Praise for Laurie Paige:

“Laurie Paige doesn’t miss…”

—New York Times bestselling author Catherine Coulter

“Laurie Paige adds humor and wit to a touching love story filled with heartfelt emotion and a thrilling cast of supporting characters.”

—Romantic Times BOOKclub on Christmas Kisses for a Dollar

“It is always a joy to savor the consistent excellence of this outstanding author.”

—Romantic Times BOOKclub

LAURIE PAIGE

reports that she is working on her seventieth romance book. She is still married to her high school sweetheart. It’s cold and snowy in the mountains of northern California where she lives, but when she checks the weather news on TV, she notes the temperatures in New Orleans and other cities that got hit by Hurricane Katrina. While many people have found refuge in other states, she knows that, in the landscape of the heart, there’s no place like home.

Christmas Kisses for a Dollar
Laurie Paige

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This book is for Tara, who said, “Yes, you can” after I explained all the reasons I couldn’t. With thanks and warm fuzzies.

Contents

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

1

Christmas Kisses—$1.00

Jonathan Sinclair smiled at the provocative banner wafting in the December breeze. The sign, attached to two trees, floated over a booth wreathed in holly and cedar boughs. The occasion appeared to be an old-fashioned bazaar in the school yard.

He stopped at a red light and used the opportunity to assess the group waiting to buy a kiss. The line was long. He couldn’t see the woman from this angle, but the guys were young—some of them teenagers, he guessed, in line on a dare from their friends, most likely—while the rest were probably in their twenties, maybe thirties.

All single, he assumed. They didn’t have the look of men who were shackled to shrews, which, from his observations of life, were what women became once they got a man to the altar.

Or even before, as his own experience proved.

A shudder ran clear down to his toes as he remembered his close call in this very town. He’d been eighteen when the girl next door, who’d been twenty, had tried to trap him into marriage with the oldest trick in the book. Few people had believed he’d been innocent as he’d claimed.

It had been a learning experience. He went on the alert when women came on to him in too friendly a manner, and he suspected ulterior motives behind their smiles.

The light changed. He waited with resigned patience for the crowd to amble past the lined crosswalk. When the street was clear, he turned the corner.

Everyone in the county was in town for the festivities, it seemed. He grimaced at his poor timing and looked for a parking space near the feed-and-seed store. The fertilizer he’d ordered last week was in. All he wanted was to pick it up and get back to the ranch.

The ranch. Three hundred acres of pines and pasture, two hundred head of cattle and a commercial plant nursery.

He’d never expected to inherit the place although he’d loved it as a kid. He’d lit out on his own right after high school, off to see the world. His parents had been upset, but they hadn’t tried to stop him. They’d understood his restlessness.

Sorrow momentarily overshadowed the bright day. They’d died last spring in a flash flood, a known hazard in Texas. He still couldn’t believe they were gone. Life was short.…

He directed his thoughts to the present. He intended to revive the successful ranch operation his grandfather had run. Once the place was booming again, he’d sell the whole works, make some money and head out for parts unknown.

That was what he was good at—fixing up a rundown enterprise and selling it at a profit, then moving on. He’d learned to do that well in the years he’d been on his own and had made a good-size fortune by speculating in floundering companies. Of course he’d lost a bundle, too.

He spotted a parking space and whipped into it before the guy in the fancy car who was also eyeing the spot could beat him to it. With a triumphant grin of one-upmanship, Jon leapt to the ground from the pickup.

The breeze, straight off the Gulf of Mexico, gave him a damp caress. He’d been living in the far west where spit dried before it hit the ground. Here, thirty miles up Highway 12 from Beaumont, Texas, the air was humid year-round. It took a while to get used to that again.

Laughter from the cowboys lined up for the kisses caught his attention. He paused and glanced over the bed of the pickup to see what was going on…and stopped dead still. Then he simply stared at the woman who stood in the booth.

She was the loveliest, sexiest creature he’d ever seen.

Her hair was black—pure raven black. The sun glinted off it with no hints of red or blond in the deep waves that cascaded over her shoulders. It invited a man to sink his hands into it, to tangle his fingers in the long, shiny strands…to use it to hold her while he dropped kisses all over her mouth.

Her smile was radiant, her lips full and luscious. She wore a rosy-red lipstick, but he was willing to bet the color in her cheeks was natural.

It was her eyes that made her irresistible. They were blue with a touch of gray and maybe violet. He couldn’t tell for sure from this distance. Her lashes were long and black, weighting the lids and giving her a languorous air…as if she’d recently climbed out of bed after making the most tempestuous love a man could imagine.

His body surged to life at the thought.

Yeah, he could see what the big attraction was. If the line hadn’t been so long, he might have been tempted to join it.

Shaking his head at his own foolishness, he crossed the street to the store. It was locked. The sign in the window said the owner was at the bazaar and would open again at one.

Jon glanced at his watch. Five after twelve. He might as well eat lunch. If anything was open. For all he knew, the whole town had closed down to attend the event.

He headed across the street toward the school yard where there were several food booths. He spotted a hot-dog stand run by the rotary club. A sign explained that the proceeds of the bazaar were to go to a new gym for the local school. Well, he’d do his part for the community effort.

Another sweep of laughter sounded from the kissing booth. He paused in the shade of an oak tree about twenty feet away and watched as a bashful youth was egged on by his friends to take his kiss. When the boy handed over the dollar, the Venus in the kissing booth caught the kid by the ears and gave him a loud buss on the cheek. The boy blushed as red as the boiled shrimp on display at the seafood booth, but tossed his friends a proud grin as he strutted toward them across the lawn.

Heat swept over Jon and set a flame in his nether parts. There were certain circumstances during which he didn’t mind a woman holding on to his ears, either. He unobtrusively ran a hand down the front of his jeans to make sure he wasn’t about to bust his zipper. Good thing he’d put on briefs that morning.

He glanced at the hot-dog booth, pulled out his wallet, checked his money—he had six twenties—and gave a mental shrug. It was only money and it was for a good cause. He headed for the kissing line, tucking a bill into his shirt pocket as he went.

The guy in front of him was grinning like a weasel who’d found a hole in the henhouse as he waited for his turn to kiss the black-haired Venus. Jon disliked the man on sight.

“Hoo-wee,” the jerk said. “I’m gonna enjoy this.”

“Do you know who she is?” Jon asked.

“Yeah. Anne Hyden. I went to school with her. Never got a chance to get close enough to kiss her, though.” The chump was obviously relishing the thought.

A stab of irritation hit Jon. He suppressed it. “She have a steady or something back then?”

“Nah.” The guy frowned as he searched through his memory. “She didn’t date nobody. Too good for the locals, I guess. Her uncle was the mayor. He still is. I figured she’d marry some rich guy when she went off to a fancy school up north, but she didn’t. I hear she’s been seeing a senator.”

