Allison Leigh - Married To A Stranger

Her fingers curled around her purse strap. “I don’t like being laughed at.”

“Nobody does, sweet pea.” He let go of her elbow and brushed his thumb over her white knuckles. “The only one I was laughing at was myself,” he said quietly. “Please. Come back in and have dinner with me. I won’t ask you to dance if you don’t want me to, but I can’t promise not to try talking you into a game of pool.”

She didn’t want to be charmed by him, knowing how easily he could accomplish it. Was accomplishing it. “What about Drew Taggart?” she asked, faintly desperate.

“What about him?”

“You wanted to look him up.”

“I’ll catch up to him later. There’s plenty of time.”

“But you told Jaimie—”

“You’d have been racing down the road with her at the wheel if I’d just told you, flat out, what my reasons were for offering you that ride.”

He didn’t wear boots like most of the men in Weaver did. Not cowboy boots nor heavy work boots. He wore scuffed athletic shoes. She stared at them so fiercely that she spotted the tiny place at the toe of one shoe where the leather had begun to wear through. “And what were they? These reasons that would terrify me so?”

“I’ll tell you, but you have to look at me first.”

Her cheeks heated. She darted a look into his face.

He tsked, and she jumped when he tucked his knuckles under her chin and lifted it. Nervousness knotted in her chest. “I’m looking at you.”

“At my chin,” he murmured. He touched the nose piece of her glasses, inching them back up her nose, and surprise lifted her gaze to his for the briefest of moments.

But it was long enough for her to be caught, unable to pull her gaze from his. They were so blue, his eyes. As if a midnight sky had been trapped in his irises. She suddenly felt warm, her senses trapped in some odd time warp where everything moved slowly. She didn’t even blink when he took a step closer, wrapping his other hand around her free elbow. Her hands brushed his hips and she pulled them back, clasping them together against her chest.

“That’s why,” he murmured.

His thumb was doing that maddening swirl-thing on her elbow. “I d-don’t know.”

“Yes, you do, Hope.”

“No—”

“Don’t be afraid of me.”

“I’m…not.” She swallowed. “I’m not.”

“You’re trembling.”

“I—”

“So am I.”

“Stop this. You’re making fun. You told your brother you weren’t interested in me. I overheard you.”

“I’m interested all right,” he murmured.

She shook her head abruptly. Her protest was as ineffectual as her mushy resistance when he drew his fingertips along her forearms, capturing her hands. He pressed her palms to his chest. And, oh God, she felt his heart. Thundering through the fine cotton of his Hawaiian print shirt as fiercely as her own heart pounded.

“You’re doing that to me, sweet pea.” His soft words stirred the loose tendrils of hair at her temples. “You have been since the coffee in the café. Maybe I didn’t see that it was any of my brother’s business, but that doesn’t mean it’s not so.”

“No.”

“Yes. That’s why I was laughing at myself. I come home expecting nothing but enduring my old man’s long-awaited wedding, and find myself meeting a teacher whose violet eyes could make me forget my own name.”

She felt his breath on her forehead, then closed her eyes and held back a gasp when his warm lips touched her temple. Her fingers curled against his chest, grabbing loose fabric. “We’re standing on Main Street.”

His jaw grazed hers, then he lifted his head, untangling her fingers from his shirt front. “If it bothers you, come back inside with me and have dinner.”

“You said you were harmless. I knew you were lying.” She frowned as another car pulled along the street and turned into the parking lot behind her. “What do you want with me?”

He laughed abruptly. “Are you kidding?”

“You used to date Serena Stevenson.” She pushed out the words.

His eyes narrowed. “So? It was a long time ago.”

“She’s a famous model!”

“Who is now happily married with two kids, neither of whom are mine, thank the good Lord. What’s your point?”

“My face has never stopped traffic.”

“That’s because you’ve probably always been in Weaver where there is no traffic.” He let go of her hands and took a step back. The cool fingers of the evening air slipped between them and Hope shivered.

She hadn’t always been in Weaver and she knew good and well that guys who looked this good didn’t seek out Hope Leoni because of her physical attributes. Only she couldn’t for the life of her think what Tristan hoped to gain by pursuing this.

Which brought her squarely back to the assumption that he was merely amusing himself. His heart may have seemed to thunder in tempo with hers. But in all likelihood it had just been her muddled senses. Which were quickly clearing again, thank goodness.

“I think you should go see Drew,” Hope suggested. “He and Jolie are building a place a few minutes outside of town. I watch their little boy on—”

“Good evening, Hope. Tristan. I’d heard you were back. For the wedding, I presume?”

Hope looked desperately at the sidewalk underneath her feet, wishing it would open up and swallow her. But it stayed dismayingly solid. She wrapped her hands once more around her purse strap and turned around to face Bennett Ludlow, the head of the school board. The man had left his parked car and stood on the sidewalk behind them.

“Yes,” Tristan said abruptly, barely sparing the other man a glance. “I’ll drive you home, Hope.”

His hand touched the small of her back, igniting a warm, melting glow.

