Hot and Bothered Read Online Free PDF Page A

to deal with their hurt feelings at being excluded. The concession was a small thing and didn’t bother her, truly.
    Today she’d been alone, choosing whatever she wanted without another opinion being given on the spot. Even more, she’d had to think about what
wasn’t
the Judith Collier everyone knew and make purchases with that in mind.
    The afternoon heat had driven most people in for a siesta. She couldn’t sleep in her oversize oven, however. She couldn’t even concentrate enough to go through the paperwork on the upcoming merger, paperwork she’d received along with her shares at the will reading. She shuddered, wondering how she would last in these conditions. If she couldn’t even muster enough energy to do her work …
    She glanced up at the house on the hill. Theconditions were nothing compared to what
he
set off inside her. Maybe her lack of focus had nothing to do with the heat.
    The beach wasn’t empty, for the kids who lived on the
ejido
had a different idea of relaxation. Most of them were splashing around in the wide, shallow cove. Good thing it was sand based, she thought, watching them. She’d seen lava rock spewed along the coast, and it could be nasty as a sea bottom.
    She took off her sneakers and left them on the beach, then walked into the water, letting the easy waves lap over her ankles, cooling her skin. She sighed. Paul had no idea what nerve she’d had to call up to ask him for a lift to town. No idea. She’d found herself wishing she hadn’t been sitting beside him on the long ride to Ensenada. She’d been all too aware of the way his hands gripped the steering wheel, gently yet firmly, in control.
    “Steering wheels,” she muttered in disbelief. She must be getting kinky in her old age. She had also admired the muscles bunching in his thighs whenever he moved his leg to brake or accelerate. She’d never known before what a pair of tight denim shorts could do for a man. Nor could she remember ever having this strong a physical response to someone. A lady didn’t feel these sorts of things … did she?
    She stepped farther in the water, almost knee-deep. The outgoing tide ate away at thesand under her feet, undermining her balance to swallow her up in its wet belly. Yet the water was so cool, like a hypnotic seduction.
    The kids swam over to her, chattering away in Spanish.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, smiling and shaking her head. “I don’t speak much Spanish.”
    “I learned English at school,” an older boy said. He was brown as a nut from the sun. All the children were. “Come in swimming with us.”
    “I don’t have a suit,” Judith said.
    “A suit?” The boy said something to the others. They all looked puzzled, then collapsed laughing into the water.
    “No, a
bathing
suit,” she corrected him, chuckling as she realized the kids thought she meant a dress suit. All of them were swimming in shorts and T-shirts, T-shirts that were in kind with her own. Even the women in the Baja wore cartoon-character shirts. She was grateful that she looked like them. Besides, she was finding out they were fun.
    “You don’t need no suit,” the boy said right out of
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
, “you can swim in your clothes. We do.”
    The kids grabbed her hands before she could protest and urged her deeper into the water. She wondered again what certain people would say if they could see her, then laughed and threw herself into the lapping surf with abandon.
    The water swallowed her up in its cool saltydepths. Her bottom hit the bottom before she bounced gently upward. She broke the surface, giggling and pushing her wet hair off her face. Her T-shirt was clinging to her and she pulled it away from her skin. The kids all laughed. They took her hands and played ring-around-a-rosy until the water’s ebb and flow knocked everyone down.
    Judith envied these children who didn’t worry about cleanliness and safety and manners. Not that they were ill mannered or threw