“That about sums it up.”
He scratched his jaw. “You’ve given me something to think on, Kenna.”
Sutton swung open the kitchen door then, calling them to the table. Beck threw a wink at Kenna and gestured for her to precede him.
Kenna twirled a forkful of pasta and let it unwind. Her appetite had apparently gone on sabbatical. Or the floating lust balloons bumping around in her stomach simply left no room for food. Although battling the urge to climb across the table and straddle the major’s lap was eminently wrong, considering her father sat three feet away, that’s exactly what she wanted to do. Highly unlike her in so many ways. She’d been at dozens of these dinners with her father, honoring one soldier or another. Mostly it turned out to be an excuse for the lieutenant general to relate his own stories. And usually the guest sent a discreet glance or nine at her cleavage throughout the meal. A perfect amount to remind her men only wanted one thing, thus justifying her plans to remain unattached. It wasn’t a cynical practice. Just a little reward for being practical. Seeing the male-female dynamic for what it was. A necessary function that rarely survived in the long term.
Beck hadn’t glanced at her rack once. Not once. He was a giant, sexy, unassuming phenomenon, and she didn’t like it. Upstairs in the old brain chamber, that is. The upstairs chamber that housed intelligent thought wanted to put him in a clean-cut category. One that made sense and didn’t throw her ideas about men into a freaking tailspin. Downstairs, however? Downstairs liked his resolve very much. Couldn’t wait to break through it when the timing was right. Shake him up again like she’d done yesterday.
Those were the two key parts of Kenna she was comfortable addressing. Upstairs and downstairs. The middle…the middle was off limits. That clumsy, clunking organ in her chest shouldn’t have sped up when Beck said sweet words. It should have disregarded them as a line. A ploy to get into her pants and finally lose that pesky virginity. And she might have pulled it off if he would just stop smiling that half smile at her across the table and start looking at her boobs and not her eyes. What was wrong with him? This bra was a man assassin, pushing those puppies up in a way that usually had members of the opposite sex groaning when she passed. She might as well be wearing a hockey jersey for all the attention Beck paid them.
Oh, it was on. In more ways than one. As soon as they were alone, she would snuff out this wayward blip on the radar screen and everything would make sense again. She’d slake her mega-watt—frankly, embarrassing—attraction for Beck tonight. He would head back to Georgia in a matter of days with his newfound knowledge of the female body and set to work using it right away, probably snatching up some chesty milkmaid or whatever the hell they had on tap down there. She’d be nothing but a fond memory to him and she could go back to meaningless, road trip hookups every few months.
Beck’s gaze met hers, one dark blond eyebrow cocked as if she’d voiced the thought aloud. Could this man read her mind? Back in the living room, she’d gotten that sense. Best to remember he was apparently one of the Army’s sharpest minds. Not just a peach farmer who not only remembered the manners he’d been taught, but stuck to them like Gorilla Glue.
“Are you sure you won’t stay past Wednesday night’s ceremony, Major Collier?”
The mind-reading major gave a reluctant head shake. “Much as I’d like to stay a while, sir, I need to be back in Georgia. My grandfather is getting on in years and needs help around the farm, harvesting the peaches and such.”
Her father wiped the corners of his mouth. “I try to imagine a mind like yours going toward peach farming and I just can’t. We need you training new recruits, here at Black Rock, passing on your problem-solving ability.”
“All due respect, sir, I put in my time.” His smile matched his good-natured tone. “I think you’d be surprised how much strategy goes into farming. My mind won’t be wasted; I’ll just be switching focus.”
Kenna took a long sip of her Diet Coke, watching Beck over the rim of her glass. No matter how personal or unintentionally condescending her father’s questions became, he kept his cool. Not a stutter or hesitation. He didn’t have to think about his answers because he was telling the truth. Somehow she didn’t have a single doubt of that. Not for the first time since they met, she wondered who would land this man. How easy it would be to trust him if a woman allowed herself.