Ashley Summers - Beauty In His Bedroom

Clint shoved back a lock of hair from his brow. “Look, I’m bushed, beat, wiped out from travel fatigue, certainly in no position to bandy clever words with you. The best I can do is apologize for my hot-headed exit. I don’t really think you’re a squatter and I doubt you’re a thief. But truth to tell, I don’t give a damn if you are or not. All I want is my hat, and in due time, your absence from my house.”

“No explanation?”

His eyes narrowed. “I said I didn’t—”

“Give a damn,” she finished for him. “Yes, I heard. Something of a character flaw there,” she murmured just loud enough for him to overhear.

He frowned.

Regretting her barb, Regina tipped her head and gave his rugged face a keen, probing look. A highly sensitive woman, she saw beyond his flinty blue eyes to the profound weariness of heart and mind. His spirit was deeply troubled. And you have an incorrigibly soft heart, Flynn, she acknowledged with droll self-amusement.

He turned his head, bringing into focus the scar slanting along one angular cheekbone. She’d noticed it as soon as he stepped into the brightly lit foyer, and wondered at the where, when, and how of it. Intriguing, she admitted, mentally tracing it with a fingertip.

Responsive to the sudden warmth blossoming in her chest, Regina reached out to rescue the Stetson from his nervous fingers. “Here, let that rest a minute. You sit down, make yourself comfortable. If you’ve been subsisting on airline food all day, you’re bound to be ravenous, and it’s an indisputable fact that I make the best spaghetti sauce in the world—in the universe, actually. The freshest ingredients, herbs I grow myself, gourmet garlic, my Italian plum tomatoes…” She kissed her fingertips. “You’ll love it.”

Without waiting for agreement, she replaced his hat on the desk and headed for the kitchen.

Clint stood awkwardly in place. Dammit, he should get out of here! He didn’t want her spaghetti, didn’t want her chatter or warm smiles. Well, part of him did. And that part acted for him, drawing him along behind her as if on a leash.

Surprisingly he really was hungry. In fact, the aromatic smells wafting from her kitchen were driving him crazy. My kitchen, he amended. He ran a rough hand over his face. “This isn’t necessary, you know.”

“I know.” She pushed a button and a low, slumberous beat of music flowed through the room. “If you’d like to freshen up, the powder room is just down the hall….” She laughed, a chiming sound that brought a sliver of peace to his troubled mind. “I guess you know where it is,” she finished, eyes twinkling.

In the bathroom, he found towels and washcloths neatly laid out, hand soap in a pump bottle, a tiny perfume sample, Lili, a toothbrush and toothpaste—and red, sling-back pumps, one lying on its side as if kicked off enroute. Feminine things. To his chagrin, he found the bathroom’s contents fascinating. Common, ordinary things, fascinating! Confounded, he shook his head at this atypical interest.

When he returned to the kitchen, Regina handed him a corkscrew. “Would you mind opening that wine? On the sideboard. It’s a bold Texas red…or so the salesman told me!”

Her chiming laugh broke out again. To his muddled astonishment, Clint soon found himself sitting on a bar stool, opening wine, watching her pleasingly competent movements. She added pasta and a bit of olive oil to the pot of boiling water. A knife swished through head lettuce, juicy wedges that she dressed with more oil, tarragon vinegar, garlic salt and ground pink peppercorns. She sliced a crusty round loaf, poured a little saucer of virgin olive oil, sprinkled in cracked black pepper. Her long, slender fingers and oval nails captured his gaze and held it prisoner.

At her request, he poured the wine. She laid place mats and napkins on the bar and they ate sitting side by side.

Rain suddenly spattered the windows, creating a disturbingly cozy atmosphere. Through the sauce’s heady fragrance he caught a whiff of some faint, flowery scent. Lilies? It tightened every muscle in his body. He concentrated on his meal.

Regina was aware of his need for silence. He was caught in a situation that perplexed and confused him. Maybe because he was actually enjoying it, she mused. As if enjoyment was forbidden, or at least foreign to him. What had caused him to close himself up to such a degree? Touching the wineglass to her lips, she gave him a sidelong glance as she wracked her brain for details about this fascinating man. There weren’t many. Mid-thirties, childless, obviously well traveled. Divorced, she decided; a man this attractive didn’t run around free for long.

“Are you a native Texan?” she asked.

He nodded, his gaze slipping back to the coral-tipped fingers holding an equally elegant wineglass. “Born and raised on a ranch in the Panhandle.”

A cowboy. Regina smiled at her instant conclusion. Quiet-spoken, tall and lean, with crinkly blue eyes and a battered Stetson, he epitomized the world’s image of a Texan. She was even certain he sat easy on a horse. Well, so did she.

“A cowboy?” she murmured, flashing him a smile.

“A veterinarian.” His plate empty, Clint wiped his mouth and expelled a long sigh. “That was delicious. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. There’s more if you’d like….”

“Thanks, but I’ve had plenty. Whose picture is that?” he asked abruptly.

Regina’s gaze followed his to an alcove furnished with built-in shelves and a small writing desk. “That’s my darling Katie,” she answered with a soft smile.

Clint looked startled. “Your daughter?”

