“Pamela Clare is a fabulous storyteller whose beautifully written, fast-paced tales will leave you breathless with anticipation.”

—USA Today bestselling author Leigh Greenwood

Praise for

Unlawful Contact

“Powerful, sexy, and unforgettable, Unlawful Contact is the kind of story I love to read. Pamela Clare is a dazzling talent.”

—New York Times bestselling author Lori Foster

“A spellbinding, gut-wrenching page-turner with a gripping plot. This story is unique and creative with an imperfect hero you can’t help getting sweaty palms over…Pamela Clare is a remarkable storyteller.”

—Fresh Fiction

“This is an exciting fast-paced romantic suspense thriller…Action-packed.”

—Midwest Book Review

“A romantic suspense that has it all: gritty realism, edge-of-your-seat action, dynamic characterizations, surprising plot twists, and a scorching romance between two leads you won’t soon forget.”

—BookLoons

“A gripping and emotional story…An engaging tale that will have readers on the edge of their seats.”

—Romance Reviews Today

“A thrilling, captivating suspense novel…It has great characters, a wonderful story line with different connect plots, and a happy ending for a couple that has many obstacles that they must surmount together.”

—Romance Reader at Heart

“Clare’s impressive novel is rife with gripping suspense, secrets masterfully revealed, and characters in readers can become emotionally invested. The sexual tension between the protagonists is deliciously steam the skillful plotting makes this thrilling book one readers won’t be able to close until the final page.”

—Romantic Times (4½ stars)

Hard Evidence

“A page-turner, a pulse-pounding thriller…Whether she is writing her incredible historicals or these g contemporaries, Ms. Clare proves, once again, she is one of the best storytellers today…It is a thriller, it is a treasure, and it is tremendous.”

—Fresh Fiction

“Superb romantic suspense…Fans will appreciate this strong thriller.”

—Midwest Book Review

“I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Pamela Clare’s Hard Evidence is a powerful and, dare I say, flawless book, in my opinion. For those who love a good suspense or even just a good, satisfying read, it’s a ‘don’t miss.’”

—Romance Reader at Heart

“This was a hard-to-put-down book with an exciting story line.”

—MyShelf.com

“Clare adds a realistic edge to her suspenseful writing…[A] tight, gritty thriller…Clare definitely found her niche.”

—Romantic Times

Extreme Exposure

“Investigative reporter turned author Clare brings a gritty realism to this intense and intricate romantic Extreme Exposure is the launch book for a sizzling new suspense series that promises to generate lots of intrigue action, and romance. An author to keep an eye on!”

—Romantic Times

“A gem, Extreme Exposure has all the elements of great romance and is an entertaining summer read.”

—Romance Reviews Today (perfect 10)

“I really loved this book because it was so realistic. The characters were people I would love to know. Obviously, Ms. Clare knows this world and the nuances of investigative reporting. She communicates this in a terrific love story that grabs you and will not let you go. Believe me, I lost some sleep reading this book. I predict that Ms. Clare is an author to watch for the future and readers of romantic suspense are sure to love this excellent, well-written novel, one of the best I’ve read this year.”

—The Romance Readers Connection

…and the previous novels of Pamela Clare

“[Written with] verve…The prose is lush, and the author clearly has a talented way with plot and pacing.”

—The Romance Reader

“Great…A page-turner.”

—USA Today bestselling author Patricia Potter

“Sizzling…Steeped in sensual fantasy, strong characters, and intense emotions.”

—Romantic Times

Berkley Sensation Books by Pamela Clare

EXTREME EXPOSURE

HARD EVIDENCE

UNLAWFUL CONTACT

NAKED EDGE

Anthology

CATCH OF THE DAY
(with Whitney Lyles, Beverly Brandt, and Cathie Linz)

Heaven Can’t Wait

Pamela Clare

B
BERKLEY SENSATION, NEW YORK

THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Previously published in the anthology Catch of the Day, published by Berkley Sensation Books.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

HEAVEN CAN’T WAIT

A Berkley Sensation eBook / published by arrangement with the author

PRINTING HISTORY

Berkley Sensation eSpecial edition / March 2010

Copyright © 2006 by Pamela White.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

ISBN: 1-101-21791-X

BERKLEY® SENSATION

Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

BERKLEY® SENSATION and the “B” design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Contents

Begin Reading

About the Author

“Do you, Lissy Charteris, take me, Will Fraser?” He looked down at her, his dark hair damp with sweat, a half-grin on his face, and nudged the thick, hard tip of his cock inside her.

Lissy could wait no longer. Her legs caught above his shoulders, she lifted her hips, reaching for fulfillment. “Yes! Yes! Oh, now! Yes!”

An amused gleam in his blue eyes, he withdrew, his thumb drawing lazy circles over her swollen, aching clitoris. “Uh-uh. You’re supposed to say, ‘I do.’”

She moaned in frustration, clutching fistfuls of linen tablecloth, her body about to combust. “I do! I do! God, I do, Will!”

“That’s better.” His gaze locked with hers, and his big hands seized her hips.

Then with one slow thrust he filled her.

“Oh! Oh, God, Will!” His name was the last coherent word she spoke, her voice unraveling into a long, throaty moan as he pushed himself in and out of her, thick and hard.

It felt so good. It felt better than good. Having him inside her was both bliss and torture.

He groaned. “Damn, Lissy! You drive me insane!”

But she was the one going crazy, the sweet, slippery friction of his thrusts fueling the raw ache inside her, forcing her to the jagged brink.

She would never, could never get enough of him. She wanted to touch him, frantic to feel the rasp of his chest hair, the iron ridges of his muscles, the velvety softness of his skin. But he was just beyond her reach.

He took her ankles in his hands, spread her legs further apart and forced her knees to bend, opening her completely, exposing every bit of her to his view. He was watching—watching where his body slid into hers, hot and slick and demanding.

“Jesus, Lissy, sweetheart!” He drove into her deep and hard and fast, penetrating her to her core.

In a heartbeat, she hovered on the radiant edge of an orgasm, the shimmering ache inside her now a tight, pulsing knot.

“Look at me, Lissy!” he growled. “I want to see your eyes when you come!”

She did as he asked, found herself staring into eyes dark with lust, with hunger, with love.

And then, even as his gaze held hers, it took her—blinding-bright and shattering.

Orgasm surged through every inch of her, a merciless rush of white-hot ecstasy, ripping a cry from her throat, her muscles clenching greedily around him as he kept up a relentless rhythm, prolonging her pleasure with forceful strokes.

Then she saw his pupils dilate with the shock of his own climax, his forehead furrowed as if he were in pain. He groaned, arched his back, his body shuddering with the force of release as he drove himself hard into her once, twice, three times, coming deep inside her.

Lissy had no idea how long she lay there on the dining room table, floating in the musky scent of sex, listening to the sound of their mingled breathing, feeling him pulse inside her. She probably could have stayed that way forever, body and heart and mind utterly satisfied.

She felt him press kisses against her moist skin, paying special tribute to her now ultrasensitive nipples. Then he wrapped her legs around his waist and drew her into a sitting position so that she was pressed against his bare chest, his arms around her, her bottom resting on the edge of the table, his erection still hard enough to stay inside her.

He kissed her hair. “God, woman, I can’t get enough of you!”

She rubbed her cheek against the damp curls on his chest, let her hands explore the smooth muscles of his back. “That’s good to hear, because two weeks from tomorrow you’ll be Mr. Lissy Charteris, and you’ll be stuck with me.”

He chuckled, a warm sound that vibrated deep in his chest, then held her closer, his lips still pressed against her hair. “Please tell me you don’t have any damned shows or gallery openings tonight.”

“Not a one.” She snuggled more closely against him, savored the hard feel of his body against hers. With the demands of her job as fashion editor and his as a sports columnist and football commentator, it was rare for them to have a Friday night at home together.

“Good, because I intend to keep you naked…all…night…long.” He punctuated his words with kisses, then nipped her lower lip.

She nipped him back, then smiled. “So I guess if I’m naked, you’re picking up the takeout, right?”

They’d ordered some Thai from the place down on Colfax—the best Thai restaurant in Denver—but had gotten distracted before either one of them had gone to pick it up. Clothes lay scattered in the hallway beside shoes, briefcases and cell phones.

With a frustrated groan, he withdrew from her, lowered her to her feet. “I guess so. But you have to stay naked—no bathrobe, no towel, nothing but your gorgeous hair and a smile. Got it?”

“Got it.”

She watched him gather up his clothes and dress, enjoying the sight of him naked, his back to her—his broad shoulders, the bulge of his triceps, the powerful V of his back as it tapered to his waist, the tight mounds of his bare ass, the hint of testicles any time he bent over.

There were definite advantages to being the fiancée of a former football star.

