time, Ms. Brooks.”
“Do you?”
At his fulminating stare, she widened her eyes innocently. “Chew gum, I mean. I hardly ever see adults chewing on gum.”
What an unbelievably aggravating woman. “No,” he said. “I admit I don’t. I was speaking metaphorically.”
“Oh.” This smile was even sunnier. “And I had the loveliest picture of you in your uniform blowing a great big pink bubble.”
He actually wanted to laugh. Duncan managed to focus instead on the soccer players; at the very moment Hector swept his laughing son into a hug. Any desire to laugh died.
“I’m going to sit,” Jane announced, and lowered herself gracefully to the ground. She crossed her legs and bent to pluck blades of grass.
Duncan found himself wondering if she could do the splits. The way her knees relaxed open as she leaned forward made him suspect she could. Not many women in their late twenties or early thirties remained that flexible. Had she been a gymnast rather than a dancer?
He moved uncomfortably. He didn’t think he’d ever made love to a woman as limber as this one. He imagined lifting her legs over his shoulders as he…
Oh, hell. In self-defense, he walked away from her along the sideline, pacing almost to the end of the field before he turned and came back. She was watching him, he saw, although he couldn’t tell what she was thinking. By the time he reached her, she’d turned her head and appeared to have put him out of her mind as she stuck her two middle fingers in her mouth and whistled her approval of something Tito had done with the soccer ball. Damn it, even that was sexy. How many women could whistle like that?
Spending time with Jane was not a good idea, Duncan was forced to realize. Annoying as she was, he did want her. But he was a man who lived by the rules he’d set for himself, and one of them was to make sure to never get involved with a woman whom he’d have to keep seeing when they were done. Jane’s involvement with the court definitely put her on the other side of the line. But the alternative to spending time with her in the coming weeks was giving up on Tito, and he wasn’t prepared to do that.
He could move ten feet away and pretend she wasn’t there.
And look like a socially maladroit idiot, he thought ruefully.
With a sigh, he dropped to the ground a few feet from Jane and sat with one leg outstretched, the other knee bent.
“The kid’s not bad, is he?”
“No, and neither is his father. Hector was telling me that he kept playing at Monroe. He says he was on his village team when he was growing up. He was good, but not quite good enough to go professional, to his regret.”
“Tito and I have played more basketball than soccer.” Man, did that sound defensive. Like he didn’t have the guts to compete head-to-head with Hector. Angry with himself, Duncan continued, “I think maybe they’re spending more time on basketball in phys ed. Tito obviously felt lacking.”
She wrinkled her nose. “He’s awfully short.”
Duncan made a sound of agreement. “He’s taken to shooting baskets for hours every evening. He’s got determination, I’ll give him that.”
“It’s a good sign.”
“Yes.”
Without turning his head, he could feel her gaze. He was reluctant to meet it. Sitting this close, he didn’t like to think how he’d react to the rich, deep blue of her eyes.
“Why a dance shop?” he asked abruptly. “If you weren’t a dancer.”
She turned her head, began plucking grass again so that her shiny brown hair swung down to shield her face. Duncan waited patiently. It had to be a full minute before she said, “Because I wanted to be one.”
“Then why weren’t you?”
Jane straightened and tucked her hair behind her ear. If she’d been feeling something she didn’t want him to see, she’d hidden it now. “Not all kids have those kinds of opportunities. I doubt Tito’s sisters did, for example.”
Was she saying her parents hadn’t had the money to pay for classes? Duncan supposed that made sense. Those kind of extras were undeniably a luxury for a lot of families.
“By the time I was…free to do it on my own, I was too old for dance to be anything but a hobby.” There was a tinge of something that he couldn’t quite read in her voice. Regret? Or was it more acid? Bitterness? “I actually take classes now,” she admitted, and this time she sounded a little shy. “For fun. And for exercise, of course.”
“What kind of classes?”
“I started with ballet. Now I continue that at home. I have mirrors, a bar and mats. So I take other stuff. Jazz. Tap. Modern dance. Even belly dance.”
Duncan heard the air escape his throat. He really wished she hadn’t told him that.
“Although I’m not exactly the sultry type.” She gave a one-sided shrug. “I guess I’m too skinny. And, well, not what you’d call exotic. I’m more girl-next-door.”
“You?” He gave her an incredulous look. “I never had any girls next door that looked like you.”
She blinked. Her eyes really were beautiful, emphasized by long, thick lashes only slightly darker than her hair. Which meant she hadn’t had to use mascara.
“I… Thank you?” she said hesitantly. “If that was a compliment?”
“It was.” He had to clear his throat to relieve the gruffness.
“Oh. Well.” There was a pause before she murmured, “Who’d have thunk?”
Once again, he almost laughed. She’d had to ruin the touching moment between them.
“I’m full of surprises,” he agreed.
Her smile was merry and less…sharp than the earlier ones. “Yes, you are. So tell me, Captain MacLachlan, what do you do for fun?”
Fun. He had to think for a minute. How often did he do anything that he could call “fun”?
“I play basketball.” Suddenly he was smiling. “I gave Judge Lehman a bloody nose with my elbow in one of our last games of the season.”
Jane chuckled. “And you had the nerve to appear in his courtroom.”
“He repaid me with an elbow to the gut. I dropped to my knees retching.”
Her full-bodied laugh rang out.
“Like that image, do you?”
“I’m embarrassed to admit how much I do.”
He was still smiling, something he hadn’t expected to do in her company. She was irritating, all right, but also not as unlikable as he’d wanted to believe. Smart, edgy, amusing. He might enjoy
