Knowing You (3 page)

Stupid.

But true. God knew, Stevie colored the way he looked at other women. He'd never had a hard time getting dates. The women in his life were successful, beautiful, and great to be with. He'd even had a couple of long-lasting relationships that might have led somewhere … eventually. Then inevitably he would start comparing those women to Stevie and they always came up short. His scientific mind chewed on that thought for a few seconds as he stared at her. There was just something about Stevie—something he hadn't found in any other woman.

Now if he could just identify it and get over it, life would be good.

She cranked the old-fashioned window open wide and stuck one hand out into the rain. Smiling, she leaned out farther and tipped her face up to the clouds. Her right leg lifted, toes pointed, and the cotton fabric of her pajamas tightened across her bottom. Paul told himself he was an idiot.

When she pulled her head back inside, her face was dotted with raindrops, sparkling in the lamplight before she wiped them away with the backs of her hands. Shivering, she cranked the window shut again and turned to look at him.

Her nipples peaked against the thin material of her tank top, but Paul refused to look at them.

Much.

“God, it's great outside. Cold,” she added with a grin. “But great.”

“You always did like storms,” he said gruffly, and congratulated himself on getting his voice to work.

“What's not to like?” she asked, not really expecting an answer. “Loud noise, lots of rain, and bright lights.” Turning back to watch the storm, she frowned a little. “It's really coming down, though, Paul. Maybe you should just camp out here tonight, huh?”

Oh, yeah, there's an idea.

“I don't know,” he said. “We'll see how the storm goes.” With any luck, it would dry up fast. Hell, there was only so much a man could take. Staring at the television, he felt her take a seat at the end of the couch again. But even if the sofa hadn't moved beneath her, he would have known she was close. Her perfume reached him, drifting on the chill air and teasing him into drawing several deep breaths just so he could pull that scent down inside him.

She grabbed her ice cream, wriggled around, getting comfortable, and when she was finally settled again, he picked up the remote, hit
PLAY
, and tried to distract his brain from her by saying, “By the way. The movie? You tricked me.”

“No way,” Stevie said, and licked the last drop of fudge sauce from her spoon. She sighed a little, eyed Paul's half-eaten ice cream and thought about finishing it off, then gave up the idea. Even she had her limits. “I promised you guns and bombs. Hello?” She pointed at the TV screen just as a car burst into flames.

“Yeah,” Paul agreed with a wry smile. “Cars, guns, Arnold. Also a love story.”

Stevie glumly stared at her empty ice-cream dish, then reached out and reluctantly set her bowl onto the
coffee table before leaning back into the cushions of the sofa. Curling one leg up under her, she stretched out her other leg and playfully nudged Paul's thigh with her foot. “So we both win a little.” She shifted her gaze from Paul's strong profile to the television and added, “Besides, Michael Biehn is one hell of a kisser.”

“You know this on a personal level, of course.” One dark eyebrow lifted.

She wished. Heck, the only kissing she'd had in the last couple of years was on her
way
too short Caribbean vacation last month. And even then, it had been nothing special.

“You think I watch this movie for the explosions?” she asked.

Hey, she was willing to give her friend the manly flick full of destruction and mayhem. But who was to say she couldn't get a little something out of this, too? Almost every woman she knew owned a copy of
The Terminator
. Romance and bloodlust. The perfect blend.

“Just look at him,” she said on a sigh, and tapped Paul's thigh with her foot again. “The way he takes her face in his hands…”

“Stage direction.” He grabbed her foot and held it still. She hadn't even realized how cold her foot was until his large, warm hand curled around it.

“How he looks deeply into her eyes…”

“He's an
actor
.” Paul snorted and shook his head.

She ignored him. Men never appreciated stuff like this, anyway.

“And that line: ‘I came across time for you,
Sarah.'” Stevie slapped one hand to her chest and sighed dramatically.

“The script,” Paul said, his hand tightening around her foot.

“God, you're as romantic as cold broccoli.”

He slanted her a slow look and dug his thumb into her arch. She tried to pull free, but Paul's grip was firm. “Hey, I don't need a writer to make my moves for me.”

Stevie chuckled. “Excuse me, I've seen your moves.”

One dark eyebrow lifted again. “Is that an insult?”

“An observation.” She shrugged and smiled at him, and this time when she pulled her foot free, he let her go.

“Based on…”

“Personal experience,” she countered, and scooted closer to him, forgetting about the movie for the chance to tease Paul. He looked so …
upstanding
, sitting there in his starched white shirt. The collar lay open at his throat and the sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing muscular forearms with a deeper tan than anyone would expect a computer genius to have. His right foot rested on his left knee, and as she watched, he reached up and stabbed his fingers through his habitually too-long hair. His expression was tight and his eyes wary as she continued.

“Remember? The summer your Nana came to visit for a whole month?”

“I remember.”

She could tell by his expression that he did, but that didn't stop her from talking about it. What were friends for if not to torture from time to time?

Outside, the rain pummeled Chandler with an unrelenting assault. But here, in the loft, they were warm and dry and Stevie was really enjoying herself. “You and I went down to the docks to get fresh fish for your mother, and—”

“I said I remember,” he ground out tightly.

She ignored his attempt at stopping the flow of memory. “And on the way home—”

He nodded abruptly. “I kissed you.”

“Uh-huh.” She grinned at him. “And it was…” Stevie paused, rolled her eyes, and made a production out of trying to find the right word. She sensed his impatience and had to hide a smile. It wasn't often a person could push Paul out of his “Mr. Reasonable” mode. So on those rare occasions, it was something to savor.

“What?” he demanded, and shifted position on the sofa, turning to face her, forgetting all about the movie, where Arnold was even now headed for the motel where the hero and heroine were—well, they
weren't
thinking about the Terminator.

