Crush by Crystal Hubbard Page A

hair other than restrain it with a rolled bandanna. Yet she was still the sexiest thing he had ever seen. Maybe I’ve built this meeting up in my head for so long, I’ve made her something she isn’t , he considered.
    To test himself, he cleared his mind completely, slowly stood, and peeped at Miranda over the top of the mountainous floral arrangement. She slumped against the tall back of her chair and appeared to be trying to hang the smallest of her three spoons from the end of her nose. She caught it deftly each time it dropped off. Her small frame looked even tinier in the massive chair. When she set the spoon back down, her sweater shifted, allowing him to steal a glimpse of the caramel glow of her right collarbone and the graceful place where her neck met her shoulder. Lucas winced in sweet pain at the sight of her smooth, ginger-brown skin, and the front of his pants began to feel more snug. Miranda tugged her sweater back in place, pulled off her bandanna and ran a hand through her hair. The spill of warm brown caught the candlelight, and Lucas was mesmerized by the crackle of natural red highlights in her hair. She looked forward, and her eyes pinned him in place.
    “I-Is…uh…everything all right down your end?” he hedged, reaching for something to say now that he’d been caught staring.
    Miranda slightly rose, to see him over the flowers. “Everything’s fine. Thank you.”
    Her sweater slipped again, and Lucas dropped into his chair. “It’s not me, damn it all,” he cursed under his breath. “It’s her.”
    Morgan and his nattily dressed assistants brought the first course and set it before them, and then retreated from the room. Lucas enjoyed escargot avec garlique. It was one of his favorite dishes, and he was starving. But as he stared at the arrangement of steaming, buttery delicacies on his plate, he realized that his hunger wasn’t for food.
    “Miranda?” he called.
    “Yes?” She called back.
    “Are you enjoying your escargot?”
    “Yes. It’s very…snaily.”
    “Very well, then.” He set down his cutlery and began twiddling his thumbs. He listened to the sounds of Miranda’s knife and fork moving against her plate.
    “Miranda?” Lucas called again, this time startling the guilty Miranda in the middle of using her spoon to catapult snail bits into the gigantic floral arrangement.
    “Yes?” she said.
    “I’ve got Fenway Franks in the kitchen.”
    Miranda smiled. Whatever tension and unease she had felt vanished as she laughed out loud.

Chapter 3
    The “kitchen” turned out to be a stadium-sized cooking arena. The wood-fired grill in the center of the space was large enough to accommodate a baby whale when all the pits were lit, and the stone hearth built into one wall was taller than Lucas and as wide as a bus. Conventional appliances lined the wall opposite the hearth; they, too, were of commercial, rather than residential, size. The kitchen was dark and empty when Lucas brought Miranda into it.
    “Where’s the chef?” Miranda asked as Lucas flipped a half dozen switches to illuminate the vast space.
    “This is the old kitchen.” He opened one of the stainless steel doors of the refrigerator and began searching various compartments. “Conwy has three kitchens. This one, one in the staff’s lodge and one off the keep. This one is used only on special occasions. For holiday and record release parties, wedding receptions and the like.”
    “Will your chef be upset that we didn’t eat his fancy dinner?” Miranda hopped onto a counter and watched Lucas. He finally found the Fenway Franks and displayed them for her with a tease of dimples that made her sweat.
    “He’ll recover.” He turned the hotdogs over in his hands. “How does one prepare a Fenway Frank?”
    Miranda scooted off the counter and took the package from him. “Usually, you boil them in a gallon of two-week old hotdog water. Do you have a small saucepan?”
    “Probably.” He set about looking for