Her Ideal Man Read Online Free Page A

arousing to have him touch her bare foot like that.
    For one long moment, she contemplated the forbidden fantasy of leaning forward to kiss those perfect lips, to put her hands on his princely jaw and pull him into her. A ripple of imagined pleasure rushed up her spine, and she lowered her eyes hastily, afraid he would see too much. “Maybe.”
    He let her foot go. “I think the toes are fine. Are you hungry?” He stirred something in a heavy black kettle on top of the potbellied stove in the corner. “I’ve got stew for dinner. I’d planned to eat at dark, but if you’re hungry, you can have some now.”
    Anna shook her head. “I can wait.”
    â€œAll right.” He picked up his coat. “I want to make sure there is plenty of wood. This storm might take a day or two to blow itself out.”
    â€œOkay. Do you want me to do something?”
    â€œNo. There are things to read over there on the shelf.”
    As he put on his coat, Anna realized there was one more thing she required. “Tyler, I hate ask, but do you maybe have some sweats or something that I could wear? My jeans are soaked.”
    The cool gaze flickered over her body, and without a word, he crossed the room to a bureau against the wall, tugged open a drawer and pulled out the requested sweats, a shirt and a pair of socks. He put them on top of the dresser without looking at her, and before Anna could even frame her thanks, he was out the door.
    Left in the silence, with only the howl of the wind and the crackling of the fire, Anna let out her breath. She carried her tea over to a small, low table made of unvarnished pine that sat nearby the fireplace. Her jeans, heavily wet, made her thighs feel clammy, and she carried the neat pile of clothes into the small bedroom she’d glimpsed earlier. Gratefully, she peeled off the wet jeans and damp sweater. A low fire burned in a second potbellied stove, and she stood in front of it for a moment, warming her cold legs and hands.
    The sweats were way too big, and the extra length pooled in a clump around her ankles, and the flannel shirt wasn’t much better. She had to roll the sleeves up four times to find her wrists. Padding back out to the other room, she imagined how she must look, and grinned wryly. So much for the femme fatale.
    Not that she had the qualifications, anyway.
    Warmed by the fire and tea and dry clothes, she wandered over to the books to see if he might have something for her to read. A knot of anticipation or excitement or worry made it hard to concentrate. Alone with Tyler. For days, maybe. How would she avoid making a fool of herself?
    For months she’d entertained vague, dreamy fantasies about him. About his long, gilded hair and his sensual mouth and even some other parts of him she wouldn’t admit. Just being in the same room with him made her a little giddy, made little nerves on her legs and the inside of her arms lift in anticipation.
    Classic crush. It happened. She’d seen her sisters go through it dozens of times.
    Anna had thought herself immune. Both of her sisters had gone boy-crazy the minute they turned thirteen, and spoken of little else forever after except this boy and that boy, and who would take them to what function. Anna, the youngest in her family until her last brother was born, when she was ten, had watched them with more bewilderment than anything else. She’d dated sometimes, and gossiped with her girlfriends over the phone for hours, and dreamed of the perfect man, waiting out there for her, somewhere.
    But mostly, her goal had been to escape to Colorado, and to do that, she’d known she had to have a good education and a skill that would provide her with employment when she got there. There had not been much time left for boys. Her only relationship—if you could even call it that—had been a man right after college, a director at the Metropolitan Museum. He’d been too demanding