Jon rolled the name over his tongue. Anne…Anne Hyden. He liked it. He observed her as she accepted the quick, dry kisses with an easy humor and a no-nonsense manner.

The blood stirred aggressively in his groin area as he thought of how he’d like to kiss her…wet and deep and sensual, with lips and tongue and hands all involved. None of this namby-pamby, closed-mouth stuff.

Not that he would do that here in front of a crowd. After all, he had some finesse.

But it was something to think about while he waited his turn. He grinned. It wouldn’t be long. She kept the line moving at a rapid clip with her friendly little smooches and teasing remarks to the men, all of whom she seemed to know.

Of course, to live in a town the size of Richport for a week, and not know everyone, would be difficult.

“I don’t see how the mayor can put up with that kind of display,” a feminine voice remarked.

Jon peered under the oak branch and spied two young matrons sitting in the shade on the other side of the tree. He grinned at the look of sour grapes on the face of the plump woman who was fanning herself furiously while she and her friend gossiped.

“Well, she did bring in the most money in the shortest time last year,” the other woman replied. “And the pastor of the Methodist church was the first in line this morning.”

“Humph,” remarked the first woman, her fan swishing back and forth in rampant disapproval.

The line moved forward. Jon settled his white Stetson firmly on his head as the breeze kicked up a few dust swirls along the side of the road. Two more in front of him.

Then it was the jerk’s turn. Jon found himself tensing for action the way he used to when he worked as a bouncer in a bar, which had been his first job after leaving home. With an effort, he relaxed his shoulders and his stance.

The guy in front of him handed over his dollar. He reached both hands out and grabbed the smiling Venus by the waist. A flicker of emotion darted through her eyes. Jon tensed again.

“Well, Snooze Allyn,” she said brightly, laying a hand against the guy’s chest. “Are you still napping after lunch the way you used to in Mrs. Brown’s English class?”

Jon relaxed when the jerk’s ears turned red. The lout let go of her waist. “Nah. My boss don’t like it.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Yeah, bosses are like that.” She held up her cheek to him. He dipped and took a quick peck at it, then ambled off with a cocky grin.

Jon saw the suppressed amusement in her eyes before she turned to him. “Violet,” he said.

“I beg your pardon?” Her expression became inquiring and, he thought, wary. Several emotions flickered through the intriguing depths. She pressed a hand against her chest as if disturbed by something.

His voice dropped to a husky murmur. “Your eyes. Blue with gray and a touch of violet. It’s a lethal combination.”

He couldn’t believe he’d said that…and in the sexiest voice he’d ever used on a woman—low and vibrant, as if they were already making love. A wave of hunger swept over him, stronger than anything he’d ever felt.

Her smile wavered for an instant, then reasserted itself. “You’re holding up the line,” she informed him. “Let’s see the color of your money, cowboy, else you’ll have to step aside.”

He placed the folded bill in her outstretched hand and pushed his hat out of the way. “Let me know when I’ve used this up,” he said and reached for her.

Anne glanced at the twenty he laid in her hand. Her heart started pounding again, the way it had when she’d first spied him staring at her from the shade of the old oak tree. His gaze had been so intent, fathoms deep and similar to the look of a hunter on the prowl. It had intrigued her and sent sensations spiraling into the innermost parts of her.

She scowled as her imagination went haywire, offering up all sorts of exotic wonders as she looked at his mouth. If he was determined to get his money’s worth, the kiss would go on rather long, the inane thought came to her.

Dumbfounded, she watched while he bent his head toward her. She got a glimpse of dark hair slanting across the brow of a narrow face with a strong chin, a thin nose and eyes that were silvery gray with a blue-gray line around the iris.

Staring into his eyes, she found she couldn’t look away. His gaze was intense…passionate…and other things she couldn’t name. Who was he?

She found herself caught up in a pair of arms that felt as strong and ropy as rawhide. The cowboy was on the slender side, an inch or so under six feet, but she sensed the strength he kept in check as his embrace pulled her forward and off-balance.

The wooden edge of the booth caught her at mid-thigh; then she felt heat all the way along the front of her body as she fell against the cowboy, dependent upon his strength to hold her up. She heard him give a grunt, then his arms tightened.

His lips hovered over hers, two inches away…one inch…a breath…

Alarm invaded every part of her, and for the life of her she couldn’t think of anything to say that would distract him from his obvious intent to kiss her soundly.

Twenty dollars’ worth!

“Don’t,” she finally managed in a stern tone, her heart working double time. The word hardly had time to form before his mouth touched hers. Her tongue accidentally stroked his lips.

She sensed his surprise, or maybe it was shock, for his chest surged upward against hers as he caught his breath, and his arms tightened in a convulsive embrace.

For the first time in his life, Jon forgot the basic tenet of self-preservation: Always keep your wits. Always.

When he grazed her lips and felt her tongue glide over his mouth, it was as if he’d been hit by a bolt of lightning. It burned out every thought of survival he’d ever had.

He only knew one thing: this was the woman he had to have. It was that simple.

And at the moment, that was enough—that he was holding her, kissing her. And it was the best thing he’d ever known.

She was warm and curvy in his arms, and she smelled like a summer garden after a light rain. Her fragrance wafted about them, becoming stronger as the heat between them intensified. He was drenched in hot desire.

Her hands clutched his shirt. She caught her breath and held it. Triumph flared briefly as he sensed her surprise, then the response she couldn’t hide.

“Mmm,” she crooned.

She slipped her hands into his hair, pulling it sharply as the passion increased. He cradled her head in one hand and took the kiss deeper, harder.

Vaguely, he heard noises around him, but the words didn’t penetrate the hazy fog of delight.

Then the Venus with the midnight hair collapsed in his arms.

Startled, he took her full weight as her head tilted back and she went totally limp. He stared at her, then realization dawned. She’d fainted.

“Young fool,” someone snarled behind him. “What do you think you’re doing—manhandling her like that?”

Someone grabbed his shoulder. Jon shrugged off the hand. Bending slightly, he hoisted Anne Hyden in his arms, lifted her clear of the booth and turned.

He faced an angry mob, all glaring at him. He glared back.

“Where should I take her?” he asked a woman who pushed her way forward and bent over Anne. “Someplace quiet,” he added, with a narrow-eyed warning holding off the school chum who’d kissed Anne before him.

“Her house,” the woman said, releasing Anne’s wrist after counting her pulse. Her eyes sparkled at him as if she found the whole incident amusing. She pointed. “Over there.”

He saw a white frame house nestled among hibiscus bushes across the side street from the school. He headed for it, the older woman brushing the crowd aside to let him through. Finally, he was in the clear.

Behind him, the older woman—a nurse by her actions—ordered the line to form again and took Anne’s place in the kissing booth. He heard several groans of disappointment.

An arm crept around his neck. He glanced down at the woman he held. Her eyes were still closed. Her cheeks were flushed an attractive pink, her breath came quickly between parted lips and her heart pounded. Her head slumped forward, nestling against his shoulder as if she’d often snuggled in his arms.

