And her body was reacting with surprising heat.
Or maybe, she suddenly realized, that heat was coming from the fact that he was still cradling her in his strong arms.
The way he’d moved her out of the way of the too-close motorcycle had her teetering on the edge of trusting him. And on any other night, perhaps it would have been enough. But was it?
They were both splattered with mud from where he’d landed with her in his arms and now that they were safe again, she struggled to stand up, to try and right her thoughts so that she could come to some sort of rational decision.
“Wait a minute,” he said, “let me get us out of here.”
A few moments later, he put her down on the side of the road. “It really isn’t safe to be out here. Not for either of us.”
Common sense told her he was right, and yet, she was still wary. Incredibly so.
But at this very moment what other choice did she have?
Replaying in her mind the way he’d protected her from harm, Chloe finally, said, “Okay. I’ll go with you.”
She sincerely hoped she didn’t end up regretting her choice.
Chapter Two
Thank god, thought Chase, as she finally agreed to come with him. That motorcycle had scared the crap out of him. He hadn’t thought, had just acted to save her. Both of them.
Now, his instincts as a gentleman had him reaching for her backpack.
She immediately jumped back a foot. “Please don’t.” She carefully banked that quick flash of fear before saying, “I can carry my own bag, thanks.”
The way she’d leaped out of his reach could hurt a guy’s ego if he let it. At the same time, Chase knew it was just plain good sense for a woman to be on her guard with a strange guy in a situation like this.
Unfortunately, as she walked to his car, he found himself unable take his eyes off her sweetly rounded curves.
But any guy with little sisters, especially two pretty girls who got into more scrapes than he was comfortable thinking about, gave an extra bit of consideration to his interactions with women. He and his brothers might like to play—a whole heck of a lot—but none of them would ever do anything dangerous or take a woman against her will. No, they’d much rather have their women begging for it.
And this was no time to be thinking about sex. Not when he had a half-drowned woman on his hands...well, in his car, at least, since he’d promised her his hands weren’t going to come anywhere near her.
Knowing his leather interior was never going to be the same after the water and mud hit them, Chase opened the driver’s side door and slid inside. Steam rose from their clothes, condensation covering the inside of the windows, making the car feel even more intimate than it already was. Chase couldn’t help but notice that his surprise passenger smelled good, like rain and freshly bloomed flowers.
“Where were you headed?” he asked.
Instead of answering his question, she said, “If you could just take me to the nearest motel, that’d be great.” She paused for a moment before adding, “Someplace cheap would be best.”
With his plans for the evening falling apart one soaking-wet minute at a time—along with the fact that he was trying to repress the way her scent was driving his senses crazy—Chase’s voice was gruffer than usual as he offered, “Look, I’ve got a free place for you to stay for the night. We can call road assistance from there.”
It would be better to wait until she was dry and warm again to break it to her that even though road assistance would be able to pull her car out of the ditch, they probably wouldn’t be able to make it run again.
“Thanks for the offer,” she said, her words still wary, but firm, too. “Really, a motel is fine.” She shrugged, an outline of moving shoulders in the dark interior of his car. “And don’t bother calling road assistance. At this point I might as well leave my car in the ditch.”
The exhaustion in her voice fought with an underlying strength for dominance. While she clearly didn’t have the money to deal with any of this, she wasn’t sitting in his car crying about it.
Chase knew he should just take her to a motel. Lord knew she’d told him to do that more than once already. But there was no way he could leave her in some dank motel. Not if he wanted to be able look at himself in the mirror in the morning without seeing the word ass**le written across his forehead.
Besides, every instinct he possessed told him she needed more help than just a ride to a motel.
Chase had learned early on from his mother and sisters not to mess with what a woman wanted. He knew better, knew this woman would be pissed off with what he was about to do.
But none of that, none of the warning buzzers that were going off in his head, were enough to stop him from deciding to help her anyway.
He turned the key in the ignition and as he carefully pulled back onto the road, he realized he didn’t know her name. Considering he was taking her to the warmth and comfort of the large guest house at his brother’s winery—whether she wanted to go there or not—he figured a couple of formalities wouldn’t be a bad thing.
“I’m Chase Sullivan.”
No sound came from the passenger seat and, inexplicably, he found himself fighting a grin. When was the last time a woman hadn’t thrown herself at him?
Then again, this one hadn’t told him anything at all, had she? Not just her name, but where she was headed.
Something was definitely up. It would be a much better idea if he could let it go, take her to a motel so that he could get on with his night of meaningless sex with Ellen at the winery.