When he turned to face her, his trousers were already up to his hips, so she caught only a glimpse of his wonderful cock. But his chest, with its dark curls and flat brown nipples, was still bare. She let her gaze follow the groove between his pecs down past the ridges of his belly to where it disappeared in a trail of curls beneath the waistband of his pants—and nearly moaned when the white fabric of his shirt ruined her view.

He grinned, revealing his dimples. “Hold that thought. And stay naked.”

Then he grabbed his wallet and keys and was gone.

Lissy quickly picked up her clothes and sorted them into piles headed for the dry cleaner’s or her own washing machine. Then she went into the bathroom, sat on the edge of the tub and began to rinse between her thighs.

How had she gotten so lucky? And it had to be luck—or divine intervention.

She hadn’t liked Will when she’d first met him years ago. They’d been introduced when he first joined the staff of the paper as its new celebrity sports columnist and she was assistant features editor. Instantly repulsed by his hotter-than-hot looks and the knowledge he’d once been a college football hero of some kind, she’d turned up her nose at him, regarding him as a brainless jock with little going for him beyond a perfect body, thick dark hair, gorgeous blue eyes and a devastatingly handsome face.

How wrong she’d been.

She stood, patted between her legs with a fluffy towel, then took up her comb and began to work the tangles from her hair.

It hadn’t been until that Saturday morning she’d gone jogging in City Park and stepped into a sprinkler hole that she’d gotten to know him. She’d wrenched her ankle badly and was sitting on the ground, in pain, calling herself names for not bringing her cell phone, when he’d emerged from a group of little boys who were playing football on the other side of the park.

Dressed in faded jeans that accentuated the perfection of his ass and a black T-shirt that seemed stretched across the muscles of his chest, he’d knelt down, carefully removed her running shoe, and gently peeled her sock away to reveal an ankle that was purple and swelling.

“You don’t need a ride home,” he’d said. “You need a ride to the hospital. If you can wait a few minutes, we’re almost done for the day. Otherwise, I can call a cab.”

Thank God she hadn’t asked him to call a cab.

He’d carried her to his beat-up Chevy pickup—weren’t football stars supposed to drive flashy sports cars?—and driven her to the ER. Then he’d waited with her while the doctor examined her ankle, took X-rays and pronounced it broken.

“I’m so sorry about what happened. Not much you can do to come back from an injury like that,” the doctor had said to Will, seemingly out of the blue. “Can I have your autograph? What did you think of the TV movie version? Made my wife cry. It must have been weird to watch your own life on the screen.”

“I didn’t watch it,” Will had answered, graciously signing his name in black felt marker on the doctor’s blue scrubs.

TV movie version?

Lissy had gone online that night, done a little research and discovered there was much more to Will Fraser than she could possibly have imagined. According to archived newspaper articles, he’d been raised by a single mother who’d worked as a waitress in Aspen, where he’d grown up in poverty amid wealth. He’d excelled both in academics and in sports in high school and had gotten a full scholarship to the University of Colorado at Boulder, where he’d been their starting wide receiver—which, Lissy’d later learned, had to do with catching the ball.

He’d been on his way to a lucrative professional career, when his knee had been shattered in the second-to-last game of his college career. He’d been in the second of four surgeries when CU had won the Orange Bowl that year. His football career abruptly over, he’d graduated magna cum laude with a degree in history, only to learn that his mother was dying of lung cancer. Though he’d spent every dime he’d earned by selling the rights to his story on the latest medical treatments for her, he buried her less than a year after he’d buried his dreams of playing professional football.

For several years, he’d worked for CU as a receivers coach. Then he’d joined the staff of the Denver Independent, covering football, commentating for the local ABC affiliate and coaching inner-city kids in his free time.

And Lissy had thought him a mindless jock.

On her first day back at work, she’d hobbled over to his desk on her crutches to thank him for his help and had asked him if she could repay him with dinner at his favorite restaurant. He’d accepted, and the two of them had ended up on her floor rutting like wild animals until dawn, as he’d helped her find creative ways of keeping her ankle elevated.

A month later they’d given up on pretense and moved in together.

Eight months after that, he’d proposed, getting down on his bad knee and offering her the most beautiful engagement ring she’d ever seen—a two-carat antique oval diamond set in filigreed white gold. She’d barely been able to speak, but somehow she’d said yes.

She set her comb aside and glanced in the mirror, smoothing her hands over her auburn hair and down her naked body, mostly content with what she saw and even more pleased by the way she felt—warm, languid, sexy.

She reached for her bottle of Chanel, then stopped.

He’d said naked—nothing but her hair and a smile.

She walked around the condo, lighting candles, her pulse quickening in anticipation of the pleasure to come. Sex with Will was…indescribable. No man had ever made her feel the way he made her feel—as if life began and ended in his arms.

She loved him more than she’d ever thought she could love anyone.

She had just turned down the covers on their bed, when the phone rang. Knowing Will would be back in a few minutes, she was tempted to let it ring through to voice mail. Then she saw the number on caller ID.

Lead in her stomach, she picked up the receiver. “Hello, Mother.”

Will stepped around the orange cones that blocked the sidewalk in front of their condo complex. Lord knew how much longer this construction project—which seemed to eat more of the street and sidewalk every day—would take the city to complete. He couldn’t wait until they moved out of this place and into the old Victorian they’d bought a few blocks away on Capitol Hill. He’d finished fixing it up last week, and they’d started moving their belongings one pickup truck–load at a time. When they got back from their honeymoon in France, they’d rent a U-Haul, and Will and his friends would make short work of the rest of it—furniture, clothes, dishes, the new plasma TV.

He took the front steps to their condo two at a time, oblivious to the pain in his knee, the spicy-sweet scent of chicken pad thai wafting from the plastic bag in his hand. He was ravenous—in more ways than one. The thought of Lissy waiting for him, warm and willing and naked, was making him intensely horny.

He slipped the key into the door, pushed it open and saw a handful of candles lit on the coffee table. He smiled. “Honey, I’m home.”

Saying it amused him, pleased him. Perhaps it was the suburban normalcy of it. Or perhaps it was the fact that at age thirty-two he’d almost given up on the idea of having a honey to come home to. Not that there hadn’t been lots of women in his life, but most of them had been more interested in fucking his name than in having a relationship with him. Once they’d discovered he wasn’t rich and realized how mundane the life of a sports journalist was, they’d moved on to the next bit of beef in a jockstrap.

But not his Lissy. The very things that attracted other women to him had left her cold—perhaps because she knew how little money could buy.

That and she’d had a pathological loathing for sports.

He found her in the dining room, setting china plates, silverware and water glasses on the table they’d so recently sanctified, her long coppery hair swaying as she moved, her luscious round ass bare. She looked over her shoulder at him, her lips curving in a smile that made his blood run hot.

Then he saw the look in her green eyes.

He set the plastic bag on the sideboard. “What’s wrong?”

She turned toward him, hair spilling over one soft shoulder, and walked into his arms. “Nothing really. My mother called.”

He ought to have known. He pulled her closer, felt the tension in her body, reined in his own temper. “What was it this time? ‘He’s marrying you for the money,’ or ‘He’s marrying you for sex’?”

“Both. Maybe we should just elope so she’ll give up.”

“Since I’m after your money and your body, I’ll do whatever you want to do.”

She laughed. “What I want to do is eat! I’m starving.”

It wasn’t until hours later, when the pad thai was long gone and other appetites had been temporarily satisfied, that Will got an idea as to what her mother must have said to upset her.

She sat before him in the tub, her back against his chest, her head resting limply against his shoulder, her damp hair clinging to his skin, while he lazily fondled a lush breast.

“Do you think it’s possible for a couple to have too good a sex life?”

He managed not to laugh out loud. “Hell, no. Are you kidding?”

“What I mean is could a couple get together and end up getting married just because they had a great sex life? Could they mistake hot sex for love?”

She wasn’t kidding.

There were times Will wished he could rip the phone line out so Lissy’s mother could never call again. The woman had all the misery her late husband’s money could buy, and she seemed to be doing her best to make sure her only child was miserable, too. Thank God she hated snow and lived in San Diego!

A wealthy attorney and his useless trophy wife, John and Christa Charteris had led a cold life, not a shred of affection between the two of them, as far as Will could tell from the stories he’d heard. John had wanted Christa for sex and looks, and Christa had hooked onto him for money and prestige. Their marriage had generated very little love in which to nurture a child.

Lissy’s relationship with her father, never warm, had soured after she’d left the pre-law program at Cornell to double major in art and English. Her father had cut her off, both financially and emotionally. Though he’d eventually resumed paying her tuition, he’d died of a heart attack without making amends. Her relationship with her mother, a calculating woman who clearly did not approve of her daughter’s independent streak or her choice of man, wasn’t much better.

Lissy Charteris. Poor little rich girl.

