JESS eyed Adam’s bedroom door from the kitchen as she mixed a dash of melted chocolate into the already decadent icing mix. He hadn’t come home last night. Not that she’d seen anyway and she’d stayed up very late, feigning interest in some rubbish movie.
He’d gone on a date with some ward nurse from the hospital so she figured he was still playing hard.
The radio, which she’d tuned to the country music station, serenaded her as she took her frustrations out on the icing, beating it into lumpless submission.
The oven timer rang, interrupting her activity, for which her arm muscles were exceedingly grateful.
Jess turned and opened the oven door. A wave of heat rolled over her as the aroma of perfectly cooked Anzac biscuits permeated the entire room. Jess inhaled deeply as she took them out and upended them onto a cooling rack.
The kitchen smelled like baking day back home and she felt suddenly homesick. Her forthcoming trip home couldn’t get here fast enough.
Jess pushed the biscuits aside and dragged the chocolate cake she’d cooked that morning closer. She’d just spooned a dollop of icing onto the cake when Adam sauntered into the kitchen.
‘Mmm. Something smells amazing,’ he said.
Jess looked up. He was lounging in the archway, one shoulder shoved against the jamb, a suit jacket hooked via his index finger over the other. His tie had been pulled askew. A hand buried deep in a trouser pocket pulled the fabric interestingly against a firm bulky quadriceps.
‘I’m baking,’ she said unnecessarily as her heart lifted a little. He hadn’t gone out last night in a suit so maybe he had come home after all?
She marvelled at the many faces of Adam—boardies, scrubs, birthday suit and now a business suit. They were all so tantalising she couldn’t decide which one she preferred.
‘So I see,’ he remarked, pushing off the jamb and prowling into the kitchen. His stomach rumbled and he realised his meeting had run over and he hadn’t eaten any lunch. He slung his jacket around the back of a chair and reached for a cooling biscuit.
‘Be careful,’ Jess said, blowing out of her eye a piece of fringe that had loosened from her ponytail. ‘They’re hot.’
Adam’s mouth watered. They weren’t the only things that were hot. Jess bouncing around the kitchen in a ponytail and an apron was pretty damn hot too.
He gave himself a mental shake as he picked up the closest biscuit. Since when had he ever thought domesticated women were hot? Where had it ever got his mother?
He bit into the biscuit gingerly to hide his confusion.
‘Wow!’ he said as golden syrup and melted brown sugar infused his taste buds with glorious sensation. ‘This is a damn good biscuit.’
Jess felt her heart fill with joy at his enthusiastic compliment. His look of bliss as he’d savoured that first bite would be duly categorised in her memory banks as one of her best Adam moments. ‘You wait till you taste the birthday cake.’
‘You’re making your own birthday cake?’
Jess laughed. ‘Of course. You can’t have a birthday party without cake.’
‘We could have bought you a cake. You shouldn’t have had to make your own.’
Jess waved her hand at him, dismissing his suggestion outright. ‘Why buy one when I can make something much better?’
Adam eyed the cake. ‘It’s that good, huh?’
Jess pulled the spoon out of the icing and they both watched as its glossy texture slid off the back like treacle. For good measure she licked the back of the spoon and sighed. ‘Hell, yeah.’
Adam, who had followed every single second of Jess’s pink tongue gliding across the metal surface, temporarily lost his train of thought as a bolt of desire ignited his loins. In any other woman he would have said it was a deliberate come-on but Jess just looked at him with the same openness she always did.
No hint of coyness or agenda.
‘I didn’t know you baked,’ he said, changing the subject.
Jess nodded. ‘Always. I love to bake. Which is just as well seeing as how I have a terrible sweet tooth.’
With the image of Jess licking the spoon fresh in his mind, Adam had to admit there was something about a woman who loved to eat. Too many of the women he dated barely ate a thing. It was a revelation to see one embrace the whole process with such enthusiasm.
‘Well, these biscuits are winners.’
‘They most definitely are,’ Jess said with pride. ‘They’re my grandmother’s recipe. She’s known throughout the district for them. They’ve won her the blue ribbon at the Edwinburra Show for the last thirty-eight years.’
