Take a Chance On Me

Chapter 16 Let's Get It On

When Thomas ended the kiss and pulled back, Emma saw that his eyes were filled with tears. Of all the things she'd never expected to see in this lifetime, Thomas on his knees before her, naked and crying, was right up there.

What right did he have to cry? She was the offended party here! And she reminded herself that he was a jerk, a conflicted jerk!

"Emma, I'm sterile. The woman I was with for four years-Nina-she left me when we found out."

Emma went completely still. He brushed his thumbs over her cheekbones. His hands trembled.

"I want you so much." Thomas laughed at his own confession and shook his head. "So damn much. But I think you deserve more than what I can give you, the best of everything, the best man there is. You deserve a real relationship with real possibilities-and I should have stopped this right at the start."

"Oh, Thomas…"

"I tried, but…" Thomas lowered his head and his voice. "I couldn't. I'm falling…" He raised his eyes to hers again. "I'm crazy about you, Emma."

"Oh."

"I'm sorry for the two-step."

Emma watched a fat tear plop over his bottom eyelid, and her body clutched in on itself. He couldn't have children? He was crazy about her? He wanted a relationship-one serious enough for it to even matter that they couldn't make babies together?

She was overflowing with a confusing swirl of joy and sadness. She thought her heart would crumble.

"How-" She stopped, puzzled. "You really can't have children?"

He gripped her face tight between his hands. "Jesus, Emma-I could come inside you for years nonstop-which sounds pretty good to me right now-and there'd never be any little Thomases or Emmas running around. I got hurt playing rugby seven years ago and thought I was fine. Then I reinjured myself at the end of last season, and it turns out I'm sterile."

He stopped, his eyes filled with uncertainty. Emma managed a nod. "Go on."

"There was a rupture-do you want all the medical details now, or can they wait?"

She brought a hand up to cover one of his, where it cradled her cheek. He was still shaking. "The details can wait."

He nodded, and exhaled in relief. "The bottom line is my sperm count's decimated. I thought maybe you could tell by looking at me. That I can't make life." He gave a small shrug. "I just seem to spend my days with death."

Emma couldn't say anything. She just gazed down into his face, stroked his hand, and felt the sadness roll through her. Good Lord! Here she was worried that she wasn't sexy enough for him and he was thinking he wasn't virile enough for her!

If this weren't so pathetic it would be funny.

"I'll understand if you don't want to see me again."

Emma let loose with a burst of startled laughter and pulled his hands into her lap, where she held them tight. "I don't mean to laugh-of course I want to see you-but it's just… well, I assumed this was about me."

"What about you?"

"The way I look. I mean, oh, God, I'm well aware that-"

"Yeah, what the hell was all that yelling about, Emma?" Thomas frowned at her.

"Me. My body. Aaron always told me that-"

A groan roared from Thomas's chest and his fingers clamped down on Emma's thighs. "What did that son of a bitch do to you, Emma? Tell me right now."

"He didn't do anything to me." She leaned away. "I just assumed I wasn't… you know… glamorous enough for you, because I'm pretty fleshy and I'm kind of basic and-"

"Stop right there." Thomas began rubbing her arms as if he were trying to warm her up. "Let me get this straight: Aaron, that dick-head of an ex-husband of yours, told you that you weren't beautiful? And you actually believed him?"

Emma snorted. "Wait a minute. I'm not some meek little housewife, okay? But I have eyes. I know I'm not really beautiful in the conventional sense, and I actually appreciated that Aaron was straight with me and didn't try to flatter me with a bunch of lies."

Thomas closed his eyes. "Oh, Jesus."

"It's not such a big deal. I've known it all my life. I mean, compared to Becca, I… oh, who cares now?" She sniffed. "The important thing is I'm smart and capable and…" Now it was her turn to cry. "And I just assumed you didn't find me attractive enough, even in the blue dress, to want a relationship with me."

Thomas had been shaking his head back and forth, slowly and deliberately, letting her ramble. But after that last statement, he couldn't listen to any more.

"That's enough." He brushed aside the silky hair stuck to her wet cheek and held her sweet face between his hands again. He wanted to kill that fucking Aaron-eviscerate him for planting such lies in Emma's lovely head.

"Look at me." Thomas brought his face close to hers. "I have eyes, too, baby, and I'm telling you-you are absolutely gorgeous. I didn't say anything about the stupid blue dress because it left me speechless. I was tortured. Insane. I wanted to lay you down right there on the picnic table! But you're the one who said you wanted to keep it all business between us, right?"

