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Nudged into remembering common courtesy, he extended his hand. “Adam,” he said. “Adam Grainger.”
“How do you do, Adam Grainger,” she returned in tones of deceptive formality, sliding her hand into his.
The touch of her palm against his, the slight friction of skin on skin, caused an electrifying sensation inside Adam unlike anything he had ever before experienced and way out of proportion to the minimal contact. The thought burst in his mind of what effect he might feel should he touch her lips, her breasts, her...
“Sunshine.” Her one spoken word scattered his erotically galloping thoughts.
Adam blinked, then frowned. “What?”
“My given name,” she explained.
“Sunshine?” He shook his head—an action he seemed to be repeating frequently since encountering her. “Sunshine Dase?” he asked in patent disbelief. “You’re kidding?”
“Nope.” Now she shook her head. “That’s it.” She grinned. “My parents were repressed flowerchildren wannabes. But most folks call me Sunny.”
Sunny Dase. Oh, Lord. Adam felt torn between a desire to laugh and an urge to groan. “I can’t imagine what kind of teasing you must have endured growing up,” he murmured in understanding and commiseration.
“It was a challenge,” she said, shrugging. “But, as you can see, I survived.”
“Very nicely,” he commended, skimming a glance over her caped form, feeling his body clench in the process. Nice barely described her appearance, but... Adam wondered if perhaps the trials and tribulations of her former years had been a contributing factor in her strange behavior.
“Thank you, kind sir,” she responded, dipping into another quick curtsy. “Actually, I’ve grown to like the name,” she confided. “It’s different.”
“It is that,” he agreed, drolly.
Sunny laughed. And when Sunny laughed like that, easy and spontaneously, the sound literally stole the breath from Adam’s body. He had to see her again.
The realization brought sharp awareness of time and place. The late autumn sun was swimming on the horizon, casting a soft golden glow on the surroundings, in the highlights streaking her hair, on her lovely face.
Adam was struck by a sudden overwhelming need to taste the ripe fullness of her lips.
“What are you so deep in thought about?” Sunny’s green gaze knowingly probed his eyes, as if reading his mind, discerning his intentions.
Adam had never before met a woman—anyone—with such expressive eyes. The perception in those green depths danced along his nervous system.
Naturally, he couldn’t reveal to her what he had been thinking, the desire heating his blood. An eerie intuition telling him she knew the truth of his thoughts, he blurted out, “I was contemplating my chances of success at convincing you to have dinner with me this evening.”
“Excellent.”
Her prompt response stopped his mental process cold. “Huh?” he said, sounding like a dullard, in all likelihood, because he felt extremely dull and slow-witted. Adam didn’t appreciate the feeling. He betrayed himself by stiffening.
Her soft smile smoothed his ruffled feathers. “Your chances of having me accept your invitation to have dinner with you are excellent,” she explained.
Astounded by the feelings of elation her acceptance gave him, Adam stared at her a long moment, assimilating the glittering facets of the sensation.
“Where?”
He frowned. “Where what?”
Her laughing eyes mocked him. “Where do you want me to meet you for dinner?” she said precisely.
“Oh. Oh.” Adam felt like an idiot, or worse, an awkward hormonally confused teenager. “You don’t have to meet me. I’ll come for you. If you’ll give me directions to...”
“Where are you staying?” she interrupted him to ask, the expression in her eyes softening.
“The Patrick Henry.” Adam indicated the upper end of Duke of Gloucester Street with a flick of his hand. “It’s across from the restored area, right along Route 60.”
“I know where it is.” Her expression grew pensive. “Look,” she went on after a thoughtful moment, “I’m located close by, right on the fringes of the area. Depending on where you want to have dinner, it would probably be simpler for me to meet you there.” She arched her eyebrows. “Did you have a particular place in mind?”
“Well... no,” Adam admitted, shrugging. “Actually, although I have made reservations later in the week for several places that were recommended to me by friends, since I only arrived early this afternoon, I was planning to eat at the motel restaurant tonight.”
“Then why change your plans?” she said reasonably. “I’ve eaten there—the food’s good. I’ll meet you in the lobby at... What time?”
Adam was shaking his head before she’d finished. “Not necessary,” he insisted. “I’ve got a rental car. I can pick you up. It’ll be dark. You shouldn’t—do not—have to make your own way to the motel.”
