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She wondered and shook her head. No way. That was her curse, she supposed. Eternally optimistic and frequently disappointed.
Well, at least this relationship was purely business. She just had to remember that, even if, for whatever reason, that fact depressed her.
“So, tell me, Carolina, why do you need protection?” Jasper asked, and his rapt stare made her squirm under the thick terrycloth robe she’d slipped on.
Was it her, or did his eyes just drop to her chest? She narrowed her gaze and removed the cinnamon ginger tea bag from her mug, nodding at him to do the same.
After a minute, she got up and grabbed a package of gingersnaps she’d bought from the gas station just down the mountain. Jennifer was pretty well-stocked, and Caro did like her tea, but she adored cookies.
Obviously.
“Thanks,” he said, grinning as she offered the box of sweets.
He took a handful, and she hid her surprise. So, he wasn’t a health nut.
Very interesting.
“How much do you know?” she asked, ignoring the sexual tension in the room.
She’d only been divorced a few months, but it had been years since she’d had sex. And even then, sex with Joffrey was nothing to write home about.
Sex with her bodyguard, however…
That seemed a much more interesting prospect. Jasper leaned forward and closed his eyes while he sucked in a deep, long breath. When he opened them, she noticed they were glowing.
“Holy fuck, you’re a Shifter!” she exclaimed.
Knowing about Shifters and having tea with one while daydreaming about the naughty things she wanted to do with him were entirely different things. Excitement filled her as a million questions emerged in her mind.
“Uh, yeah, about that, Jennifer said not to—”
“Oh, puhleeze!Ask the woman to pose for you once in her Owl, and I have never heard the end of it! I mean, really, did she tell you the whole story?”
“What?”
“Look, I was a newbie back then, and I hadn’t perfected my sculpting technique. Besides, her eyes really are that big when she’s shifted,” Caro explained, holding up both their tea saucers for him.
“Um, I don’t—”
“I still don’t see her problem, but everyone is a critic these days,” Caro huffed, but she couldn’t seem to stop. “Anyway, I made up for it with that piece she keeps on her mantle.”
“Wait, slow down a sec so I can catch up.”
Jasper grinned again, and damn, there went her hooha again. Getting all crazy for the guy, like she stood a chance. If Caro hadn’t needed new panties before, she sure as fuck did now.
“You’re a sculptor, I got that part. I take it you sculpted Jennifer, and she didn’t like it?”
“Yes, I am a sculptor—and thank you for not saying sculptress, I hate that word. It sounds like a skin disease. Anyway, I don’t know. I guess, yes, she hated it, but in my defense, I was really young. Like twelve, maybe, when I did my first study on her, and let’s just say she was not flattered.”
Heat burned her cheeks, but for some reason she kept talking, in fact, she found him perfectly attentive and enchanting.
“I’m sure anything you made was perfect.”
That crazy sexy voice of his, coupled with the certainty behind his words, had her very aware of him in the closed space of the suddenly tiny kitchen.
“Oh,” she said, hypnotized by that amber fire glowing in his eyes.
Carolina was a passionate woman. Like most artists, or at least that was what she’d always assumed. But even so, she had never had such strong feelings for a stranger before.