She nodded, frowning.

"I didn't know what to do, Emma! Tell me what the hell I was supposed to do! You set me up to fail either way!"

She gulped and her eyes went big and round. "I did, didn't I?" She rubbed her forehead. "I'm sorry, Thomas-what a mess."

"Baby." His voice had dropped a notch and it was rough and unsteady. "Believe me when I tell you that I loved looking at you in that blue dress." He peered up under her lowered lashes. "The only thing I didn't like about it was that all the other men in the place got to see you in it, too."

In a high squeak she said, "Really?"

"I love the way you look. I love your shape."

"Even my butt? Because Aaron-"

"What about your butt? Man, I have got to hear this."

Emma squirmed a little. "Forget it. This is the most ridiculous conversation I've ever had in my life."

"I'm kind of enjoying it-"

She glared at him. "I'm a thirty-four-year-old doctor of veterinary medicine and I refuse to waste another second of anyone's time discussing the pros and cons of the bundle of muscle that allows me to walk upright."

Thomas roared with laughter. "But I want to talk about it. That bundle of yours is the only topic I'm interested in right now. So what did he say?"

Emma's mouth fell open, then she slammed it shut in defiance.

"What size do you wear?"

She nearly jumped out of her skin. "What? I'm not going to tell you that!"

Thomas laughed softly and let a finger brush along the curve of her waist, the fullness of her hip. "Well, sweet-cheeks, you're sitting here in front of me and I can see it all, so what does it matter if you tell me the number?"

She flashed him a doubtful look.

"I'm going somewhere with this, Emma. Trust me."

She hissed in surrender and turned her face away. "Twelve."

"And?"

Her head swiveled back. "And what?"

"And what's wrong with that? I spend half my life studying people, taking mental measurements for descriptions, and I know for a fact that the average American woman is a size fourteen. So you're smaller than average."

She frowned at him.

"How much do you weigh?"

"For God's sake!" Emma tried to get up off the bed but Thomas clamped down on her thighs. She looked at him, incredulous. "Really, Thomas-if this is your idea of foreplay, it's not getting me hot, just bothered."

Laughing, Thomas dropped his head and planted little kisses on her kneecaps. "I'm just trying to understand," he said, nuzzling her knee. "If you tell me how much you weigh, then you won't feel like you've got anything to hide, right?"

She groaned.

He waited. "I'll go first: I'm six-three and two twenty."

Emma gulped. Yowzah! And it was nothing but muscle, power, and grace. In comparison, her stats sounded downright diminutive.

"Okay." She took a breath. "I'm five-five and about one forty-five. Aaron always said my butt was too big. Happy now?"

Thomas leaned back and reached up to run his fingers through her hair, looking into her blue eyes for a long, quiet moment. Aaron had done a number on her, no question about it, and it was now his job to correct the math.

"People can be exceptionally cruel, Emma," he said softly. "And people can be power-hungry and people can be stupid. Apparently, your ex-husband was cruel, power-hungry, and stupid."

Without warning, he rose up on his knees, grabbed a handful of her hair, and tipped her head back, then kissed her thoroughly. He slid his lips over her and his tongue into her, and bit down on that carnal lower lip of hers, sucking it into his mouth, all to illustrate the extent of Aaron's idiocy.

Then he whispered in her ear, "I think you are the sexiest woman I've ever known-especially your butt." His fingers slid down around her bottom, working their way beneath her, cupping her, holding her. He pulled her like that to the very edge of the bed and held her there, tight in his hands. He nibbled on her neck as he continued to murmur in her ear.

"Your butt is like a neon sign that flashes the word SEX over and over in my brain. Your butt is like all the perfect forms in nature wrapped up into one little pair of lacy underwear. Your butt is my reason for being."

She snorted again. "Stop it. There's such a thing as overkill."

"Oh, I disagree." He kissed and suckled at her throat, her collarbone. "I think we're just getting started on our relaxation exercises, Dr. Jenkins." He pulled back enough for her to see his face, and he hitched up his lips mischievously.

"Roll over," he commanded.

Her eyes flew wide. "Pardon me?"