Adam chuckled. He took in the whole scene. A country song played in the background. The kitchen smelled like an old-fashioned bakehouse. Jess was dressed in a gingham apron with ‘Bless This House’ embroidered across the yoke.
He eyed her speculatively. ‘You really are a country girl, aren’t you?’
Jess wasn’t sure if admitting it was a good thing or a bad thing. But she refused to pretend to be something she wasn’t. Even for Adam. ‘Through and through.’
A look of contentment infused her features into a mask of pure serenity and kicked him hard in the chest. Had he ever felt the way she looked?
The urge to know more surprised him.
‘Tell me about home,’ he said, pulling up a kitchen chair.
Jess looked at him uncertainly. ‘The farm?’
‘Is that where you grew up?’ She nodded. ‘Tell me about the farm.’
Jess paused for a moment as a hundred images crowded her mind. She shrugged. ‘It’s…beautiful out there. The sky is so…blue…not like it is here. Like this giant glass dome that seems to stretch on for ever, and the smells…they’re so different to the city. Dirt and eucalypt, campfires and horses. And at nighttime the stars…they take your breath away.’
Adam stilled as the far-away look in her eyes seemed to reach deep inside him and squeeze. ‘The sunsets are stunning—ochres and reds and then…scarlet skies full of cockatoos. The billabongs are surrounded by gum trees and in the late afternoon hundreds of pink galahs feed on the banks…’
Jess felt her earlier sense of homesickness return with a vengeance and she became aware of Adam watching her intently. She blushed as she realised she’d been prattling on and on.
She looked down into the depths of warm, sludgy icing. ‘Sorry,’ she murmured as she absently stirred it again. ‘I get a little carried away.’
Adam dismissed her apology with a wave of his hand. He’d liked hearing her voice soften and watch her eyes follow invisible flocks of cockatoos as she’d painted her outback picture for him.
‘It must have been hard to leave.’
Jess nodded, feeling the wrench of leaving all over again. ‘It felt like I’d lost my best friend.’ She’d cried for the entire seven-hour bus trip. ‘But…’ Jess shrugged and looked at him ‘…it’s a means to an end.’
‘Oh?’
‘Once I’ve got city experience under my belt I can go back home to where I’m really needed. There’s a chronic nursing shortage in the bush—too many people have to go to the city, leave all that’s dear to them, to get medical care. It’s not right.’
Adam felt relief flood his system, knowing Jess was planning on heading back out west. That alone should be enough to kill any ridiculous notions that had filled his head since she’d cluelessly licked that spoon and put his body on high alert.
‘Is that why you became a nurse?’
She nodded. ‘My grandfather died when I was twelve in a Sydney hospital. He’d wanted to come home to Edwinburra but there were no beds at the hospital because there were no nurses to staff them. So he died far away from the house he’d helped his father build and the land he’d worked his entire life.’
Jess felt the old feelings of injustice resurface and well in her chest. It was amazing how raw it still felt from time to time and she dropped her gaze back to the bowl of icing.
‘I grew up in that house, the only kid in a houseful of adults. I saw him every day of my life until he got sick and I didn’t get to say goodbye.’
Adam felt the ache in her voice right down to his bones. ‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured after a moment.
Jess sucked in a breath and blinked hard. ‘Thanks.’ She gave him a small smile. ‘Anyway,’ she said briskly, suddenly feeling foolish for confiding in him, ‘this isn’t getting the cake iced.’ She touched the biscuits, satisfied that they’d cooled enough, and stacked them in a nearby container.
Adam guessed that the abrupt changing of topic and sudden flurry of activity was his signal to drop it. And if he wasn’t mistaken, her cheeks looked pink. He hadn’t wanted to embarrass her. So he stood and followed her lead.
‘Are these for tonight?’ he asked, reaching his hand into the container to snag another biscuit.
‘No, and just as well,’ Jess said pointedly as she removed them from his reach, pleased to be back on solid ground. ‘Anzacs are not party food. But the oven was on and they’re Cort’s favourites.’
‘So what are we eating tonight?’ Adam asked as he took a step towards her, angling to get closer to the biscuits.
