Suspended by Taryn Elliott

him. He leaned on the jamb,
something she was coming to know as his I’m-going-to-play-this-cool stance. Too
bad it made her want to shake him up all the more. “Really? I’m tired of that
song. Kain doesn’t come to my room.”
    “No?”
    She folded one of the shirts, stacking it on top of the
pants. “No.”
    He stepped inside. “And you’re not interested in Kain?”
    “I’m not interested in anyone at the moment.”
    “Oh, really?”
    “Yes, really.”
    He stopped a foot away from her. “No one at all?”
    She turned to face him. “It was just fucking, remember?”
    “Right.” The gold color at the center of his hazel eyes
caught her attention. A tiny flicker of heat was alive in all the cool green.
Without the suit, he was a walking ad for LL Bean. Especially with the almost beard
he was sporting. All he needed was a plaid shirt, and he’d be like every other
man who came to the Heron. Except none of the fishermen made her feel like
Shane did. Not that she hadn’t been interested in a few over the years, but
knowing they would be leaving within a week or less tended to put a damper on
any ideas besides a fling or two.
    Most of the time it wasn’t worth the hassle.
    Most of the time she didn’t have time to think about it.
    As usual, Shane didn’t expand on that one word. The
intensity was a living thing inside him, but it was behind a wall so thick she
wondered if it could possibly be breached. Did she even have the right to
wonder? Was it even smart to?
    Their options were lousy, and nothing about this attraction
was smart. He was in her life for one purpose: to become her partner or sell
her bed-and-breakfast so they could each start a new life. Part of her wondered
what it would be like to be free to do something else, but a larger part
couldn’t face the idea of losing her home. It was everything she knew.
Everything she’d built with her mother.
    But she did have this one slice of freedom.
    A few days to see the rest of the country and forget about
responsibilities.
    She closed the distance between them until her breasts
brushed his chest. His nostrils flared, and his jaw tightened. At least she
wasn’t the only one who reacted when they were close. “So we’re really going to
drive across the country?”
    He nodded slowly. “I sold what I could and sent on the
materials for my furniture to the Heron.”
    The first fingers of annoyance crawled up her spine. “Just
like that? Without talking to me?” What the hell was she going to tell her
mother? Oh, Mom…by the way. Our home
isn’t ours anymore. We have to share it with the boy that replaced us. But
that’s okay, right?
    It just didn’t make sense that she’d even be attracted to
Shane. And yet her painfully tight nipples said otherwise. Even now she wanted
to take that final step and surround herself in the outdoor scent that was as
much a part of him as his skin.
    “I have just as much right to use the property for storage.
It is half mine.” The gruff words were chased with a gentle pull of her hair.
He wrapped the tail of her braid around his thumb.
    He was a constant source of mixed messages. Each stroke
tugged the braid lightly, keeping her nerve endings frazzled. As tempting as he
was, they were forced to be in each other’s company. Would she want to be
around him if she didn’t have to be? Would he want to be around her?
    Would this gnawing hunger exist if they’d met each other
through friends or at a Christmas party?
    She just wasn’t sure.
    She took a step back to prove that she could.
    The ache didn’t go away, but at least she could think.
“You’re right. You have every legal right to be at the Heron, whether it’s your
body or your furniture materials. I’ll call my mom in the morning so she can
direct the delivery to go into the barn.”
    “I appreciate that.”
    It was on the tip of her tongue to say Hallelujah! , but she stifled it. This was the first time he’d been
civil to her. She turned away from