To Tempt a Sheikh Read Free Page B

head I got tonight was courtesy of those neatly trimmed, capable hands of yours.”
    â€œSince I hit you with the intention of taking your headoff, I probably dislocated something in there. Your good sense, seemingly. Maybe your whole brain.”
    The man pressed closer, the freshness of his breath and the potency of his virility flooding every one of T.J.’s senses. “Oh, both my sense and my brain are welded in place. It would take maybe…” his eyes traveled up and down T.J.’s body like slow, scorching hands “…ten of you to loosen even my consciousness.”
    â€œIt took only one of me to do so earlier,” T.J. scoffed, not sure the supply of air in the cockpit would last much longer. “I almost took you down. With both hands literally tied, too.”
    â€œYou can sure take me down, just not by hitting me. Your effect on me has nothing to do with your physical strength and is certainly not proportionate to your size.”
    â€œIs that all you got? Cheap shots at my size?”
    â€œI’d never take any kind of shot at you.” Again the man’s eyes seemed to emit a force field that gathered T.J. into its embrace. “And then, I think your size is perfection itself.”
    Drenched in goose bumps and feeling the heart that had barely slowed down start to hammer again, T.J. smirked. “Sure you’re not concussed? Or is this the way you usually talk to other men?”
    The insult seemed to burn to ash in the rising temperature of the man’s smile. “It’s not even the way I talk to women. But it’s the only way I’ll talk to you . Among other things. Every other possible thing.”
    T.J. pressed against the passenger door. “So you somehow got it into your head that I’m a woman? And now you’re all over me? Just minutes after barely surviving a devastating crash and landing God knows where in this forsaken, sand-infested land? And you can’t hear how ridiculous you sound?”
    â€œWhat’s ridiculous is that you thought a fuzzy beard andan atrocious haircut would disguise the femininity blasting off you. It got me by the…throat, from the first moment. So why don’t you drop the act and tell me who you really are?”
    â€œI am T. J. Burke!”
    Painstakingly chiseled lips spread to reveal teeth so white they were almost phosphorescent in the dimness. “My bearded beauty, only one of us has testosterone coursing in his bloodstream right now. Don’t make me offer you…tangible proof.”
    T.J. glowered at him, tried not to show any weakness, to meet him on the same level of audacity. “Is it the…tangible proof proving that you’re attracted to small blond men?”
    A chuckle rumbled deep in that huge predator’s gut, zigzagged all through T.J.’s system like deadly voltage. “First thing you have to learn about me so we can move on is that I am insult-proof. I wouldn’t even sock you if you were a man. But my body knew you weren’t from the moment I laid eyes on you in that filthy hole, against all evidence and intel. So will you admit it on your own, or will you make me…establish proof myself?”
    T.J. shrank back farther against the door as the man’s right hand rose. “Lay a hand on me, buster, and have it chomped off.”
    â€œWith the way I’m reacting to you, there’s nothing I want more than your teeth on every part of me. But if anything proves your femininity, it’s that so-called threat. A man would have told me he’d break my hand or tear it off, or something suitably macho.”
    â€œSo you have men regularly threatening to do that? And women chomping away at any part of you they can reach?”
    The man narrowed his eyes, concentrating the intensity of his amusement. “You’re an expert at diversion, aren’tyou? Give it up, already. I’m on to you. So on to you that not even a