The Virgin Beauty. Claire King

did, for some idiotic reason. He didn’t look particularly trustworthy, despite the blissed-out cat in his arms. Something to do with that lingering gleam of reluctant lust in his green eyes, she thought. And he certainly didn’t feel trustworthy. She wasn’t experienced enough to know what it was she felt from him, but she knew she shouldn’t trust it.

      Yet somehow… Grace went back for her bag and coat, flicked off the lights, and followed him onto the sidewalk, locking the door behind her. A cold wind sneaked under her sweatshirt and she shivered, ducking her head as much in reflex to the cold as to keep from meeting his eyes. She fumbled with her coat. It was snatched out of her hands at the same instant a cat began winding itself around her legs. She couldn’t decide which was more startling.

      “Here,” Daniel said. He tucked her into her jacket, took the zipper between his fingers and pulled it up. If his knuckles brushed against the inside of her breast so slightly, if his hands lingered at the collar for one second too long, that didn’t make him a creep, right? He wasn’t harassing her. He was just being gentlemanly, and accidents happen. He bent and picked up Cat from where he’d dumped him unceremoniously on the sidewalk. Before touching her became less accidental.

      “Get in your truck before you freeze solid.”

      “Is it always so cold in March?” she asked pertly, to keep her mind off how gentle his hands had been, and how personal.

      “Yes. March is a bitch. But January and February are worse, so by March you hardly notice how miserable you are.”

      He’d walked her to her truck, stood while she dug in her purse for her keys. “I don’t need an escort home,” she said. “I know where I live.”

      “Barely.” He took the keys and unlocked her door, then stepped back before the urge to put his hands on her again got to be too much to resist. He kept reminding himself how much he resented her, how much he couldn’t get involved with another woman who would betray him the minute she heard about his past.

      “Why didn’t you tell me this morning you had a thousand head of beef cattle?” she asked, a little accusingly.

      He shrugged. “I figured Niebaur would have told you.”

      “He didn’t. I thought you were a real estate agent or something.”

      He laughed despite his uncertain mood. “A real estate agent. Is that what I look like?”

      She brought her shoulders to her ears, shy again. She didn’t want to say out loud what he looked like to her. It would have sounded silly, telling him he looked big and strong, man enough to make her feel small and feminine. For once. “I don’t know. You own this building, and you said you had others in town.”

      “Oh.” He scratched his nose, knitted his brows in annoyance and embarrassment. “That was kind of a stretch of the truth. I own this building and a little house on Temple. Well, I own part and the bank owns part. I bought them both three years ago when I thought I’d— When I thought about moving to town.”

      “Good thing you changed your mind about moving. I imagine it’d be hard on the neighbors to have a thousand head of cattle in town. It’s a big herd. Are you looking for a new vet?”

      “I thought you were the new vet.”

      “You know what I mean. Are you going to someone else now that Niebaur’s retired?”

      He looked at her for a minute. Glared at her, she might have said if she could think of a single reason he might do so.

      “We’ll try it out,” he finally said. “I’ve got some heifers need checking week after next.”

      “Okay.” While she didn’t appreciate his antagonistic attitude, her practical heart wanted to sigh in relief. “Okay. Good. I could use the business.”

      They stood on the sidewalk, staring at each other, unsure of what to say or do. They were having a moment, it occurred to both of them; what that meant, they hadn’t the slightest idea.

      “So,” Daniel began slowly, “Niebaur still have all his files on paper?”

      Grace smiled, relieved. She’d been scrambling for something to say, anything to break the peculiar, tingly tension between them. “Yes. I have to find an assistant right away so I can get started on getting them on computer. I don’t know how he ever managed to keep his billing straight.”

      “I don’t know, either, but he must have. Frank and I have paid out enough to him over the years to prove it.”

      “Is Frank your dad?”

      “My brother and business partner. Are you cold?”

      Grace wondered at the way his face closed at the mention of his brother. “A little. I’d better get home. I still have my suitcases in the back of the truck.”

      “Come on, then,” He slapped the side of her truck, shuffled off grim thoughts of his brother. “I’ll follow you.”

      “I’ll be fine.”

      “Do you argue this much with everyone?” he asked testily. He wanted to feel testy; he wanted the low-level anger and bitterness he’d lived with for three years to shoot back into his system. Because if it didn’t he was very much afraid he was going to grab the woman and kiss her. Damn the male sexual response, anyway. He needed to think with his brain right now, but his other, more aggressive organs were pushing for equal time, it seemed.

      He closed the door, jogged back to his own truck, tossed in Cat and hoisted himself inside.

      Grace didn’t get lost, that would have taken a 14-carat idiot in a town the size of Nobel, but she drove five miles an hour down her street until she spotted the little house. It was as dark as a tomb.

      They got out of their respective vehicles and stood looking at it.

      “You should have gone in when it was still light out,” he whispered in deference to the late hour, the quiet neighborhood, the breath he could barely catch, just standing next to her, with her shoulder against his.

      “I should have,” she conceded in the same quiet tone. His breath had moved her hair aside, brushed against her temple. She blinked. “It looks pretty dark in there.”

      He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. He gritted his teeth, rolled his eyes, sighed. It didn’t help. He still wanted to take that anxious look out of her eyes. But that would be it, he told himself. She was no little girl, no damsel in distress. She was the personification of every single thing that had pissed him off for three long years. He’d look around her dark little house and then he and Cat would head home for a long, comforting brood.

      “I’ll come in with you,” he offered reluctantly.

      Oh, she should say no. She should tell him she could handle herself just fine, thanks. But she wanted him to come in with her, chase out all the spooks and spiders. It was a rare thing, a man offering to do such a thing. Not since her father, not since her brothers, had a man looked beyond the size of her to the tender, sometimes fragile woman beneath.

      “What about Tiger?”

      “Who?”

      She looked at him. “Your cat?”

      “He’s okay in the truck. He’s sleeping in my rain slicker.”

      “Oh.” She chewed on her lower lip a moment. “Okay. Thanks. Sorry.”

      He walked in front of her. “For what?”

      “For asking you to do this.”

      “You didn’t ask me,” he rumbled crossly.

      “Oh. Well, just thanks, then.”

      He nodded shortly.

      He walked up the steps, unlocked the door with her key, and flicked on the lights. The place was furnished sufficiently, if a shade shabbily, and was well-lighted and thickly draped. She’d be safe enough