Growing up, Will wouldn’t have thought it possible to be wealthy and unhappy. He’d watched his mother literally work herself to death to feed him and keep the overpriced roof over their heads and had thought having money must be the solution to everything. He’d planned to earn millions through football, only to have that ripped away from him. It was his mother’s illness and death that made him see money for what it was—a convenience, but no substitute for health or life or love. Eventually he’d come to disdain those who’d had the way paved for them, preferring to spend time with people who’d earned their way through life.

Lissy was both. Born to privilege, she’d turned her back on it in order to live the life she wanted. It was just one of the things Will cherished about her.

Feeling the frustration he always felt when he thought of how her mother treated her, he said the first thing that came to mind. “Hot sex is a better reason than most to get married. Look at all the people who marry for money or power or property.”

Like your parents.

He felt her stiffen, knew he’d somehow said the wrong thing, so he hastily added, “Of course, when it comes time for me to walk down the aisle, it will be for the right reason, the only reason that matters—my bride’s cooking.”

Her snort, followed by giggles, told him he’d been reprieved.

Lissy lay with her head against Will’s sweat-slick chest, running her fingers absentmindedly through his chest hair, her body limp and glowing from their most recent round of crazed sex. She loved these nights when she had him to herself.

An unpleasant flutter in her stomach drew her mind back to what she’d spent all evening trying to forget—her mother’s call. She was still trying to get Lissy to postpone the wedding until Will signed a prenup, dangling cash in her face as if she could be bought. Hadn’t she proved long ago that she didn’t give a damn about her parents’ money?

But it wasn’t the usual discussion about divorce and assets that had bothered her; it was her mother’s comment about sex and love. She had quoted some study showing that couples who’d lived together before getting married had a higher divorce rate than those who waited to have sex until after marriage.

Lissy had argued that the study, like most, was skewed from the beginning, as people who waited until after marriage to have sex tended to be people who also opposed divorce. Statistics never told the whole story. Any good journalist knew that.

You wouldn’t be the first woman to confuse a man’s sexual attention with love, Melisande. Just wait till he gets his fill of you and the hormones wear off. Men like him marry for two things: sex and money.

Not her Will. No way.

“Do you realize that a hundred or even fifty years ago, we’d both be virgins?” She didn’t know she’d spoken until she heard her own voice.

His fingers stroked the hollow above her hip. “Good thing it’s not a hundred or even fifty years ago. My balls would have burst by now.”

“But don’t you think things were more romantic then? Sex would have been a great mystery for us.”

“I doubt it would have been that much of a mystery. We’d probably both have grown up in the country and seen our share of farm-animal lovin’.”

“The point I’m trying to make is that neither of us would have any personal experience with sex until our wedding night.”

“That’s assuming that I hadn’t already charmed my way into your bloomers or found some ‘loose woman’ willing to let me defile her.” His voice dropped to a dark, velvet purr. “I can be very persuasive.”

Lissy sat up, trying not to laugh, and glared at him. “You’re ruining my fantasy.”

He grinned, stretched and folded his muscular arms behind his head. “Oh. Sorry. Go on. I’m listening.”

“After the reception, we’d go to the bridal chamber, where everything would be roses and candles. There’d be a fire in the hearth—”

“—if it were winter.”

She ignored him. “You’d undress me first and then yourself. I’d probably never have seen a naked man before, so I’d be shy and afraid—”

“Oh, Will, it’s soooo big! Please, don’t hurt me!”

“—but you would soothe me and assure me that everything was going to be fine. Then you’d undress yourself, carry me to the bed and make passionate love to me.”

He reached out, ran his fingers down her hair. “Are you sure that’s how it would go? I think you’ve read too many novels. If it were a hundred years ago and we were both virgins, I think it would go more like this.”

“Do tell.”

“We’d have been raised to see nudity as shameful, so the room would be dark, and you would have changed from your wedding gown to a proper white nightgown and gotten into bed before I entered the room. I’d come in, wearing my nightshirt, and crawl into bed with you. You’d be worried that it was going to hurt, and I’d be worried that my dick might not work. I’d lift your gown up to your hips, spread your legs, and it would be over in a minute. You’d hate it, and you’d get pregnant—with the first of my twelve children.”

She fought back a giggle. “Thank you for that enchanting vision of romance.”

“You’re welcome.” His knuckles grazed a nipple, sent heat skittering into her belly.

She batted his hand away. “You’re just afraid you can’t do it.”

He frowned. “Do what?”

“Wait.”

He raised a dark eyebrow, raked her with his gaze. “It’s a bit too late for that, isn’t it?”

And then it came to her. “Not if we start over.”

“Start over?”

“You know—wait until our wedding night to have sex again.”

The look on his handsome face almost made her laugh out loud, but there was something about this that felt important to her.

Then he sat up and brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, the humor gone from his eyes. “This is about something your mother said, isn’t it?”

She hated that he was able to see through her so clearly. “I just think it would add to the romance if we held back a little bit, made ourselves wait. It’s only two weeks. Unless you don’t think you can hack it.”

Will was tempted to end this conversation by pulling her beneath him and showing her just what she’d be giving up, but something told him saying the wrong thing just now would be a bad idea. Besides, he wasn’t one to turn down a challenge.

“If you want to wait until after the wedding to have sex again, that’s fine.”

The surprise on her face mirrored the astonishment he felt.

What the hell did you just say, Fraser? Are you an idiot?

Her eyes narrowed. “You really think you can do it?”

Her long hair hung about her heart-shaped face, tangled from a night of repeated lovemaking. Her nipples peeked out from between the strands, just begging to be licked and sucked. Her lips were swollen from kissing, and her cheeks were still rosy from her last orgasm, when she’d ridden him to within an inch of his life. Her green eyes shone with a mix of intelligence and feminine allure. And he was agreeing not to fuck her?

“Of course I can do it. I’m not some eighteen-year-old college student.”

She sat up on her heels. “Then how about we make a bet?”

He leaned back on his elbows, suddenly feeling competitive. “You name it.”

“Okay. We agree not to have sex again until our wedding night, and whoever gives in and asks for it first loses.”

That sounded easy enough—two weeks, no sex. “Fine. It’s a deal.”

“But there has to be some penalty.” She hopped out of bed, walked the length of the room, forcing him to stare first at the bare curves of her scrumptious ass, and then at the auburn curls of her muff. “If you lose, you and your groomsmen have to wear the mauve cummerbunds I wanted.”

He gave a snort, lifted his gaze to her face. “In that case, there is no way I’m going to lose. I’m not wearing pink.”

“Mauve.”

“Whatever.”

She crawled back into bed, smiling. “We’ll see.”

“And what about you, Miss Lissy? What price will you pay if you come begging for it?” And then he had it. “I know. You’ll have to promise to love, honor and obey me.”

Her mouth fell open in outrage. “No way! Absolutely not!”

He couldn’t help but chuckle. “Okay, then. How about this? If you lose, you have to wear the slutty gown.”

“The Oleg Cassini?”

He had no idea what the designer’s name was, but he’d loved the way she’d looked in that dress—ultrafeminine and sexy as hell—and had been disappointed when she’d decided to go with something else. “The one that’s skintight and has the crystals on the straps.”

She gaped at him. “The Badgley Mischka! I’m fashion editor of the paper, Will. I can’t walk down the aisle half-naked!”

“Then I guess the bet is off.” A part of him—the part located about six inches below his navel—heaved a sigh of relief. He reached over and turned off the bedside lamp.

Then out of the darkness, she spoke. “You’re on.”

Lissy’s first inkling that their bet might not be as easy to honor as she’d imagined came the next morning when she awoke to find herself rubbing her bare derriere against something delicious and hard. Still half-asleep, she was already wet and more than a little turned on.

With a surprised gasp, she scooted away from him only to discover he was asleep—and sporting a glorious, thick, full erection.

She rose, pulled on her white silk bathrobe and headed off to the shower, drowsily pondering the strangeness of penile hydraulics and wondering how she was going to make it two weeks when her body seemed inclined to betray her even while she slept. Clearly, she had to do something to protect herself.

She brought it up as she sliced a grapefruit in half for their breakfast. “I’m moving into the guest room until after the wedding.”

Will, who had just shuffled out of the bedroom wearing nothing but boxers and a serious case of bedhead, looked at her as if she’d just suggested a vacation on Mars. He poured himself a cup of coffee, leaned back against the counter and sipped with the reverence of a man at prayer.

Some people needed their coffee in the morning. Will was one of those people.

After five minutes had passed and he’d moved on to his second cup, he spoke. “Okay. But isn’t that taking things a bit too far?”

Not willing to admit that she’d nearly lost the bet before she’d even opened her eyes this morning, she shrugged. “It just seems that if we’re not having sex, we shouldn’t be sleeping together either. It’s more romantic that way, don’t you think?”

