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An Excerpt From: SHAKEN AND STIRRED
Copyright © M.A. ELLIS, 2009
All Rights Reserved, Ellora's Cave Publishing,
Inc.
The
air rushed from her lungs. He studied her face for what seemed like forever
before dropping his gaze slowly down her body. Susanne swallowed, steeling
herself for the inevitable reaction of him quickly looking away when he
realized the voluptuousness that men obviously loved was nowhere to be found.
But he didn’t look away. He perused her body
with a scrutiny that had her cheeks flushing and the junction of her thighs
starting an erotic little throb. His gaze lingered on her feet and she doubted
that he recognized a pair of discounted Louboutin
slingbacks when he saw them. It was more probably
that he secretly harbored a red-toenail fetish.
Now wouldn’t that be grand!
Susanne’s field of vision turned foggy as she imagined
him undoing her sandal and tossing it haphazardly to the floor, which in
the real world would undoubtedly have her issuing a cautious warning. She
honestly believed it should be a federal offense to manhandle fine footwear
but in her daydream it would be a moot point. He’d run one calloused palm
along the outside of her leg before snaking over her hip and a second later
she’d forget about four-hundred-dollar shoes and focus solely on his palm
gliding over the curve of her ass. Back and forth, he would tease before
gently sliding a finger along the leg edge of her panties until she—slut of the dream realm—would helpfully shift her
hips to allow him better access.
Susanne caught herself before her legs actually
opened and blinked away all erotic thoughts. She took a steadying breath before
spinning around on the stool to face the bar. She wasn’t looking for some
down-and-dirty-farm-boy fantasy. She shouldn’t care that he might possess
six-pack abs and a cock that was so mountable she was likely to offer up a
rousing “hi-ho, Silver” when she straddled it. She needed to get a grip.
Yeah! A grip on any part of him that might be
over six inches in length.
She also needed to grow up and lose the
schoolgirl fantasies.
They say eight seconds is a legal ride, Susie.
Susanne mentally chastised herself. She wasn’t
supposed to be thinking about anything strong and straight up unless it had
an alcohol base and could be easily topped with edible
garnish.
She focused on the shelves holding the bottles
of liquor, happy they weren’t backed with mirrors.
She didn’t need to keep tabs on Cowboy Sexy. She needed to finish her drink
and head back to her room—call it an early night. She needed to concentrate
on all the roadblocks and challenges the judges could throw into her finely
honed repertoire of possible award-winning cocktails. She did not
need to focus on—
“Excuse me, darlin’. Is anyone sitting here?”
A low Southern drawl that had the tiny hairs
along her arms rising. Her pulse raced and her previous intent to avoid him
evaporated into thin air.
His voice was way smooth-as-silk sexy and as he
shifted a little closer, Susanne could actually feel the heat rolling off
his body. From the recesses of her mind Gia’s bold advice taunted Susanne,
daring her to consider the possibility that mindless intercourse might
actually be the perfect distraction. But she’d never done the
one-night-stand thing. It wasn’t her style. She had never been a wild child,
and the way her heart was threatening to beat right out of her chest, she
never would be. Besides, it was pretty arrogant to think he was even
interested. Maybe the poor guy just wanted to sit down.
With an imaginary “poof” Susanne’s erotic
fantasy dissipated and she turned and offered him a polite smile.
“My friend just left for a minute—”
“Don’t fib, sugar. Your girlfriend is on a
mission. It was written all over her face when she
sashayed over and blindsided Chrissy. I don’t think we’ll have to worry
about those two for quite some time. They headed for the dance floor, hand in
hand.”
Susanne looked over her shoulder, trying very
hard not to glance downward as he took a seat and hooked one boot heel over
the rung of the stool. She focused her attention on the dance floor,
craning her neck until she saw the flash of silver fabric and Gia’s long, dark
hair swaying to and fro.
“Interesting,” she said softly.
“Understatement,” he chuckled.
He shifted and his knee brushed her leg, sending
an unfamiliar jolt of electricity up her body.
Susanne suddenly remembered the way the cowboy
had reacted when he saw Gia approaching Chrissy.
“Jealous?” she asked. The last thing she needed was
to be part of some payback plan.
