Snowbound Baby (Silhouette Romance) by Susan Meier Page B

bed.
    He jerked away, but that did nothing to lessen the flood of hormones replacing the blood in his arteries and veins. Dear God. Kissing her wasn’t merely powerful. It was potent. She was soft. She smelled good. She fit against him. And everything in his body responded to that quickly, easily, naturally. Almost as if he didn’t have any control.
    But he did havecontrol. He always had control.
    His gaze jumped to catch hers and what he saw in her eyes shot conflicting reactions through him. She was not confused. She liked the kiss. If the gooey expression on her face was anything to go by, she liked him. If he kissed her again, as his hormones were voting he do, she wouldn’t stop him. She might even let him take her to bed.
    Though his body tensed and tightened and damned near took over for his mind, he managed to find a few functioning brain cells and focused on the other side of this deal. He might have been trying to get her into bed for the past two days, but he’d never expected her to take him up on it. The very fact that she “liked” him made him realize he couldn’t take them down that road. She was not the kind of woman a man trifled with. She was the kind of woman a man settled down with. And Cooper was not the settling down kind. Hell, women should thank him for realizing that about himself and staying away from them.
    But he didn’t think Zoe was going to thank him. She had too many stars in her eyes.
    Shoot!
    He pulled his hands from her shoulders and stepped away. “Okay, that was supposed to be a gee-I’m-glad-you’re-better kiss. I’m sorry it got out of hand.”
    She stared at him for a few seconds as if she couldn’t respond. Well, he certainly understood that. That kiss had rolled through him like a thunderstorm in Oklahoma. It was a miracle he could talk. It was a miracle he could think. But he had thought. Thank God. And because he had enough presence of mind to realize kissing the way they had been was wrong, he was getting them out of this before the ideas clearly rumbling through Zoe’s brain went too far.
    He grabbed his mug of coffee, downedit and turned toward the front door. “I have a change of clothes in my truck.” He set the mug on the countertop. Zoe continued to stare at him. “A shower sounds like heaven now, but a change of clothes sounds better. Plus, I think it’s time I checked on road conditions. The snow has stopped, but that doesn’t mean the roads have been cleared.”
    Zoe found her voice. “You have a radio.”
    She said it as a fact, not a question, but he nodded anyway. “Yeah.”
    He didn’t give her any more answer than that, and went in search of his boots. Once he had them on, he didn’t reiterate his mission or even say goodbye. He simply headed for the door. Shoving his hands into the pockets of his lined denim jacket, he trudged through the two feet of snow to the driveway. Because it was dark when they’d arrived, he and Zoe hadn’t seen the easier access to the house and had bounded up the front yard. In the daytime he not only saw the driveway and garage, he saw the path to the road.
    Focused on getting to his truck, he refused to let himself think of anything but trekking through the snow. When he reached the road, he groaned. Sparkling with reflected sunlight, the white blanket on the highway and in the surrounding woods hadn’t been touched by man or vehicle. No one had walked or driven on this road since the storm had started Friday night.
    With a resigned breath, Cooper madethe first line of footprints in the perfect snow. He would have thought it a shame to ruin something so beautiful since it was clear no one was leaving that day, but he had to get the hell away from Zoe.
    Though he hadn’t let himself venture anywhere near thoughts of Zoe, the kiss, her reaction, or even his reaction while he’d walked down the driveway, his subconscious hadn’t let any of it go. Like a dog with a bone it gnawed at his brain, reminding him he was