Give it Up

by Lori Foster

  “Yes!”

  He rose from the bed, turned—and ran into Axel. After they’d both regained their balance, Booker scowled. “I told you to leave.”

  “I thought I’d apologize.”

  Frannie yelled, “Go to hell, Axel!”

  Axel grinned. “She’s got a temper, doesn’t she?”

  Booker pushed past him. “Go home, okay?” He went through his apartment and next door to Frannie’s. Her door wasn’t locked, so he walked on in, but made a point of locking it behind him.

  He found Frances on her bed, facedown, a pillow over her head. She’d pulled the robe back on, but when she’d flung herself on the bed, it had fluttered up to her knees. Her smooth calves and bare feet drew him.

  God, he had it bad. “Frances?”

  She went utterly still, then gripped the pillow over her head more firmly.

  “Are you trying to smother yourself, honey?”

  “Maybe,” came her muffled reply.

  Booker sat on the bed beside her. “I’m sorry you got embarrassed.” He was so damn horny, he could barely speak. He wanted to soothe her, to make her feel better, but more than that he wanted to dispense with the robe, turn her to her back and look at her some more. That flash peek at her naked body had only whet an already ravenous appetite.

  “Embarrassed?” she repeated with incredulity. “I’m mortified. I’ll never be able to face your brother again.”

  Through the wall, Axel said, “That’s okay. The rear view was pretty spectacular, too.”

  Frannie lifted the pillow and stared at the wall with the meanest look Booker had ever seen. Before she could say anything rash, he touched her shoulder. “Ignore Axel. He’s an idiot.”

  “I am,” Axel agreed. And then, more sincerely, “I’m sorry I embarrassed you, hon. Booker will beat the hell out of me later, I’m sure, because I bumbled into his fantasy. And I’ve no doubt you are his fantasy. You only have to look at his face when he talks about you.”

  Frannie twisted about, her narrowed gaze colliding with Booker’s heated expression. “Really?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  Axel sighed. “There. All’s well that ends well?”

  Booker growled. “Will you go away, Axel?”

  Cary said, “I’ll drag him off, Booker. You two just go about your business.”

  Frannie’s expression said, Yeah, right. They both knew Cary and Axel probably had their ears pressed to the wall with no intention of budging.

  She was still red-faced, Booker noted, but at least she appeared less murderous. Tired of waiting, Booker scooped her up into his arms and carried her into her living room, away from prying ears. He settled onto the sofa with Frances on his lap. She hadn’t turned any lights on yet, so the Christmas tree provided the only real glow in the room. The lights blinked behind her, forming a soft halo against her fair hair.

  “I love you, Frances.”

  She curled into him, hiding her face in his neck. “Even though I just made a gigantic fool of myself?”

  “You didn’t. You pleased the hell out of me.” He smoothed her waist, enjoying the feel of her beneath the terrycloth, the dips and hollows and swells of her body—soon to be his for the taking. Maybe even his forever.

  “Axel’s right, you know. You are my fantasy, and knowing what you likely intended when you came over to my place has me fully loaded and ready to go.” He nibbled on her ear, kissed her temple.

  “Yeah?” She wiggled against his erection, letting him know she understood his meaning.

  “Damn right. Now if I could just get you to let loose of this robe …”

  Wearing a beautiful smile, she did, and Booker spread it open so he could look at her to his heart’s content. Curled on his lap, every part of her was within reach. Her breasts, her soft belly, her smooth thighs. Those dark blond curls over her mound.

  Booker drew a shuddering breath. Physically, he didn’t know where to start, where to touch or taste her first.

  Emotionally, he knew exactly what he wanted. Gaze glued to her breasts, voice gruff with tenderness, he said, “As long as you’re being agreeable, do you suppose you could tell me that you love me, too?”

  “I do.” He glanced up to find her face rosy with pleasure, anticipation and … love. “I have for such a long time.”

  He hadn’t realized he was so tense until her quick agreement sank in. He let out a long breath. “Do you suppose you could agree to marry me?”

  “Yes.”

