Midnight Jewels

you."
    "Are you hoping for two out of three?"
    "You're upset."
    "Damn right."
    He sat quietly for a moment and then nodded as if coming to some decision. "All right. We'll drop the subject for now."
    "Does that mean the evening is over?" she asked bluntly.
    "What do you think?"
    "Around you," Mercy admitted with a sigh, "I'm never sure what to think."
    "If it's any consolation to you, I sometimes experience the same problem around you."
    "I don't believe you. You always think you know what you're doing." She waved a fork at him. "That's a bad habit, Croft. It can lead to all sorts of problems."
    "Is that right?" He didn't seem worried, merely amused.
    "You better believe it." It wasn't much, but she did get a small amount of satisfaction out of having had the last word on the subject.
    Croft didn't take her home until after midnight. Nor did he linger on her doorstep. But just as she decided he was going to leave without anything more than a polite good night, he touched her as he had the night before. The white, scoop-necked knit dress she was wearing left her throat and the hollows of her shoulders bare and vulnerable. This time his fingers traced the faintest of patterns against her skin. Involuntarily Mercy trembled.
    The caress seemed somehow more intimate than the one the previous evening. How ridiculous, she thought wildly. By any standard the light touch should have been classified as casual, almost impersonal.
    Yet when she felt the gentle tremor that went through her senses and looked up into Croft's eyes she experienced a disorienting sensation of having just had a glimpse into her own future. It was almost as though she had read his mind. He wanted her. Mercy knew that with a woman's absolute certainty.
    But she knew it with something more than a woman's intuition. She felt Croft's desire with a new sense of awareness that was unfamiliar. It was almost as if she really
had
read his mind.
    She didn't know whether to turn and flee or throw herself into his arms.
    He turned and descended the stairs before she could decide how to handle the eerie, tantalizing sensation.
    It wasn't until she was sliding between the sheets of her bed that night that she realized he had made no mention of seeing her the next day. Sunday was her day off.
    She ought to spend it packing for the trip to Colorado, Mercy told herself firmly. She didn't need to spend it traipsing around with a man she didn't fully understand. She wasn't at all sure she wanted to understand Croft, anyway.
    Somehow she didn't think it would be safe to do so.
    She lay awake in bed for quite some time, studying the night darkened ceiling. Her thoughts drifted from Croft to the valuable book that was temporarily housed in her kitchen cupboard. Her mind and body were wide awake and she was feeling restless. The evening had ended on a note that had jangled her nerve endings the same way the shop door bell chimed its warning.
    There was an unfamiliar, oddly uncomfortable sense of physical awareness rippling through her. When she realized its source she was wryly shocked. She wasn't given to lying in bed at night aching for the touch of a man.
    Her normal bedtime thoughts usually revolved around sales receipts, book orders, accounting bills and business taxes. It had been two years since she had lain in bed and seriously thought about a man. And two years ago thoughts of her fiancé certainly hadn't done
this
to her body. This strange ache between her thighs was unsettling.
    A glass of milk might give her senses the distraction they needed.
    She got out of bed, wandered into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. Light spilled out into the dark room. She peered inside and realized she had forgotten to buy a fresh carton of milk. Scratch that idea.
    As she started to close the refrigerator door, the shaft of light swept over the kitchen closet door and she remembered
Valley
. Mercy recalled Croft holding the book in his powerful, sensitive hands, turning the old pages with great care.
    Before she could give herself time to think about it, Mercy closed the refrigerator door, switched on the overhead light and went to me closet.
    Valley of Secret Jewels
was where she had left it, snuggled innocently into its protective box. The worn leather binding gleamed dully in the kitchen light. It wasn't just age that had given the leather that burnished patina, she knew.
Valley
had been through a number of eager hands, and not all of those hands had belonged to