Flashback

“We did a lot more than kiss.”

She flashed back to that night, when she’d climbed into bed with him, pressing her icy feet to his, then her body. She remembered realizing he was naked and warm and strong and hard…God. He’d been so utterly irresistible, she’d lost her head. And, yeah, they’d done a lot more than kiss. “Fine. We kissed, and then I decided I should sleep with you and then walk away. Perfect, neat revenge.”

“Neat, maybe. But not perfect.” His eyes were glittering with knowledge, hard won. “Because it wasn’t as easy as you thought, was it?”

No, it hadn’t been. Because it’d been amazing between them. So damned amazing. “Maybe I’ve been looking at this wrong.”

He didn’t move from the door, just kept looking at her, his eyes warm, his mouth curved, his body big and bad and so gorgeous she could hardly stand it.

She wanted him.

Again.

Still.

“Maybe it’s not about sleeping with you once and walking away,” she heard herself say. “Maybe it’s about letting this thing take its own lead for as long as I’m here.”

“‘This thing’? You mean the way we apparently can’t stay out of each other’s pants?”

At the huskiness in his voice, her nipples hardened. “Yes.”

12

AIDAN PUSHED AWAY from the door and came toward Kenzie, all easy, loose-limbed confidence, yet radiating an intensity that made her breath catch. He didn’t stop until they were toe-to-toe, and she slowly tipped up her head to look into his inscrutable eyes.

“You want to have sex,” he said silkily. “Here. Tonight. Now.”

Her breath caught at his bluntness. “And then maybe again later.”

“Later,” he repeated, as if trying to process this.

“Maybe even until I leave Santa Rey. At which time we both walk away, eyes wide open.”

He just stared at her for the longest moment. “What happened to trouncing on my heart?”

“It seems you were right. I don’t really want to hurt you.”

When he shot her a not-buying-it look, she caved. “Okay, so I want to hurt you less than I want to sleep with you again.”

“You know, you’d think I’d be tough enough to walk away from such an overwhelmingly romantic offer,” he said drily, sounding both intrigued and baffled. “But apparently…” He put his hands on her hips. “I’m not.”

She offered a smile that was sheer nerve. “So…yes?”

His eyes never wavered, holding hers, leveling her as he pulled her in. “I don’t know, Kenzie. I’m a little afraid…”

“Be serious.”

His smile was crooked and impossibly endearing. “I am. This time you could really do it, whether you’re trying to or not. This time, you just might take out my heart.”

“Come on,” she quipped, even as a part of her was afraid he was right, for both of them. “If we’re just having a physical relationship and nothing else, how can we get hurt?”

With a soft laugh, he slid his hands up her spine, and then back again, low enough now to cup her butt and squeeze.

He was hard.

Bending his head, he put his mouth to her ear and let out a breath that made her shiver in longing. “Just a physical relationship, Kenzie? Is that all this is? Really?” He sank his teeth into her lobe and she shivered again.

“It-it’s all it should be,” she managed.

Another soft, deprecating laugh rumbled through his chest, this one aimed at the both of them. “Okay, well as long as we’re being honest, you should know…” His hands glided up her spine again, this time beneath her shirt to touch bare skin. “Even though you are going to hurt me, it’s not enough to make me say no. Truth is, nothing could…”

She opened her mouth to say something, but then he kissed the spot he’d just nipped at, soothing the ache as his fingers stroked over her skin. Her eyes drifted shut, and she slid her arms around his neck, pressing close. “No pain, no gain,” she whispered, and he let out another low laugh as he lifted her up and carried her to his bedroom.

To his bed.

He settled over her, looking down into her face for a beat before lowering his head and taking her mouth with his demanding one.

If simply walking into his house had felt like a homecoming, then this, here, now, felt even more so. He felt like home, he smelled like home, and he tasted even better; she hesitated, thinking, uh- oh.

His hands came up to hold her face. “What?”

She stared up into his eyes and saw herself reflected there, as if they were one, and although it was deeply unsettling to realize that this time she could fall even harder for him-if she let herself-she also couldn’t imagine walking away, without being in his arms again.

“Kenz?”

“Nothing, it’s nothing.” And she pulled him down for another kiss as the heat of him seeped into her bones, warming her with a sensual promise of what was to come. Those big, warm hands slid along her arms, lifting them up over her head, entwining their fingers as his mouth continued to plunder hers, delivering on that promise.

It was familiar, and it was comforting, and yet it was so, so much more as well. Not since being with Aidan six years ago had she given any thought to what it would be like to be with a guy long enough that he felt…like home. She was a woman who liked change, who liked the new and exciting, who lived off the lines someone else wrote for her each day.

But with Aidan, she knew what he felt like, what he tasted like, exactly how crazy he could drive her with a touch of a single finger, and yet being with him felt almost unbearably right, and far more arousing than she could have ever imagined.

Still kissing her, he pulled off her top, then her skirt. Her new bra was a front hook, which didn’t slow him down at all, and when he had her naked except her panties, he hooked his fingers in the thin strip of cotton on her hips and let his gaze meet hers. Then he tugged, slipping the underwear down her legs and off, sailing them over one shoulder. Towering over her, fully dressed while she was as naked as she could get, he let out a low breath. “You’re so beautiful.”

“And you’re overdressed.” Still in his fire gear, in fact…

“In a minute.” He was kneeling between her legs. He spread his, which in turn spread hers, and his gaze took her in, in one fell swoop, heating her skin everywhere he looked. He traced his fingers over her breasts, her belly, her thighs.

Between.

When he bent his head with fierce intent, she sucked in a breath, a breath that clogged her throat when he replaced his fingers with his mouth.

“Aidan,” she managed, hardly recognizing her own voice. “I-”

His tongue encircled her tender, sensitized flesh, making her quiver from the inside out, and she promptly forgot what she’d meant to say. While his tongue and fingers circled and teased and stroked, she gripped the sheets and stared down at him. His hair stood up, from her fingers, she realized. His eyes were closed, his expression dreamy as he brought her such bliss she could hardly even see, much less think.

But she didn’t close her eyes. She watched him concentrate on her pleasure as if it were his own, took in his moves, the moves that were driving her right out of her ever-loving mind.