Thanksgiving Groom by Brenda Minton Page B

pushed that reaction down. This wasn’t a friendship he wanted to pursue. Insteadhe stared up at her, wishing that look would send her running back to the tent.
    The one thing he’d learned about Ms. Lear was that she didn’t back down easily. Instead of cowering, she hunkered down next to him.
    â€œI’m sorry I fell apart earlier,” she whispered without looking up at him.
    â€œNo big deal.” But it had been kind of a big deal, mainly because he still remembered holding her.
    â€œI think I might have had a touch of hypothermia. The symptoms include confusion.”
    He laughed, at first loud and then softer. He didn’t want to wake the Johnsons. If they could sleep, they should. Someone should get rest for the trip tomorrow.
    â€œYou think that was from hypothermia?”
    She pulled the quilt tighter around her shoulders and moved so that her arm didn’t touch his. “Of course. It isn’t as if I’m prone to falling apart, or even to throwing myself into a man’s arms.”
    â€œOf course you aren’t.”
    â€œStop.”
    â€œWhat?” The tone of her voice had changed to anger, taking him by surprise. “Why are you mad?”
    â€œBecause you insist on putting me in some little box that you’ve labeled ‘heiress.’ You think you know me, know how I should behave or what my life is like.”
    â€œI see.” He knew the rule to this game. The less said, the better.
    â€œYou think I need a big, strong man to take care of me.”
    He listed off in his mind a few things, starting with driving a Jeep off the road, leaving the Jeep to wanderin the woods, coming face-to-face with a bear. He kept the list to himself while she rambled on.
    â€œI’m sick of people like you.”
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œStop.”
    â€œPenelope, I stopped talking a long time ago.”
    She peeked up, the sleeping bag tight around her neck so that just her face stuck out. Man, she had a kissable mouth. She had eyes that made him feel sucker-punched each time she looked at him all soft and vulnerable, or like a wildcat determined to fight her way out of a corner.
    He leaned, and for the first time in a long time, he didn’t think something through before he acted. As she stared up, half wildcat and half lost kitten, he leaned and touched his lips to hers. Soft at first, and then a little more demanding. He wrapped one arm around her quilted shoulders and held her close as his lips moved over hers. When she whispered his name and kissed him back, he didn’t know if he’d ever breathe again.
    Or if he’d ever want to breathe without her.
    Her hair slipped through his fingers and he held her close, leaning in for one more taste of the sweetest lips he’d ever kissed.
    This was more tender than his first kiss with Cindy Douglas on the playground after school. It was sweeter than a college romance that he thought would last forever.
    And it’s smoke and mirrors, he told himself as he pulled away. She was just a mirage, something out of reach and unreal. He didn’t need that. He didn’t needthis to cloud his thinking when so many things in his life were on the fence.
    What he didn’t need was a high-maintenance female in his life.
    She obviously felt the same way about him, because she broke away from his arms and stood up, wobbling a little, scaring him because he wanted her away from the fire if she was going to trip. He reached but she backed up.
    â€œDon’t.” She took a few more steps back. “This is just confusion from hypothermia.”
    He was tempted to laugh again, because she didn’t believe that any more than he did. “Sure, hypothermia.”
    â€œExactly. In a few days we’ll be back to our real lives, being who we really are. And I don’t think either of us would like the other person if we met up with them on the street.”
    â€œIn the real