Lucky Stars (Ghosts and Reincarnation #5)(12)

She moved her eyes to the vicinity of his though she didn’t look in them. She looked mostly at his nose.

He had, she thought somewhat agitatedly, a very nice nose.

When she did this, she heard his delicious chuckle.

“Belle,” he repeated and, against its will, her gaze finally lifted to his eyes and when it did, he repeated, “Pick one.”

“I can’t have a German Shepherd,” she told him.

“Do you have another dog?” he asked and she shook her head, looking away and dropping her puppy to give belly rubs to two bundles who were happily squirming on their backs on the floor. “Do you have a cat?” he went on and she shook her head again. “Do you let your house and they don’t allow animals?” he pressed.

She finally spoke. “I own my place. It’s just that I don’t have a garden and my cottage isn’t very big. German Shepherds are large dogs. They need room to move.” She scooted closer and stroked Gretl’s head, continuing in a near whisper. “It’s nice of you to offer anyway. Very generous.” Her voice went even quieter before she murmured, “Thank you.”

With that, she stood.

She could take no more. She would prefer Miles’s stifling attention at a shoulder-to-shoulder crowded party (her definition of torture) to playing with puppies in a warm room in a stable with criminally handsome, seemingly very sweet James Bennett.

She took a backward step to the door as he straightened from his crouch.

“I should really be getting back,” she told him, looking behind her toward the door.

It was only a few feet away but the distance yawned behind her like it was a million miles.

The puppies jumped at her ankles.

James spoke and what he said made her head twist around to look at him.

“We haven’t finished the tour.”

“We haven’t?” she asked, wondering what he’d show her next.

Kittens?

Lambs?

An adorable baby rhinoceros?

He shook his head, moved forward, bending low to control the puppies at the same time his hand came to her hip, fingers hot through the fabric as he expertly manoeuvred her out of the room. Baron came with him. Gretl stayed put and James managed to get her and his dog out without any of the puppies escaping.

It was a minor miracle.

However, instinctively, Belle thought he was the kind of man who wrought minor miracles on a daily basis.

Once he’d turned out the light and closed the door, he took her elbow again and led her along the stalls toward the door they entered. He didn’t take them to the door. He took them to a ladder that led up to what looked like a hayloft.

When he had her facing it, she heard him say, “Up.”

Fear seized her and Belle stared at the ladder. Then her head tipped back to examine the open floor of the hayloft facing the stable. Then she looked at the ladder again.

Then panic coursed through her.

She didn’t do ladders.

She also didn’t do heights.

And she certainly didn’t do one full side of the floor opened to a neck breaking fall haylofts.

She turned and nearly collided with him, he was standing so close behind her.

“I can’t go up there,” she breathed.

He was looking down at her. “Why not?”

She blinked and looked over his shoulder. “I just can’t.”

“It’s safe, Belle. I wouldn’t take you up there if it wasn’t,” he replied.

Her eyes went to his ear. “I’m sure it is. I just don’t do ladders,” she admitted, paused then continued, “or heights.”

Or out of the way, scary haylofts with unbearably handsome men, she thought a thought that she would never, even if paid, speak aloud.

“You’ll be fine,” he assured her, his voice deeper and gentler and somewhere in her panic stricken brain it registered that he was genuinely trying to assure her rather than force her to do something against her will.

“I –” she started but before she could say more, his hands came to her waist, he got close and all panicked thoughts (indeed, all thoughts, panicked or not) flew from her head.

She looked up at him to see his face was close.

Very close.

Magnetically close.

She held her breath and barely controlled an impulse to lean toward him.

“I’ll take care of you,” he murmured and then his fingers tightened at her waist.

He turned her to face the ladder and before she knew what he was about, he actually lifted her clean off her feet. Reflexively her hands shot out to grab the sides of the ladder and her feet found the rungs. His hands slid down to her h*ps and he put pressure there, urging her to climb.

And she did.

Instantly, she felt him come up after her.

Not a few rungs after her but right after her, his arms around her body, hands moving along the ladder sides just under hers and his body warm against her back. She was sheltered from danger by his big, strong frame and her fear of heights (and ladders and haylofts, but not him) completely melted away.

She made it to the floor of the hayloft and stepped in, James coming right after.

Without hesitation, she moved to the safest area available, the centre of the loft, as he strode to its outer wall. She watched as he unlatched a pair of doors and slid one to the side then the other.