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shade of the lipstick on her I’m-not-that-innocent mouth. He wanted to—
    No. This was why he wouldn’t comply. In a wedding dress, in a sweatshirt, in something a second-grade school-teacher might wear, she had him thinking about sex acts. His blood was already taking the bullet train southward and he knew, just knew, that his reaction was something she practiced, counted upon, had used a dozen times with dozens of men. Only an expert at manipulation could snare Penn Bennett like this when he’d been so recently burned.
    Nun of Napa, my ass.
    She clapped her pretty hands together and stood up again. Penn stared at her knees, just skimmed by the hemline of her dress, and realized that even they were turning him on. “See you later,” she told the men.
    He and his half brothers were standing again. Seth cleared his throat. “What will you do now?”
    “Something will turn up,” she said, her voice just the craftiest bit husky. And maybe Penn was wrong, but could that be yet another sheen of tears in her eyes? “I’m going to make some calls. Look around town.”
    She’d already tried that, Liam had said so, which is why Penn had been approached as last resort. He knew any reputable business would already be booked at this time of year, leaving Alessandra’s only option that of picking up day laborers from the street corner. Yet if she managed to round up workers with the kinds of skills she needed, who would supervise them? He couldn’t imagine this spoiled, sexy little bundle with a splinter, let alone with wood stain under her nails and plaster dust in her hair.
    And didn’t that just piss him off? She wanted what she wanted, but she planned on cajoling—or worse, crying—to achieve her ends. Certainly Alessandra Baci had never worked up a good sweat outside of the bedroom.
    His gaze ran over her again, from her gleaming waves of hair to her delicate high heels. The tip of her nose was pink, he decided, definite proof of incipient tears.
    What she needed, he thought, was to know what overtaxed muscles and an aching back felt like at the end of the day. That would really give her something to cry about. “I’ll do it,” he heard himself say.
    “What?” She stared at him.
    Liam and Seth were surprised, too. But it was a good idea. The experience he had in mind would teach Alessandra Baci a lesson—and prove to himself that he’d learned the one Lana Lang had taught him four months ago in L.A.
    “There’s a condition,” he added, hoping he was disguising his evil grin.
    Her pink mouth pursed, and he noticed her lipstick matched her fingernail polish, too. If he got his way she wouldn’t be thinking about makeup and manicures for the next few weeks.
    “What condition is that?” she asked, and the look she gave him wasn’t the least bit teary. Her brown eyes were as suspicious as Penn should have been of Lana and her hard-luck story.
    But it was Alessandra Baci he was thinking of now and he let his evil grin go free. “That I’m Job Boss and that you, baby, are Laborer Number One.”

    Alessandra’s life had dished up unpleasant tasks before—including not getting married on her wedding day and picking out the headstone for her father’s grave—so agreeing to work with Penn Bennett for the next few weeks should seem like recess in comparison.
    But this didn’t feel like jump rope.
    She popped open the passenger door of Penn’s truck the minute it rocked to a stop in front of Edenville’s old-school hardware store, eager to exit the close confines of the cab. As a kid, she’d looked forward to recess—and she’d been good at jump rope, too—but she definitely wasn’t good at this. In Penn’s presence she was edgy and almost breathless, and if she didn’t get a hold of herself he was going to notice he made her . . . what was the right word? Nervous?
    Yeah. Nervous.
    She couldn’t wait for his snarky comments regarding that . . . Not.
    They stepped into the street at the same time and