"Ask who it is before you open the door."
"I will," he promised, then loudly called, "Who is it?"
Brenna didn't hear the reply, but a second later she heard the door open. She brushed the eye shadow on and picked up the mascara.
"Cole. I knew it was you. Hi!" Teddy's voice carried toward Brenna. "Did you know that Auntie Brennie says she's getting married? Are you?"
Cole's laughter floated to Brenna. "She is, huh? Well, I guess I could, too, then. Where is your Aunt Brenna?"
Brenna paused with the mascara wand halfway to her eye. She stared unseeingly at the mirror as a flash of images swirled from her imagination. In the back of her mind she heard her own voice telling the man she wanted only to be friends. Except the pictures in her mind were more than friendship.
Herself. Cole. A two-story house with a big wide porch and a swing. Starchedpriscillas hanging at the dining-room window. Wide-open spaces with enough room for a big dog and little kittens. Children with golden brown hair and blue eyes.
Her fingers clenched around the wand. Dare she hope for a future she saw so clearly? She had friendship for a while. But a future with a man like Cole? How could she dare hope for that?
"She's putting stuff on her face," Teddy said. "We're having shrimp for dinner. I helped."
Brenna quickly finished getting ready, then gave herself a last check in the mirror. Smoothing her hands down her skirt, she left the bedroom.
"Hi," she said a moment later from the living-room doorway.
"Hi." He stood up and held out a paper sack, which was wrapped around a bottle of wine. He gave her a thorough glance, then grinned. "You look great."
She took the sack from him and pulled out the bottle. "White wine. Thanks. It's just right for dinner."
"Where do you keep the corkscrew?" he asked, following her into the kitchen.
Brenna rummaged through a drawer and handed him the corkscrew.
"Can I have some wine, too?" Teddy asked as she took down three goblets from the cupboard.
"No. But I'll put your Kool-Aid in a goblet if you want. If you promise to be careful."
Teddy smiled. "I promise. Can we make a toast, too?"
Brenna filled his glass from the pitcher in the refrigerator.
"Sure you can." Cole pulled the cork out of the bottle and poured the wine into the two glasses Brenna had set on the counter next to him. He handed one of the glasses to Brenna, took the other one, and knelt on the floor, at eye level with Teddy. "Who do you want to toast?"
Teddy's face screwed up as he thought about it.
"How about to your aunt?" Cole suggested.
Teddy nodded in agreement.
"What do you want to say?"
Brenna handed Teddy his goblet of Kool-Aid and knelt next to him. He lifted his glass, sloshing a few drops over the rim. "I wish Auntie Brennie had her own house again. And ... I wish ... she had a daddy."
"I have a daddy. Grandfather James."
"Oh. I mean a daddy. You know, Auntie Brennie, like Mommy and Daddy."
"You mean a husband?" Cole asked.
Teddy's face brightened. "That's it."
Brenna suspected her own face was beet-red when she glanced back at Cole.
Seeming not to notice at all, Cole clicked his glass with Brenna's. "To Brenna. May you have all the things that make you happy."
Chapter 10.
"Thank you. Both of you." Brenna took a sip of the wine, her eyes never leaving Cole's as he also sipped the wine. Cole took her hand and stood up, pulling her with him. She recognized the longing in his eyes, feeling his hunger as though it were her own.
His eyes still intent on hers, Cole lifted Brenna's fingers to his lips, pressing a warm kiss on each of them. Each separate caress pooled in her stomach, which tightened into knots just shy of painful. Then he turned her hand over and pressed a lingering kiss into her palm, the most sensual caress she had ever received.
"Is this part of the toast, too?" asked Teddy.
"Sometimes." Cole kept Brenna's hand within his own when she would have pulled it away. He took another sip of his wine and offered his goblet to Brenna. "Just like sharing glasses is part of the toast, sometimes."
Teddy lifted his glass, now only half full of Kool-Aid. "I'll share mine."
Brenna glanced down at Teddy, whose upper lip was covered in a red Kool-Aid mustache.
"You should never mix your drinks," Cole said with a chuckle.
Teddy proved to be a diversion during the rest of dinner. Cole couldn't decide if that was a blessing or a curse. He had never wanted to kiss anyone as much as he wanted to kiss Brenna. Throughout the evening, he was caught within the visceral memory of that instant when her breath had caught and her wide luminous eyes had reflected a need as great as his own. Little boys were a diversion he didn't want-not for the kind of grown-up games he had in mind with Brenna.
That thought was uppermost in his mind as he helped Brenna get Teddy ready for bed. Cole recognized stalling tactics when he saw them. Teddy proved his mastery beyond any doubt when he asked Cole for one more bedtime story. Nothing could have topped the two stories Brenna told Teddy. Cole was relieved when she gently insisted lights-out time had come.
"I'd forgotten how exhausting kids can be," Cole said after they left his room. He went into the kitchen, poured the last of the wine into a single goblet and brought it into the living room. "Kid," Brenna corrected. "Although, I admit Teddy sometimes makes me feel like he's more than one child."
"My sister has two little girls. At least they have each other to play with."
"Do you get to see them often?" Brenna turned on the stereo, and the soft sounds of aVivaldi concerto
filled the room. She sat down at the opposite end of the couch Cole had claimed and curled her bare feet under her.
"Not often enough. Three or four times a year. They live in Cheyenne. Dinner was delicious." He took a
sip of the wine, then offered the glass to her.
"I bet you say that whenever you're invited to dinner," she teased. She took a sip of the wine. "And this is lovely wine."
