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Once Bitten Twice Shy
Sommer Marsden
August Adams has an awful track record with love. She’s worked very hard to make herself emotionally unavailable. Her life consists of her art, her best friend, and a feral cat named Iris. Until the day Jack Murphy falls into her life. Literally.The new lawn man takes a tumble into the hole in her front yard — the very hole he’s there to deal with. This man with his big brown eyes, his muscled forearms, and his quick smile shakes up her safe little world from that very first encounter. Ready or not, here he is. Eager to love her and hoping to be loved in return. So it’s all up to August. But can she let go of her past and embrace her future? Or will she remain once bitten, twice shy?
ONCE BITTEN TWICE SHY
SOMMER MARSDEN
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
This novel is entirely a work of fiction.
The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are
the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to
actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is
entirely coincidental.
Mischief
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
The News Building
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.mischiefbooks.com (http://www.mischiefbooks.com)
An eBook Original 2015
1
Copyright © Sommer Marsden
Sommer Marsden asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Ebook Edition © 2015 ISBN: 9780008168803
Version: 2015-11-20
For Jim. You never felt the need to rescue me, but were always there when I was ready to rescue myself. I love you. For ever and ever. Amen.
Contents
Cover (#uebcb5b57-1f16-59b6-96ae-00159bfeb424)
Title Page (#u0405d59b-c25f-53d8-b4d3-24ed23ad2a37)
Copyright (#u9849f354-9c42-564b-b67b-921986b1dd5e)
Dedication (#u5e546e0e-73bf-5e1d-9ef9-6c7608333226)
Chapter 1 (#u4a25abbc-24b8-55ac-9dc5-d4870bd1876d)
Chapter 2 (#u3e2588ad-2294-5f1e-b406-b0b4698c9f11)
Chapter 3 (#ubf372700-5bd2-5b30-9c56-e64d6409ee68)
Chapter 4 (#ua474581d-a717-55b1-be44-c9b8dce01d14)
Chapter 5 (#ucf514a81-81e8-582d-9c12-ea7401b9ed77)
Chapter 6 (#uad7923d1-79eb-56da-b6ad-77fb6ef99d2d)
Chapter 7 (#ue08b65fb-9160-5f2a-9439-dfd4bda0f9b4)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 21 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 22 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 23 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 24 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 25 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 26 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 27 (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
More from Mischief (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1 (#u5080c4cc-b53d-5016-88bb-9894d89c7470)
August glanced out of the front window just in time to see him fall in. The new lawn man was tall and walking briskly one moment, his right knee deep in a hole the next. She unlocked the door, swearing softly, her heart beating a rapid rabbit kick in her chest.
‘Jesus!’ She knew she sounded terrified and somewhat crazy, but she couldn’t help it. Her first thought was to wonder, had he hurt himself? The next, a truly terrifying thought, would he sue her? She pushed it all out of her head as she dropped to her haunches and held out her hand to him. ‘Are you OK? Are you hurt?’
He took the offered hand, his much bigger and cooler than hers thanks to the chilly October temperature. She had a moment of near hysterical amusement when she saw her fingers smear yellow ochre paint over his wrist as he clasped them. She bit her lip and began to tug as he struggled to get himself on an even keel.
Then she froze. ‘Wait! Should we move you? Should you…um –’ she blew out a breath to try and get her mind to focus ‘– stay in the hole?’
His eyebrows shot up. Thick and dark-brown above even browner eyes. It made her laugh. All her hysterical worry, fear and bizarre amusement came bubbling up at once.
‘Why in the world would I stay in the hole?’ With that, he got his foot on the grass and stooped, hands on knees, to catch his breath. He looked up at her, his eyes bright in the stark autumn sunlight. ‘I think you’re thinking of a head injury. When you drop into a hole, protocol is to usually get out as soon as possible.’
More crazy laughter tried to escape and she pressed her hand against her lips to tame the urge to release it. ‘Sorry. I was just…worried. Are you OK?’
He nodded and finally stood up straight. He popped his back and she winced at the sound. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘That’s from years of football, not the hole in the middle of your yard.’ He stuck out his hand. ‘Jack Murphy. Your new lawn guy.’
