more, Mommy! Mine!” JJ squealed and turned and ran, laughing hysterically as Raina growled and lumbered playfully behind him.
Through her son’s shrieks of delight, Raina heard the bell tinkle over the main door, signaling a potential customer.
“Justin Junior, you stop right there! No running through the store,” she called out, but it was futile. JJ was barreling away from her at top speed.
She rounded the corner just in time to hear a muffled “oof!” as JJ ran straight into the man who’d just entered the store. The man was wearing a very expensive looking suit, which, she groaned inwardly, now wore a fair portion of JJ’s ice cream cone, right at the level of the man’s groin. JJ rapidly backed away. The stranger looked up, a startled expression on his face as his eyes met hers. A frisson of something she couldn’t quite put her finger on ran between them like a live current. It unnerved her and made her voice sharp.
“JJ! Apologize to the gentleman, right now.”
She couldn’t help it—even though it was her fault for chasing him, she couldn’t prevent the note of censure that filled her voice. And she still felt unsettled by that look she’d just exchanged with a total stranger. A look that left her feeling things she had no right to feel. Raina dragged her attention back to the disaster at hand and searched around for something to offer the man to help him clean up.
The only pieces of fabric she had close by were a set of handmade lace doilies from the early twentieth century. She certainly couldn’t afford to lose inventory, but then again, nor could she afford to lose a potential customer either.
JJ turned his little face up to hers. His blue eyes, so like her own, filled with tears that began to spill down his still-chubby cheeks. His lower lip began to quiver. He dropped what was left of his cone on the floor and ran to her, burying his face in her maxi skirt as if he could make himself invisible.
“Hey, no harm done,” the man said, his voice slightly gruff and at odds with his words.
Raina definitely noticed a hint of Texas drawl as she glanced from her son to the customer, who, despite that initial look of shock, now appeared unfazed by the incident. He reached into his suit pocket and pulled out an honest-to-God white handkerchief. Was that a monogram in the corner? Raina didn’t think they had such things anymore.
“I’m so sorry, sir. Here, let me,” she started, reaching for the cotton square.
“Might be best if I handle this myself,” the man replied.
Oh, heavens, she was such an idiot. Of course he’d have to handle it himself. It was his groin, after all. She had no business touching any man’s trousers, let alone there. She gently set JJ to one side and got busy picking up the cone that he’d dropped on the floor, gathering the sticky mess in her left hand.
“JJ, can you go fetch me the tea towel that’s hanging up in the kitchen?” she asked her son. “And no running!”
It was too late. JJ raced away as if he couldn’t wait to put distance between himself and the mess he’d created.
“Kids, huh?”
The stranger finally smiled and Raina looked up at him—really looked this time—and felt a punch of attraction all the way to the tips of her toes. Before she could answer, JJ was back and, ridiculously glad of the distraction, Raina used the cloth to wipe up the residue from the floor and then wrapped up the cone in the towel to deal with later. Her customer had likewise dealt with the mess on his trousers.
“See, all cleaned up,” he said, rolling up the handkerchief and shoving it in his pocket again.
Raina cringed at the cost of getting all that fine tailoring back into pristine condition again. “But the stain. Please, let me get your suit dry cleaned for you.”
“No, seriously, it’s no bother. Is this your boy? JJ is it?”
She nodded and watched as the man squatted down so he was at eye level with JJ, who had cautiously turned his head around when he’d heard his name. She couldn’t help but notice how the fabric of the stranger’s trousers caught snugly across his thighs and, despite hastily averting her gaze, she also couldn’t stop the disconcerting rush of acute feminine awareness that welled inside her.
“Hey, JJ, no harm done, except to your ice cream. I’m sorry about that, champ.” When Raina started to protest that he had nothing to be sorry for, he merely put up one hand and kept his attention on her little boy. “Are you okay?”
JJ nodded.
“But you lost your ice cream. Maybe I can talk to your mommy about buying you another one. Would you like that?”
Again Raina went to protest but the man shot her a glance and a smile that made her hush. As embarrassed as she was by what had happened, she found herself prepared to follow his lead.
JJ nodded again and the man put out one hand. “Good,” he said with another smile. “Sounds like we have a deal. You want to shake on that?”
Raina felt a tug of pride as her son extended his grubby little hand to be engulfed in the stranger’s much larger one. But pride was soon overtaken by something else as she noticed the man’s hands. They were tanned and broad, with long fingers and neatly kept nails. Definitely an office worker, she surmised, and not from around here, but—oh boy—there was that swell of attraction again. What on earth was wrong with her? After Jeb, she’d sworn off men. She couldn’t trust her own judgment anymore.
The man rose to his full height, which dwarfed Raina’s own five foot seven by a good several inches. He held out his hand toward her.
“Nolan Dane, pleased to meet you.”
Automatically Raina took his hand but realized her mistake the moment she did so. A sharp tingle of electricity sizzled up her arm the second their palms met.
“I... I’m R-Raina. Raina Patterson.”
She groaned inwardly. Great, now she sounded like a complete idiot. Her heart skittered in her chest as she noticed he was still holding her hand. She gently pulled free and fought the urge to rub her palm on the fabric of her skirt. “Welcome to my store, Priceless. Were you looking for something in particular? Perhaps I can help you,” she asked, forcing herself to put her business voice on.
* * *
His first reaction to her had been instant, visceral and totally unexpected. Now Nolan could barely tear his eyes from her. She looked so much like his dead wife, Carole, it was uncanny. Her shoulder-length hair was the same shade of glossy brown that hovered between dark chocolate and rich espresso. She had the same shape of chin and brows. But it was only once he looked more closely at her that he saw the differences that set them apart.
The woman before him now wore only a bare minimum of makeup, letting her natural beauty shine, whereas Carole had been so caught up in projecting the right appearance that even he had rarely seen her without makeup on. Even at breakfast. Carole’s argument had been that while he’d comfortably slipped into a law practice with his father, she’d had a harder road to travel, proving herself against the good ol’ boys in one of Maverick County’s corporate law firms. She’d needed all the armor she could get.
But there was something in the way that Ms. Patterson carried herself, too, and the sweetly serene smile
