Adopted Parents by Candy Halliday Page B

took, Nate intended to make that happen.
    As he entered the main room of the cottage, socks in hand, still looking for his shoes, a knock at the door jerked his head around. Nate’s first thought was that something was wrong. Hallie and Roberta never came down to the cottage. They always used the intercom that connected the cottage to the house if they wanted to communicate with him.
    Nate tossed the socks onto the sofa and, his shirt still unbuttoned, hurried to open the door. Hallie was on the other side.
    But not the unkempt and frazzled Hallie he’d been seeing for the past three weeks. Her hair was clean and shiny, her makeup was on and the off-the-shoulder green sweater she wore was just revealing enough to take Nate’s thoughts to the night she had taken her shirt off on the dance floor.
    “I thought we’d eat alone tonight,” she said. “So we could talk in private.”
    Nate looked down at the tray she was holding.
    There were two covered plates along with silverware wrapped in linen napkins, wineglasses turned upside down and one bottle of red wine already uncorked. All the requisite pieces for a dinner for two. Alone. Just the two of them.
    Damn. He really didn’t want alone time with her.
    “Is that a problem?” she asked when he didn’t respond.
    “No. Of course not,” Nate said, stepping aside.
    She walked past him heading for the banquette built into the kitchen’s breakfast nook. Nate’s gaze fell to the back of her jeans—a little loose from the weight she’d lost but not loose enough to keep his pulse from kicking up a notch. Yep. This could go very wrong.
    She looked over her shoulder as she placed the tray on the table. “Go put on something comfortable. I’m not Roberta. You don’t have to dress for dinner with me.”
    Nate obeyed, partly because he needed a minute to put together his game plan. No matter what his libido wanted there would be no seduction tonight. He’d listen to her, answer appropriately and hold on to whatever gruesome images necessary to keep from picturing the two of them getting tangled in the sheets.
    Belatedly he registered her words. She wanted to talk in private, making Nate wonder what they had to talk about that was so private. It wasn’t as if Roberta didn’t know everything about the situation they were in.
    Not another rendition of what had happened ten years ago, he hoped. Hopefully, they’d put that issue to rest forever. But you never knew with women. Sometimes women had to talk an issue to death before they could move on.
    Nate groaned at that thought.
    He walked to the dresser in his bedroom and grabbed a T-shirt from the drawer, then took a pair of jeans from the drawer directly below it.
    Or, Nate decided as he changed clothes, maybe Hallie had spent the afternoon thinking over his proposal. Maybe she’d decided that she would go back to work. That would certainly explain the sudden transformation—in her appearance and in her attitude.
    She seemed more confident. Not so rattled and on edge. And she didn’t look as if she were ready to cry at any minute. By the time he finished changing Nate had convinced himself that whatever Hallie had to tell him was good news. Why else would she show up unexpectedly with food and wine?

    H ALLIE HAD ARRANGED everything while Nate changed. She’d even poured the wine. But Nate’s comfort had little to do with why she’d told him to go change.
    Her own comfort was her concern.
    She’d almost dropped the tray when he’d opened the door, his shirt unbuttoned, his tanned six-pack abs staring her in the face. Unfortunately, it wasn’t until Nate emerged from the bedroom that Hallie realized asking him to change was a big mistake.
    He would have eventually buttoned his shirt. But the black T-shirt he now wore hugged every muscle. And he looked so good in his faded jeans Hallie took a long swallow from her wineglass to hide her gulp.
    He slid onto the bench seat across from her.
    “Roberta’s lasagna,”