Sherryl Woods - Courting the Enemy

She grinned at the boyish enthusiasm on his face and in his voice. “So, what do you do when you play hooky?”

“Well, now, that depends. When I’m all alone, I build a roaring fire, pick a book I haven’t had time to read and settle down in a comfortable chair.” His gaze sought hers and turned warm. “When I have a lovely companion trapped inside with me, there are all sorts of interesting possibilities.”

Heat shot through her. Anticipation made her feel all quivery inside. She swallowed hard. “Such as?”

“Now don’t go getting ideas,” he teased. “I’m not easy. I won’t be taken advantage of, just because we’re locked away here all alone.”

She chuckled and the tension was broken. “You’re outrageous, you know that, don’t you?”

“I do try. Now, seriously, what are our options? Scrabble? Cards?”

“I have a shelf filled with good books,” she offered.

“Oh, no, that would be fine if we didn’t have each other. Since we do, we need something we can do together.” His gaze locked on hers. “Now, there you go again, getting ideas.”

“I am not,” she insisted, but she could feel a blush creeping up her cheeks. How could he joke so easily about an attraction that she was desperate to ignore? Perhaps because he’d had more practice at casual flirtations, while she’d had none.

“Okay, then, how about…” He paused, then said, “A jigsaw puzzle?”

She stared at him, astounded. How could he have known that she had a dozen of them stacked in a cupboard for days just like this one? Had he guessed? Or had he been snooping? Surely she hadn’t mentioned it.

“Does that appeal to you at all?” he asked, his expression totally innocent. “Do you have any around?”

“Quite a few,” she admitted. “But are you sure you want to do that? It seems, I don’t know…a little tame, maybe?” Caleb had certainly never been interested in doing one with her. He’d considered it a waste of time to put something together, only to take it apart again. He was too practical for that.

Grady winked. “You’ve never done a puzzle with me. How about this? I’ll go check on the horses. You clear things up in here and get us set up with the most complicated, challenging puzzle you have. I’ll bring in some more wood for the fire when I come back.”

She nodded. “Sounds like a plan,” she agreed, already anticipating the lazy morning ahead. Even the company was surprisingly appealing. Grady continued to startle her with his unexpected insight into her personality and what would make her happy. Was that because he was incredibly sensitive and intuitive, or because he was devious and clever? For the next few hours, maybe it didn’t even matter.

An hour later they were in front of a blazing fire. The damp wood was popping and snapping as it caught. Karen had chosen two puzzles, one a detailed country scene with only five hundred pieces, the other a wickedly difficult thousand-piece image of hundreds of tropical fish. She left it to Grady to decide.

“The fish,” he said at once. He brought paper and pen to the table.

“What are those for?”

“To keep score, of course.”

“You keep score when you put a puzzle together?”

“I told you it was more of a challenge when I did it. Are you game?”

Her competitive spirit kicked in. “Absolutely.” She’d put this puzzle together once before. She knew exactly where some of the trickiest sections were and what to watch for. “How are you scoring? Total number of pieces we each put together?”

“Exactly. We have one hour.”

She looked up from her assessment of the pieces spread across the table. “An hour?”

He grinned. “After that, if it’s necessary, we work together to finish it. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” she said, and solemnly held out her hand.

Grady’s clasp was warm and brief-his attention was already totally focused on the puzzle. Before she’d even had a chance to catch her breath, he’d snapped his first two pieces together.

Karen forced her concentration back to the puzzle. She found two linking pieces of her own, then a third. Within a few minutes she had the bottom right corner of the puzzle coming together nicely.

She glanced across the table and saw that Grady was at work on the top left section, his brow furrowed, his gaze intent. His total absorption was endearing somehow. It made her wonder if he would be that totally absorbed when he was making love.

As soon as the thought crossed her mind, her cheeks burned. No more of that, she chided herself, forcing her gaze back to the puzzle. It would play havoc with her concentration.

As it turned out, it already had. Though she tried to get back into it, all the pieces began to look the same. She tried to fit together several that were wildly mismatched…as she and Grady were, she reminded herself.

Stop that! she ordered herself as his knee bumped up against hers, sending an electric current racing down her leg. Her thoughts turned chaotic again. Suspicious, she stared at him. Had the grazing of his knee been intentional? Was he deliberately trying to distract her? Was this payback for her game to ruin his popcorn the night before? If so, she couldn’t tell it from his expression. He appeared completely focused, completely oblivious to her presence, and his section of the puzzle was growing by leaps and bounds.

She shifted her foot under the table until it found his leg. To justify her uncharacteristic actions, she told herself this was war as she began a slow, upward slide, her gaze locked intently on the table as if she had no idea what was happening beneath it. Grady jolted as if she’d prodded him with a hot poker from the fireplace. She bit back a grin, delighted that she had his full attention.

That bit of distraction allowed her to quickly assemble several more puzzle pieces, and she grinned as she saw she had completed the full outline of the right side.

The next time Grady reached for a piece, she made sure she reached for it at the same time, her hand covering his.

“Oh, sorry,” she said sweetly, as she withdrew.

He watched her, his gaze narrowed. “What are you up to, Karen?”

“Up to?” she said innocently. “I just thought that piece was the one I needed.”

“Did you now?” he asked suspiciously. “Where did you think it went? Show me.”

She took it and tried it in the bottom corner. Of course, it didn’t fit. “Guess not,” she said with a shrug. She handed it back to him.

“You’re dangerous,” he said huskily. “You know that, don’t you, Karen?”

No man had ever suggested she was dangerous, and Karen discovered she liked it that Grady had. “Remember that,” she advised as she went back to work on the puzzle, deliberately ignoring him.

Naturally Grady wasn’t satisfied to leave it at that. Feeling his gaze on her, she glanced up to find his dark eyes studying her intently.

“Shouldn’t you be concentrating on the puzzle?” she inquired.

“You’re more fascinating,” he said.

Truthfully, he was more intriguing than the puzzle, too, but Karen didn’t dare mention that. The teasing actions she had meant to distract him had affected her as well. The deliberate flirting had made her a little too aware of him as a flesh-and-blood man, instead of an abstract enemy. She was losing her grip on that negative image of him, letting the barriers crumble.

When she realized that he was no longer staring at her but at the puzzle, that he’d used these few minutes to complete another big chunk, she recognized that letting her guard down, even for a second, was a mistake. It was a lesson she needed to keep in mind.

Glancing at the clock, she saw that there were fifteen minutes left in their competition. Grady had a serious lead. She couldn’t let him win. Not at this. Not at any of his games. The stakes were too high and, for one terrifying minute, she had lost sight of that.