Read Online The Complete Mackenzie Collection by Linda Howard - Free Book Online Page A

breechclout or loincloth, and her pulse rate had gone wild.
    He didn’t sit down, but propped his long body against the cabinet beside her. Mary kept her head down, hoping her blush would subside. What was it about the man that the mere sight of him triggered erotic fantasies? She had certainly never had any fantasies before, erotic or otherwise. She had never before looked at a man and wondered what he looked like nude, but the thought of Wolf nude made her ache inside, made her hands itch to touch him.
    “What the hell are you doing letting me even come in your house, let alone inviting me to have coffee?” he asked in a low, rough voice.
    She blinked at him, her expression startled. “Why shouldn’t I?”
    He thought he might explode with frustration. “Lady—”
    “Mary.”
    His big fists clenched. “ Mary. Don’t you have any better sense than to let an ex-con into your house?”
    “Oh, that.” She dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “It would be wise to follow your advice if you were truly a criminal, but since you didn’t do it, I don’t think that applies in this instance. Besides, if you were a criminal, you wouldn’t give me that advice.”
    He couldn’t believe the casual way she disregarded any possibility of his guilt. “How do you know I didn’t do it?”
    “You just didn’t.”
    “Do you have any reason for your deduction, Sherlock, or are you going on good old feminine intuition?”
    She jerked around and glared at him. “I don’t believe a rapist would have handled a woman as tenderly as you—as you handled me,” she said, her voice tapering off into a whisper, and the color surged back into her face. Mortified by the stupid way she continued to blush, she slapped her palms to her face in an effort to hide the betraying color.
    Wolf clenched his teeth, partly because she was white and therefore not for him, partly because she was so damned innocent, and partly because he wanted so fiercely to touch her that his entire body ached. “Don’t build any dreams because I kissed you Saturday,” he said harshly. “I’ve been too long without a woman, and I’m—”
    “Horny?” she supplied.
    He was staggered by the incongruity of that word coming from her prim mouth. “What?”
    “Horny,” she said again. “I’ve heard some of my students say it. It means—”
    “I know what it means!”
    “Oh. Well, is that what you were? Still are, for all I know.”
    He wanted to laugh. The urge almost overpowered him, but he changed the sound into a cough. “Yeah, I still am.”
    She looked sympathetic. “I understand that can be quite a problem.”
    “It’s hard on a guy.”
    It took a moment, but then her eyes widened, and before she could stop herself, her gaze had slid down his body. Instantly she jerked her head back up. “Oh. I see. I mean—I understand.”
    The need to touch her was suddenly so strong that he had to give into it, had to touch her in even the smallest way. He put his hands on her shoulders, savoring her softness, the delicacy of her joints under his palms. “I don’t think you do understand. You can’t associate with me and still work in this town. At best, you’d be treated like a leper, or a slut. You would probably lose your job.”
    At that, she pressed her lips together, and a militant light came into her eyes. “I’d like to see someone try to fire me for associating with a law-abiding, tax-paying citizen. I refuse to pretend I don’t know you.”
    “There’s knowing, and there’s knowing. It would be bad enough for you to be friends with me. Sleeping with me would make your life here impossible.”
    He felt her stiffen under his hands. “I don’t believe I’ve asked to sleep with you,” she said, but the color rose in her face again. She hadn’t actually said the words, but he knew she certainly had thought about what it would be like.
    “You asked, all right, but you’re so damned innocent you didn’t realize what you were doing,”