All Grown Up (4 page)

Annalise bent forward, trying to get close enough to see in the dim light. “Jiminy Christmas, Sam. Is this original?”

She felt his presence, big and warm, at her shoulder. “Jiminy Christmas?”

Heat washed up her throat. “I made a New Year’s resolution to give up cussing.”

“Ah.” He was so close she could inhale his clean, male scent, so close she could hear him breathe.

Doggedly, she focused her attention on the wall. “Has anyone on the historical renovation team seen this?”

Sam pulled a small flashlight out of his hip pocket and handed it to her. “No. But the plan doesn’t call for any changes up here. You’re one of the only people I know who would get excited about this.”

She shone the small beam of light on the edge of the faded paper. Once upon a time it had probably been a cheery yellow. Now, the scattering of small flowers was barely visible on a field of cream. “There’s more under here, isn’t there?”

She sensed rather than saw him nod. “I’ve picked at the frayed part enough to tell that there are at least three more layers beneath this. I think that with an X-Acto knife we might be able to extract the various pieces so that you could look at them.”

“This is so damn cool!” She clapped her hand over her mouth and heard Sam laugh. “Is there or was there anything like this downstairs?” she asked, hoping to distract him from her failings.

“If so, it’s long gone. You’ll find Sheetrock and more modern building supplies. But I know Gram would be thrilled if you were able to find a paper similar to one of these and use it in at least one room…just to tie the past to the future.”

“I’d love to try. But why do you think they would have gone to the trouble to use wallpaper up here if it was for servants?”

“My guess is that the paper was a way to keep wind out. Back then, before roofing was really well done, I’m sure this area of the house was almost like living outside.”

“Hmmm…” Her brain raced even as she absorbed the fact that she and Sam stood shoulder-to-shoulder. He seemed to be almost deliberately crowding her personal space.

Her jacket was warm, and with Sam in touchable distance her blood was pumping. The cold didn’t even register at the moment. Nevertheless, she feigned a shiver. “I’ll come back up here one day when I can see better.”

“I could show you more treasures. Disintegrating silk dresses with bustles and button-up shoes. Old army uniforms. Collections of sabers and muskets. Even Gram’s wedding dress.”

She faced him, wondering what he would do if she went up on tiptoe and kissed him. “It will keep, won’t it? I think I’m ready for bed. It’s been a long day.” She handed over the flashlight, and he tucked it in his pocket. But neither of them moved.

“Annalise, I…”

She’d never heard Sam Ely sound unsure of himself. And the scowl that etched tight planes on his face wasn’t encouraging.

Sexual tension arced and crackled between them. If it had been any other man, any other situation, Annalise would have initiated a kiss. But the specter of Sam from the past held her back.
Guys like to do the chasing
.

Confused, embarrassed and angry with herself for acting like a 1950s debutante, she turned abruptly. “I’m done here.”

She had taken three steps in the direction of the door when the lights went out. Her momentum carried her forward, and she tripped over something on the floor and stumbled to her knees. “Ouch, damn it.” Pain shot up her leg to her hip, and her big toe throbbed.

“Hold still. Don’t move.” Sam rustled behind her, and muttered beneath his breath when something fell to the floor with a loud
thunk
.

“What was that?”

“I dropped the stupid flashlight.” He crouched beside her, reaching out in the darkness. “Are you still in one piece?”

“Bruised but functional.”

“Let me help you up.” His arms went around her and they both froze.

“Sam,” she said, her voice unsteady. “That’s my boob you’re holding.”

He released her like a man backing away from a poisonous snake. “Sorry.”

She found his hand with hers. “Pull.” Gradually, wincing as her knee protested, she made it upright. “Okay then. I can walk.”

“Not without me, you can’t. Hold on to the back of my belt and I’ll get us to the door.”

“Are we going to look for the flashlight?”

“No. Who knows how far it rolled, and I have several more downstairs.”

She had to touch his waist, brush his hip, to find her way around to his back. And she was pretty sure he inhaled sharply when her fingers curled around his belt and brushed his spine. His skin was smooth and hot to the touch.

A step at a time they made their way through the stygian gloom. What had been a short distance before now became an obstacle course. Suddenly, Annalise yelped and pressed into Sam, wrapping her arms around his waist.

She felt him tense. “What’s the matter?”

“Something ran across my foot.”

“Probably just a mouse.”

“
Just
a mouse?”

“I know you’ve had the occasional rodent in Wolff Castle.”

“I didn’t play footsie with them,” she complained, shuddering. With all the lights out, who knows how many creatures would come out to play?

“The Annalise Wolff I used to know wasn’t afraid of anything. Your brothers and cousins dared you to try all sorts of ridiculous stunts, and you took the bait every time, determined to prove you were as good as they were.”

