Derek assisted Summer into the passenger seat of his plush gray Lincoln—as if she needed help to climb into a car, she thought resentfully. She watched through her lashes as he slid behind the wheel. “Where to?” he asked pleasantly.
She named the nearest shopping mall.
“We’re going shopping?” he asked without evidence of distaste.
“I have to buy a birthday present for Autumn,” she explained. “Her birthday’s next week, and I need to get the gift in the mail by tomorrow or it will never get to her on time.”
He nodded. “Is that all you have planned for today?”
“No,” she answered rather curtly. “I’ll tell you the rest later.”
“Fine.” Still he didn’t start the car but sat twisted in the seat, facing her as if he were waiting for something.
“Forget how to start it?” she inquired facetiously.
“Nope. But I’d really like to kiss you again before we leave. With you awake this time.”
She flushed. “Forget it,” she told him gruffly.
He kept his face suspiciously innocent though the corners of his mouth twitched. “Not even a little one?” he asked hopefully.
She sighed. “What is it with you and kissing, Derek? Don’t you ever think of anything else?”
She knew she’d asked the wrong question as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Derek laughed. A quick, unexpected laugh that seemed to startle him almost as much as it did her. “Yes, Summer, I think of something else. I could elaborate in great detail, if you’d like.”
“No, that’s not necessary,” she
told him hastily, cheeks burning, though her heart was fluttering crazily in response to his wonderful laugh. He’d actually laughed, she told herself wonderingly, and her own lips curved into an answering smile.
“Well?” he asked humorously. “May I kiss you? Or are you only brave in your sleep?”
He shouldn’t have made it sound like a challenge. Summer never could resist a challenge. “I’m not afraid to kiss you, Derek,” she told him flatly. “I can control my emotions.”
“Prove it.”
She reached out a hand and grabbed him by the shirt collar, tugging to bring him closer. She leaned forward in her seat to meet him halfway, stopping just short of completing the embrace. When he moved no further, she swallowed. It was clearly up to her to do the kissing this time, she realized nervously. Derek was calling her bluff. Hesitating only a fraction of an inch from his firm mouth, she inhaled, then pressed her lips to his.
Surely she’d only meant to give him a brief, friendly kiss, she told herself dazedly a long time later. It surely couldn’t have been her intention to extend the caress into a passionate clinch that had threatened to steam the windows of the car and melt all the plastic on the instrument panel.
It wasn’t even Summer who pulled away first. Derek was breathing raggedly when he pulled back and sat her firmly in her seat, running his hand through his hair as he turned back to the steering wheel. “I think we’d better go to the mall,” he said huskily, “before I think of a good use for that nice big back seat.”
Summer clenched her hands in her lap and stared down at them, grateful for small favors. At least he hadn’t teased her for allowing the kiss to get so wildly out of control.
If Summer had expected Derek to be disconcerted when she walked straight into a small boutique that specialized in expensive lingerie, she was destined to be disappointed. He strolled into the shop with the ease of a man who’d spent many pleasant hours in such places. Perhaps he had, Summer thought glumly. He stood quietly aside as Summer selected a luscious black nightgown for her fiery-spirited, auburn-haired sister.
“This is for the liberated sister?” he inquired with a lifted brow, examining the filmy scrap of froth.
“Yep,” Summer replied cheerfully, picturing Autumn’s exasperation upon opening the gift. “I like to remind her occasionally that she is a woman.”
“Maybe you should try it on so we can get an idea of how it would look on,” Derek suggested with an exaggerated leer.
Summer firmly declined, though she had to turn her face to hide the flush that accompanied several unbidden fantasies of herself wearing such a garment for Derek.
While she was in the mall, Summer made several other purchases, items she’d waited until the weekend to stock up on. She blithely loaded Derek down with her packages.
“Is there anything else you’d like to buy before we leave the mall?” he asked her politely, his arms full. “Like a couple of dozen pairs of shoes?”
“No, thanks,” Summer replied airily. “Come along, Derek.”