In his dreams, he thought, and wished they were on their way to a romantic tryst at that moment. She felt like an angel, light and ethereal, yet warm and womanly, too.

The door was open when he reached the house with its neat shrubs and flower borders. He went inside and laid the luscious burden on a comfortable-looking sofa.

He removed her shoes and swung her legs up. After putting a cushion under her head, he knelt and observed her closely, an odd anxiety constricting his chest. Surely he hadn’t hurt her.…

Bending, he gave her a closer perusal. “Okay,” he said after a silent minute, “you can open your eyes now.”

The thick black lashes fluttered, then popped up, and he stared into eyes the color of wood violets.

Anne was reluctant to give up the lovely experience of being in his arms. She placed a hand against her chest where her heart still beat in an irregular pattern. When she’d felt his lips on hers, it had nearly pounded out of her chest. Strange, to react so strongly to a kiss.

She’d reacted to him before that, she admitted. There had been a stabbing pang in her chest when she’d noticed him that first time, when he’d stood under the oak tree and watched her before making up his mind about buying a kiss.

She pulled herself together and glanced around. “Good, we’re alone.” She managed a wry smile.

He frowned at her. “What the hell was the fainting act about?” he demanded.

“I didn’t want you to get beat up or arrested for mauling me,” she explained, her sense of humor coming to the fore as her heart slowed and its beat evened out. She didn’t want him to know his kiss had affected her to the point of fainting. It sounded so utterly Victorian.

She sat up and swung her legs to the side, knees bent. She saw his gaze roam their length as she tucked her skirt around them, and she felt another flutter within her chest.

“Who was going to do the honors?” he asked in a dry voice. “The jerk you went to school with?”

“Snooze?” She laughed, regaining her equilibrium at this safe topic. “No, not him.”

He smiled, too, not cynically, but seemingly relaxed now that he knew she was all right. “Why would I get arrested?” he asked. “You were the one selling kisses. I was merely trying to get my money’s worth.”

“Twenty dollars,” she murmured, curious about him. “Do you always throw money away like that?”

She licked her lips when he continued to stare at her mouth as if he were thinking of starting the kiss all over again. “I didn’t consider it a waste.”

“It was too intimate for a public kiss.” She frowned at him. “And you didn’t quit when I pulled your hair.”

“I thought that was because you were excited, too.” He shook his head. “That never happened to me before.”

“What?”

“Getting lost in a kiss like that.”

Jon took in the delicate picture she presented. The heat, which hadn’t gone completely, surged anew. He wanted to strip her of the angelic outfit and find the devilish imp he detected deep in her gorgeous eyes.

“Black Irish,” he murmured, mesmerized all over again.

Her eyebrows lifted in question. They were as black as her hair and lashes, with a pronounced arch like a gull’s wing.

“That’s what my grandmother called my grandfather. He had Irish blue eyes, but hair as black as sin. She said it was the Spanish blood that got mixed in from sailors washing ashore after the defeat of the Armada.”

Anne smiled with delight at his story. She saw his silvery gaze flick to her lips once more. She remembered the taste of him when she’d tried to protest the kiss she could see coming but couldn’t get the word out in time.

With an effort, she resisted an urge to lick her lips again to see if she could still taste him there. That kiss had rocked her…right to her toes. A first for her, too.

His mouth was intriguing. The bottom lip was slightly fuller than the top. Both were well-defined, as if outlined by the artist who’d carved him from living marble.

“Keep looking at me like that and you might go into a real faint at my next kiss.”

Her heart did a tap dance against her chest. The pull was there between them. She backed off, using humor as a defense. “Yeah?” she challenged. “I’m waiting with a worm on my tongue.”

His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “A what?”

“Bated breath. Haven’t you been watching the reruns of ‘Mork and Mindy’?”

“No. I don’t have time for things like that.”

“Aha. An all-work, no-play, nose-to-the-grindstone kind of guy,” she mocked.

He ignored her light humor and gave her another perusal. “You have very tempting dimples.”

She lifted a hand to her mouth. “I’ve heard them described as cute, but tempting?”

Jon sat on the sofa beside her, crowding her so that his thigh pressed against her knees. “Yes, tempting.” He touched the tiny dimples that winked in and out at him as she talked or smiled. They were at the corners of her mouth. “They focus attention on your mouth. Make me think of other things I’d like to do to it…to you…with you.”

The dimples winked, disappeared. “I’d advise you to curb your, uh, impulses. This town is pretty straitlaced.”

He leaned closer and noticed that she didn’t flinch. Brave. He liked that in a woman. “Are you?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“You kissed me back.”

Anne shook her head. “I did no such thing. That was an accident when I touched your lips. I was trying to tell you not to act on what I could see in your eyes.”

“Which was?”

“Lust, clear as the nose on your face.”

“I wasn’t the only one who felt it,” he insisted. “You moved your lips under mine. And your heart was beating like sixty against my chest.”

For a moment, she thought of all the possibilities—falling in love, kissing, teasing, laughing, sleeping together, waking in each other’s arms. Having a home, children…well, it was a lovely thought, but those things were never to be, not for her.

She had the family curse.

For a moment, the old resentment rose. Because of her heart, she hadn’t been in the school band. She hadn’t been a cheerleader. She hadn’t played basketball or soccer.

Fragile, delicate little Anne, who mustn’t become overexcited, overheated, overjoyed. Poor Anne, who’d fainted when the captain of the football team had given her a smothering kiss one time. She’d been fifteen. It had been her last date while in high school. All the guys had been afraid she’d have heart failure and her aunt would kill them because of it.

Her mother’s heart had given out during childbirth. Two cousins had died from weak hearts almost at birth. She had a heart murmur, which wasn’t terribly serious in itself, but it was an indication of the family trait.

She wouldn’t pass it on to her children. To force them into a restricted life when all the world was there to be discovered, to watch them die before they’d hardly lived, to see them fall in love, marry, then die before their children had a chance to know them the way her own mother had? No, she simply wouldn’t, couldn’t do it.

But sometimes she thought of the possibilities.…

She stifled the regret. She’d learned long ago to be stoic about life, to laugh at its foibles before it laughed at hers.

She gave her companion a mocking smile. “My heart always beats fast when I’m being accosted.”

He stood, putting a couple of feet between them. His gaze licked over her like fire. “Accosted?” He gave a snort of laughter and his lashes dropped to dangerous levels over his eyes. “I’ve hardly begun. How about some lunch? The hot dogs at the bazaar looked pretty appetizing.”

She blinked at the change in topic. “Why should I want to spend my time with a known criminal?”

“I paid good money for that kiss. I didn’t steal it,” he reminded her, his mouth turning up attractively at the corners. He thrust his hands in his back pockets and rocked back on the heels of his scuffed boots as he watched her.

