Knowing You by Maureen Child Read Free Book Online Page B

curled his fingers around it just to keep from reaching out and grabbing her. Squeezing it tightly, he channeled his frustrations into his grip and allowed his features to remain a hell of a lot more composed than he felt.
    Spending the night with Stevie was just not something he’d planned on. Oh, he’d thought about it a couple hundred thousand times over the years, but hadn’t really expected it to happen. Now that it had, he damn well wished he had a plan for what to do next.
    Paul Candellano was a big believer in plans. He liked knowing the odds. He enjoyed a good spreadsheet, and it was in his nature to have a reason for everything. He was, first and foremost, a scientist. Give him a puzzle to solve, a riddle to untangle, an equation to work out, and he was a happy man.
    Ask him to understand Stevie Ryan and his response to her … and he was lost. Hell, only yesterday, at his sister’s wedding, Paul had finally come to the conclusion that the only thing he could do was get over these lingering feelings for Stevie. And today there was a whole new wrinkle in their relationship. If you could call it that.
    They’d had a friendship—built in part by her closeness to his family. But there’d always been something else between them, too. Just what that was … he’d never been able to figure out.
    But whatever it was, it had just gotten a hell of a lot more complicated.
    â€œSo you’ll leave?”
    Paul pushed away from the counter and flexed his hand, tight now from that death grip on the cold,smooth marble. “Yeah, I’m going.” Like he should have gone last night. Swinging his tuxedo jacket off his shoulder, Paul shoved his arms through the sleeves and shrugged into the fabric.
    He noted her gaze shift to his chest and back up to his eyes again and he enjoyed knowing that this wasn’t any easier on her than it was on him. After all, she’d been driving him insane for years. Seemed only fair that she start feeling her share of the heat.
    â€œGood, that’s good.” Stevie nodded, bent down, yanked open a drawer, and snatched one of the clean, fresh aprons folded there. Slipping the neck over her head, she kept her gaze averted from his while she reached behind to tie the apron strings into a bow at the small of her back.
    Paul’s gaze dropped to the curve of her behind and he’d barely had time to enjoy the view before he was lifting his gaze again and telling himself to get a grip. “Right.” He adjusted the fall of his jacket, pushed one hand through his hair, then headed for the nearest way out. Slapping one hand onto the swinging door that led into the shop, he paused and looked back at her.
    She was watching him leave and he felt the power of her gaze punch into his midsection with the solid blow of a well-aimed fist. “Stevie,” he said and waited for a response.
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œLast night?”
    â€œYes?”
    His back teeth ground together and he forced himself to stand still instead of stalking across the distanceseparating them. That wouldn’t do any damn good at all. Better to just say this and call it a day.
    â€œLast night…” he repeated, “it didn’t happen.”
    She sucked in a breath, held it, then released it again in a slow rush of air that seemed to sigh into him from across the room. Folding her hands in front of her waist, her fingers clenched together until her knuckles whitened. “That’s probably a good idea.”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œSo okay then.” She paused. “We’re … okay?”
    He gave her a smile, and judging by her expression, it wasn’t much of one. “Why wouldn’t we be?”
    â€œRight.” She nodded. “Why wouldn’t we be?”
    He pushed through the door and walked across the shining wooden floors of the Leaf and Bean. His footsteps echoed in the silence and every instinct he had was