“What?” she asked with a small laugh.
“Just the obvious,” Seth said shrugging. What man wouldn’t pause to eat up the sight of her? He resumed pouring the coffee and handed her a cup. “You look pretty. I was appreciating seeing you in girl clothes.” He dropped a kiss on her parted lips. She looked up at him, a little dazed. Adorable. “I don’t get how you do Jessie so well. You’re a miracle worker. There isn’t a masculine thing about you,” he said, stroking the taut curve of her hip.
“Thanks,” she said, looking both pleased and slightly off balance, which pleased him. She was a movie star, after all, one of Hollywood’s elite. It did something to him, to know he had the power to make her blush.
To give her pleasure.
“They’re hardly girly clothes, though,” she said, glancing down at herself with a frown. “You told me not to bring any.”
She looked as if she regretted that fact when she met his stare again. He idly moved a strand of damp hair away from her cheek, glancing down over her. She wore a pair of jeans and a Jessie-worthy button-down plaid shirt. Her unbound breasts looked soft, firm and touchable beneath the cotton fabric. She wasn’t wearing a bra, which was highly distracting. She had the most beautiful breasts. He could make out the outline of her nipples through the thin fabric. The scent of tangerines tickled his nose. Everything about her teased him. Tempted him. “You could make a paper bag look sexy,” he muttered before he leaned down and kissed her temple.
His kisses on her fragrant skin were becoming more avid when he heard the spring on the toaster release. He grunted in irritation at the interruption, but he supposed he should feed her. He gave her one more kiss and reluctantly went to remove two pieces of thick multigrain toast from the toaster.
“That smells great,” Gia said from behind him. He heard a drawer slide open as he opened the lid on the margarine. When he turned around to get a knife, she was there handing him one. “So, who is Sherona Hathoway?” she asked as she watched him butter the toast, leaning her hip against the counter.
“She owns the diner in Vulture’s Canyon,” Seth explained. “John is blind, so when he came up here for getaways, Sherona used to bring him supplies. That was before he met Jennifer. Sherona’s a good person. John told me on the phone yesterday he was going to tell her we were staying up here—me and Jessie, that is. Sherona is kind of the hub of the Vulture’s Canyon social network—a term I use lightly. People around here love their solitude and isolation too much to ever behave too socially. Sherona left us this bread. Here, I already ate mine. This is yours,” he said, lifting the buttered toast toward her lips. She looked surprised by his actions, but took a bite. Her eyes went wide in pleasure.
“This is delicious.” Before he could place the toast on a waiting plate, she caught his wrist and sank her teeth into the toast again. Their gazes met. She smiled. Only Gia could make chewing the height of sexy.
“Yeah. Sherona is one of the best cooks I know,” Seth said, blinking to bring himself out of his feral focus on Gia’s mouth. “She left us three loaves of bread, a dozen eggs, two jars of preserves, two pies, some fresh vegetables and a bag of apples. Plus, she brought us two pumpkins, which I left on the front porch. All of the fresh stuff will be from the co-op in town. Sherona’s a big backer of it. Local people work the communal farm, and they distribute the food to families who might not be able to get fresh, healthy produce because they’re isolated. Or poor. It must be a familiar routine for Sherona to come up here when someone’s in residence, because John has an animal-proof wooden box out on the stoop with a lid. That’s where I found all the food after I read the note Sherona left.”
“That was so sweet of her,” Gia mused. “Vulture’s Canyon sounds like quite a unique place.”
“The people here are artsy, quirky. Fiercely independent. They’re generous and warm, too, once they get used to you, that is. They tend to be a little standoffish and suspicious of strangers.”
“Sounds like you’d fit in perfectly here,” Gia said dryly, taking another bite of toast.
“What?” he asked, wondering if he was misreading the sparkle in her springtime eyes.
“Most of those descriptors fit you, as well,” she said.
“I suppose you’re going to leave me to stew about which ones apply and which ones don’t?”
Her smile was an innocent tease. “Can we go down to the diner later, so we can thank her in person?”
“It would require you getting into makeup,” he said with a significant glance. “And putting on the act.”
A shadow crossed her luminous face. She stared at the toast in her hand.
“You really hate it, don’t you? My acting, I mean,” she said slowly, examining the toast in her fingers like she found the vision fascinating.
; “I only meant that if you want to make a trip into town, you have to be in full disguise. I thought you might not want to, once you realized all the effort involved for a casual visit to the Legion Diner,” he explained.
“No. I realize what you meant. Still,” she murmured, “there’s something about me acting that . . . rubs you the wrong way. Not just in a general sense. On some personal level.”
He absorbed what she said while he put away the margarine and opened one of the jars of Sherona’s preserves. He really didn’t want to get into this with her. Not now.
“You’re good at it,” he said shortly, opening a drawer to retrieve a knife. “I’ve never told you. You’ll end up being the best of your generation. Maybe of several generations.”
Neither of them spoke as he handed her the knife and nodded at the opened jar of preserves. She took the knife, but didn’t otherwise move.
“Coming from most people, that would be an incredible compliment. Somehow, when you say it, it sounds a little like an insult.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” he stated flatly.
Her gaze narrowed on him. “What do you mean, exactly, Seth?” she prodded when he glanced away, wariness prickling through him.