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It’s one of those moments that makes Josh blink and look around for the director, but it’s just him, the delivery dude and Oasis on the radio, in pursuit of their elusive Wonderwall. 

Josh shakes his head, adds his thumbprint and returns the reader. “I can’t believe I just signed for a delivery of aviation fuel. What do they want with that?”

“Around here?” With a disparaging sniff for the façade of the mansion, the anonymous deliveryman wipes the back of his hand over his nose. “Probably drink it like vodka.”

With a skip and a hop up, and a smirk for good measure, the guy careens his jeep down the driveway.

Josh grimaces. “Wish he hadn’t said that out loud.” But the sunshine is stroking his skin and he tips his face up, soaking in vitamin D, and turning the inside of his eyelids as red as Scarlet’s hair. 

He doesn’t enjoy it for long. A cracking and a dull thunk from round a bend in the drive has his eyes popping open in time to catch the explosion of leaves and twigs that momentarily obliterates the nick in the landscaping.

When it clears, it reveals two people, strolling carelessly along without a care in the world except for sniping at each other. 

Josh checks his thumbs. No prickling, but the woman, a step in the lead is definitely something wicked and she has the mouth to prove it. Her halter-top is jelly-crystal pink, her capri pants are clinging white linen, and the curve of her lips should come with an X-rating, not just shimmery sugar-frosting.

“You,” she croons, zeroing in on Josh. “You said I wish.”

The man behind her slices an index finger across his throat.

“It was just a figure of speech,” Josh says slowly. “I didn’t mean it.”

He feels the effect of her pout even more than her smile, feels it all the way to his tingling toe bones and back. The woman owns the most kissable, biteable, luscious lips in three dimensions, and she knows it.