Cathy Gillen - Lone Star Valentine

Just looking at him made her quiver deep inside.

Oblivious to the sensual nature of her thoughts, he ambled closer and handed her the papers, their fingers touching briefly in the process. “I thought you might like to see a copy of the motion for dismissal for your own files.”

She did, but...seeing him again so soon, being alone with him, was something else entirely. Wishing she weren’t so attracted to him, she swallowed to ease the parched feeling in her throat. “You could have emailed it to me...via attachment.”

The corners of his lips twitched at the exaggerated lack of enthusiasm in her voice. He stepped closer, his eyes heavy lidded and sexy. Smiled. “I wanted to see how you were doing.”

Better. Since you walked in the door...

Lily pushed the unwanted emotion away. She stiffened her spine. “I’m fine, as you can see.”

And she did not need his protection.

She did, however, temporarily need his legal help. Heart racing, she flipped through the brief. His legal rebuttal was just as she expected—concise and hard-hitting. She sighed in relief. “Looks good.”

He flashed a wry smile. “Thanks.”

Unsure whether it was the long-simmering, never-acted-on attraction or nerves from all the turmoil of the day causing the butterflies in her midriff, Lily took the document back to her desk and dropped it into her briefcase. She turned back to him, all business now. “So you’re all done with your part in my case?” Which meant they’d no longer need to see each other. At least in that regard.

He gave her a long, thorough once-over, then returned his gaze to her face. “Unless Liz needs me again, but yeah, you can consider me officially off the clock.”

“Speaking of fees...” She dreaded calculating his hourly rate—which was bound to be exorbitant—times the six or so hours spent. “What do I owe you?”

His hand stopped hers before she could open her checkbook. “Nothing. I work for Liz.”

Trying not to notice how the width of his shoulders blocked out the fading winter sunlight, she eased away from his touch. Although the morning had been sunny and clear—almost warm—the weather had shifted again, bringing in cooler temperatures and dismal gray skies. Trying not to feel as depressed as the vista encouraged her to be, she tilted her chin and continued, “Then what do I owe Liz on your behalf?”

He spread his palms and remained maddeningly aloof. “Nothing.”

Trying not to wonder if the rest of him was as big and capable as his hands, she gave him a look. Waited.

He shrugged again. “I’m doing this pro bono.”

Charity? He was doing this as a charity case? Anger warred with pride. It was true, her salary as mayor wasn’t much, but she didn’t need much since she had accrued some savings before running for public office. “I don’t need your professional largesse, Gannon.”

A contemplative silence fell. He gave her a slow, reckless smile that quickly set her heart to pounding. “You really want to pay me back for my help?”

Talk about a loaded question! She regarded him matter-of-factly, letting him know with a glance she did not want to owe him any other favors, either. “Absolutely,” she snapped. “The sooner the better.”

He edged closer, inundating her with the sandalwood and spice scent of his cologne and the brisk, masculine fragrance unique to him. “Then how about dinner—tonight?”

Lily blinked. “Are you for real?”

Another slow, seductive smile. “Very.”

She drew a quavering breath, held up a staying hand and reminded herself all the reasons why not. “We went through this eight years ago. I’m not going to date you, Gannon.”

He comically palmed his chest, as if he’d received a major blow to his heart. Or was it his ego? she wondered. Then he frowned at her in reproof, adding wryly, “I wasn’t asking for a date, Lily. I was asking if you wanted to go out to dinner with me.” He waggled his brows mischievously. “But...if you want to call it a date...”

Lily flushed in embarrassment, as he had obviously meant her to. “I don’t,” she responded. Pausing, she narrowed her eyes at him. “And I can’t have dinner with you because when I’m not working, I’m with my son.”

“No problem,” Gannon said, not the least bit discouraged. “We can take Lucas with us.”

Without warning, she felt an intimacy she didn’t expect welling up between them. Most of the men she met viewed the fact she had a child as a major deterrent. Not Gannon. “You really are serious about this.”

His lips took on a sober slant. He stepped closer. “I’d like to get to know your son—and I need to talk to you.”

Lily’s pulse raced at the gentle undertone in his low voice. “About?”

Their eyes met, and Gannon regarded her seriously. “Becoming friends again.”

* * *

JUST THE THOUGHT of that, Gannon noted in disappointment, was enough to cause Lily to take a step back, away from him.

She held up a delicate left hand, conspicuous only for its lack of wedding and engagement rings. “That’s not really necessary, Gannon,” she told him archly.

“So you’re saying you forgive me for the things I said after we graduated from law school?” When they had still technically been friends. Although he had never stopped wanting something more...

Lily raked her teeth across her soft lower lip. “You were right about Bode, Gannon. He was all wrong for me.”

The knowledge brought Gannon no comfort. He followed her back over to her desk. “You didn’t think so at the time. In fact, as I recall, you accused me of being jealous of what you had with him.”

She shot him an uncompromising look. “Weren’t you?”

More like worried . Because Gannon had seen, even when Bode was merely a backup quarterback who’d spent his first three years in the NFL sitting on the bench, that he wasn’t the kind of guy who would ever give Lily even a fraction of the love and attention she deserved. A hunch that Bode had proved true shortly after he became a star.

Because then he had dumped Lily. Pronto. And hadn’t cared that she had been pregnant with his child.

But seeing no reason to go into that—Lily had suffered enough humiliation due to her ill-considered end-of-law-school liaison with Bode Daniels as it was—Gannon merely folded his arms across his chest. Stood, legs braced apart. “I never stopped wanting to date you.”

Lily looked surprised. As if she had never known he had wanted to be anything more than friends after she had rebuffed his advances that first year at UT Law.

Figuring it was time they cleared the air, Gannon went on, “But, by the same token, I wasn’t going to waste three years waiting to see if you would change your mind and eventually go out with me after all.”

Frustration and regret crossed Lily’s face. She held out her hands beseechingly, came closer. “Had I not been in my very first year of law school when you asked me out...had I not seen all of our friends who got seriously involved or married to someone in their first grueling year of professional school eventually have their relationships destroyed amidst all the stress and pressure, I probably would have gone out with you.”

“But you didn’t want to risk it.”

She started to speak. Stopped. Then tried again. An invisible emotional wall went up. “I wanted you to be friends with me, the way we never had been when we were growing up.”

“And I was.” Although, given how much he had yearned to make her his woman, it had been hard as hell keeping things light.

Her eyes grew stormy. “I wanted us to use that first year to build a foundation for whatever came next, assuming something came next, not just jump heart-first into an affair that was pretty much guaranteed because of the pressure-filled circumstances we were in, as first-years, to crash and burn!”