Trespass (27 page)

“Good idea. At least I’ll know I didn’t imagine them.” She leaned on the counter next to him, letting the scoop neck of her tank slide down a little more. “So what were you doing up on that ridge this afternoon when you so kindly saved my butt?”

Erik gave up trying to calm his unruly body. As long as she was leaning against the counter like that it was a lost cause. “I was looking at the stock tank. Rancher who owns the land had some sick goats. Claimed it was because somebody poisoned his tank. We need to have the water tested.”

Her head snapped up. “Oh shit.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t think the situation was good, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”

“It is if we’re thinking of planting a vineyard there.” Morgan rubbed her hand across her forehead. She looked like her headache was back. “Ciro is going to freak. And I told him I’d pitch the vineyard to Dad.”

“Take it easy. We don’t know what’s wrong up there yet. The water could be bad, but it could just be something that was dumped in the stock tank. Particularly since somebody also pushed you down that hill.”

He put his hand on her shoulder, reassuringly. At least he thought it was reassuring. A moment later, he wasn’t so sure. His hand rested on smooth bare skin, silky and warm. He smelled lavender and rose and hints of wine. And she was watching him with those eyes—rich, dark brown, like chocolate kisses.

All of a sudden, he felt a little dizzy. He leaned forward, almost without thinking. She rose slightly to meet him.

Her lips were soft, warm. He inhaled her sigh, tasting wine, then angled his mouth against hers. Her mouth opened beneath his lips, but he wasn’t going to do anything about it. This was just a quick kiss, an intro as it were. Nothing serious yet.

And then it was.

Morgan’s mouth opened wider and his tongue plunged deep, tasting, sensing. Warmth and smooth deep wetness. Without thinking, he raised his hand to her breast and felt the hard pebble of her nipple against his palm. Heat flashed again at his groin.

Somewhere his brain went on red alert.
Danger, danger, Will Robinson.
His body surged right ahead, hardening almost instantly. The warm weight of her breast filled one hand and he rubbed his palm against the other, her faint moan raising prickles on his scalp.

She held her hands at the sides of his chest, then smoothed them around his body, pulling herself tight against him. Erik heard a melodic chirping and wondered if it was him or her.

Until he realized it was his cell phone.

He stepped back, eyes closed, trying to catch his breath. His face was damp with sweat. “Sorry,” he whispered, clicking open the cell with one hand.

A routine traffic call, fender bender on Highway 16. But by then he knew he had to go anyway. He turned back to her, tucking his cell in his pocket, trying not to think about what had just happened.

And what had almost happened.

Her eyes were huge, her mouth a thin line. “I didn’t…” she stuttered, then stopped.

“I’m sorry about the call,” he said quietly. “I’m not sorry about the kiss. Not hardly.”

She still watched him, as if she were trying to make up her mind about something. Then the corners of her mouth edged up, slowly. “Drive carefully.”

“I will.” He smiled back at her, breathing again. “Sleep well.”

“I will.”

Erik headed for his truck, listening to the voice screaming in his head.
What was that? What the hell was that? You’ve got more than enough on your plate, Toleffson. You’ve got two months to prove yourself. Keep your mind on your freakin’ job. You’re supposed to be in control here, remember?

No question. He was definitely going to concentrate on his job and nothing else. He was going to make this work. Definitely. But the smell of lavender and roses and dry white wine lingered in his head all the way back to town.

Secretly wanting her—no problem. Her not-so-secretly wanting him—big trouble.

Just My Type

© 2010 Erin Nicholas

The Bradfords, Book 3

There’s only one problem with the woman Jason “Mac” Gordon wants: his best friend’s little sister is off limits. Way off limits, and too young and innocent for the likes of him. From past experience, he’s learned to hide his not-so-nice preferences from the nice girls he seems to attract. That definitely includes the woman he’s always thought of as a sister. At least until recently.

