‘They’ll be hot as be damned. It’s almost summer. You’re not wearing them.’
‘Tonight I’ll wear them.’ Her eyes were defiant-but still twinkling. ‘It’s them or nothing-and I’m definitely not wearing nothing.’
Erin in nothing…
Where had that thought come from? Erin not in her crimplene. Erin in less…
Hell! He had to get out of here. He was a sensibly engaged man.
Just as well, or anything could have happened.
‘We’ll talk about it in the morning,’ he told her. But he grabbed the package. There was no way he was letting her wear those pyjamas. ‘Meanwhile, wear a T-shirt or something. These are going back to the shop.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Her tone was half mocking and he grimaced. Did she know what he’d been thinking-and what he was feeling right now? Somehow he knew that she did.
He glowered and glowered some more. ‘Good. I’m glad you agree.’
‘It doesn’t mean I’m not grateful for Charlotte’s thoughtfulness.’ She wasn’t, but she wouldn’t admit it for worlds.
She turned to gather her clothing together, and he stood watching her for a couple of moments. Erin was wearing the dress she’d been wearing the night before when the home burned down-one of her Charlotte-decreed home-made jobs. It was pale blue with lemon swirls, with a couple of fire stains she hadn’t been able to remove by scrubbing. Stained or not, it made her look…
It made her look as if the jeans and windcheaters Charlotte had chosen were totally unsuitable.
Suddenly he had a thought. This was one thing that was suitable, at least.
‘Erin?’
‘Yes?’ She paused from her clothes gathering and looked up in enquiry.
She was expecting him to go to bed and leave her, he thought. She was expecting nothing from him at all.
He felt his midriff clench in sudden pain. Hell, he wanted to do something for her so badly, and all he had was this. He shoved his hand into his back pocket and found what he’d been searching for.
‘Tom showed me the layout of your house and which was your bedroom,’ he told her, his suddenly gruff voice failing to hide his inexplicable emotion.
‘Yes?’
‘There were a few things we were able to salvage.’
Her face stilled. ‘It wasn’t all completely burned?’
‘The roof burned and the ceiling caved in,’ he told her, seeing her sudden look of hope and wanting to dispel it before it started. ‘The weight of the ceiling, and the soot and smoke and water effectively destroyed most of your stuff. But the base of your bedroom didn’t actually catch fire. The roof caved in while it was still smouldering, but it was doused fast. So the lads from the fire brigade and I made a really good search and we found these.’
And he lifted up what he was holding-a string of seed pearls.
As pearls went they were what he’d been brought up to believe were inadequate. Both his mother and Charlotte would have scorned these as trumpery, he knew. But to Erin…
To Erin they weren’t trumpery. She stared at the string dangling from his fingers, then took a tentative step forward as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
‘My mother’s necklace.’ She whispered the words. It was as if she wasn’t able to believe what she was seeing, and any minute they’d be snatched back from her.
‘It’s the only trinket we found that was recognisable,’ he told her. ‘Did you have much jewellery?’
‘That’s all I had.’ She lifted it from his fingers and stared down at it, still disbelieving. ‘Oh, Matt…’
‘I’m sorry we couldn’t retrieve more stuff,’ he said awkwardly, but she lifted her face to his and her eyes were bright with unshed tears.
Then, before he knew what she was about-before he could take one step to defend himself-she threw her arms around his neck, raised herself on her tiptoes and kissed him soundly on the lips.
It was a kiss of thanks-nothing more. It was a kiss of gratitude.
So how it had the capacity to knock him sideways-to have him catch her waist in his hands and pull her in to him and kiss her back-to feel like his world was shifting on its axis and shifting forever-who could say?
Matt couldn’t.
He could only feel, but feel he did. He felt the way her body felt delicious under his hands. The way her mouth yielded to his and the touch of her hair against his, the moulding of her breasts to his chest-the fragrance of her…
He didn’t understand this in the least. He could only feel and feel some more, and when she finally pulled away he could only regret her parting, and regret it with every inch of his being.
‘Oh, Matt, thank you,’ she whispered, and the tears in her eyes were real now, threatening to slide down her cheeks. She blinked them back, fast and furious, and then made a grab for her pile of clothes. Carefully sorted heaps were ignored. They were crumpled into one vast mound of clothes, gathered against her breast almost as a defence.
‘Goodnight, Matt.’
And then she fled, taking her clothes and her necklace twin-wards, before her tears finally were allowed to run free. She left Matt staring after her, wondering what the hell he’d just done.
He’d just restored a necklace to its owner.
And now something else needed restoring but it was nothing tangible. In fact, he didn’t have a clue what it was.
But it was a long time before he slept that night. And when he slept, he didn’t dream of the lady he was about to marry.
He dreamed of seed pearl necklaces, and he dreamed of Erin.
CHAPTER SIX
DESPITE the emotions of the day, Erin slept soundly. In fact, she slept more soundly than she remembered sleeping for years.
It was because Matt was here, she thought as she drifted toward unconsciousness. As House Mother she always slept on the brink of waking. There was always a child in need. And before that…
Her mother had died when Erin was just fourteen. Erin had been the oldest of the kids. Her father had crumpled with her mother’s death so she’d reared her siblings with love and also, she had to admit, with pleasure. When the last child left home she moved on to being an orphanage House Mother, but her choice of career meant that from the time she was fourteen there’d always been a child dependent on her.
There was no one else to share her load.
But here, at the other end of the house, slept Matt. She wasn’t totally in charge. The feeling was novel, and she shouldn’t indulge it, but in truth it was also wonderful.
She indulged it. The twins slept soundly and Erin totally relaxed. She slept on dreamlessly, and she couldn’t guess that at the other end of the house Matt stirred and tossed and fretted because he couldn’t get her out of his head.
Erin woke at dawn when Matt crept silently into the room next door.
She might have been sleeping soundly, but she was still a House Mother. Some things were instinctive, and protection was one of them. The moment the twins’ bedroom door opened, her eyes were wide and she was pushing herself up in bed wondering what was wrong.
She’d propped the bathroom doors open between the two rooms so she could see, and she could see clearly straight through. Matt was in his working clothes and he was tip-toeing towards the twins.
‘What’s wrong?’ It came out as a whispered croak of surprise.
He cast her a look of annoyance-annoyance with himself for waking her. ‘Hell, Erin, I’m sorry. You go back to sleep. I’m after the twins.’
She found her right voice. ‘What on earth for?’
