Read Online One Good Friend Deserves Another by Lisa Verge Higgins - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Lisa Verge Higgins
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no choice but to close this gallery. The dust—”
“I’ll keep it contained.”
“—and the wires. They pose a hazard.”
“I’ve taped the wires down good.” He popped his head down for a moment, scanned the room, and then—shockingly—blatantly—her bare legs. “And I don’t think any ten-year-olds will be wearing shoes like that.”
Wendy’s arches prickled. She’d worn strappy red sandals, a bit higher in the heel than usual, but she’d been in that kind of mood this morning. The I’ve-been-worn-down-by-my-fiancé-and-my-mother-so-I’m-going-to-wear-red-heels-and-pretend-I’ve-got-it-all-under-control kind of mood. It clearly wasn’t working. Because when Gabriel’s gaze slipped back up her body, his leisurely perusal felt like a feather tickling her inner thigh.
She took a swift sip of her skinny latte. She really should eat a healthier breakfast, even if it meant not losing the last six pounds before the wedding.
Honestly, she knew exactly what was going on here. She’d known since the first day she’d laid eyes on this broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped hunk of man. She was all too clear about the fundamentals of sexual engagement. She’d been an anthropology major, after all. She’d written her thesis on the courting rituals of the Wodaabe tribe of Cameroon.
Here’s the thing with Gabriel Teixeira: Gabriel was a handsome man waltzing into her life in the vulnerable months before she married. It was no surprise that she would simply and strongly respond. Her thoroughly physiological reaction to Gabriel’s knee-melting gaze was an evolutionary impulse. It was her body urging her to take in a variety of genetic material before settling down with one mate.
You know, like a bonobo.
And there it was, categorized and labeled. Now she could put it firmly behind glass.
“I have no choice,” she said, swiveling on one of her slim red heels. “I’ll call downstairs and see about closing the gallery.”
“Wendy, hold on.” He climbed down the ladder, bracing the enormous coil of wire against his shoulder. “I almost forgot. I found something this morning that I want to show you.”
He let the coil slide off his shoulder to fall in a cracking heap on the floor, raising a puff of dust. Then he pinched something off the pile of flotsam near the bottom of the ladder and straightened to hold it out toward her.
She approached, drawn by the sight of a pair of grime-encrusted spectacles. She noted the small circular lenses and the delicate, blue-steel wires. “They look very old,” she murmured. “Turn of the twentieth century, maybe.”
“I found them sitting inside the ceiling on a beam. Probably been there for a hundred years.”
He turned them over in his hands, examining them with the kind of respect she was used to seeing in white-gloved experts of primitive art.
“Can you see some poor worker,” he said, “finishing the ceiling and then, when it’s all closed up, patting his pockets for his glasses?”
“He must have been frantic.” She reached out to wipe some grime from the lenses. “They were expensive in those days.”
She’d leaned in too close. Gabriel was a good head taller than her, so different from Parker, who topped her by only a few inches. More than that, she felt the warmth of him, and his scent of dust and burned wire and an honest man’s labor, and, strangely, the faintest aroma of resin, a perfume that teased the corners of her memory.
She noticed his paint-flecked knuckles and abruptly understood.
She blurted, “You paint.”
She saw the surprise flicker in his eyes. Saw, too, the darkness of emerging stubble on his cheek, a prickly little line of it following his jaw.
“I do paint.” His voice was a rumble. “Not houses. Canvases.”
“Of course.”
She took a step back and felt herself blushing. Not a swift pink tinge to her cheeks, but a full-blown flush rising up from the collar of her silk blouse, the kind of embarrassed glow that would
“I’ll keep it contained.”
“—and the wires. They pose a hazard.”
“I’ve taped the wires down good.” He popped his head down for a moment, scanned the room, and then—shockingly—blatantly—her bare legs. “And I don’t think any ten-year-olds will be wearing shoes like that.”
Wendy’s arches prickled. She’d worn strappy red sandals, a bit higher in the heel than usual, but she’d been in that kind of mood this morning. The I’ve-been-worn-down-by-my-fiancé-and-my-mother-so-I’m-going-to-wear-red-heels-and-pretend-I’ve-got-it-all-under-control kind of mood. It clearly wasn’t working. Because when Gabriel’s gaze slipped back up her body, his leisurely perusal felt like a feather tickling her inner thigh.
She took a swift sip of her skinny latte. She really should eat a healthier breakfast, even if it meant not losing the last six pounds before the wedding.
Honestly, she knew exactly what was going on here. She’d known since the first day she’d laid eyes on this broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped hunk of man. She was all too clear about the fundamentals of sexual engagement. She’d been an anthropology major, after all. She’d written her thesis on the courting rituals of the Wodaabe tribe of Cameroon.
Here’s the thing with Gabriel Teixeira: Gabriel was a handsome man waltzing into her life in the vulnerable months before she married. It was no surprise that she would simply and strongly respond. Her thoroughly physiological reaction to Gabriel’s knee-melting gaze was an evolutionary impulse. It was her body urging her to take in a variety of genetic material before settling down with one mate.
You know, like a bonobo.
And there it was, categorized and labeled. Now she could put it firmly behind glass.
“I have no choice,” she said, swiveling on one of her slim red heels. “I’ll call downstairs and see about closing the gallery.”
“Wendy, hold on.” He climbed down the ladder, bracing the enormous coil of wire against his shoulder. “I almost forgot. I found something this morning that I want to show you.”
He let the coil slide off his shoulder to fall in a cracking heap on the floor, raising a puff of dust. Then he pinched something off the pile of flotsam near the bottom of the ladder and straightened to hold it out toward her.
She approached, drawn by the sight of a pair of grime-encrusted spectacles. She noted the small circular lenses and the delicate, blue-steel wires. “They look very old,” she murmured. “Turn of the twentieth century, maybe.”
“I found them sitting inside the ceiling on a beam. Probably been there for a hundred years.”
He turned them over in his hands, examining them with the kind of respect she was used to seeing in white-gloved experts of primitive art.
“Can you see some poor worker,” he said, “finishing the ceiling and then, when it’s all closed up, patting his pockets for his glasses?”
“He must have been frantic.” She reached out to wipe some grime from the lenses. “They were expensive in those days.”
She’d leaned in too close. Gabriel was a good head taller than her, so different from Parker, who topped her by only a few inches. More than that, she felt the warmth of him, and his scent of dust and burned wire and an honest man’s labor, and, strangely, the faintest aroma of resin, a perfume that teased the corners of her memory.
She noticed his paint-flecked knuckles and abruptly understood.
She blurted, “You paint.”
She saw the surprise flicker in his eyes. Saw, too, the darkness of emerging stubble on his cheek, a prickly little line of it following his jaw.
“I do paint.” His voice was a rumble. “Not houses. Canvases.”
“Of course.”
She took a step back and felt herself blushing. Not a swift pink tinge to her cheeks, but a full-blown flush rising up from the collar of her silk blouse, the kind of embarrassed glow that would
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