.
Josie edged out from behind the counter. “Philippe, mind the store for a couple hours. It looks like snow to me.”
DREW COULDN’T BELIEVE his streak of good luck. Not only had Josie agreed to stroll through Jackson Square and then down Bourbon Street with him, she actually appeared relaxed and, yes, happy.
Why she’d decided to come out with him, he couldn’t be sure. But he wasn’t about to tempt fate by questioning whatever plan the gods had in mind.
“So you grew up at the hotel,” he said quietly, watching the play of dappled sunlight on her tight, black curls.
She nodded then watched her feet as they walked. She wore flat sandals with straps that wrapped around her ankles, the ring of shells around her left ankle clinking as she moved. “In essence, yes.” She squinted at him. “And you? I mean, I know you were born in Kansas City, but you haven’t really said anything beyond that.”
Despite the heat of the day, Drew slid his hands into his slacks pockets, to hide the fact that he’d clenched them. “Nothing much to tell, really. My father left my mother before I was born. Although I think you actually have to be a couple before one can leave the other.” He chuckled without humor.
“So you think your mom lied to you?”
He stared at her. “Yes. Yes, I do. I think she’d had a one-night stand, or a brief relationship with someone, someone who never had a clue she was pregnant. Then she blamed everything on him.”
“Sounds familiar.”
Drew was curious. “Oh?”
Josie smiled softly. “Yes. The identity of my father is as sketchy as yours, and my mother always cursed him, although they’d never been married. Granme used to say something about my mother having dated one man too many.” She shook her head. “I never understood exactly what she meant until I got older.”
Drew was surprised by the lack of bitterness with which she shared her past.
“Do you and your mom get along now?” she asked him.
“No. She died five years ago.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
He lightly grasped her arm to prevent her from running into a street mime painted in silver and dressed to look like a statue.
She said, “My mother’s still alive. Living somewhere in Chicago, I think. She hasn’t been in contact with the family for over fifteen years. I couldn’t even find her to tell her Granme had passed.”
“You seem okay with that.”
Josie shrugged, her eyes clear and lovely. “I am, I guess. I mean, my granme never excused her actions when she left her old family behind to start a new family, but she never cursed her either. Merely said that everyone had their path to walk, and that was hers.”
“While yours was with your grandmother at Hotel Josephine.”
She smiled at him, challenging the sun for brightness. “Yes.”
Josie had turned them down a side street and he followed, noticing the quietness of the road compared to the constant busyness of Bourbon. The clap of her sandals sounded against the pavement.
“And the hotel…” She drifted off, staring at some undefined point in front of them. “The hotel is almost like family to me. I’ve lived in it for so long, become acquainted with her ghosts, polished her banisters, mopped her floors so many times that—”
She stopped not because she’d run out of words. But rather because she’d looked at Drew and seen in his eyes the sudden urge to kiss her.
And before he knew it, he was doing just that.
He wasn’t sure what had inspired the move. It could have been the way she spoke with such love and longing, her pink, bowed lips moving, her eyes as warm as melted brown sugar. Whatever the reason, his kiss had little to do with his ulterior motives and everything to do with the woman who blinked at him in surprise and wonder.
Then she easily returned his kiss.
5
JOSIE’S BREATH LEFT HER at the first touch of Drew’s mouth against hers. One moment she’d been walking, talking about…she couldn’t remember. The next, he was gently turning her toward him, brushing his fingertips against her jaw, and kissing her as if he hadn’t been able to help himself.
And the surprise she read in his eyes surely had to be reflected in her own.
When Drew Morrison had walked through the doors of the Josephine yesterday, the last thing on her agenda had been personal involvement of any sort. She’d traveled down that road before and knew the dead end she would eventually crash into.
But what she hadn’t factored into the equation was that she’d gone into her previous luckless relationships without using her head. Each interlude had offered an opportunity just to feel.
And feeling was exactly what she was doing now, as she stood in the middle of the street kissing an almost perfect stranger.
And enjoying it more than was safe.
Drew’s tongue slid along her bottom lip, then dipped inside her mouth. He tasted like coffee and powdered sugar from the beignets they’d gotten at Café Du Monde. He tasted like one hundred percent man. Like desire and want and need all rolled up into one nicely wrapped package.
And Josie wanted more than anything to open it.
She splayed her fingers against the hard wall of his chest and broke the kiss.
“That was…” She drew a ragged breath, her eyes turned downward. “Unexpected.”
Drew chuckled, the sound rumbling against her palm. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
Josie stared at her short, unpainted nails against his expensive Egyptian broadcloth shirt. She was dark to his light. Poor to his wealth. Yet on a primal level they emerged equals.
She knew instinctively this man could make her body feel things as it never had before. But it was time to bring her head into the equation for a change.
“Look, Drew,” she said, meeting his gaze, “I don’t want either one of us to go into this with our eyes closed.”
“Into what?”
She smiled softly. “I’m not naive. Most of the men who come down here are looking for a brief, no-strings-attached affair with a native.”
“Josie—”
“No, don’t interrupt.” She twisted her lips. “I’m not passing judgment on you, merely stating fact. And the fact is there is no hope for a future beyond this moment. I understand that.”
He ran the back of his index finger across her brow. “Josie, we just kissed.”
“No lies, Drew,” she said quietly. “That’s all that I ask. No lies. What develops—if anything develops between us—is temporary. I don’t want either one of us to pretend otherwise. That’s all. That’s my only request.”
He stared at her for long moments then nodded. “Okay.”
A simple word, really. But one that immediately smoothed the tension from her shoulders. Wiped the memories of the other times when men she’d been involved with had sworn never to lie to her then proceeded to do exactly that.
She kissed him again, long and hard. “I, um, think we’d better get back to the hotel.”
“Best idea I’ve heard all day.”
She laughed softly. “I need to relieve Philippe so he can do his job instead of mine.”
She began walking. She felt Drew’s hand on her elbow then shivered as he moved it down to grip