Page 29 of Puppy Love

His power stance had no effect on Sophie. “You should smile more,” she said.

He jolted as if struck. “What?”

“I was just thinking that you don’t smile enough. You’d be so much prettier if you smiled.”

He glanced around the kitchen, half-expecting Oscar or his dad to pop out of a cupboard, laughing their asses off. “Is this a joke?”

“You’re not bad-looking, you know. I mean, your wardrobe is a little rustic, and I’m not sure what you have against the sharp edge of a razor, but you’d be surprised how much a smile can transform a man. Go on—try it.”

He riveted the kind of stare on Sophie that could—and had—send many a man scurrying for cover. Harsh it might be, but it was a necessary skill set as far as he was concerned. Working as a wildfire firefighter wasn’t for anyone who could only commit halfway. Each contract the Department of Natural Resources offered in the summer was for a minimum of two weeks—two weeks of pain and hard work, of exhaustion unlike most people would ever experience. If a recruit couldn’t make it through a few hours of Harrison’s rigor in the training field, there was no way they’d make it when the harsh realities of Mother Nature’s wrath hit.

And, yes, that applied to his personal life too. Harrison was cold. Harrison was callous. Harrison was closed off in ways that prevented intimacy of any kind. The sooner people learned that about him, the less hurt they’d feel in the end.

And bypeople, he of course meant Sophie.

“Um. I think we can safely call what you’re doing right now a frown. Your lips are supposed to go the other way—see? Like this.”

Sophie punctuated this statement by demonstrating her own smile. The brilliance of it, the simple and radiant joy, had Harrison’s chest growing tight all over again.

“Now you try.”

A few days ago, the idea of smiling for no reason other than because a woman demanded it would have sent him running for the hills. Today, he only wished these things came as easily to him as they did to other men.

As if recognizing this, Sophie drew forward, enveloping him all at once in a swirl of sensation. She didn’t wear any kind of scent—probably for the sake of the dog training—but he could still smell her as she came near. It would have been impossible not to. Warmth and life radiated off her, the gentle aroma of soap and fabric softener wafting through the air like a cloud.

It wasn’t just the smell of her though. He couldfeelher, even though she had yet to reach out and touch him. Her presence was that strong.

“Here. Let me help you.”

Even though Harrison knew what was coming, he was powerless to stop her. He could no more have raised a hand to Sophie than he could have to the furry pineapple who’d taken up residence in his home.

“Sophie,” he warned as her thumb started to snake its way toward his lips. The closer that thumb came, the less he felt like smiling. All we wanted was to kiss the wide pad of that digit, run his tongue along her skin until she felt the tug inside her gut as strongly as he did. “I can’t.”

“Sure you can. I’ve seen it.” She paused. “You have a really good smile, Harrison. Probably the best I’ve ever seen.”

“I do not,” he protested.

Sophie made the motion of an X over her chest. “I wouldn’t lie about something that. You have my word.”

“You’re just saying all this as part of your plan to push me.”

“Maybe. But that doesn’t make it any less true.”

He had no idea whether or not to believe her. Reason told him not to give in to the lure of her, the promise of a woman who could make him feel so big and so small at the same time. The rest of him, however, wanted nothing more than to give her exactly what she demanded.

“It’s just a smile, Harrison,” she said, her voice low. “How much damage could it possibly do?”

She has no fucking idea.

Casting aside all scruples and warnings, he took her wrist and loosely circled it with his fingers. It took almost no strength to hold her that way. Every muscle in her body stilled the moment he made contact, her eyes wide and unblinking as she looked up at him. Even now, with him shackling her wrist, his body thrumming with the roiling sensation of frustration, she didn’t back down.

She had to realize how dangerous it was to poke him. To taunt him this way.

She didn’t.

“We’re getting closer, I think,” she murmured, gazing up at him the same way Bubbles did. Full of adoration. Full of trust. “All you have to do now is—”

He didn’t bother waiting to find out what she had planned. The overwhelming urge to kiss her took over first—and it did so with a vengeance. Not content with sweeping down and crushing his mouth to hers, he began running through a virtual checklist of All the Bad Ideas.