“I was speaking of your assault.” She stood and slipped her sandals back on. “Yes, lunch would be fine. My aunt and uncle must have heard about the kiss by now. It will reassure everyone to see me whole and well. Also, it might save you from getting beaten up by my more ardent protectors if we’re seen together.”

This time he blinked in confusion as she jumped from subject to subject with no pause. She grinned at him.

He lifted her left hand. “Those ardent pals of yours haven’t put a ring on your finger.”

“How observant of you,” she murmured, pulling away and running her fingers through her hair to smooth the heavy waves into place. She felt vibrantly alive, she realized. Strong and eager for life. She cast a wary eye on her companion, wondering what it was about him that affected her so.

“Let’s go.” He took her arm. “Don’t you lock up?” he asked when they went out on the porch.

“Not during the day. What would be the point? Everyone knows I hide the key over the door.”

He gave her a sardonic glance. “Is the whole town as trusting as you?”

“I’m not trusting,” she shot right back. “If thieves want anything I’ve got, they’ll get in anyway. If the door’s open, they can go right in without breaking anything. See? It’s simple logic.”

“I have a feeling nothing is going to be simple about our relationship.”

She cast him a startled glance from under her lashes. Again a vision of the future came to her—of her running across a field with this man, holding hands and laughing, a child and a dog running ahead of them…

Retreating to sober reality, she realized he not only disturbed her heart, he sent her dreams into a tailspin. She didn’t understand it.

“We don’t have a relationship,” she stated.

“We will,” he declared.

2

“Would it be rude to ask your name?” Anne asked. She placed the two cups of cola on the table. The cups, one red, the other green, heralded the season’s colors.

Her companion put the hot dogs and curly fries, seasoned with Tex-Mex spices, on the table beside the drinks. “Jonathan Sinclair—Jon to my friends.” He smiled as if at some secret thought while he pulled out a chair and held it for her.

“Sinclair? As in Sinclair Ranch?”

“Right.”

Instead of sitting, she held out her hand. “Anne Hyden, as in the Flower Garden.”

He shook her hand, then held it as he asked, “Should this mean something to me?”

“I’m one of your customers. In fact, I have a big order in for Christmas. That’s only a little over three weeks away,” she reminded him. “It is going to be ready, isn’t it?”

He had no idea. “Would I let one of my best customers down?” He sincerely hoped not. That might delay, although not impede, the relationship between them.

“It’s been known to happen,” she said wryly. She took her seat. He sat opposite her.

She bit into her hot dog. He did the same. She tried to keep her eyes off him, but it was difficult. He had no such qualms. He stared at her, an gleam of intrigue in his eyes, as they ate. A man to watch out for, she decided. A man who could be dangerous to a woman’s heart.

“So you own a flower shop,” he said when he finished.

“Yes. It was a dream come true to be able to buy it when the owner retired.” She’d had to fight her aunt every step of the way, right up to the final closing. She licked a smear of mustard off her lips.

“I’d like to do that for you,” he murmured, his gaze glued to her mouth.

She wiped her lips with a napkin. “You’re disconcerting.”

“Do I make you nervous?”

More than that. He conjured up old dreams of forbidden things as a magician conjured up a hatful of Texas-size rabbits. “Yes. You’re rather unpredictable.”

“I’m not dangerous…only fascinated.”

“Do you always come on this strong?”

Jon wondered about that, too. It was unusual for him. Her forthright manner put him at ease. “Only when I know it’s going to be stupendous.”

“What?” She brushed her hair away from her face, another nervous gesture, he surmised.

“Our coming together.” He realized that could be taken more than one way and grinned when she fidgeted with her hair. He did make her nervous. It wasn’t a tenth of what she did to him. He could hardly wait to show her. But first…

“I’m not a marrying man,” he told her bluntly and watched to see how she’d take it.

“Has anyone ever asked you?” she inquired with only a token of polite interest after the briefest of pauses.

A surprised second ticked past. He threw back his head and laughed in delight. “This is going to be fun.”

“The chase or the seduction?” The imp danced in her eyes as she looked him over as an old-maid schoolmarm might.

“Both,” he promised, meaning it. He hooked an arm over the chair and pushed it onto the two back legs while he watched the thoughts dart through her eyes. He wished he could read them. She was an interesting woman.

“Oh-oh,” she said sotto voce. “Here come my relatives.”

He glanced over his shoulder. A man in a lightweight suit, a blue shirt and striped tie came toward them. The woman beside him wore a beige lace dress. They seemed to be dressed for a formal wedding rather than a bazaar. They were around fifty, a handsome couple actually, the man a tad thin, the woman a tad plump, but both energetic and healthy-looking.

He got to his feet when they approached the table.

Anne introduced them before they could speak. “My aunt and uncle, Marge and Joseph Pauly. Uncle Joe is the mayor. Aunt Marge is on the city council. She opposed him on a land-use tax and got elected. This is Jon Sinclair.”

“Marge. Joe. Glad to meet you.” Jon shook hands with them. He felt like a suitor on display as they looked him over.

As on the tax issue, he realized they had assessed him and come up on opposite sides. The mayor smiled benevolently; the councilwoman smiled coldly, disapproval in her eyes—which were the same intriguing blue as her niece’s.

The defiance he’d felt as a teenager surfaced. One thing he hated was being censured by self-righteous harpies, male or female.

“Are you all right?” The aunt turned to her niece as soon as the amenities were over. She peered at the younger woman so anxiously that Jon studied her, too.

She looked fine to him—a woman of many charms, all of which he’d like to sample. Also, she was levelheaded. She’d taken his announcement about marriage without a blink. Good. He liked savvy women.

“Of course,” Anne replied. “Did you know that Jon has taken over the Sinclair Ranch? It supplies the mums I get in for fall and the poinsettias at Christmas. He’s supplying the plants I’ll need for the country club dance during Christmas week.” She gave him a significant look that said those flowers had better be ready. Jon vowed to check on them first thing.

“You raise flowers?” The aunt was frankly disbelieving.

Jon assumed a broad grin and tried to look the part. “Yes, ma’am, I do, on one of the prettiest little spreads in all of Texas,” he drawled.

Anne nudged him with a sharp elbow. “Laying it on too thick, Sinclair. These are astute politicians.”

He tried to look subdued by her reprimand, but a smile kept blooming on his lips. He hadn’t enjoyed himself this much in years. Anne was a challenge he couldn’t resist.

The uncle grinned at him, but the aunt looked annoyed. Hmm, he’d have to work on the old biddy and see if he couldn’t thaw her out a little. However, before he could compliment her on her dress, she turned to her niece, effectively tuning him out.

“I went by the booth. Ellen said you’d had all the kisses you could stand for one day,” her aunt said anxiously. “Snooze Allyn said you fainted.” She put a hand on Anne’s forehead. “I knew you shouldn’t be standing around in the sun like that.”

“Well, it was for a good cause.” Anne beamed a smile at Jon and moved a step away from her aunt’s solicitous care. “And I made almost a hundred dollars.”

