Read Online For Love of Charley by Katherine Allred - Free Book Online Page A

expect me to spend the
night in here. My car is out front and you locked the door.”
    “Fine.” She locked the door behind them and
climbed into her truck, well aware that he had stopped and was watching her.
With a silent prayer, she put the key in and turned it. Nothing. Not so much as
a click resulted. “Please don’t do this to me now,” she begged.
    Still nothing.
    Charley pounded her head on the steering
wheel. “If you don’t start,” she threatened, “I am personally taking you to the
junk yard tomorrow and inserting you in a car masher.”
    “It would probably be the merciful thing to
do. Come on and I’ll give you a ride home.” His voice came from right beside
her.
    “I’ll call a cab,” she gritted, climbing
out of the truck.
    “Don’t be silly. There’s no reason to wait
on a cab when I have a car here.”
    “I don’t want to interrupt your plans.”
Sarcasm oozed from her.
    “Plans? What plans?”
    “With Marcie.” She turned and headed for
the door.
    “Marcie?”
    She stopped to glare at him. “Red hair,
skin-tight clothes?”
    “Oh, yeah. Marcie.” A smug grin spread
across his face and Charley had to restrain herself from knocking it clear into
the next county.
    “Why would you think I had plans with her?
She’s not my type.” He took her arm and began guiding her around the building.
    “You sure seemed to enjoy looking. Not to
mention flirting with her.”
    Cole shrugged. “I’m only human. Flirting is
fun, and looking is pleasurable. That doesn’t mean I want a sample of the
goods.” She saw his eyes glint in the moonlight as he glanced at her. “If I
didn’t know better, I’d think you were jealous.”
    She came to an abrupt halt, her anger
rapidly hitting the boiling point. “Why, you conceited, arrogant bastard!”
Without thinking, she swung at him.
    He caught her hand effortlessly and used it
to pull her against him. “You’re starting to repeat yourself, Charley. You
really should expand your vocabulary.”
    In spite of their intimate position, his
voice was cool again, and a new surge of rage hit her. She wanted to rattle
him, wipe that indifference away. She wanted him to feel at least a little of
what she felt.
    Her hands locked at his nape before burying
themselves in his hair, pulling his head down, her lips meeting his. Liquid
heat ignited in her veins as Cole’s arms tightened around her convulsively.
Suddenly, he went still as she continued to kiss him, his mouth warm, and firm,
and unmoving under hers. Desperate for a response, she bit gently on his lips
and then teased them with her tongue. Was that a tremor she felt run though
him? In triumph, she started to redouble her efforts, but before she could, he
gently pulled her hands loose and lifted her away.
    “It’s late and we’re both tired. I think
it’s time to get you home.” Without another word, he turned and headed for his
car.
    Charley stared at his retreating back in
shock. Oh, God. What had she done?

Chapter Six
     
    Cole sat in the breakfast nook, right ankle
crossed over left knee, and stared out the window at the surrounding mountains.
He’d alternately been kicking and congratulating himself the entire weekend on
how he’d handled Charley’s kiss. At the moment, he was back to kicking, even
though he knew she had only kissed him out of anger. That wasn’t what he
wanted. When Charley came to him, it had to be because she loved him, because
she wanted him as much as he wanted her. He would settle for nothing less.
    It had been so hard, though, to push her
away, when all he’d wanted to do was bury himself in her scent, in the taste of
her lips, the feel of her body against his. He had waited so damn long. And he
had come so awfully close to losing control.
    There was no one to blame but himself. He
had known exactly what he was doing flirting with all those women, even though
he hadn’t been interested in any of them. Some part of him had wanted to make
Charley jealous, wanted