Indulge Me. Joanne Rock

you out of it.”

      “Yeah, I did. I did want you to talk me out of it.” The legs in her kitchen window moved down a step. Darcy leaned over the sink to better admire their straight muscled length, raising her eyes slowly to where he kept the weaponry she was “soooo uncharacteristically” in the mood to test out. “But I’m pretty sure I just changed my mind.”

      2

      TYLER HOUSTON finished sanding the upper sill of a second-story window, climbed down and moved the ladder to the last one on that floor. For the third day in a row he’d lingered here after the other guys had gone. Partly because rather than being a professional painter like his coworkers, he was a soon-to-be college professor—and yes, he did like the sound of that—earning extra cash over the summer before he started teaching economics at UWM in the fall. The guys kidded him about his snail-speed painting, but after so many years of book study it was a refreshing break to work with his body again instead of just his mind.

      As he’d said, that was partly why he stayed late. To catch up. But only partly.

      The other “partly” had to do with the woman this house belonged to. He’d been attracted to plenty of women in his life. Some based purely on appearance, seen at a distance or seen up close. Some whose personality appealed and whose looks seemed to morph into loveliness the more he got to know them. But rarely the kind of punch-to-the-gut sizzle he experienced with this woman. Even his attraction to Annie Phillips, his supposed-to-be fiancée who’d busted his heart wide open a year ago, had taken hold of him slowly.

      Hardly Mr. Smooth, he still could generally hold his end up in a conversation. He liked people, enjoyed finding out about them, listening to their stories, figuring out what made them tick. Around this woman, he’d been able only to comment moronically about paint. Compliment her color choice. Admire her house. Wax philosophical about wood stain and window glazing. Never even asked her name. Worse, he’d kept laughing nervously—he would not use the term giggle. Bad enough when she had on her sunglasses, but when she took them off and looked at him with those blue-gray eyes…

      Of course she’d been completely cool, able to look at him directly, to speak coherently without giggling—er, nervous laughter. Periodically she’d toss her heavy dark hair back as if it annoyed her by continually creeping over her shoulders. Even that was sexy to him.

      Earlier today, warmer even than yesterday once the cloud cover passed on to the east, she’d been sitting in her usual lounge chair—in jeans and a large man’s shirt that made him jealous of whoever had given it to her—reading a book and listening to an iPod. He’d managed to avoid looking at her for the most part, but his gaze was jerked over when she’d sat up abruptly, put the book down and started unbuttoning the shirt.

      That got his attention. Then the shirt was tossed aside and he nearly gouged the wood of the sill he was scraping when she hiked up the tight, fiery-orange-red top underneath, yanked it over her head and flung it to the side as if it harbored bees.

      While his tongue had lolled out of his mouth—figuratively speaking—she’d calmly picked up her book and settled back down.

      He’d worked particularly slowly after that, at least until she disappeared back into the house a while earlier. Because underneath she wore a bikini top that she filled out like…like…

      Poetic words failed him. “Like beautiful breasts in a bikini top,” was about as lyrical a description as he could manage.

      Clearly he’d gone over the edge. Next he’d be like Katie, his younger sister, who claimed to have known the second she met Edwin, now her husband of two years, that he was the love of her life.

      Uh-huh.

      If Tyler were a different kind of scientist, he’d do research into why and how two people could produce such sparks. Or rather how one person could produce them in another, since he had no way of knowing if the ones he felt were reciprocated.

      He started scraping the final window to what must be her bedroom, the sun still out but the air rapidly cooling toward evening. The last few days had been warm, though Milwaukee hung on to chilly nights until close to the start of summer. Last month he’d moved back here to his hometown and only a block away from Ms. Bikini in order to—

      The corner of his eye caught movement beyond the old-fashioned slightly wavy glass.

      Her. Coming into her bedroom. What was her name? He was dying to know. Something sexy and slightly old-fashioned, like Rosemary. She walked in and passed the window, still in those jeans, low-cut and tight, still in that bikini top, again under the man’s shirt, which flared open when she moved and which continued to make him jealous. Who had given it to her? Was she still involved with him?

      Tyler really needed to pay attention to this window or he’d be here all night. And not the way he’d like to be, in Rosemary’s…er, company, but out here standing on a ladder with only a scraper for intimacy.

      So he paid attention to the window. He really did. But his peripheral vision was working, too, and kept track of her. Then he had to glance right at her just once, to confirm if what he thought he’d seen was in fact what he thought he’d seen.

      Because what he thought he’d seen was her shirt fluttering to the floor.

      Yes.

      The shirt.

      On the floor.

      Worse—no, better—no, worse—her hands were now at the fastenings of her jeans. He scraped extra loud, making sure his knuckles rapped “clumsily” on the glass so she’d realize he was there and that he could…

      Her jeans traveled down long, long, strong legs, one of which stepped out of them, followed by the other.

      …see. He could see. He could do nothing but see. Dark wavy hair streaming down to her collarbone, skin a light shade of gold, broad shoulders, slender waist, toned ass…

      Her hands reached around to the back hook of her bathing suit top.

      Ho-ly sh—

      Wait. He was not behaving like the gentleman his mother had raised.

      “Hey.” He tapped on the window. No reaction. He tapped harder. “Hey.”

      How could she possibly not know he was there? He didn’t see any earbuds or the cord of an iPod. She must be able to hear him knocking. She must know he was there.

      The bikini top slid to the ground. Which meant…

      She knew he was there.

      He put the scraper down on the sill. Tyler had never been like his late older brother Cam, whom women tried to seduce at various times, like, oh, say, whenever he was awake. If this was business as usual for painters, maybe Tyler should switch careers. Though he hadn’t gotten this…uh, lucky when he’d painted houses in college.

      Maybe because he’d never painted for anyone like Rosemary before. Not just beauty, not just body, something else. A familiarity, a sense that he knew her even having just met her. Knew she was a good person, knew he could trust her, knew they had things in common. How could he possibly know any of that? He couldn’t. He was projecting. The connection was purely physical, animal, primal. Her hormones fit his, her pheromones broadcasted to his frequency, her…uh…her…

      …breasts, God, her breasts. Naked, they tilted, slid, hung lushly as she bent to pick up her top. His throat became dry. She tossed her hair, arched her back, slid her hands up her stomach to cup, then cover, then caress them.

      His throat became drier. Desert dry. His cock swelled. He wanted to touch her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. If he wasn’t put off by the concept of deep, possibly fatal lacerations from broken glass, he’d dive through her window and ravish her.

      She swayed dreamily to some inner music, fingering her nipples, smile curving her lips, her body in profile. She still hadn’t looked at him. He still hadn’t looked away.

      Her hips started