To Wed and Protect. Carla Cassidy
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his fork down and looked at her. “Uh…could I speak with you for a moment out in the living room?”
She gazed at him curiously, then wiped her mouth with her napkin. “Sure,” she agreed. She stood and looked at the kids. “You guys go ahead and keep eating. We’ll be right back.”
Luke allowed her to precede him into the living room. “Is something wrong?” she asked, a worried frown appearing on her forehead as she turned to face him.
“I don’t know. You tell me.” Luke drew a deep breath, aware that he was about to invade deep into her personal territory. “I know this is really none of my business, but does your husband have a problem?” he finally blurted.
Her eyes widened in obvious surprise. “What do you mean?”
“I couldn’t help but notice that you have the evidence of a black eye and a big bruise on your arm.” Luke gazed at her intently. “What I really need to know is if you need some help.”
Abby stared at the big, handsome man before her and swallowed hard against the tears that suddenly pressed at her eyes. Help? She needed help in a thousand different ways, but certainly not in the way he meant.
“There is no husband,” she confessed. Shock swept over his features. “There’s no abusive husband, no abusive boyfriend. I’m a widow, and now it’s just the kids and me and I can be incredibly clumsy at times.” The lie tripped smoothly off her tongue but left a bitter taste in her mouth.
She wasn’t sure he believed her, but her heart expanded with warmth that he’d cared enough to ask. She offered him what she hoped was a reassuring smile. “This moving business has been far more physical than I anticipated. A box fell off a shelf and hit me in the eye, and I’m not sure how I got the bruise on my arm. But we’re getting settled in enough that bumps and bruises are at an end.”
She reached out and touched his forearm, trying not to notice the hard muscle beneath the warmth of his skin. “But thank you for asking.” Self-consciously she dropped her hand.
“I just had to make sure nobody was hurting you.”
Abby nodded, finding the fact that he cared far too appealing. “Nobody is hurting me, so that’s that. We’d better go finish our lunch.”
He nodded, and together they returned to the table. The meal was finished in relative silence, and Abby was grateful when the food was once again put away, Luke was back at work, and she could escape to her bedroom to finish unpacking.
It had been slightly disconcerting to sit at the table across from him and feel the silvery gray glow of his eyes on her. She was far more aware of him than she should be.
She pulled her bedspread from a box and opened it up to air out. The room would feel more like her own with her sunflower spread on the bed and her favorite knickknacks and perfumes on the dresser top.
She had peeked in on Jessica and Jason before coming into her room and knew they were having a pretend picnic on the floor in Jason’s room. As usual, Jason was doing all the talking, but occasionally she heard a girlish giggle from Jessica, and the sound warmed her heart.
As she worked unloading the last of the boxes, she heard the sound of banging coming from the porch. For a moment she allowed her mind to visualize Luke swinging the sledgehammer. She could vividly imagine the play of the firm muscles in his arms and across his back. Her fingers tingled as she remembered the warmth of his skin beneath her touch.
From the moment she’d told him she was a widow, she’d sensed a subtle change in him. He seemed less standoffish, smiling at her with a gleam in his eyes that made her breath catch in her chest.
She shook her head, as if to dislodge the thoughts. The last thing she could do was invite a man into any area of her life. She was living a lie, and to allow anyone in meant the possibility of danger and heartbreak.
It was nearly an hour later that she heard the sound of the back door opening and closing and knew Luke had entered the kitchen. She left her bedroom and hurried into the kitchen just in time to see him gulping a glass of water.
“Whew, it’s definitely warm out there,” he said.
Abby nodded, trying to keep her focus on his face. At some point he had taken off his shirt, and his broad, tanned chest shimmered with a light sheen of perspiration. The dark, springy hair that sprinkled his chest formed a valentine pattern, the faint tail disappearing into the waistband of his low-slung tight jeans.
She suddenly realized he was looking at her expectantly as if waiting for her to say something, and a flush of heat warmed her cheeks. She leaned against the table, hoping he hadn’t noticed her intense perusal of his firmly muscled, gorgeous chest. “I meant to ask you, I’m going to take the kids out to dinner tonight, but we haven’t been in town to really see what’s there. Any suggestions on a good place to eat?”
He set the glass on the counter and swiped a hand through his beautiful thick hair. “My personal choice is the diner on Main Street. It’s nothing fancy, but the food is good, and it’s where most everyone in town eats.”
“With two kids, I’m not in the market for fancy. Do they have chocolate shakes?”
He grinned at her, that wide, sexy grin that did amazing things to his sinfully gorgeous eyes. “Do I feel the kinship of another chocolate shake addict?”
“Not me,” she protested with a laugh. “Jason is a chocoholic. I prefer anything with strawberries.”
“Hmm, the best way to eat strawberries is lying down on a blanket beneath a big old shade tree.” His gaze seemed to hold the glint of blatant flirtation.
“And they taste best of all when somebody else is feeding them to you, rather than you eating them by yourself.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” she said, her insides trembling at the picture he’d painted with his words.
“I’ve never had anyone feed me anything.”
“That’s an oversight that will have to be addressed,” he replied. He studied her for a long moment. “You mentioned earlier that you’re a widow. How long has it been?”
There was a gentleness in his voice that made her regret the lies she was about to tell. “A little over a year. He died in a car accident.”
“I’m sorry. It must have been tough for you and the kids.”
She nodded and averted her gaze from his. She didn’t want to see the sympathy there, sympathy for a dead husband who had never existed. “We’ve managed okay on our own.”
“Yeah, well, if you ever need a man around here, you know, to do any heavy lifting or whatever, don’t hesitate to call me.”
She looked at him again, and something in his metal-flecked eyes made her feel as if he were offering her more than strong arms to lift heavy items. Her cheeks burned with a blush as she wondered if perhaps she was reading more into his offer than he’d intended.
“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”
“If you really want to eat at the diner, I recommend you go around five. By six the place is packed on most evenings, but Friday night is always the worst.”
She nodded, then turned and headed out the kitchen door. She drew a deep breath as she entered her room, wondering why a man she hadn’t exchanged more than a hundred words with affected her so. Maybe it was because the sight of him evoked thoughts and images that had little to do with conversation.
“Jason,” she said as she entered his room. “Time for a bath, buddy.”
“A bath? But it’s not bedtime,” he protested.
“If I’m taking my best boy into town for dinner, then I want him scrubbed sparkly clean.” His face screwed up for another round of protest. “And I hear the place we’re going to eat has the most super-duper chocolate shakes in the world.” The