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eyes burned with sexy challenge. “I want a kiss, Claire…are you going to give it to me?”
    “Sure.” She went up on her toes, intent on bussing his cheek.
    He turned his head just enough, though, and her lips ended up pressed lightly to his. She didn’t open her mouth, but she didn’t pull away immediately like she’d planned to, either. She hung there, suspended by the connection between their mouths, her body humming with excitement. One second the kiss was soft and light, and the next he yanked her against his hard, male body and his mouth slammed down over hers with definite intent.
    He took her mouth with the skill and power of an invading army…or one very formidable mercenary.
    The man certainly knew how to kiss. He ate at her lips until she was dizzy from the pleasure of it. His fingers massaged her jaw, as if encouraging her complete surrender, the only kind she was sure he recognized. She’d never experienced anything so amazing in her life as Hotwire’s kiss. She moaned out her approval while gripping the front of his white silk dress shirt in her fists.
    He growled something she could not understand against her lips and then his hands skimmed down, over her naked shoulders and around to the exposed skin of her back. His fingertips touched bare skin between the velvet lacing and played tantalizingly with the bow.
    Man alive, what would she do if he untied it? She’d read about being branded by a man’s touch, but had never known what it meant…until now. Her skin grew hot under his fingers, so hot she would swear burn marks would be left behind. Only it did not hurt like a burn.
    It felt too darn good for her sanity.
    Without really thinking about it, she opened her mouth. His tongue tangled instantly with hers and took immediate and absolute possession of the interior of her mouth. Pleasure jolted through her body, spearing her right between her legs and she arched her pelvis toward him.
    His hands traveled down over her bottom to the backs of her legs below her skirt hem, then came up under her skirt and back up her legs. She almost jumped out of her skin when he touched the sensitive flesh of her inner thighs. He curled his big fingers around them, holding her while his thumbs kneaded her bottom and he lifted her into closer contact with his body.
    She undulated against him in a move that felt entirely natural, but froze in shock as her mound brushed against the hard roll of his erection.
    He wasn’t so inhibited. He used his grip on her to move her up and down the length of his engorged and rigid penis, making a low, masculine sound of pleasure as he did so. Tremors more powerful than a Richter 10 earthquake went off inside her.
    “Stop trying to seduce my maid of honor, Hotwire. It’s time to throw the bouquet.” Josette’s voice crashed through the passionate haze surrounding Claire, bringing her back to reality with a thud.
    What in the world had she been doing?
    Hotwire jolted like a man shocked by a live electric wire and broke the kiss, practically tossing Claire away from him. She tottered on her unfamiliar heels and almost fell. He reached out to steady her, his expression pained, but snatched his hands back the moment she stopped wobbling.
    The silence between them was more charged than the air after an electric storm.
    “You have five minutes and then I’m tossing the bouquet,” Josette said, her gaze faintly amused and assessing, before she turned to head back to the reception.
    It would take Claire five minutes just to get her breath back. How was she supposed to walk back into the reception on top of that?
    After several more seconds of charged silence, he said, “I’m sorry. That was way out of line.”
    “I liked it,” she admitted. Way too much, but hot kisses were one thing, doing the deed another, and she really didn’t want him thinking she was open for that kind of play.
    “No doubt,” he said, sounding terribly arrogant. “I’ve never had any complaints on my