Jess nearly rolled her eyes. Typical man—suggested the party then left it up to everyone else to organise. She shifted the biscuits again as he closed in on them.
‘We’re getting in some of those Lebanese-style pizzas,’ she said.
Coogee had some truly magnificent ethnic eateries and Jess adored the Lebanese take-away. The closest thing to ethnic in Edwinburra was imported olives at the local deli.
Adam reached across her but Jess tugged the container out of his reach. They looked at each other for a solid moment. He, demanding to be allowed another. She, daring him to try again.
But suddenly he realised how close they were and she smelled like chocolate and treacle and his appetite turned…carnal.
His body moved from high alert to defcom four.
He sighed. ‘That’s it. You leave me no choice.’ And he dipped his finger in the nearby icing bowl.
She automatically slapped his hand but it was too late. He was bringing the icing-dipped finger back to his lips and slipping it inside his mouth.
Jess watched as if it was playing in slow motion. The way his lips parted, the glide of his chocolate-lubricated finger as it slid inside his mouth, the soft clamp of his lips, the slow passage of a stray drip as it trekked down his chin, the way his cheeks hollowed as they created enough suction to strip the icing off, his finger reappearing a few moments later clean and moist from the ministrations of his tongue.
‘Mmm, mmm.’ Adam shut his eyes as layers of sweetness coated the inside of his mouth. ‘This,’ he said, opening his eyes, ‘is very, very good.’ He licked his finger again, hoping for any residual flavour.
Jess didn’t know what to say. Or do. All she could think about was the smudge of chocolate icing on his chin. So very, very near his mouth.
‘You have chocolate on your chin,’ she said, hating the suddenly breathy quality of her voice.
Adam looked down at her, at her gaze fixed just south of his mouth. The sadness that had lurked in her eyes before was well and truly gone. There was heat now—lots of heat. His body tensed even further.
‘I do?’ he asked.
Jess nodded and handed him the washcloth she had handy. ‘Here.’
Adam regarded it. Any other woman, with this much sexual tension filling the air, would have offered to lick it off. God knew, he’d lost his mind enough to let her. But that obviously wasn’t her style.
And that should have been a turn-off.
But there was something so sweet about her primness, especially with all that heat in her gaze, it only intrigued him further.
‘Thanks,’ he said, taking the proffered cloth.
He cleaned his chin and passed it back to her. There was another moment when she just looked up at him and he gave serious thought to kissing her. Her mouth was pink and parted slightly and he knew she’d taste like chocolate icing.
‘Any time,’ she murmured.
Adam stared at her lips as they moved. ‘Happy birthday, Jess.’
Jess smiled. ‘Another year older.’
Adam nodded, dragging his gaze from her mouth and stepping away.
Still the same age as Ruby.
He unhooked his jacket from the chair. ‘I have a couple of meetings to go to so I’m going to be late to the party. Start without me.’
And then he was gone.
Jess blinked. She could have sworn he was going to kiss her. And then she’d gone and spoilt it by reminding him of her age.
Stupid.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
‘I need a dress. A sexy dress. A very sexy dress.’
Tilly looked up from blindly trying to find the hole in her ear with the hook of her dangly earrings.
‘Okay…I thought you were just wearing jeans.’ She looked down at her own casual attire. ‘I thought we weren’t getting dressed up.’
‘It doesn’t have to be dressy. Just…’
‘Sexy.’
Jess nodded. ‘Very sexy.’
Tilly nodded towards her wardrobe. ‘Help yourself.’
Jess clapped her hands, entering Tilly’s purple room and scooting over to what she knew to be a veritable treasure trove of girly dresses.
‘Is there a man you’re hoping to impress tonight?’ Tilly asked hopefully.
Jess refused to even think of Adam as she flicked through the multitude of coat hangers. ‘Nope, just tired of being the jeans and T girl.’
‘Right…’
Jess looked at her friend. ‘It’s my party,’ she said defensively. ‘I want to look like the party girl.’
‘Of course.’ Tilly nodded.
Jess narrowed her eyes. ‘What?’ she demanded.
