Lead Me On. Victoria Dahl

a copy before it leaves this office.”

      “Um…understood,” Chase answered the back of her head. She was already at the copier.

      While Quinn excused himself to head out to a site, Chase checked out Jane’s ass, but her straight gray skirt didn’t offer much of a view. She was tall, and either curvy or a little chubby, but Chase was a man, and a little softness on a woman didn’t scare him at all.

      “Here you are, Mr. Chase.”

      He blinked and took the file. “It’s just Chase,” he repeated, though he was beginning to suspect she was quite clear on the matter and simply didn’t approve.

      “Have a good day,” she said in answer.

      Unwilling to be so obviously dismissed, Chase opened the file and flipped through a few of the papers. “Your boss is good at what he does.”

      “He is.”

      He looked over a couple more drawings of the mountain home, then cut his eyes toward Jane. She didn’t notice. She was too busy staring at him again. This time it was his arm that had caught her attention, either his biceps or the ink stretched across it. Somehow he suspected it was the black bands of his tattoo.

      His heart thumped in excitement. Maybe Miss Prim and Professional wanted to take a little walk on the wild side. Luckily, Chase was in just the mood to accommodate her curiosity.

      “Jane?” he said softly, startling her enough that she jumped.

      A blush warmed her cheeks as she turned back to the computer. “Is there something more I can help you with?” Despite her pink face, her voice was perfectly cool.

      “Yes, actually.” He closed the file and approached her desk. “How about dinner tonight?”

      Although she froze, Jane didn’t look up. “What about dinner tonight?”

      Ah, of course. This woman would require something a bit more formal. Fine. He’d play along. “Jane Morgan, would you do me the honor of accompanying me to dinner tonight?” Hell, he even gave her a little bow to top it off.

      Jane was unmoved. Literally. Her fingers hovered above the keyboard again. “What?”

      “Would you like to go to dinner?”

      Her hands finally dropped, banging against the keyboard. “No, I would not.”

      Chase wasn’t exactly surprised, but he felt oddly heavy with disappointment, all the same. “Are you sure?”

      She licked her lips again and tossed a brief look his way. “Thank you, but I’m sure.”

      Damn, her lips were downright sultry now, flushed pink and glistening with moisture. Chase cocked his head. Yeah, her lips were sexy as hell. “Well, if you’re sure,” he said, stalling.

      “I am.” Jane took a deep breath, put her shoulders back and began to type.

      “Right,” he muttered. “Have a good day, then.” And there was nothing Chase could do but leave.

      THE OFFICE DOOR eased closed with a little hiss. Jane kept typing gibberish. She waited, counting to twenty, before she slid her hands off the keyboard and dared a glance at the glass door. The man’s truck was turning out of the lot. She was alone.

      Letting out a deep breath, Jane slumped in her chair. “Oh, crud.”

      What had just happened?

      Despite the scene over lunch with Greg and her mother’s phone call, Jane’s day had been proceeding at its normal professional pace. A rush of calls after lunch from contractors driving back to work sites. The quiet buzz of a well-run workplace for a few more hours. That disastrous lunch hour had hardly put a hitch in her stride.

      And then he’d walked in.

      The sight of him filling the doorway had shocked the life out of her. He wasn’t big in a body-builder kind of way, but he was tall. Probably six foot three or four, with a wide, solid frame that took up more space in a room than it should. His brown hair was short, nearly a buzz cut, but so thick it looked soft to the touch.

      Jane shivered at the thought.

      Three solid hours of freedom and she was already thinking about an inappropriate man. She shouldn’t have broken it off with Greg. Greg was educated, ambitious and mannered. He wasn’t big and tattooed. He didn’t drive a dented, dusty truck. He didn’t work for an hourly wage at a dead-end job and wear steel-toed boots and dirty T-shirts that clung to his muscles while he labored.

      Her skin tingled and Jane muttered, “Oh, crud” again. This Chase guy was exactly the type of man she didn’t need in her life. The kind of man who made her skin tingle, not to mention other less visible parts of her. No, he was not the kind of man she needed, but he was the kind she wanted. Raw and primal and big.

      “I will not be my mother,” she insisted to the computer screen. “I will not be my mother.” The computer stared her down. “Screw you,” she snapped, then glanced around guiltily. She did not use undignified language.

      And she did not date men whose biceps were ringed with thick bands of stark black ink like some sort of brutal, ancient warrior.

      Jane rolled her shoulders and stretched her neck. “I won’t be my mother,” she murmured one last time. “And I won’t be that girl again.” Then she erased the mess she’d made of her Excel spreadsheet and forcibly turned her mind back to work.

CHAPTER TWO

      JANE’S MUSCLES WERE liquid with exhaustion as she stepped out of her car the next morning. She’d been too anxious and distracted to follow through with her plan the night before. Instead of heading home for a movie, she’d called up her trainer and spent an hour working the heavy bag at his private gym. Then she’d eaten a whole pizza, watched TV until midnight and overslept.

      Jane unlocked the office door and rushed inside to drop into her chair. Fifteen minutes late. She was spiraling.

      One night on her own and Jane Morgan was sinking low, her facade crumbling like mountains of melting snow in the parking lot.

      It didn’t matter that she took care to dress professionally and maintained a manner more prickly than a librarian. It didn’t matter that she refused to show even a hint of friendliness to the dirty contractors and groping developers and sexist engineers, or that she made very, very sure to date only appropriate men…. She hadn’t changed at all.

      Jane was still attracted to the same kind of guy she’d dated in high school: tattooed, rough and ready to ride.

      “Crap,” she groaned. She’d had a very sexual dream about Chase the night before. And just that dream had gotten her off in a way that Greg hadn’t even approached.

      Though, she reasoned to herself, he didn’t seem exactly like the kind of guy she’d once run around with. And he wasn’t exactly the type of man her mother had favored for years.

      Despite the fact that his jeans had been creased with age and dingy with ancient dirt stains, he’d smelled of laundry detergent. His hair was cut short and neat, belying the dark curves of a tattoo that curled straight up the back of his neck and disappeared into his hairline. And most important, he couldn’t possibly be an ex-con. Extreme Excavations specialized in blasting. Even if Chase was low on the totem pole, permits for high explosives weren’t handed out to companies that employed criminals.

      So, no, he wasn’t exactly like the guys from her past.

      Jane snapped from her thoughtful daze and scowled at her reflection in the black computer screen. “Nice standards there, Jane Morgan. Clean underwear and no felony record.” Her reflection glared at her, stern and disapproving. Her neck was straight. Her shoulders rigid. Her nostrils flared with outrage. Until she suddenly slumped in defeat. “I’m a fraud.”