JUST BREATHE. She forced her eyes shut and did a deep breathing exercise to soothe her jumpiness. She’d learned the technique to deal with the extreme pressure of being in the field and it had always worked every time.
Until now.
With the song playing and the occasional thud and creak from next door, she couldn’t seem to slow her lungs enough to relax. Not when she kept picturing him stretched out naked on the bed. His tanned body dark and sensual against the paleness of the sheets. His muscles tight and bulging with sexual tension. His eyes blazing with—
She sat up and killed the image. With trembling hands, she reached for the remote and hit the ON button. Winona’s voice crackled over the speaker, drowning out the sounds drifting from next door. She cranked up the volume as loud as it could go.
“…when a marriage gets a little stale, it’s time for fantasy role play to spice things up. There ain’t a woman alive who doesn’t go all weak in the knees when she thinks about being captured by a pirate or forced into submission by a high falutin’ sheik. It’s the same for a man. While he would never nail a real milkmaid, especially since the only one around here has a mustache and goes by the name of Hank, he still entertains the fantasy every now and then. Not about Hank, but about his woman. He’d like to see her in a short skirt and little suspenders. That, or he’d like to see her as a sexy nurse or a gypsy or one of them there hot-to-trot flight attendants. So let’s get busy, ladies. Dress up, turn him on and help him land that plane right smack dab down the center of that runway…”
Abby had a quick visual of herself clad in a flight attendant’s outfit sitting astride a very sexy Captain Brent and her thighs clenched. The temperature seemed to kick up a few blazing degrees and she reached for the glass of ice sitting on the nightstand.
She grabbed an ice cube and touched it to her lips. Icy liquid drizzled down the corner of her mouth, winding a path down her neck. She slid the cube down over her chin, to the pounding pulse beat. The hard chunk felt cool and soothing. Cool, as in the opposite of hot. If she could just focus on the sensation, she might be able to forget the fire burning her up from the inside out.
Moving the ice even lower, she slid it over her collarbone, down between her breasts. The frigid touch grazed the tip of one nipple and she stiffened. Electricity zipped up her spine and a gasp caught on her lips. Her skin grew tighter. Itchier. Hotter.
This was definitely not helping.
No, there was only one thing that would help ease her frustrated hormones—sating said hormones. Not that she was about to knock on Brent’s door and ask for a quickie. Hardly. While her body might crave him, the reality was that she could handle this all by herself. She’d done it before and it made the morning after a lot less complicated.
One orgasm coming right up!
She grabbed another piece of ice and touched it to the quivering bud of her clit. Hunger spurted through her and her nerves hummed. The air seemed to shimmer and her heart started to pound. She slid the hard coolness along the length of her hot slit. The ice melted against her blazing flesh, drip-dropping between her fingers and gliding down her palm as she moved back and forth. The coldness quickly disappeared, until only her fingertips rasped the swollen flesh.
She didn’t meant to fantasize about him, but she couldn’t help herself. Through a haze of pleasure she saw him standing there wearing nothing but a pair of jeans and a hungry expression. Watching.
Waiting.
The notion sent a rush of excitement through her and she slid a finger inside her drenched heat. Her body clenched and she moved her hips, riding the sensation, drawing it deeper until her breath quickened and a cry worked its way up her throat. The room seemed to explode in a burst of color as she arched, holding on to the feeling for a long, brilliant moment. “Beautiful.”
The deep, familiar voice slid into her ears and jerked her back to reality. Her eyes snapped open, and that’s when she realized that it wasn’t just her erotic imagination at work.
Brent Braddock stood, live and in color, at the foot of her bed.
She blinked, but he didn’t disappear. Shock ripped through her and she bolted to a sitting position. Scrambling for the sheet, she stuffed it under each arm. “What are you doing here?” she blurted, her heart pounding out of her chest.
“Enjoying the view.” The deep, seductive voice whispered through her head so clear and distinct that she could have sworn he spoke the words.
He didn’t. The only movement of his mouth was the faintest crook of a grin. Slow. Subtle. Sexy.
Her heart skipped its next beat.
“I heard a scream,” he finally murmured. “I thought you might need help.”