She plopped the grapefruit halves on lunch plates, plucked two slices of fresh, hot toast out of the toaster, and carried the plates over to the kitchen table.

“Okay,” he said, echoing himself and looking completely confused. “I’ll move the boxes out for you, make some room.”

Then he set his coffee down on the table and went off to fetch the morning papers. He returned with an armful, and the two of them quickly sorted through the plastic bags and newsprint. He got all the sports sections. She got all the fashion, arts and lifestyle sections. Whoever finished fastest got first dibs on the news sections.

Neither of them spoke as they nibbled their breakfasts and perused the pages. Reading newspapers was serious work, offering the conscientious editor a chance to spot every typo he or she had missed the day before, as well as the opportunity to compare the contents of one’s own paper to that of the competition. As Tom Trent, the paper’s rather caustic editor in chief was fond of saying, being a journalist meant starting every day with your bare ass hanging out the window, waiting for passersby to come along and smack it.

In the world of newspapers, mistakes were very public.

A half hour later their gazes met over the serrated edges of newsprint.

“Anything?” He reached for his coffee.

“I think the Post completely overplayed that feature on customized drapes. I mean, how exciting are drapes?”

He rubbed his foot against hers beneath the table and grinned. “Pretty damned exciting—if you’re a window.”

The contact was reassuring, comforting—arousing. “Do you know that a hundred or even fifty years ago you’d have ruined me?”

His grin grew wider. “Not me, sugar. You were ruined when I met you.”

“No, I mean by moving in with me. You’d have ruined my reputation for all time.”

He got a disgusted look on his face. “What did people do before television—sit around discussing their neighbors’ sex lives? ‘Verily, Myrtle, methinks he hath boffed her silly.’ If you ask me, whatever we’ve lost in romance, we’ve more than made up for in the people-minding-their-own-business department.”

She glanced at the microwave clock, stood and gave him a chaste kiss on the cheek. “I’ve got to get dressed. I’m meeting my bridesmaids for our final fittings this morning, and then we’re going to lunch.”

He grabbed her around the waist, pulled her into his lap and planted a kiss on her mouth. “Don’t forget to put the slutty dress on hold. You might need it.”

At first, the fittings had seemed to drag on forever. The seamstress kept talking on her cell phone, which made her lose her concentration to the point where Lissy had become truly irritated. But then she’d slipped into her gown and looked in the mirror.

She’d looked like…a bride.

She’d found herself staring, transfixed, at her own reflection, tears streaming down her cheeks, her heartbeat fluttering.

“I’m getting married,” she’d said, as the seamstress had handed her tissues.

The gown she’d chosen was an empire-waist Vera Wang sheath of white silk with delicate cap sleeves. At five-foot-four she couldn’t pull off the poufy princess look, and she’d loved the way the empire waistline emphasized her breasts.

Holly, her maid of honor, and Tessa, Sophie and Kara, her bridesmaids, were wearing mauve empire-waist gowns with white silk sashes. The look worked as well for Holly, who was model-thin and would look stylish in burlap, as it did for Kara, who’d had a baby not quite a year ago and was still nursing.

They’d ordered salads and waters all around—not the most exciting lunch, but appropriate when only two weeks away from a day they all wanted to look sleek and slender.

At first they’d talked about the newspaper—a hard thing not to do when they were all journalists. Holly worked as an entertainment writer, while Tessa and Sophie were part of the paper’s elite Investigative Team, or I-Team. Kara had been part of the I-Team but had quit to work freelance when she’d gotten married. Members of the I-Team did hard-core journalism, the stuff that made headlines, stuff Lissy had no desire to do.

It wasn’t until they were almost through their meal that Lissy told them about the bet.

“I think it’s really romantic,” said Tessa in her soft Georgia accent, pushing her empty plate aside. With her long blond curls and big blue eyes, she looked like Goldilocks, but Lissy pitied anyone who misjudged Tessa. “But then I’ve always told you Will is a real gentleman. He’d do anything for you.”

“Except wear mauve cummerbunds.” Kara, who was married to a state senator, dabbed her lips with her napkin and smiled. Her long dark hair hung in a braid over her shoulder. “I don’t think Reece would have done that either.”

“If you stick to it, you’ll have the most amazing wedding night. You’ll both be ready to rip each other’s clothes off.” Holly squeezed lemon into her fizzy water. With short platinum blond hair and huge brown eyes, she reminded Lissy of an elf. “But if you lose—and with a stud like Will, losing would feel like winning—you’ll look gorgeous in the Badgley Mischka.”

The others nodded in agreement.

“You do look lovely in that gown,” Tessa said. “The way I see it, if you’ve got it—”

“—flaunt it,” they all said in unison before erupting in laughter.

Holly shrugged her slender shoulder. “I just don’t know how you’re going to make it for two weeks living with Will without mauling him.”

Sophie leaned in, a smile on her freckled face, her sleek strawberry-blond hair sliding over her shoulder. “Batteries.”

Lissy felt her cheeks turn pink. But why should she be embarrassed? They were all women. They’d surely all had a battery-operated boyfriend at one point or another. “I retired that particular device after my first date with Will. Besides, two weeks isn’t all that long.”

Will’s best man stared at him as if he were insane.

“That has got to be the most lame-ass thing I’ve ever heard.”

A former CU linebacker, Devon King bore a strong resemblance to Montel Williams—but with hair. He’d been one of Will’s closest friends through college and had stood by Will when his life had come crashing down around him. Of all his teammates, Devon had been the only one to attend Will’s mother’s funeral. Unable to bank on a pro career, Devon had gone to law school after graduation and was now a defense attorney. The two of them coached kids’ football on the weekends during the summer. This year, they had a team of eight-year-olds sporting little Steelers uniforms.

“Lissy thinks it’s romantic.” Will grabbed a duffel bag crammed with gear out of the back of his pickup and swung it over his shoulder.

But Devon was still staring at him, openmouthed and unmoving.

“Oh, come on, man! What was I supposed to say? ‘No, Lissy, darling, you’ve got me by the gonads, and I can’t last two days, let alone two weeks’?”

“That would have been better than ‘yes.’” Devon gave a disgusted snort. “Let me get this straight. You agreed not to have sex with your extremely fine fiancée because she thinks not having sex is somehow romantic?”

“It’s more than that. I think it has to do with something her mother said to her. Lissy asked me if it was possible for a couple to get married because they mistook great sex for love.”

“Like that’s a bad thing.” Devon grinned. “So you went along with it to prove there’s more to your relationship than sex?”

Will knew he had to tell Devon the whole truth. “That’s part of it. Also, she bet me.”

Devon shook his head. “You never could turn down a dare. What happens if you lose?”

This was the hard part. Will tried to say it casually, as if it didn’t matter. “We have to wear those pink cummerbunds.”

“Hell!” Devon jerked as if he’d been struck. “Man, I will personally come to your place at two A.M. to dump ice on your crotch. I am not walking down the aisle wearing pink!”

The horror on his friend’s face made Will laugh. “Don’t worry. I have no intention of caving. It’s only two weeks. Let’s get set up. I see a few mini Steelers waiting for us.”

Still frowning, Devon grabbed a bag of balls and they started toward the field.

Will got home, sweaty and thirsty, to find Lissy on the phone with their wedding planner, working out minuscule details of the rehearsal dinner, the ceremony and the reception. Rose petals instead of rice. Silk organza ribbons on the banisters, white not mauve, which would just be too much. Fourteen people requesting vegetarian entrees at the reception. Add a fourth layer to the chocolate truffle cake.

Thank God he was the groom and didn’t have to deal with that stuff. It would have made his brain bleed.

He tossed his sweaty clothes into the laundry and stepped into the shower. By the time Lissy was off the phone he was covered with soap.

She stuck her head in through the bathroom door. “Do you realize this is our last two days of peace and quiet before the wedding? This week is crazy-busy for both of us at the paper. Next weekend is the bridal shower and the bachelor and bachelorette parties. Then the week after we have wedding stuff almost every day.”

They did? All he could remember was the rehearsal and the wedding itself. He made a mental note to check his planner against hers. But what he said was, “Mm-hmm.”

He turned his back to the spray and let the water spill over his shoulders to rinse the soap away. He saw her look at his bare chest, then his abdomen, then lower still, and watched her pupils dilate. Her reaction sent a rush of blood to his groin, and he felt himself start to swell. He turned away, trying to hide his growing erection, and rubbed slick soap over his ass.

When she spoke, her voice was unnaturally light and casual. “Well, what would you like to do tonight?”

He’d like to have a repeat of last night. He’d like to bury his cock deep inside her and fuck her in a half-dozen positions, a half-dozen different places. But he couldn’t say that—not without seriously pissing off Devon and the rest of his groomsmen. “What did people do a hundred years ago?”

