around to save him. Or beat him senseless.
Of course, it was possible that she was just toying with him, just messing with his mind. Look at what you can’t have, you big loser.
After all, she was dating some lawyer. Wasn’t that what Wes had said? And these days, wasn’t dating just a euphemism for in a relationship with? And that was really just a polite way of saying that they were sleeping together, lucky son of a bitch.
Colleen glanced up from her conversation with the station-wagon mom and caught him looking at her butt.
Help.
He’d known that this was going to be a mistake back in California—the second the plea for help had left Wes’s lips. Bobby should have admitted it, right there and then. Don’t send me to Boston, man. I’ve got a crippling jones for your sister. The temptation may be too much for me to handle, and then you’ll kill me.
“I’ve gotta go,” Bobby heard Colleen say as she straightened up. “I’ve got a million things to do before I leave.” She waved to the kids in the back. “Thanks again, guys. You did a terrific job today. I probably won’t see you until I get back, so…”
There was an outcry from the back seat, something Bobby couldn’t make out, but Colleen laughed.
“Absolutely,” she said. “I’ll deliver your letters to Analena and the other kids. And I’ll bring my camera and take pictures. I promise.”
She waved as the station wagon drove away, and then she was walking toward him. As she approached, as she gazed at him, there was a funny little smile on her face.
Bobby was familiar with the full arsenal of devious Skelly smiles, and it was all he could do not to back away from this one.
“I have an errand to run, but after, we could get dinner. Are you hungry?” she asked.
No, he was terrified. He sidled back a bit, but she came right up to him, close enough for him to put his arms around. Close enough to pull her in for a kiss.
He couldn’t kiss her. Don’t you dare, he ordered himself.
He’d wanted to kiss her for years.
“I know this great Chinese place,” she continued, twinkling her eyes at him. “Great food, great atmosphere, too. Very dark and cool and mysterious.”
Oh, no. No, no. Atmosphere was the dead-last thing he wanted or needed. Standing here on the blazing-hot asphalt in broad daylight was bad enough. He had to clench his fists to keep from reaching for her. No way was he trusting himself around Colleen Skelly someplace dark and cool and mysterious.
She touched him, reaching up to brush something off his sleeve, and he jumped about a mile straight up.
Colleen laughed. “Whoa. What’s with you?”
I want to sink back with you on your brightly colored bedspread, undress you with my teeth and lose myself in your laughter, your eyes and the sweet heat of your body.
Not necessarily in that order.
Bobby shrugged, forced a smile. “Sorry.”
“So how ’bout it? You want to get Chinese?”
“Oh,” he said, stepping back a bit and shifting around to pick up his seabag and swing it over his shoulder, glad he had something with which to occupy his hands. “I don’t know. I should probably go try to find my hotel. It’s the Sheraton, just outside of Harvard Square?”
“You’re sure I can’t talk you into spending the night with me?”
It was possible that she had no idea how suggestive it was when she asked a question like that, combined with a smile like that.
On the other hand, she probably knew damn well what she was doing to him. She was, after all, a Skelly.
He laughed. It was either that or cry. Evasive maneuvers, Mr. Sulu. “Why don’t we just plan to have lunch tomorrow?”
Lunch was good. Lunch was safe. It was businesslike and well lit.
“Hmm. I’m working straight through lunch tomorrow,” she told him. “I’m going to be driving the truck all day, picking up donations to take to Tulgeria. But I’d love to have breakfast with you.”
This time it wasn’t so much the words but the way she said it, lowering her voice and smiling slightly.
Bobby could picture her at breakfast—still in bed, her hair sexily mussed, her gorgeous eyes heavy-lidded. Her mouth curving up into a sleepy smile, her breasts soft and full against the almost-transparent cotton of that innocent little nightgown he’d once seen hanging in her bathroom….
Everything about her body language was screaming for him to kiss her. Unless he was seriously mistaken, everything she was saying and doing was one great big, giant green light.
God help him, why did she have to be Wes Skelly’s little sister?
Traffic was heavy through the Back Bay and out toward Cambridge.
For once, Colleen didn’t mind. This was probably the last time for a while that she’d make this drive up Comm. Ave. and over the BU bridge. It was certainly the last time she’d do it in this car.
She refused to feel remorse, refused even to acknowledge the twinge of regret that tightened her throat every time she thought about signing over the title. She’d done too much pro bono work this past year. It was her fault entirely, and the only way to make ends meet now was to sell her car. It was a shame, but she had to do it.
At least this final ride was a memorable one.
She glanced at Bobby Taylor, sitting there beside her, looking like the perfect accessory for a lipstick-red 1969 Ford Mustang, with his long hair and exotic cheekbones and those melted-chocolate eyes.
Yeah, he was another very solid reason why she didn’t mind at all about the traffic.
For the first time she could remember, she had Bobby Taylor alone in her car, and the longer it took to reach Harvard Square, the better. She needed all the time she could to figure out a way to keep him from getting out when they arrived at his hotel.
She’d been pretty obvious so far, and she wondered just how blatant she was going to have to be. She laughed aloud as she imagined herself laying it all on the table, bringing it down to the barest bottom line, asking him if he wanted to get with her, using the rudest, least-elegant language she knew.
“So…what are you going to do tonight?” she asked him instead.
He glanced at her warily, as if he were somehow able to read her mind and knew what she really wanted to ask him.
“Your hair’s getting really long,” she interrupted him before he could even start to answer. “Do you ever wear it down?”
“Not too often,” he told her.
Say it. Just say it. “Not even in bed?”
He
