Read Her Fifth Husband? for Free Online Page B

or he was going to eat his share cold somewhere else. “Should I have gotten some drinks to go with it?” he asked as they rolled onto the bridge over Currituck Sound.
    â€œI’ve got iced tea,” she said, which pretty much answered the question.
    â€œTea’s good.” Jake pushed in a CD and whistled under his breath, keeping time with the music with his thumb tapping against the steering wheel.
    With work piling up, his home and his office in a mess and the Jamison case going nowhere, he had no business being where he was, doing what he was doing. He’d never been the impulsive type.
    On the other hand, when he started something, he always liked to carry it through. In his business, following procedure was the only way to get the job done.
    Oh, yeah? And what have you started this time?

Three
    S asha desperately needed to reach her own front door unaided, if only to assert her independence, but after the first few steps she grudgingly accepted Jake’s help. This had definitely not been one of her better days. Awkwardly, she dug out her keys. He took them from her uninjured hand. “It’s the key with the fingernail polish,” she told him.
    Independence could wait another few minutes.
    Without releasing her, he managed to unlock the front door. “Want me to carry you over the threshold?”
    Her look said it all. Over my dead body. Sprained, splintered and disheveled didn’t count.
    Once inside, he steered her toward the three-cushion sofa. “First, let’s get you elevated. Then if you’ll point me to the kitchen, I’ll make you an ice pack.”
    â€œHow do you know what I need?”
    This time it was his look that said it all. “Trust me, I’ve seen a sprain or two. Underneath that bandage you’re probably already turning purple.”
    Sasha wanted to tell him to take his sympathy and his barbecue plate and go back to wherever he came from, because she didn’t need him.
    Only she did. This was Faylene’s day to work for Lily, and Marty was just back from her honeymoon, still busy washing sand and salt out of her trousseau.
    â€œThe doctor called it a type-II sprain. He said something about torn ligaments, but I wasn’t really listening.” Admittedly, she had a few bad habits, one of them being deflecting bad news by concentrating on something else. In this case, she’d been focused on the possibility of insuring her more expensive shoes. “He mentioned ice. I think there’s a gel pack somewhere in the freezer, but I usually use frozen vegetables.”
    â€œYou do this often?”
    While she gave him her patented supercilious look—naturally arched eyebrows tinted half a shade darker than her hair helped—he eased her down onto the sofa and gently lifted her legs up onto the cushions, which involved a lot more touching than she needed at the moment. Her skirt twisted around her hips and she tugged at it with her good hand, wishing she’d worn something longer. She had mini and maxi, nothing in between.
    â€œHere, let’s lift your foot up and slide a pillow under your heel.” His voice was like blackstrap molasses—rich and sweet, but with a definite bite.
    While she wondered where he came by his expertise, he slipped another pillow under her knee, which involved more touching. Considering she was still in appreciable pain, even after a dose of prescription-strength anti-inflammatory medication, she shouldn’t even have noticed. If she didn’t know better, she might think her whole body had been sensitized. The slightest brush with sumac and she broke out in a rash. The slightest brush of Jake Smith’s hands on her thigh or the back of her knee raised goose bumps in places he hadn’t even touched.
    Granted, she’d been on a self-imposed diet these past few years, but she wasn’t that starved for masculine attention.
    He stepped back and looked her over.