“Yeah, you still owe me,” he reminded her.

A tiny thrill worked its way down Anne’s back. His eyes issued a dare. She wished… “You got your kiss, cowboy.”

“One. That leaves nineteen to go.”

She caught her breath at the thought of nineteen more of those kisses. “I can’t hold my breath that long.”

“We’ll take short breaks,” he assured her.

Their eyes met in a duel of laughter and desire. He was a man to steal a maiden’s heart, she acknowledged. Longing flowed through her like wind through a willow.

“Is Randall coming home this week?” the aunt interrupted.

“Uh, no. Not that I know of.”

Silver eyes narrowed on her. “Who’s Randall?” Jon asked, ignoring her aunt and uncle, both of whom listened in on the conversation with blatant interest.

“The senator from our district,” Anne replied. “He’s in Austin while the state legislature is in session.”

“Oh, a politician.”

With these words and a casual shrug, the senator was dismissed as being unimportant in her life. “Yes. We see each other.” She waited for Jon’s reaction to this statement.

“As in exclusively?” he demanded, his gaze spearing into hers, thrilling her with his quick concern.

“Really,” Aunt Marge said indignantly. “It’s hardly any of your business.”

He shoved his hat off his forehead, stuck his hands in his rear pockets and rocked back on his heels. A posture he assumed when he was considering things, Anne decided, remembering his doing the same at her house.

The action pulled his jeans snug across his lean hips. She recalled the feel of his hard body against hers when she’d fallen against him at the kissing booth. He’d been aroused.

Heat surged through her in tiny star bursts of reaction to his masculine stance. She was attracted to him…in a way she’d never been to Randall. Her heart had never gone out of control when the handsome politician kissed her. It was worrisome.

Did she dare take Jon Sinclair on as an opponent? He’d made it clear he was looking for adventure. Was she? One mad adventure before eternity closed over her?

“Would you care to join us?” he asked her aunt and uncle. “I’ll be glad to get you a hot dog or whatever you like.”

A polite maverick. She gave him a smile of approval.

“We’ve had lunch, but a tall, cool lemonade would taste real good right now,” the uncle spoke up.

Jon noted the mayor’s Texas drawl had thickened a bit. When he glanced that way, the mayor smiled. Jon thought he saw an imp of mischief in Joe’s dark brown eyes. Uncle and niece shared the same sense of humor.

“Yes, that would be nice,” Marge said, her gaze darting from Anne to him. “I’ll help you get them.”

Jon raised one eyebrow but followed along at the woman’s heels as she led the way across the lawn. As soon as they were out of hearing of the other two, she turned on him in squinty-eyed disapproval.

“Anne has a heart condition,” she told him in a low, intense tone. “She mustn’t be upset in any way.”

This wasn’t what he’d expected to hear. He glanced over his shoulder. Anne looked the picture of health to him—pink cheeks, clear eyes, a smiling mouth, a firm, luscious body. His heart kicked up at the thought…as well as other parts.

Was this warning some kind of ploy on the aunt’s part? She didn’t exactly keep it a secret that she favored the senator as the companion of choice for her niece. But that was for Anne to decide. She was a mature adult.

He spread his hands in an innocent gesture. “I wouldn’t think of upsetting Anne.”

“This isn’t funny, Mr. Sinclair.”

“I’m not laughing.” He leveled a steady gaze on her as the old rebellious spirit stirred in him. Being told not to do something had always set him on a direct path for it. Of course, rebellion sometimes led to disaster.

“Just what are your intentions toward my niece?” the older woman demanded, stopping in the shade of the oak tree and out of sight of the other two.

He gave her a cool glance. “I think that’s between Anne and me. She is of age, isn’t she?”

“She’s twenty-five. And a virgin.”

“I’m thirty-one. And I’m not.”

Ignoring her indignant gasp, he headed for the lemonade stand and ordered four drinks. The gorgon gave him the silent treatment on the return trip. Which was okay by him.

Anne glanced from one expressionless face to the other. She sighed dramatically. “My aunt give you the medical diagnosis?”

“Yes,” Jon admitted, looking her over.

“Still planning to seduce me?” she asked, mostly out of curiosity. Men fled when they found out she might turn into a liability rather than a lover.

“Anne!” her aunt admonished.

“Yes,” Jon said, meeting her eyes. He grinned.

Anne placed a final spray of greenery in a bouquet of yellow and pink roses, then stepped back and eyed the arrangement. She nodded in satisfaction at its loveliness.

Doc Adamson had ordered an impressive array of flowers for his cousin’s thirty-ninth birthday. Ellen Adamson had directed his office and business affairs for the past two years with cheerful efficiency, but this was the first time he’d sent her flowers. Perhaps this signified a change in their relationship.

For a tenth of a second, Anne was wistful, then she pushed aside the feeling. If she ever married, it would be to a man like Randall, someone who wouldn’t expect too much from her.

Her aunt and uncle liked him and had encouraged their dating. Randall had hinted several times of late that he wanted to ask for more from her, but she’d managed to evade the final question. She wasn’t quite ready to commit herself.…

A restlessness stirred in her, a longing for something more. Excitement. Danger. Romance. Oh, sure.

She shouldn’t expect fireworks, rainbows and all that. She knew wild romance was only in books and movies. Still, she wondered about it sometimes. A startling thought came to her—Jon Sinclair could give her all those.

But then, what about commitment and mutual respect and common goals? Excitement and danger were childish fantasies. And wild romance was not lasting devotion. Randall was a much better choice. If she ever decided to marry.

Another wild idea intruded. Wasn’t a person entitled to one mad fling before settling down to marital and family bliss and responsibility?

She was shocked at the errant ways of her mind. She had always been the soul of respectability. After all, Randall had two sons—one in his first year of college and one a junior in high school who still lived at home. She liked the boys and would be a model parent for them. If she married.

The bell tinkled over the door, announcing a customer.

She stuck her head around the corner. “Ellen, hi,” she called, seeing her friend. “Be right with you.” She quickly hid the bouquet with a covering of colorful foil paper and walked into the front part of the flower shop.

“I thought I’d see if you had time for coffee,” Ellen Adamson said, admiring a wreath made of Christmas bows with cinnamon sticks and sachets of cloves to add a holiday scent. Monday was the day the doctor did routine surgery. The office was closed, and so Ellen had the day pretty much to herself.

“Give me a second to freshen up.” Anne renewed her lipstick and checked her hair. She wore it clipped out of the way with a big bow at the back of her neck while she worked. “Okay, let’s go.” She stuck a Be Back Soon sign in the window.

The two friends walked two doors down the block to a restaurant and took a free table amid a myriad of hanging plants. Anne picked a couple of dead leaves off a spider plant and checked its moisture level before taking her seat.

“That was some kiss Saturday,” Ellen commented after the waitress had departed with their order.

“Yes.” Anne tried for a nonchalant manner and failed.

