Page 72 of Puppy Love

As was the case with most things in life, all good things had to come to an end.

“Um, you know how I mentioned that thing about my mom?” Sophie asked as she, Harrison, and Bubbles pulled up the road to the Parks farmhouse. All three of them smelled like stale smoke and looked like dried meat, but that seemed about right. Camping was serious business. “About how she’s staying at my house right now?”

Harrison grunted a noncommittal response. To be fair, his attention was taken up with his truck’s sharp turn into the drive, but he could have at least provided a yes or a no answer. She wasn’t such a fool that she assumed a few hot sexual interludes in the wilderness would cure Harrison of his taciturnity forever, but she’d hoped they’d at least have reached the monosyllabic stage.

Alas, not even the lure of her mighty vagina was that strong. Her determination to prove the rest of herwasthat strong, however, compelled her to keep going.

“According to this series of increasingly outraged texts from Dawn, it seems she has no intention of leaving anytime soon,” she said. “She’s even talking about installing one of those beds that pulls down from the wall and making her stay a prolonged one.”

The truck came crunching to a halt, and Harrison cranked the parking brake. “Because she’s being overprotective?”

“Well, yes.”

She shifted in her seat, grateful for the need to get Bubbles comfortably out of the cab. Nothing provided a distraction quite like a puppy. They were a lot like babies that way. Slinging her bag over one shoulder and her purse over the other, she scooped the dog up and opened the door. To her surprise, Harrison was waiting on the other side. Wordlessly, he placed his hands on either side of her waist and helped her down.

His truck was tall—taller than her Fiat, certainly—but she could have easily made it down on her own. In fact, this kind of assistance, this careful solicitude, was the exact thing she resented from anyone related to her by blood. She was no small, precious thing that needed to be guarded from the world.

But as Harrison’s hands lingered and his fingers crept down toward her ass, she felt nothing but a delightfully girlish thrill. To be cherished and protected because she was perceived as weak was a thing she loathed. To be cherished and protected because Harrison couldn’t keep his hands off her was something she could get used to.

Waytoo used to, if the sudden throb between her legs was any indication.

He set her on the ground with his hands still in place. Sophie had to look up to meet his gaze, which she did with easy frankness. Just as frankly—but not as easily—she said, “The reason my mom is being like this is because of you. She heard about our, um, altercation at knitting circle and decided you were out to destroy her precious darling.”

A frown touched the corners of Harrison’s mouth. “I was afraid of that.”

“I’m sure this weekend has given her time to cool off, but—”

“You should stay here,” he said, the offer fairly tripping off his tongue.

Those words were exactly what Sophie had been angling for, but she’d expected to have to put forth a lot more effort first. This weird, old house was Harrison’s castle, his home. Considering how strongly he’d reacted when she’d brought out the candles, she’d been prepared to plead her case—and plead it hard.

With sad, raisin eyes if she had to.

“Only if it’s what you want, I mean,” he added. His hands on her waist tightened, gripping her almost urgently. “I can’t promise my dad will like having a houseguest, and it’s hardly the Ritz around here, but you did say there would be some night training, didn’t you?”

“Well, yes. But—”

“Then there you go,” he said. “We might as well start now.”

“You’re sure you don’t mind?” Her gaze searched his, but she was having a hard time reading him. The offer sounded sincere enough, but there was something shifty in the way he made it. It was almost as if he had an ulterior motive in asking her to stay.

What that motive might be, however, she had no idea.

“I’m sorry.” He dropped his hands from her waist and stepped back. “I didn’t mean to be pushy. If you don’t want to—”

“No! No, I do.” Sophie put Bubbles into his hands, once again grateful that the puppy gave her something concrete to do. Her fingers brushed against Harrison’s as they made the exchange, both of them weirdly fumbling.

Huh.Arguing with this man was easy. Sleeping with him a delight. But for some reason, this attempt at honest conversation was seriously tripping her up. The fact that he seemed just as awkward as she did helped her to add, “I do have one stipulation though.”

“Why do you sound so cautious?”

“Because I don’t think you’ll like it.”

His breath came out as a laugh. “When has that ever stopped you from doing things your own way before?”

A relieved grin spread across her face.Here, at least, she knew what she was doing. “Good point. I appreciate the offer to stay here, and I’m going to shamelessly take you up on it, but I think I should be in my own bed—my own room.”

The expression on his face fell with such speed it might have been a bowling ball dropped from the top of the Space Needle. She leaped forward to reassure him, to tell him that it wasn’t a personal choice so much as a professional one, but his dad sauntered out of the front door before she could get the words out.