Snowball's Chance Read Online Free PDF Page B

pattern.
    The lights went out….
    Kendall froze beside the center island, a feeling of dread replacing her concern about Denise’s guests. “Oh, God. He’s here.”
    â€œNot possible,” Joe assured her. “Hang tight, the generator—” The lights came back on. “—will kick in. Go and turn—”
    â€œThe outside lights off.” She was already striding toward the mudroom where that control panel was located. She turned to look at Joe. He’d stopped dead in the middle of the kitchen. “Coming?”
    â€œYeah.” His eyes looked a little glazed.
    Kendall shot him a worried glance. “You’re not sick are you?”
    He swiped a large hand across his jaw. “I’m fine. Hit those lights. I want to get cracking and check upstairs.”
    He sounded as if he were coming down with a cold. Which was unfortunate. Because just looking at him made her feel hot all over.
    Odd because she had felt nothing sexually in over a year. Not a flicker. Not even a nanosecond of thought. Yet here was this giant of a man, with his dangerous eyes and his sexy mouth and all she could think of was wanting to climb his body and kiss him.
    She shook her head. She was really losing it if she was this tempted to jump the bones of a man she’d just met. She’d had two fairly long-term relationships over the last ten years. She’d dated Jerry for a year, and Andy for more than six months, before sleeping with him.
    She just wasn’t that spontaneous. She liked to think things through. Weigh the pros and cons. Deliberate. Kendall bit her lip as she pondered this weird anomaly. Part of it, she admitted to herself, was the latent strength and power of Joe Zorn. Not only did he make her feel sexy; more important, he made her feel safe.
    Almost —almost —back to her previously invincible self. That in itself was a big turn-on to a woman who’d begun to believe her fear was part and parcel of who she’d become.
    The scars Dwight Gus Treadwell had inflicted on her weren’t all on the outside.
    Joe followed her to the door of the mudroom and waited while she dealt with all the plugs and switches for the outside Christmas lights. That done, she crossed to the counter and started cleaning up the mess she’d made earlier when she’d done the floral arrangements.
    â€œWhat the hell are you doing?”
    Her hands cradling wet newspapers filled with flower stems and stripped leaves, she glanced at Joe over her shoulder. “Cleaning up my mess.”
    He rolled his eyes. A very male, extremely irritating gesture, that immediately brought back to mind the reason she was racing hither and yon like a florist on speed.
    â€œLeave it,” he told her shortly, motioning for her to go through the door ahead of him.
    Kendall was so filled with nervous energy, she didn’t know what to do with herself. She dumped the armload of cuttings into a nearby pail and busied herself washing and drying her hands. “You’re annoyingly bossy, Mr. Zorn.” She turned to look at him.
    His gaze drifted to her mouth, and something elemental sparked between them. He hadn’t moved from the doorway, but Kendall felt crowded, breathlessly so. He lifted his eyes back to hers. “And you’re annoyingly … busy, Miss Metcalf,” Joe drawled.
    â€œYeah?” He wasn’t getting out of the way, and she started to move past him. “Well, there are a billion things to d—” He snagged her arm and her gaze clashed with his. She forgot what she’d been about to say, her breath stopping altogether at the blaze of predatory heat she saw in his eyes. The smell of him—damp wool, woodsy cologne, male —was intoxicating, and made her giddy with longing.
    She ached to slide her hands under his sweater so she could touch hot, bare skin. She wanted to stand on her toes and press her mouth to his. God. She wanted him to kiss