She took it and shook, noticing the way his fingers felt pressed against her wrist. She noted nicks and scars on his flesh and thought they’d be wonderful to paint, those beat-up hands.
‘August. Adams. August Adams,’ she repeated, blinking against a sudden gust of wind. ‘I’m sorry about the hole. As you can see, I really do need a lawn guy. Or a hole guy.’
When the words registered she felt her embarrassment flame in her face. She was certain that two big swatches of red stood out on her cheeks as if she’d been slapped.
He chuckled at that, took off his cap and ran a hand through his unruly brown hair. ‘I’ll say. You must have had a tree here at one point.’
August nodded. ‘Pear tree.’
‘Ah, and let me guess, the wood went soft, it started dropping limbs and then you had to have it removed.’
‘We have a winner,’ she said. ‘It actually dropped a limb on my Jeep. So that’s when I had to bite the bullet and get someone to take it down. Before it killed someone. Or my Jeep.’
He smiled and it caught her off-guard. When he smiled the skin around his eyes crinkled and made his rugged face a bit softer, more boyish. The smile itself was broad and friendly and, as odd as the thought seemed, welcoming. ‘Well, you have to protect a good Jeep. I –’ He glanced down and August followed suit.
‘Oh, crap, you’re –’
He levelled that intense gaze at her and something sleepy and slow rolled over in her chest. It was an unusual but peaceful feeling. She refused to acknowledge it. It helped when he said, ‘I know it’s very unprofessional of me to ask to use your bathroom but I appear to be –’
‘Bleeding!’ she said. Then she turned on her heels before she could admire that warm smile any longer. ‘Come with me. I have peroxide and bandages and I’ll even make you a coffee since you fell into my pit of despair on the very first day.’
She found it easier to talk to him over her shoulder. That way she didn’t have to notice how handsome he was. And she didn’t have to notice herself noticing.
He sat on her paint stool, his trouser leg rolled up so it was above his knee. There was a small tear, minimal blood, and the reason her hands were shaking was because of him. Not his wound. Being close to him had made her jittery like she’d had too much caffeine or too little sleep. It had been a long time since any man had given her a jolt. At first she figured it was the shock of seeing him fall, but now, close up, she saw it had more to do with him and the faint endearing energy that seemed to radiate off him. She’d never had someone make her feel nervous and calm all at the same time.
She tried to keep her focus by slowly removing the tabs from the bandages and then carefully put them in a crisscross, forming an X, over his wound.
He smelled like fresh air and green grass with just a hint of something else she couldn’t place.
‘Painter?’ he said. His gaze ticked slowly around the studio as she attended to his battle scars.
She stood, stretched her back and kept her eyes off him. She looked at everything but him. The irises she was working on. A series of hyper-coloured flowers, the current ones being done in the yellow ochre she’d smeared all over him.
‘Yep. Painter. What gave me away?’
When he grinned at her, she glanced back at her work. Better to look at the work than at his handsome face.
Jack rolled his trouser leg back down and fingered the hole in the knee.
‘Sorry, I’ll get you new ones,’ she said, finally.
‘No worries.’
‘No, really. My fault, I insist.’
He stood and walked over to a finished painting. The only one in the entire studio she considered truly finished. It showed the ocean during the day but the water was coloured the true reds and oranges of a sunset. The body of water reflecting a horizon that wasn’t there.
Her heart stuttered. He reached out as if to touch it and she flinched. In his peripheral vision he must have caught the reaction because he stopped before actually placing a finger on the canvas. ‘Sorry,’ he said, drawing his hand back.
‘It might be wet is all,’ she lied. The painting had been dry for a decade. ‘Let me walk you out,’ she said. She had to get him out. Now. Fast.
At the door she stopped him. ‘Seriously, let me write you a cheque for the trousers. And if you need to go to the doctor –’
He shook his head before she could finish. ‘You have a pole with a red flag in the hole,’ he said.
August blinked. ‘Yeah? And?’
Jack grinned again and she felt that electric feeling once more in her gut. It unnerved her more than seeing him take a spill.
