See Jane Score

“Caffeine. Sugar.” He lowered his gaze to her lips. “You.”

“Me?”

“Most definitely you.” He slid his hand to the back of her neck and he lowered his mouth to hers. “I’ve never had you my way,” he said, and he kissed her because he couldn’t seem to stop himself. Her lips were warm and sweet and instant desire settled heavy in his groin. With nothing more than his hand on the back of her head and his mouth pressed to hers, lust rolled over him like a Zamboni.

He pulled back with every intention of walking away, of leaving before he did something he would regret, but she looked up at him and licked her moist lips. Instead of turning on his heels, he wrapped one arm around the small of her back and brought her body against his. He was used to tall women and he had to pull her up on her tiptoes. His mouth opened wide over hers and he fed her a hot wet kiss. He held her to him as her hands ran across his shoulder and up the sides of his neck. His tongue touched and mated with hers as she combed her fingers through his hair. His scalp tingled from her touch. She moaned deep in her throat, that sound of lust and frustration and yearning that had urged him on the other night and had him thinking about having sex with her right there against the wall now.

In the weak light of the parking garage, he unbuttoned her coat, then shoved his hand under her sweater. Her flat stomach was warm and he slid his hand to her breast. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and her breast hardly filled his hand. Her puckered nipple poked the middle of his palm like a hard little raspberry, and his testicles squeezed and his scrotum tightened and his knees almost buckled. He slid his mouth to the side of her cheek and took a deep breath. This was the most sexual excitement he’d felt in a long, long time, and he had to stop.

“Luc,” she gasped, then she grabbed the sides of his head and brought his mouth right back to hers. She ran her hands over his shoulders and chest and kissed him like a woman who wanted to end up in bed. A hot openmouthed feeding kiss that had him thinking of security cameras and of the likelihood of arrest. He rolled her hard nipple beneath his palm and she wrapped her leg around his waist. He shoved his erection against her crotch. The heat of their bodies nearly did him in. He ground against her and forgot about stopping.

“Not here,” he said as he ended the kiss. “We’ll get arrested. Believe me, I know.” He tilted his head back and took a deep breath. “There’s a Best Western or a Ramada within a few miles.” He blinked. He was fairly sure there was anyway. “I’ll grab a room while you wait in the car.”

“What?”

God, he wanted her. He wanted to fall on top of her and stay there for a good long while. “We’ll have sex all night. Half the morning too. And just when you think you can’t take anymore, we’ll go at it again.” It had been a long time since he’d wanted it so bad that he could hardly think beyond the throbbing in his pants. “I’m going to fuck you real good.” She didn’t say anything and he looked down into her face.

She unwrapped her leg from his waist and lowered her foot to the ground. “In a motel room?”

“Yes. We can take my car.”

“No.”

“Where?”

She pushed his hand from her breast. “Nowhere.”

“Why the hell not? I’m hard, and I don’t have to stick my hand down your pants to know you’re wet.”

Her eyes were wide and a little glassy. “You’re talking to me like I’m one of your groupies.”

He’d never even thought of her in those terms. Had he? No, he hadn’t. “You don’t like wet? What do you call it?”

“I don’t call it anything, and I don’t fuck. I make love. Groupies fuck.”

“Jesus,” he swore, “who cares? When you get down to it, it’s all the same thing.”

“No, it’s not, and I care.” She shoved at his chest and he took a step back. “I’m not one of your women. I’m a professional reporter!”

He didn’t know who she was trying to convince. Him or herself. “You’re a tease and a damn prude,” he said and turned on his heels. He shoved one hand in the pocket of his jacket and his hand curled around his keys until they cut into his palm. He was sorry he’d ever met Jane. He was sorry he’d ever laid eyes on her, and sorrier that she made him so insane that he’d kissed her and now he was going home hard. Again.

As he walked to his vehicle, he heard her car start and by the time he unlocked the driver’s side door of his Land Cruiser, she was gone, the glow of her red taillights the last remnants of her.

That and the ache in Luc’s groin and the pounding in his brain and the knowledge that he’d have to see her again in three days.

I make love, she’d said. The first time he’d met her, he’d figured her for one of those uptight, probably-hadn’t-had-sex-in-five-years women. And he’d been right.

“ ‘Make love,’” he scoffed as he climbed into his vehicle and started it up. Jane didn’t want to make love. He hadn’t misinterpreted her signals. A woman who wanted him to “make love” to her didn’t kiss like a porn queen. A woman who wanted to “make love” wanted to take her time. She didn’t wrap her leg around his waist while he had her shoved up against a wall in a parking garage.

He backed out of the parking space and headed home. Someone should teach the little prude a thing or two about being a tease. But it wasn’t going to be him. He was through with Jane Alcott.

This time he meant it.

Chapter 11

Juke: To Fake an Opponent

Three days after the parking garage incident, Jane sat in the press box at the Key Arena, staring down at the ice.

“Do we get free food and booze up here?” Caroline asked her.

“There’s free food and booze in the media lounge.” She’d brought Caroline along so that she’d have someone to talk to. Someone to help take her mind off her current man problems. “I don’t usually go there until later.”

Caroline was dressed in an extremely tight Chinooks T-shirt and equally tight jeans. She was dressed for a fishing expedition, and she’d already caught the attention of the guy operating the video for the game. He’d flashed Caroline up on the screen three times already.

Darby joined them a few minutes before the pregame entertainment was to start. His hair was stiff with gel, and his pocket protector was stuck in his black silk shirt. Jane introduced him to Caroline, and his eyes widened and his mouth fell open a little as he gazed at Jane’s beautiful friend. She wasn’t surprised by Darby’s reaction, but she was a bit surprised when Caroline turned her charm on Darby and reeled him in.

The pregame show started, and Jane knew that in about fifteen minutes she was going to have to go to the locker room and wish the team luck. She was going to have to see Luc for the first time since he’d kissed her and she’d lost her mind and wrapped her leg around his waist. Thank God she’d come to her senses at the last minute and hadn’t gone with him to a motel. That would have been bad for a lot of reasons.

There was no denying it, though, she’d fallen madly in lust with Luc. She was drawn to him, pulled like she was a magnet and he was a big hunk of metal, and there didn’t seem to be anything she could do about it.

She’d spent the past week on the road avoiding him as much as possible. Avoiding the man who irritated her, and angered her, and made her in-sides melt. For the most part, she’d kept herself busy. She’d interviewed Darby for her Single Girl column, and she’d written a piece about nice guys who finished last. She’d told her readers that they should avoid those guys who set women’s hearts on fire and instead give nice guys a second look. She’d quoted Darby and made him sound good, and in return he was supposed to talk her up to the coaches who still didn’t want her around.

She’d taken her own advice and done fairly well at avoiding the one guy who set her heart on fire. Then he’d backed her against that wall and kissed her. She should have been shocked and appalled, but seeing him come at her, his lids lowered to half mast and lust heavy in his blue eyes, she’d gone all weak and excited at the same time. The moment his lips had touched her, she’d given in to her heart and fed it what it so desperately wanted. Luc.

Even though her feelings for him were a tangled mess, she could no longer avoid the truth. She wanted Luc.