Real Vintage Maverick

Cody felt it was only right to try to explain that to her. “I’m a simple man, Catherine,” he told her. “If you’re waiting for me to get excited about something, you’ve got a long wait ahead of you.”

There was that shiver again, Catherine thought as it shimmied up and down her spine. That wonderful/strange sensation that insisted on undulating along her back as if she was anticipating something.

Something from him.

Pressing her lips together, Catherine did her best to block the feeling. To ignore it and just focus on the business at hand.

Still, she couldn’t help saying, “I’m sure it’ll be worth waiting for when it finally happens.”

Damn, but there was something about this woman, Cody caught himself thinking, the thought flashing across his mind completely out of the blue. Something that stirred up his insides like one of those food processors he’d seen demonstrated once. All without any warning.

And when she tilted her head just like that—as if that could help her understand something—the sun wound up getting caught in her hair and he could see reddish streaks lacing through it.

Warming his blood.

Warming him.

And, yeah, by God, tempting him, he silently admitted.

Maybe he should just kiss her and get it over with, Cody thought, doing his best to be pragmatic. That way, maybe his thoughts would finally stop going where they didn’t belong and he could get back to focusing on “paying up his debt” to her. He didn’t like being beholden to anyone, even someone as pretty as Catherine.

For just the tiniest split second, he debated acting on the thought. Debated kissing her purely for practical reasons.

He even leaned into her a little. And once he did, he started to go through the rest of the motions. His eyes held her prisoner just as much as hers managed to hold him in the same cell.

His lips were almost touching hers—

And then the bell over the doorway went off, splintering the moment. Breaking the mood.

Announcing the presence of another person entering their private space.

Acute discomfort, laced through with a prickly dose of guilt, had Cody taking a step back away from his intended target before he looked in the direction of the offending doorway.

“I thought you said you were closed,” he said to Catherine, his tone dark.

It almost sounded like an accusation, Catherine thought, even as she tried to figure out exactly what had just happened here—and what hadn’t happened.

“I am,” she finally answered, the words emerging from her lips in slow, confused motion.