Flash Point (13 page)

Before he could stop himself, he pulled her hand into his. Her eyes widened with surprise.

“Your shop’s not as bad as it could’ve been. The fire stayed pretty contained to your office, where Walt started it in the waste bin.” He hesitated. “I’m not going to lie, there’s some smoke damage, but you should be fine with insurance. Be back on your feet before you know it.”

“I sure hope so. This could kill my business.” She clutched his fingers, then bit her lip and looked away.

“It won’t. We’ll arrange a huge grand re-opening. You’re already the talk of the town, Kate. Everyone will be lining up to support you.”

A wan smile flickered on her mouth.

He cleared his throat, which suddenly felt too tight. “So, I ran into your parents in the hallway. Told them I’d drive you home when the hospital discharges you and take care of you.”

“You?” Kate glanced at him in surprise again, her sharp gaze searching his.

“Yeah, they’re heading back to Portland now. Said they’d call you tonight.”

Her mouth flapped open as she clearly tried to make sense of what he was saying. And since he didn’t want there to be any more doubts, and more confusion, it was time to lay it all on the table.

“I’m sorry, Kate,” he said quietly. “You were right. About me. About everything. I was bitter, trying to prove I didn’t need a woman for more than a few nights. And you were just another woman moving through the revolving door.”

Hurt flickered in her eyes and she tried to pull her hand away, but he tightened his grip. His stomach roiled and his muscles were coiled with tension. Even though it was hardly hot in the room, beads of sweat broke out on Todd’s forehead.

“But I knew when you left me last night how wrong I was. That no matter how much I didn’t want to give a woman that much power, didn’t want to fall in love, it was too late.”

Shock mingled with hope in her eyes, but he could see her fighting it, not wanting to believe. She shook her head and her mouth tightened.

“And even then, Kate, I was too damn proud to admit it. To tell you.” His voice trembled as he relived the fear from last night. “But when I realized you were inside the bakery, saw it burning, it became so clear everything I was about to lose. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

Todd watched the wall around her crack, saw that she finally believed him and her eyes shimmered blue with sudden tears. He cupped her face, brushing the moisture from the corner of her eyes.

“You have every right to tell me to go to hell, Kate, I deserve it. I thought I knew what love was, but I was wrong.
You
showed me what it meant to be in love. To love someone so much that thought of losing them makes you literally sick to your stomach.”

Tears spilled down her cheeks, faster than he could wipe them away, and she began to tremble. He leaned down and brushed his mouth across hers, before kissing her damp cheeks.

“I don’t want to take care of you for the next few days, Kate,” he admitted softly. “I want to take care of you forever. I want to marry you. Have kids with you. Grow old with you.
I want it all, Kate
.”

“Yes. Oh, yes. I love you, Todd.” Kate wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him, whispering, “And I want it all too.”

Todd blinked, surprised to find his eyes misting a bit, as relief raged through him. His chest tightened, swelled with an emotion he’d denied for too long.

He clutched the sexy woman in his arms, never wanting to let her go. Knowing he’d never be stupid enough to again. She was his sweet Kate, whom he’d known his whole life. There was no doubt anymore. No hesitation.

“I love you so much,” he murmured again against her hair and sighed when she lifted her mouth to his again for a kiss.

It was damn shame he’d fought destiny for so long, he thought, kissing her deeply. But he had plenty of years to make up for it.

About the Author

Shelli read her first romance novel when she snuck it off her mother’s bookshelf when she was eleven. One taste and she was forever hooked on romance novels. It wasn’t until many years later that she decided to pursue writing stories of her own. By then she acknowledged the voices in her head didn’t make her crazy, they made her a writer.

Shelli currently lives in the Pacific Northwest with her daughter. She writes various genres of romance, is a compulsive volunteer, and has been known to spontaneously burst into song.

