Hold on Tight by Deborah Smith Read Free Book Online Page A

tentatively reached out and rested her hand on his shoulder.
    “Long time ago. Doesn’t hurt anymore,” he grunted.
    “Caveman, if it means anything to you, I thought your basic lovableness showed through.”
    He twisted his head, and his eyes narrowed in a puzzled frown. “It did?”
    Dinah couldn’t help herself. She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. She knew that wasn’t wise, but for the moment she didn’t care. “It did,” she whispered.
    “Well, I’ll be,” he murmured. “You really think so.”
    The night was suddenly alive with emotion. Dinah hesitated for a sensible moment, then gently pressed her mouth to his. He shuddered with delighted surprise and took her in his arms. They leaned against the back of the bench, kissing each other slowly and thoroughly. He wrapped her hard against his chest, and when his mouth moved roughly down her neck she let her head droop back.
    “You taste so sweet!” he gasped hoarsely, his lips on her throat. “What I could do for you, Dinah. What I
would
do for you …”
    The hot, jumbled sensations inside her body made her clench the lapels of his coat for safety. “Snuggle,” she implored. “Stop. Please … please. I’m not ready … for anything … like this.”
    “Stop,” he agreed raggedly. He held her and she nestled her head into the crook of his neck. Rucker turned his head so that his cheek rested against hers, his mustache tickling her skin. “This is a helluva fantastic first date.”
    “This isn’t a date,” she argued. “It’s … I don’t know what it is.”
    “But you know what it’s gonna lead to if I hang around your town a few more days,” he murmured.
    “I have a vague idea,” she whispered weakly. “I make no guarantees.”
    “Want me to leave?”
    “Would you leave if I asked you to?”
    “Of course not.”
    Dinah laughed in resignation. “Then I might as well not ask.”
    “I sure am glad you’re so smart.”
    “There’s nothing smart about this. Two people who barely know each other, who are so different …”
    “Who need each other,” he countered. “Who fit together like two spoons in a tray. Who knew that the first night they laid eyes on each other.”
    “I laid eyes on a man with a possum on his head.”
    He sighed confidently. “I’m just perfect. I admit it.”
    She placed a hand over the center of his chest and let the reverberation of his soft laughter send pleasant ripples through her body. Dinah began to laugh too. Moonlit nights were meant for lunacy, she assured herself. Tomorrow she’d get back to normal.

Three
    “And he said he’ll never eat any food that’s still wearing its overcoat,” chortled Myra Faye Hayes, the algebra teacher. “That includes enchiladas and oysters.”
    A rousing chorus of laughter went up around the table in the teachers’ lounge. Dinah sat down and opened her container of tuna salad. “I can only assume,” she said dryly, “that you’re discussing Rucker McClure.” In the bright, crisp light of day, last night’s temptation seemed very removed from reality. Had she really had such a splendid time?
    Don Barkley, the shop teacher, nodded happily over his baloney sandwich. “He’s my kind a’ man. He wrote in that book of his,
Loving a Dixie Gal
, that the ideal woman is an excheerleader who majored in home ec at college. She has a beehive hairdo, and wears high heels at all times.”
    More laughter. Dinah’s lips flattened into a thin line. She popped the tab on her diet soft drink and frowned, not having heard this particular information about Rucker’s taste in women before. Yes, it was amazing what moonlight, fragrant autumn air, and expert masculine lips could do to her good sense.
    “I like the characters he writes about in his column,” noted Gita Smith, the English teacher.
    “Oh? What characters?” Dinah asked nonchalantly.
    “Well, there’s Miss Hunstomper, his secretary. Hesays she used to be a female wrestler. Then there’s