Linda Howard

She glanced at her watch. He'd been massaging his legs for half an hour. "I think that's enough," she said firmly. "Don't you want to go back to bed?" He straightened up in the wheelchair and his teeth flashed in a grin. "Baby, I'm so tired of that bed, the only way you could get me back in it would be if you crawled in there with me.

She whimpered softly into his mouth. "We can't," she cried, desperation and desire tearing her apart. "The hell we can't," he rasped, taking her hand and moving it down his body to where his flesh strained at the fabric of his pants. Her fingers jerked at the contact: then a spasm of pain crossed her pale face, and her hand lingered involuntarily, exploring the dimensions of his arousal. He caught his breath. "Jay, baby, don't' stop me now!

Her lips parted slightly in a smile so female it took his breath away, and her deep blue eyes beckoned him, dared him. Once again her hips lifted. "What are you waiting for?" she breathed. "For you," he answered, and even as he lost himself in the mindless ecstasy of making love to her, the truth of that remained. He'd waited for her forever.

She didn't want to handle him. She didn't want anything to do with him - this man with his cold, intense eyes and clipped speech, this stranger, this Yankee. He made her feel like a rabbit facing a cobra: terrified, but fascinated at the same time. He tried to hide his ruthlessness behind smooth, cosmopolitan manners, but Evie had no doubts about the real nature of the man.He wanted her. He intended to have her. And he wouldn't care if he destroyed her in the taking.

I'm not good at games, Robert. Don't kiss me unless it's for read. Don't come around unless you mean to stay.""Do you mean marriage?" he asked coolly, his expressive eyebrows lifting...."if you're looking for a summer affair, I'm not your woman."His mouth twisted as an unreadable expression crossed his face. "Oh, but you are. You just haven't admitted it to yourself yet.

She had opened the refrigerator door and was looking at her supply of frozen microwave dinners with an expression of distaste when the doorman buzzed. Deciding to forget about dinner, something she'd done too often lately, she depressed the switch. "Yes, Dennis?" "Mr. Payne and Mr. McCoy are here to see you, Ms. Granger," Dennis said smoothly. "From the FBI." "What?" Jay asked, startled, sure she'd misunderstood. Dennis repeated the message, but the words remained the same. She was totally dumbfounded. "Send them up," she said, because she didn't know what else to do. FBI? What on earth? Unless slamming your apartment door was somehow against federal law, the worst she could be accused of was tearing the tags off her mattress and pillows. Well, why not? This was a perfectly rotten end to a perfectly rotten day.

Do you want me?" she whispered, licking him again. She felt very warm, and slightly drunk with her feminine power. Desire was unfurling inside her, opening like a flower. Her breasts throbbed, and she rubbed them against his leg.He gave a strangled laugh, almost undone by her natural sensuality. "Look a few inches to your right and tell me what you think.

Jay stepped into the room, and for a split second both her heart and lungs seemed to stop functioning. Then her heart lurched into rhythm again, and she drew a deep, painful breath. Tears sprang to her eyes as she stared at the inert form on the white hospital bed, and his name trembled soundlessly on her lips. It didn't seem possible that this ... this could be Steve.

I don't have casual sex," she said.He almost smiled. It was merely an expression in those pale eyes, rather than an actual movement of his mouth. "My dear, I promise you there wouldn't be anything casual about it.

I thought you were a drunk.""A drunk?""Bloodshot eyes, dirty clothes, getting home in the wee hours of the morning, making a lot ofnoise, grouchy all the time as if you had a hangover_ what else was I to think?"He rubbed his face. "Sorry, I wasn't thinking. I should have showered, shaved, and dressed in asuit before I came out to tell you that you were making enough noise to raise the dead.

Death isn't peaceful; it is just nothing. Everything is gone. No more sunrises, no more hopes, no more fears. Nothing.

Calmly, deliberately, he moved his hands down to her breasts and molded his fingers over them. Jay inhaled sharply, and he said, "Easy, easy," as he stroked the soft mounds. "Steve, no." But her eyes were closing as warm pleasure built in her, her blood beating slowly and powerfully through her veins. His thumbs rubbed over her nipples and she quivered, her breasts beginning to tighten. "You're so soft." His voice roughened even more. "God, how I've wanted to touch you. Come here, sweetheart.

He was silent a moment; then he said, "I want a drink of water." She almost laughed aloud, because it was such a mundane request that could have been made of anyone, but then she saw the tension in his jaw and lips and realized that, again, he was checking out his condition, and he wanted her with him. She turned to the small Styrofoam pitcher that was kept full of crushed ice, which she used to keep his lips moist. The ice had melted enough that she was able to pour the glass half full of water. She stuck a straw into it and held it to his lips. Gingerly he sucked the liquid into his mouth and held it for a moment, as if letting it soak into his membranes. Then, slowly, he swallowed, and after a minute he relaxed. "Thank God," he muttered hoarsely. "My throat still feel swollen. I wasn't sure I could swallow, and I sure as hell didn't want that damned tube back." Behind Jay, Frank turned a smothered laugh into a cough. "Anything else?" she asked. "Yes. Kiss me.

He's thought he was willing to do anything in order to get what he wanted, what was right for his kind. He'd been certain any sacrifice was possible.He'd been wrong.

It's daylight. Shouldn't you have burned to a crisp, or something? Don't you have to crawl into a coffin? Where do you keep it stashed, anyway?""I've never owned a coffin," he admitted, unable to hold back a smile.

Chloe said the first thing that popped into her head., "I don't sleep with dead guys..."Luca gave her an amused look. "Good. I'm not dead. Never have been.... I'm immortal.

You don't just... just float someone in the air like that!" she shouted, so beside herself she was almost frenzied."Why? Is there some human law against it?

He lifted her hand to his mouth. The touch of his lips was soft on her scraped palm, the tiny licks of his tongue so light she could barely feel them. Wait. He was licking her?"You can't lick me," she said sternly. "i don't know your name."He looked up and a quick grin slashed across his face. "Luca," he said...."Luca," she repeated. "Is that an America name?""No." He lifted her hand to his mouth again, and his tongue once more began a slow, gentle movement over the scrape. She was okay with it now, because she knew his name.