Devon slid the bucket directly beside her chair, then reached over and pulled her to him.

She stiffened.

“You’re cold. The least I can do is keep you warm.”

She relaxed a little, glancing up at him through eyelashes that were spiked with wetness. “If that’s all you’re going to do.”

“Until you say otherwise, it is.”

They sat there, listening to the rain, their bodies gradually growing warmer. Devon rested his cheek against her hair, the faint scent of lavender drifting through the air. He always associated that scent with Kat now. Lovely and light, it seemed just like her.

Kat sighed and moved, her shoulder rubbing against his chest. Devon’s body reacted immediately. God, but she was a lovely woman. A lovely person.

The tension between them that had begun at lunch grew with each passing moment. The longer they sat together, his arm about her, her head resting against his cheek, the more insistent the urge became.

Devon lifted a strand of her hair and pressed his mouth to the tress. Wet, it curled about his fingers, clung in a way he wished Kat would. “At least your hair likes me.”

She blinked at him, a quiver of humor curling her lips. “I never said I didn’t like you.”

“Yes, but you haven’t said you did. I take that as a bad sign.”

She turned and, to his surprise, trailed her lips across his cheek. It was an innocent touch, though his reaction was anything but.

He almost gasped. “If you don’t wish me to touch you, you’ll have to forgo little demonstrations like that.”

Her brows rose. “Just a kiss on the cheek?”

“Any kiss, anywhere. They are maddening and make me want to pull you into my lap and savor you correctly.”

For an instant, heat flared in her eyes, but then her lashes slid down to hide her reaction. “I have a puzzle to solve.”

The soft words lingered in the air.

“Oh?”

“If I agree to take this relationship to a more physical level, what guarantee will I have that it won’t hurt when you leave?” She sighed, the sound sweet in the rain-wet air. “My mind and my body are at war over the answer.”

He drew her hair over his lips, savoring the silken stroke. “Sometimes the body is more truthful and uncomplicated than the mind.”

“And sometimes what seems an honest and truthful response is no more than a thoughtless reaction that would happen in a variety of other circumstances. For example, the way you might jerk away if a bee were to fly close by, or how you’d react if an ember from the fire landed near your foot.”

He smiled. “Has anyone ever told you that you think too much?”

She tilted her head to one side, her wet hair now more red than gold. “No.”

“Then they were only being polite.”