She immediately lost count of how many cups she’d measured and stared stupidly into the bowl.

“Tell me you’re not turned on,” he said huskily, rocking his hips slowly against her bottom, allowing her to feel the fact that he was exactly that. “Tell me.” His hands, oh, those very talented hands, slid from her hips over her ribs and dallied there, outlining each and every one with slow precision.

She ached. “There is a room full of people out front,” she managed to reply, just barely stopping herself from melting to the floor in a boneless heap.

“Tell me to stop, and I will.” The tips of his fingers stroked the very bottom curve of her breasts now and she nearly moaned out loud.

Tell him to stop? She couldn’t even breathe. “I don’t want this,” she told him, twisting in his arms and flinging hers around him, taking his mouth hard.

“You may not like wanting it,” he said, tearing away to tell her, “but you do.” And then he rejoined the kiss, the all-consuming kiss, until they were both grappling for a better grip, streaking their hands over each other, dying, dying for more.

“Ahem.”

Holly gasped, then shoved away from Riley to face a broadly grinning Jud.

“Sorry,” he said, looking anything but. “I heard some banging around in here and just wanted to make sure everything was okay.”

“Everything is okay,” Riley said, sounding pressed for air.

“Hmm. Sure?”

“Sure,” Riley said tightly. “We’ve got everything under control.”

Jud didn’t move. “Can’t be too sure, you know.”

“Jud.”

“Yes, boss?”

“Do you like your job?”

“Very much.”

“Good. Get out and you can keep it.”

Jud nodded thoughtfully. “Okay, you don’t need to tell me twice. But you might want to wipe those handprints away.”

“What handprints?”

“The ones made of flour that are all over your butt.”

Holly just groaned.

8

BY MONDAY, Holly was ready for business. Really ready this time.

“It’ll be great,” Dora told her. She was popping her wild-raspberry bubble gum as she prepared for their first family-style dinner. “I’ve got the lasagna nearly set, you handled the bread-excellently I might add-and we’ve actually got help out front.”

“Assuming we get customers.” Holly paced the kitchen in an unusual fit of nerves. “I hope Steve can take the pressure.” She was referring to Dora’s younger brother, who was going to wait tables in the afternoons after school. “The people here are brutal.”

Dora laughed as she stopped in front of the steel refrigerator to check out her reflection. “They are not. They were only brutal to you because you asked for it.”

“I did no such thing.”

“Oh, really?” Dora smiled, then straightened, lifted her nose in the air and strutted across the kitchen as if she owned the place. “You didn’t walk like this? You didn’t maybe, just a little, think you were too good for this backcountry, out-of-the-way little hole-in-the-wall?”

Holly had to laugh at the imitation, which granted, probably wasn’t that far off the mark. “If I thought I was too good, you people showed me otherwise in less than thirty seconds.”

“No one meant to hurt your feelings. We just have an inherent mistrust of ‘them city folk,”’ Dora said, drawling out the last two words.

“Well, maybe I deserved to be taken down a peg or two. I guess I thought I was better than this place.” It was humbling. “Though I’ve learned the opposite is true.”

Dora dropped the pretense and became Dora again. “Don’t you say that. I love having you here. You’ve given me so much.”

“What? A job?” She felt the desperate need to lighten this conversation before she had to face exactly what and how much this place had given her.

“Yes, a job. Among other things. Holly…are you going to stay? Maybe even be with Riley?”

Holly forced a laugh. “Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental.”

“Uh-huh.” Dora smirked. “You’re hot for him.”

“I thought you wanted him.”

“Nah, I just said that to be petty.”

“I’m going to stay,” Holly said. “Until this place sells.” And when it did, she’d have to find a new place to go. A new job. New friends.

She didn’t want new people in her life. She wanted what she’d started for herself here. She wanted these friends, people like Dora. Yes, maybe she wore too much makeup. Maybe her hair was teased into new and dizzy heights and she wore pink spandex that wasn’t quite as flattering on her very lush figure as she probably hoped.

But she was smiling at Holly with such affection, such fondness, that she felt tears sting her eyes. To combat that, she imagined herself in one hour, standing at the front door, looking like an idiot as she waited for customers that weren’t going to come.


THEY CAME. Riley made sure of it. Due to his influence, and a good amount of called-in favors, the place was comfortably full.

