throughout every waking moment he’d cursed that clinging memory. Tried to ban it. Ban her. Make himself forget.
But it was during his dreams when he had no power over the direction of his thoughts that she wiped away all his willpower and held him at her mercy. Until he stood right where he was now. Looking at her. Assessing her. Trying to fathom whether she’d thought about him as much as he had about her.
Somehow he knew that she had thought about him. Thought about them. Could tell by the dilation of the pupils in her dark eyes. The flick of her tongue at the corner of her mouth. The shallowness of her breathing. The tightening of her nipples under her damp blouse that seemed to beg him for attention.
J.T. knew that if he slid his fingers inside the waistband of her slacks he’d find her hot and wet and ready. And right then he wanted that more than anything. More than the food that sustained him. More than the air that he breathed.
More than the risk of his own freedom.
Leah finally broke away and turned toward the shelf. She stuffed a chocolate bar into her basket, began to walk away, then backtracked and put another bar, then another into the basket before she passed him.
J.T. noted that she had yet to say more than his name. As she disappeared at the end of the aisle, he supposed seeing him again after so long was quite a shock for her. She might even be having some trouble convincing herself he was really there.
His mind filled with the ways that he could prove to her that he was back.
2
PLEASE, HURRY.
Leah pushed her few items down the checkout line conveyor belt, mentally praying for the cashier to pick up the pace. She wanted…no, needed to get out of there as quickly as she could. Before J.T….
Someone put a six-pack of Coors on the belt behind her. Her breath froze in her lungs. She didn’t have to look to see who it was. She already knew. The brand was J.T.’s.
“Ma’am? Your card, please.”
Leah blinked to stare at the cashier. Her card…Her brain distantly registered that she was being asked for her savings card, but she couldn’t bring herself to retrieve it from her purse. “No card,” she whispered.
The cashier entered a code and began ringing up the purchases.
Leah was acutely aware of J.T.’s presence behind her. Felt a magnetic force drawing her in, affecting the flow of her blood, the direction of her thoughts. Never in her life had she met someone as physically powerful, emotionally mesmerizing as J. T. West. He entered a room and you knew it. If J.T. wanted you, you were loath to refuse him.
The cashier named a price.
Pay…she needed to pay for the groceries.
Leah’s brain refused to register the simplest of commands.
She reached into her bag and rummaged around inside for her wallet, her hands trembling wildly. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath…then watched as the contents of her purse dumped out onto the floor at her feet.
She knelt to pick everything up at the same time as J.T.
Leah swallowed thickly. God, he smelled good. Too good. There was something about the way the detergent he used on his clothes combined with the musk of his soap and the rich leather of his jacket that appealed to her on a primal level. Made her think of clear streams and wide-open spaces. And of a passion so wild she forgot who she was.
“Ma’am?” the cashier said again, repeating the price.
In that one moment, Leah forgot not to look up into J.T.’s eyes. Forgot that up this close the intoxicating golden hue would hypnotize her. Tempt her to count the flecks of green in the light brown depths. Lure her into doing things that in her right mind she would never, ever do.
“I’ve got it.” J.T. peeled a couple of bills from a roll he took from the back pocket of his jeans.
“No, really…” Leah stood up, nearly dumping her purse again, only to realize she was too late. J.T. had not only paid for her things, but was now paying for his beer.
She stared at him as he handed her bag to her and gestured toward the door.
Leah knew she should say something. Thank him for buying the groceries. Offer to pay him back. Ask him what he was doing there. But she couldn’t seem to bring herself to say anything. Instead she virtually rocketed for her car and climbed in, ignorant of the rain and her appearance.
And unsurprised when J.T. climbed into the passenger’s seat next to her.
Her gulp sounded loud in the small confines. She hadn’t been prepared for how…intimate the setting would be. With the darkness outside, the rain pelting against the rooftop, the scent of his nearness crowding her senses, it was all she could do not to gasp at the evocativeness of it all.
“When did you get back?”
Leah’s words sounded breathy even to her own ears and she wondered if J.T. could hear the thud-thud of her heart in the silence of the car.
He squinted at her. “Does it matter?”
No, it didn’t. But his response did imply that he’d been back for more than just a day.
The thought made her thighs grow even damper. Knowing that J.T. had been in town for a prolonged period presented her with a whole different viewpoint. Partly because she’d known that when he’d left sixteen months ago, he’d left town completely and she’d figured he’d never come back.
But he had. And for more than a day.
And now he was sitting in her car making her remember with vivid clarity how sweet it was to kiss his skillful mouth. How thrilling it was to have his arms around her.
How very wrong it was for her to want both.
“Dan and I are reconciling,” she said.
That got a response from him. He dropped his gaze then squinted through the windshield, headlights from a passing car flickering over his granite features. “You divorced?”
Leah caught her bottom lip between her teeth and also looked away. She nodded, wondering how wise it was to reveal that she was free.
Oh, free was so wrong a word it made her wince. She wasn’t any freer now than she had been back then. She and Dan were reconciling. For God’s sake, they were even now discussing the date when he might move back into the house. Her daughter, Sami, talked about her father’s return nonstop. Her family had come to accept the reconciliation and plans were being made for a family dinner on Easter, mere weeks away.
And she still wanted the man sitting next to her with a ferocity that scared her to death.
Leah felt J.T.’s hand on her cheek. The thick, callused pad of his thumb felt so natural against her skin that rather than pulling back, she allowed her eyes to drift close and her head to lean into his touch.
“Do you love him?”
Leah
