Second Chance Bride (Montana Born Brides) Read Free Page B

as he collected her close against his chest, his hands molding her to him, from shoulder to waist to butt, his mouth doing wicked things to her skin, the drumbeat of her blood blocking out rational thought, so that she wondered the point of an eight times table , anyhow?
    It made no sense at all.
    Nothing made sense beyond the desperate need to lace her arms around his neck and drink in the feel of him, hot and hard against her.
    God, but he smelt good, of clean skin and lemon soap and all overlaid with the scent of masculine desire.
    She shuddered against him. He was like Christmas and New Year all rolled into one; the surprise package under the Christmas tree and the fireworks on New Year’s Eve. He was the birthday present she’d always wished for and never gotten, and the blessing she would have given eternal thanks for at Thanksgiving.
    He was the lover she’d imagined meeting when she’d knocked on that ordinary door on an ordinary house in a middle -class suburb in Perth.
    And didn’t that sluice a bucket of cold water over her right there? How cruel life was that it would send her a man who could make her feel like this now. Here. In this place.
    A place where she had no wish to feel anything, least of all this heavy, pooling heat between her thighs.
    Vaguely was she aware of the towel at his hips tugging loose between them and falling away at the same time as his hand curled over her breast, his thumb tracing the line where skin disappeared under fabric.
    His mouth moved lower and he kissed her there, his tongue flicking fire across the skin of her breast and she gasped, knowing she’d lost any semblance of control—times tables long forgotten, her senses in disarray.
    A day or two more —a few more clients—and she’d be used to this.
    And part of her rebelled.
    She didn’t ever want to get used to this.
    She didn’t ever want to be numb to something that felt so good.
    Didn’t want something that felt so good as to be ultimately meaningless.
    She felt his hands at her back, felt a tug and a loosening and his hands easing the corset down and her nerves turned to panic with the knowledge that she couldn’t do this —could no more turn off from what was happening than pretend that up was down or that night was day.
    Couldn’t bring herself to do this, whatever the reason, and knew that her mother would never in a million years expect her to.
    “Actually, you know, maybe not,” she said, wriggling away on an bubble of panic that came out half way to laughter, while her fingers held on tight to the front of her loosening corset.
    He growled approvingly against her ear, his warm breath threatening to break her resolve as his hands skimmed her body and honed in on her panties instead. “You want to keep it on with the boots? Kinky.”
    “No! Yes! ” She shook her head and tried to wriggle away. “But no, that wasn’t actually what I meant.”
    “So what— ” he said, not letting her go and nuzzling the skin below her ear so that she almost purred with it, “—did you mean?”
    She pulled herself away from his hot -as-sin mouth. “I meant, you seem like a nice guy ’n’ all… ” She searched for the words. “But I’d rather not have sex right now, if it’s all the same to you.”
    Finally she had his full attention. The hands at her hips stilled as he pulled his head back to look at her. “You’d rather — what did you say ?”
    The hungry growl in his voice was gone, she noticed, replaced by a tone a lot less friendly. And it was a shame to make him mad when he seemed like a nice guy, but she guessed he had a right to be just a little cranky. She shrugged and smiled apologetically. “I don’t know about you, but it’s just not working for me.”
    His hands fell away from her, his blue eyes disbelieving, his lip tugged up into a what-the-hell without the words. “You’re kidding me, right?”
    She shrugged. “I’m real sorry, truly I am, but under the circumstances, I can’t