Free If You Can't Stand the Heat... (Harlequin Kiss) by Joss Wood Page A

nice enough to help her out, but there was no call to start thinking that he was anything more than a transient visitor. He was nothing but her father’s friend, a brief acquaintance, and realistically she wasn’t his type.
    Oh, she was attractive enough for a brief fling, but she wasn’t stupid enough to believe that she could ever be more than that. Nobody will give up their freedom and time for monogamy with you...
    Jack had got up, rested his hand on her clenched fist and forced her fingers open.
    Ellie twisted her lips and blew out a breath, but kept her eyes fixed on the cake.
    ‘I think that’s enough for now. We need pizza and beer and to chill,’ he said.
    Ellie pulled her hand out from beneath his and brushed her hair off her forehead with the tips of her fingers, leaving a trail of red icing on her forehead. ‘This cake...’
    ‘Will still be here tomorrow.’ Jack took her hand again and pulled her away from the table. He leaned forward and his voice was low, seductive and sexy in her ear. ‘Beer. Pizza.’
    Ellie looked at the half-white, half-red train. Beer, pizza and conversation with an interesting man versus a stupid train cake...? No contest.
    * * *
    The woman amazed him, Jack thought. Twenty minutes ago Ellie had looked as if she was about to collapse, but now, sitting across from him at a table on the deck of an admittedly fake, slightly scruffy Italian restaurant, she looked sensational. She’d pulled her hair back into a sleek ponytail which highlighted her amazing cheekbones and painted her lips a glossy soft pink. She’d sorted out the smudged make-up around her eyes and she looked and smelled as if she’d just stepped out of a shower.
    He, on the other hand, felt as if he’d spent the day hauling hay and cleaning out stables. He took a long sip of his beer and sighed as the bittersweet liquid slid down his throat. The night was warm, the surf was pounding, he had a beer in his hand and a pretty girl across the table from him.
    The only scenario that sounded better was if he’d had pizza in his belly and the girl was naked beneath him.
    ‘There’s that smile again,’ Ellie murmured.
    ‘Huh? What smile?’
    Ellie rested her chin in the palm of her hand. ‘You get this secretive, naughty, sexy smile...’
    ‘Sexy?’ The light on the deck was muted but Jack grinned as he saw her blush.
    ‘Yeah, well...anyway. So, I’m starving.’ Ellie looked around, not trying to hide the fact that she was looking to change the subject. ‘Where’s that pizza?’
    Jack decided to let her off the hook—mostly because flirting caused his pants to wake up and start doing its happy dance.
    He looked around and narrowed his eyes. ‘Have you had any more thoughts about the bakery?’
    Ellie wrinkled her nose. She took a sip from her glass of wine and glanced at the ocean. ‘Moving it, you mean?’
    ‘Mmm.’
    ‘I have an idea that I’m working on,’ Ellie said mysteriously.
    His curiosity was instantly aroused. ‘You can’t leave me hanging!’ Jack protested when she didn’t elaborate.
    Ellie smiled. ‘There might be a property that could work.’
    ‘You don’t have much time,’ Jack pointed out.
    ‘I know. Six months.’
    Under the table Jack felt Ellie crossing her legs and he heard her sigh.
    ‘I want to hyperventilate every time I think about it.’
    ‘Call your mother and tell her to come home. It’s her business too, El. You don’t have to carry this load alone. Tell her about having to move. Tell her that you need help.’
    ‘I can’t, Jack. She’s been working in that bakery for ever, never taking time off. Now she’s living her dream and having such a blast. I can’t ask her to give that up. Not just yet. And...and I feel that if I do I’m admitting failure. That I need my mummy to hold my hand.’
    Jack shook his head. ‘So you’d rather work yourself to a standstill, knocking yourself out, instead of asking your friend to come back to work and your mother to come