Read Online Man of Her Dreams by Tami Hoag - Free Book Online Page B

over horse liniment. What’s the story on this, McSwain?” A naughty smile tipped up her lips as her delicately lined face lit up with the glow of anticipation. “Is it kinky?”
    Maggie ground her teeth. Her hand tightened visibly on the back of her chair. “No, it’s not kinky. In fact, it’s not at all worth discussing.”
    â€œYou can tell us, Mary Margaret,” Miss Emma assured her in a conspiratorial tone as she tore a biscuit in two and baptized half in a puddle of raspberry jam. “We’ve been around the block a time or two, you know.”
    Mrs. Claiborne sniffed. “A time or two? You darn near ran your tires bald.”
    Miss Emma’s answer was an impish grin.
    Maggie took her seat, snapping open a linen napkin as if it were a bullwhip. “There’s nothing to tell.”
    She had awakened the previous afternoon on Rylan’s bed—alone, untouched, frustrated, and furious with herself. How many years had she been waiting for Rylan Quaid to make love to her, only to fall asleep when the perfect opportunity presented itself!
    He certainly had been ready if not willing. She almost groaned aloud at the memory of the accidental intimate contact they made when he sat down on the bed. At least there was one part of him that was living up to her dreams. And she had zonked out. Her big seduction scene and she had nodded off before they’d even gotten to the good part.
    Of course, the scene might have been salvaged had Ry come into the room to awaken her. He could have stretched out beside her and wooed her out of sleep with a string of soft kisses that started at her temple and trailed downward over her cheek to just under her jaw to the hollow at the base of her throat. She would have sighed, half awake, watching him through lowered lashes as he tugged the towel away from her breasts to capture an aroused peak in his mouth….
    Instead, he’d bellowed through the door that he had a hunt club meeting in thirty minutes, and she’d better quit sawing logs and haul her tail out of bed. The rude, overbearing, overgrown ox. What kind of gentleman insinuated that a lady snored?
    Damnation. Her clever plan had gotten her nowhere, and nothing on God’s green earth could scrub the scent of that blasted horse liniment off her skin. She’d soaked in a tub slick with a double dose of rose-scented bath oil and gotten nothing but slippery. She’d fumigated her room with a cloud of Passion’s Promise, but she still smelled like Mr. Ed.
    â€œI knew a French chef once,” Miss Emma said dreamily. Gazing at the brass chandelier, she pressed a frail-looking hand to her heart as if feeling it beat would somehow sharpen her age-dimmed memory. “We met at a little sidewalk café in Antwerp, Belgium. He used to do the most delicious things with olive oil. I declare, it makes my heart race to think of it.”
    â€œIt ought to make your nose grow,” Mrs. Claiborne said with a snort as she cut a bite from her slice of ham. “You’ve never been to Belgium. You’ve never been farther than Biloxi.”
    Miss Emma gave her sister a peeved look. “So I got the location mixed up. Sue me. It must have been New Orleans and it just seemed like Antwerp.” She turned back to Maggie with the sincere look of a schoolteacher at lesson time. “The point is, different men find different things erotic. With André it was olive oil. Baron Huntleigh once went wild watching me eat a fig. If Rylan finds horse liniment stimulating, darlin’—”
    â€œBelieve me, Miss Emma,” Maggie cut her off as she mutilated a slice of toast with a butter knife. “Rylan doesn’t find horse liniment stimulating. I’m sure I haven’t the first idea what Rylan Quaid finds erotic.”
    Miss Emma looked puzzled. “Hadn’t you better find out?”
    Maggie intended to redouble her efforts to find out. She was