Read Online Southern Hospitality by Sally Falcon - Free Book Online Page B

would come out roughened by his suppressed emotions. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could stand having her undivided attention on his body without doing something about it. He let out his breath in relief when she walked behind him, momentarily taking temptation out of sight.
    “Hey!” He whirled around as the touch of a slender finger drew a white-hot line down his spine. His affronted exclamation was met by a delicious giggle.
    “Sorry I startled you, but you’re so stiff. Do all Yankees look like they have a poker stuck, um, to their backbones?” Tory asked with widened brown eyes and an unrepentant grin that raised his blood pressure another twenty points.
    “I have excellent posture. It’s something to be proud of in Boston,” he replied, adjusting his jacket with a show of dignity that also kept his hands busy when all he wanted to do was grab her and shake her. Or kiss her. Anything that would have her in his arms.
    “Oh, Logan, it isn’t your posture. It’s your attitude, I think,” she said gently, as if trying not to hurt his feelings.
    “What about my attitude? Would it be better if I slouched, wore suspenders, and scratched my stomach?” As amazing as it seemed, he realized that she hadn’t a clue that she was responsible for his attitude.
    “You’re not posing for a portrait every second of the day. You can relax and still stand up straight,” she explained patiently, using her nephew tone again. “Take off the jacket and turn around.”
    He started to shrug out of the jacket, hoping they would get this torture over with quickly. Then, with the garment halfway down his arms, he gave her a suspicious look over his shoulder. “What are you going to do?”
    “Don’t worry, this won’t hurt.”
    That’s what you think, lady, he mentally shot back, but he tossed aside the jacket anyway. Tory placed her hands tentatively at the back of his neck and began to knead the stiff muscles. Fatalistically, Logan gave himself up to Tory’s delightful torture, slowly relaxing under her ministrations.
    As she worked her way down his back, he knew he was going to die a slow and painful death. The pants of his outfit had been simply snug when he first put them on. They’d become increasingly uncomfortable with Tory’s slim fingers moving freely over his body. He wasn’t going to be able to stand much more and maintain the slender hold on his sanity. Another minute and he’d have Tory beneath him on the oversized cabbage roses in the carpet.
    “Don’t move.”
    He gladly obeyed. He couldn’t have moved if he wanted to without pulling her into his arms, throwing all his noble intentions out the window.
    “Now, shake out your arms a little. Very good, Logan. Okay, walk toward me.”
    Walk? Can I do that? Yes, yes, I can, he discovered, carefully putting one foot in front of the other. It wasn’t so difficult, if he focused on the fat cherub on the piano just to the right of Tory’s shoulder.
    “No, it just won’t do. Logan, you walk like you’re on a bed of nails,” she said, shaking her head and walking toward him clicking her tongue.
    Oh, please God, say she isn’t. She is. She’s going to massage my legs. All rational thoughts left him. What happened was going to happen, he decided, looking down at the top of Tory’s head as she knelt at his feet. He might as well enjoy what she was doing. If she did the same thorough job that she’d done on his back, Tory Planchet would be as knowledgeable as his tailor in a matter of minutes. He closed his eyes, knowing a smile was stretching his mouth from ear to ear. Please, sweetheart, don’t stop now.
    Victoria, you’re amazing. This is working like a charm, she congratulated herself with complacent satisfaction, her hands working deftly over the taut muscles of Logan’s calf. He was being so cooperative, if a little stiff, and doing nothing to follow-up on his visit to her cottage. Probably thought better of it this morning, she mused, and