  She squeaked from his sudden tight embrace, but Booker couldn’t seem to loosen his hold. She pressed her palms against him until she could turn on his lap, facing him. She shrugged off the robe, opened his shirt and pressed herself to him chest to chest—heart-to-heart.

  Booker’s hands roamed freely down her back to her bottom, along the sides of her thighs. Again, he scooped her up, keeping her tight to his chest until he laid her gently on the floor beneath the tree.

  As he shrugged off his clothes, his hands already shaking with anticipation, he smiled. “Christmas dinner is going to be interesting.” He pulled a condom from his wallet and tossed it to the floor beside her.

  “If your brother says one word to me, if he even looks at me funny, I’ll clout him.”

  Booker came down over her. She hadn’t refused dinner, and that was all he cared about. He wanted his family to meet her. They’d love her as much as he did. “As I said, interesting.”

  For several minutes, he simply enjoyed kissing her, touching her. There was no music in the background this time, but Frannie’s soft moans and small whimpers were better than any holiday tune.

  When he slipped his fingers between her thighs, she arched up. Wet, hot. He stroked two fingers deep, working them in and out of her at a leisurely pace, feeling the grasp and release of her body. Her eyelids sank down, her lips parted.

  “Come for me, Frannie.” He brought his thumb into play, using her own wetness to glide over her clitoris, softly, easily, repeatedly.

  “Booker.”

  “That’s it.” He kissed her mouth hard, swallowing her cries, drowning in satisfaction. When she quieted, he rolled the condom on in record time, held her knees high and wide, and pushed into her.

  They both groaned.

  To Booker’s delight, he felt Frances begin tightening all over again. Her short nails stung his shoulders, her runner’s thighs held him tight to her. He pumped into her fast, deep—and as she arched high, her mouth open on a raw cry, he came.

  Though it was frosty and cold outside, they were both now warm and sweaty. Frances’s heart continued to gallop under his cheek. He remained deep inside her, and he never wanted to move.

  She was quiet so long, he finally forced himself up to his elbows. Looking at her, at her sated, sleepy contentment, filled his heart to overflowing. “What are you thinking about?”

  Lazily she smiled, her eyes opening the tiniest bit. “I got what I wanted for Christmas.”

  “Me, too.”

  “But Christmas morning isn’t for several more days. I’d like to know just how you plan to top this, Booker Dean. Because I can tell you, it isn’t going to be easy.”

  The grin tugged at his mouth, then won. He laughed out loud. “Oh, I dunno. I think I can come up with something.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.” He lowered himself to kiss her throat, her flushed breasts, each and every rib. Little by little, he scooted down her body. When he reached his destination, he whispered, “Now this is a gift I won’t mind getting every morning for the rest of my life.”

  With a small moan, Frannie agreed.

  SOME LIKE IT HOT

  Chapter One

  Harsh sunlight found its way through the mini-blinds on the window in exam room four. Though it was well after six, there were no clouds and no breeze to offer relief from the ninety-degree day. Saturday and Sunday promised to be just as stifling. Cary Rupert peeled off his requisite white coat, loosened his tie, and opened the top button of his dres
s shirt with a sigh.

  Maybe the heat could account for his adult patients being so cranky, as well as the incessant whining of his younger patients. Appointments had run two hours over; nothing serious—a summer cold, sunburn, poison ivy rash. Cary was more than ready to head home. He wanted an easy chair, a cold drink, and a smiling, willing woman.

  Hell yeah, he’d take all three. Didn’t matter where he got the first two, but the third was a specific craving for one elusive woman. Maybe today he’d finally get lucky.

  Leaving his office assistant and two nurses to lock up, Cary stepped outside, a man on a mission. Immediately, he was struck with a wave of hot, humid air. He reached into his breast pocket and fished out his reflective sunglasses for the short walk across the lot to the complex next door, where his best friend, Axel Dean, had an office and where the woman of his dreams worked.

  Last year he and Axel had leased space side by side in the new medical complex. As a general practitioner, Cary saw patients of all ages, with just about every ailment under the sun. Axel had specialized as an OB-GYN, so he had only female clientele with the occasional husband or boyfriend stranded in the waiting room. A few spaces down were an ENT and a plastic surgeon. Other various businesses unrelated to medicine filled the complex, and not too many yards away, a Hooters restaurant kept the parking lot packed.