“Hell no.” His laugh was low and deep. Genuine. “And
I apologize for throwing a kink into the one-word answer game we were
playing. I’m thinking you’d have come out the winner, sugar.”
“I’m not a game player,” Susanne said, looking
into his eyes. Now that he was less than two feet away, she realized they
were a deep gunmetal color.
“Not a player…just a competitor? What division?”
Susanne arched a brow and he offered her a
benign look.
“Surprised to find out we’re not here by chance,
that a bunch of plowboys were actually invited to the hottest ticket in
town? It’s true. And let me tell you, it was hell on the valet trying to
find parking spots for all our horses.”
In the land of Porsche
and Mercedes and Lamborghini the picture he painted was totally ludicrous
and Susanne was unable to keep a straight face.
“What’s your name, cowboy?”
He tilted his head back a little and looked down
his crooked nose at her, doing his best to offer her a
you-have-got-to-be-shitting-me look.
“Sorry. I’ve always wanted to say that,” Susanne
defended.
“Never had the chance before?”
“Not in Miami.”
“So the men ‘round these parts aren’t much into
throwing on a pair of boots and their best hat and waltzing on up to a
beautiful woman sitting at a bar? Hoping for nothing less than the
possibility that she just might be considering a little cowpoke role-playing?
‘Poke’ being the operative word, of course.”
Susanne looked into his twinkling eyes and
fought to keep her breathing normal and the conversation carefree.
“Oh, there’s more than a little role-play going
on in this town but I don’t think it involves steers and sagebrush. At
least, I hope it doesn’t. I’ve been a loyal supporter of the Holstein for many years.”
“Well, well. A city girl who knows her breeds. I’m
impressed,” he said, offering her a quick wink. “Where’ve you been hidin’, darlin’?”
It had been ages since Susanne had actually
returned a bar-side flirtation. She was starting to enjoy herself.
“I spent thirteen years in southwestern Missouri. But I don’t
remember rural role-playing being a sanctioned FFA event. I’m not sure what
that fantasy involves,” she said.
“Where I’m from, it usually consists of a stable
with some fresh-cut hay, a horse blanket and a squeeze bottle of Tupelo honey.”
“A barn and some honey? That’s it? No green and
yellow tractor? No hundred-degree afternoon with the sun beating down and a
swimming hole just waiting to cool a person off? I would have thought a
picnic lunch and a quart of sweet tea at a bare minimum.”
“Not since high school, sugar. I generally don’t
need some stretched-out scenario to get me to the main event. But if you
have a pair of cutoffs and a little white tank top in your suitcase, then
we can go back in time. I’m imaging how hot you’d look carrying that basket
across a field of alfalfa, your hair all sun kissed and blowing in the warm
summer breeze.”
She stared at him long and hard, wondering how
his voice could have the dual power of lulling part of her into a relaxed
state while setting every sexual fiber in her being on edge. He leaned
forward and brought his mouth close her ear, as if he had the biggest of
secrets to share with her.
“Can you see it?” he whispered, his breath
sending a wave of shivers down her spine. “Me crawlin’
down from the cab of that Deere. Wantin’ nothing
more than to dribble that sweet tea all over your hot body and lick every
drop away.”
Susanne sat stock still
and tried to get her heartbeat under control, praying he couldn’t hear the
rapid drumming. Flirtation was one thing. The way her body was reacting was
something altogether different. Just that quick, his words were making her
burn. It was a far cry from the aloof no-strings, country-lovin’ attitude she thought she might actually be able
to adopt for the evening.
“All I can see,” she said, forcing herself to
lean away and not into him, “is a woman who thought she could be totally spontaneous.
I kick major ass at the impromptu drink making, but this? Sorry, Tex, I can’t pull it
off.”
“Can’t you?” he asked, lowering his eyes. He
pursed his lips into a thoroughly dejected pout. “Well, that’s a damn fine
state of affairs.”
“I’m sorry. Please, don’t think I’m some sort of
barfly tease.” She gnawed at her lower lip, effectively halting any further
explanation.
His gaze lifted and settled on her mouth and her
lips began to throb.
“Let me get you a drink,” she offered.
“A drink?” His blinding smile returned as
quickly as it had disappeared. “If they have some specialty that’s
guaranteed to work as well as a cold shower then order away ‘cause that’s what I need, sugar. You’ve got the most
kissable mouth I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing.”
