She smiled at his deadpan humor. But with the initial burst of enthusiasm and defiance behind her, she’d slipped back into her old routine. She loved the library work, spent her nights doing Freddie’s research, and never really cut the velvet ribbons tying her to the foundation, to her old life.
Until she realized that if she didn’t go after Lucas, she’d go back to Chicago exactly the same as she was when she left. Decisions weren’t easy, or her strong suit. She just followed where Freddie led, and for the most part, she was happy to do that. She had the kind of life people dreamed of having, making a difference on a large scale, jet-setting around the world, rubbing shoulders with rock stars and billionaires and policy makers at every level.
So why did she feel so ridiculously happy sitting across from Lucas at a restaurant in Brookings, South Dakota, discussing kitchen renovation plans?
Don’t think about that. You’re going home. You said you were going home. You’ve made commitments there. You can’t leave your family. Freddie depends on you, and the work matters. You don’t really have a reason to stay.
“So that’s my bad breakup,” Alana said briskly, retrieving her phone. The memory didn’t just sting. It burned. “He proposed. I said no. My mother was so disappointed.”
Lucas’s brow furrowed. “You’re not your sister. I don’t know you all that well, but you don’t seem like the type to want a big production for anything that intimate.”
She blinked, because if he’d figured that out, he knew her better than most of her family. “After that, all I knew was that I needed to do something different. Be different. I needed time to regroup.”
“Walkers Ford, the halfway house for people needing a second start,” he said, startling a laugh out of her. “I hope it goes better for you than it did for me.”
Time to change the subject. “How long will it take to renovate the kitchen?”
“A few weeks. I can move the fridge into the living room, but there’s nowhere else wired for the stove unless I move it into the garage.”
“So no cooking, unless I microwave and use paper plates. I’m leaving in a few days anyway.”
“I can wait. This is going to be a hell of a mess.”
The corners of her mouth lifted. “No, if you’re okay with it, I’m okay with it. It’s your house, after all.”
“But you’re living in my house.”
Such simple words, with so many nuances to them. She did live in his house. She slept in his bed, and Walkers Ford was his town. Mr. Walker might own the bank, and Dave Miller might be the school superintendent, and a husband-and-wife team might be the doctor-pharmacy team, but this was Lucas Ridgeway’s town. He protected the residents, their property, their sense of safety.
A delicious shiver of possession danced up her spine. She was accustomed to belonging somewhere. She’d always belonged to the Wentworth family, but always by accident. Born to her mother and father, part of the package when her mother married the Senator, part of the team at the foundation. But no one possessed her. No one reached out and claimed her. Of course in the twenty-first century, women didn’t want to be claimed. They built careers, made their own money, raised children on their own, planned for their own retirement.
Given a little time, she could probably come up with a less politically correct ambition, but she really, really wanted to belong somewhere, to someone. Because there was a difference between being part of a package deal, and belonging.
“I like being in your house,” she said.
His gaze somehow both sharpened and heated. “Keep going.”
“I’d like to be in your bed.”
“I can arrange that.”
6
LIBRARIANS KEPT SECRETS. They heard odd stories, got requests that ranged from reasonable to wildly inappropriate, and like cops, they learned not to bat an eyelash. But keeping the arousal humming under her skin from heating into a radiant aura visible in the spring darkness took every bit of her professional demeanor.
And then some.
Lucas backed into her driveway. “I’ll unload this,” he said as he shifted into park in front of the single detached garage.
“I’ll help,” she said.
“Go inside,” he said, his brusque tone refusing her offer of help.
The interior light faded, leaving them in darkness. Moonlight washed the planes of his face in pale light. Her gaze skipped from his eyes, shadowed in darkness, to his mouth. Trusting the darkness to hide them from the neighbors, she reached out and brushed her fingertips over his full lips.
“I have something in mind for that mouth,” she said.
She felt more than saw the sudden tension in his body, then his lips parted ever so slightly, and his exhalation drifted over her fingertips. “Go inside,” he said against her fingertips, this time lower, rougher. A completely different meaning.