Stone followed her gaze. His casual ease vanished. Every muscle in his body tensed, hard and battle-ready. For a split second, the men exchanged glances, Rand’s slightly amused, Stone’s exacting and sharp.

Rand broke eye contact first, looking far from happy now.

Jenna held her breath. Clearly the tension between the two men had not lessened with time. She knew this was because of her, because of that time when Stone had been the only person on earth to believe in her.

With Rand’s eyes off them, Stone turned his attention back to her. He touched her arm softly, and when he spoke, his voice had changed, had become lower, gentler, automatically easing some of her fright and helping her to gain control of herself. “Are you certain you’re all right? You’re shaking and pale.”

With a last careful look at Rand, who was now speaking to someone on the other side of him, Jenna forced a smile. “I’m fine, really. I, um, just love basketball,” she said inanely.

His lips curved in a slow sexy smile. “Do you now?”

“Uh-huh.” She brought a still-trembling hand up to her hot face and hoped he didn’t notice.

His soft laugh brought butterflies to her stomach. Nice ones, she realized, really nice ones, and it had less to do with lust and more-everything-to do with how she felt being with him. Safe, warm, special. His hand reached up, gently touching her hand, still on her face.

She jumped, and this time it wasn’t from fear.

“Did anything else bring you here?”

“Like… what?”

“I don’t know…” His long fingers skimmed hers, playing havoc with her pulse, reminding her that she was indeed attracted to him. He reached her earlobe, sliding lightly, playfully, racking her body with a shiver.

His eyes, those wonderful all-seeing eyes, went hot. “Like maybe you have a thing for the coach?”

His hopeful and purposefully lecherous grin made her laugh, and it felt so good she laughed again. “Hmm. Do you know him?”

“I could introduce you.” At this, he grinned wider. “He happens to think you’re something, too, you know.” He stroked her jaw.

Good Lord, she thought weakly, if a sexier man than him existed, she couldn’t imagine.

“How about meeting him over pizza?”

She firmly shoved away her fear and smiled. After all, she was older now and wiser. She knew how to protect herself from danger.

Then she looked at the fascinating hot-blooded man waiting patiently for her answer and realized she’d just traded one dangerous man for another, for this one held her heart in his hands.

“Pizza sounds nice,” she said, sealing her fate.


A couple of days later Stone was deeply buried in work. He had his table saw pulled out, and the twelve-foot machine easily dwarfed even his big body as he bent over it, setting the correct measurements for what would become the frame for his latest prototype.

This particular job was new to him, a design he’d created last year. Kids liked big, responded to the visual, and Stone had capitalized on that He was making life-size puzzles, created of wood, designed to stimulate the minds of second graders across the state.

Flipping up his ear protectors, he turned on the saw and started. It was difficult back-aching work. Cutting out the pieces for the frames took hours, and by the time he was nearly done, his every limb trembled with fatigue.

Just two more cuts, he told himself, and then he’d break for lunch. Maybe he’d even catch a glimpse of his new neighbor. Over the past few days, he’d spent more time looking out his window and contriving to be on the sidewalk than in all the years he’d been here.

He would have been annoyed at himself, except he knew it was the same for her. There was no mistaking that he affected her every bit as much as she affected him, for he could see the pulse dance at the base of her neck when they saw each other. Her eyes would widen, her mouth would open slightly. She couldn’t keep her breathing even. She was definitely attracted to him.

Still, she’d done her damnedest to avoid being alone with him. In fact, the only time he’d spoken to her in the past days had been after Sara had arrived home from school

She had a great interest in his child, something that concerned him, for Sara had decided she didn’t like Cindy. Stone knew that was because his daughter sensed his interest, and since he’d never expressed a serious interest in another woman before, it threatened her.

There was one solution to this problem-stay the hell away from Cindy Beatty. Except that he really liked her, unsettling as that was.

Stone shook his head and pushed the last two-by-four through the massive noisy saw. But with his head buried in the clouds, he miscalculated, and didn’t push hard enough, even though he knew that with a saw this big, such an error could be dangerous.

He saw the mistake, but it was too late; he could do nothing to save himself as the saw kicked back the heavy beam directly at him.