Tilly bit her lip, choosing her words carefully. ‘Well…it’s just that…you’re not really the party-girl type…are you?’
‘I am tonight.’ She held up a red dress with no back and a plunging neckline.
Tilly shook her head. ‘What about this baby-doll dress with the—?’
‘No,’ Jess interrupted, shaking her head vigorously. ‘No baby anything.’
‘Okay…let’s see.’ Tilly hunted a bit more. ‘What about this one?’
She held up the chocolate-brown short cotton sundress against Jess. It had a funky fringed hem and the colour suited Jess’s blonde hair and emphasised the amazing blue of her eyes. The V-neckline wasn’t too risqué and given that Jess was a couple of inches shorter than Tilly, it would probably fall to mid thigh.
‘It’s an amazing colour on you,’ Tilly said.
Jess inspected herself in the mirror on the inside of the wardrobe door. ‘Is Marcus around?’
Marcus was an obstetrician at Eastern Beaches. He and Tilly had met when Marcus had tried to shut down Tilly’s beloved birth centre.
He’d seen the error of his ways.
Tilly shook her head. ‘He doesn’t finish for another hour.’
‘Good.’
Jess whipped off her T-shirt and threw the dress over her head. It did suit her but the neckline gaped because Jess didn’t have enough cleavage to do it justice. She plucked glumly at the sagging material.
‘Here.’ Tilly reached into a drawer behind them and pulled out a shopping bag. ‘Use this. It’ll work a treat.’
Jess looked at the fancy push-up bra that seemed more padding than anything else. How it would ever fit Tilly she had no idea.
Tilly seemed to read her mind. ‘I bought it in a hurry on sale without trying it on. I never did get round to taking it back. Consider it a birthday gift.’
Jess held the bra against her. ‘Really?’
Tilly nodded. ‘It’s yours.’
Jess gave her friend a quick hug. ‘Thanks. You’re a life-saver.’
The party had been in full swing for two hours when Adam finally showed. Jess was aware of him the second he entered, even though the lights had been dimmed right down and music blared out from the sound system.
She was determined to stick to her strategy, though. Look damn good and completely ignore him.
Tilly’s bra helped the first part of her plan immensely. It managed what nature and genetics had not—cleavage—and several appreciative looks from men had boosted her self-confidence significantly.
Even Cort, Marcus and James, three of the most seriously in love, monogamous men, she knew, had stared at her like she’d got full body ink done instead of thrown on a dress and a push-up bra.
‘Wow.’ Marcus had whistled. ‘Little Jess is all grown up.’
It had earned him a swift elbow to the ribs from Tilly who, after this afternoon, was particularly aware of Jess’s sensitivity about how old she looked.
Jess had laughed. She really didn’t mind it coming from Marcus. Or anyone else, for that matter.
Just not Adam.
She knew she’d been cursed with youthful looks. She was constantly carded at night clubs and bottle shops and patients sometimes looked at her like she was still a uni student ‘practising’ on them.
It was inconvenient at times, for sure. But she’d never seen it as a real issue until she’d fallen for a man twelve years older than her.
Her confidence in the new improved party-girl Jess lasted until she came back from the downstairs bathroom where she’d snagged her third beer for the night. The bathtub had been filled with ice and was being used as a makeshift esky.
The first person she saw was Adam. He hadn’t bothered to change out of his suit from earlier. Just pulled off his tie and undone the top button. He was smiling down at three women who were all gazing up at him adoringly.
She recognised them from Eastern Beaches and was dismayed to see how confidently they flirted. How they swayed their bodies, laughed, touched his arm, pushed their hair behind their ears, played with their necklaces, tipped their heads to the side as they chatted.
And to add insult to injury not one of them looked like their cleavages needed enhancement.
Suddenly she felt young and gangly again.
‘Hey, Jess.’
Jess smiled at Nicholas, one of the orderlies from Theatre, as he approached. She took a deep swig of her beer. This was her party and she would not feel sorry for herself or mope around over a man who had no idea she existed.
It was her birthday and she planned to have a damn good time. When Nicholas kissed her on the cheek and wished her happy birthday, she plastered a smile on her face and leaned in close to hear what else he had to say.
