Barefoot Brides by Annie Jones Read Free Book Online Page A

step.
    She blocked him.
    He stepped to the side away from where she had moved.
    She followed suit. When this kind of thing happened accidentally in the narrow passages between these tables, someone—usually Billy J himself—would holler out, “Hey, no dancing on dining floor, we’re a wholesome establishment, y’all!” Today, no one said a word.
    But everybody watched.
    They probably made quite a sight, too. Moxie with her cap and flip-flops looking like a fresh-faced surfer girl who wasn’t afraid of the big waves or an overgrown bossy boy. Only this wasn’t a boy.
    One look at him told anyone with eyes that the man who had jangled her down to her very last nerve was all man. Older than her, but not by much. Taller, too. Just a few inches, not enough to make it difficult for her to hold his gaze with hers.
    His dark gaze. His deep gaze. His “sleepy-lidded, superconfident but just might break into a smile that would make his brown eyes sparkle” gaze.
    Moxie wavered.
    He started to step around her again.
    She rallied back to reality and cut him off.
    He sighed. “If you’ll just step aside, I’d like to find a seat before my arteries close up from sheer proximity to this stuff.”
    â€œI don’t think so.” She meant she wasn’t stepping aside, but if he took it as a staunch defense of her daddy’s fine food fare, then so be it.
    â€œOkay, I guess here is as good a place as any to get a jump start on my first heart attack.” He slid onto the bench directly across from Vince.
    Directly over the boundary she had just tried to set. “Hey! No way. Uh-uh. Don’t even try to sit there, buddy.”
    â€œToo late. Not only have I tried it. I have succeeded.” He snapped his napkin and laid it across his knees.
    â€œOh, no. No.” She started to reach for the white paper resting on top of the faded denim of his jeans, then caught herself. “You can’t stay here.”
    â€œWho says I can’t?”
    â€œI do!” She put her hand on her chest. “ I say you can’t.”
    â€œAnd you are?”
    â€œThe person about this close to calling the police to have you forcibly removed from this place.”
    â€œHmm.” He nodded at her then shook his head slightly, the way a dog shakes his head to get rid of slobber. Then he calmly fixed his gaze on Vince and offered another instinctive reaction without regard to who might be present to suffer the consequences. He tossed off that look that all males seem capable of when they think a female is doing something irrational, ridiculous or, well, typically female.
    Vince recognized it right away. He must have, because he extended his hand in a show of instant kinship and said, “Vince Merchant. Feel free to sit and eat as much as you can in peace before the cops show up.”
    â€œDon’t fraternize with him, Vince. He’s, like, the enemy. The…the…interloper. The…the…”
    â€œNew editor of the Santa Sofia Sun Times. ” The man grasped Vince’s hand and gave it a firm shake, but those dark eyes, dancing with amusement, focused solely on her as he said, “R. Hunt Diamante.”
    â€œYou…are?” Moxie sank down to sit on the bench again, a little stunned.
    â€œAlmost nobody actually calls me ‘R.’” He grinned.
    A totally gorgeous, I-know-I-have-the-upper-hand kind of grin that, despite the sheer cockiness of it, still charmed her enough that she could hardly form a complete thought, much less sentence.
    Her stalker, Road Rage Pharaoh, this adorable man with the mesmerizing eyes, they were all the same guy. R. Hunt Diamante. The new editor. The guy who called her Maxine! The man she was going to give her card and a piece of her mind.
    Just that fast she snapped to her senses, pulled her shoulders up and stabbed her finger in his direction. “You are just the guy I am looking