“Well, I’ve matured since then.”

He cursed as they both staggered around some kind of chest. “Too bad…I kind of liked that crazy girl.”

Annalise didn’t have an answer for that. Was he trying to tell her something, or was this chitchat designed to distract her from the fact that with the electricity out, this old house was going to chill rapidly?

At last Sam located the door, which was rather anticlimactic, because as soon as they stepped through it, they were no better off than they were before. Now they faced two steep flights of stairs.

He ran his palm down her arm, ultimately linking their fingers. “Stay close. I’ll follow the stair rail, and you hang on to me.”

Annalise wasn’t about to argue. Her heart was dancing to some kind of ragged staccato beat and her lung capacity had shrunk to nothing. Not even to herself would she admit that holding hands with Sam Ely rocked her world.

“Works for me,” she said, trying to sound matter-of-fact. His grip was firm and warm, unbelievably so, since her own smaller hand was icy.

It was a clumsy sort of ballet, but it worked, albeit slowly. At the second-floor landing they stopped to catch their breath. Sam squeezed her fingers. “You doing okay, Princess? I know you didn’t sign on for this.”

It seemed as if he surrounded her, all hard muscle, broad chest and gravelly voice.

She swallowed, her throat dry as the dust that danced in drafts beneath the roof. “Not to worry. I may not have been a Girl Scout, but I can handle you and a dark house.”

Four

S
am was disoriented, and it had more to do with having Annalise Wolff clinging to him than it did with the lack of electricity. He was getting definite mixed signals. One wrong move on his part could be disastrous.

Right now, she was silent, seemingly docile. Perhaps regretting her last boastful retort. He was pretty sure she hadn’t meant for it to come out sounding like sexual innuendo.

He sighed inwardly. Rarely did he find himself wandering in the dark when it came to a woman, and now he was in the position of doing so both literally and metaphorically. Keeping his voice neutral, he tugged on her hand. “Ready to keep going?”

He felt her nod. “Yes. Won’t there at least be some firelight from the kitchen and living room?”

Stepping gingerly down one step and then another, he led her behind him. “As long as the embers haven’t burned too low.”

Moments later they made it to the hallway.

She exhaled. “Well, we didn’t break a leg. That’s something.”

He could tell that Annalise was ready to escape into her bedroom and call it a night, but he kept a firm grip on her hand. “We need a snack. Dinner was a long time ago. Can I interest you in a s’more?”

“Served by a roaring fire? Sure.”

He steered her to her earlier seat. “Sit here and don’t move. We’re surrounded by lethal furniture. I’ll go find the flashlights.” He wasn’t gone more than two minutes. Grabbing what he needed out of the kitchen, he returned to find Annalise stoking the fire. The roaring flames danced and crackled, spreading a semicircle of light and warmth.

“What part of
sit still
don’t you understand?” Joining her in front of the hearth, he laid two sets of graham crackers and chocolate bars on the mantel and then ripped open a bag of marshmallows. Threading one onto a wire coat hanger, he handed it to her.

She stared at it, a small smile on her face. “I love mine burnt to a nice dark brown.”

“Says the woman who doesn’t cook. The trick is to get it hot and gooey without involving carcinogens.”

“Oh, pooh.” She crouched and thrust her marshmallow deep into the flames. “Live a little, Sam.”

Again, that odd frisson of awareness. He wasn’t convinced she knew how her sharp-edged repartee was affecting him. But maybe he was naive. Perhaps Annalise Wolff was planning sexual revenge and knew exactly what she was doing. He couldn’t imagine what that would look like or what her goal could be other than to torment him, but already his body betrayed him.

He wanted to strip her naked and take her there on the rag rug, uncaring that snow drifted deeper and deeper against the windows or that he and Annalise were like oil and water.

Here—and now—he wanted her.

Before he could formulate a suitably masculine retort, Annalise stood abruptly. “Hold this, please.”

When he took the coat hanger from her without complaint, she stripped off her jacket and fanned her face. “I think I’m the one melting, not the marshmallow.”

Good Lord. That damned silk blouse clung to her arms and breasts with static electricity, outlining pert nipples that riveted his attention even through the evidence of a lacy bra.

He turned away, shocked by how quickly his arousal segued from piqued interest to heavy, molten lust. “Here. Take it back,” he croaked. “I’m not going to be responsible for cooking this. Do it your own way.”

“Thank you,” she mocked. “I will.”

As he rotated his coat hanger in precise increments, Annalise laughed when her marshmallow burst into flame. The sound of that husky, sensual chuckle did to his insides what the hot fire had done to puffy white sugar. He was ablaze suddenly, so hungry for her he was actually stunned.