He took the goblet back and set it on the coffee table. "Now that we have all this polite stuff out of the way, do you want to know what I really think?"
She glanced at him.
"I think you're a special lady. You're wonderful company. I like being here with you."
Her eyes dropped, the color in her cheeks high and her expression full of a discomfort that bordered on
... pain, he decided with surprise. He wanted to ask her what she was thinking, which would have been fine if he had thought she'd tell him. He doubted she would.
"That embarrasses you?" he asked, wishing he understood what had made her so uncomfortable.
She shook her head. "No."
"But?"
Her eyes met his. "The gracious thing to say is 'thank you.' Right?"
He grinned. "Right." For the moment he'd content himself with returning to the more neutral topics she seemed comfortable with. "Dinner was delicious. Shrimp is my favorite. I ate too much, and I'm stuffed."
"That's good," she said.
Staying away from her was impossible. Gently Cole pulled on her arm. When she didn't come closer to him, he slid across the couch, eliminating the distance between them. "I'm glad cooking is one of your talents."
"I always thought being domestic was overrated, myself." She tipped her head back, and the corners of her eyes crinkled when she smiled up at him. "Besides, maybe this is the only thing I know how to make."
"Suits me," he said. "I make a great steak. Between your cooking and mine, we'd eat real well."
She chuckled. "Expensive, too."
"Then I'll just have to round up a few more clients, preferably ones that pay a fat monthly retainer."
"I thought getting away from that very thing was one of the reasons you left the old law firm."
"Nope. I just wanted to get away from having to accept cases I didn't want." He picked up the goblet and offered to it Brenna again, watched as her lips left a faint mark against the glass. He traced the side of her face with one long finger, then wrapped a strand of her hair around it.
"You're so beautiful," he whispered.
Her eyes grew wider, and she gave her head a tiny shake. "You are to me," he insisted. "From the very first time I saw you, I wanted this."
His hand slid behind her head, his fingers raking through her dark hair, drawing her closer. He brushed his lips lightly over hers, feeling as though she left a mark on him just as she had on the glass.
His warm lips barely touched hers before drawing a hairsbreadth away, then touched again, each separate surface of her lips brought to life under his touch.
Torture. Wanting to feel his mouth completely. Wanting more to extend the moment, to let the anticipation stretch until she thought she'd die from it.
She opened her eyes and found Cole watching her, the gold flecks in his blue eyes hot, molten.
"My beautiful Brenna," he whispered against her mouth. His eyes closed and his tongue traced the inside line of her lips. Brenna sighed and leaned against him, her lips parting under his unspoken request. Cole increased the pressure of his mouth against hers, but withheld what she wanted. He wrapped his arms around her, drawing her across his lap.
Brenna put her arms around his neck and slid her hands through his hair, feeling each strand against her fingertips, giving herself to the moment. If he wanted to tease, two could play that game. She touched his lips with the tip of her tongue, feeling his warmth to her core. He imitated exactly her gossamer caress, then deepened the caress ever so slightly, which she answered in kind. Kissing-mere kissing-had never been like this. At once satisfying and making her hunger for more.
At last long last his tongue touched hers.
She moaned, moving her mouth over his, taking as much from him as he took from her. A spark ignited and blazed into flowing heat that erased all thought. Nothing was more important than being in his arms, than feeding the fire with the slow bond of tongue caressing tongue.
Cole shuddered, passion flaring into timeless need. He loved kissing Brenna. That he already knew. What he hadn't expected was this yearning-so deep he wanted to nurture as well as possess. The feeling was new, unlike the aroused pulsing of his body. Other women had desired him, but not one had trembled within his arms or whimpered softly with her own need.
He knew what it was to enjoy a woman, but he wanted to cherish Brenna. He was accustomed to wanting the unique softness of a woman, but he needed Brenna with an intensity that bordered on pain. He understood desire, but what he felt for Brenna made desire seem superficial and one-dimensional.
He lifted his head and looked at her. Her breath was as shallow as his own.
She sighed and trailed a line of feathery kisses along his jaw. She pressed her nose against his skin, and inhaled deeply, her pleasure in him heightening his own need to painful intensity. She sighed again, then smiled contentedly.
Her smile hit him in the gut. No touch, not even her kiss, had ever been as erotic to him as her drinking in his scent, then smiling as though nothing could be better.
Cole pressed his mouth against her cheek, caressing each plane of her face before claiming her mouth again. He wanted to feel the hot satin of her skin, wanted to see her lying beneath him with the gold chain around her neck and his body the only things touching her.
He didn't want to remember Teddy, who might interrupt at any moment. He didn't want to remember Michael and Jane, who might return at any time. He didn't want to face the long drive home and yet another restless night as he considered all the ways to fit Brenna's supple body against his.
None of those intrusive thoughts kept him from seeking her mouth in one last deep kiss before gently ... slowly ... pulling her arms from around his neck. "No more. You're killing me."
She smiled, her glance sultry, her eyes sparkling with sudden devilment. He loved that look on her.
"What a sweet way to die." The tip of her tongue touched her own lips, swollen from kisses-the ones he had taken and the ones she had given.
He laughed. "You'd tempt a saint." He brushed his lips across hers, keeping the kiss chaste in spite of his need and her invitation. "And I'm no saint."
He stood up, pulling her with him. He glanced around the room in search of a diversion. Any diversion. Even that last bedtime story Teddy had wanted. Several board games on the bookcase next to the stereo, including his favorite, caught his eyes.
"How about a game of Scrabble?" he asked.
The question shattered Brenna's euphoria.