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She thought she should drop the subject because it seemed to be a touchy one, so she remained silent.
“The thing is…”
“Mmm?” She didn’t even want to use an actual word to prompt him, for fear he’d clam up completely. She sensed that whatever he’d started to say wasn’t something he mentioned to many people. Maybe not to anyone.
He sighed. “Never mind.”
He’d retreated. His behavior reminded her of animals who’d come from bad situations and were afraid to trust. She let the silence stretch between them and figured that was the end of his willingness to share something personal. Then, to her amazement, he spoke again.
“I think you have to have a store of good Christmas memories to draw on from when you’re young.” He cleared his throat. “That’s how I think you get the Christmas spirit, tapping into that.”
Her heart ached for him, but she kept her voice light. “I’ve never looked at it that way, but that could be true.” What had his childhood been like, that he had no happy memories of Christmas? More than anyone she knew, this man needed the unconditional love of an animal…or a person.
She led the way up her porch steps and reached for the front door latch.
“You don’t lock it?”
“I don’t bother if I’m right next door and I have an alarm like Ewok and an enforcer like Wookie in residence. Besides, I’m sure even burglars know that anyone running an animal shelter is probably broke. Don’t expect cut crystal wineglasses and fine china at my house. My family and friends know to give me stuff for the shelter or a donation to whatever fund-raiser we have going.”
Ben smiled. “I can hear your fan club coming.”
She could, too. Ewok’s toenails scrabbled on the hardwood floor as he raced toward the door. Wookie was coming, too, but he signaled his happiness with a noise in his throat that was somewhere between a moan and a whine. She opened the door. “Honeys! I’m home!”
Ewok danced with joy and she gathered him up in her arms, but she managed to reach out a hand and stroke Wookie’s head at the same time. “Good to see you, guys. And look who I brought with me, Ewok. Your friend from the TV station. Doggies, meet Ben Rhodes, top-notch photographer. Come on, Ben. We need to let them out in the yard for a bit, and then we’ll get started on dinner.” She set Ewok back on his feet.
The dogs knew the routine, so she followed them through her living room with its secondhand furniture and the small dining room with more of the same. Then she turned left into the kitchen. The door at the end of it opened onto a porch and a fenced yard. Both dogs stood waiting impatiently in front of the door.
“Cozy place,” Ben said as he followed her.
“I actually love it. The house belongs to the foundation that runs The Haven and can’t ever be mine, exactly, but it’s mine for as long as I do a good job.”
“Then it should be yours for a very long time.”
“Not if we go broke with the roofing repairs.” Tansy opened the back door. “Okay, guys, out you go!” Ewok shot out first, and then Wookie padded through the doorway and took the porch steps in one bound. She stepped out on the porch and glanced over her shoulder at Ben. “I usually stand out here until they’re ready to come in, but you don’t have to.”
“Sure I do.” He joined her on the porch and closed the door behind him. “I’m not going to cower in the warm house while you’re out here in the cold. In fact, if you want to go in and start heating up that soup, I’ll supervise the operation here.”
She gazed over at him. “You really are famished, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
Something in the way he said it made her heart beat faster. But he was probably talking about food. It was late, well past most people’s dinner hour. “Okay, if you’re willing to watch them, I’ll go turn on the stove.”
“Excellent.”
Ducking inside, she took off her coat and hung it on a peg by the back door. Then she pulled the soup pot out of the refrigerator and set it on a burner. Soon the aroma of carrots, onions, diced tomatoes and potatoes filled the kitchen.
She buttered several slices of her favorite cheddar cheese yeast bread, wrapped them in foil and popped them in the oven. The meal wasn’t fancy, but adding a bottle of wine would make it a little more gourmet. She wondered if he liked wine, and whether he preferred red or white.
Opening the back door, she stuck her head out to ask him and discovered he was no longer on the porch. The sound of his laughter filled the air, mingled with happy dog barks. When she walked out onto the porch, the glow from the porch light revealed a scene that made her heart squeeze.
Ben, who professed not to want animals in his life, was romping with her dogs. Snow fell around them as all three leaped and ran through the cold night air.
As if sensing her presence, Ben skidded to a stop and glanced in her direction. “They were really amped up and I figured they’d give us some peace if I played with them a bit. Was that okay?”
“Of course it’s okay!” She smiled. “But dinner’s ready.”
“We’re a mess.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll get some old towels. Be right back.” Still smiling, she went inside to put on her coat and grab the towels.
No matter what Ben might say, his actions proved to her that he would be a happier man if he allowed animals into his life. But she wouldn’t try and convince him anymore. She’d let Ewok and Wookie do it for her.
AFTER HELPING TANSY with doggie cleanup, Ben gestured toward the wood in a metal rack on the back porch. “Do you use your fireplace?”
“I sure do.”
“Mind if I build us a fire and we eat dinner in front of it?”
“Sounds great to me.”
He left his wet boots on a mat in the kitchen. Then he busied himself with logs, kindling and newspaper. Having something to do kept him from thinking about the bonehead comments he’d made about his lack of happy Christmas memories. He had no idea why he’d felt the need to reveal something so personal. Luckily she hadn’t pressed for details, but he’d have to watch himself from here on out.
The fireplace was great, and made him wonder why he’d never had one in any of the places he’d rented over the years. He’d seen them as an amenity for a vacation cabin or a ski lodge, not a home. He needed to remedy that.
