things that had never really happened with her own family.
All the things she could tell would never happen with the man sitting at her kitchen table.
The microwave dinged, shaking her awake enough to edge back from that emotional vortex. She got out the bowl and set it in front of Joe, handed him the box of crackers, poured him a glass of tea, sat down at the table and said, “So what were you doing in Tulsa earlier today?”
Huh. So she’d decided to go on the attack. Interesting, if a mite disconcerting, since he’d apparently hit a nerve he hadn’t meant to hit. Not this time. Yeah, when he’d told her she was pretty, he’d definitely been trying to get a rise out of her. He’d had a long day, he was stressed to the gills and for a single, stupid moment, he thought it would be amusing to rattle her chain. But this…this was different. This reaction, he couldn’t quite figure out. Except that something must be threatening her sense of control—an illusion, if ever there was one, but it wasn’t as if Joe couldn’t relate—so she became the aggressor.
What she didn’t know, however, was that if she wanted the upper hand, she’d have to fight him for it. So he scarfed down several spoonsful of chili before answering. “My boss asked me to take on another project at the last minute. I couldn’t turn it down.”
“Why?”
What she also didn’t know was that Joe’d always had a thing for women who didn’t make a man turn cartwheels trying to figure out what was going on in their heads. For some weird reason, the more direct the woman, the more turned on he got. Which, in this case, was one of those good-news, bad-news things.
“Because I need the extra cash, for one thing,” he said. “And because I need to prove to Wes—my boss—that I’m the right person to take over for him when he takes semiretirement next year.”
Taylor turned her glower on his empty tea glass, like she was trying to figure out how to be a good hostess without giving him any ideas about women serving men. Then she got up, apparently deciding the solution was to plop the pitcher in front of him so he could refill his glass any time he wanted.
“But how on earth are you going to handle two projects in two different places?”
“I have no idea. But I’ll manage.” He picked up a cracker and dunked it in his chili. “I have to.”
“You don’t sound all that happy about it.”
Happy? When had he last thought of his life in those terms? The muscles in his upper back mildly protested when he shrugged. “Just being realistic, is all.”
She snorted. “Honestly—what is it with men and their need to prove themselves? No matter what the cost?”
His gaze fixed on his food, Joe stilled and then lifted his eyes to hers. “I’m not sure how being responsible is the same as proving myself. Besides, seems to me men don’t exactly have the market cornered on ambition.”
A second passed before she pushed out a breath. “You’re right,” she said, and he thought, point to him. “It’s just that…I don’t know. Men get this whole protective thing going and…”
“And what?”
“And they can’t see that they’re accomplishing exactly the opposite of what they think they are.”
Joe leaned back in his chair, brows drawn, arms folded across his chest. “You think there’s something wrong with a man wanting to provide for his family?”
“No, of course not. Except…” He was startled to see her eyes soften with tears. “Except when he neglects his family in the process.”
He thought of all the things he could ask, wanted to ask. Wouldn’t ask. Not now, at any rate. Probably not ever, if he were smart. Because asking questions might get him answers, but it could also get him involved. And getting involved, now, with her—with anyone—wasn’t in the cards.
So he did what any sane man who didn’t want involvement would do—he turned the tables on her. Not rudely, or meanly, but with the conviction of somebody who didn’t need some female making him question his own motives, for crying out loud.
“You know,” he said quietly, “you’re cute and all, but you’ve got a real problem with judging folks when you don’t know them worth squat.”
She flinched a little, then recouped. “I’m not judging you. I’m just familiar with the signs.”
“Of what?”
Another breath. “My father was a workaholic, Joe. So was my ex-husband. And it sucks.”
The words were brittle, as if years of acid had eaten away at them. And they arrowed straight from her heart to his.
“Your father…”
“…Literally worked himself to death. When I was eleven.”
“I’m sorry,” Joe said softly. “But I’m not a workaholic, Taylor.”
For several seconds, their gazes tangled like a pair of kids scrapping over a toy, until Taylor got up from the table and walked over to the kitchen window, her hands stuffed in her back pockets. “How many hours a week do you work? And that includes work you bring home.”
His eyes narrowed. “It’s the sex thing, isn’t it?”
She whirled around. “What?”
“You don’t know what to do about this attraction between us, so you’re picking a fight with me.”
“I’m not picking a fight with you. And this has nothing to do with…that. I just asked you a simple question. How many hours a week do you work?”
“And how is this any of your business—?”
“Sixty? Seventy?”
Joe’s jaw tightened. “Somewhere in there, yeah.”
She turned, brows arched. “And you don’t think you’re a workaholic?”
“No, I think I’m somebody who can’t stand the thought of letting people down who depend on me.”
“And what the hell do you think you did when you didn’t pick Seth up on time tonight?”
Though spoken barely above a whisper, her words exploded around him like buckshot. And Joe wasn’t real partial to picking buckshot out of his butt. Man, if this was what she was like when she wasn’t picking a fight, he’d sure hate to be around her when she was.
“I didn’t have a choice, Taylor. You know that.”
“There’s always a choice! And right now, that kid needs you! Not what your paycheck can buy him!”
And what he didn’t need was this woman in his face about this, a fact the chili was only too vigorously corroborating. Direct was one thing; deranged was something else entirely. Except Joe was as ornery as she was. He’d never in his life walked away from a challenge, and he wasn’t about to start now. Even if he didn’t have a clue in hell what this one was even about.