“I stubbed my toe.” It wasn’t the most original lie, but it was the best she could do with him standing so close and staring so intently. “It hurt, so I yelped.”
His brows drew together. “It didn’t sound like a yelp. It sounded like a full-fledged—”
“How did you get in here?” she cut in, eager to distract herself from the heat creeping up her spine. “I locked the door.”
“You must have made a mistake.” He shrugged. “It opened right up.”
Her mind did a quick rewind. She felt the metal against her fingers. Heard the click of the deadbolt. “I don’t make those kinds of mistakes.”
“There’s a first for everything.” He cocked an eyebrow. “How else would I be here?”
He had a point. He couldn’t very well have slipped through the keyhole. He was six foot plus of solid, hunky muscle. Half-naked and devastatingly handsome.
Half-naked and devastatingly sexy.
He wore only a pair of faded jeans. Muscle sculpted his chest and arms. Slave band tattoos, the pattern dark and intricate, circled each bicep. Hair sprinkled his chest from nipple to nipple before funneling into a silky swirl that followed a decadent path that bisected a very impressive six pack before disappearing beneath the waistband of his jeans. A frayed rip in the denim gave her a sneak peak of one muscular thigh dusted with hair.
She had the sudden image of that thigh flush against hers, his body pressing her down into the mattress, his lips eating at hers, and her mouth went dry.
“Let me take a look at your toe.” His deep voice pushed into her head and snatched her back to reality and the all important fact that she was naked beneath the sheet and he was still standing there. His pale green eyes darkened to an impenetrable jade and her stomach hollowed out. “To see how badly you’re hurt.”
She pulled her knees up to her chest beneath the sheet and tucked the cotton more securely under each arm. “It’s fine. Really. No permanent damage.” She summoned a smile and tried to ignore the urge to jump up and pull him down onto the bed with her. “Thanks for checking on me.”
“Anytime.”
The word held a wealth of meaning and lingered in her head long after the door closed behind him.
As if he really and truly wanted her as badly as she wanted him. He didn’t.
She knew that.
She’d always known that when it came to men.
She was a plain cookie in a bakery full of chunky decadence. And no man in his right mind would sink his teeth into the ho-hum sugar variety when he could have quarter-size pieces of melt-in-your-mouth chocolate or M & Ms or peanut butter. It just didn’t happen that way. Men didn’t lust after her. Or flirt. Or send suggestive signals.
Especially men like Brent Braddock. He was way out of her league with his smoking body and his raw sensuality. No way was she reading his signals correctly.
At the same time, that’s what she did. She read people for a living and assessed every situation. It was her job and she was good at it. Even more, she didn’t make careless mistakes.
He wanted her. He really and truly wanted her.
And she wanted him.
A truth that had her powering on the TV again, desperate for a distraction.
“It’s all about dressing for success, Ladies.” Winona stared back at her from the television screen.
It was the last thing she needed to watch, but she found herself tuning in anyway for lack of anything better.
At least that’s what she told herself.
“If you want your man to notice you, you have to go the extra mile,” Winona went on. “And if you want him to really notice you, you need to do it with the minimum amount of clothing because men like to see skin. Lots and lots of skin. And a slutty pair of high heels don’t hurt none either. We’ve got several shops right here in Skull Creek where you can buy a decent pair of tramp shoes…”
Winona droned on about the need for high heels and how they made the legs look longer and the boobs look bigger. It was nothing Abby hadn’t heard before in the girls’ locker room back in high school. Of course, she’d never had such an interesting visual to go with the gossip (namely Winona parading around in a pair of silver sandals with blinking red lights on the toes). Yes, she’d heard it over and over, but she’d never tried it.
Not then and certainly not now. She was fine with her life. Fulfilled. She didn’t need sexy clothes. Or sexy men. Or another orgasm.
She needed to find Rayne. End of story.
That’s why she’d come here in the first place. To find her man.
Her man. Not just any man. And certainly not one as hot and sexy as Brent Braddock. She didn’t need that kind of distraction right now.
Even if she suddenly wanted one.
Letting loose a deep sigh, she kicked off the covers, forced her eyes shut and settled in for the longest, most restless night of her life.