Before she could protest, he'd flipped her over onto her stomach and stretched her legs down and apart, her feet dangling off the bed. She felt completely exposed, the air hitting her bare back and shoulders and the inside of her thighs. She sensed Thomas hovering over her, close, his breath warm on the small of her back. She began to tremble.

"Stay." His command was deep and serious, but his voice shook with laughter.

Emma giggled, but a spark of real fear flared inside her. It seemed there was always a touch of fear in her response to Thomas, because it was too intense, too fast, and all unexplored territory.

What was he going to do to her?

She craned her neck to look over her shoulder. "Is this where you tell me to bark like a dog for you?"

Thomas laughed again, then leaned down and kissed the side of her cheek. "Maybe later. Right now, I'm going to redirect your attention-you're going to get so interested in what I'm doing that you won't remember what upset you in the first place."

Emma started to giggle-realizing she was about to get a taste of her own medicine-but abruptly stopped when Thomas slapped his two big hands down on her rump and ripped off her underwear in one quick swipe. She felt the fabric drag along the back of her legs and fall off the end of her toes.

His hands came back to her bottom, raising her until she was a few inches off the bed and her knees slightly bent. He held her there, his touch firm and unmoving. And hot-so wonderfully hot where he grasped her.

Then he moved his palms in delicious, rhythmic circles, caressing, then pulling apart, pushing together, and Emma could hear his breath coming as fast as her own. She could hear him make little noises in the back of his throat that were part grunt and part murmur, and she tried not to imagine what she must look like in this position. She tried not to worry. She simply tried to feel.

"I'm an ass man, Emma." His hands continued to caress her, cup her, grip her.

"That's good to know," she mumbled, half into the sheets. Half out of her mind.

"Well, actually, I'm a breast man, too. And a leg man. But mostly an ass man."

"Okay," she squeaked. "I got all those things."

"Hell yes, you do, Miss Marple." His hands slid up into the dip in her back, thumbs touching, then let his fingers slide down into her waist, around the swell of her hips to her bottom, where he grabbed on and started over.

"And my God, you've got one fine ass." His fingers began to stray down the furrow of her bottom and she felt the bed move as he came up behind her.

His tongue landed hot and wet on her flesh and she nearly screamed at the intensity of the sensation. He licked her, dragged his lips and tongue across her, and flirted with the crease of her. She felt his tongue flick and his teeth nip and then one of his hands was sliding hot and slow up the length of her spine until it grabbed a handful of her hair. At the same time, his other hand moved down, down, until he cupped her sex.

Emma knew instinctively that she'd just been claimed.

"Every inch of you is beautiful," he whispered, his breath hot on her skin and his lips vibrating against her flesh. He was such a big man that he could be every place on her body at once-her hair, her sex, her back-and Emma heard herself make little whimpers of pleasure, soft moans, then a startled cry when his long fingers tickled the opening to her body.

His fingertips separated her, slicked around the swollen tissue, but didn't enter her.

Emma lost it,just like the night on the front porch, and her body seemed to move of its own volition. Her hips began to circle slow and rhythmically, pushing against his touch, pulling away, until she was lost in it, suffocating in the pleasure, rubbing her face into the bed as she moved her hips.

For what seemed like an eternity, Thomas just let his fingertips play along the wet rim of her, spellbound by her greedy wiggle and the sight of his big fingers up against her beautiful little pussy-so puffy and sweet and so ready for him.

Emma was into sex. He'd figured that out by now and said a little prayer of thanks.

And being naked with her, so close to her heat, hearing those little noises she made, getting drunk on her scent-he couldn't remember experiencing this kind of buildup before, this kind of exquisite torture, pressure, agony.

Never in his life had he wanted a woman this much.

"Please," he heard her whimper. Her hips began to circle a bit faster and he smiled, keeping his fingers just on the outside of where she needed them, aware that he was teasing her.

It was time to end at least some of her discomfort.

He adjusted his touch, slowly pushing down into the liquid heat, and let his middle finger make contact with her stiff little clitoris.

Emma groaned low and deep. Thomas brought his lips to her ear as he let his finger flick over her slippery heart-beat. "I've been dying to get close to you, put my hands all over your body, make you come. I think you're going to come a lot for me, aren't you, baby?"

She moaned.

He wanted her to wait. He wanted her to go higher. He wanted it to be exceptional for her. He wanted only truth between them, right now and always.