They had an early dinner, then caught a new French art film that Holly had recommended at Chez Artiste, leaving the theater two hours later confused.

“Did that make any sense to you?” Lissy tried to piece the images and subtitles together.

Will unlocked the passenger door of his pickup and opened it for her. “I liked the part where she ate her lipstick. And all the bare breasts—I liked those, too.”

Lissy waited until he’d climbed into the driver’s seat to continue the conversation. “What is it with French art films anyway? They portray women as if we’re all just dying to get into bed with one another.”

Will turned to her, his disappointed frown visible even in the dim yellow light of the street lamp. “You mean you aren’t?”

“Of course not!” She answered before she realized he was joking.

“Damn, Lissy! Way to ruin my fantasies. And I suppose next you’re going to tell me there’s no Santa Claus.”

His sulky tone made her laugh. “Just drive.”

The night was warm, one of those not-too-hot, not-too-cool early June nights when the Colorado sky was so clear the snow-capped peaks of the Rockies were visible even in the starlight. They went to their favorite coffee shop, where they tried to decipher the film’s deeper meaning over frothy cappuccinos, and then took a stroll on the 16th Street Mall, its rows of trees lit up by tiny white lights. They passed street vendors, a few Bob Dylan wannabes, an amazing sax player, a guy making funny animals out of balloons, and a fit-looking woman with dreadlocks performing on a unicycle.

Lissy didn’t know if it was just her imagination, but the Mall seemed to be crawling with lovers. A young couple dressed in black, their faces full of metal piercings, their eyes locked on each other. An old man and woman walking hand in hand, their skinny, pale legs sticking out of matching Bermuda shorts. A couple in their early thirties walking slowly along the red bricks, the woman’s belly big and round with their baby.

It had been a pregnancy scare that had gotten the whole marriage ball rolling. Lissy had missed a few pills, and then she’d been late. Only when the test had come up negative had they realized they were more disappointed she wasn’t pregnant than they had been afraid that she was. Will had proposed a month later.

Lissy watched the woman’s round tummy as she passed, felt the warmth of Will’s big hand surrounding hers and tried to inhale the sweetness of the moment. “I felt like a bride today.”

Will looked down at her, saw the dreamy look on her face. He could only imagine what she was talking about. No little boy sat around at the age of six planning what kind of tux he’d wear on his wedding day. Guys just didn’t dream about being grooms the way women dreamed about being brides. But guys did dream of being husbands and fathers. Perhaps what she’d felt was similar to the feeling he got when he saw her asleep at night, safe and sound—a warmth beyond contentment that told him all was right with the world.

He gave her hand a squeeze. “Have I ever told you I love you, Lissy Charteris?”

She smiled up at him. “Once or twice.”

He spotted a vendor selling flowers off to his right. He stepped away from her, pulled out his wallet and handed the man a twenty in exchange for a dozen pink roses. Then he turned to her, held out the roses and spoke in his loudest, most dramatic voice. “I love you, Lissy!”

People around them stopped, watched, laughed.

“You’re a lunatic, Will Fraser!” Lissy’s sweet face lit up with a smile, and she ducked her head the cute way she did any time she felt embarrassed, long hair spilling over her cheek. Then she looked into his eyes. “But a very handsome lunatic. I love you, too.”

They said good night outside the guest room, with slow lingering kisses that made Will’s blood burn—and turned his cock to concrete.

“I had a wonderful time tonight.” She leaned against him wearing one of his old T-shirts, her breasts pressing into his ribs, her arms locked at the back of his neck. “It was almost like we were dating again—and very romantic. Thank you for the roses.”

“I had a good time, too.” A voice in his head told him to quit kissing her, to let go and step away. But he loved the taste of her mouth. He took her lips with his, let his tongue toy with hers, felt her melt against him—then felt her stiffen. And he knew.

She’d discovered wood.

She stepped back from him, rested her hands on his chest, glanced down at the bulge in his boxer briefs. “I guess we shouldn’t be doing this—or not too much of it, anyway.”

Will felt his mouth move, heard his own voice. “I guess not.”

What do you mean, you frigging idiot! It’s exactly what you should be doing!

A part of him wondered what she would do if he kissed her again. He could tell from the sharp points her nipples made through his T-shirt she was turned on, too. But some part of him—some really stupid, overly chivalrous part of him—thought that might be cheating.

She smiled, looking insufferably sexy and sweet. Then she kissed him—on the cheek. “Good night, Will. I love you.”

“Good night, sugar. Sweet dreams.”

Lissy lay in the small twin bed, her body pleasantly aroused. It really had been a wonderful evening. She loved Will’s sense of humor and his whip-smart mind and had enjoyed discussing the film with him, even if neither of them had understood it or liked it. She felt she could talk to him about anything and never grow tired of hearing what he had to say. And even though they’d been together for a year and a half now, he still surprised her, as he’d done tonight by bellowing, “I love you!” on the Mall.

All in all, their first day of no sex had been well worth it. Not that it had been easy. Seeing him in the shower today had brought her to the edge of a meltdown. The sight of soap bubbles sliding over the muscles of his chest and abdomen, his dark body hair slicked against his wet skin, bubbles gathered in the wet hair that covered his testicles, had left her sopping in an instant. Clearly, unless she wanted to walk down the aisle in a barely there Badgley Mischka, she was going to have to be more careful.

No, it hadn’t been easy. Not then, and not when she’d been tempted to follow him to their bed so he could rock her world with that hard cock of his. Still, today had proved they didn’t have to have sex to cherish being with one another. Maybe going without sex for a while would deepen their relationship.

She rolled over, ignored the tingle between her legs and was soon fast asleep.

Will fell asleep, too, but a few hours later and only after he’d wrapped his mind around Lissy—and his hand around himself.

Lissy woke early the next morning when she tried to snuggle against Will and found herself pressing into a rough, cold wall. Unable to fall back asleep, she took a shower, brushed her teeth and started a pot of coffee.

They spent the morning doing chores. Lissy did laundry and went shopping for groceries, while Will packed their books, photo albums and his collection of vinyl LPs, carried them through the “Cone Zone” to his truck, and moved them to the new house. They were halfway through the grilled salmon salads Lissy had picked up for lunch when Devon called and asked if Will was in the mood for a little game of touch.

And so Lissy found herself sitting next to a cooler full of Fat Tire in the park down the street from their condo watching Will toss around a football with his groomsmen. There were a thousand other things she could have been doing, but she loved to watch Will play, partly because he enjoyed it so much and partly because—okay, she could be honest with herself—there was something about six-foot-plus of sweaty man in battle against sweaty man that made the secret girly part of her squeal.

She certainly knew more about football than she had when she’d met him, and she knew talent when she saw it. Will had more than his fair share, his movements powerful, focused and graceful. Even with his knee injury, he ran like the wind, though he limped slightly between plays. With hands that had been described as “magic” by sports commentators—and Lissy knew they were magic, only not in the way sports commentators thought—he seemed to lure the ball out of the air and against his chest.

And he looked damned sexy doing it.

Although it was hazardous to her libido—how could she watch him jump and grunt and run and sweat and not get turned on?—she couldn’t make herself walk the hundred steps home.

At least he was having a good time. That was what mattered.

Will caught another pass and ran it out of bounds, enjoying the exertion.

Then Devon called a time-out and pulled everyone, including the three members of the opposing team, into a huddle. “Is she watching? Good. Will, take your shirt off. The way we see it, you need to play some offense here. As long as you’re just playing D, you’re going to lose.”

Nods all around.

“You told everyone?” Will glared at his best friend.

Devon shrugged. “You give in, and we wear pink. It’s our asses on the line.”

More nods.

“Except mine, of course, because I’m only an usher,” Chris grumbled.

“Let’s face it, man. You don’t stand a chance. Lissy is…well, Lissy is one fine female.”

“Extremely hot,” Chris added.

“She’s…whoa, yeah…hot,” stammered Robert.

“A total babe,” Scott agreed.

“I’d do her,” Nick said, acting surprised when Will glared at him. “What?”

“What are you guys suggesting? You want me to cheat?”

“Not cheat,” Devon said, smiling from behind his mirrored sunglasses. “Just turn up the heat on your woman. Play to win.”

The idea had its appeal. Will wasn’t looking forward to two weeks of sleeping alone and solo sex. He glanced at Lissy, caught her smile, then shook his head. “I don’t think so. I agreed to this, and I’m just going to have to ride it out.”

“Just take off your shirt, man, then go fetch a beer.”

Nods.

Hadn’t he had the same thought last night?

Play to win.

“Do you know how weird it feels to hear you say that, Devon? ‘Take off your shirt.’” Despite the niggling of his conscience, Will yanked the sweaty T-shirt over his head. “If I catch you eyeing me, dude, I’ll kick your ass.”

