Appeals Court, and Geoff Dias was on a top-secret mission somewhere in the Middle East.
Chase had left urgent messages for both of them. He’d even used an old code word to alert them that his life depended on their quick response. They might not appreciate his tactics when they found out what was actually going on. But hell, it was his life at stake. He had a woman claiming legal rights to his bed and board, to his personhood!
He didn’t like anything about the predicament with Annie Wells. And he especially didn’t like the fact that he was in such a hurry to get back to her. Actually it wasn’t Annie he was in a hurry over, he told himself. It wasn’t the woman herself who had him worked up. It was all the emotional baggage she brought with her. She was a threat to his way of life, to his very peace of mind. He had to get things under control.
Not a second later, he had a graphic mental flash of the striptease she’d done in his living room, and he nearly veered off the road. He hit the brakes and brought the Jeep to a stop that sent gravel flying like shrapnel. A vein throbbed in his forehead as his own black eyes flashed hotly from the rearview mirror. Who are you kidding, you dumb ass? It’s not the predicament you’re hurrying back to. It’s her .
The crimson sky was swathed in deep purple velvet by the time Chase pulled up to his cabin. Like a plush theater curtain dropping, it blotted out the footlights of the fallen sun. Unaware of the spectacular beauty around him, uncaring, Chase reached over the backseat and scooped up the grocery bags.
He thought he’d prepared himself for any eventuality when he nudged open the cabin door with his foot. He’d imagined her sound asleep on the cot, curled up like a kitten. Or long gone with all his possessions. He’d even imagined her staring down the barrel of a gun at him. But it had never occurred to him that she might be standing in the bathroom doorway naked and dripping wet.
“What the hell?” It was a moment before he realized she wasn’t totally naked. She had on that flimsy, sliplike thing, but sopping wet, the material might as well have been invisible. Patches of it clung to her breasts and hugged the slender lines of her body in ways that were indescribably sweet, and unspeakably lewd.
Chase felt as though he’d been hit by a truck in high gear. She aroused feelings in him that were both carnal and impossibly innocent. She took him back to his teenage years. She made him yearn for young love. She made him remember the wet dreams and every dirty movie he’d ever seen—or wanted to see.
Set the groceries down, cowboy. Before you drop them.
He deposited the bags on the table by the cot, but nothing had changed when he turned back to her. She was still standing there, dripping all over his hardwood floor and staring at him like a wood nymph caught emerging from some magic pool. “Annie, what the hell—”
“I took a shower,” she said, stating the obvious. She shifted her weight, a barely discernible movement that hung the diaphanous material over her thighs and hipbones like cellophane wrap, revealing a reddish delta of hair. Strawberries and cream, Chase thought, struck by the contrast of her ginger hair and her porcelain skin tones.
He could feel his breathing quicken as he stared at her. He could feel muscles responding and heat gathering. Luckily there was something stopping him from making wild love to her right there on the floor in a pool of water. It was the total incongruity of the situation.
The woman standing across the room from him didn’t seen unduly embarrassed by having been caught naked, and yet she couldn’t have had much experience with men if what she’d told him about the convent was true. She hadn’t even been allowed to shower in the nude.
Sweet God, he thought. Could he actually have made love to her on that mission? If he’d been delirious, he wouldn’t have known what he was doing, but still, she hadn’t
Chase had left urgent messages for both of them. He’d even used an old code word to alert them that his life depended on their quick response. They might not appreciate his tactics when they found out what was actually going on. But hell, it was his life at stake. He had a woman claiming legal rights to his bed and board, to his personhood!
He didn’t like anything about the predicament with Annie Wells. And he especially didn’t like the fact that he was in such a hurry to get back to her. Actually it wasn’t Annie he was in a hurry over, he told himself. It wasn’t the woman herself who had him worked up. It was all the emotional baggage she brought with her. She was a threat to his way of life, to his very peace of mind. He had to get things under control.
Not a second later, he had a graphic mental flash of the striptease she’d done in his living room, and he nearly veered off the road. He hit the brakes and brought the Jeep to a stop that sent gravel flying like shrapnel. A vein throbbed in his forehead as his own black eyes flashed hotly from the rearview mirror. Who are you kidding, you dumb ass? It’s not the predicament you’re hurrying back to. It’s her .
The crimson sky was swathed in deep purple velvet by the time Chase pulled up to his cabin. Like a plush theater curtain dropping, it blotted out the footlights of the fallen sun. Unaware of the spectacular beauty around him, uncaring, Chase reached over the backseat and scooped up the grocery bags.
He thought he’d prepared himself for any eventuality when he nudged open the cabin door with his foot. He’d imagined her sound asleep on the cot, curled up like a kitten. Or long gone with all his possessions. He’d even imagined her staring down the barrel of a gun at him. But it had never occurred to him that she might be standing in the bathroom doorway naked and dripping wet.
“What the hell?” It was a moment before he realized she wasn’t totally naked. She had on that flimsy, sliplike thing, but sopping wet, the material might as well have been invisible. Patches of it clung to her breasts and hugged the slender lines of her body in ways that were indescribably sweet, and unspeakably lewd.
Chase felt as though he’d been hit by a truck in high gear. She aroused feelings in him that were both carnal and impossibly innocent. She took him back to his teenage years. She made him yearn for young love. She made him remember the wet dreams and every dirty movie he’d ever seen—or wanted to see.
Set the groceries down, cowboy. Before you drop them.
He deposited the bags on the table by the cot, but nothing had changed when he turned back to her. She was still standing there, dripping all over his hardwood floor and staring at him like a wood nymph caught emerging from some magic pool. “Annie, what the hell—”
“I took a shower,” she said, stating the obvious. She shifted her weight, a barely discernible movement that hung the diaphanous material over her thighs and hipbones like cellophane wrap, revealing a reddish delta of hair. Strawberries and cream, Chase thought, struck by the contrast of her ginger hair and her porcelain skin tones.
He could feel his breathing quicken as he stared at her. He could feel muscles responding and heat gathering. Luckily there was something stopping him from making wild love to her right there on the floor in a pool of water. It was the total incongruity of the situation.
The woman standing across the room from him didn’t seen unduly embarrassed by having been caught naked, and yet she couldn’t have had much experience with men if what she’d told him about the convent was true. She hadn’t even been allowed to shower in the nude.
Sweet God, he thought. Could he actually have made love to her on that mission? If he’d been delirious, he wouldn’t have known what he was doing, but still, she hadn’t
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