Look for these titles by Shelli Stevens

Now Available:

Trust and Dare

Theirs to Capture

Four Play

Seattle Steam

Dangerous Grounds

Tempting Adam

Chances Are

Anybody but Justin

Luck be Delanie

Protecting Phoebe

Holding out for a Hero

Going Down

Command and Control

Flash Point

Coming Soon:

He’s afraid of losing his grip. She’s about to untie his last knot…

Command and Control

© 2010 Shelli Stevens

Holding Out for a Hero, Book 2

Megan Asher has a thriving career, looks, self-confidence to spare. It all means little without the love of her life. Trevor has returned from deployment in Afghanistan a haunted man, emotionally distant and unwilling to connect—except in bed. Then even that fragile thread snaps. Brokenhearted, she is forced to call off their wedding and, after a few months’ separation, try to move on.

With every aspect of his life spinning out of his once-legendary control, Trevor Wyatt convinces himself that Megan is better off—and safer—as far away from his demons as possible. Until he comes back to town for his brother’s wedding, and discovers Megan is dating.

Suddenly realizing what he’s thrown away, he vows to breach the fortress she’s built around her heart. They come together in a cataclysm of rekindled passion that unleashes the very demons he never wanted her to witness.

Back to square one, Megan realizes she must take the ultimate risk to slip past Trevor’s defenses. Give him control in the one place she can. The bedroom. The seductive move is one she prays will be the first step in helping heal him and their love.

Warning: This book contains a tormented military hero and the sexy woman he’s determined to win back. Mild BDSM and kink, and blow jobs of the beverage and non-beverage kind.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Command and Control:

Megan’s breath hitched at his not-so-subtle implication. Her breasts swelled beneath his gaze and a liquid heat seared through her body and gathered heavy between her legs.

Keep the control, Megan. You can’t let him see how much he affects you still.

“Perhaps you could be more specific?” She arched a brow. “And if this is legal advice, you realize I have a fee.”

He laughed, the deep, sexy sound sending a wave of shivers down her back.

“I’m not here for legal advice, Megan.”

“No? Then what are you here for? Because, in case you haven’t noticed, Trevor, I’m working. And I can’t spend my time—”

“Planning dates with a guy named Henry?”

So he’d heard that? A flush worked its way up her neck, but she kept her expression impassive.

“Why are you here, Trevor?” she asked again.

“You’ll have to tell him no.”

Megan stilled. “Excuse me?”

“Henry boy. You’ll have to tell him that you can’t have dinner with him tonight.”

This time she let out a slow, throaty laugh that had his eyes darkening further.

“And why is that?” she asked.

“Because you’re having dinner with me.”

The hell she was. Megan let the smile on her face become a bit sympathetic.
 

“I find it best not to go to dinner with my exes,” she murmured and pushed back her chair to stand. “Now if you’ll excuse me—”

“Because there’s so many of them? Exes?” Trevor asked, standing as well and blocking her escape from where she’d been about to slip past him. “We were together for two years and before that, I remember you saying there was no one serious.”

Annoyance sparked in her belly and it pricked her to realize she probably wasn’t hiding it from her eyes now. “This is all a bit irrelevant, Trevor. I’m not having dinner with you.”

He slowly made his way around her desk, and she took a few steps backward, her pulse quickening and her mouth going dry.

“Come on, angel, just admit it,” he said softly, advancing upon her. “The idea of dinner with Henry does nothing for you.”

“Henry happens to be a very nice man,” she said quickly, her back literally against the wall now.

Oh God, if he came any closer—and there, damn it he did! Their knees were nearly bumping now. She drew in a sharp breath, but it only filled her head with the scent of him. His shampoo and soap that was painfully familiar. The faint hint of his cologne. Megan had the urge to nuzzle his neck, to flick her tongue and see if he still tasted the same.
 

You’re crazy, Megan, get it together.

“Tell me about this Henry guy,” he commanded softly, his gaze sliding over her face, searching her eyes. “Does he wear starched suits and bowties?”

“Actually, he doesn’t.” They were just regular ties.