He sauntered over to where Lissy sat in the shade, tossed the T-shirt on the ground and reached into the cooler for a cold one. “How you doing, sugar? Hot day.”

“Yeah.” Her gaze was fixed on his pecs.

Lissy dropped the chicken strips into the wok and stirred them, her blood sizzling hotter than the pungent sesame oil. Watching him play a hard game of football, all those delicious muscles shifting and bunching beneath his sweat-slick skin, had left her wishing she’d never suggested this stupid bet. She’d be in the shower with him right now, running her hands over those luscious muscles, washing that spicy man-sweat away, instead of stewing in her own pheromones in the kitchen.

Why had she gotten herself into this?

You wouldn’t be the first woman to confuse a man’s sexual attention with love, Melisande. Just wait till he gets his fill of you and the hormones wear off.

Is that what had happened to her mother? Had she married her father in the afterglow of an orgasm only to regret it later? Lissy had always known her parents’ marriage was an unhappy one, but she’d never understood how unhappy it was until she’d left home, watched other couples and seen her parents from the outside. They were angry, bitter, worn.

Even when she’d been a little girl they’d slept in separate bedrooms, lived separate lives, coming together only when occasion demanded. She knew her father had fooled around with other women, his unfaithfulness seeming to rob her mother of what remained of her youth. No amount of money had been able to fill the void between them.

But Lissy’s relationship with Will was nothing like theirs. She and Will truly loved each other, loved spending time with each other. They earned about the same amount of money, held similar jobs, had similar interests. She would not wake up one morning to find herself in her mother’s shoes.

Still, a bet was a bet. She had agreed to it. Worse, it had been her idea. And now she was stuck with it.

She dropped chopped veggies into the wok and watched them fry.

“No, sugar, I’ll do it. You made supper. It’s my turn to do dishes.” Will stood, winced.

She looked up at him, concern in her pretty eyes. “Your knee?”

“Yeah.” He picked up their plates and silverware, took another step, allowed a hiss of breath to pass his teeth. His knee did hurt. Not much. But it did hurt. “Damn!”

She stood, took the plates from his hands. “Sit, hon. I’ll get an ice pack.”

“No, let me handle this. It’s not bad.” He was telling the truth.

She gave him a worried frown. “Liar. Sit and elevate it. I’ll be right back.”

He sat and lifted his leg onto a chair, suppressing a satisfied grin. She’d been distracted and grumpy during dinner, and he thought he knew why. He’d followed the football game with a shower and had come to dinner wearing a pair of old jeans and a Calvin Klein shirt—which he’d left unbuttoned. She’d spent the better part of their meal trying not to look at him.

Devon was a genius. Will could win the bet and get Lissy back into his bed, protecting his groomsmen from the Curse of the Pink Cummerbunds while preventing himself from becoming the first man in history to die from a case of blue balls.

He soothed his conscience by telling himself it wasn’t cheating. Nothing in the conditions of their wager prevented them from trying covertly to seduce the other person. And when Lissy gave in to her lust, he’d not only make certain she enjoyed it, but he’d also prove what a great guy he was by letting her wear the Very Wang or whatever gown it was that she liked so much.

When Lissy returned, she had a pillow, a tea towel and an ice pack in her hands. She looked down at his knee. “Oh!”

He pretended not to understand the problem.

“You’re going to have to take off your jeans.”

He nodded, stood, unbuttoned his fly. Then he slipped the worn denim down his hips, letting his cock hang free, and watched her eyes widen. “Sorry, Lissy. You said dinner was ready, so I hurried.”

Lissy drew an I and Will a P, so Lissy went first. Will watched as she calculated the value of her letters, then set five tiles on the board: N-I-G-H-T.

“Double letter score on the T for ten points.” She scribbled her points on paper and drew five more tiles.

It had been decades since Will had played Scrabble. With sex out of the question and nothing decent on television, he’d figured they’d rent a DVD. But Lissy had found the old board game last week while packing the contents of the guest room closet and had wanted to play.

“You can keep your leg elevated, and we can still have some fun,” she’d said, dropping a pair of gym shorts in his naked lap.

He adjusted the ice pack on his knee, looked at the letters on his tray, then bit back a smile and set down his tiles, taking advantage of her T: B-R-E-A-S-T-S.

“Double points for the R for a total of ten. We’re tied.” He pulled six new tiles and sat back to see how she’d react.

“The game has just started.” Her green eyes held defiance. Using the second S from BREASTS, she spelled out S-E-X for eleven points.

Will studied the board and pulled three tiles from his tray; using the B in BREASTS, he spelled B-L-O-W for ten with a double score for the L.

She smiled sweetly, picked up a tile and dropped an N above his O, spelling NO. Four points. “Your turn.”

Will was glad they weren’t playing poker, because once he’d looked the board over and considered his tiles, he was unable to keep himself from smiling. He pulled five tiles from his tray and set them down one by one, using the R from BREASTS: P-E-C-K-E-R.

“Double word score for a hot twenty-eight points. Top that, sugar.”

Lissy squirmed in her seat, considered her options. She would put him in his place. She picked up three tiles, and going down from the P he’d just placed added U-N-Y to spell PUNY. It was only eight points, but sometimes it wasn’t the score that mattered.

She looked up at him, ready to gloat—only to find him watching her through intense blue eyes that told her he knew she knew better. There was nothing puny about Will.

She swallowed, watched him set out his next word for twelve points: L-I-P-S.

She rolled her eyes, used his L to spell L-I-M-P. Eight points.

He gave her a lopsided grin and shook his head, drawing her gaze down to the telltale bulge in his shorts. Then he used the E in SEX to spell E-N-T-E-R. Seven points.

She lifted her chin, used his N and spelled out N-E-V-E-R for ten points.

He narrowed his eyes at her, bit his lower lip. Then a slow smile spread across his face as he moved back up the board and used the A in BREASTS to end the word V-A-G-I-N-A. Twelve points.

And so it went, crossword warfare, neither of them speaking, Lissy barely breathing, until Will passed two hundred points with the fifteen-point word Q-U-I-M.

Lissy stood, glared at him and began tossing the wooden tiles back into the little velvet bag. “So long as you understand, Will Fraser, those four letters are as close as you’re getting to the real thing until you say ‘I do.’”

This time, Lissy said good night to Will while he was in the bathroom brushing his teeth, then fled to the safe haven of the guest room.

Will heard Lissy open the bedroom door. He opened one eye and glanced at the clock—twelve-oh-five. He pretended to be asleep, certain she was about to crawl beneath the sheets and wake him for a bit of midnight madness. Instead he heard the drawer of her nightstand slide open, then close. And then she was gone.

A few minutes later, he heard a faint buzzing sound.

And then it hit him.

She was having sex with herself! Without him!

He sat up, intensely aroused and irritated. He’d spent the better part of the day trying to get under her skin, and she was taking it out on a sex toy?

He’d set one foot on the floor on his way to replace the stupid bit of vibrating plastic with something real when he caught himself. He forced himself back into bed, flipped onto his side and punched a pillow. And listened.

By the time the buzzing stopped ten minutes later, he was hard as steel. He’d take care of the steel tonight. The vibrator he’d take care of tomorrow.

She wasn’t getting off that easily.

The wall woke Lissy again early Monday morning. She took a shower, slid into her bathrobe and had breakfast ready and coffee brewing when Will emerged from the bedroom, looking tired and surly. She poured him a cup, handed it to him, then kissed him on the stubbly roughness of his cheek. “Morning, babe. How’s your knee?”

He sipped, frowned. “My knee? Oh. Better. Thanks.”

“Should we ride together?”

He looked into his coffee, shook his head. “Take your car. I’ll be at Broncos team camp most of the day. We’re doing a couple of live feeds.”

“A late night?”

He nodded. “How about you?”

“A day of boring meetings. We’ve got to pin down the concept for our fall fashion preview, and I need to finish interviews for the staff writer position. We can’t head into the rest of the summer understaffed.”

He set his coffee down, pulled her into his arms and kissed her forehead. “I miss you, Lissy. I miss having you in our bed. Sex or no sex, it’s not the same without you.”

She pressed her cheek into his chest, sank into the haven of his body. “I miss you, too. But it’s only—”

“—thirteen more days.”

Thirteen more days.

Somehow that had begun to sound like a long time.

That was what she thought, but that was not what she said. “Don’t tell me you’re ready to cave so soon.”

“Who said anything about giving up? I was simply stating a fact.” Then he kissed her on the nose. “Have a great day.”

“You, too.” Lissy watched him head back up the hallway toward the shower and wished he’d had the good grace to give up. Although sex with her vibrator relieved some of the tension and helped her sleep, it didn’t come close to the pleasure of sex with Will.

