Need You for Mine (Heroes of St. Helena)(15)

“Would you like some wine?” Chantel offered, pointing to the flight Harper had bought specifically to impress her. Not Adam.

“Nah, I’ve got my coffee,” he said, and instead of behaving, he helped himself to a seat—her seat—leaning back as if he were right at home. Which, surrounded by women’s panties and female fantasies, he probably was. “And I’d go with the Parisian peek-a-boos. In fact, I was thinking of picking some up and I wanted to see if Harper could show me her favorites.”

The only favorite Harper was going to show him was her favorite finger. But since this was a meeting, and being professional was of utmost importance, she decided letting her bird fly would have to wait. “I’m a little busy with Chantel right now, but if you’d be so sweet as to wait outside—”

“Ah, but sweet is my specialty.”

Didn’t she know it. And like sugar, he had addictive qualities that were unexplainable.

“You shop here?” Chantel asked, and the genuine surprise that a man like Adam would buy presents for his girlfriend here had Harper snapping back to what was important: her grandma’s shop.

“All the time.”

“Really?” Chantel made a note in her little red journal. “Besides the Moulin Rouge, what sparks your interest?”

Harper held her breath, waiting to see just how bad Adam’s answer would affect her ability to spin this situation. The amusement in his eyes as they roamed around the room at the garments, then over her body, told Harper it was going to be a good one. Only instead of making some offhanded remark about the sex toys in back, he picked up a chocolate-dipped strawberry and said, “I like everything Harper has laid out today. She has a good eye.”

Ignoring the way her thighs tingled, she cleared her throat and in her most professional voice said, “Thank you.”

“But what has me most interested is whatever she’s got on under that dress.”

Harper felt her cheeks flush—and not just the ones on her face.

“What are you wearing?” Chantel asked, as if this were a normal way to sell lingerie.

“Excuse me?”

“I wondered too,” Chantel said. “Do you mind?”

Adam smiled. “Of course she wouldn’t. Would you, sunshine?”

Harper secretly sent Adam a death glare, because, poof, just like that, what little spotlight she’d created with her dress and remodel vanished.

Adam had come with his alluring charm and bigger-than-life persona and made Harper an insignificant part of the meeting. Of her own meeting.

“No, of course not,” Harper said diplomatically. “All the employees wear the merchandise. Today I have on the Honeysuckle demi-cup and matching boy-shorts from your summer line.”

“Honeysuckle.” Adam leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Is it lace like the one you had on the other night that made your boobs—”

“Could you excuse us for a moment?” Not waiting for a response, Harper took Adam by the arm and yanked him out of the chair—not letting go until she led him out of the room.

She marched through the store and onto the sidewalk, her patience reaching nuclear levels, as he slowly strode out the door behind her. God forbid the man actually move at a normal pace. Not Adam.

He was the kind of guy who liked to set the pace—for everything. Even worse, he only had two speeds: Superman and How you doing? The former he used to fight fires, and the latter he used when sparking them. But since Harper was itching for a fight, he was wasting his good moves.

“What are you doing?” she demanded.

He took a leisurely sip of his coffee, savoring it for a moment, while a gentle summer breeze carried the sweet scent of ripe grapes through town. “Helping you sell a Honeysuckle demi-cup and matching boy-shorts,” he said, his eyes dropping to the vee of her dress. He ran his thumb over the edge of her dress near her collarbone.

She swatted his hands away. “She’s not a customer, and I’m not selling her a bra-and-panty set. She is a sales rep and . . .” Her voice trailed off because Adam’s eyes had drifted down. Maybe there was something to the red rule. It was something she could investigate later, after the rep agreed to the original terms.

“What are you doing here?” she asked again, this time annoyingly breathless. Which had zero to do with the way his work shirt clung to his chest and arms. Or that he’d arrived at the store on his big red engine, which was glistening in the sun beside them and making him look bigger than life.

“I came for my jacket,” he said, looking into the shop. Harper glanced over to watch the flurry of sunbonnets and man-hammocks swarming the register. “I left it the other night, and I need to get it back. It’s my uniform jacket.”

“Sorry, I haven’t seen it.” There wasn’t an inch in that shop that Harper hadn’t dusted or decorated since last week.

“It was hanging by the dressing-room door.”

“Nope.”

At her easy dismissal, he leaned in slightly and grinned. “Maybe you can help me look for it?”

“I’m a little busy right now.” She pointed inside the store where every bifocaled eye now stared back. A few faces were even pressed to the window.

Completely unfazed, Adam waved to his adoring public, then turned his back on them, getting eye-to-eye with Harper. That’s when the phone cameras came out, arthritic fingers ready to shoot. “How about tonight then?”