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For a moment, if she closed her eyes and imagined, she might believe that he’d actually wanted to touch her....
But he hadn’t.
He’d simply been trying to drive home his angry point. As she’d learned, wanting and being wanted were for other women.
Jessie finished undressing and pulled on a flannel nightdress. Last week, at the women’s clothing store in town, she’d passed satin and lace teddies on the way to the dressing room. She’d stopped, looking longingly at the material while wondering how it might feel against her skin.
Since it didn’t really matter anyway, she’d settled for flannel. No one would see her in lingerie. Besides, a long gown was warmer, especially when there was no one to share the bed with.
After combing her hair its customary one hundred strokes, she turned off the lights and slipped beneath cold blankets, curling into a ball, seeking protection from the rejection still searing her heart.
Seconds later, the insistent thud of a fist on her front door made her sit upright.
“Open up, Jessie!”
Kurt.
She dragged a pillow against her chest and hugged it tight. Maybe if she ignored him...
“I’ll get Sheriff McCall, say we’ve got an emergency.”
He wouldn’t.
“I will, Jessie. Try me.”
Her heart pounded.
“Neighbors just turned on their porch light.”
Jessie groaned. Maybe when she went to Denver in the morning, she wouldn’t come back.
“No, Mrs. Johnson, Jessie’s not answering. I’m starting to worry. Yes, her car’s here.”
Silence hung as cold as a newborn snow.
“Sure...thanks. I’ll wait here for the sheriff.”
“Wait!” Galvanized by the threat, Jessie tossed back the covers and pillow, then ran toward the front door. She’d never be able to show her face in Columbine Crossing again if anyone else witnessed her private torment. “Don’t you dare call Spencer,” she called, twisting the bolt.
Before she had a chance to open the door, Kurt did.
She gasped.
He stood there, wearing no jacket, his cheeks bitten by the frost. His breath clung frigidly to the night air, air that still felt more like winter than spring.
“Invite me in.”
“But the neighbors—”
“Are asleep. Invite me in, Jessie.”
There were no lights on across the street. There was only Kurt, all six feet of him, masculine determination written in the set of his jaw and shoulders.
Jessie had never felt more helpless. “You lied.”
“I accomplished my goal.” When she said nothing more, he added, “Fine. We’ll talk here.”
In the years she’d known him, she’d learned to tell when he was joking. He wasn’t. “Kurt...”
“Decision’s yours, Jessie. We’re going to talk. Now. We can do it inside or out here, where the neighbors might overhear. Unless you want what I have to say printed in Miss Starr’s column?”
The threat chilled as much as the weather. For protection against both, she dragged the neckline of her nightie tighter around her throat. The subzero wind nipped at her toes and ankles. But even that didn’t freeze as much as the ice in Kurt’s green eyes.
“Okay,” he said. “We’ll play it your way. First of all—”
“Stop!” Her insides reeled and she felt as though the world had started spinning backward. “You can come in.” The invitation contained only the barest hint of civility.
He didn’t hesitate.
With the door closed and both of them standing in the tiny foyer, she suddenly felt very small, very feminine. Her skin tingled where he’d touched her earlier, and sanity demanded that she get him out of here immediately. “Go ahead, Kurt. Say what you need to so you can leave.”
“I’m wondering,” he said, taking a step toward her, filling her senses and indicating her suitcase with his thumb. “Where the hell you think you’re going.”
The question was delivered quietly, but whipped by the lash of anger.
Jessie took another step away from him, then stopped. She reminded herself he was her best friend’s brother, nothing more. She was a grown woman and answered only to herself.
Straightening her spine, she pretended an indifference she didn’t feel. “It’s none of your business.”
“You made it my business.”
She shook her head, her hair falling forward to frame her face and allowing her to hide. “Look, Kurt, I presented you with a business arrangement, but you didn’t like the terms. End of discussion.”
“It would be, if you weren’t planning a trip.”
Frustration began as a small knot in her stomach. “It’s late, and I have to get up early.”
“So you can go to Denver.”
“Yes.”
“And get inseminated.”
The knot became tighter. She hated the emphasis he put on the words, as though she was doing something repulsive. Tipping back her head, she gave him a falsely sweet smile. “Good night, Kurt.”