She hurried to the bedroom, got dressed, then grabbed her briefcase and purse and drove through early morning traffic to the five-story office building that housed the Denver Independent. As a senior editor, she got one of the coveted parking places beneath the building—a luxury that saved her countless hours searching for a spot on the streets of downtown Denver, where parking was a blood sport.

She had a meeting with her assistant editors, interviewed two candidates for the staff writer position and then shot down three design concepts for the fall fashion cover. By ten, she was beginning to feel in control again. Not even her mother, who called to demand once again that Will sign a prenup if she wanted her to attend the wedding, ruined her morning.

Because Will was in Englewood watching the Donkeys—she only called them that because it irritated him—she had lunch with Holly. Over a salad so wilted it looked like it had been fished out of the alley garbage can, she found herself telling Holly about the weekend: how she’d woken up ready to jump Will’s bones and had moved into the guest room, how the sight of Will in the shower had driven her out of her mind, how she’d nearly melted watching Will play football without his shirt, how he’d toyed with her over a game of Sex Scrabble.

“Thirteen days sounds like forever!” She leaned forward and whispered, “And there’s not a vibrator in the world that comes anywhere close to him.”

For a moment Holly said nothing but nibbled at her fruit plate. Then she smiled. “He’s doing it on purpose, you know.”

“Doing what on purpose?”

“Trying to turn you on. Trying to make you so desperate you’ll give in first.”

“Oh, no! No, no, no! Will wouldn’t do that.” When Holly gave her an exasperated how-can-you-be-so-stupid look, Lissy tried to explain. “Scrabble was my idea, and I’m the one who walked in on him when he was in the shower. He didn’t ask me to come in. And he’s played football without his shirt before. No, it’s me. I’m just—”

“—head-over-heels in love with a very sexy man,” Holly finished for her, then continued, “who knows perfectly well how he affects you and is doing everything he can to make you lose the bet before he does.”

Lissy shook her head and stood, cafeteria tray in hand. “I just don’t think he would do that.”

Holly followed her to the trash. “Lissy, dear, Will is special, but he’s still a man.”

“The Broncos have a young receiver corps this year, heavy on strength and speed but light on experience.” Will spoke into the mic on his headset, almost finished with their second live broadcast of the day. The hot June sun beat down on him, made him sweat beneath the sport coat the station insisted he wear. “Receivers Coach Tony D’Angio put them through their paces today running cross patterns and focusing on technique—footwork and hand position.”

From the station downtown, helmet-haired sports anchor Don Philips was interviewing him, his voice buzzing in Will’s earpiece. “Darius Williams was taken out with a pulled hamstring. Any word yet as to how serious it is?”

“No, Don, though it’s unlikely he’ll return to the field this week. The coaching staff is working hard to prevent preseason injuries in hopes of avoiding an early season like the one they had last year. They’ve added extra stretching and conditioning workouts, which are also helping the newest members of the team adjust to playing at altitude.”

“If anyone knows what injuries can do to a player’s career, it’s you, Will. It was a devastating knee injury that ended your career, taking you from Big 12 star to former college legend overnight.”

Will hated it when Don brought up his past, but Don seemed to love rubbing it in. “That’s right, Don. Neither the coaches nor the players want to see that scenario unfold here at team camp, so, while they’re training hard, they’re also holding back a bit, waiting for their conditioning to peak before they push forward into the more strenuous workouts.”

“Checking in with Will Fraser at Broncos team camp in Englewood. We’ll continue to follow events as the week unfolds. Tonight, the Red Sox—”

Will waited until the red light on the camera went out, then ripped off his headset. “Stupid dick.”

“Don’t listen to him, Will.” Merrill, the cameraman, began breaking down the equipment. “The asshole can’t catch a clue, much less a football. Spends his days worrying about his hair.”

“Thanks, Merrill. Go find yourself something cold to drink and some AC.”

Will had assumed he’d be over it by now. It had been eleven years since his dreams of playing pro football had ended in one moment of shattering pain. Although he’d never played a single pro game, he had turned professional football into a solid career for himself, using his name and his knowledge to earn a good living reporting from the sidelines. His work had brought him together with Lissy, more than making up for anything he’d lost. He had no regrets. Yet there were still times when he found himself wondering what might have been.

Let it go, Fraser.

Feeling on edge, Will turned back toward the practice field and watched the players finish one-on-one drills in the red zone. He’d been irritable all day, maybe because it was ninety-nine degrees outside and maybe because he had a beautiful fiancée whom he hadn’t touched for almost three long days.

He’d come close last night to winning the bet and ending this whole thing. Then Lissy had gotten help from an old friend. He’d known the vibrator was there. Why hadn’t he thrown the damn thing out or hidden it somewhere else? Well, he might have blown it last night, but he was a man who learned from his mistakes.

He’d waited until she’d walked out the door this morning, then he’d searched the guest room until he’d found it. Knowing he couldn’t smash it or toss it out without giving himself away, he’d turned it on and slipped it back beneath the mattress where she’d hidden it. By the time she got home from work, the batteries would be dead—and he’d taken care to make certain there were no more AAs anywhere in the condo. If she reached for her little buzzing boyfriend tonight, she’d find him unresponsive—and Will doubted she’d go to the trouble of getting dressed and traversing the Cone Zone for replacement batteries.

Of course, she still had fingers.

The thought of her touching herself, sliding her pretty fingers between her lips and over her tasty little clit until she came, sent a rush of blood to his groin, leaving him half-hard.

“Hey, Fraser!” Coach D’Angio strolled over to him, pigskin in hand, followed by two rookies who would most likely spend the year serving an apprenticeship on the bench. “I hear you’re getting hitched.”

Will nodded, grinned, grateful for the distraction. “You heard right—two weeks from this past Saturday.”

D’Angio slapped him on the shoulder. “Congratulations!”

The rookies nodded and smiled.

“Is she worth the ball and chain?”

Ball and chain? Will had never thought of marriage to Lissy in that way. “More than.”

Coach D’Angio held up the ball. “Hey, you want to show these two clowns how to catch a damned football? Will here is more than just a pretty face,” D’Angio said to the rookies. “For six years, he was the Big 12 all-time leader in receptions, receiving yardage and touchdowns.”

“Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve run a serious pattern, D’Angio? These guys are pros. I can’t teach them anything.” But Will was already unbuttoning his sport jacket.

From Big 12 star to former college legend.

By the time Coach D’Angio had the ball in the air, Will was far downfield. He turned in, saw the leather spiraling toward him but about two feet too far to the left and high. As it had always done, his mind emptied of everything except how much he wanted that ball. He leapt for it, thought it into his hands, pulled it against his chest. Then his feet hit turf, a sharp bite of pain in his knee the only proof he’d just done something stupid.

Back toward the fifty-yard line, D’Angio was applauding and shouting. “Softest damned hands in the Big 12, boys, and feet with wings. If it hadn’t been for an interception and a linebacker with a grudge, he’d be shaking up the pros. Want to go for another one, Fraser?”

Will let himself be talked into catching three more before he pleaded deadline and retrieved his jacket. “I still have a column to write.”

Only then did he realize Merrill had taped the whole thing.

“Please tell me you’re going to scrap that.” Will tossed his jacket over his shoulder.

“Might be fun at the employee holiday party. I do take bribes, you know.”

Lissy picked up Chinese on the way home and tucked Will’s supper in the fridge. Then she hunkered down before the television with her dinner plate and a pair of chopsticks. The station was just finishing weather, which meant sports was next. They’d probably recycle Will’s live broadcast—Denver was Broncos crazy—and she’d at least get a glimpse of him. She hated it when one or the other of them had to work late.

No, it’s me. I’m just—

—head-over-heels in love with a very sexy man who knows perfectly well how he affects you and is doing everything he can to make you lose the bet before he does.

Lissy hadn’t been able to forget her conversation with Holly. She’d run Sunday through her mind again and again but could find no reason to believe Will was deliberately trying to seduce her. Holly had an overactive imagination.

But why had none of his friends taken off their shirts? Hmmm?

Lissy ignored the irritating voice in her head and turned up the volume.

The latest Red Sox victory over St. Louis. A doping scandal in the world of cycling. A few surprising NFL draft picks.

Thank God they were finally getting to football. No matter how much she loved Will, Lissy could only stand so much sports news. She stood and hurried to the kitchen to refill her glass of ice water, the sound of the television following her.

“At Broncos team camp this afternoon, spectators might have assumed the team had inked a new draft pick. But look closely. The man catching the ball is none other than Channel Four commentator Will Fraser, who stepped out from behind the microphone and onto the field this afternoon to catch a few passes thrown by Receivers Coach Tony D’Angio.”

Lissy nearly tripped in her crazed dash from the kitchen to the sofa. She watched, thrilled, as an image of Will leaping into the air and catching a football filled the screen.

My man.