Adam worked the room for the next couple of hours, watching Jess surreptitiously as men flocked to kiss the birthday girl. Not that anyone would describe Jess as a girl tonight. Hell, the country girl he’d left in the kitchen a few hours ago surrounded by pots and pans and smelling like chocolate and treacle had morphed into some gorgeous, sophisticated city chick.
With cleavage.
Her heavily kohled eyes drew attention to the startling blue of her irises and her lips shimmered with something glittery. It reminded him of jelly crystals and he wondered if she tasted as good. Her blonde hair, freed from its regulation ponytail, hung loosely around her face and shoulders, kicking up at the ends. Dangly chandelier earrings brushed the side of her neck.
And then there was that cleavage, constantly drawing his gaze south.
She looked a good two or three inches taller and he recognised Ellie’s red retro shoes with the ridiculously high cork platforms she’d worn out the other night. They made Jess’s slender legs seem even longer and the dress, its fringed hem swinging enticingly around her upper thighs, even shorter.
Yep—there was nothing girly about her.
As the clock struck eleven Jess wondered how much longer she had to endure the pretence. Everyone, it seemed, was having a good time. Except her.
Oh, sure, anyone looking in from out on the street would say it was a pretty rocking party. People were dancing and laughing and chatting and enjoying themselves. Hell, she’d even cracked a laugh or two.
But deep down it just wasn’t enough.
She spied Cort and Ruby plastered together on the makeshift dance floor and Marcus laughing at Tilly as she strummed her guitar in a dark corner. She looked a little further afield and noticed Ellie sneaking up the stairs with James in tow.
Her three best friends were blissfully happy and she was miserable. On her birthday. Not that she wasn’t happy for them, she was. She just wanted a little of what they had for herself.
Was that too much to ask?
She’d hoped that Adam might at least actually acknowledge her but he hadn’t said a word to her all night. And it wasn’t like he wasn’t in the mood. Oh, no, he’d been very chatty to plenty of women!
As one more busty female approached Adam, she guessed maybe it was too much to ask.
Snagging another bottle of beer from the bathroom, she escaped to the kitchen. She unscrewed the top and drained half of it in one long swallow. She may look like a sip of champagne would knock her flat but she’d grown up with farm boys—she’d been drinking beer since before it was legal.
A pleasant buzz already bubbled in her veins and she was hoping she could kick it up to don’t-care-what-Adam-does-with-whom level. She leant her hips against the table and looked over at the sink and the surrounding benches overflowing with the detritus of a well-attended party. Her cake sat in the centre of the draining board and she wandered over, picking up a fork and shovelling some of it into her mouth.
Which was how Adam found her moments later. She was bent slightly at the waist, her elbows on the bench, her bottom sticking out slightly and swaying to the music. The fringed hem of her dress swung in time and brushed the backs of her upper thighs.
If it had been any other woman, he might have moved in close, stroked a finger down her spine. Whispered something flirty in her ear.
But it wasn’t any other woman. It was Jess.
She rocked her left foot from side to side, testing the flexibility of both her ankle and the cork heel.
‘Careful,’ he said from the archway. ‘You might break your ankle in those things.’
Jess almost choked on her beer as she spun around to face him, licking cake crumbs from her mouth. ‘Adam.’
Adam couldn’t decide which was more tantalising, the dress fringe still in motion swaying against her thighs or a pink tongue swiping at errant crumbs. ‘You seem deep in thought,’ he murmured.
Jess took another swallow of her beer and Adam watched as her head tipped back, exposing the length of her throat. Her earrings brushed the side of her neck and the way that cute pink mouth pressed against the opening of the bottle should have been illegal.
‘I’m contemplating cleaning up,’ she said.
Her words dragged his brain back to the conversation as he held up some empty beer bottles. ‘Great minds.’
He moved towards her and plonked them down amongst the mess. ‘Let’s leave it,’ he said. ‘We’ll all attack it tomorrow and it’ll be cleaned in a jiffy.’
Jess gave a half-laugh. ‘You know we’re going to regret that in morning, right?’