“I’m a big girl, I can find my way,” she said wryly. “It’s no hassle for me to hop onto the bus that circles the area. I’ll be perfectly safe.”
Adam opened his mouth to argue, then immediately shut it again. Her chiding expression said volumes more than her spoken assurances. Advising himself to quit while he was ahead and before she changed her mind, he sighed in defeat.
“Okay, in the lobby at...say, six-thirty?”
“What time is it now?”
He glanced at his watch. “Four thirty-two.”
“Suppose we say six,” she suggested, her smile enticing. “I haven’t eaten since breakfast and I’m famished.”
“Six is fine.” He offered her a teasing smile. “I’d hate to see you waste away to a shadow of your former self.”
“Terrific. See you then.” Laughing, she turned away, then slanted a look at him over her shoulder and softly called, “By the way, my former self was little more than a shadow.”
Not again. A sinking sensation mingling with the anticipation perking inside him, Adam watched her stride away, the long cape swirling around her trim ankles.
Two
“Damn.”
Washing the trickle of blood from the razor nick on his jaw, Adam dug a styptic pencil out of his shaving kit and grimaced as he applied it to the minor wound. The grimace wasn’t in reaction to the sting of the pencil, but to the visible tremor in his fingers.
Ridiculous, Adam decided, flinging the towel aside and striding into the bedroom.
He was always cool, collected and logical. He ran a far-ranging family-owned corporation. He never lost his composure, maintaining his vaunted, steel-edged control through even the most intensely fought business battles.
The very idea of him suffering so much as a slight case of the shakes over the prospect of spending time with a woman was a concept beyond the pale.
Ms. Sunny Dase—preposterous name!—intrigued him, Adam concluded, absently rejecting one shirt in favor of another, too distracted to take note of his unusual indecisiveness concerning his choice of apparel.
Every article of clothing Adam possessed was well made, elegant, tasteful and outrageously expensive. Whatever he chose to wear suited him and any occasion. Formal wear excepted.
Should he wear a tie—or go for a more casual look?
The thought jolted Adam into the realization that he was actually agonizing over a necktie.
Was he losing his mind...or simply bewitched?
The follow-up thought brought a wry smile to his compressed lips. The consideration of bewitchment immediately wiped the smile from his mouth.
Nonsense.
Sunny was an enigma, a puzzle, nothing more. Adam had earned a reputation for his ability to untangle puzzles and expose supposed enigmas.
But she did possess the power to excite him. He had felt the zing and sting of that power with his first sight of her striding across the Palace Green.
Forgoing the neck wear, Adam felt a recurring sizzle dance along his nerve endings as he shrugged into his jacket. He would be meeting Sunny in exactly...
He shot a glance at his wristwatch. Another jolt went through him. While he had been musing on his limited sartorial section, time had slipped away from him.
Scooping his loose change, wallet and keys from atop the dresser, he shoved them into his pockets as he strode into the sitting room of the suite, then to the door. He had never known a woman to be on time. Still, he had three and a half minutes to get his rump down to the lobby—in the unlikely event Sunny proved to be the exception.
She was waiting for him.
The sight of her, standing at ease and relaxed next to the impressive bust of Patrick Henry on a pedestal in the lobby, not only surprised but delighted Adam.
The contrast in her attire alone was startling. Whereas before she had appeared the picture of an eighteenth-century maiden in her period costume, with her hair pulled up into a loose knot on top of her head, Sunny now projected an image of an ultramodern, thoroughly “with it” young woman.
She was dressed in a severely cut, perfectly fit, austere-looking black suit, with a figure-hugging pencil-slim ankle-length skirt, the side seems slit to just above the knees. The peek of curvaceous calves, in addition to her enticingly rounded bottom and long, slender thighs, caused a sudden dry tightness in Adam’s throat.
Swallowing with some difficulty, he shifted his gaze, giving her person a more encompassing look.
The severity of her black suit was balanced by a snowy white blouse with a froth of lace at the collar and cuffs, the lace spilling over the backs of her hands. Sheer black nylon encased her legs. Her slim, delicate feet were enhanced by highheeled black suede evening pumps.
