as she reached the mailbox, he turned his face in her direction and she felt as if one of those early morning gardeners had just swung a shovel hard into her stomach.
Spence Gregory. Here. On Willowleaf Lane, in all his sweaty, muscled glory.
That thought barely had time to register—along with the far more horrifying realization that he must be the one renting the Telford house—before her feet became as tangled up as her brain.
She wasn’t quite sure how it happened, only that she hadn’t been paying a bit of attention to where she was running. She must have stepped off the curb or something. How fitting. One moment she was running along minding her own business, admiring a well-built man who just happened to cross her path, the next she was lying in the gutter.
Pain exploded from her ankle, racing up her leg with hot, angry ferocity, but it was nothing compared to the sheer, raw humiliation of tripping over her two feet, right in front of Spencer Gregory.
She wanted to die. She wanted to slither down that storm grate and just disappear.
Spence.
Of all people.
Fudge.
She could only pray he hadn’t noticed the idiot woman who had just made a fool of herself in front of him. That fleeting forlorn hope was dashed when she spied him trotting toward her, concern on his features.
“Oh, wow. Are you okay? That was quite a tumble.”
No, she wasn’t okay. She was mortified. Even worse, this was far from the first time she had ever made a fool of herself around him. The reminder of all her other little humiliations seemed to parade across her memory in all their delightful glory.
How many times had she tripped up the stairs at Hope’s Crossing High School when he said hello to her on his way down the other way? Or spilled her drink when he slid into the booth across from her at Center of Hope Café?
Once, she had ridden her bicycle into a fence just because he had happened to drive past and wave at her.
She wasn’t normally a graceless person. Witness that she’d been working out for more than a year without incident until this morning.
Now Spence had only to look at her and she was twelve again, dropping her ice cream cone down her shirt when he had smiled at her at the county fair.
Apparently, her old habits didn’t just die hard, they went down kicking and screaming and then resurrected themselves at the least opportune moment.
“Charlotte!” he exclaimed when he came close enough to recognize her. “I thought that was you but I wasn’t sure.”
She could feel her face heat. “Oh, it’s me,” she muttered.
“Are you okay? What happened?”
You. You happened.
“I’m not sure. I think I just came down on the edge of the curb and lost my balance.”
“I’m so sorry. Here. Let’s get you back on your feet.”
He held a hand out and she eyed it balefully, even though she knew she didn’t have a choice but to accept his help. She gripped his hand and told herself she was completely imagining the spark arcing between them.
He reached his other hand beneath her elbow and helped her up. When she put weight on her ankle, that pain roared through her again and she would have slid back to the ground if not for his supporting hold.
“Ow,” she said in a small voice, when what she really wanted to do was burst out into tears. Having six older brothers had taught her early to man up and hide her tears until she was in the safety of her bedroom or they would freak out and not let her play with them anymore.
“Did you break something?”
Wouldn’t that just be her luck? “I don’t think so. I just twisted my ankle.”
“That scrape looks nasty.”
The pain from the ankle had been so overwhelming, she had hardly noticed the abrasion on her palm but now she could see blood was beginning to seep around the edges of the tiny embedded pebbles. She must have thrown out a hand to catch herself as she went down.
Stirring fudge would certainly be more of a challenge with a big, ungainly bandage on her hand.
“Let me help you inside, and I can take a better look at that ankle and clean off the scrape. I have no idea where the bandages might be in the house but I can probably find something.”
“That’s not necessary. My house is just there.”
She pointed to her whimsical little cottage, tucked amid the trees.
“Great house. I noticed it when we were house shopping yesterday.”
“I like it.” Until you moved in down the street, anyway.
“This seems like a pretty nice neighborhood.”
Again, until you moved in. “It is. There’s a good mix of vacation homes and year-round residents.”
She couldn’t believe she was standing here calmly talking real estate with Spence while her ankle breathed fire up her leg and her palm sizzled along with it.
She was beginning to feel a little light-headed.
“The town has certainly changed since I lived here,” he went on. “I barely recognized some of these neighborhoods when the agent was taking us around yesterday.”
“It’s grown, hasn’t it. Will you excuse me?”
Hoping she didn’t pass out, she shifted in the direction of her house. The thirty feet between them seemed insurmountable, as tough as the 10K she ran with Alex in the spring.
She took a step away from him but made it no farther and would have fallen again if he hadn’t rushed forward and absorbed her weight into his solid bulk.
“You need to see a doctor for that.”
He was warm. Incredibly warm. And how was it possible he still smelled good after jogging? She caught a hint of laundry soap from his T-shirt and some kind of sexy citrus and musk aftershave.
“I only twisted an ankle. Not the first time. Once I ice it and take some weight off, it will be fine.”
She hoped. She did not have time for this. She managed to extricate herself from his arms and hobbled another step. By sheer force of will, she managed to remain upright, though it took every ounce of strength.
She made it maybe four steps before she heard a muffled curse.
“You’re as stubborn as ever, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said stiffly.
“I’m talking about the girl who once insisted on going on a six-mile bike ride with Dylan
