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NICOLE TURNED OFF the security system and reset it. The first thing she’d done after escrow closed was hire a company to wire the doors and windows. While she didn’t want to be paranoid, she’d had a security system ever since dealing with an obsessed fan years earlier.
With a yelp, Toby sped through the house and she leaned over to receive his frantic welcome. It helped her resist the urge to peek through the curtains and watch Jordan drive away.
“Hey, it’s all right,” she soothed the dog.
This was the first time she’d been out so late since adopting the little guy. No wonder he was relieved to know he hadn’t been abandoned again.
“Maybe I should get you a friend,” she said. She’d heard of taking a dog to the shelter and letting it pick out a feline companion. At the very least, it would tell her whether Toby was okay with cats. On the other hand, adopting another animal might be too much to handle at the moment.
Toby stuck with her as she got her computer out to check emails. She’d kept her phone turned off; it felt rude to constantly check an electronic gadget while viewing a performance or spending time with someone.
There was a message from Rachel, inviting her to call and talk if she needed to vent about Jordan. Nicole might have phoned…if it hadn’t been for the kiss. She needed time to deal with her thoughts.
It was partly her fault. She should have simply ignored the signs of the northern lights. Going to a quiet park had prompted an intimacy that wasn’t real, even if it had been charged with sexual tension. As a reporter doing a story on her, Jordan shouldn’t have succumbed, but Nicole knew she should have been smarter as well.
Upstairs she ran a bath in the jetted tub, undressed and sank into the deep warm water.
Since it was big enough for two people, the tub was another reminder that she was alone. The Realtor had almost cooled the deal when she’d raved about the amorous possibilities. Nicole had brushed it off, joking that she preferred thinking of the bathroom as a fortress of solitude.
Turning on the jets, she tried to lose herself in the sound of the water and the warmth of its swirling currents.
Jordan had definitely improved in the kissing department. But while she’d been tempted to let it go further, she had pulled herself under fierce control. He might question her motives for helping Chelsea, but she questioned why he’d kissed her. There didn’t have to be anything ulterior in it, but she couldn’t take a chance. For the sake of her friends as well as herself, she had to keep her head.
The truth was, she had a naturally romantic nature…which put her at a disadvantage. As a model, her image had often been used to promote the romantic possibilities of certain products. But roses and candlelight, kisses in the rain, sexy lingerie…nobody lived that way twenty-four hours a day. To keep from getting sucked into what other people seemed to expect, she had been forced to keep her romanticism in check.
A cold nose nudged her elbow. Toby was on his hind legs, looking into the tub. She fondled his ears and he didn’t seem to mind her damp fingers. What a sweetheart.
Being alone and heartache-free, having fun with her dog and her friends…that was the right choice for her. Discovering that physical needs weren’t easily ignored didn’t change her mind on the issue. Maybe someday she’d consider other possibilities if she was sure the guy in question was grounded in reality and could see past her bustline and polished photographs. She needed a man who could deal with life being messy and sometimes out of control.
That hypothetical man definitely wasn’t Jordan, no matter how good his lips had felt against hers.
As she pulled up old memories, Nicole recalled how defiantly he’d pretended his family was happy and normal as a kid. Since their parents had been friends in the early years, she’d picked up on some of the pain and ugliness. She had known he was putting on a show. Old habits died hard, and even from the little she had seen, it looked as if he enjoyed being a bachelor, with everything in his life organized and controlled. Definitely not the guy for her.
So the thing to do was treat the kiss as an aberration. He surely recognized it as such, and there was no need to discuss the matter; it had nothing to do with the magazine articles.
