Still Lake

“I could help. If there’s one thing I know how to do nowadays, it’s clean houses,” she said with a moue. “I’m sure you could do with a little company.”

“Actually I’m fine….” he began, but she’d already twitched her way out of the kitchen.

“I’ll just go put something on,” she called back to him. “I know Sophie wouldn’t miss me.”

“Hell,” he muttered. There were hand-thrown pottery mugs on the counter, and he took one, filling it with coffee. He drank it black, and he almost snarled when he took his first sip. He should have known that Sophie Davis would make the kind of coffee most men would die for.

He should have poured the rest out, left the deserted kitchen and headed straight for Audley’s General Store and the instant coffee section. He didn’t usually succumb to temptation, but for some reason being back in the place where he’d let his appetites run wild seemed to be doing a number on his iron self-control. The least he could do was drain the mug and get the hell out of there, before Martha Stewart found him.

Too late. Just outside the kitchen, he heard footsteps coming from the old hallway, and he froze.

The last thing Sophie Davis expected to see when she walked into her kitchen was the enigmatic Mr. Smith. He was leaning against the kitchen counter, his long, elegant fingers wrapped around a huge mug of coffee, and the dark eyes behind his wire-rimmed glasses were cool and assessing.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded, too startled to remember her manners.

“Your sister offered me a cup of coffee,” he said. She didn’t like his voice. It was slow and deep and sexy, at complete odds with his cool manner. And then his words sank in.

“You met Marty?” She tried to keep the note of suspicion and worry out of her voice. For a brief moment she’d thought Mr. Smith would provide a harmless distraction for her younger sister. In the full light of day, in her bright and airy kitchen, she knew instinctively that Mr. Smith was far more dangerous than she’d ever imagined.

“Yes,” he said, giving nothing away. He seemed entirely at ease, drinking her coffee and watching her.

“She’s not even eighteen years old, Mr. Smith,” she said sternly.

“So she told me. Not that I was interested. Nubile nymphets aren’t exactly my style.”

She wasn’t sure she believed him. “What is your style, Mr. Smith?”

He cocked his head. “Is your interest personal or academic?”

The question startled her, but she met his gaze stonily. “I’m trying to look out for my little sister.”

“And who looks out for you?”

No one at all, she wanted to say, but she kept her mouth shut. If this was John Smith’s idea of making small talk she preferred his taciturn persona. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I have a lot of work to do today, and I don’t have time to spend socializing.”

“Is that what we’re doing?” he said. There was an undercurrent of amusement in his rough voice. She didn’t like it when men found her amusing.

“I’ll be happy to send you home with a thermos of coffee. We’re set up to offer them to our guests.”

“You mean you’ll be happy to send me home and you don’t care what you have to do to get me there,” he corrected her. “Trust me, Ms. Davis, I’m absolutely harmless.”

“Sure you are,” she muttered. “You underestimate the effect of those brooding Byronic looks on an impressionable teenager.”

“Brooding Byronic looks?” he echoed, his horror unfeigned.

“I’m ready!” Marty appeared in the kitchen door, dressed in a micro skirt and tube top.

“Ready for what?” Sophie demanded.

“I’m going to help John open up the house,” she said with sunny ingenuousness. It was almost enough to make Sophie waver—there were times when she thought she’d do anything if Marty would just smile.

But that didn’t include sending her off with a good-looking stranger. “No, you’re not,” she said flatly. “I need your help around here, and I’m sure Mr. Smith is entirely capable of handling the Whitten house on his own. If he needs any help I can give him the names of a couple of people who work out of the village.”

“I don’t need help…” he began, but Marty broke in, stamping her foot like a spoiled child.

“You’re always trying to stop me from doing anything I want. You don’t want me to have any fun! You’d just as soon lock me up in a convent and throw away the key.”

Sophie took a deep breath. “When did you decide that cleaning old houses was fun? You’ve been complaining since the day we got here—why in heaven’s name would you want to volunteer to do any more than you’ve grudgingly agreed to do here?”

“Maybe because I want to?”

“And what’s a convent got to do with it? Were you planning on helping him open the house or having sex with him?”

Smith choked on his coffee.

“You hate me!” Marty cried in a fury. “Well, I hate you, too!” And she stormed out of the kitchen, slamming the door behind her.

Sophie didn’t want to face her unwelcome guest. She should have gotten used to Marty’s scenes by now, but she hadn’t slept well the night before, and for some reason Mr. Smith made her uncomfortable. “I’m sorry about that,” she said, heading for the coffee and pouring herself a mug, determined not to look at him. “My sister is at a difficult age. She’s got a lot of problems to work through.”

“Does she? She seems fairly typical to me. All teenagers are a pain in the butt.”

She glanced over at him. “You’re a father, Mr. Smith?”

“No. I just remember what it was like. Don’t you?”

“Not particularly. I was too busy being responsible to behave like a selfish adolescent. I didn’t have time to rebel.”

“Maybe you should try it when you get a chance,” he said evenly.

“I’m just as happy to have skipped that part of growing up.” She glanced out the kitchen window toward the lake, not wanting to look at him any longer.

“I’ve found that you can’t really skip parts of the process. Sooner or later they catch up with you and you have to go through them, anyway.”

“Let’s just hope I’m immune to that particular theory. I don’t have the time or the inclination to act like a giddy, lovesick brat.”

“Maybe you don’t know what you’re missing,” the man said, setting his empty coffee mug down on the counter. He’d chosen her favorite mug—the teal blue one shaped like a bean pot. She had the gloomy feeling that she’d never be able to drink from it again without picturing his long, elegant fingers wrapped around it. His mouth on it. There was no way around it, the man had the sexiest mouth she’d ever seen.

“I’m better off that way,” she said. Wondering why the hell she was even discussing this with him. She knew he was watching her out of his cool, dark eyes, even though she was determined not to meet his gaze.

“Maybe,” he said. “In the meantime, since your sister’s otherwise occupied, would you consider coming over to the house and taking a look? Give me some idea what kind of help I’ll need, maybe give me a few names?”

She stared at him in shock. Yesterday afternoon he’d looked as if he’d be more welcoming to a horde of Vikings rather than his neighbor. Now he was suddenly being relatively pleasant, asking her for help.

The problem was, she didn’t trust him. “I can give you the names, anyway….”

“Do I bother you, Ms. Davis?”

She had no choice but to meet his gaze. He was taunting her, and she was half tempted to tell him just how much he bothered her. And why.