  There were no men waiting in Axel’s outer office on this late Friday. Cary had no sooner removed his glasses and taken a breath of the air-conditioned lobby air before Axel stuck his head out. “I’ll be out of here in ten minutes. You wanna do dinner?”

  In doctor mode, Axel was a different person. Serious. Concerned. Attentive to his patients’ every word.

  Away from the job, he became a complete hedonist, hysterically funny, and the world’s biggest ladies’ man. Cary liked him a lot. “Sure thing.” Cary cleared his throat and tried to sound casual. “I’ll just gab at Nora till you’re ready.”

  Axel rolled his eyes as if he’d expected no less. “She’s filing papers in the back,” he said, then pointed a finger. “Don’t distract her too much. She needs to finish up before she heads home.” He ducked back into the hallway and disappeared into an exam room.

  Cary’s heart beat a little faster in anticipation. From the day he met Nora Chilton eleven months ago, she’d always had that effect on him. She stood five feet, six inches tall, had light brown hair, and kept her soft brown eyes shielded behind librarian-type glasses. Physically, there was nothing to drive a man into a frenzy of lust. But … sometimes these things didn’t make sense, they just were.

  He’d been frenzied from the word jump, and it just kept getting worse, not better. When she smiled, his abdomen clenched as if accepting a punch. Once she’d assisted a pregnant woman to her car, and her gentleness had his pulse tripping. Seeing her in quiet conversation with an expectant father made him tense in what felt too damn much like jealousy. And watching her work, her head bent in just that way, her brows puckered in concentration, caused a slow burn. He loved the way she moved, the gracefulness of her hands, her studious expression behind her glasses.

  Five times now he’d asked her out. Five times, she’d declined.

  He wanted her, damn it.

  She wanted to remain friendly associates.

  Sooner or later, Cary knew he’d wear her down, but until then, his life had been filled with frustration of the sexual and emotional kind. Lately, he’d turned down so many other women that Axel was starting to give him funny looks. But he didn’t want anyone else. He wanted Nora.

  Hands deep in his pants pockets, Cary approached the room where his quarry worked. Nora wasn’t alone. Before he’d reached the open doorway, Cary heard her chatting with another female. He stuck his head inside and noticed an older woman running a fax machine.

  “Hello.”

  Both women looked up. The older woman smiled. Nora flushed. “Dr. Rupert.”

  “Cary,” he told her, a little peeved that Nora continued to insist on such formality when they were in the office. For crying out loud, there were no patients around, no one to be offended by the fact that they knew each other. Even as he scowled at her, he absorbed her every word. He loved her voice. It was deep and sexy, and she had this crooked way of smiling when she spoke …

  Nora turned to her coworker to make hasty introductions. “Liza Welch, this is Dr. Rupert. He has an office next door.” And with a mere glance at Cary, “Liza started with us a week ago.”

  Liza reached out. “Nice to meet you, Cary.”

  He smiled. At least she got it right. “Same here, Liza.”

  She started to say more, but Nora adjusted her glasses and stepped forward. “Can I help you with something?”

  Cary stared into those big brown eyes and was lost. He’d meant to just chitchat. He’d meant to just visit her. Instead, he murmured low, “Have dinner with me.”

  Nora blinked at his husky tone, blushed—and shook her head. “No, I can’t. I have work to do.”

  “Axel’s a slave driver.” He took two steps into the small room, his gaze glued to hers. “You have to eat. I want the company. Your company.” And then softer, coaxing, “Have dinner with me.”

  Her lips parted. Her breath stuttered. And a file slipped right out of her hands, scattering papers everywhere.

  Cary backed up a step.

  “Oh damn!” Frantic, Nora dropped to her knees to gather the papers. Cary stared at the top of her head. Her hair was cut in short wispy curls that looked adorable and exposed her nape—a nape he wanted to touch and kiss. She was dressed in a shapeless white nurse’s uniform, and somehow even that looked sexy, despite the rubber-soled shoes.

