Let it Ride. Katherine Garbera

a planner.”

      “I don’t follow you, Kylie.”

      “I just want to know where this will lead,” she said. She scooted away from him, and his arms felt empty without her. “I’m not really the vacation-fling kind of woman.”

      “I know,” he said quietly. That was part of her attraction.

      Silence grew between them. Deacon didn’t have words to reassure her. Didn’t know what she was trying to ask with her veiled questions. But he did know that if he pulled her back into his arms, he could reassure her in the most fundamental way a man could.

      “You make me forget that,” she said at last.

      Her words were like a velvet glove on his groin. Hardening his arousal and strengthening his resolve to make her his. “Angel, sometimes your honesty is lethal.”

      “I can’t be any other way,” she said, twisting her hands together.

      “Come here and let me hold you,” he said.

      “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

      “I am.”

      “Deacon, I don’t want to have sex with you out here.”

      “Well, hell. That kiss said otherwise.”

      “Which is why I’m backing off now. You make me forget things that are important.”

      He nodded and touched her face gently. Because she was so different from every other woman he’d ever dated, he forced himself to only brush his lips across her forehead. Shifting away, he said, “I’d never push you into something you weren’t ready for.”

      I’d never push you into something you weren’t ready for. The words echoed in her head, and she wondered how hard he’d have to push.

      Kylie wanted to believe everything that Deacon said. And that was her first warning that her traitorous body had taken control. Her mind, her sensible mind, knew better than to give in to a smooth-talking guy with magic hands.

      But there was something in Deacon’s eyes that was different from Jeff’s. A wildness to him that struck a chord in her soul. Tempting her with the knowledge that she could soothe him.

      He made her feel desirable, something she hadn’t felt in a long time. She hadn’t been lying when she said she didn’t date. Jeff had wounded the heart of her femininity when he’d tried to shape her into his idea of the perfect woman. And the men she’d gone out with immediately after her divorce had proved to be cut from the same cloth.

      Deacon wasn’t, though. She knew that with the wine and gourmet dinner he’d meant to seduce her under the stars. But his reaction to her touch had been instinctive, not part of any plan, she was certain.

      She’d never been wined and dined before. Smooth jazz still poured from the speakers in his car. The night breeze had cooled a bit, Deacon’s jacket and the man himself kept her warm.

      This was a fantasy night, though she knew better than to buy into the whole illusion of it. The last time she’d believed in happily-ever-after, she’d ended up alone in a run-down duplex with more bills than money and shattered self-confidence. She wasn’t going back to that place for anything, not even the incredible promise of pleasure in Deacon’s arms.

      Deacon was worlds different from her ex-husband, but he was still a man. She knew that for most men she represented a certain ideal woman. No one had ever bothered to look beyond the surface of her girl-next-door looks and sunny personality.

      Deacon was different, though. His words. His honesty touched a spark deep inside her, and though she knew a vacation fling wasn’t what she really wanted, a longing for him pulsed through her. She hated to fight herself. She wanted Deacon. Why was she making this so complicated?

      She knew Tina was probably having sex with the guy she’d met in the casino earlier this afternoon. Tina had the most incredible vacation flings. But Kylie had never been able to compromise her standards enough to have an affair. She wasn’t a prude. She didn’t have to be married to sleep with a guy. She just wanted some reassurance that there was something more involved than just sex.

      Deacon watched her with his brilliant gray eyes. Suddenly she felt as if everything she was thinking was broadcast on her face. Insecurity swamped her. She pulled the lapels of his jacket closer around her. God, she loved the way he smelled. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. It was like being in his arms again. But a hundred times safer.

      “I’m not sure what to say,” she said at last. She definitely should have stayed in the room with her book. Her book was uncomplicated. Her book was easy to deal with. She knew her heart was going to ache when the foppish Percy Blakney got down on his knees and kissed the cobblestone where his estranged wife had just stepped.

      But there was nothing predictable about Deacon. Even though being here with him tonight had a certain excitement, the potential for heartbreak was too great. She wished she’d never stepped out of her safe little world. From the moment she’d stepped on the plane to come to Vegas, she knew she’d taken unsound steps toward something new.

      “Which part scared you?” he asked. He lightly traced his finger down the deep V left by his jacket. She shivered with awareness, realizing she’d been fighting her physical reaction to him because it was something she didn’t know how to control.

      “You have to know I want you,” he rasped. Leaning forward, he cupped her face and dropped the lightest of kisses on her nose. Then he took her mouth in a kiss that was more intense than the one they’d shared earlier. While that one had been all about instinct and passion, this one was more profound, because of the way he controlled it. Actually, controlled himself and her. His mouth was thorough, leaving her feeling completely exposed to him. She slid her hands around his neck and held him tightly to her.

      She took from the kiss what he offered. An intimate knowledge of himself and the kind of desire she’d never experienced with another man.

      Her body had reacted to his words. Her breasts felt full and heavy and her nipples tightened, needing his hands and mouth on them. Her center was dewy. She shifted on the blanket, trying to get closer to him. He fell back, cradling her against him. She moaned deep in her throat. Oh, man, this was getting out of control. She needed him deep inside her. She ached for him.