Free The Sweetheart Secret by Shirley Jump Page B

cheeks.
    Daisy kept up a constant chatter with Earl while she washed and he dried. Colt finished his salad, then joined them in the kitchen, taking the dishes his grandfather dried and putting them away. The tension between the men eased. They joked and chatted with her as they worked, and the three of them whipped through the cleanup in record time. The whole thing was so domestic, so ordinary, that for a little while Daisy fell into the fantasy of being in a family. A home.
    When the last dish was washed, she pulled the plug and watched the water drain, taking along a swirl of soap bubbles. With it, the light feeling she’d had before disappeared, and she remembered.
    She wasn’t here for some warm and cozy memories. She wasn’t here to act out some missing component of her childhood or pretend she was in some traditional two-point-five kids and white-picket-fence world. She was here for business reasons—and nothing more.
    â€œWell, kids, it’s about time for
Dancing with the Stars
. I’m going to call it an early night.” Earl put the towel on the counter, then laid a hand on Daisy’s shoulder. His kind blue eyes filled with warmth. “We’ll make fun of the neighbors another time, young lady.”
    Daisy nodded. “No problem.”
    Though Daisy had no intentions of coming back here. Too bad, really, because she liked Earl. And had enjoyed the pizza more than she wanted to admit.
    Earl left the room, his steps slow and shuffling. Leaving Daisy alone with Colt, with the perfect opportunity to bring up why she was here. But for some reason the same woman who could tell off a rude customer in five seconds flat, level a grope-hungry boss with one look, and take on every challenge handed to her, had gone tongue-tied.
    It wasn’t the pizza or the homey environment. Every breath she took brought with it a whiff of Colt’s cologne, dark, woodsy, tempting. She wanted to curve into his height, lean her head on his broad shoulders, and hell, yes, jump his bones and take him upstairs to what she hoped was a king-sized bed.
    She wanted to grab Colt’s tie, unbutton his shirt, and get to the man beneath the starch. She wanted to hear his voice, growling deep against her throat, telling her everything that he was planning on doing to her in bed. Just like he had oh, so many years ago.
    Those thoughts were not helping anything. She shook her head and refocused on the topic at hand. “I enjoyed talking to your grandpa. He’s a really interesting man.”
    â€œThank you,” Colt said. “You really have a nice way with him. He’s never that nice to me, not lately anyway.”
    â€œWell, maybe it was just the change in conversational partners. You can be a little . . .”
    â€œWhat?” He came a little closer. That dark cologne wafted between them. Enticing. “I can be a little what? Go ahead, you can say it.”
    A smile curved up her face. “A little . . . stuffy.”
    â€œMe?”
    She danced her fingers along that tie, the buttons, the still-fresh panels of button-down. “Yes, Mr. Khakis, you.”
    He caught her hand, and her breath lodged in her throat. “I do own other clothes, you know.”
    â€œOh yeah?” she said, pretending she didn’t notice how warm her hand felt against his. “Then prove it.”
    â€œCome by on a weekend and you’ll see me in jeans and a ratty T-shirt.”
    â€œ
You
own a ratty T-shirt?”
    â€œWell, technically”—a sheepish grin filled his face—“I’d need to poke a hole in the fabric, maybe tear a seam or two, but yes, I
can
own a ratty T-shirt.”
    She laughed. “Oooh, you are living on the edge, Colt.”
    He released her hand and stepped away. Something shifted in his eyes, a shadow dropping over his features. “Yeah, that’s me all right.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, what did you want to