First Impressions by Nora Roberts Page B

face was streaked with mud from his own fingers. The hands pressed against his chest were slippery with it. The grip on the back of her neck lightened until it was a caress. The hand at her hip roamed absently down her thigh as he lowered his eyes to her mouth. Slowly, without any conscious thought of doing so, Vance began to draw her closer.
    Shane saw the change in his eyes and was suddenly afraid. Did she really have the defenses she had bragged to Donna about? Now that she was certain she loved him, could there be any defense? It was too fast, she thought frantically. It was all happening too fast. Breathless from the race of her heart, she scrambled up.
    “I’ll beat you to the creek,” she challenged, then was off in a flash.
    Pondering her abrupt retreat, Vance watched her run around the side of the house. Normally, he would have considered it a ploy, but he found it didn’t fit this time. Nothing about her fit, he concluded as he rose. Oddly, he realized he didn’t seem to fit either. He hadn’t realized he could find anything amusing or enjoyable about wrestling in the mud. Nor had he realized he could find a woman like Shane Abbott both intriguing and desirable. Trying to organize his thoughts, Vance walked around the side of the house to find her.
    She had stripped off her boots and was wading knee-deep in the rushing creek water. “It’s freezing!” she called out, then lowered herself to her waist. At the shock of cold, she sucked in her breath. “If it was warmer, we could walk down to Molly’s Hole and take a quick swim.”
    “Molly’s Hole?” Watching her, Vance sat on the grass to pull off his own boots.
    “Right around the bend.” She pointed vaguely in the direction of the main road. “Great swimming hole. Fishing too.” Shivering a bit, she rubbed at the front of her shirt to help the water take off the worst of the mud. “We’re lucky it rained, or else the creek wouldn’t be high enough to do any good.”
    “If it hadn’t rained, your car wouldn’t have been stuck in the mud.”
    Shane shot him a grin. “That’s beside the point.” She watched him step into the water. “Cold?” she said sweetly when he winced.
    “I should have pushed your face in,” he decided. Stripping off his shirt, Vance tossed it on the grassy bank before scrubbing at his hands and arms.
    “You’d have felt really bad if you had.” Shane rubbed her face with creek water.
    “No, I wouldn’t have.”
    Glancing up, Shane laughed. “I like you, Vance. Gran would have called you a scoundrel.”
    He lifted a brow. “Is that praise?”
    “Her highest,” Shane agreed, rising to rub at the thighs of her jeans. They were plastered against her, molding her legs while her shirt clung wetly to her breasts. The cold had her nipples taut, straining against the thin cotton. Involved with cleaning off her clothes, she chattered, sublimely unaware they left her as good as naked.
    “She loved scoundrels,” Shane continued. “I suppose that’s why she put up with me. I was always getting into one scrape or another.”
    “What kind?” Vance’s torso was wet, cleaned of mud now, but he stayed where he was. Her body was exquisitely formed. He wondered how he hadn’t noted before how perfectly scaled it was—small round breasts, wasp-thin waist, narrow hips, lean thighs.
    “I don’t like to brag.” Shane worked the mud from the slippery sleeves of her shirt. “But I can show you the best way into old man Trippet’s orchard if you want to snitch a few green apples. And I used to have a great time riding Mr. Poffenburger’s dairy cows.” Shane sloshed over to him. “Here, you haven’t got it all off your face.” Cupping some water in her hand, she lifted it and began to clean his face herself. “I tore my britches on every farmer’s fence for three miles,” she went on. “Gran would patch them up saying she despaired of my being any more than a hooligan.”
    With one small, smooth hand, she