She didn’t.
Even though Rick timed it so that he started jogging again just as Lori reached him, even though he smiled whitely, oozing friendliness that Josh could feel even through the plate glass, Lori didn’t even glance at the other man. As a matter of fact, she picked up her pace, causing Wily to have to leap forward in order to keep up with her.
His mouth moved. Probably saying something witty, Josh thought. Something far more interesting than “Ms. Hanson, find me the Feeney file, please.” But she responded to Rick with even fewer syllables and less animation that she did when Josh spoke.
Surprise crossed Rick’s oh-so-slick and handsome face, and he slowed a bit, letting Lori get ahead. Strike one for Wily.
“Well,” Andy said. “Rick hasn’t bowled her over.”
“Neither have I,” Josh muttered.
And just like Josh himself, Rick didn’t find it easy to give up on Lori either. As Josh watched, the other man caught up with her again and tried to start another conversation. Her slight grimace made clear, to Josh anyway, that she didn’t appreciate Wily’s second attempt.
Josh stood up. “I’m going to take a few laps myself,” he told Andy.
The other man’s grin was knowing. “You do that. But be careful. I haven’t seen you chasing—I mean running—in a long time, old friend.”
Josh didn’t look back. He wasn’t chasing. He was going after Lori to make sure Wily wasn’t annoying her, not because of the apparently one-sided attraction he had for her. That attraction he was determined to put a lid on, because it would be hell on his brain and his business if it was allowed to simmer unchecked for the remainder of Lucy’s maternity leave.
Just as Josh jogged onto the track, Wily jogged off, a look of baffled disappointment on his face. He didn’t even acknowledge Josh’s two-fingered salute. It wasn’t often Rick struck out, and it looked as if it was going to take him some time to recover.
Josh was smiling when he caught up with Lori. He brushed off the niggling notion that his entire reason for joining her was now heading for the men’s showers. “Good morning,” he said.
She looked over at him, her eyes widening, then she trained her gaze back on the track in front of her. “Good morning, Mr. Anderson.”
“Josh.”
She made another of those maddening, absent hmms that she liked to torture him with.
“Well. How are you this morning?”
“Fine.” She didn’t look at him.
“I, um, thought I’d let you know that I’m stopping off at the Feeney site before I come into the office this morning.”
“All right.”
When he thought about it, maybe he should still bring up Rick and his attempts at flirtation. He hesitated, then plunged in, unable to come up with some way to ease into the subject. “I saw Rick talking to you,” he said.
“Who?”
“Wil—Rick Weber. The curly-haired guy who was running with you.”
“Oh. Him.”
The little breeze they generated running caused her peach scent to waft enticingly over Josh’s face. He tried not breathing through his nose. “He’s okay, but he has a reputation for two-timing.”
Now she looked at him, her expression bewildered. “Why would you tell me that?”
So I could feel my feet grow five sizes larger, Josh thought. But he went on doggedly. “I just thought you should know because…I, well… Well, he was hitting on you.”
“I’m not interested in him.”
“Good.” She shot him a look, and he hoped he didn’t look as satisfied as he felt. To cover it up, he cleared his throat and then forced himself to test the waters again. “But just in case you are interested in dating, I do know a few good men I could introduce you to.”
Did he imagine it, or was her face turning a shade of red that bespoke embarrassment, not exertion?
“I didn’t come to Whitehorn to meet men.”
“I didn’t say that you did,” Josh answered, plodding on with his offer. “But you’re a young woman. Certainly you’d like a social life. I have friends who—”
She shook her head. “Please, Josh. I don’t want to meet anybody. Please.”
The tone in her voice was urgent. Anxious.
Despite her discomfort, he had to admit he felt that satisfaction again. “Okay. Sure. No problem,” he answered.
“Josh.” She abruptly stopped running and he skidded to a halt beside her.
“What?” he asked.
Her chest moved up and down, her breaths still coming fast. Josh tried not to stare, focusing instead on her dark eyelashes that hid the expression in her eyes.
“I’d even be grateful,” she said, “if you’d…pass the word around the gym.”
Josh blinked at her. “Pass what word?”
Her shoulders hunched in an embarrassed sort of shrug. “I’ve…sworn off men for the moment, okay? I’m not eager to meet any, date any, become entangled with any.” She darted one swift look at him. “With anyone, no matter how…appealing.”
With him, she meant.
Then she dashed off in the direction of the women’s locker room, leaving Josh staring after her. Well, he thought. Finally, there was his answer. It wasn’t mixed signals. It wasn’t him misreading. It wasn’t that she didn’t feel the same attraction he did—she’d even implied she found him appealing. But the fact was, she’d sworn off men.
He could understand that. Appreciate it. Abide by it. For God’s sake, he hadn’t paid any but the most cursory attention to his own social life in the last five years.
And why she’d sworn off men was none of his business either.
Josh showered and dressed quickly, telling himself he was glad to have the Lori problem straightened out. It meant he could refocus his attention on business. That he could smother the attraction he felt for her because she wanted to smother it too.
He even managed a cheerful goodbye to the kid who manned the check-in desk as he left. Even when he encountered Lori at the door leading outside, his lightened mood didn’t change. Much.
He smiled at her as he held open the door. “I’ll be in around ten. You can get me on my cell phone, though.”
“The Feeney site,” she replied, stepping onto the concrete sidewalk, her gym bag in one hand.
The morning had grown colder in the hour he’d been working out. Lori’s second step found a patch of ice that had been a shallow puddle sixty minutes before. The sole of her shoe lost purchase, and Josh saw her heel slide out from under her.
Her free arm windmilled.
Without a second thought, a first, any thought at all, he reached out, sliding his arm around her waist. With a jerk, he swept her upright and against him.
She screamed.
Startled, Josh’s arm tightened. It wasn’t a shriek of surprise, or an I’m-about-to-fall squeal. It was—
She screamed again, fighting wildly against his arm.
Startled again, he let her go.
She whirled to face him, her face white, her eyes huge pools of blue fear.
Fear.
He remembered her reaction when he bumped into her on the running