She looked at him and grinned. “Yucky.”

Actually, that kiss had been hurried and unexpected and sort of sweet, as she recalled it now, through that cottony haze of memory that made every embarrassing moment of your life a little easier to swallow than it had been at the time. It was summer then and the sun was hot, blasting down out of a startlingly blue sky. Tourists had invaded Chandler and the screeching laughter of the crowds on the docks had vied with the cawing of the gulls wheeling in the air over the fishing boats.

Chandler hadn't changed much over the years,
though it had seemed a lot bigger when she was thirteen. She'd loved this town even then. She'd been so happy to belong. To finally have a home where people knew her, knew her father. After living like a gypsy, trailing after her mother for years, coming here and finding a home had meant more to Stevie than anything. The Candellanos had been icing on the cake, so to speak.

Even summer seemed longer, hotter, back then than it did now. Then her only worry was how to get the darkest tan possible before school started. Well, that and avoiding going to visit her mother wherever the woman happened to be living at the time.

Still, Stevie remembered that summer more clearly than any other. Because it was the last summer she'd been completely alone. The summer before she'd found love.

Paul grabbed her foot and scraped the tip of one finger along her arch just to get her attention.

It worked.

Stevie jumped, yelped, and pulled her foot out of his grasp. “Hey, tickling is
not
fair.”

“All's fair, like they say. Besides, I resent the word
yucky
.”

“Yeah, well, that's how I remember it.” She rubbed her foot, then curled it under her just to be on the safe side. Smiling, she looked up at him. “You bit me, remember?”

He scowled at her. “You moved.”

She blew out a breath. “Didn't know you required statuary for your best work.”

“A little interest, maybe.”

“You caught me off guard.”

“It was a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing.”

“Ah … so you needed warm-up time,” she said, remembering now how quickly that kiss had ended. And just how quickly Paul had walked away from her, leaving her standing on the boardwalk at the docks, watching him go as she rubbed the taste of him into her mouth. A young girl was allowed to romanticize her first kiss.

Paul muttered something she didn't quite catch, then said, “You know, you weren't exactly a great kisser yourself.”

Okay, fair's fair, but let's be realistic. “Hey, I was a kid.”

Yeah, she had been, Paul thought. But even then he'd been nuts about her. Back then, he'd considered himself light-years older than his little sister's best friend. But that hadn't meant he could avoid dreaming about sun-kissed fair skin, big blue eyes, and a sprinkling of freckles across a tiny nose.

He just hadn't admitted those dreams to anyone.

Not even Nick, his twin.

Though many times over the years, he'd wondered what might have happened if Nick had known that Paul was interested in Stevie. Would it have changed anything?

“So,” she said, bringing him back to the moment at hand, “how do you get all of these dates with women like the Amazing Sandy? It's your brain they're after, right? Can't be your kissing abilities.”

He gave her a tight smile. “I've improved a little over the years.”

“Sure you have,” she said in a deliberately placating tone.

He stared into those incredible eyes of hers and felt his blood pump expectantly as he promised, “I could curl your toes.”

“Uh-huh.” Her gaze drifted toward the television again, where the hero and heroine were tangling together on the bed, finding satisfaction and peace for a few wild, heartbreaking moments before running from their enemy again.

“You think I can't?” he asked, irritation coloring his tone.

“Hmm?” Stevie said, only half-listening as Michael Biehn threaded his fingers through Linda Hamilton's and took her on a slow ride toward heaven.

Stevie's body burned and she shifted uncomfortably on the sofa. A slow, sweet ache settled low in her body. Oh, wow, she'd been manless way too long. And maybe watching this movie hadn't been such a good idea after all.

“I said,” Paul repeated, and stared at her profile as she watched the movie instead of him, “I could curl your toes.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said, waving one hand at him.

Paul bit back a rush of frustration. “You know, I'm not that sixteen-year-old kid anymore.”

This time she looked at him and smiled. But she still didn't look convinced that he was anything but “good ol' reliable Paul.” Exasperation spilled through him. It was one thing to be fighting to ignore his response to her. It was quite another for her to not even admit to a
chance
that he could take her places she'd never been before.

And a purely male streak of pride rose up and refused to be quieted.

“I know that.”

“Y'know,” he said, studying her, “I don't think you do.”

“What is up with you tonight?”

“It's not just tonight,” he said, more to himself than to her.

“Paul,” she said with a shake of her head. “You don't have to prove anything to me. We've known each other too long.”

“Yeah. Maybe
too
long.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.” Pushing one hand through his hair again, he muttered, “I'll bet you five bucks I can make you whimper.”

“Huh?”

She looked so surprised, her expression only fed the sudden need to prove something to her—and to himself. If all they were going to share were memories, then he'd damn well give her one worth remembering.

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his wallet, thumbed through a stack of bills, and plucked one out. Slamming the five-dollar bill onto the coffee table, he looked at her. “Five bucks says I can make you curl up and cry ‘uncle.'”

“You're crazy,” she said on a laugh that bubbled from her throat and fizzed through his bloodstream.

“Probably, but that's beside the point.”

She stiffened. “I'm not going to bet you. And I'm
not
kissing you.”

“Chicken?” he prodded, knowing damn well that Stevie Ryan had never turned down a dare in her life.

“No, I'm not chicken,” she said, lifting her chin defiantly. “But I think you're nuts.”

“Chicken, like I said.”

She shook her head slowly and blew out an exasperated breath. Paul was pretty sure she was going to say no after all and then he wasn't sure what he'd do, because suddenly he wanted to kiss her more than he wanted to take another breath.

Then in the next instant, her expression shifted into one of resigned submission. “Okay, fine. I don't know where this is coming from, but if it'll make you happy”—she scooted closer to him, tipping her face up to his—“go ahead. Give it your best shot.”