was relaxed and at ease with him before making his move—which he did with a subtlety and skill that would have made the teenage boys surrounding them green with envy. Ryan couldn’t even have said when he scooted closer to her in his seat or when his arm slipped behind her.
At first she thought it coincidence that his hand brushed hers so often as she reached for popcorn. A very pleasant coincidence. And then she noticed how long his fingers lingered, making her all too vividly aware of the feel of him.
His thigh pressed lightly against hers, and she felt his warmth through the thin layers of clothing that separated them. His strength. Their shoulders touched; she felt him breathing. She could see his shadowed profile from the corner of her eye. His lashes were long, his chin firm, his mouth luscious.
Gorgeous. And dangerous.
The beautiful couple on screen eased into a slow, heated embrace. The background music was deep, stirring, swelling to a crescendo that seemed to throb through her. Max’s hand slid caressingly over her shoulder, down her arm, his fingers lingering just inches from her right breast.
Ryan