Adam grinned back and turned so he too was lounging against the bench, facing the door. ‘Probably.’
Jess rolled the beer bottle between her palms. ‘You seemed to be enjoying yourself,’ she said, watching the gold flecks in the label catch the light just like the ones in his eyes. ‘I thought that ward clerk from female surgical was going to swoon.’
Adam chuckled. ‘You ought to talk. I think every man at this party kissed you at least twice.’
Not every man. Jess shrugged. ‘It’s my birthday. It’s customary.’
‘Once is customary. Twice is just plain old greedy.’ As far as he was concerned, she’d been way too indulgent in the kissing department.
‘And you’ve not even scored one.’
The foolish words were out before she could stop them. Yep. The beer buzz had most definitely kicked in.
‘Exactly.’ He chuckled. ‘Terribly remiss of me.’ he said. ‘I’m usually first in line to kiss a birthday girl.’
Jess’s heart thumped loudly in her head as Adam leaned in. But his girl comment needled and she was gripped with the urgent desire to show him she was all woman.
She turned her face just as his lips were about to connect with her cheek. ‘Woman,’ she whispered as she pressed her mouth against his.
For a moment Adam was too stunned to react. But then her lips parted and moved against his and a rush of high octane lust slammed into his gut. He pulled back, shocked by the intensity.
Jess sucked in a breath as his wild-looking eyes searched hers. ‘I’m a woman, Adam,’ she murmured, dropping her gaze to his mouth. ‘Not a girl.’
Thanks to Ellie’s shoes, the distance between their mouths was less of a handicap and this time she didn’t wait for him to make the first move. She kissed his unprotesting lips once, twice, three times. Brief butterfly presses. The fourth time she opened her mouth more and murmured, ‘Adam.’
Adam heard the half sigh, half plea and was powerless to resist. He opened his mouth on a groan and swallowed her answering whimper.
He sucked in a breath as his senses infused with the essence of her, shoving his hand into her hair, tilting her head back, demanding more of her mouth. She tasted like beer and chocolate cake and he wanted more.
He wanted all she could give.
A shrill bubble of laughter burst in through the archway and they sprang apart. But not before Ruby and Tilly had witnessed at least some of the kiss. Breathing hard, Adam couldn’t even look at Jess. What on earth had just happened?
Recovering first, Ruby looked at Adam. ‘All right…what the hell’s going on here?’ she demanded.
Adam shook his head. ‘Nothing. Just a birthday kiss.’
Jess tried not to let his denial hurt as she struggled to regain her breath. After all, it had probably meant nothing.
To him.
Ruby eyed them both then looked at Tilly. ‘I’ll take him. You take her.’ She looked at her brother with disgust. ‘We need to talk.’
Adam, his body in revolt, was too dazed to tell his little sister to mind her own business. And frankly he was pleased for the easy getaway. He followed Ruby out of the room without argument, without looking back.
Jess and Tilly watched them go. ‘You want to tell me what just happened?’ Tilly asked after a beat or two.
Jess shook her head. Partly to deny any wrongdoing. Partly to clear the fireworks that were popping and fizzing behind her eyes. ‘Nothing,’ she denied, turning to the bench and absently clearing the debris. ‘It was like Adam said. Just a birthday kiss. That’s all.’
Tilly snorted. ‘It bloody was not.’
Jess stopped what she was doing. Tilly was a dear friend but with a swag of younger siblings she missed terribly she did tend to mother them all. Her in particular.
‘He keeps referring to me like I’m a child. A…bloody teenager…or something. I just wanted to prove I was a woman.’ She turned to her friend. ‘I’m a woman, for crying out loud. I have…needs.’
Tilly nodded. So that’s what the dress was about. ‘I know, I know. Of course you are. Of course you do. But, Jess, you’re playing with fire there. Adam likes to flirt. And he’s…well, he’s, you know…experienced. Really experienced. And you know I adore him…’
Tilly broke off, choosing her words carefully. She didn’t want to ruin the birthday of one of her best friends. ‘I know you’ve had a crush on him for ever but, sweetie, you’re just not his type. I’d hate to see you get your hopes up.’
