Summer Kisses (154 page)

“Planning on doing some running?” he asked with a grin as his gaze settled on her feet.

She looked down at the white leather tennis shoes she had chosen to wear for their date instead of heels, her usual footwear of choice.

“The message you left on my answering machine said to dress casual. These are casual.”

“I wasn’t complaining. In fact,” he said, his grin widening, “I find them kind of sexy on you.”

Sexy wasn’t the look she had been going for when she’d slipped them on. Anything but that. Cole’s unexpected reply had her struggling for a response. “I...you...” If someone could just uncurl her tongue for a moment she might be able to get something out.

“Just what I thought,” he said. “You were trying to play it safe by wearing those, weren’t you?”

Ooh, he was good. Too good. She had to remember that. She looked up at him with a smile. “A girl never knows when she might have to make a run for it.”

“That eager to get to my bed, huh?”

Her pulse skittered wildly at the thought. “Only in your dreams, Fire Boy.”

He made her apartment seem incredibly small as he towered over her, that firm jaw beckoning her fingers to explore it. She fought the urge to lean into him and inhale his scent even deeper into her lungs.

“Okay,” he said with a grin, “so if they’re not for racing to my bed, you must be preparing for one of your great date escapes?”

He was so onto her. “Maybe. Besides, these tie on. They’re tied tight. No chance of you getting them off me to hold hostage for a second date.”

He gave a husky chuckle. “Is that a challenge?”

She never would have believed the thought of having her tennis shoes removed by someone else could be so arousing, but Cole made her wish he was slipping them off her feet right then and there.

“Considering it?” he teased. “Because I’ll be the first to admit I like a challenge.”

So did she, which meant she knew better than to issue a challenge she wasn’t prepared to see through. Kelsie forced all thoughts of him removing her clothes from her mind and shook her head. “No. Just stating a fact.”

“Okay, just making sure.” He turned, looking around the apartment appraisingly. “Nice.”

Nanci was right. The man filled his jeans well. The dark blue denim hugged his long legs and muscular thighs, and did things to his butt that made her want to reach out and see if it felt as hard as it looked.

“It sure is,” she muttered, wondering if he’d mind if she copped just one quick little feel. Cole’s husky chuckle as he turned had Kelsie’s eyes snapping up to meet his. Oh, damn, he’d caught her checking out his butt. “I...I mean it’s just right for me.”

“My butt or your apartment?” he teased with that melt-a-girl-into-a-puddle lone dimpled grin of his.

That would teach her for not being more discreet with her ogling. “Both,” she admitted, countering his grin with one of her own. “But your butt is off limits.”

“Says who?” he challenged, taking a step closer to where she stood looking up at him. Tiny lines formed at the outer corners of his dark eyes as his grin widened.

Ooh, volcanic activity in her lower region. Maybe she’d allow him one little peek at her thong...

“Forget about it,” she muttered with a frown, immediately reeling that last thought back in. She was not about to give in to her primal urges.

“Excuse me?”

