Strong And Sexy

“Is that okay for now?”

She stared at him for a long heartbeat, during which time he didn’t so much as blink. Her heart seemed to be in her eyes, and it was damn hard to look at them because they made him feel things he hadn’t expected to feel.

Finally she nodded, and he could breathe. “Okay.” He felt this odd, overwhelming sense of relief. “Okay…So now it’s my turn to name a rule.”

She eyed him warily. “Oh?”

“I was thinking we should have a no-clothes rule. You know, when we’re here or at my place.”

Her eyes lit with shock, then humor. “A no-clothes rule.”

“Yeah. Is that a problem for you?”

“No.” She smiled, and he felt like he’d just won the lotto. “Especially since I can’t seem to find any underwear around you.”

He kissed her. And then again. And when they were both breathless, he raised his head. “Your turn for a rule.”

“Okay.” She nodded. “Rule number three,” she said very seriously. “The next food item we use during sex has to be a heated item.”

His heart actually stopped. Then kicked hard. And right then and there, he felt himself fall just a little bit. “Deal.”

Dani woke up just before dawn to elephants bleating at the top of their lungs.

Her alarm.

Heart racing, she slapped the snooze button and turned over with a smile already in place for the man-

Not next to her.

He’d left. Which, she supposed, was only fair. After all, she’d done the very same thing to him the night before. And just because they’d talked about rules didn’t mean they were going to continue this thing. So him leaving? No biggie. In fact, as far as good-byes went, it was a fairly gentle one. Gentle, and yet somehow, at the same time, a little sad.

Okay, a lot sad.

Get over yourself. In that vein, she got up and looked into the mirror. Her hair stuck straight up on one side (courtesy of the ice cream) and was flattened completely to her head on the other (also no doubt courtesy of the ice cream), making the no make-up status just that much worse. She had a beard burn beneath her jaw, which she could live with, and something stuck to her shoulder.

A condom wrapper.

Good God. She was a walking Don’t Be This Girl ad. No wonder he’d run off. Any sane person would have run off.

But next time, no matter what, she wasn’t going to let him in. Next time she’d-

Ah, hell, who was she kidding?

She’d let him in. She’d probably let him in and strip him out of his clothes so fast his head would spin.

Clearly, she was depraved.

She showered. It took three shampoo applications to get rid of the ice cream, and when she came out, her phone was ringing. Running for it, she stubbed her toe on her nightstand and went down like a brick. “Damn it, don’t hang up, don’t hang up!” she yelled as she crawled the last few feet to the phone. “Hello?” she gasped, a small part of her hoping it was Shayne.

God. She needed therapy. “I’m here, don’t-”

Click.

“-hang up.” Damn it! She sagged to the floor, her forehead to the carpet that definitely needed vacuuming. When the phone rang again, she nearly parted ways with her heart. “Hello!”

But in her ear came another click.

Huh. That wasn’t Shayne. He would definitely not hang up. No one she knew would hang up on her, unless-

Oh, boy.

Unless this wasn’t just a random annoying hang-up. Maybe it’d been from her special psychotic stalker. A little creeped out, she rushed her morning routine and left for work as soon as she got dressed, needing to get out of her apartment before her fear gripped her.

The zoo’s employee parking lot wasn’t nearly as empty as it had been the night before, but she still didn’t dawdle. Halfway across, her cell phone rang, making her jump. Shayne’s name on the ID caused some other reactions entirely. Be cool. “Hi,” she said as casually as she could with all her parts clamoring for his attention.

“Hi yourself. I just landed in sunny Las Vegas.”

“Oh.” He’d had a flight. Of course he’d had a flight. “So…you’re calling because…”

“Because.”

“Because what?”

“I’m calling just because, Dani.”

That had a silly grin splitting her face. He hadn’t dumped her. They were still on for their Just Sex. Her body let out a sort of shiver.

“Anything odd going on?” he asked.

Other than her heart had tightened at just the sound of him? And her nipples too? Oh, yes, her nipples were very happy to hear from him. “Nope.”

“No more dead bodies?”

“Nope.”

“No more break-ins?”

“Nope.”

“How about hang-ups?”

She winced. “Well…”

“Tell me.”

“A few hang-ups,” she admitted. “I figured they were just a wrong number.”

He didn’t say anything, but she could practically hear him thinking. “I’m okay, Shayne.”

“Actually, you’re amazing, but that’s another story altogether. Look, just be careful, watch that sweet ass of yours. I’m fond of it.”

God, look at her. Grinning. Just sex, she reminded herself. But she couldn’t stop grinning. This was so bad. “I can do that. Have a good flight back.”

“Will do.”

“Good.” She paused, then let it out. “Because I’m really quite fond of your backside too.” Shocked at herself, she closed her cell-then laughed.

Her cell immediately vibrated with an incoming text message that had three words: “Tonight? Hot fudge.”

Oh, God. This was ridiculous, this flow of euphoria that sex caused. Too bad it couldn’t be bottled.

Dani’s day was crazy. It didn’t take her long to discover that scheduling and managing the other keepers, each with their own thoughts and agendas and temperaments, was a hell of a lot more challenging than she’d ever imagined. By that afternoon she’d listened to three grievances, broken up two fights-not between any animals but between two other keepers-and had redone the month’s employee schedule four times.

Oh, and everyone hated her.

It wasn’t until most of her staff had left for the day that she managed even a single moment to herself. It was six o’clock, time for food, her stomach proclaimed, but she couldn’t leave, not yet. So she stood in front of the vending machine trying to decide between a relatively harmless bag of pretzels or the bag of cholesterol-crippling Twix bites. She slapped her pockets for change, but came up empty.

Damn, she needed her energy for the hot fudge. Just thinking it had her insides going all tight and tingly, and anticipation rushed through her. What could he do with warm fudge that they hadn’t done with the ice cream? She couldn’t even imagine the possibilities, and that made the rush of lust even worse.

Definitely she should have the pretzels and save the calories for later. “Bob,” she said when one of the night keepers rushed by her, “do you have change?”

Bob was fresh out of college on the East Coast. He was six feet five, weighed maybe one hundred and fifty