Along Came Trouble(44)
The urge to make excuses annoyed her. She still hadn’t promised not to leave the house; he still hadn’t asked her to promise. The woods were mostly on her property, and she’d never encountered another soul back there.
And this time, she hadn’t even been trying to antagonize Caleb. All she’d wanted to do was to watch her movie. Carly had come over three minutes into it and begged and whined until Ellen gave in and agreed to take another walk with her.
She glanced at the glass of ice water she’d carried through from the kitchen. “You want something to drink?”
He crossed his arms and shook his head. “Did anybody take your picture?”
“Nobody even saw us.”
He made a face, sort of half-amused, half-resigned disgust. Like a guy who fed a stray dog all his best table scraps and pretended to mind. Such a male face.
“What are you smiling at?” he asked.
“Nothing. Do you even own shorts?”
“Sure. But I’m working.”
“This is not in your job description.”
“You might be surprised.”
She mirrored his posture, leaning against the house opposite him. Something in the set of his jaw, the intensity of his mood, made her want to tease him. This wasn’t the Caleb she was used to. He needed lightening up. “Is that your best guard stance, all slumped like that?”
“No, this is my defeated stance. It’s for when I’ve given up hope of protecting the women I’m supposed to be taking care of.”
“Really? You look very relaxed. Not at all defeated.”
“I’m good at pretending. On the inside, I’m a wreck.”
She smiled at him, and after a moment he rewarded her with a reluctant version of his sexy smirk.
“We really were perfectly safe this time.”
“There’s no such thing as perfectly safe.”
Ellen lifted her knee and planted one foot against the siding. “Don’t be such a downer. I can’t handle negativity tonight. I had another death-march day.”
“Me, too.”
“Oh, yours couldn’t possibly have been as bad as mine.”
“No?”
“I snuck out for the first time in my life this morning, and I got caught.”
“The first time in your life?”
“And then I ran into my ex-husband, which I try very hard never to do, and he called me ‘Els’ and told me he wanted to see more of me and Henry, which is nightmarishly bad.”
“‘Els’ is a really terrible nickname,” Caleb said with an agreeable nod, and she was grateful for the levity. There had been so little of it today.
“And then this big, angry man showed up and drilled holes in my house—”
“And played with your kid for an hour.”
“—and gave my son all kinds of ideas about how he should get his own screwdriver, and maybe a drill for his birthday. And this obnoxious guy sent circus-freak workmen over to make even larger holes in my house without my permission—”
Caleb pointed his index finger, a pistol of emphasis, and said, “Because he’s trying to keep you safe, despite your stubbornness.”
Ellen smiled and let her eyes drift to her trail shoes. “And you’re not going to believe this, but he hit on me. It was so weird, and unbelievably badly timed—”
“You loved it, too.”
“It was completely gross. And all I wanted to do tonight was watch The Big Sleep in the dark, in my room, and pretend to be Lauren Bacall, but instead Carly made me go for a walk, and now you’re probably going to give me a lecture.”
“I’d rather give you a spanking.”
The thought made her snort, even as it gave her a naughty thrill. “Just so we know where we stand.”
When she dared to look up, he was grinning at her. “I’m standing right here, trying to figure out why I haven’t kissed you yet.”
“You’re not standing, you’re slouching. And you haven’t kissed me because we just met yesterday, so kissing would be way out of line. Plus, you have a couple employees who are probably watching us right now, so you can’t even afford to look like you want to kiss me, much less actually go through with it.”
“It’s going to be fantastic, though, when we finally do it. Fireworks are going to go off. Pyrotechnic kissing. Your hair will probably catch on fire.”