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She fidgeted with the stem of her wineglass and he realized he’d probed past the bounds of what was polite conversation and gone straight into that forbidden territory marked personal. A place that it was obvious she wasn’t ready to go.
“This is a really nice house. I can’t believe how big all the houses are in this area.”
Actually, the house was rather modest for the neighborhood, only 4,000 square feet. Certainly small compared to other properties he had around the world. But he’d liked the soaring windows and the large deck outside was a terrific place to work on the laptop on nice days. Well, it would be if he were ever here long enough to enjoy it.
Since the Johnsons had gone, he had a cleaning service come in periodically to check on things and dust. He’d had them stock the kitchen before he’d arrived. He might have to have them in more often if he truly was going to stay in Plano for the next six months.
“Where do you live?” he asked, because every detail about her life was becoming important to him. He’d certainly be happier discussing her and her life. Maybe get her to confess she’d always been attracted to him and had written a sexy little story about the two of them.
“Not so far from the school. My subdivision is a few years old. It’s a good thing I moved there when it was first built. I don’t think I could afford to buy there now.”
“What do you like about where you live?”
She took a sip of her wine. He finished putting the tomatoes and onions on the salmon and wrapped them in foil before putting them in the oven. He checked the boiling water and dumped in the couscous and then turned back to her. She was staring at him.
“What?”
“I thought you were faking it. That you were going to pretend to know how to cook, but then when I turned my back you’d be pulling ready-made meals from the freezer.”
“No matter what else you believe about me, Grace, know that I never lie.”
“Never? What if I asked you if this suit looked nice on me?”
“I would say that the color is good with your skin tone but that the cut isn’t flattering.”
She arched one eyebrow at him. “What if you get pulled over for a speeding ticket?”
“Not even then. I just don’t see the point in making up a story.”
“Even when you’re starting a relationship? When you want to make a good impression?”
He shook his head. “That would set a tone for the relationship that I think I can fool the other person and I don’t like it.”
“Did someone lie to you?”
Deep inside the icy part of his soul where he hid the truth of what he was, he cringed. Lies were the very foundation his life had been built on and he hadn’t even realized that until he was twenty-five. At that age when most people were coming to terms with their past, he’d learned his was a sham. “That’s in the same closet that you closed the door on.”
“What closet? When did I close that door?”
“The one marked personal. You closed it when you changed the subject from your mother.”
“Oh. If I tell you about her …”
“I’m not trying to make a deal with you. Just saying some areas aren’t meant to be trod this early in a relationship.”
There were some places he didn’t ever want to go. Digging into her secrets and finding out more about Grace was his only goal. He didn’t want her to see him in a different light.
“Are we going to have a relationship?”
“I didn’t invite the rest of the board back to my house for dinner.”
“No, you didn’t.” She set her wineglass on the counter and walked around the island so that she stood right next to him. “Why is that? Why are you suddenly noticing me as a woman and not just as a coworker?”
He realized that he’d boxed himself into a corner. “I saw a different side of you today. I was—I am—intrigued.” That was the truth.
“Desperate and willing to do anything to save the school—no wonder you’re interested in me.”
He laughed because he could tell she wanted to lighten the moment, but inside he knew that he shouldn’t seduce her until she revealed the truth. Until she acknowledged that she’d been attracted to him for a long time.
“I don’t see you as desperate.”
“Well, I was. And you are turning out to be a very nice person to have in my corner.”
Thinking of why he’d invited her over, he knew he wasn’t nice. “No one would ever call me nice.”
“I would, Adam. I know you don’t see it that way, but taking a chance on me and the school … it was a very kind thing you did. And I really appreciate it.”
“I don’t want your appreciation.”
“No?”
He shook his head, closing the distance between them and drawing her into his arms. He lowered his head, brushing his lips over hers. He told himself that he was just telling her the truth with his body because he still couldn’t reveal it with his words, but he knew that something else was going on here. For the first time since he was twenty-five, he wanted to pull a woman into his arms and keep her there forever.
