Free Hard to Handle by Lori Foster Page A

“Honey?”
    With an arm around her, Harley started walking her toward the front of the bar. “Anastasia is too many syllables to keep spewing.”
    â€œSpewing?”
    He glanced down at her with sympathy and understanding. “There’s no reason to be nervous with me. I know you’ve had a rough time tonight; I have no intention of coercing you into bed.”
    Like he’d even need to, Stasia thought with disgust. At the moment, nothing sounded more appealing to her than crawling up close to Harley and staying there, for any and all reasons.
    At the back of her mind, she knew someone had tried to hurt her tonight. Not knowing why only made it worse. Being close to someone so big and strong would be only one of many enticements to snuggle with Harley. “Right, sorry,” she muttered. “My brain is still a little frozen.”
    Without interrupting his pace, Harley cupped her jaw, tipped her head toward him, and kissed her forehead as if it meant nothing, when it felt like so much.
    â€œTell me what your family calls you.”
    A simple, avuncular kiss on the head shouldn’t have tripped her up, but it took her a second to unglue her tongue. “Why?”
    â€œBecause you have to have a nickname, and while I think ‘Anastasia’ is pretty, it’s too damn long.”
    She agreed. “I’ve always thought that parents shouldn’t name their children anything with more than two syllables.”
    Harley grinned.
    â€œThey call me Stasia.”
    His hot hand pressed against the small of her back. “I guess that’ll work since you have a problem with endearments.”
    He hadn’t given her a chance to decide if she had a problem with endearments or not. So much had happened, not the least of which was his rapid about-face concerning her. He’d gone from keeping her at arm’s length, to treating her like a little sister, to touching her like a lover.
    After leading her back through the crowd to the front of the bar, he stopped by her coat, hat, and scarf hanging on the wall. He bunched the material of her coat in one fist—and was displeased.
    Not understanding him, Stasia said, “You’re going to give yourself wrinkles frowning like that.”
    He turned to face her. “Your coat is still wet, so it’s not going to be much good to you in this weather.”
    His words rang with accusation. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s a good coat, a warm coat, and it has weather-proofness built in.”
    To make his point, Harley lifted a saturated lapel. “That’s a joke, right?”
    Seeing it reminded her of how it felt to wear it, and she shuddered. “No.” She yanked the coat out of his hands. “It is a good coat and it’s usually more than adequate. The problem is that I never expected to wear it in weather this bad for so long. But then I never expected to lose my brakes either, or to have to walk into town, or…”
    Her voice trailed off; he wasn’t really listening to her anyway.
    As he took his own coat off the hooks, he said, “You can wear mine.”
    â€œNo.”
    Very slowly, he turned to face her. “It’s not up for debate, Stasia.”
    â€œI agree. I’m not wearing it, and that’s that. And before you get all huffy about it—”
    â€œI don’t get huffy.”
    â€œâ€”you should remember that I don’t take orders from you.”
    He looked at the ceiling for a double beat before pinning her again with his gaze. “Think of it as a gentlemanly offer, not an order.”
    â€œDoesn’t matter. Either way, I don’t want you to sacrifice for me.”
    â€œSacrifice?” Harley took a beleaguered stance. “Maybe you failed to notice, but I’m not already chilled to the bone, and I have on a couple of layers. I’ll be fine.”
    Like a layer of flannel and thermal would be enough to protect