While he tended the fire, she set up their dinner arrangement. Soon the fire was crackling nicely and they were sitting on the floor in front of it, bowls of steaming soup and warm bread laid out on her coffee table. She’d fed Ewok and Wookie when they’d come back inside, and they were now both zonked out, Wookie next to Ben and Ewok next to Tansy.
Ben sat beside Tansy with a few inches between them. He’d left that space on purpose. This was a dinner shared by friends, not lovers.
The energy in the room might go a notch past friendship on the relationship meter, but that only served to sharpen his enjoyment of the food and the cozy setting. He couldn’t remember ever being happier. “This is great.” He sipped his red wine and took a bite of the fragrant bread. “Thank you.”
Pausing with her spoon in midair, she gazed at him with softness in her blue eyes. “Got to treat my volunteers right.”
He wasn’t sure if he was the reason for that look in her eyes, but he liked thinking he made her happy, even if it was a friendly kind of happy. “I’m glad I played with the dogs, it seemed to be good for them.”
“It was, and I’m thrilled they got the exercise. They’ll sleep well tonight.”
“Good.” He took a mouthful of soup and realized exactly how hungry he was. He finished off more than half of what was in his bowl before he spoke again. “Does it ever get to be too much, living right where you work?”
“Never. This is my dream. I’ve wanted to help animals ever since I was a kid.”
“Brothers or sisters?”
“No, although my parents had planned to have more than one kid. It took them forever to have me. They were both in their forties. So they filled the house with dogs and cats, instead. Having a lot of animals around seemed normal to me.” She chuckled. “My folks still have quite a menagerie.”
“Here in Tacoma?”
“No, they got tired of the winters and moved to Arizona. They’d love it if I’d move down there, too, but I’ve found my bliss with this foundation. I’m not going anywhere.”
He was glad to hear it. As much as he worried about his intense emotional reaction to Tansy, he didn’t want her to leave town. “I’m pretty settled here, too,” he said.
“It has lots of good points.”
“Yep.” Tacoma had always felt like home to him, maybe because it was the last place he’d lived with Mickey. So, once he was on his own, he’d moved back here. His aunt and uncle had continued to roam, and last year they’d headed to Mexico in an RV. He’d had no word since then, but they’d never been big on keeping in touch.
“It’s great, what you’re doing with The Haven,” he said. “But don’t you ever get discouraged?”
She turned her head to look at him. “You mean because I can’t save them all?”
“Something like that, yeah.”
“The fact is, I can’t save them all, but if I let myself dwell on the negative side of the ledger, I’m wasting valuable energy. Instead I think about all the ones I have saved.”
“The glass-half-full theory.”
“That’s me.”
Indeed. He looked into those luminous eyes and finally began to understand how strong she was and how perfectly suited to the work she’d chosen. “That’s inspiring.”
“Thanks, but I’m inspired by what you do, which seems a lot more complicated to me.”
“It’s not. I keep saying you could learn it.” He tried to keep from staring at her mouth, but it was so tempting. And so very close.
“I could learn the basics, but your talent can’t be taught. You work instinctively to capture the essence of your subjects. I can tell you operate by instinct—so do I with the animals.”
“I’m not always successful.”
She laughed. “Who is?”
“I know, but I get impatient.” He’d made a copy of the footage he’d taken of her at the station. He wasn’t satisfied with it. “Like with you, for example.”
“Me?”
“The camera work I did when you came to KFOR was okay, but you’re so much more…filled with light than what I managed to record. I need another chance.”
Her breath hitched and her eyes grew dreamy. “Filled with light?”
“Mmm.” He realized that he’d moved close enough that their shoulders touched. He risked a lot being this near to her and saying these things, but he couldn’t seem to help it. “You give off this subtle glow. I didn’t capture that in the footage I took.”
“That’s very flattering.” She spoke in hushed tones as she drifted toward him, closing the gap. “But I don’t think I glow.”
“Yes, you do. You’re glowing now.”
“I am?”
“Yes.” He breathed her in. “Here.” He touched his lips to her cheekbone. “And here.” He pressed his mouth against the space between her brows. “And here.” He feathered a kiss along her jawline.
He would have missed her soft gasp if he hadn’t been so close. But he didn’t miss it. “Tansy, if I don’t kiss you right now, I’m going to explode.”
Her lashes fluttered down, concealing those incredible eyes. “Ben, if you don’t kiss me right now, I’ll explode, too.”
“Can’t have people exploding, can we?” He cupped her cheek, his fingers sliding over the silky temptation of her skin. His heart threatened to pound right out of his chest as he hovered nearer. At last, when his breath mingled with hers, he closed his eyes and sought the velvet softness of her lips.
And when he settled his mouth over hers, his sense of homecoming nearly overwhelmed him. Risky or not, he needed to be with this woman, to absorb her warmth and bask in the light that surrounded her.
Then she moaned softly, and the surge of desire that roared through him left him trembling with the effort to keep his pressure light, his touch gentle. But he managed it. She’d yielded this much to him, but if she sensed that his control could snap any second, he might lose her trust.
With great effort, he lifted his head and gazed down at her. Her eyes opened slowly. He waited, breath held, for what they would reveal.
At last, with a quivering sigh, she let him see what he’d dreamed of, but never dared hope for. Passion blazed there…for him.
“I shouldn’t want you,” she murmured.
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