For a man who liked living a solitary life, that was a scary thought.
Grace rose on her tiptoes to meet Adam’s mouth. She snaked her arms around his waist and held on to him, afraid to wake from the dream that he’d enveloped her in. For some reason, Adam Bowen was suddenly paying attention to her and she didn’t want to let him go.
The worries she’d carried for the last ten days faded to the back of her mind. He opened his mouth and she knew he’d said something but for the life of her she couldn’t hear him over the roaring in her ears. She kept her eyes open as he moved closer to her.
“Grace?”
“Hmm?”
“Last chance …”
She realized he was telling her to pull back but she couldn’t. He was her fantasy and after the long stressful day she’d had, she wanted—no, needed—to put her needs first. She’d wanted to kiss Adam since the first moment they’d met.
His lips brushed over hers. Adam Bowen was kissing her. He tasted way better than she’d imagined he would. He kept his touch light, his tongue tracing the seam between her lips. She let her eyes drift closed and knew that she’d made a choice that was going to change the nice safe world she’d created for herself.
The timer on the oven beeped and he pulled back. Reluctantly. He directed her toward the dining room and she went in by herself, knowing she needed to collect her thoughts and find her center.
What if he was toying with her? One other time, she’d believed in a man and he’d disappointed her badly. She didn’t want to be a fool again, but Adam had always seemed different to her.
The dining room was ultra-formal, decorated in dark wood and antiques. This was the kind of showplace house her father would have eyed with a fanatical gleam, sure the owner had plenty of spare cash to donate to the church. The kind of place she’d never have been invited into as a child.
She heard Adam’s footsteps behind her and turned as he entered the room. He set the plates on the table and held out a chair for her. Once seated she muttered a quick prayer of thanks under her breath.
Then glanced up in time to see him take his seat. The meal was delicious and she wanted to keep the conversation light. To remind herself that no matter what Adam intimated, this wasn’t the beginning of a personal relationship.
But she wanted to know more about him. She wanted to find out why he had a thing about lying. Most people paid lip service to believing in that, but in real life often rattled off falsehoods without a second thought.
She should just ask him straight out if he’d seen the story in her office and maybe picked it up. But she’d be so embarrassed if she had to explain about it. What if it wasn’t Adam? Jose, Bruce and other staffers went in and out of her office all the time. Even students and other teachers had access.
For just one night, she wanted to see the real man so that when she got home after this strange day was over, she could write down her impressions of him. The way his hand had felt on hers. The way his lips had moved over hers. The way he’d cocked his head to the side and really listened while she talked about subjects on which no one else wanted her opinion.
Even if she never saw him again, she knew he’d given her a gift. But she would see him again. And she didn’t want to slip back into invisible mode with him. The weight of her hair against her shoulders reminded her that he already saw her in a different light.
“What were your parents like?” she asked, when they’d finished their main course and were having coffee on his deck. It overlooked the well-landscaped backyard. In the center of the yard was a large pool with a waterfall on the far end.
“Ward and June Cleaver. Are you old enough to know who they are?” he asked.
“I think everyone has seen Leave It to Beaver on Nick@Nite.”
“Very funny. My mom and dad were the perfect parents, doting, supportive, strict when they needed to be.”
“So why haven’t you settled down?” she asked. It was the one thing she’d always wondered about him. He seemed so perfect—what was stopping him from committing to one of the perfect women he dated?
“Why haven’t you?” he asked.
She swallowed hard. This was why she didn’t do close relationships. Sooner or later you had to talk about your past. Small talk only lasted so long. “I didn’t grow up with the perfect parents.”
“What kind of childhood did you have?” he asked.
It was an innocent question. She wanted to counter with a change of topic—something to turn the spotlight back on him—but she wasn’t going to, because she did want to get to know Adam better. And that thing he’d said earlier about trust had struck a nerve. Here was a man she thought she could trust.