His words stunned her. She didn’t believe him.
But part of her wished she could.
“You can stop. Really. You’re handsome as hell
and I’m sure this works with most women but you need to realize that I’m
not going to sleep with you.” She turned around and tried to get the
bartender’s attention.
“Whoa now. There’s a helluva
lot that happens between kissing and consummating. It would definitely still
involve my mouth—probably my teeth now and again. A finger or two.”
He placed his forearms on the bar and made a
great show of studying his large hands. His fingers were long and roughened
but his nails were nicely kept. He drummed them
slowly against the metal and she realized that precision tapping was for
her benefit—a sign that he had all the time in the world. That he’d go
slowly. Keep his promise that there was a “helluva
lot” between the lip locks and the sex.
What more could you want?
Susanne motioned for the bartender a second
time, annoyance flaring. She wanted to buy him a drink to apologize for her
come-and-get-me attitude and then she wanted to leave.
Leave? Or escape?
“What’ll it be, handsome?” the woman purred.
Susanne’s mouth actually dropped open when the
blonde planted her elbows on the smooth surface and offered the cowboy an
enticing smile and a healthy glimpse of bosom. It was the most blatant,
inappropriate display Susanne had ever witnessed and she’d seen a lot in
her years behind a bar.
“What I’d like from you, miss, is a Jack on the
rocks.” His voice dripped with amusement.
Susanne snapped her head around, surprised to
find him staring at her and not the huge expanse of cleavage that was offered up.
He reached forward, shocking her further when he
rubbed one long, roughened finger along her jawline from ear to chin before
pushing her mouth closed. The light movement caused a slow heat to creep
down her neck and across her collarbone. A sheen
of moisture broke out along the swell of her breasts a second before her
nipples tightened and she barely managed to stifle her gasp.
“And what I need from you is even simpler.” He
spoke in a husky tone as he gently cradled her chin in his palm and pulled
her face closer to his. A delicious little flutter teased her belly as he
rubbed his thumb against her skin.
“I want you to step back into that fantasy land
we were discussing. Give me a chance to answer one of your life’s burning
questions.”
Susanne stared at him, no longer certain she
truly wanted whatever diversion they were about to take part in.
“C’mon, sugar. Ask me my name again. In that
same sweet voice that could have me doing anything your little heart
desires.”
Unable to draw her eyes away from his
penetrating stare, Susanne gnawed at her bottom lip and tried to think of
any sane reason to refuse his request but her rationale seemed to have
disappeared in a cloud of dust.
“Do you know how bad I want to nibble that soft
skin at the corner of your mouth?”
His grip tightened and Susanne squirmed in her
chair, desire slamming into her with a vengeance.
“We need to get the introductions out of the way
so I can kiss you properly. Ask me, darlin’.”
Her heart shifted into double time, its erratic
thrumming jolting through her body as she faced the utterly insane truth.
She wanted that kiss. And a great deal more.
“What’s your name, cowboy?” Her voice wavered.
“L. Treyton Ryder.” His eyes gleamed teasingly
as he touched the tip of his hat with his free hand and the fluttering that
had burst forth in Susanne’s stomach began to
migrate lower. “But you can call me Trey, darlin’.”
Who knew that all those “darlin’” and “sugars”
could have a woman’s panties ready to incinerate.
“What’s the ‘L’ stand for?” Susanne asked,
searching for a neutral topic that might divert her from climbing into his
lap and seeing if his kisses were as good as his game.
“You don’t really want to know.” He chuckled,
offering her another sexy smile.
“Tell me anyway,” she demanded.
“Lucifer.”
Lucifer?
Second
after second ticked away.
“Of course it is,” she finally said, feigning
nonchalance.
His lips parted on a wide, white, totally
devilish grin.
“And you are?”
Susanne met his teasing gaze, hoping her eyes
weren’t crossing from the rush of want that coursed through her.
“Screwed,” she snorted.
He tilted his head back and gave her an amused
look before leaning forward and sending another wave of shivers down her
spine as he brushed his lips against the sensitive skin along the curve of
her ear.
“Not yet, sugar. But it sure as hell would be my
pleasure to oblige,” Trey whispered.
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