The Tycoon's Defiant Southern Belle Page 0,33
wine and resumed her pacing. “Jasper can just spend the night there. I don’t care!”
She prowled the deck, her eyes glancing through the night in the desperate hope that Jasper would come bouncing through the woods, his tail twitching and his ears moving back and forth in irritation that he hadn’t caught whatever he was hunting for.
Nothing! Just stillness interspersed sporadically with a flash of a lightning bug.
With a growl of frustration, she set her wine glass down on her deck table with a clink and walked through the pathway. It was dark but she still didn’t have trouble getting through the bushes since she’d walked the path so many times. “I’ll just go over to the edge and call him again but I’m definitely not going into the house.”
No one commented on her pronouncement but it still irked her that she had to go find her silly cat. She reached the edge of her property and stared at the enormous, silent house. There were very few lights on, probably because Angelo was in his office working. Or maybe he was in his bedroom reading, getting ready for bed just like she should be doing.
“Jasper can just rot, for all I care!” she said and traipsed back and forth at the edge of the tree line. “If he doesn’t want to eat, I’m not going to get him.”
She moved a bit closer to the edge of the patio, peering through the new bushes into the darkness. “Jasper!” she whispered harshly. “If you’re out here, come home now!”
Silence. Again!
“I’m not going in there!” she said, pacing some more. She stepped up onto the now smooth stones of the patio. Thankfully, the chipped and broken concrete had already been replaced by field stone that looked much more elegant. So there wasn’t anything for her to trip on in the darkness. “I’m not going in. I’m not going to do it! That cat is just trying to play match maker and I’m simply not going to fall for his ridiculous tricks!”
She heard Rufus behind her. His heavy, clumsy feet could be heard crashing through the underbrush as if there was some sort of stampede to the barbeque. Wasn’t he supposed to be a hound dog? And hound dogs were hunting dogs! Rufus definitely didn’t fit the character traits of a hound dog but what could one expect? He was just a sweet, gentle giant of a goofball.
With a sigh, she stepped closer to the house. And there he was. Just like the last time, Angelo was sitting out on his new patio, a bottle of wine at his elbow but this time there were already two glasses next to the bottle. And it didn’t appear to her that he’d poured any of the wine yet.
“Are you going to join me?” Angelo’s deep voice came through the darkness, sending those now familiar shivers down her body.
“I’m still trying to decide.”
Angelo laughed and stood up, lifting the cat to his shoulder before he walked to where she was standing. “If I promise to behave, will you join me for wine?”
She bit her lip, wanting to just sit with him and enjoy his company. But she knew it was too dangerous. Hearing that he was an orphan had made the man more human. She definitely couldn’t offer him comfort and sympathy, but she was shockingly more attracted to him than she had been before their earlier conversation.
“What do you consider ‘behaving’?” she asked.
Angelo chuckled softly, the feeling smoothing over her skin like warm chocolate. “How about if I promise not to touch you until I walk you home?”
She bit her lip. “I’ll walk myself home,” she countered.
Another smile, but he nodded. “Deal.”
She took a deep breath and stepped closer to the table. “What did you eat for dinner?” she asked.
“I had a business meeting with one of my new managers,” he explained as he poured both of them a glass of wine.
Jade was very conscious of the fact that she’d already had one glass of wine tonight so she sipped this one carefully. But it was very nice to just sit with him, conversing about his newly acquired companies, her hobbies, each other’s preferences in books and movies…it was a wonderful, sweet evening and she laughed more with him that night than she had in a long time with Dave. She even learned about his two best friends, Dominic and Zayn, who were coming down for a visit to see his new house as soon as