“I don’t know. One like most kids. I think you’re the exception, Adam.” In her small town, he would have been the exception. They’d had rich kids like everywhere else, but no one who’d grown up the way Adam had. Traveling every season, going to trendy ski resorts and all-inclusive Caribbean getaways instead of riding in the backseat of a cramped car to some dreary relative’s house several hours away.
“How?” he asked, his interest genuine.
“Just that a lot of parents weren’t that supportive of kids in my neighborhood.”
“You’re from a small town, right?”
“Yes. A poor one. Most families really scrambled to make a living.”
“Yours?”
“Yes.”
“What did your folks do?”
She should never have started this conversation. How could she talk about being deprived when her father had been a preacher and had provided a nice house for her? How could she explain, without sounding like a whiner, exactly the way she’d been deprived? How could she explain what she herself never wanted to understand?
“My dad’s a preacher.”
“So you’re the rebellious preacher’s daughter?”
“No. Not a rebel. I prefer to just blend into the walls.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“Well I must be doing something wrong, because you weren’t supposed to notice.”
“I didn’t until today.”
She smiled at the way he said it. Like it was an important thing. That having noticed her had made a difference to him.
Was it because of the story?
“I’ve noticed you before.”
“Really? Tell me what you observed.”
She took her time trying to figure out how to tell him what she’d seen in him without revealing how deeply she’d studied him. Now that she was here with him, she felt a little silly that she’d given him a starring role in her fantasies without really knowing the man behind the good looks.
Adam knew he was pushing. But the more he learned about Grace, the more he realized that his knowing about her fantasies was going to wound her. She gave off the image of being so superefficient and competent that only tonight had he glimpsed the vulnerabilities she had underneath.
He didn’t want her to think he’d exploited those weaknesses. And guilt ate at him. Omissions were lies, he thought. Hell, he knew that omissions were the biggest kind of lies.
But he wanted to hear from her lips that she found him attractive. That he hadn’t imagined the story that he’d reread during the day about five times. He knew exactly what she liked. How she wanted a man who was forceful in the bedroom but sensitive and understanding outside.
To be honest, that wasn’t how he normally operated with a woman, but everything about Grace was different. She made him want to be more. He didn’t know why. He couldn’t explain it to himself. But tonight, with a cool breeze in the air and the fragrance of the blooming vegetation around his pool filling the air, he didn’t care.
He didn’t want to think of anything other than this woman and how he could convince her she’d be safe in his arms. And he wanted her in his arms. He wanted her mouth under his with no dinner buzzer about to go off. No crowded restaurant of people too close to them. Just the two of them and the night and nothing between them.
“Come on, Grace, what did you think about me the first time we met?” he asked, having the feeling that she was going to just keep quiet and let the conversation die an awkward death.
“It’s complicated,” she said, leaving the deck and walking toward the pool. She stopped by a potted hibiscus and bent to smell the bloom.
She ran whenever he pushed too far into her barriers. The ones she used to keep everyone at arm’s length. She was subtle and only someone who spent a significant amount of time with her as he had today would notice it.
“I understand complicated. Is it such a bad impression that you’re worried about hurting my feelings?”
“Give me a break. You must know that no one has a bad first impression of you.”
“I don’t know that, Gracie. You won’t tell me what you thought.”
She took a deep breath and faced him, her eyes alive with an emotion he couldn’t name. “I thought, this man is someone who knows how to really live his life.”
He was taken aback by her comment. To be honest, he’d been fishing for a compliment. Having read her story, he knew she liked his shoulders and his backside. He was chagrined to realize that he’d expected her impressions to just be physical. If they had been, he would have felt comfortable using the physical attraction between the two of them to seduce her.
“Not what you were expecting?” she asked.
“No,” he said. What she’d observed in him revealed what she herself was afraid she was missing. It took him a moment to identify fragility and fear as the emotions in her eyes. Grace didn’t lie, either. The knowledge made him feel protective of her.
“Well, there it is. You also have very nice eyes.”
She took a step closer to him. There were still a few inches of space between them, but she’d made a move toward him—the first she’d made since they met. He was a little thrown by her compliment. Nice eyes? “No one has ever mentioned that before.”
