Seducing the Old Flame (10 page)

A smile lit her face.
 
“Let’s see, play in the mud bog or have your
arms around me, uhm, I’ll take option number two, please.”

He scooped her up in his
arms.
 
“You need to eat more.”

“What?”

“You’re too thin.
 
Even skinnier than you used to be.”

“I’m filled out where it counts
thank you very much.”

“Can’t argue with that.”
 
To have such a tiny waist, she did have
amazing breasts and hips that flared out perfectly.

“You’re shameless.”
 
He really should toss her into the mud.
 
Maybe she’d sling some on him and they could
wrestle around and…he swallowed again.

“I know.”

He carried her up the steps and
let her slide down his body.
 
Probably
not a good idea as a skeleton crew worked today.
 
He’d hear about the sexy redhead he carried
to the office come Monday morning.
 
If
not before.
 
Hopefully the guys would
have enough good taste not to say anything in front of Tabby.

Much more likely that they’d
hit on her themselves.

“Thank you.”
 
She bestowed one of her killer smiles.
 
“Makes me think of times gone past when
gentlemen used to toss their coats down for a lady to walk on.”

“Yeah, well, I always thought
that was kinda stupid myself.
 
Just ruins
a good coat when the guy could have had her arms around his neck if he’d played
his cards right.”

“Like you just played yours?”
she teased.

“You better believe it.”

They were both laughing as they
stepped into the portable office, a mini-sized trailer that moved from one
commercial job site to another as needed.
 
He had seven of them now.
 
Hoped
he’d have reason to purchase another one in the near future.

Jason glanced around the main
room, trying to see the office through Tabby’s eyes.
 
A desk piled high with papers, files, and
magazines, not to mention two used coffee cups, monopolized the front part of
the room.
 
Three metal fold-up chairs sat
in front of the desk.
 
Several filing
cabinets lined one wall.
 
His desk, a sturdy
metal and wood monstrosity occupied the far back corner.

Jason’s foreman sat reading a
set of blueprints in front of his desk.

“My, my, my, what have we
here?”
 
Rooster Stevens crowed as he
raked his eyes up and down Tabby’s body.
 
He didn’t bother dropping his feet from where they were propped on the
edge of the desk.

“Rooster,” Jason greeted his
foreman.

Rooster didn’t even glance at
him.
 
He was too busy eyeballing
Tabby.
 
Yep, he’d be beating his buddies
off Tabby.

“Who do we have here?”

When Jason still made no show
of introducing her, Tabby stepped forward and stuck out her hand.
 
“Hi, I’m Tabitha Sterling, an… old friend of Jason’s.”

“Baby, there ain’t a thing old
about you and if there is, I’ll volunteer to do a thorough search to find it.”

Tabby laughed.
 
Jason didn’t.

“Don’t you have work that needs
done?” he growled.

“Nah, man, I’ve been waiting on
your sorry ass to get here.
 
Savannah
Blue dude showed up here about ten minutes ago and is checking out the site.”

“And you let him go alone?”

“Hell no.
 
Biscuit’s with him.”

“Good.”
 
Biscuit had more manners about him than the
womanizing clout drooling over Tabby.
 
But Jason should have been here to meet the man himself.
 
He had meant to arrive early.

Still, feeding Tabby would have
been worth missing the meeting completely.

Which was damned stupid and not
in line with his future plans.

Jason pushed Rooster’s feet off
the desk.
 
“Haven’t I told you not to do
that?”

“Do what, boss?”

“Prop your boots on my
desk.
 
I swear it’s a wonder all my
papers aren’t coated in red clay.”

“I know what I’d like to see
coated in red clay,” Rooster echoed Jason’s earlier thoughts.
 
“Of course, I’d be praying for rain.
 
I always wanted to know what a soaked tiger
would look like.”

“Watch National
Geographic.”
 
That was it.
 
Enough flirting with Tabby.
 
“Out.
 
Now.
 
Go do something.”

Rooster’s dark eyes moved from
Tabby to Jason.
 
Jason couldn’t
particularly say that he liked the way his long time pal was looking at
him.
 
As if in a whole new light.

He’d snapped at Rooster over a
woman.
 
That had never happened
before.
 
From the amused narrowing of the
other man’s eyes, he’d never live this down.

Rooster snickered.
 
“Got a tack in your ass today, Kelly?”

“More like a pain in the, oh,
never mind.”
 
Jason grabbed his hardhat
off his desk and turned to Tabby who looked as out of place in his office as
she had in his truck.
 
An exotic orchid
in Jason’s weed patch.
 
“Have a seat.
 
For health reasons don’t drink any of
Rooster’s coffee.
 
There’s probably some
doughnuts left from yesterday on the table.
 
Help yourself.
 
I shouldn’t be
more than thirty minutes, tops.
 
There’s
a few magazines on my desk.
 
Feel free to
look through them or to use the phone.”
 
He shot a warning glance toward Rooster.
 
“Scratch out his eyes if he bothers you.”

Tabby laughed.
 
“I get the feeling I’ve been relegated to the
principal’s office.”

Jason’s gaze dropped to Tabby’s
feet.
 
No way could he take her out in
those shoes.
 
It just wasn’t safe.

He really didn’t want to leave
her alone.
 
Not that Rooster would do
anything to hurt her.
 
Although
construction worker rough on the outside, he was really a good guy with a strong
sense of right and wrong.

“Have you been naughty?”
Rooster piped up, honing in on Tabby’s comment.

