feeling in the pit of her stomach.
“Yeah, and what if Jake’s tired of slick women and is looking for a small-town girl?” Caro asked.
“I doubt that someone like Jake is interested in me…”
Caro chuckled. “I would have never dreamed I would end up marrying Max Riley…Yet here we are.”
“Yeah, and me with Troy Cramer!” Sadie said then laughed. “The last I had heard he was a computer nerd. He surprised the hell out of me, and Jake might just surprise the hell out of you.”
Hannah licked her suddenly dry lips.
Sadie caught her forearm and squeezed lightly. “Hannah, if you’re attracted to him, you can’t leave town without trying.”
All right. So Hannah agreed with them. Sort of. Somewhat. It did seem possible that after fifteen years of running around, and also because he now had a baby, Jake might be ready to settle down. She could buy that.
Over the course of the three days Jake was away, Hannah also admitted to herself that she really didn’t want to leave Wilburn. She never had. She liked it here. She liked the simple, quiet life. She liked kids. And, yes, damn it, she also liked Jake. If her sisters saw a spark of interest in his eyes then Hannah would be a fool to leave town without at least attempting a relationship with him.
After the cleaning lady had gone Thursday afternoon, Hannah popped a casserole into the oven, set Jake’s dining room table with good china and waited for his return. The itinerary his secretary had given Hannah said that he would arrive in Pittsburgh at four and take Troy’s private plane to the airstrip behind Troy’s estate. Adding a twenty-minute drive from the airstrip, Jake would arrive a little before six.
But he wasn’t home by a quarter to six as she believed. He didn’t even make it home by six. Unfortunately, six turned into seven, which turned into eight, and Hannah had no choice but to put Dixon to bed. She lowered the temperature of the oven for her casserole and then began to pace the foyer. She considered calling the Sunbright offices to see if he had stopped there before coming home, but didn’t feel right about that.
When another half hour ticked off the clock without Jake, Hannah began to worry in earnest. Troy had built the Sunbright Solutions complex in a wooded area. He’d wanted space to expand and plenty of land for employees to walk the grounds as they thought through complicated problems. But that also meant the road that led to the offices was twisty and windy. Jake could have been in an accident. He could have driven off the side of the road, rolled down a hill, landed in the thick forest and not be discovered for days!
She was just about to panic when the front door opened. Jake stepped inside as if nothing had happened and Hannah threw herself into his arms. “Oh, my gosh! I was so worried about you!”
For the briefest of seconds Hannah thought she felt his arms tighten around her, and she realized she was pressed against his chest. The stretch of her arms around his neck proved he was a good six inches taller than she was. She could smell the faint scent of the aftershave he had put on that morning.
Her breathing stopped. Every cell in her body sprang to life with awareness of him. And all she wanted at that moment was to snuggle against him and to bury her face in his neck.
But just as quickly as she had gotten the impression that his arms were around her, the feeling was gone. She realized that holding a briefcase and a suitcase made it impossible for him to hold her, yet she was clinging to his neck like an idiot.
She jumped away. Though her face flamed with embarrassment, she decided to use her brother’s friendship with Jake to make hugging him seem reasonable. “Sorry. It’s just that we never know about Luke. We’re always pacing the floor, thinking the worst. I expected you at six and started to worry at eight. For the past half hour I’ve been pacing.”
“I stopped at the office.” Jake dropped his suitcase and pocketed his keys and, as if nothing had happened, turned toward the hallway that led to his office. “I work late a lot.”
The completely neutral tone of his voice made Hannah swallow. Good Lord, she’d really made a fool of herself this time. She was such an idiot! Sadie would have never lost control and shown her emotions that way. Caro would have died first. Even Maria would have been cooler, calmer.
Hannah swallowed hard. “I made a casserole, if you’re hungry.”
He shrugged. “No. Not really.” He began to walk down the corridor, paused, and faced her again. “You do know you’re only here to care for the baby.”
She swallowed, then nodded.
“You don’t need to make me supper, wait for me, or anything like a regular housekeeper would do.” He held her gaze. “You just take care of Dixon.”
She nodded again. Jake smiled and resumed his trip to his office.
But tears stung Hannah’s eyes. She was an idiot. A big, fat, stupid idiot! And if she didn’t learn some sophistication soon and get the hell out of this town, she was going to die of embarrassment.
Chapter Three
Absolutely positive he was going to be punched out by his best friend in the very near future, Jake arrived at the Sunbright Solutions complex early the next morning. He had ducked out of his kitchen before Hannah had awakened and stopped at a convenience store for his morning coffee rather than drink it at home while he waited to say hello to Dixon. He was, admittedly, avoiding his new nanny until he figured out how to handle this mess.
He couldn’t believe that Hannah had thrown herself into his arms the night before and all but wept with relief. Worse, he couldn’t believe how elated he was to see her and how his arms had instinctively wrapped around her, even though he was holding a briefcase and a suitcase…. But she had leaped into his arms and he had wrapped his arms around her, and both had shocked him.
No. They had scared him. Sexually, he and Hannah were on the same page. He had many times seen the glint of attraction in her eyes that mirrored the intense gut-level reaction he kept having with her. That wasn’t the problem.
The problem was that emotionally and experience-wise, he had her by almost ten years. There was no way in hell he could get involved with her. She was too young for him and, he reminded himself, she was the little sister of his best friend.
Unfortunately, neither of those points stopped the tingles, the urges, the unmitigated sexual response he had every time he got within ten feet of her.
Jake took the right, then the left that would get him in the corridor that led to the wing that housed the offices for his portion of the staff. Troy had been moving his company, Sunbright Solutions, from California to Wilburn for the past year. The first few months, employees who transferred worked in the office wing of Troy’s mansion. Now that most of the Sunbright Solutions complex was complete, everyone had his or her own space. To Jake’s great relief, there was little chance he would run into Sunbright’s vice president of operations, Luke Evans, the big brother of the naive woman who seemed to have the hots for him.
Jake and Luke might have been on the same high school football team, but Jake was a quarterback and Luke was a fullback. At least fifty pounds—and the ability to bench-press large chunks of iron—separated them.
“Jake! Jake! Wait up!”
