Free A Loving Man by Cait London Page B

children around her by now, but since she doesn’t, I’d guess you’d better leave well enough alone. She’s pretty well over the hill for that game.”
    “Thank you, Mrs. Wilkins. I think you’ve pretty well said all there is to be said.” Rose’s life had always been an open book to the people of Waterville. When she was growing up, most of them had either fed her or patched her scraped knees. As they aged, she’d started taking care of some of them—not because she felt an obligation, but because she loved them. Their lives fitted together like one of the old pioneer quilts, worn and soft and comfortable. She knew they meant well, and she tried not to show her heartbreak because they worried for her.
    She stared meaningfully at Stefan. Stefan looked more like lover material, than like that of a husband. Rose didn’t want to dip into dreams safely tucked away. Just looking at him caused her body to hum and she didn’t want to get started all over again—she suspected that Stefan could leave even more scars than Mike. “One of you has to leave. I’d prefer it was you.”
    “Very well. But I want you to think about this—we started off wrong, but I have waited too long for a womanlike you. According to what your father told my mother, you fixed up Henry with Shirley and Larry with Mary Lou. Maggie White has started hunting me and I want you to call her off. I cannot oblige Maggie’s not-so subtle invitation to her bed, because I intend to be in yours.”
    With that, he lifted her palm up to his lips and pressed a kiss into the center.
    “You know how you are, dear,” Mrs. Wilkins called while Rose tried to slow her heart. “Too sweet and soft and naive for big-city men. Better shoo him away before you get all tangled up again.”
    Stefan’s sultry look took in Rose’s blush. “Yes,” he said very quietly. “I would like to be tangled up with you.”
     
    The first of June marked the Donatiens’ one-month anniversary on their Waterville farm. For Stefan, it marked two long weeks without that enjoyable sparring with Rose. He sat on the porch he had just repaired, tipped back his chair against the side of the house, propped his bare feet up on the railing and gave himself to the sweet early-summer night.
    A reasonable man, he told himself as he ran his hand across his chest, would give a woman time. When his daughter spoke of her friend, Rose, his heart shouldn’t stop, his mind sliding back to how she looked, dressed in that emerald lounging gown and curled upon the wicker chair. He’d been too blatant, telling her of his need for her. With the fireflies blinking in the June night, the scent of his mother’s garden wrapped around him, Stefan tried not to think of Rose. He tried not to think of how she looked when he’d come into town that early morning. She’d been jogging, her damp T-shirt plastered to her breasts, whichbobbed gently. Her shorts had fluttered around her smooth bottom, those long legs eating up the road.
    He’d give her time to think, Stefan promised himself as the vision of Rose, all hot and sweaty and sexy raced through his mind. Then he stopped thinking and breathing as Rose’s pickup pulled in front of the house. Dressed in her usual T-shirt and cutoff shorts, Rose stalked up the walkway, her thongs slapping against her soles. “I want to talk with you,” she said bluntly, tapping her hand against her bare thigh. “I see no point in beating around the bush, while you’re the cause of all my problems. So I’ve come right to grab the bull by the horns as we say hereabouts.”
    She blinked, hesitated as though she were replaying her own words and pushed on. “I wanted to talk with you privately…Estelle is at my house watching a video with her friends. I know your mother is with my dad—and I’m not certain I like how he’s acting lately, all sappy and happy—enough to make Maggie White take notice. She called to see what was making him seem so frisky. He bought new