forced herself to blunder on, though her skin felt hot, tight, itchy. “I told you, I haven’t been able to get that kiss out of my mind. Every time I see or talk to you, the memory simmers just under the surface. You might be talking away about the house or about Haven Point or your family and the only thing I can think about is, wow, that man knows how to kiss.”
He raised an eyebrow and she felt herself blush even more. “Thank you. I guess. Right back at you.”
She wouldn’t let herself find pleasure in that. Okay, maybe a little pleasure.
“Of course, we both agreed it was a mistake that shouldn’t have happened. But as mistakes go, you’re right, that particular one the other night was, um...” Incredible. Amazing. Off-the-charts sexy. “Noteworthy.”
“Noteworthy,” he said faintly. “And did you? Take notes, I mean?”
“I’ve been trying to forget it. It was a mistake, right?”
“Unwise, certainly.”
“Bingo. I couldn’t agree more. And now I’m going to have to spend the next week trying to forget this kiss, too. As if I didn’t have enough to do, with your family coming in only a few days! Thanks for that.”
The frustrating man actually seemed to find the situation amusing. “Well, then, I’d better try to make a lasting impression.”
“Aidan,” she began, but he moved forward with that inexorable focus of his and lowered his mouth to hers again.
This time the heat raged back, exploding between them with wild intensity, as if the earlier kiss had only been the warm-up act to the real thing. He held her close and she wrapped her arms around his back. She was vaguely aware of random sensations. The heat of him, the leashed strength of his surprising muscles, the wonderful, half-forgotten ache in all her girly places.
If he threw her back on the sofa and began ripping buttons and tangling zippers, she wouldn’t have been able to protest.
She wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him closer as her body turned liquid and soft. She wanted this man, so much she couldn’t breathe around the hunger. She wanted to feel him around her, inside her.
As their mouths tangled, he groaned her name and the sound seemed to jolt her back to her senses.
They couldn’t do this. As much as she wanted to make love to him right now, she sensed it would leave her shattered.
Somewhere deep inside, she at last uncovered a forlorn little shred of self-protectiveness. Though it was the hardest thing she had ever done, she managed to slide her mouth away from his.
“We have to stop. Please, Aidan.”
He eased away, his breathing ragged and a slightly unfocused look in his eyes.
“Why?”
She scrambled for words, her thoughts as scattered as paper snowflakes on the wind. “I like you,” she finally said. “I like you very much. And you’re a fabulous kisser. As I believe we have quite firmly established. But I...I haven’t even dated since Trent died. I can’t just jump headfirst into the water with someone like you.”
“Someone like me?”
She eased away another few inches and tried to tuck her hair out of her face with fingers that had a rather embarrassing tendency to tremble. “You’re larger than life, Aidan. I’ve seen pictures of you with the kind of women you usually date—thin, gorgeous, perfectly made up. They’re not frazzled mothers who drive an SUV with Cheerios under the seat and juice boxes in the cupholders. You’re not interested in a relationship with me. The idea is completely laughable.”
“Funny. I’m not laughing.”
“Come on, Aidan. Be serious. You’re the CEO of your own billion-dollar business and I’m a heartbeat away from being homeless.”
“You’ve had a run of hard knocks. That’s hardly your fault and certainly doesn’t negate the possibility of a relationship between us. I don’t think less of you for circumstances out of your control, El. You’re one of the hardest-working women I’ve ever met. What you have done with Snow Angel Cove is amazing.”
He wasn’t listening and she couldn’t seem to make her brain cells cooperate to come up with a cogent argument. “Thank you. But that’s not the point.”
“What is? This is the point, as I see it. I’m attracted to you. You’re attracted to me. I like you very much and enjoy your company. I suspect you feel the same, though I could be wrong.”
She shook her head. “You’re not wrong.”
“I already care about your daughter. As far as I can see, there aren’t that many additional barriers that would keep us from pursuing this attraction.”
On a logical plane, she would lose any argument she put forward. The reality settled over her with depressing force. “You forgot the most important one. Yes, I like being with you. Yes, I’m obviously attracted to you. You’re the Geek God and I haven’t been with a man in more than three years. I would have to be dead not to be attracted to you.”
“You’re saying it’s only physical.”
For some ridiculous reason, she thought he actually looked a little hurt by that.
“I’m saying that for the next week, you’re my employer and that has to be the only relationship between us. I apologize for kissing you. It was completely inappropriate and won’t happen again.”
She didn’t want their wonderful evening together to end like this, with cold words and anger but, again, the words to make it right just wouldn’t come.
“What about friendship? Any interest in that?”
Suddenly, for no reason she could have pinpointed, her throat felt tight and her eyes burned. “Of course. I told you I like you, Aidan. Far too much for my own comfort, if you want the truth. I just...I’m a realistic kind of girl. Life hasn’t given me a lot of choice in that pragmatism. The way I see it, you’re like a fairy-tale prince and I’m Cinderella without the godmother and the cool shoes.”
And on that ridiculous, entirely too revealing statement, she moved toward the kitchen and her rooms. Before she left the great room, she turned back and found him standing by the fire, the glow silhouetting him. “Thank you again for a wonderful evening. I’m sorry I spoiled everything.”
“You didn’t spoil anything,” he assured her, but she knew it was a lie.
She tried a shaky sort of smile and then hurried out of the room before she could make an even bigger fool of herself.
Once in the safety and privacy of her sitting room, she closed the door quietly behind her—no emotionally wrought slamming of doors here—then collapsed onto the sofa.
She felt completely wrung dry, as if she had just tried to swim the length of Lake Haven.
She couldn’t believe what she had just said to him.
I like you, Aidan. Far too much for my own comfort... The
