“Your…sympathetic side?” she stammered.
“You sound surprised. Don’t you think I have one?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Once again, she tried to pull away from his grasp, but he held her firmly, forcing her to look directly in his eyes. Somehow, she’d managed to sound calm and unmoved, she thought, despite the tremors that shook her within. His face was so close to hers, barely a breath away, and as his gaze dropped down to her mouth some inner alarm sounded, warning that he was about to kiss her.
“Ridiculous…yes, of course,” he murmured in a husky tone, still staring hungrily down at her lips. “I assure you, Ms. Price, I’m trying very hard not to be…”
Then his dark head dipped toward hers, and his hand lifted her chin. Georgia thought to pull away, to make some forceful protest, but all she could do was lift her hands and press them again his chest. The sensation of his firm muscles against her fingertips wasn’t the dash of cold water she needed at the moment. To the contrary, making contact with his hard, warm body had just the opposite effect, shutting down her powers of reasoning completely.
Georgia sighed and closed her eyes—as much a sign of pure frustration with herself as a sign of her surrender. It was all the encouragement Jackson needed, and in a heartbeat she felt herself pulled into his hard embrace, her mouth covered by the seeking, seductive touch of his lips.
It was shocking.
It was wonderful.
It was a pure revelation.
Despite all rational and moral objections Georgia might have voiced in saner moments to kissing a man she barely knew—especially this man—she found herself swept away by the moment, giving herself over to the wave of sensual pleasure that suddenly crashed over her, body and soul.
Her arms moved up to circle his shoulders, her fingertips toying with the thick, damp strands of his hair. His mouth glided over hers, coaxing, tasting and teasing until she couldn’t help but respond. She moaned quietly in the back of her throat, and the small sound inspired him with a new surge of ardor.
Heavens, it had been months—no, years—since she’d been kissed like this. Had she ever been kissed like this?
Then, just as Georgia began to call a halt, she was saved. A small voice sounded from the top of the stairs, and Georgia heard it as if it echoed from miles away.
“Mommy?”
Noah. He’d woken up.
Georgia sprang away from Jackson’s hold as if she’d been stuck by a cattle prod. She ran over to the staircase and started up, toward her son, some part of her mind reflecting that it was funny how a child might sometimes sleep through a tornado—then wake up to the sound of a toothbrush dropping on the floor three rooms away.
“It’s okay, honey. Everything’s all right,” she assured him. “Go back to bed. I’ll be up in a minute to tuck you in.”
He rubbed his eyes sleepily but didn’t budge until she reached him at the landing. “I heard voices. It sounded like you were talking to someone…. Is someone here?”
Georgia wondered for a moment if she should tell one of the little white lies that help adults survive parenthood, for she could make Noah believe all he had heard was the TV. Then she thought best not to, realizing that Noah could easily get out of bed again and see Jackson Bradshaw.
With a hand on Noah’s shoulder she gently guided him back toward his bedroom. “Mommy has a visitor. But he’ll be gone in a few minutes.”
“A visitor?” Noah sounded confused. And rightly so. Georgia rarely dated and never had men over for the night, out of consideration for her son. “Who’s here?”
“Just a man who got lost in the rain on the road,” she said. The explanation satisfied her as it wasn’t a total fabrication, from what Jackson had told her of his journey. “His car broke down near our house and he needs to call up for a ride to town.”
There, that should appease even Noah’s eight-year-old, insatiable mind, she decided.
She flipped back the comforter on Noah’s bed. “Okay, back to bed now.”
“How is this man going to get a ride to town?” Noah protested as he climbed back under his quilt imprinted with the infamous Curious George. “He’ll never get a ride into town in the middle of the night, Mom,” Noah assured her.
“Hmm, we’ll see.” Georgia tugged the quilt up over his small body and dropped a kiss on his forehead.
As she descended the stairs again, she realized that Noah was correct, as usual. The only way Jackson Bradshaw could get back to town at this hour was if she packed up Noah and drove him or lent him her vehicle. She guessed the time to be close to 2:00 a.m., and neither solution seemed appealing.
When Georgia entered the living room, Jackson was standing at the far end, gazing out at the rain again, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. He turned to look at her with a bland, distant expression, and it was as if their intimate encounter had never happened.
Just as well, Georgia decided. She was quite happy to skip any commentary or analysis. The moment had seemed like a dream, a wild fantasy. She couldn’t begin to understand her reaction to him—no less explain it.
“Is your boy all right?” he asked politely.
“He’s fine,” she assured him.
“I’m sorry I woke him. I hope he wasn’t scared, hearing a strange voice in the house in the middle of the night.”
His consideration for Noah surprised her. Was it an act, designed to put her off guard? Had that impetuous kiss been a ploy, as well? she suddenly wondered.
“I explained that your car got stuck on the road and you walked here for help. He said he didn’t think you’d be able to get a ride back to town tonight.”
“From the looks of your town, I suspect he’s right. If I’d sneezed while driving down Main Street, I might have missed it.”
“It’s not quite that dinky,” Georgia protested. “But Sweetwater doesn’t have a twenty-four-hour taxi service. We don’t have any taxi service at all, actually,” she admitted.
“And I suppose that, even if I could find a ride somehow, there probably aren’t any motels around here, are there?”
“Sure, there’s a motel,” she replied agreeably. “The E-Z Rest. About thirty-five miles north on Route 6. The truckers seem to like it.”
She tried to picture Jackson Bradshaw spending a night at the E-Z Rest. The image made her secretly smile. Well, it certainly was not the Ritz….
“I might have guessed,” he replied in a grim, resigned tone. He sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Well, maybe you could kindly lend me an umbrella, then. It looks as if it’s still raining a bit, and I do have a rather long walk back to my car.”
“Your car? I thought you said your car wasn’t working.”
“That’s correct. And the rental agency can’t get a replacement out here until sometime late tomorrow. And that’s only if the rain stops.”
“Well then, why, may I ask, are going back out to your car? If you’ve left any valuables there, you needn’t worry. This area may be a backwater, but we are just about crime free.”
“I’m pleased to hear that, Ms. Price. At least I won’t fear for my life, sleeping out on the roadside. Do you have an extra umbrella or not?” he queried.
She suddenly understood. The poor man. He thought she was going to toss