Heart of Gold - By Tami Hoag Page 0,6

under his breath as he rose and motioned for her to precede him out the door. It wouldn’t do for him to forget that she may well have played a role in her ex-husband’s scheme. He reminded himself of that and pushed away the foreign feelings of sympathy that had been niggling at him as he’d stared down into Faith’s fathomless brown eyes.

Faith just caught his comment and bit back a retort. What did she care what Callan thought of her? Why waste her breath telling Shane Callan that a charming politician on his way to big things had swept a naive girl from the farm country of Ohio off her feet, that he had wooed her with words of love because he had believed she would be an asset to his “down-home” image. What would a man like Shane Callan know of the heartbreak she had lived with bound to a man who didn’t love her by vows she felt she couldn’t break?

No, she told herself. She was stuck with Shane Callan. The best thing she could do would be to ignore him.

Pulling herself up to her full height, she tilted her head back and looked Callan in the eye. Heavens, he was tall—six feet four if he was an inch—and his shoulders seemed to take up half the room. There was an awful lot of him to ignore, and every inch was to-die-for handsome.

“I’ll show you around the house and give you a room, but I’ll ask that you stay out of the way,” she said primly. “This inn opens in five days, and there’s still a great deal of work to be done. I don’t need some brooding cop hanging around leaving the toilet seats up.”

Shane forgot himself and let go a rusty-sounding laugh. Damn, she had more spunk than he would ever have given her credit for. He had to force a frown; he wasn’t supposed to find her amusing … or cute … or alluring …

“Take your time doing the work,” he said as he followed her down the hall toward the central staircase. “You won’t be opening for business until after the trial.”

Faith wheeled on him with a stern look that brought him up short. “I most certainly will. I have guests booked. My friends have been staying here helping me get ready for the grand opening.”

“Friends?”

Shane stopped her on the stairs with a hand on her upper arm. Turning her around, his fingertips brushed the soft outer swell of her breast. The shock of the contact instantly derailed his train of thought. How would it feel to cup his hand beneath that firm, womanly globe of flesh? Heat surged through him in a wildfire of desire.

Locking his gaze on hers, he held his breath tightly in his lungs and willed his concentration back. The strain came through his sandpaper voice. “Nobody said anything to me about your having friends.”

“I don’t doubt the concept is foreign to you,” Faith said weakly, her breath running out of her in fluttering ribbons.

Her breast seemed to heat and swell at his touch. A burning sensation ran from her chest downward to pool and swirl in the most feminine part of her. Self-preservation made her jerk her arm from Shane’s grasp.

“Jayne and Alaina are out running errands for me right now,” she said, trying to turn her mind away from sex. To her dismay she found her mental power steering had gone out, and her thoughts kept veering back to the feel of Callan’s hand on her breast. It had been forever since a man had touched her, even accidentally. Stifling a groan, she cleared her throat and forced her thoughts back to the conversation. “I’m lucky to have such good friends. Setting up an inn takes a lot of work.”

And a lot of money, Shane figured, dragging his gaze off the well-rounded female fanny that was now at eye level three steps ahead of him. The cost of this property alone, which was in a prime location along the coast less than two hours north of San Francisco, had to be astronomical.

“A thrifty way to invest your divorce settlement,” he commented mildly as he joined her in the second-floor hall.

Faith’s dark eyes flashed. “The money I took from William in the divorce was for Lindy. All I wanted for myself was to get out.”

“Ah, well, what would you need with alimony when you no doubt had your cut of the money from the defense contracts safely stashed