CHAPTER THREE
The evening passed in a blur of townsfolk greetings — Georgia Rae did make her appearance — beer and bar food. Harper felt slightly buzzed and incredibly exhausted as she stood with Luke watching Sophie lock the front doors. She stifled a yawn. It was 2 a.m., way past her bedtime. And her face was starting to throb again.
“Thanks again for hanging out,” Sophie said, as they crossed the lot.
“Have a good night, Soph,” Luke said, opening the car door for her.
“You too, big brother. Night, Harper! I hope I’ll see you again.”
Harper waved with her good arm and yawned her good-bye, “Thanks for everything, Sophie.”
“Better get her home before she falls asleep standing up, Luke.”
He tapped the roof of her car and waved as she pulled out. “Ready to go?” he asked Harper.
She nodded, crossing her arms against the spring night’s chill. They were alone. And they would be for the next several hours. Harper wondered if she would lay awake all night on his couch thinking about him being so near ... and presumably naked. Men like Luke didn’t sleep in pajamas.
“We’re over here,” he said, pointing to a dark gray pickup at the back of the lot. “Need anything out of your car?”
“No, I’m good.” The only thing in her car was her old coffee from the morning.
They started walking together and Harper rubbed her arms.
“Cold?” he asked.
She nodded and felt a tingle exactly halfway between comfort and lust ignite as Luke draped his arm over her shoulder and pulled her in. The heat coming off his body instantly warmed her bare skin and she didn’t resist the urge to snuggle a little closer.
He opened the passenger door for her and she levered herself up and onto the seat trying not to wince as her aching body slid across the leather.
Luke slid into the driver’s seat and started the truck. He pushed a button and Harper instantly felt heat under her ass. Seat warmers! He hung a left out of the parking lot and in just a few minutes they were pulling into the driveway of a tidy brick three-story with a sprawling front porch. Harper blinked through tired eyes. “You live here?”
He glanced out of the windshield at the house. “Yep.”
“I expected something different. Like a bachelor pad apartment. Do you have roommates?” A girlfriend? A wife and four kids?
“Nope. Just me.” He smiled, a quick, heart-tickling grin. “Come on.”
The wide-planked porch was deep, wrapping around to the far side of the house. There was no furniture, but Harper could just imagine a porch swing and hanging baskets blooming with color.
Luke unlocked the front door and held it open for her.
She stepped over the threshold and waited while he flipped on the lights. The foyer opened directly to a wide-banister staircase. A pair of doorways mirrored each other from opposite walls leading into darkened rooms. Above the dark wainscoting, the walls were covered with ornate wallpaper with roses and hummingbirds.
“You don’t really live here, do you?”
Luke tossed his keys on a skinny table just inside the door. The only piece of furniture visible to Harper. He raised an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?”
She trailed a finger over a paper rose. “No reason.” Harper poked her head into the room on the right. From the streetlights outside she could just make out an ornate sofa with wooden arms opposite a flat screen on sawhorses. The rest of the room was empty.
“Did you just move in?”
“Not really.” He looked sheepish. “I’ve been here a couple of years.”
“Seriously?”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Where did you get that couch?” She gestured at the carved wooden monstrosity with its lumpy red velour cushions.
“It was my grandmother’s.”
“Oh, thank God. I thought you went flea marketing one day and thought that looked like the perfect place to watch TV evangelists.”
He cracked a smile. “This was my grandmother’s house. I bought it when she passed away.”
“Were you close?”
“As close as you can be to a crazy Italian grandmother who chases you with a wooden spoon. Most of the furniture that’s here is hers.”
“There doesn’t seem to be a lot of it,” Harper observed.
“I keep meaning to get more, but I’ve been —”
“Busy,” she finished it for him.
“Anyway, there’s only one bed, so you can take that and I’ll take the couch.”
Horrified, Harper stared at the unwelcoming lines of the couch. “Absolutely not. I’m not putting you out of your own bed.”
“Well, you’re not sleeping on the couch.”