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Isabelle Drake erotic romance....the nicer side of naughty
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Everglades Wildfire excerpt IT ONLY TOOK Amber Hill one glance to realize how completely wrong she’d been. She stared at Rick Belleair’s powerful backside as he went through the motions of some routine chore, and she fought against the swell of emotion threatening to weaken her resolve and good sense. Bright, southern Florida sunshine glinted off his blonde ponytail, a mass of curls like some windblown pirate’s, hanging halfway down his bare back. He looked and moved like the rogue she remembered, but he wasn’t some fantasy man she’d conjured up. His bare feet were planted firmly on the ground, not on the deck of an Eighteenth century schooner. There was no denying the truth, he was exactly as she remembered. Each inch of him had been imprinted into her memory, from the wild curls barely contained by the piece of string binding them, to the smooth muscled arches of his size 14 feet. Amber swallowed hard. Being a sensible girl from the Midwest, Amber figured or hoped that once she got close to him the spell would be broken. She’d been so very, very wrong. She was a long way from over him. But she needed him. The documents in her glove box had to be signed. By him. The sooner she got him to cooperate, the faster she could be on her way back home, to the full life that she hoped was waiting for her there. Before she could finish her approach, Rick turned. The gaze of his icy blue eyes flickered over her body, not lingering as hers had, but skimming. His face reflected none of the emotions that churned through her. The air between them, already hot and humid from the threatening afternoon thunderstorm, thickened. Amber’s throat tightened. What exactly had she planned on saying? With the swiftness of a man born and raised in the dangerous Everglades, Rick moved to her, wrapping his fingers around her neck. The rough calluses of his palms chaffed her skin as his mouth took hers. Amber sucked in a sudden breath, the scent of hard work and dirt assailing her. How familiar it was. How it turned her on. The sweet caress of Rick’s lips moving across hers. Completely in control, gentle but demanding. She reached for him and pulled him closer. She parted her lips, and was rewarded by the strong flick of his tongue over her teeth. Amber arched into the embrace of the man she’d fantasized about for months, and then, tried so desperately to forget. The solid plane of his wide chest pressed into hers. Her body melded completely, wonderfully to his. From his lips, delivering a demanding kiss, to the unmistakable hard press of his arousal, she ached for every taut inch. Rick lifted his mouth from hers to whisper into her ear. “Good girl Amber back for a fuck?” The husky whisper sent shivers down her back. Yes, she did want that. She looked up. A smear of dirt ran across his cheek. Sweat trickled over his sun-darkened skin. When her gaze met his, she saw the unmistakable desire that matched hers. With his thick fingers still curling around her neck, he glanced at the ground, and then asked, “Do you want to do it here? Or take the time to go up to the house?” This was not the way things were supposed to go. Her hesitation was long enough for him to shove her away. She stumbled back, barely catching her balance. He grabbed a grubby T-shirt from a nearby fence post, yanked it over his head, and turned to the bags of feed he’d been moving. The long curls of his hair swayed as he twisted side to side. Sweat glistened on his forearms. Amber shifted on her feet. “Rick...” He continued to ignore her. Everything had seemed so simple when she’d planned it out back home. All she had to do was get him to sign the contract, allowing her to use the hatchling growth rate research they’d gathered the previous summer, and get back to the airport. Once home, she’d finish her graduate degree, and marry Christopher. That was her plan anyway. The past months of lonely, late night fantasies meant nothing. The only thing she accomplished during those hours of longing was reliving a summer that never should’ve happened. She was letting the memories of great sex block the security she was going to have as Christopher’s wife. With Rick’s signature, their only tie would be cut, and she could get on with her life. He’d just be someone from her past. “I came to...” He turned. At his full height, he towered almost a foot over her, and weighed nearly a hundred pounds more. The strength in his arms and legs radiated from him, circling her. Heavy muscles stretched, filled out each inch of denim and cotton covering him. Even as he loomed over her, staring at her with dark contempt, she wanted him, and hated herself for it. He rested his hands on his hips and leaned down. “What do you want, Amber?” Her fingers fluttered around the wisps of her hair shifting in the slight breeze. She needed a way to deny her feelings for him. “I came…to ask…to tell you…” “What?” “I’m...” she started, but the words faltered. She looked away. Why couldn’t he be the one for her? But he wasn’t. She had to believe that Christopher would be the man to love her. One who’d give her the things she’d longed for her whole life—stability, a family, a home of her own. All she had to do was get the papers signed, and forget Rick. To push him away, keep him from touching her again, she said, “I came to tell you I’m getting married.” After the words were out, she waited, hoping...praying that the electric charge sparking through the air would vanish. Why did he have such a hold on her? Why couldn’t she wish it away? Rick unloaded the last of the bags from the bed of his rusted out, white pick-up, wiped his palms over his thighs, and then folded his arms across his chest. “Come over here, Amber.” He spoke softly, but the insistence of the demand was loud and clear. He was a man who gave orders, and people obeyed or suffered the consequences. Her first step was unconscious, but her will to oppose him took over. When he saw her pause, he ordered again, “Come to me.” After two more steps, she stood at an arm’s length from the man she’d once thought of as her lover. His gaze darted from her to the ground at his feet. She obeyed the silent command, moved closer. With only inches between them, his breath whispered across her face when he leaned down to speak. “Kiss me again.” No, anything but that. That kiss of a minute ago had been a mistake she was not going to repeat. There was a chance she wouldn’t be able to stop at a kiss. Not when she knew what Rick was capable of doing, to her body. Overhead, a storm-cloud blocked out the sun. A rumble rolled through the air. As though he controlled even the sky above, he didn’t even blink at the threat from the heavens. “Do it, Amber. I’m sure your man won’t mind. After all, you’ll save the best for him, won’t you?” She heard the taunt in his voice and knew she had to hide the truth from him, from herself. She could handle a kiss. Rising on tiptoe, Amber reached for him.
Everglades Wildfire |