Tabby shot him a saucy
smile.
 
“I’m always a naughty girl.”

Rooster’s feet fell off the
desk with a loud thud that practically shook the trailer; he stared from Tabby
to Jason, then slapped his leg.
 
“Aw
hell.
 
You’ve done gone and got yourself
a live wire, this time, Kelly.”

Jason grimaced.
 
A live wire.
 
Yep, that was Tabby all right.

“Yeah, well, she’s playing the
role of principal today, so you’d better be on your best behavior,” Jason said,
picking up a handheld two-way radio.
 
“If
you need anything, push that button, and speak into this piece.”

She looked at the radio,
nodded, then stepped up to straighten his hardhat.
 
“Have fun and don’t worry about me.
 
I’ll be fine.
 
I’m sure Rooster will keep me entertained.”

Yeah, that’s what worried him.

Chapter Six

Tabby sank into the seat that
she was pretty sure was Jason’s, crossed her legs, and regarded the man staring
at her with a goofy grin.

“So, how long have you known Jason?”

“Hey,” he crowed.
 
“You stole my line.
 
I was just going to ask you the same thing.”

“Then, I’ll go first.”
 
She grinned.
 
“We first met about two and a half years ago.”

“That long?”
 
Rooster’s face screwed up into thoughtful
scowl.
 
“And this is the first time I’ve
seen you?
 
Why’s that?
 
He keep you locked away in a tower
somewhere?”

She smiled at the thought.
 
Sad thing was that she might agree to be
locked away in a tower just so long as Jason came to visit every dusk to
dawn.
 
Pathetic and a sad show for
feminism all around.

“Actually, last night is the
first time we’ve seen each other for a couple of years.”

“So, you two aren’t an
item?”
 
Rooster’s expression said he
didn’t believe that for one minute, but if she said no, he wouldn’t mind moving
in himself.

“We used to be.”
 
Tabby opted for a safer answer.

“Two years ago.”
 
Rooster looked thoughtful.
 
“That’s about the time I came back to work
for Kelly Construction.
 
I was on Jason’s
original crew.
 
He and my lil bro
graduated from high school together.
 
I
joined them on that first house we build and moved on when the time was
right.
 
Time was right for coming home a
couple of years ago.”
 
His gaze
narrowed.
 
“I heard some chick messed
with Jason’s head real good right before I got back.
 
That you?”

Tabby started to automatically
reply with a sexual connation, after all, the man practically asked for it with
a comment like that.
 
But she stopped
herself.
 
Although she was an admitted
pathological flirt, it just didn’t feel right this morning.

“Might have been,” she
admitted.
 
“Hard to say as I’ve not
spoken with him at all during the past two years.”

She leaned back in the chair,
noticing Jason’s scent for the first time.
 
Mixed amidst stale coffee, hard work, and grime she could smell his
unique fragrance.
 
She squirmed in her
chair.

“So you just happened to run
into each other last night and he invited you to come to work with him today?”

“Something like that.”

Rooster’s grin revealed a
mouthful of surprisingly white, straight teeth.
 
“You planning to stick around?”

Just until tomorrow night.
 
Although the thought of leaving Jason wasn’t
pleasant.

“That’s really none of your
business, now, is it?”

“Beautiful and sassy.”
 
Rooster whistled.
 
“What a fiery combo.
 
Hope Kelly doesn’t get burned.
 
He was hell to work with there for a
while.
 
Not that you had anything to do
with that, of course.”

“Of course.”

Rooster opened his mouth to say
something, when the door opened and a young man who looked barely old enough to
be driving stuck his head in.
 
“Jason
needs you pronto.”

“Hey, Biscuit.”
 
A wry grin crossed Rooster’s mouth and he
stood up.
 
“That didn’t take long.”

Tabby just smiled and waved at
Biscuit.
 
She vaguely remembered meeting
him a few times with Jason.
 
Biscuit
looked startled, then shook his head, shrugged, and waved back.

“Tabitha,” Biscuit said in
acknowledgement, causing Rooster to give a curious look.

He slapped on his hardhat,
grabbed up a role of prints, and walked to the door.
 
“Nice to meet you, Tabitha.
 
Imagine I’ll be seeing you around.”

“You, too, Rooster,” she said
as he disappeared out the door.
 
But he
wouldn’t be seeing her around.
 
Not
unless he came into Stewart and Steinman needing financial advice.

Tabby flipped through the stack
of files, papers, and magazines in search of something to fill her time until Jason
came back.
 
She pulled a magazine on
sports from the stack and managed to knock a packet of papers off into the
floor.
 
The contents spilled.

Stooping to pick up the papers,
she flipped them over to put them into some semblance of order and realized she
was looking at plans for a house.
 
A
legal sized drawing with lots of notations in Jason’s small neat handwriting
said he’d been the one to do the design.

She studied through the different
sheets and read the comments.
 
This
wasn’t a house he planned to build for someone else.
 
He’d designed a house for him.
 
A house with lots of room for a family.

That had always been his
dream.
 
To design and build a house on
the land his grandfather left him.
 
Vaguely she recalled hearing him talk about it, telling her his
plans.
 
Vaguely because she hadn’t been
interested in listening to him plan for their future because, very simply, she
never believed they had a future.
 
At
least not one together.

With one last glance at the
papers, she stuffed them back into the folder.
 
She didn’t want to think about the house Jason would built, about the
woman he’d share that house with, the babies he’d make…

Babies.