  Jesus, he had it bad.

  He knelt down to help.

  At his nearness, Nora rushed into a speech, turning him down once again. “Really, Dr. Rupert.” She snatched a paper right out of his hand. “I’m so busy and I don’t have time to talk right now. It’s going to take me forever to sort this again.”

  Insulted, Cary pushed back to his feet. She stood, too, the mangled papers clutched to her chest. She looked pugnacious and put out and so damn cute, it irritated him.

  “I’m sorry I interrupted.” In a huff, he stalked out.

  To hell with it. He wouldn’t ask her again. Of course, he’d told himself that before, but whenever he saw her, the invitation just came out of his mouth, without his permission, without coherent intent from him. She muddled him and made him hot and destroyed his ego with her persistent cold shoulder.

  When he didn’t hit on her, she was as pleasant as could be. But let him even hint that he wanted more than friendship, and she shot him down real fast.

  Cary had his head lowered, chewing over his turbulent thoughts, when he literally ran into Axel.

  “Whoa.” Axel, tall and strong and equally stubborn, stumbled back into a wall. “Where the hell are you going?”

  Cary slashed a hand through the air. “Out.”

  “Out?”

  Shit. He didn’t want Axel in his private business, privy to his turmoil. They shared a lot, but not that, not rejection. Axel never got rejected, which guaranteed he’d find Cary’s situation entertaining and fodder for endless prodding.

  Cary thought fast and came up with a lame but plausible excuse. “I’m going to start my car so it can cool off. It must be like an oven inside with this damned heat wave.”

  “Great idea.” Axel thwacked him on the shoulder, hard enough to be retaliation for the way Cary had run into him moments earlier. “Grab my keys out of my office and start mine, too, will you? I’ll be ready in just a couple of minutes, I swear.”

  “Why not?” Cary turned around and retraced his steps to reach Axel’s office. He was glaring toward the room where Nora and the other woman worked when, as he got closer, he heard their voices, and this time the conversation was much more … titillating.

  “Why in the world would you turn a stud-muffin like that down?” Liza demanded.

  Stud muffin? Cary fla
ttened himself against the wall beside the door.

  “I have to work.”

  “Yeah, right,” Liza said. “And I’m a nun. You’ll have to tell that tale to someone younger or dumber than me, because honey, I’ve been around the block.”

  Cary could hear the smile in Nora’s tone when she replied. “You’re only fifty, not a wizened hundred.”

  “Fifty is a lot of years to watch human nature. That young buck scares you.”

  “No.”

  “Yes,” Liza insisted. “And I’m nosy enough to want to know why.”

  He scared Nora? Ears cocked like a bloodhound, Cary waited to hear more.

  Nora’s sigh of exasperation was extreme. Papers rustled, the fax machine dialed. “I’m widowed.”

  Widowed! But she was in her midtwenties—too young to be married, much less widowed.

  Liza snorted. “I know, but you’re very much alive.”

  How come Liza knew, but no one had ever told him?

  “And,” Liza continued, “given the way Cary was looking at you, it’s for sure you’d have a great time if you just gave him a chance.”

  “A good time, maybe. But I want what I had. A husband, not a lover. The promise of home and hearth, not just sex.” Nora sighed. “And I want kids.”

  Chuckling, Liza said, “Now, I may have just met him, but that young man looked more than potent enough to give you a dozen babies if you want them.”

  Cary’s eyes nearly crossed. Babies? With Nora? He thought of her pregnant, maybe breast-feeding, holding an infant that looked like him or her or both.

  “Capable, sure, but willing?”

  Hell yeah.

  “Maybe you should ask him,” Liza suggested.

  Yeah, ask me. Ask me.

  “No need. If you’d ever heard the way Cary goes on about children, you’d know how he feels on that subject. After a long day of treating them, he makes it clear how glad he is not to have any of his own.”

  Liza was undaunted by that fact. “So until you meet this paragon of husband material, why not have some fun with the willing doctor?”

  Cary held his breath. The silence stretched out so long, he almost suffocated himself.