“Blow it out,” he said. “Before you ruin it completely.”

She waited two clicks—two interminable seconds—and then she did as he commanded. “You just can’t stand not to boss me around. That doesn’t bode well for our collaboration.”

“It’s not a collaboration,” he insisted. “You’re in charge.”

She snorted. “Yeah right.” Reaching for the rest of her s’more sandwich, she trapped the marshmallow between the other layers and extracted the coat hanger.

“You’re gonna burn your tongue.”

Annalise bit into her messy s’more and groaned. “Wow. These are amazing. Great idea, Sam.”

He pulled his perfectly browned marshmallow from the fire and made his own s’more. He was hungry. And the melted chocolate and marshmallow smelled wonderful. But he couldn’t look away from Annalise. Firelight painted her classic features with warm, golden hues. Her mouth was sticky with sugar and chocolate.

“You’ve got some on your chin,” he said gruffly.

She reached up, eyes dancing with laughter, and rubbed a spot. “Did I get it?”

“No.”
Lick it. Kiss it. Make her want you like you want her.
The little devil on his shoulder had gotten him into trouble more than once. But something stopped him. A dead certainty that this time he didn’t want to screw things up with Annalise Wolff.

He took his thumb and rubbed it across the side of her chin. “There,” he said, throat dry. “All clean.”

The smile disappeared from her face, and her eyes widened, something unidentifiable flickering in the depths of her wary gaze. “Thank you.”

They finished eating in silence. Watching her lick her fingers nearly did him in. “I’ll get you a flashlight,” he said gruffly. “And there are extra covers in the chest at the foot of your bed.”

“Don’t worry about me,” she said. “Once I burrow under a pile of quilts, I won’t come out till morning.”

“I’ll be sleeping upstairs. Is it going to bother you to be down here alone? If you’re worried, I can camp out on the sofa.”

Even in the shadowy room he could see her roll her eyes. “Get serious, Sam. Do I strike you as the nervous type? I’ll be fine. Besides, there’s no way you could stretch out on that couch. You’re far too big.”

Again, a seemingly innocuous comment with an undercurrent of sexual nuance. “Your choice,” he said. And wasn’t that the problem? Given their past, for him to make a move on her was risky in the extreme. But in light of his long-ago sins, the likelihood of Annalise Wolff pursuing him a second time was almost nonexistent.

Where did that leave a man who was breathless with wanting and aching for one woman in particular?

“So when do you break out the generator? I assume there is one.”

“Yes. But we don’t know how long we’re going to be stuck, so I suggest we use it sparingly. If you can make it through this one night, we’ll power it up tomorrow to cook a decent meal and take showers, anything else we need to do.”

“Makes sense.”

Annalise was not a whiner. Thank God for that. As soon as he gave her a flashlight, she disappeared with a muttered
good-night.
It didn’t escape his notice that when she left him, the novelty and fun of being snowed in vanished. Now he was cold and grumpy and hard…with a long, unpleasant night ahead.

He made sure both of the fires were banked and the screens in place. After clearing up the mess from their bedtime snack, he found his way upstairs. The air was so cold he almost expected to inhale ice crystals.

His bedroom, the one he stayed in when he visited his grandparents, was furnished with more modern items, including a king-size bed. Since he was well over six feet tall, he appreciated the concession. Sleeping in a narrow antique bed had never interested him. At least not until tonight. If Annalise had invited him to share hers, he’d have been more than willing.

In the modern, newly renovated bathroom he made quick work of washing up in the dark. A shower at the moment was out of the question. It might have done him some good considering the fact that he had been semi-aroused for the last three hours. But the house was just too damn cold.

He never used pajamas, and tonight, he bitterly regretted that decision. The sheets felt damp, even though he knew they were not. Huddling into the covers, he tried not to think about what it would be like to have a warm, feminine body curled against his.

Exhaustion claimed him quickly, but he slept in fits and starts. Dreams plagued him. The unrelenting winds rattled the windows and howled around the eaves. At one point he sat up and looked at his phone. Hell, it was only 2:00 a.m.

The cold seeped into his bones. He started worrying about Annalise. But her room was just off the living room and no doubt had benefited to some extent from the fire. And he couldn’t imagine that she slept naked. As much as she enjoyed pretty clothes, she probably packed all kinds of sleepwear.

In lieu of counting sheep, he began picturing her in various sexy outfits. Teddies. Football jerseys and knit shorts. Elegant negligees. Camis and thongs.

His imagination was regrettably thorough. Cursing roughly, he cupped his hand around his aching shaft. He didn’t want to find relief in that way. He didn’t want to be alone.

