Can't Say No by Jennifer Greene Read Free Book Online

Hart, references to bed made her nervous.
    With a frown, he let that busy hand of his snake across the table again. A very gentle forefinger flicked at a crumb on her cheek. “You know,” he said mildly, “you’re an incredibly beautiful woman, even with black streaks all over your nose. I was thinking about you all the way into town. What a pleasure it would be to have a quiet woman around for a change, one who couldn’t make demands, who couldn’t whine about commitment, who wouldn’t prattle on and on when a man was trying to think.”
    She choked, and had to grab the hooch again.
    “I’m not sure I can get out of my lease, as I told you. Been renting the same cabin for a number of years, but that glass trilevel place on top of your ravine is really something else. A perfect bachelor pad, with sauna, built-in stereo, the works. As the crow flies, we’d be within sight of each other, though would you believe that by the road it’s a half-hour drive around the mountain? Odd, that. Anyway, if you have any objections to having me for a neighbor, feel free to say so.” He paused, responding to the horror in her eyes with a slowly expanding smile. “I didn’t think you’d object. Here, finish this. Can you eat another sandwich?”
    With the last bit of sandwich jammed in her mouth, she couldn’t have talked if…she could have talked.
    She added to the list of things she detested about Hart Manning that he had no problem talking. Ceaseless, that mouth of his. Once he’d finished two more sandwiches, she thought he would leave.
    Instead, he started cleaning up the remains of their makeshift lunch, then poked around the dry sink until he’d figured out how it had been converted, rambling on about the import-export business he’d inherited from his family, a firm that apparently ran itself and left him free to travel around the world. Bree didn’t have to do much reading between the lines. He clearly didn’t care that he was presenting himself as a vagabond who lived off his family in high style, or that he had a cut-and-run philosophy where women were concerned.
    Trailing helplessly after him, she stopped listening, increasingly aware that she didn’t have the brawn to throw him out. As nosy as he was, he had to check every pilot light in the lean-to, examine the propane containers, fuss around the electrical box, and all the while prattle on in that sexy baritone about getting kicked out of Dartmouth way back when.
    With yawns and hostile body language, she did her best to communicate boredom. Staring pointedly at the door only sent him in that direction to check the lock, frown, forage through Gram’s cabinet for oil, and fix the damn thing. “I hope you had the well checked before you came here. You should have it inspected at least once a year for ground contaminants…” He glanced back to find Bree slumped in a chair in defeat, both hands cradling a chin that was wobbling with weariness.
    She gave up. She didn’t care. He could stay and talk until doomsday, and she was going to be the first recorded person in Ripley’s to fall asleep in a straight kitchen chair.
    With a strange little smile, Hart crossed to the open cupboard, set a water glass in front of her and filled it halfway with hooch. “After you finish that, have to be on my way,” he said regretfully. “I’ve got a dozen arrangements to make today. I can wait until you’ve finished every drop, though, not to worry.”
    He splashed a little in a glass for himself and raised it as if to toast her. The man was mad. Bree stared first at him and then at the unwanted liquor, then lifted the glass and downed it all in one choking gulp. A violent shiver of revulsion raced up and down her spine, but he’d be surprised at what she’d do to get rid of him.
    Hart chuckled. Before she could give the least thought to what he was doing, his hands reached for hers, pulling her to her feet. Her legs felt like Lego blocks; her spine was trying to