Keep It Together - By Lissa Matthews Page 0,7
conversation. “I’m glad to feel it. To say it. It—”
“Maybe you’d like to have dinner with me to celebrate.”
Just like that, her smile fell and her eyes grew wide. “Huh?”
“Oh, that was elegant,” he teased. “I’ll chalk that effort up to my having surprised you.” He touched her again, rubbing his thumb over her bottom lip. “How about a real answer now? Yes or no?”
“I, uh…” She was doing her very best to keep from tasting him with the tip of her tongue. Her lips were dry, and she felt the need to lick them, but she wouldn’t. Him right there, touching her, was doing more to her insides than her dreams of him had, and she wanted to crawl all over him. “I have to work tonight.”
Colt removed his sunglasses and pierced her with a stare that had her looking away quickly. Those eyes… Then she met his gaze again because she couldn’t stop herself. He was beautiful to look at, dark where she was light, big and bold where she was a muddle of putty in the palm of his hand.
“Truth or…?” His eyes narrowed, and his lips thinned slightly. He dropped his hand away, but not before the tips of his fingers caressed her cheek and jawline, making her skin tingle where he’d touched, and ghost sensations lingered as if he were still physically doing so.
If she spent any significant time with him, he was going to be hell on her self-control. “Truth.”
“Tomorrow night?”
“Work.” She hesitated. “I think,” she rushed to add when he opened his mouth to speak again. It was an automatic response because as much as she wanted to say yes, she wasn’t sure she wanted to tempt fate. Dreaming about Colt was one thing; going out on a date with him was something else entirely. She wouldn’t be able to promise either of them that she’d keep her hands to herself.
“Breakfast? Lunch? Late-night snack?”
Chrissie laughed in spite of herself and the strange situation she currently found herself in. “What are you up to?”
He shrugged, a casual lift of his shoulders, and shook his head. “I’m not sure exactly. I’m not used to this type of reaction. Seems I’m trying to ask you out for a meal, and you are trying to come up with reasons not to accept.”
“Work isn’t an empty excuse.” Even though Chrissie knew she was using it as one. Something about their ease with one another struck her as odd and sent a little warning flag up inside her head. They were little more than strangers, no matter their near related-by-marriage connection, but she was comfortable around him, with him. She might not be comfortable with her reaction to him, thinking it was perhaps unseemly, though at the same time, maybe it wasn’t. And maybe she was thinking too hard. “Girls in the big city aren’t this difficult?”
“Not in my general experience. Usually all it takes is a nice suit and a flashy car to tempt most of them. But you country girls? You make a man, rich or poor, work hard for it.”
“Makes the end result worth it, though.” Chrissie slung the comment as easily as she slung the rifle case over her shoulder by the strap and headed across the backyard up to the house. “Besides, I’m not impressed by flashy or by money, or worried about impressing anyone.”
“That’s right,” he said as he fell into step beside her. “You come from old family money.”
Chrissie laughed. “Old family money. Yes, that’s me. My mother wished I’d been able to use my old family money connections and marry into other old money connections or even into new money.”
“Russ was definitely new money. I’m somewhere in between.”
“But we’re not getting married.” She would so marry him, though. If for no other reason than the man was hot. Of course, she knew there had to be something more rational than that, but if she had to pick a reason in that moment, his hotness would be it.
No, she told herself, but the thought wiggled itself into her mind and started to make itself at home. She had to disabuse her wayward gray matter of the notion of him wanting to marry her and quickly…
Still… No, dammit.
“Not yet, no. I can’t even get a date with you. I’m sure I need at least one, though it would be nothing more than a formality at this point. I’ve already said yes.”
He found humor in the situation—and Chrissie wanted to find the same humor—but