Standing a distance in front of him was Danielle Ford. She was bending forward, reaching into a display of ripe red tomatoes. Her tight white shorts accentuated her moonshaped buttocks. He halted his cart, unable to take his gaze off her. Her long, bare legs winked out at him.
He squeezed the chrome of the cart handle, imagining caressing the silken flesh of her thighs and gliding his palms up to her firm buttocks.
An elderly customer accidentally banged into him with her cart, waking him up from his sexual fantasy.
At the tomato stand, Danielle lightly squeezed each tomato for the perfectly ripened ones. She was excited about cooking Lisa an Italian dinner. She had just pulled out a red winner from the middle of the stand, when suddenly several tomatoes started falling down the display.
“Oh, no!” she whispered as an avalanche of tomatoes began tumbling to her feet. She frantically pressed her body against the display to stop the onslaught.
Just as she grabbed several, a strong hand collided with hers to help stop the tomatoes. She looked up to see Paul Richards’s charcoal eyes on her. The warmth of his masculine hand made her skin heat up in the icy airconditioned produce department.
For a moment, she forgot what she was doing and backed away from the display. “Paul, what’re you doing here?”
Suddenly, a huge batch of tomatoes rolled down the counter and splattered to the floor. Before answering, Paul immediately bent to catch the next batch of falling tomatoes in his open palms.
As Danielle swiftly stepped back from the counter to grab more plunging tomatoes, her foot slipped on tomato juice. She lost her balance and slammed into Paul, pushing him backward, then fell smack on top of him on the supermarket floor.
Her lips were close to his. She could feel his warm breath on her cheeks. Her breasts were crushed against his hard-muscled chest. She felt his broad palms against the small of her back. Desire raced through her veins.
Eventually, she realized that customers were trying to help them up. She rose with red-stained white shorts.
Paul’s shirt was filled with tomato skins. His curly hair was moist with red juice.
“Paul, I’m sorry,” she said, feeling that she was starting their working relationship on a terrible note.
Paul wiped off the skins. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Besides, I enjoyed taking a tomato bath with you.”
He said it with a smile, but his voice was deep and sexy. She felt a sizzle between her legs.
She quickly grabbed her shopping cart. “I’d better pay for these items.”
He eyed the food in her cart. “Some lucky guy is going to have a great dinner tonight.”
“Oh, no, I’m single,” she instantly replied, then frowned. Why had she told him that? Was she trying to let him know she was available? “I mean, I’m cooking dinner for my sister tonight. If it hadn’t been for Lisa, I would’ve never had the interview with Mr. Harrington.”
Paul’s gaze was steady on her. “Thank her for me, too.”
He turned to his shopping cart. “Well, I’d better get my Italian dinner into the microwave before it melts in the cart.”
“Why don’t you stick that frozen dinner into your freezer and come over and eat with us?” she heard herself ask before she knew what she was saying.
His eyes lit up. “Really? I don’t want to cause more work for you.”
“I owe it to you for the tomato mess,” she immediately added. “Besides, I always cook way too much Italian food for me and Lisa to eat.”
“When should I come over?”
Her pulse was racing. “Dinner’s at seven-thirty. Here’s my address.” She searched for a piece of paper in her bag.
“Tell me the number. I won’t forget.”
“Twelve-oh-four Beethoven Street in Santa Monica,” she replied, flattered and totally taken with him. “Apartment 2A.”
“I’ll be there.”
Mesmerized, she watched Paul walk out of the supermarket toward his van, when she suddenly realized that she’d just invited the man she was going to work with to a dinner date at her apartment!
What am I doing? she thought. She had vowed to maintain a professional-only relationship with general contractor Paul Richards. Why was she giving him a personal invitation into her heart?
With a bag of groceries in her hand, she ran out to the parking lot after Paul, hoping she could make an excuse to cancel. But she caught the red taillights of his van disappearing out of the lot.
Two
In the shower at his cottage, Paul washed the tomatoes out of his hair. He wondered if Danielle was soaping the red juice from her skin.
He couldn’t stop thinking about her lying on top of him on the supermarket floor. The turquoise of her eyes. The sweet smell of her hair. Her firm breasts against his chest. Her soft body pressed against his manhood.
His loins ached.
What a glutton for punishment you are, he thought. He turned off the shower. Can’t you remember what your relationship to Danielle Ford really is?
He dried his aching, naked body with the bath towel. Danielle was the architect who stood between his success or failure with Mr. Harrington. If she made one mistake on the honeymoon house that he didn’t catch, goodbye partnership.
He hurried into his bedroom, zipped up his jeans and put on a clean white shirt. He glanced at the clock.
Who am I kidding? he thought. He couldn’t wait to be with Danielle again. That’s what scared him. He knew he wasn’t destined to have a permanent relationship with her. A female friend, sure. But how could he be platonic friends with a woman as sensitive and sensual as Danielle Ford?
The doorbell rang. He buttoned his shirt and opened the door to his construction supervisor.
“Butch, you have lousy timing,” he said with a grin as he shook his hand.
“I try to,” Butch replied as he sauntered inside. He wore a gold earring and black motorcycle jacket and carried a helmet. He was divorced twice, with no kids and no responsibilities except to himself, and was an old-timer at building houses.
“Man, I just heard the horrendous news,” Butch began. “Danielle Ford’s gonna be the architect on Harrington’s honeymoon house. Remember the Tilden house catastrophe? She’s major bad luck for us, man.”
To his surprise, Paul felt a jolt of protectiveness toward Danielle. A feeling he’d never had for a woman before.
“Don’t sweat it, Butch. The honeymoon house will go up smooth as velvet.”
Butch leaned on one leg and stared at him. “What’s with the change in attitude toward Danielle Ford?”
Paul avoided his gaze. “What change?”
“After the Tilden mess, didn’t you say you’d quit contracting before ever working with the woman’s plans again?”
Paul hedged. “Yeah.”
“I don’t get it,” Butch said, confused. “Are you glad she’ll be working with us?”
“I didn’t hire her,” Paul quickly replied. “Mr. Harrington did, and I’ve got to make it work.”
Butch shook his head. “I still don’t like the idea.”
Paul glanced at his watch.