He turned and she experienced a flash of triumph.
Then he clicked the dead bolt into place with a threatening thud.
Her heart momentarily stopped. “What are you doing?”
“Stopping you from doing something you’ll regret.”
Two
Until that moment, Kurt hadn’t realized how deadly serious he was.
He knew Jessie, better than she realized. Mary, his sister, had spent many evenings telling him about her friend. He knew about Jessie’s broken engagement and the time she was stood-up for the prom.
And because he and Jessie volunteered together at the local children’s center, he knew how much having a real family meant to her. But this wasn’t the way to accomplish that, no matter what she thought.
“You can’t stop me from going to Denver.”
“Yes,” he said. “I can. And I will. I’ll save you from yourself, Jessie.”
Slowly she shook her head, loose hair framing her face and so very nearly distracting him.
“Thanks for the offer, but I don’t want a knight in shining armor.”
“Tough. You’ve got one.”
Her eyes, columbine blue and frosted by icy resolve, seemed to challenge him. “Heroes are for fairy tales, Kurt, just like happily ever afters.”
“You don’t believe in them.”
“No...I never did.”
“Never?” he asked. Her eyes told a different story, though. They revealed what she never willingly would.
He took a single step toward her and watched her retreat. It wasn’t much, just a fraction of an inch. But her toes, with an intriguing brush of pink across the nails, had peeked out from beneath her nightclothes.
The flannel gown, severe, prim and proper, swooshed around her ankles. More than that, however, it was her eyes that still riveted his attention. They hinted at the secrets in her soul. “Never, not even once? In all your childhood years, you never wanted to be rescued?”
She opened her mouth, then closed it again.
“You were content with what you had, being shuffled from family to family?”
“Get out.” She pointed to the door.
“A little close to the truth?” he asked with coiled quietness. Her ridiculous proposal had angered him, the fact that she wanted only his sperm infuriated him and now her determination to go to Denver fanned a flame of frustration in him.
“Truth?” she repeated. “You want the truth, Kurt? Well, how’s this?” Her voice quivered, betraying the emotions that Kurt knew she was trying to hide. “I’m going to have a baby—if not yours, then someone else’s. So save us both the aggravation of misplaced chivalry.”
He shook his head and advanced again. “Sorry, sweetheart. You brought this to me and you made it my concern.”
“So what are you going to do, physically stop me from leaving in the morning?”
“If I have to.”
She shivered.
He took another, measured step toward her.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Try me.”
She sucked in a breath, her breasts rising beneath the cotton of her gown. Her nipples strained against the fabric and something deep inside him wrenched. For the first time since he’d first met her—when she wore a braid and knee-high white socks with a skirt—she affected him in a way that had nothing to do with friendship.
His instincts warned of danger while his body urged him toward it.
He reminded himself that Jessie was his sister’s friend.
Yeah. Right Too bad he wasn’t buying what his mind was selling.
“This is crazy, impossible.”
For a second, he had no idea what she was talking about.
“If you stop me in the morning, I’ll go later, after you leave. You can’t hold me prisoner in my own home forever.”
“Is that a challenge?”
“Kurt, stop this ridiculousness.”
“Sure.” He folded his arms. Better than touching her. “As soon as you agree to cancel your appointment.”
“If it’ll get you out of here, I promise I’ll call the clinic first thing in the morning.”
“Not good enough.”
Her eyelids squeezed shut for a fraction of a second.
“I’ll cancel it for you.”
“Cancel it for me? You’re out of your ever-loving mind.”
“That makes two of us. Give me the number of the doctor’s office, Jessie. Then I’ll leave you alone to your sweet dreams.”
“And an empty house,” she said quietly, the words more of a confession than a statement.
She winced, obviously having disclosed more than she wanted. He should pretend he hadn’t heard, and more, hadn’t seen the painful display of honesty in her eyes.
But right now, Kurt wasn’t feeling like much of a gentleman. He’d capitalize on her weakness, get her to see things his way, the right way. “That’s what this is all about, isn’t it?” he asked quietly. “An empty house.”
She didn’t answer him.
“If you don’t like being alone, get married.”