“I was coming to rescue you, but you fainted before I got there. Quick thinking, that.”

Anne cleared her throat. “Thanks, but it wasn’t all an act. I sort of panicked, then things went dark. When I realized what had happened, I decided to go along with it. I was afraid my aunt would club him if she saw him kissing me like that.”

“A couple of guys were ready to step in when you made your dramatic move. I was worried about you for a minute.”

“You were?”

“Mmm-hmm. Until I saw your face.” Ellen laughed softly. “You looked totally blissed-out. Was the kiss that wonderful?”

Anne hesitated. “Yes.”

“Oh.” Ellen studied her a second. “That sounded like a very serious yes.”

Anne lifted the bangs off her forehead. “Is it suddenly hot in here or am I blushing?”

“Blushing. This gets more interesting by the minute. What are you going to do about Jon Sinclair?”

“I don’t know,” she hedged. “Got any advice?” She wasn’t sure if she should confess, even to her best friend, the insane idea that kept occurring to her.

“Go for it,” Ellen announced.

“Go for it?”

“Right.”

Anne frowned at her friend. “Are we talking about the same thing?”

“I hope so. I think you should have a torrid, tempestuous affair, one that will singe your eyebrows.”

Anne had to laugh. “That kiss nearly did.”

Ellen became serious. “I don’t want to see you settle for…oh, I don’t know, less than you deserve. Randall is almost twenty years older than you.”

“Does that matter?”

“Maybe. Everyone deserves that wild, impossibly insane first love. I’d hate to see you miss out on it.”

Anne watched Ellen become pensive, her smile bittersweet. Her friend had once been married, but it hadn’t worked out.

“Everyone should have that first sweet taste of passion,” Ellen continued. “For men, it’s called sowing their wild oats. For women, it’s gather ye rosebuds while ye may.”

“This advice from a doctor’s right-hand person? What about safe sex and all that?”

“I didn’t say not to be careful. Just have fun while you’re doing it.”

“Jon Sinclair told me he wasn’t a marrying man.”

Shock momentarily stopped Ellen, then she grinned in pure glee. “Arrogant beast,” she murmured. “So it has already gotten that far.” She gave Anne a purely speculative perusal. “From a kiss to talk of marriage in one breath. Impressive. You must have singed more than his eyebrows.”

Anne lowered her lashes demurely and murmured wickedly, “I hope so. I like to give as well as I get.”

Ellen looked momentarily disconcerted at this statement. “Can this be the Anne Hyden we’ve come to know and love?” she questioned, then she chortled. “Oh, this is going to be good,” she declared, clearly seeing the affair as the coming event.

Anne was tempted. “One passionate affair before settling into domestic bliss?” she mused, unable to keep from thinking about that wild, erotic caress.

“Bliss? Or boredom?”

“I’m very fond of Randall,” she said firmly.

“I’m fond of my dog, but I wouldn’t care to depend on him for witty conversation. Have you ever thought of being alone with Randall for days on end if, for instance, you were stranded on a desert island for a month?”

“Well, no.”

A picture came to Anne. Jon Sinclair, dressed in ragged cutoffs, his body lean and bronzed by the sun, standing ankle-deep in the ocean, homemade spear lifted to catch their dinner.

“So how does Jon Sinclair look standing on a deserted beach?” Ellen’s snicker broke into Anne’s musing.

“You’re putting ideas in my head,” Anne told her.

“It’s time someone did. I think Marge tried to make an old maid out of you from the day you were born.”

It was no secret the two women didn’t get along. Ellen thought Marge was too possessive and overprotective of Anne. Marge thought Ellen was a bad influence.

Anne thought her aunt’s attitude was because Marge had been there when Anne’s mother had died in childbirth. Uncle Joe and Aunt Marge had raised her from the time she was a toddler because her father traveled extensively in his job with an international corporation. He hadn’t been home in almost two years.

Aunt Marge meant well. She, too, had been affected by the family curse—two children had died in infancy from heart defects. Anne loved her aunt and tried not to resent the older woman’s interference in her life. Aunt Marge reminded her to be careful because she was concerned about Anne’s health.

Thinking of her reaction to the kiss, Anne shook her head ruefully. “I’m not sure my heart is up to an affair with Jon Sinclair.”

“But you won’t know until you try.”

“Have you ever had an affair?”

Ellen was silent so long, Anne thought she wasn’t going to answer. “Once. A long time ago.”

“Did it make your heart pound like it would fly right out of your chest?”

“Of course. That’s the point of the whole thing.”

Their coffee and muffins arrived. Anne changed the subject, but the memory of the kiss lingered in her mind. It stayed in the minds of her neighbors, too. Before Anne had finished her coffee, five people drifted over and asked if she was feeling better.

“It is the biggest raisin on the grapevine, or something like that,” Ellen advised when Anne grumbled about the avid interest in her love life.

Jon Sinclair kicked the sheet off and swung out of bed. Naked, he walked to the window and looked out at the dawn. From his bedroom, located on the second floor of the sprawling home of his youth, he could see the Sabine River chugging along on its way to the Gulf of Mexico.

He was restless and hungry. But not for food. Glancing down, he shook his head in wry exasperation. His body was erect and ready for a torrid session between the sheets.

The emptiness of his bed only underscored the problem. Last night, eating a lonely supper in a seafood place along the river, he’d passed up the chance to spend a few pleasant hours in another bed.

Wrong woman, wrong bed.

Truth was, he couldn’t get Anne Hyden out of his mind. She lingered like the annoying line of a song that wouldn’t go away. It was driving him crazy.

Frowning at his own stupidity, he dressed, ate a slice of bologna stuffed into a hot-dog bun and took his coffee to the field with him. He worked on the irrigation system until Pedro, Jon’s ranch manager, and his son arrived; then he left them putting PVC pipe together and went to town for more parts.

The first person he saw was Anne Hyden, looking like a perky pansy in a gold top and brown slacks. Her hair was clipped at the back of her neck with a fluffy gold bow. She was unlocking her shop door when she spied him. She stopped at the door and waved.

Her action surprised him. He’d thought she would be cool and standoffish for some reason.

He parked and jumped down from the pickup. Going to her, he nodded toward the restaurant. “How about some breakfast?”

“I’ve eaten.” The dimples winked saucily at him.

He thought of crushing them under his lips. “Then you can watch me while I eat.”

“Okay.”

Again, he was thrown slightly off-balance. She never reacted the way he thought she would. When she fell into step beside him, he took her hand and swung it between them.

“I’ve dreamed of you for two nights now,” he complained, giving her an oblique glance to see how she took this statement.

“Oh, too bad.” She laughed when he frowned at her.

A grin came over him in spite of his irritation at her cavalier attitude toward his sleepless nights. “You’re driving me up the wall,” he announced, guiding her into the restaurant.

“This your new office?” the waitress asked Anne when they were seated. The woman gave him a speculative glance.

