The Rebound Guy

by Colgan, Jennifer

  “Maybe we…can change the reservation?” Lauren murmured the words through a silky sigh. She backed against him, giving him unspoken permission to do as he pleased. His fingers found the lacey band of her panties and tugged down. He cupped her and seated his erection between her legs.

  “This isn’t what I had planned for tonight,” he told her as he ground his hips against her. She spread her legs and leaned forward. One strap of her dress fell from her shoulder, and Eric was lost.

  He held her against him with one hand while the other found the zipper of her dress and yanked it down. When the satiny bodice fell open, he filled that hand with her breast. Her nipple grew hard against his palm.

  He planted kisses from the nape of her neck down her spine as he sank to his knees behind her. The dress fell, inch by inch, until it pooled around her ankles, and she kicked it aside.

  She braced her hands on the counter as he dragged her black lace panties down to her knees and farther, kissing the sensitive skin behind her knees as he went. She kicked them aside as well, and turned around.

  “How do you want me?” she asked. His body seemed to catch fire, burning under his clothes as he gazed at her. He’d been prepared to worship her, but her question transformed him from supplicant to plunderer. A growl bubbled up around his reply.

  “On the floor, on your back.”

  Lauren’s knees buckled at Eric’s command. A small part of her brain that was still lucid thanked the stars that her kitchen floor had carpeting.

  She lay back, watching Eric as he dragged his loosened tie out of his collar. He trailed the strip of silk over her thighs and between her legs.

  The rasp of fabric set her clit pulsing with need. She arched and dug her heels into the carpet, writhing for him as he unbuttoned his shirt and pulled off his belt.

  He peeled his fly open and released his erection, already glistening at the tip. She wanted him inside her so badly she almost suggested they forget the condom, but that lucid part of her mind wouldn’t allow her to be completely irresponsible.

  She flicked her gaze in the direction of the bedroom and he understood her telepathic signal.

  “Don’t worry. I’ve got one.” He produced a foil packet from his back pocket and ripped it open with his teeth.

  Had he planned this all along? Did he know she’d be so hot for him after two days apart that she wouldn’t care about dinner? She’d worry about that later. Right now…

  She reached for his cock, pumped him as he settled over her.

  Together they rolled the condom down over his shaft. “In me…now!”

  He didn’t question her directive. Instead, he plunged inside, his hot, hard length filling her. She gasped at the sensation. With no mattress to cushion her hips, no give to the floor, she felt him all the way. “Ah!”

  Lauren pulled Eric’s body down on top of her and threw her head back. He kissed her neck, her breasts, and began to move. She clung to him, riding the wave of sensation that built higher each time he crashed against her. Her moan became a whimper as her ass slid along the carpet. He pumped harder and she rose to meet him, titling her hips to take him in as deep as she could. His breath rasped in her ear and sweat covered his chest. At the moment his body went rigid, Lauren’s orgasm claimed her. She gasped at the sensation of his cock pulsing, thrumming inside her tight channel. She held him while he emptied and he stroked her gently, easing her back from the brink as her inner spasms subsided.

  They lay panting, wrapped in each other, Lauren’s dress beneath her head and her panties at arm’s length on the floor beside her. Eric’s tie trailed between her thighs, christened with the essence of their lovemaking.

  It had never been that good with anyone else. Eric thought his heart would give out from the intensity of his orgasm and from the overwhelming need to feel Lauren around him. When his racing heartbeat finally slowed and the sheen of sweat that had lubricated their movements cooled, he pushed himself up, straddling Lauren as she lay spent beneath him. He didn’t yet trust his legs to hold him, so he rolled to the side, pulling the used condom off carefully for disposal.

  “I really wanted to take you to dinner tonight,” he said finally. “I didn’t plan this.”

  She rose on her elbows. With her legs now crossed at the knees and one sexy foot dangling, she looked both heavenly and sinful. “So the emergency condom is a throwback to your Boy Scout training?”

  “It is.” He tried to sound sober and determined. She laughed.

  “Do you get a badge for that?” She rolled to retrieve her panties and handed them to him. “Put these back where you found them, please.”

  “If I must.” He slid the lace over her thighs and she shimmied them back into place. He looked at the clock above the dinette. “If we hurry…”

  “Hurry? And go out looking like I just had sex on the kitchen floor?

  No way.”

  “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “Not hungry enough to go out with my new rug burns showing.” She reached around to massage her shoulder and when she turned her back, Eric saw some of the damage they’d done to her creamy skin. He traced a reddened patch with his finger and she shivered.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

  “It’s all right. You can be on the bottom next time.”

  “No problem.” He caught her gaze then zeroed in on the slight trembling of her bottom lip. “Are you okay?”

  She nodded and turned away to gather her dress. Eric’s heart missed a beat and he scooted across the floor to pull her into his arms. “What’s wrong? You didn’t…I didn’t…”

  “You did. You proved your own point, I guess. Or maybe it was my point. I didn’t mean for this to happen when I showed up at your apartment last week. All I wanted…” A deep, shuddering breath interrupted her confession, and hot tears spilled on Eric’s chest. “All I wanted was to be with someone I trusted. I didn’t want to hurt you or lead you on.”

