Joss Wood
JOSS WOOD wrote her first book at the age of eight and has never really stopped. Her passion for putting letters on a blank screen is matched only by her love of books and travelling—especially to the wild places of Southern Africa—and possibly by her hatred of ironing and making school lunches.
Fuelled by coffee, when she’s not writing or being a hands-on mum Joss, with her background in business and marketing, works for a non-profit organisation to promote the local economic development and collective business interests of the area where she resides. Happily and chaotically surrounded by books, family and friends, she lives in Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa, with her husband, children and their many pets.
Vaughan and I have been married for twenty years this year and he’s my biggest fan, my best friend and my favourite travelling companion. He’s also pretty hot…
This book is dedicated to him to say thanks for making me coffee every morning, for being a brilliant dad, for loving me so much and for the fun that is our life.
Eight years earlier...
Noah Fraser looked at the crown moulded ceilings above his head and tried not to think about the action in his pants—hmmm, at least he wasn’t wearing a kilt. Truthfully, he could understand what was happening in his pants far more easily than he understood the mess in his head. Lust was easy, and there was a straightforward and time-honoured process for getting shot of it. But since the obvious was out of the question—it required a great deal more privacy than he currently had—he knew he had to distract himself.
He’d spent a lot of the past five years feeling horny—thanks to several tours of duty in dusty countries with little to no female interaction—and he’d learned a couple of techniques to relieve the frustration. Running through the process of dismantling his favourite weapon, the MP5 sub-machine gun, in the field usually did the trick.
Safety check. Check.
Noah banged his head back against the arm of the couch and cursed softly. What he really wanted was to get naked with that annoyingly sexy bundle of energy beyond the bedroom door. He was head-over-heels in lust with her...and a whole bunch of like. He could handle the lust...sorta, kinda...but the like had him tied up in knots.
It was a time of firsts for both of them. He was her first bodyguard and hers was the first body—and what a body it was too!—he’d guarded. His mission was to keep her safe, and apparently hers was to crack the inscrutable façade he’d been told to present. It wasn’t easy keeping his demeanour deadpan, because she was funny and smart and had a dry sense of humour that he deeply appreciated. He’d soon realised that she was winding him up by practising her flirting skills on him and it had started a battle of wills between them: she tried to get a reaction out of him and he refused to give her one. He still wasn’t sure what the score was, but if they had to judge the competition by his frustration levels then she was streaks ahead.
Release bolt by vigorously slapping the cocking lever out of the indent. Check.
Okay, slight improvement...not much, but some. Noah, curled up on her too-small couch, glared at the closed door and cursed himself for being a fool...and for being unable to concentrate. Concentration, focus, control—control was his thing.
Pull out the locking pin...
His mind drifted again. She had the most amazing smile...and a ‘shoot-all-the-blood-to-his-groin’ body! Firm, toned, luscious, sweet...young.
Noah pulled the pillow over his head and silently screamed into the fabric. Nineteen, for crying out loud! He couldn’t believe he was losing his mind over a teenager. He was a flippin’ moron. Morgan Moreau was too young and she was his principal. His principal! Six months out of the unit, he was new to bodyguarding and the CFT Corporation, but he was pretty sure that sleeping with his principal was high up on the list of bodyguarding no-no’s.
Since he had no intention of getting his ass fired over a piece of ass, no matter how sexy and tempting it was, he pulled the pillow away from his face, heaved in a deep breath and opened his eyes.
‘Crap!’ he yelled, scuttling up into the corner of the couch.
‘Some bodyguard you are. I could’ve stabbed you in the heart,’ Morgan drawled.
‘You’re naked,’ Noah croaked, dimly aware that the saliva in his mouth had dried up. It had probably joined his blood as it sprinted south.
Naked, naked, naked, his body panted. Yeah, baby!
Noah was unable to stop his eyes from scanning her body. Perky breasts, a flat stomach, a Brazilian... Oh, he was a dead man...a Brazilian.
What was he thinking?
‘You have amazing powers of observation,’ Morgan said, her sexy mouth curving upwards. Her voice was perfect for the bedroom: gravelly, low, sexy.
‘Why...? What...? How...?’
Morgan perched on the edge of the couch and placed her elbow on her knee, immensely at ease in her nakedness—which ratcheted up his level of panic. ‘I thought you were brighter than that, Noah. I’m here, you’re here—let’s have some fun.’
Noah, his last two brain cells working overtime, narrowed his eyes at her. ‘Subtle.’
‘Straightforward,’ Morgan countered. ‘So, what do you say?’
They could... Who would know? They could have a couple of nights of uncomplicated sex, and when they’d hunted down the group of fanatics threatening her famous and wealthy family he’d return to the field and they could both move on with their lives. He’d move on to another job and she’d pull the same thing on another guy...
Noah frowned at the thought. While he believed in equality, the thought of Morgan getting naked with someone else left a sour taste in his mouth. It was on the tip of his tongue to warn her not to do this with anyone else, but he bit the words back.
Which was weird. He didn’t like being controlled, hated people telling him what to do, so why did he want to do that to her? This was all too confusing; he’d had his fair share of sexual encounters but this was out of his ken. Way, way out. Outer Hebrides out.
He