Old Enough To Know Better. Vicki Lewis Thompson

She held up a plastic bottle.

      He could use a whole lot more than water. A cold shower would be good, and not because he was sweating, either. His strong attraction to her was a little embarrassing, to be honest. By his age he was supposed to be over this sort of reaction to a pretty girl. He’d seen plenty of pretty girls, even plenty of naked pretty girls. Yet he was mesmerized by this particular woman.

      Maybe he’d developed heat stroke. He forced himself to engage in normal conversation instead of the caveman-speak that occurred to him. “Sure,” he said. “I’d love some water.” Now wasn’t the time to let her know he had several bottles of the stuff in a large cooler in his truck.

      “I’ll toss it up,” she said.

      “No, I’ll come down.” The way she’d messed with his concentration, he didn’t trust his hand-eye coordination right now. Nothing would be worse than missing the bottle she threw up to him.

      Correction. Worse would be missing the bottle and falling out of the tree at the same time. Besides risking serious injury to his body, he could destroy his pride forever, not to mention his chances of dating this woman.

      He left the saw propped in the tree. Then he took off the goggles and hung them on a branch before grabbing his shirt and pulling it on over his head. At last he started the climb down.

      He’d never descended from a tree in front of an audience before, and self-consciousness made him clumsy. His foot slipped and he nearly fell. Grabbing a limb with both hands, he dangled for a humiliating second or two before finally relocating a supporting branch with one foot.

      He could imagine Carlos and Murphy snickering behind their hands during this stellar performance. They both knew he had plenty of water in the truck. They knew because he always brought enough for all of them. Dehydration was a real danger working outside in Arizona.

      But he was willing to look foolish in front of the guys and accept the bottled water from a woman he desperately wanted to meet. He would have liked to meet her when he was a little less fragrant, but he’d stand down-wind of her and hope for the best.

      No sense missing a golden opportunity because he was sweaty. If all went as he hoped with this woman, they might end up sweaty together, eventually. Yes, he was getting ahead of himself, but this connection had fate written all over it.

      He dropped to the ground and headed toward her, ignoring his two employees. If either of them took this moment to go to his truck and pull a bottle of water out of the ice chest, they’d be on fertilizer duty for the rest of the summer.

      “I didn’t mean to interrupt your work.” Her voice had a silky quality to it.

      He liked silky. Silky usually meant a woman had a sensuous nature. “That’s okay. I needed to take a break, anyway.”

      “I’ll bet. You look hot.”

      So do you, sweet thing. Her eyes were a startling shade of blue, possibly helped along by tinted contacts. He liked the blue, although he wondered what color her eyes were, really. “But it’s a dry heat.”

      “Yeah, right.” She laughed and held out the dripping bottle. “Here. This should help.”

      “You’re a lifesaver.” He took the bottle, his hand brushing hers. He figured that was the idea. She’d obviously brought the water so they could have an interchange. As a way to meet a guy, it was clever.

      “That’s me,” she said. “Kasey Lifesaver.”

      “Kasey?” He unscrewed the top of the bottle. “Is that all one word or initials?”

      “One word. K-a-s-e-y. Kasey.”

      “Nice to meet you Ms. Kasey Lifesaver. I’m Sam Grateful.” He took a long drink of the water, gulping down half the bottle. Although he really was thirsty, the drinking moment gave him time to think. He’d ask her to dinner. Yeah, that was a good idea. Dinner. What about tonight? Did he have anything going?

      Damn it, he did. The Tin Tarantulas had a gig in a little club downtown, and he’d promised to be there. He didn’t think taking a woman to hear his brother’s very loud rock band was right for a first date. So he’d ask for tomorrow night, although he hated to wait that long.

      He took one last swallow, lowered the bottle and smiled at her. “Thanks. That was great.”

      “You’re welcome.”

      “Listen, in exchange for the water, how about if I—”

      “So how come you climb around in the tree? Wouldn’t it be safer to use one of those cherry-picker things?”

      Obviously he hadn’t impressed her with his coordination. “You mean because I almost took a header a minute ago? Usually I’m smoother than that.”

      “You did give me a scare, but that isn’t what I meant. It seems dangerous to me, being up in the tree with a chain saw.”

      “Well, I’m a professional.” That sounded stuffy, so he grinned and added, “Don’t try this at home.”

      “Don’t worry about that! Just watching you makes me nervous.”

      “Don’t be. I’ve logged a lot of hours in plenty of trees.” But her comment made him realize she probably worked in the office next to this tree and had been observing him from her window. That was gratifying. “I do use a cherry picker for some jobs, like palms and eucalyptus, but for big mesquites like this with an elaborate canopy, I’d rather get right into the tree so I can see how it needs to be shaped.”

      “Oh.” She glanced over at the mesquite. “I guess there’s more to it than I thought.”

      “Believe me, there’s more to it than I thought when I first started out.” He didn’t want to talk about his work, though. He wanted to ease back around to the subject of having dinner tomorrow night. “Listen, would you—”

      “Are you by any chance free for dinner tonight?”

      Oh, hell. Now she’d beaten him to it. “Not tonight, but tomorrow night, I’d love to.”

      She hesitated. “Well, tomorrow night I have this…thing. Maybe the next night…no, wait a minute, there’s—”

      “Hold on.” He could see they were losing steam, and he didn’t want that. “Let me tell you what I have to do tonight. You might be willing to go with me.”

      “Okay.” She looked wary. “What is it?”

      “My little brother has this rock band, and they’re playing tonight at the Cactus Club. It’s not exactly my kind of music—they appeal to a younger crowd, but this is an important gig, and I want to show my support, so I promised I’d be there.”

      Instead of making a face, she actually looked interested. “What’s the name of the band?”

      “The Tin Tarantulas. I’m sure you’ve never heard of them.”

      “But I have! I heard them play when I was…um, when I just happened to be down at ASU last year. It was an open-air kind of performance. I…the college kids really seemed to love their music.” She combed her hair back with both hands, a gesture that jiggled her breasts under the lacy top. “I wouldn’t mind going, if that’s your question.”

      “It’s my question.” He was careful not to let his gaze rest where it wanted to and looked into her eyes, instead. “So that wouldn’t be too painful? We can have dinner first, of course, but I need to be at the Cactus Club by nine. Colin expects me to show up.”

      “That’ll work.” She smiled. “And don’t forget I asked you to dinner, so that part’s on me.”

      “Okay.” He was so wrapped up in her smile that he didn’t care to debate who would pick up the check. Her lips, decorated in the same shade of red as her car, made him think of hot kisses. But what made her mouth even more fascinating to him, a man who loved details,