Snowfall on Haven Point(55)
He couldn’t very well tell her his impossible attraction to her was clouding his normal courtesy.
“No brilliance here. Just a man who’s forced to apologize once more for taking out his bad mood on you.”
She turned onto Riverbend Road but didn’t speak until she pulled into Wyn’s driveway and turned off the engine.
“When my babies were teething, I always found it sad and funny at the same time how they would always tug at their ears. The ears might have hurt, too, I don’t know, but maybe they couldn’t quite figure out exactly how to fix the pain they were in, so they reached out to the closest tangible object.”
“You’re comparing me to a teething baby?”
“I’m saying you’ve got a lot on your plate. Someone tried to kill you, possibly a person who works for you. Your injuries have forced you to be in a dependent position, which you hate. And you’re struggling to deal with the very real problem of how to reveal yourself to a son who doesn’t know you exist. It’s enough to make anyone cranky.”
“Whatever the reason, it’s my behavior that matters and it’s been lousy, especially to you. I am grateful for all you’ve done, even if I’m not doing a very good job of communicating that. I’m very sorry.”
The smile she gave him was much warmer. Somehow it left him feeling like he’d just been sucker punched.
“Apology accepted,” she said.
They gazed at each other for a moment. She was the first to look away and he didn’t think he imagined the little rosy flush on her cheeks.
She couldn’t possibly be attracted to him, too. It would make no sense, considering how he had consistently acted toward her.
“You’re too forgiving,” he said. “You shouldn’t tolerate anybody treating you poorly. You deserve better.”
“Good advice. I’ll try to keep that in mind, the next time I’m blackmailed by a friend into watching over her injured brother.”
Despite everything, he couldn’t help laughing at her tart tone, which earned him a surprised look.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Do I have something in my teeth?”
“You should laugh more often.”
“I laugh,” he protested. “I just haven’t found that many things funny lately—until you and your kids came along, anyway, and reminded me the world doesn’t have to be so serious all the time.”
“Oh,” she exclaimed softly. “That is the nicest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“See? I’m not always the biggest ass in town.”
“Not always,” she murmured.
The moment seemed to stretch between them, soft and sweet as a summer afternoon. She smelled like summer, too, of wildflowers and sunbeams and a gentle breeze blowing through meadow grass.
In contrast to the winter landscape outside the vehicle windows, she was irresistible.
He gazed at her for just a moment and then he couldn’t resist leaning forward and stealing a little taste. The instant just before their mouths met, he knew it was a colossal mistake, but he could no more have prevented himself from moving forward that last half inch than he could stop the ice floes on the Hell’s Fury.
Her mouth was soft, sweet, delicious. She tasted of orange and cardamom from Ali’s cookies, a taste he had a feeling he would forever associate with her.
For just an instant she froze, green eyes wide and startled, and then her lashes fluttered down and she gave herself up to the kiss.
CHAPTER TWELVE
FOR JUST AN instant when Marshall kissed her so unexpectedly, she panicked. Her last time in a man’s arms had not been by choice and the memory of it slithered in, dark and ugly.
And then, suddenly, this man, this moment pushed it away.
The scent of him—soap and laundry soap and a unique mix of cedar and sage and him—mingled with the leather from the vehicle upholstery and the cinnamon-and-clove air freshener she’d hung after Thanksgiving. Just like that, she was back in the present, being kissed by the very sexy, very intriguing Marshall Bailey, the tough, stubborn sheriff of Lake Haven County.
She closed her eyes and let the sensations shiver through her, silvery and bright and wonderful. How could she possibly have forgotten the delicious magic of a slow, sensual kiss? The kick in her heart rate, the tingle in her fingertips, the delicious, sensuous churn of her blood.
Oh. She could do this all day.
Whoever would have guessed that the sometimes dour and taciturn sheriff could kiss so eloquently?
He kissed with the same seriousness he brought to everything else, focused only on tasting her, exploring her mouth. Andie savored it as myriad sensations consumed her.