He pulled his hand away, and with gentleness he picked her up and turned her around so that she sat on the edge of the bed again. He kneeled before her, pleased to see that she looked dazed by desire-sleepy and drugged and trembling with anticipation.

"Now you know how I feel about your little blue dress and what goes in it," he said, trailing a finger down her kneecap. "And you know exactly what I am and what I'm not. So what happens now?"

Emma exhaled, shuddering from his hot touch and his words and the intensity of her desire and sorrow. "I'm so sorry you can't have children."

Thomas looked up into her wet blue eyes, her face and breasts framed by the fall of all that glorious, dark hair. She put her hand on the top of his head, like a benediction, and he let his chin drop to his chest in heavy relief.

"You really thought it would matter-that I wouldn't want you?" she whispered.

He nodded.

"Oh, Thomas." Emma reached for his chin and tipped it up. His eyes were closed and his face was tight with emotion. She leaned down and kissed the little semicolon scar, then his eyelashes, his temples, the golden skin over his cheekbones, his dimples, his lips. "I want you, more than ever, because you trusted me enough to tell me the truth. Thank you for that."

He nodded, his eyes still closed. "Can you forgive me for paying your fee?"

Emma let her hands stroke his soft, short curls. She cupped her hands around the hard curve of his skull and dropped a soft kiss to his forehead. "I forgive you."

"I want you, Emma."

"I want you, too. I want to know everything about you. I want to experience everything with you. I want more than I've ever had."

Thomas jerked as he felt Emma's small hand close around his erection.

"And man, oh man, do I ever want this bad boy." She swirled her tongue along his earlobe and then bit him, feeling the shiver course through his body.

"You're a sexy, funny, complicated man, and I've wanted you from the very first moment I saw you. I couldn't help myself."

"Oh yeah, Emma-"

She smiled with pleasure-the pleasure of hearing him say her name in that deep, resonant voice. In Thomas's voice, the two syllables of her ordinary name sounded like desire itself.

She drank in the vision of the man on his knees before her, head thrown back, eyes closed, jaw clenched.

She removed her hands from his erection and caressed his muscled ass, roamed up his back, slid her hands to his shoulders. It was a bittersweet place-a great ledge of muscle and sinew that seemed to be the home of both his strength and his sorrow.

"If she left you, she must not have loved you."

Thomas opened his eyes and looked right up into Emma's face. "I was closed off. Unwilling to commit." He shrugged, his body rippling under her hands. "Finding out I was a spermless wonder made it easy for her to move on, and I don't blame her."

Emma moved her palms to cover the rounded muscles of his chest, lacy with blond wisps and dotted with silky, pink nipples.

"Did you love Nina, Thomas?"

"I realize now that I didn't."

She let her hands flutter down the ridged surface of his abdomen and ran a finger along the edge of the flat, smooth navel.

"Have you ever been in love?"

His stomach quivered and he breathed faster. "Just this once, I think-I'm still trying to figure it out, Emma."

Her heart skipped a beat.

"And you? Did you ever love anyone besides Aaron?"

She moved her hands over the sweet indentations near his hipbones and down into the darker, springy thatch of hair, then clasped him at the root.

"Only you."

He groaned and threw his head back. Emma stared in wonder at her woman fingers on the man flesh made red-purple and hard with blood. Without a doubt, it was the most shockingly beautiful sight the world had to offer.

She wished she were an artist and not a scientist, someone who could capture the graceful lines of him on canvas or in clay-the aching perfection of the physical. But she wasn't an artist. She was just a woman who had the privilege to touch him, see him.

Love him-if he'd let her.

Thomas's erection twitched in her hands, and she smiled. She brushed her fingertips over the plump head and its swollen, velvet edge, then let her fingers slip down to the rigid flesh again. Veined. Hard. Thick.

And it occurred to her that the man's penis was soft on the outside and steel on the inside-the exact opposite of the man himself.

"I'm sad, Thomas. I'm so sad about the babies." She leaned down to rain kisses along his cheeks and beard stubble and under the ledge of his jaw. "But it doesn't affect how I feel about you. It's scary how much I want you. I've never felt anything like it in my life."

She reached beneath to cup his testicles, and his eyes shot open.

"It's all right, Rugby Boy." She smiled at him, gently exploring his heavy sac in one hand while stroking his length with the other. "I know everything now. There's nothing to hide, right?"

Thomas shuddered, and Emma watched him flex his back and bring his hands up to hover before her-then tenderly claim her breasts. It was the first time he'd touched her there since the front porch.