She slipped around his lean frame. “I said I just need to grab my purse from the kitchen and then we can go.”
Before I drag you down the hall and into my bed.

~~~

Thank God women carried purses. If Kelsie hadn’t stepped away to get hers when she did, Cole wasn’t sure where things would have ended up. And the last thing he wanted to do with her was move too fast. She was already skittish when it came to relationships. Even more so about dating him.

Holding back wasn’t easy around her. She was just so damn sexy. And she wasn’t even trying to be, unlike the women he’d dated before. The women Joe admitted after-the-fact he thought were shallow and boring.

Remember, Maxwell, you’re trying to convince her just how imperfect you are.

Problem was, he’d lost focus on his plan the second Kelsie had opened the door to greet him with that sexy little smile of hers and those big beautiful green eyes. Boy, had he lost focus.

The phone rang once and then stopped. Kelsie must have picked it up in the kitchen. He leaned against the doorframe and ran a hand over the fake hillbilly teeth in his jean pocket with a smile. She was on to him, which meant their date wasn’t going to be nearly as easy to screw up as he’d hoped it would be. But something told him it was going to be well worth the effort.

A minute later, she stepped from the kitchen, purse in hand. “Sorry. Phone call.”

“Should I be jealous?” he teased as they made their way outside. But the thought of another man calling Kelsie didn’t sit well with him. Not at all.

“Not unless you’re jealous of a nosey older woman with incredibly bad timing.”

“Your mother?” he asked as they stopped next to his truck.

She laughed. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess.”

She slung her purse over her shoulder and tipped her head to look up at him. “Do you think we could just videotape our date so I won’t have to answer a million questions afterwards? My mother can just watch the video.”

Grinning, he reached past her to open the passenger door. “Are you sure you’re not using your mother as an excuse?”

“An excuse for what?”

“To have a video to remember me by since you’re so certain we won’t be going out again.”

Her beautiful green eyes studied him for a long moment before she said, “I hope you realize that our not going out again is nothing against you. You seem to be a really nice guy.”

Maybe so, but not tonight. Tonight, he was a bad boy waiting to happen. Pushing aside the urge to help her up into the cab of his truck, he stepped away.

“We’d better get going.”
Before I give in to the urge to press you against my truck and taste those lips again.

He turned away and rounded the truck, the gentleman in him finding it incredibly hard to walk away without helping her up. He settled behind the wheel and started the engine while Kelsie climbed up into the cab on her own.

The subtle scent of wildflowers and something more exotic filled the enclosed space, teasing his senses. Everything about this China doll teased his senses.

“Cole, would you mind stopping by my office on our way to dinner? I need to pick something up.”

“No, I don’t mind.” He put the truck in gear and pulled away from the curb. “What’s the address?”

She recited it off to him as she buckled her seatbelt. “It’ll be on your left. The office is a restored Victorian house with white siding and light blue shutters.

“I know the place.” He’d passed by the old Victorian many times on calls, but had never paid it much mind. Now every time he would pass by it he’d be thinking about her.

She turned to him. “So how long have you been a firefighter?”

His grip tightened on the wheel. “Close to fifteen years,” he replied, waiting for her to respond like the other women he’d dated had.

“Wow. That’s a long time.”

He nodded. “I suppose so.”

“I think that’s great.”

Her comment took him by surprise. His gaze left the road ahead to settle on her face. “You do?”

She laughed softly. “I wouldn’t have said so if I didn’t mean it. I told you before. I admire someone who dedicates their life to rescuing others from accidents and burning buildings, and...” she added with a blush, “trees.”

Laughter rumbled in his chest. “Yeah, well, we firefighters go through hours of training to teach us the proper technique for rescuing sexy women from trees.”

“Is that so?” she replied, her tone just as teasing.

“Okay,” he confessed, “so I might be exaggerating a little bit about the how-to-rescue-a-sexy-woman training, but not about what I said about your being sexy.”

She averted her gaze, looking out the passenger window. “I’m not the least bit sexy.”

“I beg to differ as would all the guys at the firehouse.”

Kelsie turned to face him, one bent, jean-clad knee resting atop the bench seat. “Tell me more.”

“About how hot the guys at the firehouse think you are?” he asked with a grin as he turned onto the main street.

“No,” she said, laughing softly. “About you. What made you decide to pursue a career in firefighting? I can only imagine the kind of dedication and strength, both mentally and physically, it takes to do that.”

She didn’t seem the least bit uneasy about his chosen career, just curious. The tension he’d felt moments before when she’d begun asking about his job melted away.

