Page 176 of Coach

Okay, maybe I didn’t care about appearingthatprofessional. I was hauling furniture, for Pete’s sake.

Besides, I didn’t figure anyone would be looking at me.

It wasn’t like this delivery meant anything. It was just a sideboard. Sure, it was a solid one with good lines, smooth grain, and clean joinery. In fact, it was one of my best pieces in a while; but still, it was just a job.

I stepped down from the cab, my boots clomping against the pavement of Mateo’s driveway, andwalked around to the back of the truck to check the straps again, not because I needed to, but because I needed to do something with my hands.

Then the front door squealed open. I made a mental note to offer to squirt some WD-40 on the hinges. I carried a can—along with a toolbox most craftsmen would envy—everywhere I went.

I released the strap in my hand, turned toward Mateo’s house, and promptly forgot how to breathe. Mateo stepped into the sunlight, squinting a little, one hand raised as if he’d just been hit with a stage light.

He was . . .

Holy shit.

He was beautiful . . . and not in the fake, polished way people tried to be when they wanted to make a great first impression. He looked real, with hair slightly messy, like he’d slept in and been too lazy to fix it. For the briefest moment, I could imagine digging my fingers into that mop of inky blackness and . . .

Shit. I had to check myself. He was a customer.

A customer wearing jeans that clung in all the right places and a T-shirt that had a PhD in “accidentally hot.”

And his eyes . . .

His eyes were this warm, syrupy brown. When they locked on me, his whole expression froze. He blinked a few times, so fast I thought his brain might be glitching. It might’ve been funny if I hadn’t been worried the guy was about to have a stroke.

And then—he stumbled.

Literally, he just . . . tripped a little.

He caught himself before losing his balance, then did that fast-blinking thing again, like he couldn’t quite compute what he was seeing. For a second, I thought maybe I had something on my face or head.

“You all right?” I asked, my voice rougher than I meant it to be.

He blinked again. Three times. Damn, he was a fast blinker.

“What? Yeah. No. Yes. Sorry. Sun. In my eyes. I—uh—hi.”

Jesus Christ.

That voice.

I’d forgotten he had an accent. I mean, his name was Mateo Ricci, which in any good mystery would be considered “a clue,” but still . . .

It was soft and rich and a little too fast, like a melody I didn’t know the lyrics to. Some of the words clipped together in a way that made me feel like I was hearing them underwater—and I still wanted to hear them again. Over and over. It wasn’t just an accent; it was the sound asmooth hand makes when it caresses tender skin.

Good God, what was I thinking?

Maybe I’d just blocked it out so I could function like a human being.

“Hi,” I managed.

Which—great. Cool. I wasdefinitelynot monosyllabic and flustered,definitelynot already sweating more than the sun warranted . . . through a tank top that was suddenly very heavy and felt skimpy beneath his gaze.

Mateo smiled, and it hit me like a shot to the chest.

“Is, uh, that the piece?” he asked, waving a hand toward the truck, his accent curling around the sentence like it had nowhere better to be.

My brain had to rewind and play it twice.