And for a long moment they simply closed their eyes and cradled each other, savored each other.

Until it wasn't enough.

Thomas was the first to move. He dipped his mouth to one of Emma's nipples and swore he heard a sizzle on contact with his wet tongue. Her flesh hardened and elongated in his mouth, begging him to suckle and tease and nip, first one, then the other, until both nipples were rock hard, glistening, and ruby red, and Emma was groaning.

Thomas widened his mouth to feed on as much of each glorious breast as he could. She was heavy with arousal and the flesh seemed to melt in his mouth.

Her breasts were perfect. Perfect for his mouth to suck and lick and bite. Perfect under his hands. Perfect for him. And he never wanted to stop making love to them.

Emma let go of him and leaned back on her hands to support herself. She threw back her head and cried, "I'm so sorry I yelled at you and called you names!"

It was difficult to keep the suction going while laughing, so Thomas moved his kiss to the hot and tender skin of her throat. While he did this, his hands came down on her inner thighs.

Emma rose up to look at him.

"Spread your legs for me, baby," he said.

She whimpered, and let her legs fall open.

"Wider. All theway." He looked from the tender juncture of her thighs back to her eyes, and saw the sweet female vulnerability in both places. "I need to touch everywhere, Emma. I need to see everything. Do everything."

He lowered his head. When his fingers spread her open, Emma sucked hard on her bottom lip to stop from screaming. Then his tongue lapped, slicked around, probed, while he slid the tip of his middle finger inside her. Right about then, she gave up trying to be quiet.

"And you don't have to apologize, sweet-cheeks-you're awful cute when you're calling me names." Thomas laughed deep, pushing two fingers in to the last knuckle as he smiled up at her. "But you're even cuter when you're all wet and swollen and ready to be fucked."

"Thomas-"

"You sure you still want me?"

She laughed, then gasped as he whirled his thumb over her exposed clitoris. "Oh, yeah."

"Do you want this, Emma?"

"More," she breathed.

He pushed in a third finger, stretching her impossibly wide, and decided maybe this was the approximate thickness of his cock, although right at that moment it felt as big around as a grain silo.

He pistoned his fingers in and out of her, pressing against her swollen little cit. He felt it pulse with each rock of his hand.

"Now!" Emma yelled out, meeting his invasion with her own greed. "Please! Oh, my God, Thomas! Now!"

Just as she began to spasm against his fingers, Thomas pulled his hand away, pushed her on her back and replaced his fingers with all of his cock-one long, slick slide home.

She rippled against him and the sound of her hungry little moans made it nearly impossible to keep from mindlessly ramming into her. But he stayed focused, stayed with her as she shuddered, took her pleasure, and then took more.

Emma came hard and steady while the exquisite cycle went on and on. He entered her, slid all the way out, then pushed slowly way back in-bigger and thicker than anything she'd ever had inside her before. She gasped for breath.

When she could, she opened her eyes to see that exceptional face gazing at her, the skin around his eyes pulled in concentration and pleasure.

"My beautiful Emma." His hands cupped her cheeks and his mouth came down on hers, and his hot, sleek tongue licked into her opened lips, pierced her mouth as he pierced her body.

Good Lord, he was blistering and huge and heavy and all over her and inside her, and she let herself go, let herself feel for the first time in her life the unbearable pleasure of physical domination.

But it was domination wrapped up in the safety of love-and oh, daddy, it was everything. It was the secret of life.

When he reached for her wrists and pinned them over her head, she screamed with surprise and pleasure.

Then he moved slightly higher on her belly and started a deeper and faster grind, and in a flash of wonder, Emma knew that there was even more acute physical joy to be had. And as all of his tough, solid weight gnashed directly against her and thrust deep inside her, she started to lose it again.

"Come for me, Emma."

Thomas let go of her wrists and reached under to grab her butt-he seemed to do that a lot-and plunged even deeper inside her. "I knew the minute I saw you. It's you, Emma. Damn, it's you."

In that instant, Emma surrendered her heart to him, along with her body, and the world caught fire.

He slammed into her so hard she nearly fell off the edge of the bed-the edge of consciousness-and she wrapped her legs around his hips in an act of self-preservation. Then she was coming again, gripped by the pulse, riding the wave, relentless, never-ending-and there was nothing but Thomas. Thomas in her, under her, on her, with her. And it was more than she'd ever dreamed.

