Confessions of a Small-Town Girl. Christine Flynn
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Aware of how uneasily Kelsey watched him, he conceded that he was definitely interested now. On a number of levels. The feel of her tempting little body arched against his had seared itself into his brain. As conscious of her effect on his long-neglected libido as he was the pages themselves, he started reading a page toward the front. The date was April 23.
The math test was awful, she’d written. I think I passed it, but I was so not ready for cosigns. Tommy M kept trying to look over my shoulder. He’s such a jerk. I helped Mom in the diner before homework. Bertie Buell came in to have another slice of mom’s coconut pie. Mom says Bertie is trying to figure out her recipe and is all bent because she won’t give it to her. I told her Mrs. Buell is always bent. I overheard Carrie’s mom say its because she’s never had sex.
Seeing nothing incriminating there, he flipped to the middle.
I’m at the mill. Carrie is grounded. She sneaked off to see Rob again. Shell has to baby-sit her sister. I wish I could live here. I could fix up the old miller’s quarters and plant flowers in the window boxes. The building seems sad sitting here with nothing to do. It’s like it’s just sleeping and waiting for someone to wake it up and put it back to work.
He’d never thought of a building being sad. And just that afternoon, she’d said the house they were in seemed lonely. He had no idea what made her think such things about inanimate objects, but other than a bent toward sentiment he couldn’t begin to relate to, nothing he read accounted for why she looked as if she were holding her breath.
Or so he was thinking when he skipped forward a few more pages.
His own name stared back at him, written in a half dozen ways.
Sam. Sam MacInnes. Samuel MacInnes. KES + S?M. Mr. and Mrs. Sam MacInnes. Kelsey MacInnes.
Frowning, he turned the diary toward her. It was out of her reach, but still close enough for her to see.
“What’s this all about?”
Heat moved up Kelsey’s neck. “It’s just something teenage girls do. It doesn’t mean a thing,” she insisted, reaching for the diary again.
He immediately lifted it away, leaving her to back off once more as he flipped ahead a few pages.
“‘I dreamed about Sam again,’” he began aloud, only to pause, glance up, then start reading more slowly. “‘It was just like on The Tame and the Torrid when Jack kissed Angela’s neck and backed her into her bedroom. My heart was pounding when I woke up and my stomach felt weird. Just like when I’m around him. I’d give anything if he’d kiss me. Really kiss me. The way Jack did Angela.’”
Thinking this was definitely getting better, he turned back a few pages to see what he’d missed, skimmed over an entry that began with I haven’t seen Sam for four days, then began again when he noticed his name once more. “‘Carrie asked what I like best about Sam,’” he read. “‘I didn’t know where to start. I like his smile and the way he twists his mouth when he seems to be thinking about something. And I like his eyes and how big his shoulders are—’”
Kelsey heard him cut himself off as he read the rest of the line to himself. A moment later, he looked at her with a grin that would have stopped her heart had she not been so busy being mortified.
“You thought I had a great butt?”
He watched her press her fingertips to her forehead, and slowly shake her head as she lowered it. Her cheeks had turned a telling shade of pink. If he had to guess, he’d bet she was burning with embarrassment from the inside out.
He should put her out of her misery, he thought, and give her back her diary. It would be the decent thing to do, given how uncomfortable she clearly was. She really did look pretty thoroughly humiliated. But he wasn’t ready yet. He honestly couldn’t have imagined anything that would have so completely diverted his focus from what he’d nearly done to her.
He also couldn’t remember the last time anything had made him genuinely feel like smiling. Especially after his perusal of a few more pages revealed him to be the subject of a few more rather specific fantasies. Very specific, actually.
“I can see why you wanted this back.”
Kelsey was dying inside. “May I have it now? Please?”
She couldn’t remember exactly what else she’d written. All she knew for certain was that whatever she’d felt toward him had been fueled by a huge romantic streak—and that whatever he was now reading must be fairly provocative. His eyebrows had risen just before his mouth formed a thoughtful upside down U and he gave what looked very much like an approving nod.
She noticed, too, that the tension had left his face, allowing his smile to reach his eyes when he finally looked to where she stood wishing she could evaporate.
“Do you still have erotic fantasies?”
“No,” she insisted, not about to give him any more insights than he already had. “That’s nothing but the imaginings of a teenager who used to watch a lot of soap operas.” And read a lot of romances, she thought. She and her girlfriends had devoured them. Sam had been every hero she’d ever fallen in love with. No doubt she’d written something about that in there, too.
“You mean you’re repressed now?” he asked, still grinning.
Her tone went heavy with forbearance. “I am not repressed.”
“Then, you do still have fantasies?”
He was having entirely too good a time at her expense. Even the rich tones of his voice held a smile. “Of course, I do. Right now, I’m fantasizing about a hole opening up under my feet. Or yours.”
“Hey, I wasn’t the one who wrote this stuff.”
“It was meant to be private.”
“I don’t mind that you shared.”
“I didn’t share. You picked the lock.”
“A technicality,” he murmured and, still grinning he finally, mercifully, held out the diary.
She practically snatched it away.
“Thank you,” she muttered, so relieved to have the incriminating little volume back in her possession that she didn’t bother wondering what else he’d read. All she wanted now was to leave. Better yet, to get on a plane back to Phoenix and forget she’d even come to Maple Mountain.
She wasn’t at all inclined to give Sam points for sensitivity. Yet, he actually seemed to take pity on her rather desperate need to escape.
The floor creaked beneath his weight as he walked over and closed the window she’d opened. “You might as well go out the door,” he said, nodding toward the stairs on his way back. “No need to risk your neck on the ladder.” He flipped on the stairwell light, turned off the one overhead.
“Thank you,” she murmured again, and was down the stairs and halfway across the living room before he stopped her.
“The back door is open. You can go that way.”
She changed direction as the beam of a light arrowed over her shoulder. “Don’t forget these.” Coming up behind her, undoubtedly still grinning, he handed her the flashlight she’d borrowed from her mom’s and the stocking cap he’d tossed to the floor.
She didn’t bother to thank him this time. Taking them, she clutched the cap in her hand with the diary and followed the flashlight’s beam through the kitchen to the back door. She’d made it across the porch and down the steps when his deep voice stopped her again.
“Where’s your car?”
From a dozen feet away, she turned to see him close the door and descend the steps. Bathed in the pale moonlight, his body gleamed like hammered bronze. Broad shouldered, bare-chested, scarred, he looked like a warrior to her. Heaven knew he’d had the training of one.
“It’s