Her heart thumped wildly against her rib cage and the proximity of his body to hers had every tiny hair on the back of her neck lifting up in awareness. Why oh why didn’t she share an office with anyone? Most of her days were spent on the phone with clients, answering e-mails or doing paperwork, but very rarely did anyone come in.

She was alone with Trevor unless she forced him to leave. And right now—though her brain was screaming at her to throw him out on his cocky ass—her body was begging him to stay. To stop just looking at her and to touch her. Because she missed him so much. She missed being held in his arms and kissing him. Touching him. Talking…though the talking had ended long before the kissing had.

Every muscle in her body was coiled with tension. With need.

“I’ve always loved you like this, Megan.” He reached out and traced the lapel of her blazer. “But you know that, don’t you? All prim and proper in your trim little suits.”

“Trevor—”

“Nobody could possibly know by looking at you just what a little animal you are in bed,” he muttered thickly, his fingers gliding back up her lapel and then inward, to trace the neckline of her silk camisole. “How when you come hard you can scar up a man’s back with those claws of yours.”

His words had her biting back a throaty moan. Even as her nipples tightened and dampness gathered in her panties. She could see it in her head. Could almost feel his cock pounding into her again as the weight of his body pinned hers to the bed.
 

No, sex won’t fix anything.

“Remember that time when we first started dating, when I fucked you in this office?” he asked. “When I bent you over that desk right over there, lifted your skirt, pushed those tiny panties you love to wear aside and just took you?”

Her sex clenched with an ache to be filled, because she did remember. But she shook her head, trying to make him stop verbalizing such a sensual memory.

“Remember how you begged me, angel?” He smiled. “’Cause I sure do.”

“Please…”

“Does Henry make you feel like this? Does he know that kissing the small of your back makes you whimper like a bitch in heat?” His voice dropped an octave as his finger dipped under the neckline of her top to caress the swell of her breasts.
 

Push him away. Tell him to stop
. But she couldn’t. Didn’t want to.

“Or when he’s sucking on your tits, are you biting your tongue not to call out my name?”

“Trevor,” she pleaded huskily, arching into his touch.
 

“Yeah. Just like that.” And then his head descended, his mouth slanting across hers.

Megan couldn’t have resisted even if she’d wanted to. She cried out as his lips plundered her, as his tongue thrust fiercely against hers as if to remind her just who was kissing her. As if she could ever, ever forget.

Loose ends have a way of tripping you up…

Creative License

© 2011 Lynne Roberts

Years ago, a law school graduation weekend in Vegas had been part of Lily MacPherson’s plan. Waking up next to a naked Adonis with a ring on her finger was not. After a quick annulment, she relegated Caleb Anderson to her late-night fantasies—and very short list of mistakes—until his voice on the other end of the phone asks a favor that could shake the foundations of her neat and tidy future.

Caleb is still haunted by Lily’s horrified expression that morning in Vegas. At least it had made it easy to set her free…except they aren’t. The papers were never filed. And when the nosy patroness who could launch his painting career insists on meeting his “wife”, does he confess, or call Lily? He calls Lily.

When she steps off the plane, Caleb’s determination to play tour guide disappears in the San Francisco fog. Lily thought she could keep up the pretense for one weekend, cut the last tie to her past, and move on. But their chemistry still pops and sizzles, finally exploding into passion at Caleb’s studio.

It’s everything they remember…but so is the yawning chasm of differences that, in the end, could once again drive them apart.

Warning: Contains balmy ocean breezes, coffee as seduction, the creative use of melted chocolate, and naughty shower lovin’ that gives new meanings to the term “shower head”.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Creative License:

Lily swallowed. A predatory light had come into Caleb’s green eyes. Her fingers paused on a button. What was she doing? “Caleb, I…” She breathed in as his lips brushed the skin above her collarbone. His breath warmed her flesh. Her legs trembled and she knew without his support, she’d sink to the ground. And isn’t that where she wanted to be? On the floor with Caleb thrusting inside her?