Her last client, Tony of Tony’s Import Auto Repair, had trailed the aroma of gasoline, and she needed the perfect atmosphere for the magazine writer due any minute. His story would rescue her company, she hoped, so the place had to smell like success. Or at least not like a garage.
She took a deep sniff. Still a tang of metal. Candles! Candles would fix it! In seconds, she’d arranged a rose-cinnamon pillar and three lilac-rosemary votives in an attractive clump on the far corner of her desk.
The first two wooden matches snapped in half and the next two burned out, but the fifth worked and soon four golden flames glowed in red and lilac pools of wax. She brushed the match stubs into the wastepaper basket, then waved the Arizona Weekly over the candles to spread the aroma before dropping the newspaper into the trash, too—it was a competing publication, after all.
The candles’ scent radiated outward, but too slowly, so she grabbed the stepladder out of her supply closet and climbed it to mist the AC vent with freshener.
A tap at the door to her left made her jump down, but before she reached the knob, the door flew open, revealing her visitor—a man holding a notepad, a camera over his shoulder. Definitely the reporter from Inside Phoenix.
“Sorry to bust in,” he said. “There was no one out front.”
Gail chose the worst times to disappear. At least when she returned she generally brought in a new client or two.
“No problem. I’m Janie Falls.” She switched the spray to her other hand and reached to shake his.
“Seth Taylor.” He had a nice grip and startling blue eyes that gave her an up-and-down just this side of decent, which sent a charge straight through her.
He was handsome, with a cocky smile, longish hair and the beginnings of golden stubble emerging from a strong jaw. Why did he have to be hot? She needed full focus to give him the best possible impression of Personal Touch.
“Have a seat,” she said, managing to sound gracious. She motioned toward the guest chair beside her desk.
He headed there with a lazy grace, his washed-out jeans cupping his behind like friendly hands. He sat and rested a foot in worn athletic shoes across his other thigh. Confident, carelessly groomed and sexy as hell. In short, he was just her type. He reminded her of Jason, the firefighter who’d headed for Alaska when things got comfortable between them.
She’d declared a moratorium on dead-end relationships for as long as it took to get Personal Touch in good shape and until she was emotionally mature enough for the real thing. She had no idea how long that might take.
Her reaction to the reporter was just a vestige of the old urge. An automatic physical response. Nothing she could do about that. She headed for her desk, determined to show no crack in her armor.
Just as she passed him, the reporter said, “Uh, Jane?”
She turned.
“You might want to…” He motioned at her behind.
At first, she was offended at his nerve until she saw that her slip was on full display. The back of her gauze skirt had brushed up when she jumped off the ladder, no doubt. She shoved it down, blushing.
“Purple’s your color,” he said with an easy smile. No need to freak. We’re good.
“Thank you,” she said primly. So much for her armor, she thought, watching Seth flip back a page on his steno pad with long, strong fingers. She had a thing for men’s hands. Certain men. Certain hands.
She forced her eyes up to his face and swallowed across a dry throat. “Are you single, Seth?” Please be married, please be gay, please be leaving for the Arctic.
“Am I single? Yeah, but—” Her question had startled him. Great. That put her more in charge.
“Good, because I thought the best way to show you how Personal Touch works is to give you a dry run of a client’s experience. Just a sample.”
“That’s not necessary. Your press kit is very complete.”
“We’ll compress the time, don’t worry. We’ll do a Personality Profile inventory, I’ll interview you, show you some Potentials in one of our quarterly magazines, and—”
“Thanks anyway. I just have a few questions and I need to take your picture.”
“But if you want to capture the Personal Touch atmosphere…” Speaking of which, the air had begun to reek of something burning. Something besides candles.
She glanced to the far side of her desk, where a wisp of black smoke rose above the wastepaper basket. Heck, oh dear, she’d started a fire!
The paper towel Tony had tossed in the trash must have contained oil. Her discarded matches and the newspaper were heat and fuel. She lunged for the basket, intending to run it to the bathroom, but her movement made the fire lick at her loose sleeve. The gauze lit up like tissue paper.
Seth was there so fast she hardly had time to panic. He grabbed the trash out of her hand, upending it, then whipped off his jacket to smother her flaming sleeve. After that, he bent to pound out the embers with the bottom of the basket while she examined her arm under the flash-fried fabric.
He rose. “Are you hurt?”
“Only my pride.”
He acknowledged her joke, but he gripped her wrist and turned her arm to examine it for himself. “Maybe ice it.”
It stung a little, but she was too mortified to dwell on that. She pulled out of his grip, shook her tattered sleeve into place, aware of how close he stood. “It was stupid to run. Thanks for saving me.”
“No problem.” He shot her a wry smile. “When a woman’s on fire, I’m always ready to kill the flame.” Did he have to be self-deprecating, too? The needle of her bad-boy meter shot into the red zone.
They both bent to scoop the charred debris back into the trash. The combination of candles and burned paper made her office smell like a burning gift shop, but beneath the stink she picked up Seth’s mix of soap—Irish Spring?—coconut shampoo and worn leather. Her favorite smells on a man.
Seth plopped the basket over the burn marks that now marred her pastel-flowered Oriental rug. “Good as new.”
“For now, I guess.”
They both rose, standing close together. His blue eyes twinkled with amusement. “You were saying something about atmosphere?”
She grimaced. “How about if you wipe this from your mind?” She waved her arms as if to clear the smoke and the memory.
At that moment, Gail burst in the room. “Did that reporter ever get here?” She caught sight of him. “Oh, good. I was at the Macy’s sweater sale and got to talking. You’ll be happy to know that the women’s wear sales staff includes two divorcées, a widow and three women with Singles-Bar Burnout. Expect appointments this week.”
“That’s great, Gail. Thanks.”
Gail scrunched her nose. “Bad incense, hon. Smells like burning tires and candy apples.”
“I