The lasagna was fantastic.

The service was…interesting. Steve did his best, but he was easily flustered, especially when three of his high-school classmates-all girls-came in, sat down at one of his tables and proceeded to giggle every time he walked by.

He dropped a pitcher of ice water, though not in anyone’s lap, so that was a bonus. He messed up several bills, giving Jud one for forty-five dollars, and then a family of six one for six dollars.

Both of which were fixed by Holly, who had a smile firmly in place and her best manners on. She was flitting back and forth between the kitchen and helping Steve, lending a hand wherever it was needed.

Her hair was not perfect, she had a smudge of mascara beneath one eye and a red sauce stain across the front of what should have been a simple cotton sundress, but on her nothing was simple.

He shouldn’t have kissed her.

He could still taste her, could still feel her body under his hands. No way could he have predicted that amazing, almost explosive chemical reaction between them. He would have thought she’d shove him away.

Dammit, she never did what she was supposed to do.

Without thinking, he headed straight toward her, only to be stopped by a smirking Jud.

“What? You want more flour on your butt?”

“Jud-”

“Yeah, yeah, mind my own business.” Jud sat back down and stuffed a huge bite of lasagna into his mouth. Grinning, chewing, he studied an uncomfortable Riley. “Hard to do, boy, when you’ve got your feelings out for the world to enjoy.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you do. You’ve got it bad. Real bad.”

“I do not.”

“Oh, you’ve got it sooo bad.” His grin spread. “And for a city girl at that.”

“Jud-”

“I know. I’ll shut up just as soon as I get to my point.”

“You have one?”

“Very funny.” Jud shoved in another bite and shook his head. “Mmm, that girl really got it right this time.”

“Your point,” Riley said through his teeth.

“Ah, yes.” He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “My point is, I’ve been worried. I thought you were going to let love pass you by. It disturbed me, because if ever a man was made for having a family around him, it’s you, Riley.”

“I have family. I have my dad. I have-”

“A woman. I mean a woman. And your own kids.”

“Whoa.” Riley lifted a hand. “Just stop right there. I’m not even close to thinking about that stuff right now.”

“Ah. You’re still thinking with your zipper.” Jud nodded smugly. “That’s okay, too. I figure you deserve that, the rest will come.”

“Jud-”

“She’s a fine woman,” Jud said quietly, nodding to Holly. “I misjudged her, and so did everyone else. Get her to stay, Riley.”

“Are you kidding? Soon as she’s able, she’ll hightail it out of here.”

“She likes you.”

“No.”

“Do I need to remind you about those flour handprints?”

Jud let out a low laugh. “Wants me, maybe. But like? No.”

“Son-”

“And even if I’m wrong, it’s nothing that won’t go away when she’s tired of slumming.”

“I think you’re underestimating the both of you. Get her to stay.”

“That’s not up to me.”

“Sure about that?”

They both looked at Holly, who was smiling a bit nervously at Dan. Dan pointed to his glass of ice water, and must have made a crack about where Holly had spilled it the last time she’d served him, because she blushed.

Blushed. Looking nothing like the sophisticate she had only two weeks ago, Riley couldn’t tear his eyes off her. “I’ve gotta go,” he said to Jud, who merely lifted an eyebrow and smiled knowingly.

“Of course you do, son.”


RILEY CORNERED HER in the storage room, where she’d gone to get more napkins.

“Riley?” she gasped in surprise when he slammed the door behind them, pressed her back against a shelving unit and slid his hands into her hair.

“What are you doing?”

“This.” He took her mouth with his. He had to. And it was no gentle, hey-how-are-you-today kiss. It was a hot, fiery mark of possession, which might have given him pause, if he could think.

“Wait.” She tore away after a long, breathless, soul-searching connection. “Wait just a minute.”

“No.” He leaned in for more, and she gave it, until with a weak laugh, she put a hand to his chest and pushed.

“Riley…I can’t think when you do that.”

“Thinking isn’t required. You look delicious. All messed up and off balance.”

Her hands went to her hair. “I’m messed up?”

He laughed at her horrified expression. “Perfectly. Damn, I’ve got to taste you again.”

This time the kiss lasted until they both broke it off, panting. She stared into his eyes, then dropped her gaze to his mouth. She licked her lips, looking dazzled, dazed, and so damn hot he groaned and reached for her once more.