He cried out her name in rhythm with each frenzied spasm of his climax, and once he'd emptied himself into her he collapsed, panting into the crook of her neck, nuzzling her, kissing her, murmuring unintelligible things in her ear.

Emma lay in awe, her legs still hooked around his narrow hips, dazed by the feel of his hot breath on her throat and his heartbeat slamming against her breasts. How she loved having him this close to her-closer than she'd ever felt to another human being in her life. How right this was.

"Emma…"

She brushed her fingers down his spine, and Thomas arched into her touch like a friendly domestic shorthair. He made a primitive noise into the side of her neck that sounded-and felt-just like a purr.

She couldn't stop smiling at the wonder of it all.

This man wasn't a moody robot-he was a battle-scarred tomcat who needed a loving home. And though she'd always been more of a dog person, she had a feeling that was about to change.

She had a feeling a lot of things were about to change. "How are you, baby?" Thomas's moist kisses below her ear made her tingle all over.

"I'm alive. I think."

He laughed, and the press of his cheek against her throat told her the dimples had returned. She wished she could see them. After a long moment, he pushed up and looked down on her, his face impossibly open, full of humor and warmth-the most endearing face she'd ever seen.

"Do you mind if I call you that-'baby,' I mean?"

She let loose with what she feared was a completely goofy grin. Nobody had ever called her that before. It made her feel small, delicate, and so very feminine. It made her feel treasured.

"I like it, actually. Don't tell Velvet."

Thomas dropped his head and showered her with sweet kisses. "Thank you for making love with me, Emma."

He was thanking her? "Anytime, Rugby Boy."

"Oh, yeah?" He raised one hand to brush the hair from her forehead and let his fingers trace over the arch of her brow.

"Mmm…" Emma closed her eyes in pleasure.

"Am I squishing you?"

"No! You feel really good right where you are. Do you think you could stay awhile?"

His smile spread slow and he continued to stroke her cheek, her chin, her ear, her bottom lip. "I warned you I'd like to come inside you for years on end, but I'm afraid you're going to suffocate if I don't move."

He rolled onto his side, taking her with him, and she snuggled up against his solid body, lulled into sweet, warm peace with the beat of his heart, the stroke of his hand on her hair, the rhythm of his breathing.

Emma didn't know how long she slept, but she woke with something hard prodding her hip. She opened her eyes to find herself sprawled half on top of Thomas. He smiled down at her.

"Hey, Emma."

She laughed-the guy may be shooting blanks, but his trigger worked fine.

"Hey, big guy."

Thomas folded his arms around her and kissed her gently. "I wasn't exactly prepared for this-for you. I know I didn't do such a smooth job with all of it. Sometimes I just assume the worst, you know?" He kissed her chin, her throat. "But I won't hurt you again. I won't ever let anything hurt you."

Emma smiled against his neck. "Don't make promises, okay? Just hold me, Thomas. Make me forget everything but you."

"I can do that." He nuzzled under her jaw. "But you've got to let me make just one little promise to you."

"Thomas-"

In one movement, he pulled her up on top of him, spread her thighs and pushed inside her. After the initial surprise, Emma felt her body melt around him, pull him in. She wantonly wriggled on him, allowing herself to sink all the way down, skewered. His.

He put his big hands on her hips and lifted her, just a bit.

"I promise not to hurt you."

Then he brought her back down.

"I promise to take care of you."

Back up.

Emma fell forward, her hands on either side of his head, her breasts dangling in front of his mouth.

Back down.

He mouthed a nipple, then the next, tonguing, biting, rubbing his cheeks over them until they were once again raging red, swollen and hard.

Up.

"And I promise to ravage you until you can't take any more."

Down. Hard.

Emma shuddered, overwhelmed by the sensation of his mouth and teeth on her, his flesh hard inside her, his words seducing her.

Up and down.

She didn't want to cry again, but she couldn't help it-it was simply too much, too wonderful.

Up and down. Faster. Harder. Rougher. She detonated, the heat searing through her, Thomas's quicksilver eyes burning right through to her soul.

When she caught her breath she said, "It really is you, isn't it?" Her voice broke as the tears stung her eyes. "You're the man who's going to sweep me off my feet."

Thomas stilled. He let the nipple pop from his mouth, and grinned up at her.

"Consider yourself swept, babe."