I’m In No Mood For Love

Fifteen

On the twenty-fourth of December the Boise Towne Square Mall was packed with last- minute shoppers. Christmas Muzak kept time with the ringing of cash registers. Groups of teenagers hung over the second-floor railings, calling to friends below, while mothers maneuvered strollers through the melee.

At the entrance of Walden’s Books, Clare sat surrounded by a stack of her latest, Surrender to Love, and was partially hidden by a big easel-backed poster of a busty heroine and her shirtless hero. For the signing, she had dressed in her black double-breasted suit and emerald silk blouse. She wore black hose and four-inch pumps, and her hair was curled about her shoulders. She looked successful and sophisticated, and in one hand she held her gold Tiffany signing pen. There were ten minutes left of her two-hour signing, and she’d sold fifteen of her books. Not bad for December. It was time to sit back, relax. A slight smile tilted her red lips as she gazed down at the open book hidden in her lap: Redneck Haiku, Double-Wide Edition.

“Hey there, Cinderella.”

Clare glanced up from a haiku about Bubba’s wedding and her gaze landed on the faded button fly of a pair of well-worn Levi’s. She recognized those jeans and that voice and knew who both belonged to even before she looked up past an open fleece jacket and blue shirt, past that familiar smile and dark green eyes.

“What are you doing here?” She’d heard Sebastian was back in town for Christmas. He was expected with Leo at her mother’s house for dinner tomorrow night, but it was a shock to see him standing across her small table. His answer was a bigger shock.

“Buying your book for my dad for Christmas.”

Seeing him, a familiar little sensation lifted her stomach. She didn’t love Sebastian, but she did like him. How could she not like a man who braved holiday shopping to buy a romance novel for his father? “You could have called and I would have brought you one.”

Inside his black fleece, he shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”

Which was a blatant lie. No sane person was at the mall unless they absolutely had to be. “I picked up Leo’s lithograph this morning.” Just as much as she liked him, she was physically attracted to him. Much in the same way she was attracted to Godiva truffles. They weren’t good for her and had an addictive quality. If she reached for one, she’d have to have the whole box. Afterward she’d regret it, but there was no denying how much she wanted to dive in and pig out.

His smile creased the corners of his eyes. “Did you get crazy with ribbon?”

She chuckled and sat back. “Not this time.” And there was no denying to herself how much she wanted to binge on Sebastian. “I haven’t wrapped it yet.” Perhaps start at the top of his golden head and work her way south past the hard abs she knew were hiding beneath that flannel.

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“Are you going to invite me to your house to see it? Or do I have to invite myself again?”

She closed the book in her lap and looked at her watch. It was almost six. “Do you have Christmas Eve plans?”

“No.”

She reached for a copy of Surrender to Love and opened it to the title page. “I’m done here, so why don’t you come over and see it before I wrap it up.” She wrote Leo a nice Merry Christmas message and signed her name. “Or you can wrap it.” She handed him the book, and the tips of her fingers touched his over the busty heroine on the cover.

“Uh, I suck at wrapping. You can go ahead and handle that.”

She placed the book of haiku on the table and stood. “I knew you were going to say that.”

He chuckled, pointed at the bright yellow and red book and raised a dubious brow. “Japanese poetry?”

“Well, redneck Japanese poetry, at any rate.” She stuck her pen in her small black purse. “A girl can never have too much culture,” she said.

“Ah.” He reached for the book and thumbed through it. “I did hear somewhere that the pursuit of intellectual and artistic endeavors are necessary for a healthy mind.”

“And a sign of an enlightened society. Even a redneck society,” she added as they moved deeper into Walden’s.

Clare said a quick good-bye to the bookstore manager and left Sebastian standing in the long line at the registers. In one hand he held the book she’d signed for Leo, and in the other he skimmed Redneck Haiku.

Getting out of the mall parking lot was a nightmare. The drive across town, which normally took her twenty minutes, stretched over an hour. By the time she walked in the door, she was more than ready to be home. She kicked off her shoes and nylons and hung her blazer in her closet. As she unbuttoned her sleeves, the doorbell rang and she moved out of her bedroom to the front of the house. She opened the front door, and Sebastian was standing there, a tall, wide-shouldered outline in the darkness. She felt his gaze on her even before she flipped on the porch light and his green eyes met hers.

“How did you get here so fast?” she asked, and opened the door wider for him to enter.

Instead, he looked at her for several more heartbeats before lowering his attention to her mouth, the front of her blouse and skirt, and all the way to her bare feet. White puffs of his breath hung on the cold air in front of his face.

She shivered and folded her arms beneath her breasts. “Would you like to come in?” she said, finding it odd that he just stood as if his feet were frozen to her porch.

He glanced back up into her face, seemed to hesitate a moment, then stepped inside. He shut the door behind him and leaned back against it. The chandelier overhead showered his blond hair and shoulders in golden light.

“Are you hungry? Would you like me to order a pizza?”

“Yes,” he said, finally speaking. “And no, I don’t want a pizza.” He leaned forward, slid his hand around her waist and pulled her against his chest. “You know what I want.”

Her hands slid up the soft fleece of his jacket. The way he looked at her, his meaning was clear. He explained it anyway.

“Ever since that night when I saw you strip down to your little thong, I’ve thought of making love to you a dozen or so different ways. When I went to your signing tonight, I told myself I was there just to get your book for Leo. That’s thirty percent true. Seventy percent a lie. On the way over here I thought of all the ways I could try and get you out of your clothes, but when you opened the door just now, I realized I don’t want to try and get you out of anything. We’re no longer kids. Playing games. I want your full participation while I strip you naked.”

A part of her wanted that too. Really wanted it. The way he looked at her twisted a heated knot deep in the pit of her stomach. They were both fully clothed and Sebastian still wore his jacket, yet he turned her on with nothing more than the press of his body and the sound of desire in his voice.

“Just in case you’re confused about what I mean,” he added, “if you don’t kick me out right now, we’re going to have sex.”

What about tomorrow? her inner voice asked. The twisting knot, deep in the pit of her belly, answered, Who cares! Her rational voice slightly edged out the desire spreading warm tingles across her flesh. “I’m obviously attracted to you, but I can’t help but think we’ll both regret it. Is a few hours of sex worth it?”

“I’m not going to regret it, and I’m going to make damn sure you don’t either. And it doesn’t matter now, we’re beyond that particular bullet point.” He lowered his face and kissed her throat just beneath her ear. “We need to have crazy hot sex and get it out of our systems. I’ve thought about it, and there’s no other way.”

His breath warmed the side of her neck, and she closed her eyes. She’d never made love with someone with whom she didn’t have a romantic relationship. At least none that she could recall. “Has that worked for you in the past?”