Jess knew every word Tilly said was the absolute truth. And she knew her friend was just worried about her. She was lucky to have such good friends.
‘I know, Tilly,’ she said, squeezing her friend’s hand. ‘It’s okay, I do know that. It was just a little birthday kiss that got out of hand. I’m not stupid enough to think it’ll mean anything more to him than that.’
Tilly put an arm around her shoulder. ‘He doesn’t mean to be that way, Jess. He’s just been hurt in the past.’
‘I know,’ Jess murmured.
And she did know. She knew all about Adam’s long-ago fiancé who’d broken his heart. But right now all she wanted was to escape to her bedroom and relive that kiss over and over and she knew Tilly wasn’t going to let her go until she was satisfied she was okay.
‘I promise I won’t get my hopes up,’ she said, squeezing Tilly’s hand.
‘Are you sure?’ Tilly asked.
Jess nodded. ‘Cross my heart.’
‘Are you freaking insane?’ Ruby hissed as she slammed her brother’s bedroom door.
‘Don’t be melodramatic,’ Adam said. He could still taste Jess on his lips and his pulse rate was marching to a strange tattoo.
‘I mean it, Adam, don’t play with her. She’s not like your other women. She’s not your type.’
Adam looked up. ‘I have a type?’
Ruby glared at him. ‘Yes, fast and loose.’
‘Your opinion of me is flattering,’ he said, his voice heavy with derision.
‘You know what I mean, Adam. She’s not some thirty-something go-getter who knows the score and is happy for a couple of quick nights in your bed.’
‘Maybe I don’t want that any more?’ Ruby, who had taken up pacing, stopped abruptly and stared at him like he’d grown a second head. He couldn’t blame her—where the hell that thought had come from he had no idea.
Except being home this time felt different.
It didn’t feel like prison any more. He didn’t feel the urge to run.
Ruby snorted. ‘Since when?’
Adam shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I’m just…’ he pressed the heels of his palms into his eye sockets ‘…tired these days.’
‘Well, lie down and have a nice long sleep,’ Ruby snapped, resuming her pacing. ‘Just leave Jess the hell alone. For crying out loud, she wants to move back to outer whoop-whoop, get married and have babies. She comes from generations of men and women who mate for life. She thinks that love cures everything and that there’s one special person for everyone.’
‘Ruby,’ Adam said firmly. ‘It was just some harmless flirting. Jess is a grown woman. I think she knows that.’
Ruby stopped in front of her brother. ‘She has a crush on you, you idiot!’
Adam looked up alarmed. She did? ‘She does?’
Ruby shook her head, annoyed that she’d let Jess’s secret slip. But, honestly, her clever brother could be exceedingly dim-witted sometimes.
‘Yes,’ she sighed. ‘She does. A big one. Do you remember what happened with Francine? How crazy that got?’
‘Jess is hardly like to turn into some nutty stalker, Ruby. I think we both know that.’
That had been a harrowing time in his life. Francine, a hairdresser, had been twenty-two. He’d been an intern. After three dates she’d been totally obsessed and had not taken well to being blown off.
He’d gone on his first humanitarian mission overseas just to get away from her. The only silver lining from the whole nasty incident. ‘She’s my friend, Adam. And one of the nicest people that I know. And as much as I love you, I’m not going to sit by and watch you destroy all that lovely Pollyanna sunshine when you break her heart.’
‘Ruby.’ Adam shot his sister an exasperated look. ‘I have no intention of getting involved with Jess. I’m twelve years older than her, for crying out loud.’
And if he said it enough, it might just help him remember it next time Jess looked at his mouth like she wanted to own it.
Jess, who had a crush on him. A big one. ‘It was just a birthday kiss.’
‘To you,’ she yelled, thankful for the music still blaring outside.
‘I think you’re overreacting.’
Even though the news of Jess’s crush did complicate things.
Damn.
‘Well, I hope you’re right, big brother. I really do. I hope, for Jess’s sake, this isn’t something you regret come morning.’
Adam shot his sister a grim look. Unlike the dishes, he doubted he was going to have to wait till the morning.