she heard, “Umm, are we interrupting something?”
Ad seemed as surprised as Kit felt to discover that Kira Wentworth and Cutty Grant had joined them.
“Kira!” Kit exclaimed, jumping to her feet to cover her own preoccupation with a man she had no business being preoccupied with.
Kira gave her a hug and said, “I’m so sorry I couldn’t meet your bus! I made you come all the way to Montana, and I wasn’t even there when you got here. But Mel fell against the corner of the fireplace in the new house and cut her forehead. We had to take her in for stitches.”
“I know, Ad told me. It’s okay,” Kit said.
But Kira went on anyway. “I couldn’t leave her. She was scared and upset and she doesn’t like anything to do with doctors as it is, let alone having to get three stitches, poor thing. And then we decided that rather than push it, we should just get the girls home and put them to bed and call the sitter to stay with them after we got them to sleep for the night.”
“I totally understand. You needed to do what was best for the babies. Really, it was no big deal. I’m just glad to see you now,” Kit assured.
Ad had risen to his feet when Kit had and he’d been very busy pulling two chairs from another table.
“What can I get you guys?” he asked then. “Something to eat? To drink?”
“I’ll have a beer,” Cutty said.
“Nothing for me,” this from Kira. “I just want Kit to meet Cutty.”
While Ad got Cutty’s beer Kira introduced Kit and Cutty and by the time that was accomplished and the four of them were situated around the small table whatever it was that had been going on between Kit and Ad Walker before Kira’s and Cutty’s appearance had been put to an end.
But as happy as Kit was to see her best friend and to meet the man who had made Kira nearly glow with delight, as happy as Kit was to know that their baby daughter was okay, there was still a tiny speck of regret lurking deep down in her.
A spark of regret that had something to do with Ad Walker.
And with that interruption of whatever it was that had been going on between them.
Chapter Two
A fter a night of tossing and turning, Ad was up early Sunday morning. Not only was he up, he was in the kitchen of his apartment rushing to fix a big breakfast, keeping a vigilant eye out the window over the sink that afforded him a view of the alley—and the landing he shared with Kit—and silently berating himself for all of it.
The tossing and turning hadn’t been simply an ordinary restless night. He hadn’t been up since the crack of dawn just because he was an early riser. The breakfast he was making was double what he could eat and he wasn’t in a hurry because he was hungry. And he wasn’t watching the weather change through that window.
Kit MacIntyre—she was the reason for everything.
He’d had a bad night’s sleep because he hadn’t been able to get her out of his head, and dreaming about her had woken him up before his alarm had gone off in the morning.
He was making double the food so he would have an excuse to invite her to breakfast.
He was hurrying to do it and keeping an eye out for her to make sure she didn’t go down to the restaurant before he had the chance to convince her to come to his place instead.
And those were all absolutely the wrong reasons for everything. He just couldn’t seem to help himself.
But then it wasn’t every day that he met someone he hit it off with the way he’d hit it off with Kit. Someone he felt so comfortable with. Someone who—unless he was mistaken—had been pretty relaxed with him, too.
Conversation hadn’t been a struggle. They’d fallen easily into teasing each other. Into joking around. Their whole time together had been… Well, fun. It was as simple as that.
But simple or not, that hadn’t happened for him in a long while.
Oh, sure, it was easy enough to talk to other women he knew. To tease them and joke around with them. But last night, with Kit, there had been an added element to it. A different dynamic.
Attraction.
Okay, he admitted it. He’d felt an attraction to Kit.
Much as he didn’t want to. And he didn’t want to.
What had he sworn to himself after Lynda?
No out-of-towners.
It wasn’t a difficult concept. He didn’t want to get involved with any woman who had a life and ties outside Northbridge. Certainly no one who had a whole business somewhere else.
So what the hell was he doing? he asked himself as he began to scramble eggs.
He took another peek out the window in the direction of the studio apartment. That simple gesture was enough to put the picture of Kit into his head even though there was no sign of her.
It was a phenomena that had been happening since she’d left him in the restaurant the night before. Every detail of the way Kit looked would pop into his head even when he was trying not to think about her or trying to talk himself out of the things she’d roused in him. Out of the blue the image of her would invade in bright, living color. And it certainly wasn’t helping anything.
How could it when he liked the way she looked so damn much?
That was somewhat of a puzzler all on its own.
He usually went for the surfer-girl types—sleek, sun-streaked blond hair; healthy tans that spoke of athletic, outdoorsy interests; long legs that went on forever.
And that wasn’t Kit.
Kit had crazy-wild espresso-colored hair that made her look a little untamed. And it framed pale, flawless, alabaster skin that didn’t seem to have ever seen the unblocked sun. Plus she wasn’t particularly leggy. How could she be when she was barely more than three or four inches over five feet tall?
But still it all worked for her.
He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone with features that fine and delicate. With cheekbones that high. With a nose that thin and impeccably shaped. With lips that were a perfect mix of full and pink and perfect. With dark, purplish blue eyes.
Violet—that’s what they were. The color of the flowers on that bush his mother loved so much. Blue-violet eyes. Big, round, sparkling blue-violet eyes with the longest, thickest black lashes….
Ad sighed a long sigh.
She also had a terrific little body. Tight and compact with breasts that had drawn his attention and thoughts more than once, and a rear end that would just fit in his hands….
Yeah. He definitely liked the way she looked.
But she lives in Denver, he reminded himself. She has a business in Denver. She’s only here
