Turn Up The Heat. Victoria Dahl

out the rickety wooden privacy wall erected around Tonya’s small back porch to divide her property from Merrily’s. Shading his eyes, he looked up at the large trees that probably dumped a ton of debris on the roof and into the gutters.

      Casual as you please, as if it didn’t really matter, he said, “That’s what I meant, yeah.”

      “You couldn’t tell?” She made a rude sound. “I’m almost as rare as Bigfoot, you know. In this day and age, there’ve only been a few sightings.”

      Brick fought off a grin. “It makes me a little nuts. And it sort of scares me.”

      That got her attention. “Scares you?” Another rude sound. “Don’t worry. It’s not contagious.”

      He laughed aloud. “Yeah, virginity is a long-lost virtue for me. Hell, I was...mmm, sixteen, I think, when our nineteen-year-old neighbor talked me into skinny dipping with her.” Ha! He knew exactly how old he was—and the girl hadn’t needed persuasion to get him in her pool. “That night, it was almost over for me before it started.”

      Curious and still somewhat offended, Merrily watched him. “Virtue?”

      Huh. He hadn’t figured on her latching on to that particular part. “It is, you know. Very few people have the fortitude to wait.”

      “To wait as long as I have, you mean.” She rubbed her face. “It wasn’t precisely by choice.”

      “No?” Hoping to encourage her, Brick put a hand to her narrow back, stroked down her spine and back up again. Through her shirt he felt her warmth and how rigidly she held herself. Trying for subtlety, he nudged her a little closer to him. “I won’t believe the guys weren’t interested. Not looking the way you look. Not with you so sweet.”

      She gave a self-deprecating laugh. “My ex-fiancé didn’t think I was sweet. Not at the end.”

      “The end of your engagement?”

      “Yes.” She dropped her hands and stood, moving away from him. “But you don’t want to hear about all that.”

      Okay, so he’d have to work a little harder now. He didn’t mind. On an exaggerated sigh, he stood. “You don’t have any lawn furniture.”

      For three heartbeats she said nothing, then she shrugged. “If I’m out here, it’s usually just long enough to let the dogs do their business, and I sit on the stoop.”

      “A deck would be nice.” He glanced around. “Probably for Tonya, too.”

      Merrily shot him a dirty look. “You should offer to build it for her.”

      “I was thinking I might.” It’d give him an opportunity to hang around more. “You’re wrong, you know.”

      “About?”

      “I want to hear everything that concerns you.” He watched her and saw her surprise. “So tell me, who dumped who in the engagement?”

      She took two steps out to the yard but halted. Shoulders stiffening with defiance, she turned to face him again. Her chin lifted. “He dumped me.”

      “Seriously? What an idiot.” To keep things casual, Brick went to Dundee and again threw the stick for him. Dolly paid little attention; she found a sun-warmed spot in the grass and sprawled out. “Do you let the cats out, too?”

      “Yes. They don’t go far and they always come right back. When I’m home, it’s in and out, in and out. The cats always want to be on the other side of the door.”

      Brick looked back at the house, and sure enough, all three cats were there looking out the kitchen window. Cute. He went to the house and opened the door. They bolted out as if expecting him to change his mind at any second. And as Merrily had said, they didn’t go far.

      Stan immediately started eating grass.

      “He’s like a cow,” Merrily complained with a shake of her head. “He’ll barf that up later, but I gave up trying to get him to quit.”

      Eloise joined Dolly in the sun. “Looks like the girls are sticking together.”

      “They’re both sun worshipers.”

      Tom hung up on the stoop, posture alert as he took in the sight of a few birds in the trees. “Does he ever catch any?”

      She shook her head. “So far, no, thank God.”

      “What hours are you home?”

      The quick change of topic surprised her. She rolled a shoulder. “I have classes in the morning, then work at the diner until six or so. I’m usually home by six-thirty, seven at the latest.”

      “What time do your classes start?”

      “7:00 a.m.”

      Brick whistled low. “Long day.”

      “I have all day Sunday free,” she said, then bit her lip. “I mean... I wasn’t suggesting—”

      “Good to know.” He wanted to spend some time with her, not just rush through hurried sex that she might not even enjoy. “So you’re free after six-thirty Monday through Saturday and all day Sunday.”

      She searched his gaze, wrapped her arms around herself and looked out at the yard again. “He dumped me because I wouldn’t have sex with him.”

      Glad that she’d brought it back up, that she wanted to tell him about it, Brick watched her. “Was there a reason why you wouldn’t?”

      Nodding, she whispered, “My mother.”

      “She needed you with her.” Made sense to him. It was beyond tragic for her, but he knew there wasn’t much he wouldn’t give up for his mom.

      Then again, no matter what his obligations, he’d find a way to sneak in a quickie here and there.

      Brick shook his head at those wayward thoughts. A world of difference stood between him and Merrily. “You had priorities. I get that.”

      “At times, Mom struggled so badly. There wasn’t anyone to help her but me. I was gone enough with school and work. I couldn’t see...” She trailed off.

      If she’d been experienced, no doubt she’d have found the time for relief, too. When necessary, it didn’t take long.

      Especially for guys.

      But for a young, female virgin? A wham-bam incident wouldn’t do, which, again, meant he had to get a handle on his lust. Her first time should be memorable—for the right reasons instead of the wrong ones.

      “The timing was off,” she explained. “I should never have gotten involved romantically in the first place. I can’t really blame Kyle. He was young and healthy and energetic. And at first, he did wait, for months and months.”

      She sounded far too admiring for Brick’s peace of mind. Was she still hung up on the guy? “I’d say he should have kept waiting, but would that have done any good?”

      She shook her head. “Maybe because I knew a normal life wasn’t in the works for me, I couldn’t see getting that intimate.”

      How intimate had she gotten? No, maybe he didn’t want to know. “You loved him?”

      “Yes.”

      A little hard to buy because if she’d loved him, wouldn’t she have found a way? Or maybe she loved him—but didn’t really want him. Was that possible between a man and woman? He adored his sister-in-law, Cinder, but he didn’t have sexual thoughts about her.

      And any woman that dated Jesse first was automatically off-limits. He didn’t go where best friends or brothers had gone before. Period. It had nothing to do with the woman, and it didn’t matter how attractive she might be.

      “Maybe,” Brick ventured, sharing his thoughts, “you loved him more as a friend than anything else.”