Fortune Found Read Free Page B

his.
    Jessie’s curtains were open this morning. They hadn’t been when he’d checked last night before he’d gone to bed before closing his own drapes as far as they would go. But there was no sign of Kelsey’s sister, then or now.
    He had to laugh a little, though, when he thought about what young Adam had said the day before and the fact that those curtains had been so steadfastly closed last night to ensure that he hadn’t been able to see Jessie put on her pajamas, or even just smile and wave when she saw him.
    Too bad.
    He wouldn’t have minded getting a glimpse of that petite body, with the great rear end that had tantalized him all the way up the stairs and the hint of firm breasts hidden beneath that oversize T-shirt.
    The weird thing was that he also wouldn’t have minded just seeing her wave to him. And for that he had no explanation.
    What was he, some schoolboy hoping for just a look at the girl next door? Just a raise of her hand to acknowledge him?
    He hadn’t felt like that since he was thirteen. He’d actually stood there for at least half an hour last night hoping she would appear. And here he was again this morning. She was something to look at, he told himself as consolation for how dumb it seemed.
    Not that he hadn’t seen—up close and personal—plenty of women who were something to look at. But a pretty woman was always something to look at. And Kelsey’s sister? She was more than just pretty. A lot more.
    When he’d first seen her yesterday, he’d recalled, instantly, the first moment he’d seen her.
    She was the woman from Lily’s party who had caught his eye over and over again, long before he’d finally been introduced to her.
    Jessie—he’d barely learned her name and he hadn’t had the chance for more than that at the time.
    Then all of a sudden yesterday, there she’d been again, in the living room downstairs. She was lovely. Downright beautiful, actually. Even in baggy jeans and that World’s Greatest Mom T-shirt. Beautiful, but in an approachable kind of way. Natural and artless. And without any indication that she was even aware of her looks.
    She had the silkiest hair he’d ever seen—chestnut brown and so shiny that it glistened as it fell to belowher shoulders around a face that no man could ignore. Her skin was fresh and flawless, interrupted by only a small, adorable dot of a beauty mark just below the corner of her left eye.
    And those eyes, big, round, cocoa-brown, they had the softest look to them. They glimmered a little—they were almost dewy. He’d had trouble glancing away from them.
    Until his own gaze had slid down her straight, thin, well-shaped nose to those lush, exquisite lips. Slightly full but not too full. Petal pink. Just the right shape. Perfect whether she was smiling or talking or doing nothing at all with them. Perfect for kissing…
    Not that he’d ever know if that was true, he reprimanded himself, shoving aside the thought by altering his view from her bedroom window to her backyard again.
    Four kids.
    Four!
    A mom—however beautiful—who had been widowed somehow and left to raise them on her own. That was a situation shouting for him to stay away.
    He was happy for his own three siblings—all married or engaged. But for himself? Marriage wasn’t in the cards.
    He’d tried it once, and once was enough. More than enough to confirm what he’d seen of marriage growing up and watching his mother do it again and again. Complicated and difficult and costly. Something that could too easily deteriorate into a very, very ugly situation—that was what marriage was to him, and as far as he was concerned, it didn’t have anything to recommend it.
    And the fact that Jessie had four kids?
    Flint wasn’t a kid person. One of the worst pieces of news he’d ever received in his life had come last month when word had gotten to