"Then how do you know you won't get drunk, strip off all your clothes, and dance naked on top of the desk?"
He touched the rim of her cup with his. "Because, my Jenny," he whispered roughly, "if we were both naked on top of the desk, we wouldn't be dancing."
Her stomach did a backward somersault. She managed to tear her eyes away from the hypnotizing power of his and noticed that her hand was trembling.
"Take a sip," Cage urged in that same husky voice. Grateful for something to do, she did. The champagne was cold and biting on her tongue. "Like it?"
"Yes." She took another sip.
He moved his head closer until they were almost nose to nose. His eyes fairly smoldered. "How do you feel about…"
"About what?"
"Hot pastrami?"
Hot pastrami had never tasted so delicious. In fact, it was one of the most fabulous meals Jenny had ever eaten. As they ate he told her more about his business and was pleased with her intelligent and intuitive questions.
He couldn't coax her into drinking more than half the paper cup of champagne. When they were finished, he carefully picked up the empty cartons and put them back in the sack. "I wouldn't dare litter up your office," he said with a crooked smile.
For a long time after he left she couldn't stop thinking about both of them being naked. What had he meant when he'd said they wouldn't be dancing? But she knew what he'd meat.
And she couldn't stop thinking about that either.
* * *
The days fell into some sort of pattern, though life with Cage was always spontaneous and unplanned. It was like traveling down a mysterious jungle river. One never knew what unexpected surprise would be waiting around the next bend.
He left her small presents that shouldn't have been significant, but to someone who had never been courted, they were very much so.
A small cake with a single candle was waiting on her desk the morning of her first week's anniversary of employment. She found a red rose lying beside the coffeemaker another time. One morning when she opened the door she almost screamed. A giant teddy bear was grinning at her from her chair behind the desk.
She knew the town was buzzing with gossip about them. The tellers at the bank were shocked when she began to handle Cage's business banking. Now they were accustomed to seeing her come in on his behalf. But she could see them clustering together when she left.
The postmaster, who she had known for years, was still friendly, but now that she was handling Cage's mail instead of the church's, he looked at her in a way that made her skin crawl.
And Cage had begun attending church regularly, which really had the town gossips aflutter.
She loved the challenge of the new job and by the second week was handling every situation like a pro.
"Hendren Enterprises."
"Jenny, darlin', get your celebrating shoes on," Cage said, laughing.
Jenny could gear the racket in the background. "The well came in?" she squealed.
"The well came in!" he shouted. The roughnecks around him were already breaking out the coolers full of Coors. "Sweetheart, I'm going to buy you the biggest chicken fried steak lunch we can find. I'll be there in an hour."
"I have an errand to run. Why don't I just meet you somewhere?"
"All right. The Wagon Wheel at twelve-thirty?"
She agreed on the time and place.
But at twelve-thirty Jenny was wandering aimlessly down the main street of town, her brain registering nothing. Entranced, she stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and sightlessly gazed at the garish display of goods in the variety store's front window.
Cage drove by, spotted her, called out her name, and honked. She didn't turn around. She didn't even hear him.
He executed an illegal U-turn and whipped his pickup, which he had driven out to the drilling sight, into the only available parking space and hopped out onto the sidewalk. He jogged toward her. His boots and the hems of his jeans were caked with mud.