“No, my sister,” Regina answered, chuckling. “She’s fifteen. I know she looks much younger, but she’s a tiny thing, very petite, barely five feet tall. She’s away at school right now.”

His eyebrows rose. “Private school?”

“Yes.” Regina began clearing the counter. “I’ll be through here in just a minute. You finish your wine in the den—we need to talk.”

Hard blue eyes collided with hers but made no headway against her imperious regard. A smile flickered around his mouth. Inclining his dark head, Clint picked up his glass and removed himself to the den.

Music still whispered, more imagination than reality. Rain played on the windowpanes as if in counterpoint. He felt angry, perplexed. Being here should be harder than this, shouldn’t it? But his wife hadn’t lived long enough to occupy their new home.

He sat down on the couch, then impulsively stretched out his legs full length on the soft, cushiony surface. It’s my couch, he thought irritably. If I want to put my feet up, I’ll damn well do it. He set aside his wine. A moment later his head fell back against the stack of jewel-colored cushions. Slowly his thick lashes fanned down….

“Oh, dear,” Regina murmured as she entered the room and stopped beside him. He was asleep. The tremor that started in her heart coursed through her legs as she looked down at him.

Decision time. A simple decision, really, she thought; wake him, and be through with it, or just let him sleep and ride whatever horse the morning brings.

Regina sighed, knowing her flippancy was just a cover for an awareness she’d rather not probe too deeply. Her friends all considered her to be a warm, giving, loving person, often to a fault. She didn’t agree with this last assessment; the world was in such desperate need of love, how could one possibly give too much? This part of her character she attributed to, and honored for, her Italian mother. Still, while it might be admirable to have a big heart, she thought with gentle self-mockery, it wasn’t all that smart.

Because it left her terribly vulnerable.

And because Clint Whitfield was the most dangerous man she’d ever met, the kind of man who touched every instinct known to womankind.

Regina pressed a hand against her breasts. She was nearly thirty and never married. She’d come close once. But when her fiancé learned that she’d assumed responsibility for Katie after their mother’s death, he’d bailed out.

“He dumped you,” she corrected with brutal self-honesty.

Although she still enjoyed the sensual art of flirtation, she’d become wary of deeper involvement. She doubted any man would willingly take on such a burden. A burden she could never lay down. So she’d decided she didn’t need romance in her life. Friendship would do.

But this man had stirred something deep inside her, something innocent of prior experience. And he’d done it without the usual social exchanges, with little verbal or physical communication, and without using an ounce of masculine charm.

Baffled by his effect on her, Regina studied the sculpted features now softened by slumber, the challenging, provocative scar. “Yep, dangerous,” she murmured, a smile touching her mouth. “Wonderfully dangerous.”

Her decision having made itself, she unfolded a cashmere afghan and spread it over his long body. Vulnerable she might be, and sensibly cautious, but she was also Irish as well as Italian, which made her courageous as well as warmhearted. She wasn’t afraid to take chances—as long as it didn’t hurt Katie.

Regina turned off the lamp. Only the moonlight illumined his dark face, glossing it with mystery and sadness. “Good night, Mr. Whitfield, sleep well,” she whispered, and tiptoed from the room.

Clint Whitfield brushed at his face as if clearing away the sunlight teasing him to wakefulness. In his years of roaming the globe, rarely did he awake confused as to his whereabouts. But this wasn’t the veld, the jungle or the dun-colored plains with animals flowing across its soft folds like streams of dark water. He was in his own house—and for a fraction of a second, he expected his wife to come in….

No, no. She was gone and he was alone.

Still confused, he gazed around the sunlit room, noting plants and flowers, a snowy knit shawl flung over a chair, framed snapshots on the mantel, none of them his. The center picture, a small girl riding a hand-guided pony, pricked his memory, rousing him to his new reality despite an intense desire to avoid it.

Even worse, once confusion vanished, he was left with a sense of stupidity that made him groan aloud.

Regina Flynn. Clint groaned again as her sweet face formed in his mind. He had meant to sit down, exchange a few sensible words with the woman and leave none the worse for the encounter. Instead, he’d fallen asleep. How could he have let that happen?

I’ve got to get out of here! Reacting to an urgency he didn’t fully understand, he threw off the afghan, bounded to his feet and grabbed his hat off the desk—

“Good morning.”

The low, musical greeting affected Clint like a shout. He froze, then whirled, eyes narrowing as he noted the tiny smile sweetening her lips. Yeah, just as he thought—amusement, so faint he’d have missed it had he not been immediately suspicious!

She sat at the bar, coffee cup in hand, head still tilted in humorous regard. “Sleep okay?” she asked.

Clint grunted. She wore something long and pink and looked absurdly delicious with all those messy curls streaming around her face and down her neck.

“I slept fine,” he said. “I didn’t intend to,” he added tersely when she gifted him with another smile. “Falling asleep here was definitely not in my plans.”

“You were exhausted,” she said easily. “There’s hot coffee—pour yourself a cup. Then go shower if you’d like. Meantime I’ll get dressed. We can talk over breakfast. Nothing fancy, just bagels. Frozen, unfortunately.” She dimpled. “But there’s homemade strawberry jam to even things out.”