Free One Week (Stolen Kiss #0.5) by Shana Norris Page A

my head against my seat and pulling my hands up away from the steering wheel. My gaze darted back toward the gray truck, hoping by some miracle he hadn’t heard me accidentally blare my car horn at him.
    But no such luck. Jude straightened, shielding his eyes with one hand as he looked directly at me. Would I look too much like a stalker if I sped away? Did he remember that this was my car?
    I lifted one hand and gave a small wave. I didn’t know what else to do.
    Jude stuck the rag into his back pocket and walked across the dry grass toward me. I pressed the button to roll down the window, growing light-headed as he neared me. It took everything in me not to stare at the lines of his abs.
    “What are you doing?” he asked.
    I gestured at my steering wheel. “Just out for a drive.”
    “Doesn’t that require actually driving and not parking?”
    Heat flushed up my neck, “I stopped for a minute.”
    “In front of my house,” he said.
    His chest gleamed with a light sheen of sweat. Don’t look at his chest , I told myself. Don’t look at his chest. “Don’t flatter yourself. I didn’t know it was your house. I was looking at the shirt.” I pointed at the tree, though I couldn’t keep my eyes off his chest.
    Jude didn’t look at the tree, but kept his eyes on me. “You keep showing up everywhere,” he said. “If I didn’t know better, I might think you were stalking me.”
    I snorted. “I have better things to do with my time. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a city to explore.”
    Jude didn’t lift his hands from the doorframe. “Where are you going?”
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll find something to look at. You guys have lots of tourist traps here, right? Maybe I’ll go get lost at Biltmore.”
    “You ever been to Biltmore?” he asked.
    “I’ve never been to Asheville before,” I told him. “This isn’t exactly at the top of my family’s vacation destinations.”
    “If you don’t know where you’re going, you might end up lost in the mountains,” he said. “Some parts of the country are a little more rugged than others.”
    “Well, I don’t exactly have a tour guide on hand.”
    He shrugged. “Maybe I could do it.”
    I narrowed my eyes at him. “You want to go tour around Asheville with me?”
    “Are you inviting me?”
    We stared at each other for a long moment. A car drove by, slowing down as it passed so the driver could look at us before he moved on. I thought about what my mom would say, that Jude looked like an unemployed miscreant and I should stay far away. I thought about what my dad would say, that I owed Jude repayment for changing my tire and giving me a ride home.
    But it was what Mark would say that made up my mind: Do whatever you think you wouldn’t do.
    “You need to change if you’re going with me,” I said, wrinkling my nose at his greasy jeans. “I don’t want oil all over my seat. And put on a shirt.” Before I go crazy trying not to look at you , I added silently.
    I expected Jude to back out and tell me to go on without him. But he nodded and then turned back toward the house. I sat in my car, tapping the steering wheel as I waited. What was I doing? Was he really going to tour Asheville with me?
    Just when I had decided that Jude was playing a joke on me and that I should drive off, the door opened again and Jude emerged, this time wearing dark jeans and a clean white T-shirt. He had brushed his hair and pulled it back into a neat ponytail.
    I raised an eyebrow.
    “What?” he asked once he was settled into the passenger seat.
    “We’re really going to do this?” I asked. “Go to Biltmore Estate. Together.”
    Jude shrugged. “I don’t have anything else to do.”
    I gestured back at his house as a breeze lifted the strands of hair around my face. “Weren’t you working on your truck?”
    “I’m always working on my truck,” he said. “It’s a work in progress.”
    Still, I didn’t put the car into drive.
    “If