Sara Bradford always gets what she wants—which is partly Mac’s fault. After all, he helped spoil her. So she has no intention of taking his no for an answer on anything—least of all his refusal to sleep with her. He thinks she’s too innocent? Fine. She’ll simply get un-innocent and show Mac that she wants him—the good, the bad and the nipple clamps.

When Mac’s plan to drive her away works too well, he’s forced to follow her to a tropical paradise, determined to make sure she doesn’t find her wild side with anyone but him. Once she gets a real taste of what he likes, he’s sure everything will go back to normal.

That’s until he discovers a slight kink, er, flaw in his logic…

Warning: Contains hot sex at the beach, kinky online shopping—and yes, cotton-candy-flavored body powder does exist.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Just My Type:

He pulled his mouth from hers, loving how she followed him with her lips for a moment, not wanting to let him go.

“I want to see you naked. Now.”

She nodded, looking slightly dazed. “Let’s go to my condo.”

He shook his head. “Now.” He watched her look around the empty restaurant. It was past lunch and before dinner, so there wasn’t a crowd—or an audience—but there was no way sweet Sara would get naked in public.

“Here?” she asked.

He crossed his arms and tried to look disappointed. “I like a streak of exhibitionism,” he said. He did too. He’d had sex in more than one public restroom and in two storage rooms he could think of. And there had been a couple of times in his car in public parking lots. And an elevator. They hadn’t had sex, but he’d gotten an eyeful between the twenty-second floor and the lobby.

Definitely not nice-boyfriend material.

The idea of taking Sara up against the wall of a toilet stall didn’t sound appealing. Sara was too good for that. But she would remind him of that and it would be a moot point.

“Okay.”

Belatedly he recalled the tattoo parlor from the night before and the way she’d stripped her bikini top off without a second thought.

She started in the direction of the ladies’ room and then turned to look over her shoulder. She slid the strap of her dress down and as she stepped into the enclosed hallway the dress slipped down off of her left breast.

Mac went from hard to granite in less than a second. Dammit. This was already backfiring.

He tossed another twenty on the table, stalked over and grabbed her hand and headed out of the restaurant, swearing under his breath. He was obviously going to have to go a lot further to convince her she didn’t want a part of his games, his sex life, or his…life.

The sick feeling in his gut at that thought was probably because he was still hungry.

It was going to take an actual demonstration to give Sara a full picture of what she did
not
want for as long a they both should live.

A cab was stopped along the curb a half block away and Mac headed after it, giving a sharp whistle to catch the cabby’s attention. Fortunately, Sara had pulled her dress back up to cover herself.

Once they were settled in the backseat, he once more did as Sara had accused him and used money to get what he wanted. He handed the cab driver thirty bucks and said, “Take the long way back, mind your own business and don’t look in the rearview mirror.”

When the man nodded his consent and pocketed the money, they pulled away from the curb and Mac said to Sara, “Do you have panties on?”

He didn’t look at her, but in his periphery saw her pivot to face him.

“Yes. Well, a thong.”

Damn
. He wasn’t sure this game was such a great idea. Still, he had to keep going. He had to push her into discomfort in order to push her away.

“Take it off.”

She sat and stared at his profile for several seconds. Then, without a word, she lifted her butt off the leather seat, reached up under the skirt of her sundress and pulled the underwear off.

He couldn’t help but look then. The thong was white. Virginal white. And tiny.

He held out his hand and she put the warm silk in his palm. He cupped his fingers around it and then slipped it into his front pants pocket.

“Now come here.”

Without hesitation, she slid across the seat. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her into his lap, one knee on each side of his thighs, making her straddle him. Without panties. Mac took a moment to compose himself so his voice wouldn’t come out as a squeak. The backseat of a cab wasn’t new to him either, but he’d never felt this wound up before.

“Let me see your nipples,” he told her, finally letting himself look at her face.

She was flushed, breathing hard, her lips slightly parted and her eyes full of heat, surprise and anticipation. She reached up and pushed the straps of her dress off her shoulders, then peeled the straps down, taking the upper portion of the bodice down as well.