  “It’s okay.” Ah, the truth. Lauren didn’t want to date him. He was good for a roll on the kitchen floor, but that was it. Beyond the incredible sex, they were nothing more than friends, drifting apart now because sex had replaced the easy trust they’d built with each other. He smoothed her hair and swallowed a bitter, self-deprecating remark about not minding being her rebound guy.

  “It’s not okay, Eric. I want more than just this.” She shook a handful of black satin at him. “I want to be with you. I don’t care about fancy dinners or keeping a respectable distance during the week. I want you here, all the time. I know that doesn’t make sense. I know it’s stupid to think I’m in love with you after one week of—”

  “You think you’re in love with me?”

  “No. Yes! How can I be sure? Is this love?”

  Eric looked around the kitchen. His pants lay under a chair. His tie smelled like sex and the roses he’d brought lay wilting on the counter above their heads. God, yes.

  “Maybe not this,” he replied. “Sex in the kitchen might just be sex.

  But this…” He kissed her, each cheek, her nose, her lips. He folded her body against him and kissed her hair. “I think this might be.”

  “How can we tell?”

  “I don’t know. Why don’t we start by getting dressed? Then we can order some Chinese food and watch a movie, or talk…and then go to bed, alone or together. Whatever feels right at the time.”

  Lauren smiled through her tears. “You sound so wise. This is why I always come to you for advice.”

  “Well, no more of that. I’m not going to help you deal with your man problems anymore.” “What will I do…if I have man problems?” Lauren nuzzled his ear, kissed him, and her head dipped down, seeking access to the smooth skin above his collarbone.

  “If I’m your man, you won’t have any problems.”

  She laughed. And laughed.

  “Hey.” He tapped her nose.

  “Sorry. It’s a sweet sentiment. I guess I’ll just have to rely on Tara and Roxy to g
et us through the rough patches in our relationship.”

  “Heaven help us.” He kissed her again and cradled her in his arms as he lowered her back to the floor.

  “I thought you said kitchen sex was just sex,” she said as he tucked her dress behind her shoulders and dove in to taste the sweet spot beneath her collar bone.

  “It is. But I think I have another condom in my other pocket—and the only rough patches we’re going to have will be on your butt.”

  She bit his earlobe and rolled on top of him.

  “Or maybe mine!” he said.

  “Burn, baby, burn!” Lauren giggled as she straddled Eric and set to work giving him a few rug burns of his own.

  About the Author

  To learn more about Jennifer Colgan, please visit jennifercolgan.com.

  Send an email to Jennifer at jcolgan@newoa.com, join her Yahoo! group to join in the fun with other readers

  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/electricromance/, or stop by her Two

  Voices blog at http://bernadettegardner2.blogspot.com/

  Two firefighters battle the hottest flames they’ve encountered—their attraction to one another.

  Red Hot Lover

  © 2006 Lyn Cash

  After a fire sweeps through the school where she teaches and she’s unable to save the life of her best friend, Faith Sloan leaves the chalkboard jungle for a career as a firefighter, only to find that one of her former students may be the arsonist responsible for the current devastation in her area of the city.

  Without losing her trust, Captain Chance James must ensure that his rookie firefighter doesn’t get caught between the truth and a killer.

  He’s willing to bend the rules to protect Faith from harm, but there’s nothing he can do to shield his own heart once they become lovers. Faith takes him into her bed, her parents take him into their home as he recuperates from a freak accident, and soon the rough-and-ready firefighter must decide what he wants most…his woman or his career.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Red Hot Lover: Chance’s fingers slid through the soft curtain of hair, giving him access to the zipper, and he felt her shiver slightly when the backs of his fingers grazed her neck. He bent to drop a light kiss on her shoulder as the dress slid down her arms, and when she relaxed against him, exposing her breasts to the moonlight, he knew he was a goner.

  Her arms crept up and back to entwine about his neck, and she rolled her head against his chest, giving him total access to her body from the front and inviting his hands to claim her.

  He’d never known a woman so trusting, so willing to give herself to the moment. To unabashedly invite him as she had, to taste and touch her. And he wasn’t about to say no.

  She turned in his arms and began aggressively undressing him, her fingers sure and confident as she released his belt and practically ripped his shirt open.

  “Faith!” he whispered, his head bent to her hair. “Are you sure that you…?”

  “I’m sure!” she said, pressing her lips against his chest and trailing kisses across it as she continued in her quest to strip him to the bone. “I want you!”

  After a failed marriage several years back, in which case nobody wanted anybody, and several affairs in which case the spark just wasn’t there, Chance was overwhelmed with her passion, her audacity, and her… enjoyment of the moment. She took his breath away!

  The little devil on his shoulder smiled an evil ah-ha as they tumbled to the bed in a flurry of undergarments.

  He tried to register his thoughts, to rationalize why he was a party to this seduction, how he could possibly face her afterwards once she knew how their relationship would change come Monday morning. He struggled not to fall into the abyss she’d created and to cling to at least one solid reason for not sleeping with her tonight.

  “Faith, I didn’t plan…that is, I didn’t bring any…”

  She leaned over and pulled a foil packet from her beside table.