“You mean you two were here together?” Bennett’s white teeth smiled, but Hope knew the older man too well not to see the wheels clicking inside his brain. He was undoubtedly wondering the same thing Hope was. Why?

“Not really,” Hope answered quickly. “And I think I’ll walk home. It’s such a lovely evening.” She didn’t dare look up into Tristan’s face again. Every time she looked into his eyes, her sensible brain simply ground to a halt. And the last thing she needed was to look as muddled as she felt with Bennett there to witness it.

She wondered if she’d ever be able to forget that she’d been hired last year as a last resort because no other more qualified teacher had been available.

She smiled vaguely at both men and hurried across the street.

“She’s not your usual type, is she, old boy?”

Irritation bubbled beneath Tristan’s calm as he watched Hope reach the sidewalk on the other side of the street. He looked at Bennett. The attorney was as much a part of Weaver and the surrounding community as the Clays. More so than Tris, in fact. Because Bennett had returned to Weaver after college and Tris had not. Not that they’d ever had a lot to do with each other since Bennett was more Sawyer’s age than Tristan’s. “Should I be flattered you think you know my ‘type,’ Bennett?” he asked lazily. “Didn’t think you cared.”

Bennett’s face tightened. “Before they moved away from Weaver, Gerri and Justine Leoni always were after a nice meal ticket, but I’d hoped that Hope had more sense than her mother and—”

“Go on inside and enjoy a steak,” Tris smoothly interrupted. “Double-C beef, you know,” he added as he started after Hope. “Can’t be beat.”

Certainly not by the failing spread that Bennett’s parents had once run, long ago. They’d sold out to the Double-C more than twenty years earlier. As far as Tris knew, Bennett had hated the Clays ever since. And though Tris didn’t give two hoots and a holler what Bennett thought or said about them, having that cap-toothed blowhard look down his nose at the Leonis—Hope in particular—was more than Tris could stand.

Hope. She was running away from him like the dogs of hell were at her heels. He wasn’t so conceited that he believed all women found him irresistible. But he was wholly aware that Hope felt the same drugging attraction that he did, whether she admitted it or not.

He wanted her. Badly.

Seducing virgins was the one thing over which Tris drew the line. But a kiss was not a seduction.

He wanted to kiss her, and he knew she wanted it, too. But what had him going after her now was not the irrefutable urge to taste her lips, but the hurt in her eyes she hadn’t been able to hide.

He quickened his step and caught up with her just as she was turning the corner toward her house. The hem of her white and purple flowered dress flared out behind her.

“Hold up there, sweet pea.”

She looked over her shoulder once, but kept walking.

He swore silently and lengthened his stride, stepping in her path. She sidestepped, but he wasn’t dancing. He closed his hands over her shoulder and she stopped cold. His gut tightened even more at the silvery trail wending its way down her sculpted cheekbones. “I’m sorry.”

Her chin angled. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

He thumbed away a tear drop. “What are they for?”

“My shoes are pinching my feet,” she said flatly. Red color flooded her cheeks.

Little liar. He hoped she never played poker. That milky pale skin of hers would give her away every time. He looked down at the confection of narrow straps and tiny heels gracing her feet. They were shamelessly feminine, sexy shoes and not at all what he’d expect her to wear with that ill-fitting sack of a dress. He crouched down, circling her ankle with his palm.

“What are you doing?” She pressed her palm to his shoulder, but he still managed to lift her foot and slide off the supposedly offending shoe. That was the nice thing about the element of surprise. He confiscated the other shoe, too, then swept her up into his arms.

She gasped, her eyes as wide as a child’s. “What are you doing?”

“It’s my fault your feet are hurting,” he explained reasonably, looking down into her shocked face. “I said I’d give you a lift.”

“A ride,” she sputtered faintly.

He shrugged and turned up her street. He didn’t dare think about how comfortable she felt in his arms, even squirming and kicking her legs the way she was. “What’s the difference?”

“Well, one is in a car,” she hissed. “Put me down before someone sees us—oh, fabulous.”

“Hope? Is everything all right here?”

Hope smiled back at the openly curious question issued from a very pregnant woman who was watering a row of flowers in her yard. Tris noticed, however, that Hope’s smile was frantic around the edges. “How are you feeling, Brenda? Your baby should be here any day now, right?”

“Next week,” the other woman said. Her eyes were suspicious. “You sure you’re okay?”

“She’s fine,” Tris said easily. “Stepped on a stone.” He kept right on walking.

Even though he held Hope squarely in his arms, he could feel her straining as if to reduce the contact between their bodies. “Brenda Wyatt is one of the biggest gossips in the county,” she muttered. “She’s probably already heading to her phone to spread the word.”

Tris cut across the corner of Hope’s green lawn and carried her up the steps. A glance over his shoulder told him that Hope was probably right. Brenda-the-Blab was gone, and the screen door at the front of her house was swinging in the faint breeze because it hadn’t caught the latch. “People in this town have always gossiped.”

“Yes,” Hope agreed tightly. “And half the time it’s been about one of the infamous Leoni women, whether it was my mother or my sister.” She leaned over and pushed open her front door. “Put me down.”