Her breasts bared, her nipples prominent, she sat on his lap, waiting for his next move.

“Put one in my mouth.”

He kept his hands firmly around her thighs, just above the knees, not daring to even twitch a finger for fear his hands would never stop until Sara was naked and begging him to take her hard, right there in the cab.

What made him nearly lose it, still in his boxers and blue jeans, was that Sara didn’t hesitate to respond to his commands. She pushed up slightly off his lap, her hands going to his shoulders, to put her right breast in front of his mouth, then leaned forward, offering the tip.

Mac’s tongue tasted it first. He flicked over the hardened nipple, causing her to moan. Then he closed his lips around it, kissing gently, before he sucked, once soft, then harder, making Sara squirm on his lap and her fingers tighten on his shoulders.

“Mac,” she whispered. “More.”

He sucked again, willing his own fingers to lessen their grip on her thighs as he fought the wave of lust. He licked, sucked and licked again. Then switched to the other side with only a slight turn of his head. She knew what he wanted—and what she wanted—and she shifted to give him access to the left breast as well.

Several delicious minutes later, he gave her the next order. “Touch yourself.”

Finally, a hesitation.

“What do you mean?”

“Squeeze your nipple.” He figured they could start slow.

She lifted her hand to her right breast and took the tip between her thumb and forefinger. She tugged gently and sighed with pleasure.

Mac was amazed at his willpower. Everything in him screamed at him to take her, but he was still clothed and his hands hadn’t left her thighs. Impressive. Or stupid. Still, he was going to congratulate himself for what he could, because in the next few hours, maybe days, he wasn’t going to be the nicest guy in the world.

A minute later, God proved His existence—and that Mac wasn’t completely off His list—and they arrived in front of the resort.

“Cover up,” Mac told her. When she was slow to respond to his instruction, Mac slipped the straps of the dress back up to her shoulders as the cab stopped.

He threw thirty more dollars into the front seat and slid from the cab putting Sara on her feet first and then nudging her along in front of him.

Without a word, they walked toward her condo, not touching but overwhelmed with awareness of one another. He needed to shock her, he needed to push her sexually, he needed to turn her off, but everything he did she kept right up with.

Dammit. He’d been here before. And regretted it. He wasn’t doing that again. Guilt was not something he lived with well. He hadn’t forgiven himself for the past, and he hadn’t forgotten, but he was strict about his reparation, which made him feel better.

He’d made himself choose between women who wanted meaningful relationships and women who could match his sexual preferences, understanding that, for him, they didn’t mix. In his life there were no women who might fall in love with him, no women who might require him to remember anniversaries, no women who batted an eye at having their hands tied during sex.

And now there was Sara. She couldn’t fit into his life either, but she was the first in a very, very long time that he wanted to. He had to get to Sara’s no-way-in-hell limit damned quick.

He needed to get creative.

Trespass

Meg Maguire

He opened his home. She stole his heart…and his money.

Many would envy veterinarian Russ Gray’s life in rural Montana’s wide-open spaces. Russ calls it lonely. In a country with more cattle than eligible females, he doesn’t envision his seven years as a widower ending anytime soon. Until a mysterious woman lands at his door in the dead of night, riddled with buckshot.

Sarah Novak hates lying to such a kind, handsome man, but if an upstanding citizen like Russ finds out why she’s been three weeks on the run, he’d surely turn her in. Yet she can’t refuse his offer to let her stay until she heals, no questions asked.

From the start they fall into an easy companionship, then teasing flirtation flares into an unexpected intimate connection. But no matter how right it feels in his arms, guilt tugs at Sarah’s heart. Russ doesn’t deserve what she must do next.

When Russ wakes up with an empty bed—and an empty wallet—his first instinct isn’t to call the cops…it’s to catch her and find out why his urge to protect her overshadows all reason. Because he’s had a taste of real passion, and he’s not letting it slip away without a fight.

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