Can't Say No by Jennifer Greene Page B

he had to spend some time scouting out the territory inside the peasant blouse. A poor choice, she should have thought of that.
    Still, she figured she’d done a fairly good job of getting her message across…particularly when for a few moments one could have heard a pin drop. Hart just stared with those eyes as dark as the woods behind them, no expression on his shadowed face that she could read.
    And then he slumped back, drawing a hand over his face. A shudder racked his body. Bree scowled. Another shudder, and suddenly his ridiculous guffaws were filling the night. He stumbled back. He said something, but he was so choked up with laughter she couldn’t make out his words.
    With no respect for his suit whatsoever, he collapsed on the grass with his head bent over his knees, laughing in absolutely uproarious humor.
    Bree leaped up and hurled the pitchfork off to one side. Funny, was it? She ran down the steps so fast she nearly tripped, her hands on her hips and her hat gone flying. “You… varmint. You…”
    The croaking voice seemed to be coming from miles away. Bree was too incensed to care. The hoarse whisper cracked and stuttered and creaked like a rusty record, but it gradually gained momentum. “You skunk! You egotistical, domineering, patronizing, know-it-all, interfering, insensitive, overbearing, pushy, sneaky…”
    The litany just kept coming.

Chapter Seven
    Still seated on the ground, Hart wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. Leaning back on his elbows, his mouth twisted in a lopsided grin as Bree hovered menacingly over him. “Honey, you’re talking!”
    She was so mad she was shaking, words tumbling out like spilled rusty nails. “How many women do you have up there anyway? Thousands? If you think you’re camping out here again tonight, you’d just better not count those chickens, Manning. You wouldn’t be welcome here if I were a ninety-year-old virgin. I’ll sleep in the same room with you again when hell freezes over. You wouldn’t know a moral if you were painted with them. You—”
    “Keep it up,” Hart encouraged. “You’re doing terrific, Bree.” He leaped to his feet, grinning hugely. Upright, he let out one more exultant whoop of laughter and started stalking toward her. “Honey, you’re talking! ”
    Bree was not to be diverted. “You wouldn’t know a principle if it shot you between the eyes. You have the sensitivity of an ox. Insensitive? Dammit, you’ve been cruel. You’re cruel and you’re pigheaded—”
    “You did it, honey! You finally did it!” With another bellow of laughter, Hart tugged off his jacket, balled it up as if it weren’t the most luxurious Italian linen Bree had ever seen and hurled it at the moon.
    She lost a little of her momentum, having completely run out of breath and being slightly stunned to see his expensive jacket decorating a bush at the edge of the woods. When she glanced back to him, her eyes narrowed warily and she folded her arms protectively across her chest. He was advancing very slowly, with a devilish grin that boded trouble for her sanity. She backed up a step. And then another. “Hart. I don’t know what you’re thinking, but don’t. ”
    “ You, lady, owe me a thank-you.”
    “A thank-you!” she sputtered incredulously. “All you’ve done since I’ve met you is interfere and order me around and act like a patronizing, chauvinistic—”
    “Hey. You’re talking, aren’t you?”
    Actually, she was still retreating, until the back of her skirt rubbed against the porch step. Her tormentor continued to stalk. She put out her hands in a gesture pleading for mercy that would have made a hardened criminal turn chivalrous. Hart kept coming. “Now just listen —”
    He raised his arms, clearly with every intention of snatching her. She ducked before he could and, grabbing her skirts so she wouldn’t trip, darted out of his reach and down the porch steps. She lost a boot in the process. Feeling like a perfect fool,