Sandra Hill - [Jinx] by Pearl Jinx Page B

regardless.”
    “And why is that?”
    “He needs to be needed.”
    “Says the shrink?”
    “You don’t have to be a psychiatrist to know Mark is hurting. This project could be a jump-start out of his depression. And developing the cavern into a tourist site would be a new career path for him.”
    “You’ve thought all this psychobabble through, huh?”
    “Don’t be sarcastic. Not everyone has to be a gloomy gus all the time.”
    “Gloomy gus?” He smiled, and Lord, his smile could make a nun melt. Reaching out, he used his fingertips to twine an errant strand of her hair behind her ear. “You shouldn’t look at me like that.”
    She didn’t need to ask what he meant, but she did press her lips together just to make sure her tongue wasn’t hanging out. “And you shouldn’t touch me.”
    “That was not touching, baby. Believe me, when I touch you, you’ll know it.”
    “What a macho thing to say!”
    “Ya think?” Raking the fingers of both hands through his short hair, he stared at her. “You know that we’re going to end up in bed together, don’t you?”
    She shrugged. “Maybe.”
    He arched his eyebrows in question. When she remained silent, he said, “Please don’t tell me you were serious about the baby making.”
    “I was serious, all right.”
    “And that would be your condition before letting me in?”
    Letting him “in”? Ooooh, boy, I am in over my head.
“I didn’t say that.”
    His eyes raked her body. Slowly. And you would have thought she wore a bikini and not a long-sleeved PSU sweatshirt, jeans, and hiking boots. And a stupid hard hat scrooching her hair down. He was probably fixating on her freckles again.
    “I’m good,” he said.
    I don’t doubt that for one minute. Navy SEAL. Stam-ina and all that. But if he thinks he can disconcert me so easily, he’s got another think coming.
She laughed. “Hey, sailor, I’m pretty good myself.”
    That got his attention. She could tell by the slight tensing of his jaw and the flare of his nostrils. He was an expert at hiding his emotions, though.
    He leaned his head down, inch by inch, giving her every opportunity to pull back. Instead of kissing her, though, he laved her lips with his tongue, then blew against the wetness.
    Kiss me.
    Still only a hairsbreadth away, he whispered against her mouth, “I want to lick you. All over. Till you beg.”
    “I don’t beg,” she rasped out.
Kiss me.
    “You will,” he promised, swiping his thumb across her bottom lip.
    Kiss me. Dammit!
    Never actually touching her with his mouth or his hands, he moved his lips from side to side, over and over, almost but not quite kissing her.
    It was the most infuriating, tantalizing thing he could do. And he knew it.
Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me.
    He was running a fingertip, light as a feather, along the curve of exposed skin from her chin to her collarbone, then back up.
Who knew I was so sensitive there?
    Claire couldn’t let this man have the upper hand like this. “We’ll see who’s the one to beg first.” With a grunt of disgust, she took him by the ears, tugged him closer, and kissed the bejesus out of him. Then she drew back slightly, nipped his bottom lip with her teeth, and swung around, walking away.
    She thought she heard him moan.
    Moaning was definitely the first step toward begging.
    Unfortunately, his moan made her feel like begging.
    Time flies when you’re having fun . . .
    By the end of day two of the project, they had chipped away fifty gallons of rock flakes and chunks. Speck by speck. Minute by minute. Still, half the boulder remained.
    With the improvised pulley system they’d erected, those up on the ledge filled the metal buckets, which went down to those on the path, who carried the debris outside, where it was dumped into a sinkhole to be covered later with topsoil and grass seed. It was a painstaking procedure, but necessary to maintain the integrity of the cavern.
    He glanced over at Claire and Mark, who were on the