Slowly, reluctantly, Adam dragged his gaze up along the alluring lines of her body and settled on her face. She appeared to be wearing a minimum of makeup: perhaps a light, translucent base, a brush of color on her cheeks; a darkening swish of mascara on her lashes; a clear, true red applied to her luscious lips.
Gliding his tongue over his own lips, Adam forced his glance away from temptation, past her straight nose, the glowing skin of her cheeks, the alert and bright interest in her curious green eyes, to the top of her head and...
And her hair... Oh, Lord, her hair. Sunny’s wavy mane of gold-streaked brown hair tumbled onto her shoulders and halfway down her elegantly straight spine.
In truth, the sight of her took his breath away. Adam’s fingers twitched with the desire to spear into the alluring brown mass; his mind reeled with an image of those gold-streaked strands spread out on a pillow...his pillow.
But first things first, he advised himself, crossing the lobby to her. Dinner, then...
“Hello,” he said, attempting to corral his bedbent thoughts as he came to a halt beside her. “Were you early or am I late?”
“Oh...hi.” Sunny flashed a nerve-crunching smile at him. “Since it is now precisely six, you are not late. So I guess I was a few moments early. No big deal.”
“Even so, I’m sorry I kept you waiting.” Adam replied, appalled by the slight catch in his voice, the rapid beat of his heart, the quivery sensation inside him...all direct effects of her disarming smile.
Boy, he mused, inwardly shaken by his response, mentally and physically. He had heard about dynamite smiles, had even witnessed a few, but this woman’s smile went way beyond dynamite; megaton came closer to the mark.
“Still hungry?” he asked politely, quashing a different hunger expanding inside.
“Starved.” Though her tone was somber, her eyes, those amazingly expressive green eyes, conveyed her understanding of and amusement at his unstated appetite.
Batten down the hatches, Mabel, there’s a rocka-butzer storm gathering on the horizon.
The sudden recollection of one of Adam’s late father’s favorite expressions in times of trouble had a settling effect on his equilibrium, easing the strain from his voice, allowing him to return her perceptive smile.
“In that case, I suppose I’d better feed you.” Taking her by the hand, Adam steered her to the restaurant.
“My hero,” Sunny murmured, batting her eyelashes—her long, dark eyelashes—at him. Then, as she moved around the bust, she drew her fingers along the chiseled jawline of Patrick Henry. “It’s a good likeness,” she said, slanting a teasing look at him. “The fiery radical would be pleased.”
Adam laughed at her whimsy, but composed himself enough to give his name to the pleasantfaced hostess standing in the restaurant entrance, checking names against the leather-bound reservation list in her hands.
“Ah, yes, good evening, Mr. Grainger.” She offered a smile and an ushering movement of her hand. “Right this way. Your table is ready.”
“Have you eaten here before?” Sunny asked, after they were seated and proffered menus, when the hostess had departed.
Adam shook his head. “No. I didn’t get in until early this afternoon. I had lunch on the plane.” He grinned. “Unlike some, I find nothing wrong with the in-flight food. In truth, I thoroughly enjoy it.”
“So do I.” She grinned back at him. “Does that make us peasants or merely plebeian?”
“Or, just maybe, it makes us too honest to affect a pseudosophistication,” he suggested.
“Yes,” she agreed, giving him the chills with the soft look she swept over him. “You always were...honest, I mean, almost to a fault.”
Not again, Adam thought, smothering a groan. Not yet another not-too-veiled reference to them having met, known each other before.
Still, he couldn’t deny the spark of interest her remark generated.
Studying her, and more than a little impressed by her clear-eyed and direct regard in return, Adam decided that perhaps it was time he probed the depths of her assumed previous knowledge of him, his personality.
“We’ve only just met,” he said. “How could you possibly know that I’ve always been honest.”
Her eyes darkened, as if with an inner amused knowing. A gently mocking smile kissed her lips, making his mouth ache with desire to do likewise.
“I’ve known almost forever.”
“Indeed?” The skeptical arch of one eyebrow underscored his tone of voice.
“Yes.” Though quiet, her tone was absolute.
“But, how?” he persisted. “How could...”
Adam broke off with the arrival of a waiter at the table. He concealed his impatience until they had given their drink and dinner orders and the man had left them.
“How?” he repeated the moment they were alone again. “How could you know anything about me?”
“Oh, Andrew...”
