Finally, she gathered up enough self-control to make herself shift away, one inch at a time until Jack had no choice but to let her go. “I can’t believe we were doing that…and that Gerry caught us. Thank God, it was him and not your partners.”
“What if they had seen us? We’re not hurting anyone, or anything, by kissing each other.”
But what if you do end up hurting me?
Mixed into her fear of being hurt again by someone she worked with was the lingering memory of how humiliated she’d been by the knowledge that everyone in her circle knew just how foolishly she’d given her heart…and then been tossed aside. She couldn’t stand for that to happen again, not when she was supposed to be older and wiser.
“Have you told them about Friday night, about what happened between us at my house?”
Jack looked more than a little insulted by her question. “Of course I haven’t. I don’t kiss and tell, Mary. What happens between us is private.”
A moment later, Howie and Larry poked their heads into the room. “Hey Jack, Mary, we brought back a sandwich for you both.”
She could easily read the frustration on Jack’s handsome face as she told them she’d join everyone in the common area in a couple of minutes. They all left the room and her hands were trembling as she sat down at her mirror and picked up her hairbrush. A moment later Gerry walked in and closed the door behind him.
“I thought something was going on between the two of you.” Gerry grinned at her in the mirror. “Now, before we start shooting again, tell me everything about that gorgeous man who can’t keep his hands off you.”
As she ran a straightening iron over a lock of hair to get ready for their second set of shots, she had to work to keep her hand steady so she didn’t burn herself.
With another photographer she might have tried to hide what she was feeling. But, with the man who had known her for her entire adult life, there was no point in pretending Jack’s touch had been innocent. Besides, there was a reason Gerry was such a great photographer—he saw things other people didn’t.
“Jack is different from any other man I’ve known,” she admitted.
She knew she shouldn’t say anything more, but she was dying to talk to someone about Jack. She couldn’t possibly have discussed him with the young models she was looking after, not when she was trying to set a good example for them. But Gerry had watched her grow up. First, from behind a camera lens, and then later when they became friends. He’d held her hand and let her cry when her various romances hadn’t ended in happily ever after. If anyone would understand how confused she was right now, he would.
“The men I’ve been around have always been so self-aware, so conscious of everything they did and said, and especially how they looked. But Jack’s brain is working so fast all the time—he’s so different. He told me that sometimes he doesn’t even remember to shave.”
“Adorable,” Gerry said, echoing her own thoughts.
She sighed. “Agreed, but I still shouldn’t have kissed him just now.”
His eyebrows went up. “Why the hell not?”
“Because we’ve agreed to keep things strictly professional between us for now. As I’m sure you recall, last time I mixed business with pleasure, things went horribly awry.”
Gerry frowned. “Romain Bollinger was a worthless piece of scum. I thought you were over him.”
“Of course I am,” she insisted, horrified that anyone would think she was still pining for that horrible excuse for a man. “I’m just trying to be careful.”
“If that was a careful kiss, I would love to see what a dangerous one looks like,” he teased.
So would I, she thought, despite knowing better. So would I.
* * *
Between the kiss Jack had given her this afternoon and the one from Friday night, Mary knew he had made his intentions abundantly clear. If she couldn’t resist temptation, then she’d just have to make sure not to put herself in its path. She was not a young, naive girl anymore who would melt into a puddle at a few sexy words from a good-looking man. If anything, her experiences with love had hardened her to the point that sexy words were far more likely to put her on her guard.
And yet, all weekend—and then all day today during the shoot—she’d been replaying his sinfully sexy words: Next time you invite me in, I’m going to make love to you.
She didn’t think he had said it to shock her or even to turn her on.
He’d simply said what he was feeling…and what he clearly believed would happen the next time they were alone together in her house.
When she and Gerry finally wrapped the shoot, Howie and Larry got up out of their chairs and showered her with compliments. She tried to be gracious as she thanked them, but at the same time, she wondered where Jack was. Would they think it was strange if she asked about him?
Fortunately, before she could make a lovesick fool out of herself, Howie said, “Jack had to take care of some urgent business back at the garage.” He turned red as he realized what he’d just admitted to her about where they worked. “I mean, our office. But he said for you to call him if you need anything at all.”
Despite the fact that Mary had been reminding herself again and again all afternoon that she and Jack needed to keep their distance, disappointment came swift and strong.