Kiss Me, Katie! & Hug Me, Holly!

Granted he was tall, dark and…okay, gorgeous. So what? And yet for some reason that only upped her annoyance factor, she couldn’t take her eyes off him. Even worse, she was hit with a strange sense of… awareness?

She didn’t understand it, but she didn’t appear to suffer the enigmatic problem alone. Apparently every female in the room was afflicted. Even Holly, who managed to maneuver herself close to him.

Watch out, Katie wanted to warn him. Holly was looking as predatory as she had… oh, about one minute before she’d stolen Katie’s fiance three years ago.

Beneath her own Christmas tree no less.

Old times, she reminded herself. Forget it.

And anyway, where was Matt?

She’d been hoping for a few minutes alone with him to discuss their kiss. It’d been three days!

But still, she couldn’t tear her gaze away from Bryan. She had to admit the man had a presence. The very air around him seemed to change, shimmer with an aura of excitement. Thrill.

Danger.

That presence wasn’t put on, like it was with so many daredevils. Nope, all that edgy restlessness came utterly naturally to him.

Which was exactly why Katie didn’t-couldn’t-like him.

“There’s something not quite tame about that man,” Julie announced in a conspirator’s whisper. She shivered with delight.

To Katie there was nothing even remotely exciting about it. Her father had flown stunts. He’d done things no one else would even consider and had still craved more, even putting aside the needs of his own family in order to get it. He’d been grown-up enough to have a family, but not mature enough to want to be with that family. Her father was always pushing the envelope, and always going full speed ahead. Always wanting, craving, yearning, burning for something just out of his reach.

He’d found it in testing experimental aircraft.

Oh, and it had also killed him.

Katie tried to swallow the nearly twenty-year-old resentment and only managed to swallow her last piece of gum, which left a heavy feeling in the pit of her stomach.

She could never fall for a man like that, one who wasn’t mature enough to put fun on the back burner in the favor of a quiet, lasting, enduring relationship.

Julie looked at her. “Are you telling me you don’t think he’s spectacular?”

Well, she was human. Female human. She could admit Bryan’s broad shoulders, so perfectly covered in his white pilot’s shirt, were nice, very nice indeed. So were his long, long, powerfully built legs, which were in dark-blue trousers fitted in a way that might have made her sigh in feminine appreciation if she was weak enough to sigh over such things. He had his aviator sunglasses tucked in his front pocket, his sleeves shoved up instead of rolled, and scuffed work boots on his feet. His hair was tousled as if he’d been running his fingers through it.

Gorgeously rumpled, she supposed was the correct term.

But it was his face that held her; the rugged, tanned, lived-in face. The one that had laugh lines around his generous mouth and smile creases around his sharp eyes, eyes that told her what she needed to know-he actively recruited fun and trouble, and-

Darn it.

He caught her staring at him.

No surprise, no discomfort, not for this man, who was probably used to being stared at. He merely absorbed her gaze, gave her a quick wink and a slow grin.

And in spite of her embarrassment and irritation, something strange happened. Something…almost familiar.

What was it about him?

Why did she feel as if…they knew each other? As if she’d kissed him instead of Matt? She nearly laughed out loud at that, because really, she knew who she’d kissed.

Matt stepped into the room then, a very welcome sight indeed. His hair was perfectly groomed, his shirt perfectly ironed, his trousers perfectly styled.

Everything about him was perfect.

Only, oddly enough, the little flicker of awareness, the one Bryan had caused, died. Died.

And Katie went cold.

She had kissed Matt. Right? Well, of course she had, what a ridiculous notion, one she put right out of her thoughts. Instead, she concentrated on smiling a welcome smile. Only Matt’s nose was in his notes and without even glancing in her direction, he sat directly across from her. He was distracted, she decided, and very busy. She understood that. Still, her smile faded with the slight, unintentional as it was.

Yes, Matt was the perfect man for her, but she did expect to get noticed at least. Determined to get a reaction, she pasted on a new smile. “Hello, Matt.”

“Hmm?” Matt lifted his head, blinked her into focus. “Oh. Hello.” He even returned her smile, blossoming her hopes, but then he went back to his notes.

Sedate and mature were fine qualities, but this was getting ridiculous. “I was wondering about the party.” This time he didn’t so much as lift his head from his work, and Katie went from vexed to insulted. “And the decorations,” she added. “Specifically the mistletoe.”

Matt sent her an absent smile at that. His face was open, easy to read and utterly serene. Nothing bothered him, or very little. He was a peaceful, quiet, reserved man. The perfect man, she reminded herself.

So why did she feel like smacking him? Oh, yes, because he wasn’t acknowledging their hot kiss!

“The mistletoe was a great idea,” he allowed. “I already mentioned that.”

“Yes, but-”

“For God’s sake man, she’s trying to ask you about the use of it.” Bryan merely smiled sweetly at Katie when she stared at him. “Aren’t you?”

“I…well…” How did he know? And why was she feeling that feeling again, the one that made her insides tremble, the one she had thought Matt would give her?

Holly laughed, the sound easy and infectious. “Wasn’t it a grand party? I know for a fact that every single one of those strategically hung plants got good use.” She smiled slyly at Matt, who blushed.

Blushed!

Katie stared at him in dismay. For days she’d been attempting to get a reaction from him and had gotten nothing. Then Holly says one little thing and he blushes! Frustrated, she glared down at her stack of notes, mail and various pencils and stuff she’d brought with her to the meeting.

Her heavy silver mail opener gleamed temptingly in the harsh office lights.

No, killing Holly right here would not be good office protocol, she decided, not even when the darn woman brushed part of Katie’s paperwork off the table.

“Oops,” Holly said lightly as everything scattered and entangled on the floor. She glanced over at Matt as she spoke to Katie. “Sorry.”

Katie glared at her-she’d done that on purpose!-but Holly didn’t notice, she was still staring at Matt. So Katie bent for the mess, and from her vantage point beneath the table, she had a front row seat of Holly slipping off her right heel and lifting her toes up to…Bryan’s lap! Her bright-red polished toes cradled the spot directly between his thighs…and squeezed.

He made a sound, though it was muffled to Katie because she was beneath the table. She watched as Bryan’s hand grabbed Holly’s ankle, his fingers gripping so hard his knuckles turned white.

They were playing hanky-panky, right here in the conference room and she had to witness it! Holly slid off her other heel, then lifted that leg up to Bryan’s lap as well.

Katie jerked back…and smacked her head on the underside of the table hard enough to rattle everyone’s water