“Can Grandma bring us over after we get back from Chicago to work on Lucy again?” Brendan asked Eric.
“I’ll take any help I can get,” Eric replied.
“Can we, Grandma?”
“Sure, if it’s all right with your mother,” Brigit said. Colleen became aware that everyone was staring at her. Eric’s gaze might have been the most interested of all. Nervousness flickered in her belly. Was it really wise to allow her children to get involved so early, when she’d just decided to attempt the risky adventure of seeing Eric?
“Mom? Can we?” Brendan prodded.
She smiled. “It’s fine with me. As long as I get to help, too.”
What choice did she have, really? Eric was becoming part of the family. It wasn’t just because of Colleen that he’d become friends with her children.
“Yes,” Brendan said triumphantly before he wandered off to see what was happening on Jenny’s show. His bandages had been removed a week ago, and much to Colleen’s relief, her son was now walking without a limp or experiencing any pain.
After her mother left, Colleen helped Eric clean up the mess from the living room while the kids became absorbed in another television show. When she entered the large, modern kitchen carrying several soda cans, she was highly aware that he was just behind her. Ever since what had happened in the car earlier, she felt both more comfortable around him and more hyperaware of him at once.
She smiled as he tossed a handful of candy wrappers into the garbage. “The last of his Halloween spoils. At least I hope so.”
“I’m glad I’m his orthopedic surgeon and not his dentist.”
Colleen snorted with laughter and turned to the sink, prepared to clean up the few dishes they’d used during dinner. Eric caught her hand, halting her. She turned to him in surprise. His expression was somber as he studied her, but as usual, his eyes were warm as they moved over her face. He reached for her other hand. He held both next to his legs. Her knuckles pressed against his outer thighs. Since when could the sensation of hard male muscle beneath jeans seem like the height of eroticism?
She really needed to get a life.
“Brendan told me that he and Jenny are spending the holiday weekend in Chicago,” he said quietly.
She blinked, the seemingly innocuous statement striking her as charged. “They always go visit Marc after Thanksgiving,” she said, perhaps a little defensively.
A small smile pulled at his mouth. Her lips trembled. She stared fixedly at his collar as he dipped his head and spoke next to her ear.
“I know you weren’t sending the kids away with any illicit purpose in mind,” he said. “But it is a good time.”
“It is?” she whispered. His face was only inches from hers. He possessed a Grecian nose—straight and bold. For some reason, the combination of his nose, his mouth, cleft chin and jaw were nearly as compelling as his dark eyes. Her gaze was often drawn downward…especially when he stood this close.
He nodded and released one of her hands. He used it to brush a tendril of hair off her cheek. She shivered at his light touch.
“Yeah. For us to go out.”
“Go out?”
“Yeah…on a date? Friday night?”
She blinked. The thick sexual tension she’d been experiencing fractured slightly. The word date sounded a little mundane. Every sense organ seemed to go on high alert at Eric’s touch. Her body, at least, seemed to want much more than just a date with Eric Reyes. “Oh…a date. Like the movies?”
“Uh-huh,” he murmured before he brushed his warm, firm lips against hers. Her body went on red alert once again. He kissed her cheekbone and spoke near her right ear. His breath against her skin made her tingle with delight. It reminded her she was alive…an exciting, vibrant woman.
“I pick you up, we go to dinner and a movie, we talk. A date.”
“A date,” she repeated, as if she’d never heard the word in her life. It took on a whole new meaning when Eric said it. “Okay.”
He leaned back slightly and smiled. “Yeah?”
She nodded and stared up at him, transfixed, her desire swelling. Then she freed her hand and grasped his shoulders. She went up on her toes and touched her lips to his.
She kissed him like she meant it, and when Colleen threw herself into something, she made it count.
When they separated a moment later, both of them were breathing heavy. Eric looked like she’d just hauled back and clobbered him with a club.