fingers along her cheek. “I suppose they’re just concerned about who their little girl is getting involved with.”
Her skin tingled where he touched her, eliciting a sensual warmth that spread through her entire body. “As if they have any say in the matter,” she said, forcing an indignant note over the quiver of awareness infusing her voice. “If my parents had their choice, they’d have me married off to some stuffy blue blood, being a proper wife.”
“I can’t imagine it,” he murmured, a sly smile curving his mouth.
She exaggerated a shudder, adding to the humor of the situation. “Neither can I.”
They both laughed, his low, husky chuckles mingling with her lighter ones, the sound pleasant and very intimate in the close confines of the car. The lighthearted moment released some of the tension she’d sensed in him a half hour after arriving at her parents’. The evening had only gotten worse, and certainly more complicated than she’d expected.
Austin drove on, maneuvering the car through the streets of Pacific Heights. He wasn’t taking the normal way back to her condo, but she didn’t mind if he wanted to take a longer route, which would give her more time with him. It was Christmas Eve, and for the first time since she could remember, she dreaded being alone.
“Austin…” She fiddled with the strap of her purse. “I’m really sorry for my parents’ behavior tonight, and that you had to lie about owning your own landscaping business. I’ll be the first to admit that my parents can be judgmental, but they’ll come around.”
He glanced her way. “You planning on bringing me to another family get-together?”
Her heart thumped in her chest, and a flood of emotions shook her to her soul. There was no denying she enjoyed everything about Austin, from his humor and honesty, to the feminine way he made her feel. But he made her yearn for things that conflicted with everything she’d worked so hard to attain, and the strength of those feelings frightened her.
She gave a noncommittal shrug, which was the best she could offer him. “You never know.”
He stared at her for a long, intense moment, then switched his gaze back to the road. “Does it matter to you what I do for a living?” he asked quietly.
She glanced out her window to the darkness beyond, giving his question serious consideration. If she was honest with herself, she had to admit that on some level Austin owning Fantasy for Hire bothered her, because she disliked the thought that other women fantasized about him and lusted over that gorgeous body while he performed a sexy striptease for them. She was beginning to think of Austin as her fantasy, and she didn’t want to share. Jealousy was a foreign emotion to her, one she’d never experienced in a relationship with a man, but she quickly realized she wasn’t immune to the green-eyed monster.
So how did she answer his question without sounding like a possessive shrew? “I’d be lying if I said it didn’t matter to me what you did for a living. But I suppose I can learn to get used to you stripping for other women.”
“And what if I really did own my own landscaping business?” he asked, his voice slightly anxious. “Would that line of work make a difference to you?”
She studied his face, seeing the taut line of his jaw, the tense set of his shoulders beneath his cable-knit sweater, and the truth finally dawned on her. “You really are in that line of work, aren’t you? Along with Fantasy for Hire.”
He nodded, and turned onto another darkened street that climbed upward and overlooked Pacific Heights. “Yep. McBride Commercial Landscaping is a real, solid business. I’m not rich, but I’m successful enough to support myself, and I love my job.”
She tilted her head, fascinated with this facet of Austin’s life. “And Fantasy for Hire?”
“It’s been a lucrative business, and it helped to support me when I needed the money, but I’ve definitely outgrown it. I’m going to sell the business so I can devote my time to McBride Landscaping.”
The car rolled to a stop. Austin cut the engine and turned to look at her with searching eyes, as if gauging her reaction to his newest revelation. It struck her then, that as confident as Austin appeared, he harbored a few insecurities of his own.
“Why does what I think matter so much to you?” she whispered, breaking through the quiet that had settled in the car.
“Because this is who