Time Out Read Free Page B

grin and held out his hand, introducing himself. James did the same.
    Rainey instantly liked them both, and not just because they were famous, or cute as hell—which they were—but because they were quite harmless, as compared with their head coach. He wasn’t the least bit harmless. Rainey squirmed a little, probably due to the soapy water running down her body.
    Or the way Mark was studying her with the same quiet intensity he used on the ice—which she knew because she watched his games. All of them.
    “So how do you know Coach?” James asked her.
    Rainey looked into Mark’s eyes. Well, not quite his eyes, since they were still behind the reflective Oakleys that probably cost more than her grocery bill for the month. “We go way back.”
    Mark’s almost-smile made an appearance again. “Rainey went to school with my brother Rick.” He paused, clearly waiting for her to add something to the story.
    No thank you, since the only thing she could add would be “and one time I threw myself at him and he turned me down flat.”
    They’d seen each other since, of course, on the few occasions when he’d come back to town to visit his dad and brother. Once when she’d been twenty-one, at a local police ball that Mark had helped chair. He’d slow danced with her and the air had crackled between them. Chemistry had abounded, and she could read in his dark eyes that he’d felt it too, and she’d melted at his interest. But she hadn’t been able to swallow her mortification about the fiasco on her sixteenth birthday, so she’d made an excuse and bailed on him. She’d seen him again, several times, and each accidental run-in had been the same.
    The laws of physics didn’t change. The sun would come up. The sun would go down. And she would always be insanely attracted to Mark Diego.
    The last chance encounter had been only two years ago. They’d had yet another near miss at a town Christmas ball when they’d again slow danced. He expressed interest in every hard line of his body, some harder than others, but she’d let self-preservation rule once more.
    “So are you friends?” James asked her and Mark now. “Or…?” He waggled a finger back and forth between them with a matching waggle of his brow.
    Mark gave him a single look, nothing more, and James zipped his lips.
    Impressive. “Neither,” she told James resolutely, trying to wring out the hem of her shirt while ignoring how close Mark was standing to her, invading her personal space bubble.
    “It’s been a long time,” he said. “You look…”
    “All wet?” she asked.
    His eyes heated, and something deep inside her quivered. Damn, he still had the power. He smiled, and she narrowed her eyes, daring him to go there, but his momma hadn’t raised a fool.
    “Different,” he finally said. “You look different.”
    Yes, she imagined she looked quite different than the gorgeous women she’d seen hanging off his arm in magazines and blogs.
    “It’s good to see you,” he said.
    She wanted to believe that was true, but realized with some horror that she’d actually leaned into him, drawn in by that stupid magnetic charisma. But she was nothing if not a pro at hiding embarrassment. Spreading her arms, she gave him a hug, as if that’d been her intention all along. Squeezing his big, warm, hard body close, she made sure to spread as much of the suds and water from her shirt to his as she could. “It’s good to see you as well,” she said, her mouth against his ear, her lips brushing the lobe.
    He went still at the contact, then instead of trying to pull free, merely folded her into his arms, trapping her against him. And damn if her body didn’t burst to life, as if all this time it’d been just waiting for him to come back.
    “Yeah, you’re different,” he murmured, doing as she had, pressing his mouth to her ear, giving her a shiver. “The little kitten grew up and got claws.”
    When she choked out a laugh, he closed his teeth over her