“After graduation I went through several unfulfilling jobs before I finally decided to follow in my father’s footsteps and become a firefighter.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize you and your father worked together.”

“We don’t. He retired about two years ago, but even then we didn’t work together. He worked out of Station 72 in Upper Arlington, but retired a few years ago and took Mom to Florida. She hates the cold winters.”

“Your mother must be very proud of you.”

“She’d be happier if I would settle down and give her grandchildren.”

“Oh, believe me, I can sympathize with you there. Only my mother thinks it’s going to take my getting my breasts enlarged to get her some grandkids.”

He chuckled. “Unless I missed something in my medic training, breasts have nothing to do with the reproductive system.”

“Not according to my mother. Big breasts are like honeysuckle blooms to bees. Men swarm to them. Catch a man’s attention and the rest will follow. Sort of a prelude to reproduction.” She glanced down at her shirt. “Needless to say I didn’t follow her advice.”

“I’m glad.”

“What?”

“I think you look good just the way you are.”

Color flooded her cheeks, turning them a deep shade of pink that only made her more attractive to Cole. “Thanks,” she said with a warm smile. “I don’t suppose you could convince my mother of that, do you?”

“I’d be happy to give it a try.”

“On second thought,” she said, “never mind. If I took a guy like you home with me─”

“You mean a guy who’s too perfect,” he said, cutting her off with a frown. Trying to shake this good guy image she had of him was damn hard.

“Exactly. If I took you to my mother’s, she would have her tape measure out in a flash.”

His brows shot up. “Excuse me?”

She laughed. “Not for what you’re thinking.” Then she quickly added, “It’s worse.”

“Worse?”

She nodded. “Yes. She’d be sizing you up for a wedding tux.”

“Oh.” That wasn’t nearly as disturbing as having her mother want to measure his... Cole pushed that thought aside with another chuckle. Despite Kelsie’s concerns about her mother’s reaction to him, he really had to find some way to meet the woman. Maybe work on scoring some Brownie points and hopefully find himself an ally, because he knew even before this date was finished that he wanted to see Kelsie again.

“Do you have any brothers or sisters?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Nope. I’m like you. The one and only.” He turned into the parking lot behind Kelsie’s office and cut the engine. “Here we are.”

“Thanks.” Opening the door, she slid from the cab. “I’ll be just a second.”

He watched her go, enjoying the view, and then stepped out of the truck to stretch. They couldn’t have asked for a nicer evening for their date. Though it was summer and the humidity had been close to unbearable the past few days, it wasn’t that night.

He looked up as a light breeze stirred the leaves on the trees around him, cooling the air even more. No doubt a prelude to the rain that was predicted to move into the area the next morning.

The back door to the Victorian-house-turned-office opened and Kelsie stepped back outside. Juggling a brown paper bag in one hand, she dug through her purse in search of something.

“Everything okay?” he called out.

“I can’t find the key,” she replied. “I stuck it in my purse when I went inside.”

He walked up to her and reached for the bag so she’d be free to search for the key. “I’ll hold this.”

“Thanks. This purse is a bottomless pit when it comes to finding things.” She dug deeper, finally locating her key ring. “Got it.”

Shoving the key into the lock, she gave it a quick turn and then tested the door to make certain it had latched. Then she turned to him with a smile. “All set. I’ll take that now.” She reached for the bag.

He let go as her hand curled over the rolled up top of the brown paper bag. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a good enough grip on it and it dropped to the ground with a loud thud. The thin paper sack split open, spilling its contents everywhere.

“What the...” His eyes rounded and his jaw went slack as he stared down at the assortment of vibrators strewn out across the shadow-dappled walkway.

Whoa!

“Oh, shit,” Kelsie exclaimed, her cheeks instantly turning a vibrant shade of red. She fell to her knees and scrambled to gather up the assortment of sex toys scattered around her. “They’re not mine,” she insisted as she reached for a package that read THE GLOW WORM.

He couldn’t help but grin. “Let me guess,” he said as he knelt to help her. “They belong to a friend?”

“Exactly,” she blurted out, looking up at him. “They do.”

He arched a brow.

“It’s true. I swear. And I’m going to kill Nanci the second I see her again.”

Nanci.
Now that made more sense. She was more the ‘Glow Worm’ kind of girl. An odd sense of relief surged through him. Not that he was uptight when it came to people finding sexual pleasure. It was just hard to imagine Kelsie having that kind of sexual weapons arsenal.

He continued picking up the boxes. “I had no idea there were so many kinds of these things.”

She laughed. “This is nothing.”

He returned the last of the battery-operated joy-toys to what was left of the bag and then stood, carefully handing it over to Kelsie. “Looks like Joe’s got himself a lot of competition.”