A Hero for Tonight (7 page)

In the parking lot, Krista turned to say goodnight, only to find Shane looking at her with an odd expression on his face. In the dark, with only the lights from the diner behind him, it reminded her of her favorite picture of him. A fellow marine had snapped the photo, and he’d sent it home to his parents in an email that his mother had forwarded to her. The picture had been taken in the desert in Iraq with the sun setting behind him. Strong, sure...a hero. He looked just like that right now, and her heart skipped a beat in response.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Home. Why?”

Shane stepped closer. “I’d love to see some of the websites you’ve built. Maybe we could talk a bit about the farm market and your plans.”

She furrowed her brow. “Or are you just hoping I have some apple pie?”

“Well, now that you mention it. You know how much I love coffee and dessert. But seriously, I would like to see the websites you’ve done.”

“Don’t you have to be up at some insane hour to drive to Fort Drum?” The last thing she wanted was to prolong her time with Shane tonight. It was bad enough she’d broken down and tried to talk to him about her future plans.

“Yeah, but it’s not even seven thirty. Even I can stay up until to at least nine and still function.”

She shrugged and turned toward her car. “Okay then, I’ll meet you at my house.”

Chapter Four

The short drive to her house from town didn’t take long enough for Krista to figure out what was going on. Usually, Shane avoided being with her at all costs and was rarely ever alone with her unless they were working the farm market. Tonight, though, he was really acting strange. Twice, she’d caught him staring at her chest as if he’d never noticed she had breasts before. And what was up with his sudden defensiveness when she said he was selfish? She’d been telling him that for years, and he never cared what she said before.

And why was he eating dinner alone instead of out with Melissa tonight?

She was no closer to answers minutes later as she set a heaping plate of pie with vanilla ice cream melting on top in front of Shane. He had his fork dug in before she could sit down across from him. Her kitchen wasn’t very big to begin with, and with him seated at the table, it seemed to shrink in size even more.

Krista picked up her coffee and sipped. It was odd having Shane across from her with no one else at the table. What was he thinking? Better yet, why was he here at all? It couldn’t just be for pie; although knowing him as she did, it could very well just be for dessert. He wasn’t that deep, and free pie could actually be his only motive.

Shane glanced at her, and his mouth lifted in that familiar half grin that he’d been doing since he was five. “Why is it that my mother’s apple pie and yours come from the same apples, the same recipe, and yet yours has a different taste?”

Well used to his insults, Krista wasn’t even put off by his comment. She set her coffee down. “No one told you to eat it if you don’t like it.”

He lifted his mug. “There you go again thinking I’m saying something that I’m not. I didn’t say I
didn’t
like it.”

She shrugged. “It’s the same pie, Shane. Your mother and I make the same apple pie.”

He took another bite. “Nope. There’s something in here that she doesn’t do.”

Okay, she’d tweaked the recipe just a touch, but it was weird that he picked up on it immediately.

Not wanting to give him the satisfaction of being right, she changed the subject. “Are you still seeing Melissa?”

He looked up from under his incredibly long lashes and then turned his attention back to his dessert. “Sort of.”

She wrinkled her nose. “How do you sort of see someone?”

“We’ve gone out a few times; you know, casual.”

She sat back and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re bored already. That’s gotta be close to a record, even for you.”

“I’m not bored. And you can’t lecture me on dates until you’ve been on some.”

“I’ve been on plenty of dates.”

He snorted and finished off his pie. “Conjugal visits aren’t dates. I keep trying to explain that to you.”

Would he ever let her forget about Bruce? Rather than start another round of sniping at each other, she stood up to get the coffee pot.

Shane put his hand over his cup “I can’t. I have to be able to sleep tonight.”

“I know. That why I put on decaf.”

His eyes widened, and he moved his hand so she could pour. She caught him staring at her open neckline as she leaned slightly over him.

What is wrong with him?
Inside her sweater, her nipples hardened.
Holy crap!
What the hell is wrong with me?
Was she really responding to Shane like
that
?
No, it was probably just cool in here, and she hadn’t noticed.

Krista spun away, crossed to the counter, and set the coffeepot back on the burner. But she couldn’t help sneaking a glance down at her chest. Fortunately, her new bra gave her the full coverage it claimed it would, meaning he couldn’t have noticed her reaction. When she turned back around, his attention slowly slid up her body to her face.

She lifted her chin and held his gaze for a moment in a bizarre kind of trance. Her heart thudded at the look of…what was it? Curiosity? Interest? Appreciation? Her stomach did a flip-flop. She
was
a woman after all. It wasn’t as if she was completely immune to Shane in the physical sense. There’d been times over the years when she found him as sexy as any other woman did, but then he usually opened his mouth and any interest quickly fled.

Krista shifted her gaze off him to his empty plate as Shane cleared his throat.

“Dave...Dave said you had some work done on the house after your dad moved out.”

Leaning back against the counter, she latched onto the conversation topic. “I turned the family room into an office and redid the master bedroom. Nothing big, just enough to make it more my own.”

“Can I see your office? I’m still a bit in shock that you have your own web design business.”

“Why?” She frowned and crossed her arms over her chest, eager for him to leave. That was how uncomfortable the feeling in the room was. “I mean, what’s with all the interest tonight, Shane? Normally, you can’t stand to be in a room with me for more than ten minutes. Now you’ve had dinner, dessert, and want to see what I’ve done with the place? Seriously? Are you bored, desperate, or what?”

His gaze on hers narrowed before flicking away. She caught the clench of his jaw when he pushed back from the table.