“It looks that way.” Anne gave an attractive shrug. “I’ll have tea this time.”

Jon ordered the waffle special. When the waitress left, he asked Anne, “You’ve already been in this morning, I take it?”

She nodded. “Ellen Adamson and I were in earlier. We were discussing you.”

“Who’s Ellen Adamson?” He searched his memory for a face and came up blank.

“Doc Adamson’s cousin. She was the one who pointed out my house Saturday and kept things calm while you made your getaway.”

“Ah, yes. Is she a nurse?”

“No, but she runs his office. He hired her about two years ago, shortly after his wife died in a car crash. Ellen and Doc grew up here. As a teenager Ellen used to baby-sit me. When she returned to town as an adult, we became the best of friends.”

Their coffee and tea arrived. He scorned the sugar and cream and watched while Anne added both to her tea. He noted the way her fingers curled around the handle of the cup when she lifted it to her mouth and sipped cautiously in case it was too hot. Her dimples appeared when she grinned at him.

“Not going to ask, huh?” she said.

“Ask what?”

“What Ellen and I were saying about you.”

“I’ve never much cared what people said about me.” He took a drink of coffee and found it hot and strong.

“She thinks we should have an affair.”

He nearly spewed the coffee on the table, but managed to swallow it instead. Then he choked.

She patted him on the back and made sympathetic noises.

“What did you think?” he asked as soon as he was able.

“It sounded…interesting.” The imp of mischief peeked at him from her blue-violet eyes.

“How interesting?”

“Make me an offer.”

“Dinner tonight. My place.”

She shook her head. “Too easy. You’ll have to court me first, I think. Candlelight and romance…sweet nothings in my ear and all that.”

He muttered an expletive. The expressive eyebrows went up as she studied him, a slight smile lingering on her mouth.

“If it’s too much trouble…” Her voice trailed off as she gazed at him.

“I’ll walk over coals,” he told her bluntly. “I just hoped I wouldn’t have to.”

His meal arrived—waffle, bacon, two eggs over-medium and an assortment of attractively arranged orange and cantaloupe slices.

“But the chase makes the end that much sweeter, don’t you think?” She was all wide-eyed innocence.

“I think you’re going to make me run till I drop,” he muttered darkly. He dashed pepper vigorously on his eggs before chopping them into pieces. He gave her a challenging glance as he lifted a bite to his mouth. “However, the race isn’t over until someone crosses the finish line. That’ll be me.”

He grinned and started eating.

There was nothing arrogant about his confidence, Anne noted. He was quietly sure he would win this chase…battle…whatever…between them. Maybe they both would.

“There won’t be a loser,” he added in a husky tone, reading her mind. “I’ll take you over the line with me.”

“Mmm,” she said noncommittally.

“Your aunt said you were a virgin.”

Anne shook her head in exasperation. “How could she presume to know that?”

“You’re not saying, huh?” His gaze was speculative…and a little troubled.

“I was almost engaged once. In college.” she told him in a low voice as the waitress brought fresh coffee.

“I see.”

He didn’t ask her about what had happened. She wasn’t going to confess that the relationship hadn’t gone beyond a few torrid kisses, none of which had made her feel more than slightly breathless. She glanced at Jon’s mouth and wondered what kind of magic he’d used on her and if she’d feel it again if they kissed.

The waitress leaned over him as she refilled his coffee cup, her arm brushing his as she did. There was a wealth of invitation in the action. Anne found it irritating.

With something akin to shock, she realized she was jealous. “I need to get back to the shop. I have several orders to fill for delivery this afternoon.”

“I’ll walk you back.”

“Stay and finish your coffee while it’s hot.” She stood.

So did he. He seemed tall and powerful. “If you’re leaving, I’m finished,” he told her.

“A very diplomatic way of putting it.”

“And true.” He laid a bill on the table and took her hand as they left.

At the flower shop, he went inside and looked around. “Very nice,” he commented, sniffing a bouquet.

He followed her when she stored her purse on a shelf in her workroom. Suddenly he was very close.

Her eyes went wide when she saw the intent in his eyes. “I don’t think—”

“Good,” he murmured. He slipped his arms behind her and gathered her close.

With a sigh, she leaned into his embrace. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she lifted her face, closed her eyes and waited for his kiss…and waited…and waited.

She opened her eyes. He was watching her.

“Yes?” she said, flustered by his stare.

“Do you want the sweet nothings now or later?” he inquired politely, a hint of a smile in his eyes.

It took less than a second to decide. “Later.” She pulled his head down to hers, surprised at the urgency.

“I like aggressive women,” he murmured.

She shut him up by the simple expedient of rising on tiptoe and pressing her lips to his. She felt his breath catch, then a shudder ripple through his lean frame.

His hands traveled a restless circuit over her back, again and again. She felt surrounded by his male presence and sensed the power he held in check. Perhaps this wasn’t wise.…

“Open your mouth,” he whispered against her lips.

“I don’t like openmouthed kisses,” she tried to explain, then remembered how exciting it had felt to run her tongue over his lips when he’d kissed her at the bazaar.

“That was before,” he muttered.

“Yes,” she agreed.

He deepened the kiss before she could protest, his tongue sliding easily between her parted lips and dipping into her mouth as if he were tasting honey.

She became lost in the sensuous feelings he aroused in her. Instinctively she moved against the hard ridge that pressed so provocatively against her. The knowledge of his arousal fed her own excitement. She felt his hands slide down her back and cup her buttocks, bringing her into closer contact.

With a gasp, she threaded her fingers into his dark hair and pulled him closer. The kiss became hungrier, more demanding.

He pressed her against the wall, holding her there with his strength while his hands roamed over her. Finally he stopped his roaming and settled both hands over her breasts, taking their weight in his palms, then rubbing the tips with his thumbs until both stood out against her knit top.

The dizziness she’d experienced on Saturday returned. No! She didn’t want to faint and miss a second of this bliss.

The bell jingled over the front door.

“Hello. Anybody home?” someone called.

With an effort, she brought her senses under control. Her companion didn’t seem to notice the interruption. She twisted her face to the side. He caught a handful of her hair and buried his face against the side of her neck, holding her captive while he controlled his breathing.

“Be…be with you in a minute,” Anne called. “I’m…uh…tied up at the moment.”

“It’s the mail. I’ll put it on the counter.”

“Oh, yes…thanks.” She could hardly pull a coherent word from her dazed mind.

“See you tomorrow.” The bell jingled again.

Silence pervaded the shop.

“Is she gone?” Jon murmured against her neck.

“Yes.”

He took several deep breaths and lifted his head. His gaze searched hers in a somber manner. “That’s the second time this has happened to me.”

“What?”

“Forgetting everything because of you.”

Her own reactions to his nearness were more primitive and lustful than anything she’d ever felt. “I know.”

He released her slowly, reluctantly. “The invitation to dinner still stands.”

“Maybe we’d better think on that,” she suggested, troubled by the way her body went haywire when he touched her.

