Hunks Too Hot To Touch (6 page)

Shauntie’d made a promise to herself. She wasn’t going to allow Sapphire or Emerald to draw her into any of their nonsense. They might be looking for a sense of adventure at their ages, but she was all adventured out for the moment. Maybe her reluctant behavior honestly came from being thirty years old while both Sapphire and Emerald were still in their late twenties.

She was no longer seeking out a hot man to warm her bed at night. Nowadays, Shauntie thought it was more important to find one who could be on the same credit report as her. It was surely more important than bulging muscles, a washboard stomach and a killer ‘let me drop my panties’ smile Nash liked tossing at her today.

Emerald was constantly on her case, teasing her about how she only wanted a boring man who would essentially fall asleep during sex instead of after. But she wasn’t going to give her friend’s crazy assessment any acknowledgment, because as much as she loved Emerald with her heart and soul, she wasn’t the best judge of character in the world when it came to men.

So what...if she might end up with a horrible lover as a husband
, Shauntie thought. At least she wouldn’t be the only one offering to treat them to an expensive meal. Nash probably thought a cold beer and a plate lunch at a bar off the highway was something fancy.

If Sapphire knew she was thinking like this, she would jump on her case about how she shouldn’t judge a man by his job and then end it by calling her a snob. But she wasn’t a snob in the least; she didn’t look down her nose at anyone. All she wanted to do was find someone this time who was her equal.

Was that too much to ask
?

Shauntie knew passion was the reasoning behind her involvement with J.T. All it got her in the end was a broken heart and a stack of his bills to pay off. She was going to make damn sure the past didn’t repeat itself. Not after all of the hard work she had done to get where she was today.

Of course, only one of her two best friends knew about the dumb mistake she’d made with J.T. when she was first starting her career as an optometrist. Sapphire already lived in DaVita, Illinois, so it was her shoulder Shauntie cried on after she found out about the betrayal of her no-good money hungry ex-boyfriend.

Emerald hadn’t known anything about her relationship with J.T. because she moved to town a year and a half after everything was over. Shauntie became friends with Emerald after Sapphire introduced them at her house. Sapphire’s friendship with Emerald grew from her being a new patient in her dental office.

From the first moment Shauntie noticed J.T. everything about him had drawn her. For weeks, she’d walked past the construction site just to check out how good he looked when he stripped out of his shirt.

His thick, black wavy hair begged her to run her fingers through it to test out and see if it felt as good as it looked. Tight dark jeans molded his thighs drawing her eyes to J.T.’s well-defined ass and the look was only enhanced by his tool belt and his dirty work boots. He was the type of man she constantly fell for back then before she realized her mistake.

When J.T. finally approached her after two weeks of her walking back and forth to her job, she thought she was the luckiest woman in the world. Shauntie couldn’t wait until her work day had ended so she would get to spend her personal time with J.T.

Shauntie never questioned the times he wasn’t able to attend events with her. She knew she had J.T.’s love and that was the only thing that mattered to her. If she had only known what was really going on, the truth might have saved her a lot of heartbreak and tears.

Sadly, she thought the feelings she was experiencing were mutual because J.T. made her believe he was in love with her. He was such a pro at his game of deceit that he even conned her into buying him expensive gifts, especially when he happened to be short on cash which happened a lot.

Why hadn’t she seen J.T. for what he was?

Not once did it cross Shauntie’s mind her ‘picture perfect’ boyfriend didn’t have any money because he was spending it on his girlfriend, the mother of their three year old son.
Why hadn’t she seen the signs before that day?
Everything was right there in front of her face, but she was too blinded by lust or maybe love to even notice it.

Shauntie never felt so stupid in her life until she showed up early that Wednesday afternoon at J.T.’s work as a surprise. She wanted to see if he could get off and have lunch with her.

Instead, she was the one who got the surprise when she caught her supposed boyfriend in the arms of another woman. Not only was the woman wrapped up in J.T.’s arms, he was kissing the hell out of her while a three-year-old little boy, who was undeniably his child, stood beside them.

The pain hit her so fast it sent her pulse spinning. A tumble of confused thoughts and feelings assailed her. Her mind had refused to register what was going on not ten feet from her.

Complete and utter shock had kept her feet firmly planted on the ground instead of turning around and running away. To her it seemed like hours passed around her, but it was probably only minutes until J.T. finally sensed her staring at him and glanced over his shoulder right into her eyes.

She had expected his eyes to show her some kind of feelings like shock, fear or remorse at being caught red-handed by her. However, sadly, there weren’t any of those feelings expressed on his face.

What made matters worse was the lying asshole didn’t even try to act as if he wasn’t cheating on her with another woman. J.T. wrapped his arm around the woman and pulled her even closer to his side.

Shauntie swore she would never allow herself to forget the words that came out of his mouth. They set her on the path she was going down right now.

“Shauntie, I want to thank you for a good time, but I was never in love with you,” J.T. told her with a slight smirk on his face.
“
I only dated you until my girlfriend decided to take me back. Sure, dating a rich woman was fun for a while. What guys wouldn’t want to be taken care of, but after a few days I was getting bored with you. You just didn’t have what I wanted in the end. Why don’t you find
someone else who will be into everything you have to offer
?”

She had been so shocked and embarrassed by J.T.’s confession she stood there and watched as he walked away with his girlfriend and son.

Shauntie had felt the eyes of the other construction workers burning a hole in the back of her head, but she didn’t turn around and look any of them in their faces. She was trying to find the best way to get out this situation with her pride still intact, but she was woman enough to admit it was totally shredded to pieces.

She’d wanted to tell his ass to go to hell, but she just couldn’t find the words. It was like they just lodged there in the middle of her throat like a piece of popcorn. She couldn’t get anything out.