No time to duck or even react before it hit him with terrific force, plowing him directly in the belly, knocking him ten feet back into the concrete wall of his workshop.

His head hit the wall with a sickening thud, and he saw stars. With the air socked right out of him, for long torturous seconds all Stone could do was lie there and open his mouth like a dying fish as he began the desperate painful struggle to pump air into his lungs.

“Stone?” Over the roar of the still-running saw, he barely heard her. “Guess what!” she called. “I’ve just taken on two girls looking for clerical and secretarial work, one of which I can place right away and-Stone?”

From his vantage point on the cold floor, all Stone could see was a set of long legs running toward him.

Great legs, he thought woozily.

“Stone!” Cindy dropped to her knees on the concrete beside him. “Oh, my God, what happened?”

He tried to smile. Tried to whisper her name, but nothing came out except a horrible gasping breath.

Well, at least he wasn’t about to suffocate, he thought, as his vision faded to black.

“Stone!” Jenna cried.

There was no response. He only slumped further, and Jenna’s heart nearly jerked right out of her chest.

She leaped to her feet, searching desperately for a phone so she could call for help. The saw screeched, driving her crazy, but she didn’t have a clue how to turn the thing off.

“Cindy…”

She found the phone base, but the portable was missing from it. Dammit. Whipping around, she searched the cluttered countertop, ready to run out into the street screaming for help if the phone didn’t materialize.

“Cindy…”

It took her a minute, for she still wasn’t used to that horrible name, and on top of that, the saw still roared.

“Cindy…”

The weak voice finally penetrated her panic. It was Stone.

Racing back, she hunkered down, wrapping an arm around him for support. “Don’t move,” she ordered, wishing she knew more first aid.

Stone slowly pulled himself up to his hands and knees-one hand clutching his stomach.

“Stone?” Propping him up with her shoulder, she bore most of his weight. With her free hand she cupped his face and tilted it up, waiting until his eyes fluttered open. They were glassy-oh God, didn’t that mean something bad? A concussion? “I’m calling an ambulance,” she told him. “Soon as I find your phone.”

The glistening in his eyes got stronger. His face, looking drawn and tight with pain, flushed. “No.”

He wheezed when he breathed. Under her hand, his bunched back muscles flexed. She could feel him tremble. “Oh, this is ridiculous!” she cried. “Where is your phone!”

His jaw set determinedly, which in a calmer moment she would have recognized as pure stubbornness, but panic had taken over. “Stone!”

He glared at her. “Over there…on left side of the saw…”

Leaping up, Jenna looked and looked, but on the left side of the saw she saw nothing but a black switch.

“Hit…it. Turn off…the damn saw.”

Exasperated, she hit the switch as he’d requested, and the shop fell blessedly silent.

Stone sank back to the floor, silent and still, and Jenna’s heart stopped.

Terrified, she skidded back around the counter and again dropped to her knees beside him. “No,” she whispered, draping herself over his broad back and hugging him tight. Just touching him like this, holding his big warm body, had memories slamming into her: Stone laughing, Stone making her laugh.

Stone caring for her, when no one else did. What if she had lost him now, before she told him the truth? “No,” she whispered again, squeezing him hard, fear overriding all else.

He groaned. “Don’t,” he gasped in a strangled voice when she inadvertently squeezed again. He pushed himself away from her and back up on his knees.

He didn’t want her to touch him, and forgetting for a minute that he had no idea who she really was, Jenna felt a deep self-loathing; she couldn’t blame him for not wanting her to be near him. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

Grimacing, he wrapped his arms around his middle. “You don’t understand.”

“Yes, I do. You don’t want me to touch you.”

He laughed shortly, then winced, trying to hold both his head and his belly at the same time. “God, that hurt. That damn two-by-four kicked back at me with enough power to stop a locomotive.” He wobbled a minute, then pushed himself to a standing position and groaned again. “Never even saw it coming.” Carefully, as if testing, he drew a breath. Apparently satisfied, he pierced her with his gaze. “Now come here.”

Not waiting for her to move, he snaked a hand out and grabbed her wrist, tugging her close. He ran his hands up her arms, then slowly back down. Grasping her hips, he pulled her closer, then closer still, until they were only a fraction of an inch from an embrace.