It occurred to her that her aunt might be right. Maybe her heart couldn’t handle this kind of intense excitement. It seemed so unfair—to find ecstasy and not be able to savor it. Her entire life had been like that, and she wanted more…more…

“Yeah,” he agreed. He stepped back and looked down.

Her gaze followed his. He was still rigid with desire. Heat swept through her again, making her weak with longing. She wasn’t sure she liked another person having this much power over her. It seemed too serious for an affair.

He recovered his equilibrium first, and his sense of humor. “Eighteen to go,” he told her with a wry chuckle and headed for the front door.

“That surely counted for more than one,” she protested.

She followed him, smoothing her knit shirt over her slacks. She couldn’t help but note that his shirt was half out of his jeans. She’d done that, pulling at it, wanting it out of the way so she could touch his bare skin.

He turned at the door. “No way.” His gaze caressed her before he left. “When will I see you?”

Alone and uninterrupted was the rest of the sentence.

“I don’t know.”

“Scared?” he challenged.

“Yes.”

“Me, too.”

She stared into his eyes. Then, for some reason that escaped her, they both smiled. He nodded briefly as if making his mind up to some silent concern, then left.

She leaned against the wall, a hand pressed to the pounding ache in her chest, and wondered how to let go once a person caught a tiger by the tail.

3

Jon stood on the sidewalk beside his truck. He checked his watch, then frowned at the building. The receptionist had said the office closed at five on Thursdays. The last patient had left thirty minutes ago. Where was Ellen Adamson?

“Hello. What are you doing here?”

He spun around. Ellen came toward him from a side door of the medical building. She stopped where the two sidewalks joined and smiled at him. Her eyes held a question.

“You got a minute?” he asked. “I’d like to talk to you.” He stuck his hands in his back pockets. “I thought we might go have a bite to eat. If you’re free.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “The diner?”

“Sure.”

He fell into step beside her, unable to think of a single item of small talk. “About Anne,” he began hesitantly.

“Now, why did I think her name might come up in this conversation?” Ellen asked. Her expression was kind.

“Yeah, well, I have some questions.” He held open the door to the small restaurant, then followed Ellen inside. She chose a table in a secluded corner. The waitress brought them menus and water right away. They waited until she left.

“Sweep her off her feet,” Ellen said.

“What?” He surely wasn’t hearing correctly.

“Sweep Anne off her feet,” she explained with a patient air. “She deserves some fun in her life…for a change.”

Jon frowned. “I’m not planning on staying here.”

“Why not? It’s a nice place to raise a family. Rich-port was your home once. It’s time you were settling down.”

“Spoken like a true female.”

His companion ignored the sardonic statement. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I want Anne to have one glorious experience in her life before she succumbs to boredom.”

He took a sip of water to douse the fire her advice incited and to gain some time, then decided he’d better come right out with it. “Her aunt told me Anne has a heart condition.”

Ellen nodded.

“Is it safe for her…I mean, if…How serious is it?”

Understanding dawned in the brown eyes watching him as if she could see right into his mind. He tried to block the memory of the kisses he and Anne had shared—two of them, so potent, the thought made him burn with longing.

“It’s nothing to worry about,” Ellen assured him in a soft voice. “Certainly it’s nothing that would preclude a normal relationship between a man and a woman.”

He heard the slight stress on normal, but it didn’t relieve his worries. “She fainted in my arms last Saturday although she pretended afterward that it was an act. Part of it was real, I think. And her heart beats so hard when I touch her…”

The thought trailed away as he recalled how she’d felt in his arms. She became as lost in their kisses as he did.

“What else would you expect with an aunt like Marge?” Ellen demanded, her eyes narrowing in anger.

“Explain that.”

Ellen sighed in disgust. “All her life Anne’s been told she mustn’t run, she mustn’t get excited, she mustn’t get overheated. She wasn’t allowed to participate in sports or any rough play. It’s a miracle that she ever broke free and made a life for herself at all. But she did, and it’s a nice one. She’s happy, productive and busy. She’s even thinking of marriage.”

Jon scowled. “The senator may be okay, but he’s not the one for Anne. She’s not in love with him.”

“Right. But she is thinking of marrying him. Then she meets a man who makes her feel things she’s never felt before.” Ellen smiled. “You’ve shaken her up. I personally think that’s what she needs.”

“What exactly is wrong with her heart?”

“She has a valve that sags a bit. If it gets to leaking, she might need a new one, but there’s no indication of that happening. She can lead a perfectly ordinary life.”

He gave her a skeptical glance. “Anne couldn’t fake the way her heart beats when we kiss.”

“If a person has been cautioned about her heart all her life, what do you think is going to happen when she runs into her first real experience with sexual excitement? It’s going to be a bit overwhelming, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, I see what you mean,” Jon said, mulling this over. “So making love would be no danger to her?” He felt the heat sneak into his face at this disclosure.

“Making love never hurt anyone. Except for Type A middle-aged men trying to recover their lost youth,” Ellen added in her usual dry manner. “I hope you won’t let it put you off Anne. She needs someone to open her eyes to the things she’s missed. Even if you offer nothing more than a torrid affair, at least she’ll know what to look for next time. She’s a first-class person. I don’t want her to settle for a second-best love.”

Jon found that the idea of someone else with Anne, making love, sharing her laughter and those incredible kisses, didn’t set well with him. He grimaced. Next thing he knew, he’d be dreaming of rose-covered cottages and the patter of little feet.

“Thanks for leveling with me,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt Anne, in spite of what Esmeralda thinks.”

“Esmeralda?” Ellen questioned.

“Aunt Marge.” He grinned wickedly, already gearing up for battle with the old witch.

Ellen laughed in delight. “Oh, I wouldn’t miss this for the world.” She studied him for a second, then added softly, “You’re a fool if you let Anne get away.”

“I’m not a marrying man,” he informed her.

She was still laughing when the waitress came for their order. He had to grin. She didn’t say it, but he had to admit it sounded like a case of him protesting too much.

One thing he knew—he’d never spent this much time worrying about whether he’d be good for a woman. In fact, he’d never thought about a relationship in those terms at all. Until Anne.

Anne sat at the table by the door, ticking off names as people arrived for the chamber of commerce dinner, which was the first Friday of each month. Their guest speaker, a professor from the university at Austin, had called in sick. Randall Talbert had agreed to come down in his place.

She could hear Randall’s pleasant voice and deep chuckle behind her as he talked to the members who had already arrived. When he’d called to chat earlier that day, she’d mentioned the problem. He’d immediately volunteered to come to their aid, rearranging his schedule to do so.

“Good evening,” a masculine baritone broke into her musing.

She stared up into eyes that reminded her of the river with an early-morning fog rising from its smoky surface.

Jon was dressed in a tailored suit of salt-and-pepper gray with a thread of blue running through the material. His shirt was light blue, his tie navy with a red-and-gray abstract design.

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