The Look of Love (The Sullivans #1)(20)

This was the perfect opening. Her chance to tell him she’d never had any intention of staying, to make it clear that there was no connection between them, and that it was time for her to be moving on.

So then, why did she find herself saying, “I wanted to stay.”

The pure truth of that statement resonated within her solar plexus. Turned out the truth didn’t care if she wanted it to be true, or not.

“I want to stay,” she said again in a firmer voice. She wanted to spend more time with Chase. She shouldn’t. But she did.

His grin came back, softer this time, and somehow even more potent. “Good.” And then, “You were saying something about how you and I aren’t going to do…?” He paused, letting the unsaid words hang in the air between them.

She should have come back with a quick retort, something to put him in his place. But right at that moment, with the Napa Valley sun shining down on her and grapevines budding to life across rolling hills as far as the eye could see, there was nothing left but honesty.

“I haven’t had a male friend in a very long time.”

He was silent for a long moment, and even though the butterflies in her stomach had her keeping her eyes on the horizon, she could feel his gaze on her.

“I’d be honored to be your friend, Chloe.”

Her breath caught in her throat, then, and she liked him so much it was almost impossible not to grab him and kiss him.

Sure that he could hear her heart beating in her chest, it was so loud to her own ears, instead of kissing him she had to be content with whispering, “I like you, too.”

Chapter Six

Chloe wasn’t used to sitting still. Especially not after the past year, when she’d had to keep working odd jobs just to pay the rent and eat and be able to buy some fabric to quilt together. She kept asking Jeremy if there was something she could do to help, but he was firm about her being Chase’s guest.

Worse still, all that staring at Chase was doing really funny things to her insides. To her outsides, too. Her skin felt sensitive all over beneath her clothes. Warmer than the weather warranted. Similar to the way she’d felt in the tub as the water had slid across her skin and she’d ended up coming apart with his name on her lips.

Chloe’s uncomfortable musings were interrupted by a loud squeal that was followed by female cursing. Chloe craned her neck and saw that Amanda had tripped over a rock and her dress had a long, jagged rip across the front.

Chase called, “Jeremy, we need a new dress. The same one.”

Jeremy’s face had gone even paler than it already was. “I don’t think they sent more than one of this dress. I’ll look again to make absolutely sure.” He scurried off to look through the huge containers of clothes.

Chloe spoke without thinking. “I’ll fix it.”

Chase turned his green-eyed gaze to her and at the question in his eyes, she said, “I’ve worked with some pretty similar fabrics in my quilts. I can at least try.”

“Amanda, take off the dress.”

The model pulled it off without giving so much as a thought to the fact that she was wearing only very sheer panties beneath the gauzy fabric.

At first it had been a bit of a shock to see how comfortable these young girls were with their near nudity, but then, Chloe figured if she’d had a figure like that when she was nineteen, she would have been smart to flaunt it, too.

More glad than she should have been that Chase didn’t so much as glance at Amanda’s perfect naked br**sts, Chloe got up out of her seat and came to get the dress. “Can you wait ten minutes?”

He looked down at the large tear. “You can have this fixed in ten minutes?”

She looked at it more closely, running her fingers along the tear. “I think so.” Satins and silks were always harder to work with because every hole the needle made showed, but she’d been eying the enormous sewing box all day. Now she finally had a reason to dig into it.

Chase called out for a break. She quickly threaded a needle with thin, transparent filament and began to work on the dress. She was so entranced by the soft fabric beneath her fingertips that it took her a few moments to realize Chase was sitting beside her.

“What would I do without you?”

She almost stabbed herself with the needle. Thankfully she was concentrating too hard to have to reply. Actually, she wasn’t concentrating all that hard. After the past year of doing side jobs for the local tailor for what amounted to little more than slave wages, she could sew up things like this in her sleep.

Only, it was more than a little unnerving to have Chase’s full attention like this.

“Don’t you have something else you need to be doing?”

She could feel his grin without needing to see it. “Just keeping my friend company while she does me a favor.”

Friends. He’d agreed to be her friend. So then, why was she a teeny bit disappointed that he hadn’t pushed her for more up on the hill?

No. That was crazy thinking. And she knew exactly where that kind of crazy would lead.

A bed…with Chase in it.

“I’d like to help more,” she told him. “You’ve been so kind to me and I wish there was something more I could do to repay you.”

“Chloe.” The serious way he said her name had her looking up at him. “I wanted to help. You don’t need to repay me for anything. Ever.”