Another half hour passed. He was more awake than ever. Surely a warm room was preferable to this misery, even if he did have to sleep with his legs hanging off the end of the couch.

Climbing out of bed, he winced when his bare feet met the cold wooden floor. He dressed rapidly in a pair of old, soft jeans and a flannel shirt that he wore when he did chores in the barn. Dragging two pairs of socks over his feet, he grabbed his flashlight and crept downstairs.

Sadly, Annalise’s door was firmly closed.

He walked quietly into the living room and shut himself in, away from temptation. His nose detected the faint scent of burnt marshmallow in the air. He had to smile, despite his discomfort. Annalise was never boring.

Crouching on the hearth, he shoved twisted newspaper into the midst of the glowing coals. When a tiny flame erupted, he fed it, using an old-fashioned bellows to encourage the sparks. He thought ruefully of the high-tech gas fireplace in his condo overlooking Charlottesville and the mountains beyond. His home was exactly that—a home. He entertained there, relaxed there, and sometimes when the mood struck him, even worked from home.

He had bought an industrial loft five years ago, torn out almost every wall and redesigned the space exactly the way he wanted it. The resultant living areas were open and roomy, but comfortable and welcoming at the end of a long day.

Like his father, he had a hard time turning down new clients. He loved what he did, and it was both challenging and personally satisfying to give families and small businesses a manifestation of the dreams they carried in their hearts and minds.

Seeing a new structure come to life on paper was a creative and artistic endeavor. Making the reality happen involved hard work and occasionally a dose of informal mediation when a husband wanted a man-cave and his wife a mini-gym.

Sam prided himself on being able to give them both. He was a problem solver. Unfortunately, one of his biggest problems at the moment lay only a few feet away, fast asleep. It was anyone’s guess as to whether or not he and Annalise would reach an understanding…or perhaps even something far more interesting.

Adding a final log to the fire, he rose to his feet, stretched and turned to survey the sofa. It sat farther back in the room at right angles to the fireplace. It wasn’t much of a decision to choose the leather chair and ottoman he had occupied earlier. Pulling them even closer to the fire, he grabbed an afghan and prepared to stretch out for what remained of the night.

Before he could sit down, he realized he hadn’t replaced the fire screen. He picked up the unwieldy antique and moved it into position, but in doing so, knocked over the bellows, which in turn tumbled into a large brass urn, crashing it to the floor.

He froze, hearing the sound echo through the house. Was Annalise a light sleeper? Ten seconds passed…fifteen…the silence told him he was home free.

With a groan of exhaustion, he settled into the chair, pulled the cover to his chin and crossed his ankles. The position was semicomfortable. His eyelids grew heavy, and he watched the wildly dancing flames through his lashes, remembering bonfires from when he was a kid.

He was almost asleep when a female voice, laden with irritation, spoke not two feet behind him. “Good Lord. What are you doing down here? You scared me to death. I thought an animal had gotten into the house.”

Closing his eyes and counting to ten, he tried to assess the situation rationally. But even the sound of her voice turned him on, despite the fact that the tone was more angry than amorous. “I couldn’t sleep. That upstairs bedroom is like a morgue during an ice storm.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I thought you weren’t afraid to stay down here by yourself,” he taunted.
That’s right, Sam. Provoke the beast. Sarcasm will make things better.
He tossed aside the light blanket and stood, only to feel a blow to the chest when he saw her for the first time. In one hand, she brandished a can of pepper spray. With the other she clutched the flashlight he had given her. But what was in between…sweet heaven…

Crimson silk edged in expensive black lace slid sinuously over her body, whispering seduction with every move she made. He scrubbed the heels of his hands over his eyes and yawned, giving himself a chance to swallow the lump of emotion in his throat. Annalise Wolff had grown into an exquisitely beautiful woman.

The stunning view was imprinted on his brain. The gown plunged in front, revealing the swells of soft, creamy-skinned breasts. The thin robe that covered the gown was long-sleeved, but hung open, hiding little. On her feet Annalise wore black satin slippers embroidered in red and gold thread with tiny birds and flowers.

The fact that he could describe her footwear in so much detail only spoke to how hard he was trying not to stare at her chest.

When he finally looked up, she was eyeing him curiously.

“What?” he asked, wondering if he had soot on his face.

She shrugged. “I’m accustomed to seeing you in a suit and tie, or even a tux. This casual ‘cowboy’ look takes some getting used to.”

He might be half-asleep, but he knew interest when he saw it in a woman’s eyes. Rounding the chair, he took the flashlight and spray from her hands and set them on a bookcase. “Do you often have animals in the house at Wolff Mountain?” He was standing so close to her he could see the faint throb of a pulse in her neck.