Page 23 of Drop the Mitts

She gritted her teeth, glancing around. The lot was full of other cars, but there didn’t seem to be any signs of life. She’d be fast.

Grace inhaled, stripped off her coat, and pulled her shirt over her head. She shivered and laid it out over the steering wheel, making the seams lie flat. She inserted the pin, trying to hide it under the first layer of fabric, then jumped when a tap sounded on her window.

She yelped at the prick of pain in her thumb as her head snapped up.

André stood at the driver’s side, hands shoved in his pockets, watching her like she’d just handed him an early Christmas present.

Chapter

Nine

André

André had seena lot of unbelievable things in his life. A line brawl so vicious that a guy left the ice missing half his front teeth. A goalie scoring from the other end of the rink, the puck floating in like it had divine intervention. Hell, he’d even seen a fan throw a fully cooked rotisserie chicken onto the ice in the middle of a playoff game.

But nothing—nothing—had prepared him for the sight of Grace Fairbanks sitting in the front of her car wearing khaki slacks and a black lace bra, her blond hair curling over her bare shoulders.

André stopped dead in his tracks. His brain stalled, lagging like a bad WiFi connection. She was stunning. This was what men wrote poems about. The way the light hit her skin, the curves of her body. He could only see snippets through the car window, and it was enough to make him start thinking in rhyming couplets.

His heart sped so fast, his hands tingled. When Grace lifted her head, he panicked. Since he didn’t want to get caught staring, and he was sure any movement on his part would draw her attention at this point, he went with the default. Play it off. Make the whole thing a joke. Be the asshole.

He strode up to her window and tapped, plastering a grin to his face and forcing his eyes to stay fixed on hers even though they screamed to drop south.

Grace startled, her head whipping up, her eyes wide. She looked completely, utterly horrified, her navy blouse bunched in her hands like she was debating whether to throw it at him or choke herself out with it.

For one long, excruciating second, they just stared at each other. Then, in a motion that looked physically painful, she rolled down the window.

André bent over, leaning his arm on the top of the door. “So, is this a morning ritual? Or a special perk I get for inviting you to a charity meeting?”

Grace made a strangled noise, draping her shirt over herself. “Can you give me some privacy, please?”

André tilted his head, biting his cheek to keep from laughing. “If you need help with whatever is?—“

”I don’t need help.” Her jaw clenched. “It’s a missing button on my shirt, okay? I’m not having the best morning, so—“ Her voice cracked, and she turned her head.

She flipped the shirt, opening the safety pin, her fingers shaking as she fumbled with the fabric. And just like that, his amusement flickered into something else. She wasn’t laughing. She wasn’t even yelling at him the way she usually would.

Grace ducked her head, swiping at her face like she had a stray hair bothering her, and he realized she wasn’t only frustrated. She was on the verge of tears.

Shit.

His stomach twisted. Maybe it was his fault. Maybe it wasn’t. Either way, he didn’t like it. Didn’t like seeing her like this. Didn’t like not knowing what the hell to do about it.

So he did the only thing that made sense. Without a word, he reached for the hem of his shirt, pulled it over his head, and handed it to her. “Here.”

Grace blinked at him, confused. “What?—?”

“Trade me.”

Her mouth parted slightly, but for once, she didn’t argue. Just passed him her ruined blouse, fingers barely brushing his.

André sucked in a breath, working to ignore the jolt of energy zinging from his hand to his thighs. Without another word, he turned and headed back to his truck. Because if he stayed any longer, if he kept looking at her like that, he would do something stupid.

He barely made it five steps before Grace scrambled out of her car, his shirt hanging loose over her frame. “I can’t go in there like this.”

“Do you have the button?” he asked over his shoulder.

“What?”

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