  “Taken care of, sir.”

  “But…this is…I mean, you’ve had a bit to drink tonight.”

  “I’m not drunk.” She shut him up with a kiss. “Intoxicated in another way, but I assure you that I am not drunk.”

  Chance lay back and moaned in ecstasy as Faith administered the condom on his aching shaft.

  “Captain,” Faith said, after she’d managed to land on top of him, with his hands on her bare hips and her body poised above him. “I’m not asking for your hand in marriage.” She cupped his balls as she slid down on him.

  “Nope,” he agreed breathlessly, enunciating each following word clearly in an effort to maintain concentration. “That wouldn’t be my hand.”

  “Then show a little enthusiasm.” She gouged him in the ribs and laughed. “You’re not immune to me, are you?

  “This feel like I’m immune?” His hips thrust to meet hers.

  Faith eased herself up and down over his body, rubbing her stomach with her fingertips before letting them travel upwards to caress her own breasts and then to slip into her hair as Chance’s hands replaced hers on her body. And as blood gathered speed and intensity in his veins and his rod became more rigid, she began thrusting harder, taking him deeper and eliciting one unvarnished groan after another from him, her body glistening with sweat the closer she came to climaxing.

  Chance pulled her off him and rolled her onto her back.

  “No!” she cried. “Chance…no…please!”

  “I want to taste you as you come.” He growled, burying his face into the moist curls that had rubbed against his groin moments before.

  He thrust his tongue inside of her and laved her clit, tugging at it until he had his teeth gently but securely planted on it. She clutched his hair and screamed…

  What was happening to her? This wasn’t what she’d planned. She’d just wanted to release some pent up emotions, not fall for the guy.

  Tears pooled in her eyes as her brain finally caught up with her body.

  This wasn’t fucking—this was mating, and she had definitely crossed over into unfamiliar territory.

  He's vice. She's nice. This potent mix has to be handled with care…

  Strip Tease

  © 2006 Kate Davies

  It seemed easy enough. Hit the local all-male strip club, pick a likely target, and hire him for her best friend's bachelorette party. But the stripper who catches Caroline's eye has a different agenda. He's an undercover cop, and Caroline ends up under arrest — for solicitation!

  Tony DiMarco realizes too late that he's made a mistake. Caroline's reputation and business are suffering, and he feels responsible. He feels something else, too — the pull of red-hot desire. He wants Caroline, but she's afraid that he's just trying to make up for his mistake. Can this determined vice cop teach her to trust again?

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Strip Tease: What the hell?

  Caroline stopped at the entryway into the club, staring around in confusion. When she’d slipped backstage, everything had been calm, almost comatose, especially since the stripper who had followed Tony had been the poster child for anticlimactic.

  Now, the entire room was in chaos. People were shouting, tables knocked over, drinks spilled across the floor. A uniformed police officer stood in the doorway yelling orders through a megaphone that no one was listening to. One of the bachelorette party attendees was bent over the funky-haired waiter, her knee in the small of his back, cuffing his hands behind him. Another was lining up the dancers against the far wall, holding a gun on them.

  A gun! Caroline backed away, trying to escape the madhouse in front of her. There had to be a back exit somewhere around here…

  She made it a couple of steps before she ran into a solid object. A warm, well-muscled, breathing object. “Where are you going?” Tony gripped her upper arms.

  Any other time, she would have focused on how good it felt to have his hands on her. Right now, though, she only wanted to escape. “We have to get out of here. The whole place has gone crazy.” Sh
e turned just enough to see his profile. “I think some people are getting arrested.”

  She couldn’t get caught up in this. It was tough enough being a massage therapist, what with all the assumptions about the profession.

  If news got out that she’d visited a strip club—especially one where illegal activities were evidently happening—it could destroy her career and her reputation.

  “This is a bust,” Tony said in her ear, his hands sliding down her arms.

  “I know,” she hissed back. “I can’t be found here. Is there a back door or something?”

  “Yes,” he said, his fingers circling her wrists. “But you won’t be using it.”

  Too late, she realized he was snapping something around her wrists.

  “What are you doing?” She struggled, but the restraints were metal and unyielding.

  “You have the right to remain silent,” he answered. Grasping her by the elbow, he pulled her into the main room. “Everything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

  “You’re arresting me?” Caroline knew she was shrieking, but it wasn’t as if anyone could hear her besides the stripper-slash-cop dragging her into the fray. “What for?”

  “Solicitation.” He turned her around so she was lined up with the rest of the criminals. Criminals!

  “Solic—” She gaped at him. “You thought I was trying to pay you for sex?”

  Silence descended on the room, heads swiveling her direction.

  “You have the right to an attorney,” Tony continued, unaffected by her outburst.

  “I was trying to hire a stripper for a friend’s bachelorette party, you moron,” she yelled, too angry to care that they were the center of attention.

  “Let’s get everyone down to headquarters and sort this out,” a female cop said, placing her hand on Tony’s shoulder. Her lips twitched, as if she were trying to hold back a grin. “Nice show, by the way. I don’t blame her for wanting to see you strip again, whatever the circumstances.”