“Never mind. I don’t know what I was thinking. Thanks for the pie.” He stalked toward the front of the house.

She’d wanted him to leave, but now she felt bad he was upset, so she followed him down the hall. “Shane?”

He paused at the front door and turned back. “Yeah?”

Stepping closer, she sighed. “I’m sorry. You have to see this from my side, though. It’s rare that you’re nice to me, and rarer still that you take any interest in what I do.”

“I’m not taking an interest in you, I was just being polite. I gotta go.”

She reached out and grabbed his arm as he turned away. “I’d like to show you the office and maybe a couple of the websites. Do you really want to see them?”

For a second, she thought he’d slam her offer in her face, and she’d be humiliated, not for the first time. But once again, his gaze met hers and something in the air changed. Something almost electrically charged moved between them. His eyes widened, then narrowed as his attention dropped to her mouth. Heat warmed her cheeks.

“Yeah. Show me what you got.” His gaze flicked back to hers. “I mean, show me your websites.”

She nodded and turned toward her office. He’d been to this house enough times over the years, but she still heard herself informing, “It’s through here.”

She led the way through the house to the room overlooking the backyard. When she was a kid, it was the room her family gathered in to watch television or play board games. As she became a teenager, it was the place she hung out with her friends.

After her father’s new marriage, she’d had fun transforming the area into a huge work space. “Wow. Look at this place,” Shane commented from behind. “It looks nothing like it did before.”

Krista ran her hand along the front of her desk. “That’s what I wanted. I needed to feel like I was going to an office if I was going to work from here all the time.”

Shane stood, hands in his pockets and looked around. She tried to see the room through his eyes. The seriousness of the work area, the cabinets and very comfortable leather desk chair, but also a small relaxed area on the other side with a couch and oversize chair—her favorite place to curl up, read, or use her laptop to review her work. Truthfully, she pretty much lived in this room, and the rest of the house was unused.

“You use all these computers?”

She only had a Mac desktop and a laptop, but it must look to him like she was quite the geek. Then again, wasn’t she, a little bit? “Yeah. You really need a Mac to do design work and the laptop for flexibility.”

“I need to get a new laptop.” He picked up hers. “You like this brand?”

“Yeah. If you want, I could go with you next week, and we could take a look at what’s out there.”

“Sure.”

He didn’t sound too excited about the offer, and she immediately wished she hadn’t said anything. Shane didn’t need her help.

“So, show me these websites.”

She took a deep breath, trying to shake off the strangeness of the night. Having Shane in her home was weird to say the least; showing him her office and work was bizarre. But she went through the motions of sitting down behind her desk and keying in the login for one of the sites she’d recently worked on. Shane moved to stand behind her just as the local veterinarian’s website popped up.

“Here’s the one I did for the Country Vet.”

As the graphics came to life on screen, she moved the mouse over several drop downs. When Shane didn’t say anything, she explained, “This is where their patients can sign in and have access to their pet’s records. It’s password protected for each individual, so only they can access the information—for example, see the date of a past check-up or print out their rabies certificate. They can also see the hours Doc is available and book their own appointment. Of course, that link can be changed by the office staff if necessary and an email is then sent to inform the client.”

“Pretty high-tech for a small-town vet, don’t you think?”

Krista shrugged. “But Doc was willing to let me do whatever I wanted, and with the easy interface, his clients have a wider access to what they need at their fingertips.”

He laughed. “Sure looks great on the computer, but then you go in his office and it’s the same furnishings since 1950. I think even his receptionist has been there since then.”

“Just goes to show, even an old-timer like Doc recognizes how important a website is to his business.”

Shane’s large hand reached out and covered hers where it rested on the mouse. “What happens if I go here?” The screen widened and switched to a video of a dancing cat. “What’s that?”

His hand stayed over hers, and it felt weird to have him touch her. Her breath caught, making her feel like she was sixteen years old again. Should she pull away? Leave it there?

“Um, it’s a silly little video that Doc’s wife sent me of their cat,” she finally replied.

His thumb shifted and slipped between her fingers. The simple movement was enough to send tingles racing up her arm. Her body warmed, and she had to struggle to keep her breath even. When Shane’s thumb grazed across the back of her fingers, she turned her head toward him. His gaze was on their joined hands, but as she glanced up, he snapped his head toward her and their eyes met. Their stare lasted for several, awkward seconds; she couldn’t seem to look away even when his gaze shifted lower to her lips. Her toes curled into the carpet under her chair, and her mouth slipped open.

With a quick jerk, he straightened next to her and pulled his hand away. “Show me what you have for the farm market.”

Krista jerked back to focus on the screen. “Oh, it’s not done. I don’t want you to see it like it is; you’ll get the wrong impression.” She turned in her chair and he was closer than she thought. Her gaze came into direct contact with his waist. From the bulge behind his zipper, it was pretty clear that she wasn’t the only one sensing a weird physical attraction between them. The question was, what was going to happen next? Her tongue slipped out to wet her lips as she tipped her head to glance up at him.

Shane furrowed his brow and stared back down. For a long few seconds, he didn’t say anything, his gaze searching her face, staring at her mouth and lower before flicking back to her eyes.

“I want to see it. If I’m going to help you convince my mother of this plan, I need to know what you’re planning.” His voice was huskier than normal, and she thought she even heard it crack.

If it was any other man, he would have definitely kissed her. And Shane sure looked as if he wanted to. But she was the last woman on earth he’d ever kiss. Heck, he was the last man
she
wanted to kiss her.