For six months, Shauntie allowed the image of that day to play over and over in her head. Why did she allow herself to fall for such a lowlife? She was glad; at least, they’d always used protection. Lord only knows what kind of awful souvenirs he might have given her if they hadn’t.

Maybe her subconscious had known something back then about him that she hadn’t. After J.T. stomped on her heart and walked out of her life, Shauntie swore that she would never allow a man like J.T. into her life again.

Several times after his betrayal, Shauntie thought about going to the construction site and flinging something heavy at the back of J.T.’s head. But she realized he was the ultimate asshole and he wasn’t worth her time or energy. Plus she didn’t want to spend the next fifteen to twenty years of her life in prison for attempted murder.

So, instead of acting out on her first impulse Shauntie let it go and sent a silent prayer up to God thanking him she hadn’t wasted any more of her time than she had.

Besides, he had a way of restricting her not physically but emotionally. J.T. tried on numerous occasions to tame her and it never worked. Shauntie loved having her freedom to come and go as she pleased. Independence was very important to her. She would actually call it the foundation to her overall happiness. She wasn’t about to change who she was to please any guy she might be dating to make them feel important. She had the right to her own feelings and thoughts which gave her the ability to share them anytime she wanted to with anyone who cared to listen.

She was an adult.

Why did he ever think she would want or need his approval about anything she did in her life? It was just plain crazy. Maybe her independence was one of the reasons her ex-boyfriend decided to run back into the arms of his old girlfriend. J.T. had the capability of handling a girl, but not a woman.

What J.T. never understood about her the short time they were together was her nature of being flexible. He didn’t comprehend she got a thrill from taking on new challenges in her life, which is why she decided to become an eye doctor. It gave her such immense satisfaction.

Ever since she was a little girl, she’d had a fascination about people’s eyes and how they worked. In elementary school, she used to wonder why some kids in her class wore glasses and others didn’t have a problem with their sight.

However, her ability and drive to help others almost got tossed to the side because of a bad judgment call, but fortunately she pulled herself out of her funk. Shauntie swore that she wouldn’t allow herself to get swayed by another handsome man because he would only bring trouble.

So, if she had to cast her attraction to Nash to the side and settle for a career-driven over-achiever who still wore suspenders with his suit, Shauntie would gladly make that sacrifice for her career, her patients...not to mention her heart.

Shauntie didn’t want to admit it, but her degrading experience with her ex-boyfriend pushed her even further away from dating and more into her job. She avoided being around any man who couldn’t afford an expensive restaurant or a nice suit.

She’d been quite happy with the few meaningless men she’d dated until
he
had to show up. Why did someone like him have to make her want everything she shouldn’t?

Nash was tall, handsome and very dangerous on her emotions. One minute she wanted to find a way to push him away and then a spilt second later she
craved
the feel of his mouth on hers.

Unfortunately, Nash wasn’t aware that he’d shown up at the wrong time in her life; a time when she wasn’t interested in anything but advancing in her career. Having a boyfriend or man in her life wasn’t her top priority at all. Besides, Nash Wentworth wasn’t the kind of man she needed in her life at the moment.

Nothing personal would ever take place between them. He was going to fix her leaky roof, and after it was done, he would be gone.

Truthfully, she didn’t know anything about him and he could be the nicest man in the world; but she wasn’t ever going to find that out, because their dealings with each other would only stay on the impersonal side of the scale

He just had this restless power about him...the kind women found deliciously appealing.

Nash had this innately captivating presence that made her want to forget everything she’d just vowed not to do and throw caution to the wind.

Nothing good could come from her getting more involved with Nash. How could it when he was ten times better looking than J.T. had ever been on his best day?

Chapter Eight

Walking across Shauntie’s roof bright and early the next morning, Nash checked the horrible workmanship in the valleys, the canals that come between two sections of a pitched roof. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing up here. How in the world did this roof even pass inspection in the first place?

The previous work must have been done by hired laborers instead of a skilled professional like himself. The end result ended up not being done properly. The roof would undoubtedly create a leak, and then a stunned homeowner might not even know when a leak occurred, but it would eventually happen. Shauntie was proof of that.

Yesterday while he was up here Nash spotted another problem along the ridges, but that issue didn’t come from poor workmanship. Instead it came from ridge caps being exposed to the weather elements. Luckily for Shauntie, he was skilled enough to replace her roof better than the people who laid it in the first place.

Usually, he didn’t start his second roof inspection before nine o’clock in the morning, but after the hot dream he’d experienced about Shauntie last night and the things he fantasized about doing to her delectable body with his hands and mouth, Nash couldn’t spend another moment in bed without losing his mind.

Shauntie...what was it about her that was making it so hard for him to stay away? They were still practically strangers to each other but she had taken root in his mind since their first meeting by her flower garden.

No, he needed to be honest with himself. He’d wanted her all the time she was dating his former egotistical co-worker J.T. What an idiot his former roommate had been not to realize what a perfect woman he had in Shauntie.

Something about Shauntie’s aura was pushing him to get to know her better. Could it come from the fact that during his first encounter with her, she hadn’t tried to flirt with him or look at him like he was the main course at her dinner table? Truthfully, she hadn’t even noticed him when he worked with J.T. and that made him even more interested in learning more about her.

Her standoffish attitude intrigued him making him wonder what was racing through that gorgeous head of hers. The last time he was here Shauntie blew him off pretty quickly, but he would make sure she didn’t get a chance for a repeat performance with him. She would take notice of him today. Nash wanted to imprint himself in Shauntie’s memory, so she would still be thinking about him even after he was gone for the day.

For some reason, Nash didn’t like the fact Shauntie wasn’t affected by him. Sure, a majority of the time women did approach him even when he wasn’t interested in being bothered, but he couldn’t take how Shauntie acted like he was getting on her nerves.