The words popped into her head, uttered by some primitive female part of her, as she savored the replay, melting into the cushions. Then they segued from the footage of him catching passes to his prerecorded analysis of the team’s receivers.

It was only later that it dawned on her.

His knee, which had hurt so much last night, hadn’t seemed to bother him at all.

Will drove home feeling ready to hit someone. He’d been halfway through his column when his phone had rung and he’d found himself on the line with Lissy’s mother. She obviously hadn’t expected to reach him in person, had planned to leave him a message. But once she recovered from the shock of speaking with him live, she told him that she was prepared to compensate him handsomely if he signed a prenuptial agreement, which she had just faxed to him at the paper.

“You’ll receive a check for fifty thousand dollars as soon as the document is legally final,” she’d said, her voice all ice and clipped syllables. “Once Lissy sees you’ve signed it, she’ll quit being ridiculous and sign it herself. The money—”

“You mean the bribe?”

“—will remain our secret.”

Anger and disbelief had tied Will’s tongue, but only for a moment. “I don’t know how a woman as warm and loving as Lissy came from you, but for her sake I’m going to keep this conversation to myself. It would crush her to know you’ve gone behind her back like this.”

“I will not have my daughter lose her fortune to trailer trash! You don’t even know who your father was!” The ugly sharpness of her words rang between them like shattering glass.

Will fought back profanity, chose his words carefully. “I know he was a wealthy married man, like your husband, and that the young waitress he took advantage of paid the rest of her life for his irresponsibility, raising a child alone on tip money. She had more courage in her heart than he had dollars in the bank. Lissy is like her—kind, courageous, caring.”

“Don’t presume to tell me about my daughter!”

“Good-bye, Mrs. Charteris.” He’d slammed the phone down, then retrieved the hateful document and fed it through the shredder.

Will got home just before nine to find Lissy curled up on the sofa with a pile of fashion magazines and a glass of iced tea, Seal playing over the stereo. At the sight of her, he felt his anger drain away. God, he needed her tonight.

She was wearing a skin-hugging black tank top—without a bra—and a pair of very short denim shorts. Her auburn hair was pulled back in a sleek ponytail that hung halfway down her back. She stood when he neared the sofa, raised herself onto her toes and kissed him—on the cheek. “I missed you.”

He pulled her close and kissed her long and slow—on the lips. “I missed you, too.”

She stepped away, started toward the kitchen. “Your dinner’s in the fridge—Chinese.”

“There’s nothin’ like my Lissy’s home cookin’.” He followed her, watching the feminine sway of her hips and the sexy curves of her ass, willing himself to forget the conversation he’d had with her mother.

“I saw you on TV today.” She opened the refrigerator and bent over to reach inside, her shorts rising an inch to reveal the soft, rounded undersides of her ass cheeks.

His mouth watered, but not for Chinese food. “I’m always on TV, sugar.”

She turned around, two take-out containers in her hands. “The receivers coach was throwing passes, and you—”

“What? Are you telling me they aired that?” Mortification followed astonishment.

She poured the containers out onto a plate and popped the plate into the microwave. “You looked really good. And, hey, you caught it every time.”

Cringing on the inside, he shook his head. “Christ, that’s embarrassing! I didn’t even know Merrill was taping. I think he was trying to get back at that dickhead Don, but I sure wish he’d asked me first.”

She took a pair of lacquered chopsticks out of the silverware drawer. “Why would that be embarrassing? Most men would give anything to be on the six o’clock news tossing the ball around with a Broncos coach.”

“Most men don’t have to see how much they’ve gone downhill or worry that everyone will think they’re trying to show off.” He hated the self-pity he heard in his own voice.

She looked over at him, her green eyes going soft. Then she set the chopsticks aside, walked over to him and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m sorry, Will. I’d give anything to be able to change things, to see you live the life you want to live.”

He stroked and kissed her hair. “You are the life I want to live, Lissy. You’re not someone I got stuck with because the rest of it didn’t work out.”

He felt her body relax, an almost imperceptible shift. “It’s still hard, isn’t it? Every day it’s hard for you.”

He pulled her closer. “Not every day.”

What was hard was not reaching down to cup the lovely, firm breasts that pressed so temptingly against his ribs. He ran his knuckles up the warm, bare skin of her arms and cupped her silky shoulders instead. Then he ducked down and brushed his lips over hers, tasting first her upper lip, then her lower.

He heard her quick intake of breath, saw her eyes go smoky. She lifted her chin, reaching for his kiss with her luscious red mouth.

The microwave beeped.

Will bit back a groan as she slipped out of his arms, pulled his steaming chicken and vegetables out of the microwave and carried it to the table.

They shared the highlights of their day while he polished off his supper, then they snuggled on the couch to watch the ten o’clock news.

Later Will would not be able to say how it started—an innocent brush of skin against skin, a glance, a shared breath. They’d made it through the day’s headlines, when he found himself brushing his lips slowly over her cheek, kissing her temple, nibbling at the whorl of her ear, sucking on her earlobe, the sound of the television a distant buzz.

Her breath came in shudders. Her lips were parted, her eyes closed, her hands clenched into fists in her lap. When her head fell back onto his shoulder, he did what he’d wanted to do all night. He kissed her full on the mouth—and she kissed him back.

It seemed like forever since they’d kissed like this with lips and tongues and teeth, and he found after the first taste that he wanted more. With a groan, he took her beneath him, pressed her back onto the cushions, kissed her harder, deeper.

She arched against him, wrapped her legs around him, moaned into his mouth, a sweet feminine sound that made every muscle in his body tense and sent his mind reeling with urgent, throbbing lust. His cock strained eagerly against his fly, seeking a way out of his pants and into her. He reached down with one hand, grasped her ass, rubbed his clothed erection between her legs, searching for relief.

She whimpered, slipped out from beneath him so that she sat on the floor, holding her hand out at arm’s length as if to ward him off. “W-we have to stop. We can’t!”

The goddamned bet.

Will wanted to point out that they didn’t have to stop, that the best possible thing they could do right now was fuck each other’s brains out, but that would mean wearing pink. He sat up, forced breath into his lungs, bit back a few choice words. “I’ll bet engaged couples kissed a hundred years ago.”

She seemed to consider his words, hugging her arms around herself as if that would stop whatever she was feeling. “I don’t think they kissed like that.”

He leaned toward her, almost touching her. “I bet they touched every way and everywhere they could—as often as they could.”

She scooted backward. “But they stopped. They knew they had to stop.”

“They didn’t all stop.” He dropped to the floor beside her, slipped an arm around her waist to halt her retreat and pressed his lips against the pulse at her throat. “Ever hear the expression ‘shotgun wedding’?”

Her answer was something between a squeak and a moan.

He pressed kisses along the silky skin of her throat. “Besides, we’re just kissing.”

“Kissing…often…leads to…sex.”

“Only if you want it to. I’ll prove it to you.” He licked the sensitive skin just beneath her ear, felt her shiver. Then he caught her hair with his fist, tilted her head back and plundered her mouth, thrusting his tongue deep, nipping and sucking her lips, taking from her mouth what he could not take from her body. He gave her no quarter.

With a muffled cry, she melted against him and met the potency of his kiss with her own ferocious hunger. He knew he was pushing her to the edge because he was being pushed right along with her. He knew he had to stop to make his point, but his body wouldn’t let him. One more stroke of tongue against tongue. One more taste of her lips. One more gust of breath.

His cock hard as stone, his blood raging through his veins, he broke the kiss. “I agreed not to have sex until after the wedding. But I didn’t agree not to touch you, Lissy. I intend to touch you every day. Get used to it.”

She stared at him through wide green eyes, her pupils dilated, her lips swollen.

He kissed her on the forehead. “Good night, sugar. Sweet dreams.”

Lissy lay in the dark, burning. She crossed her legs, squeezed her thighs tightly together, tried to ease the ache.

No, it’s me. I’m just—

—head-over-heels in love with a very sexy man who knows perfectly well how he affects you and is doing everything he can to make you lose the bet before he does.

Was Holly right after all?

After tonight it certainly seemed like it. Lissy’d tried to keep their contact chaste, kissing him on the cheek, keeping her distance, trying not to add fuel to the fire. But Will had grabbed the gas can and emptied it over both of them. Whoosh!

He’d been just as turned on as she, his cock a hard ridge inside his pants, his breathing unsteady, his blue eyes dark like the night sky.

I agreed not to have sex until after the wedding. But I didn’t agree not to touch you, Lissy. I intend to touch you every day. Get used to it.

But Lissy would never get used to it. Although she’d always enjoyed sex, nothing could compare to the way she felt when Will touched her. Will had more passion in his kisses than most men possessed in their entire bodies. His tongue alone was…

She couldn’t think about that. She’d already found herself weighing the pros and cons of the Badgley Mischka. Swarovski crystals. Chapel-length train. Corset waist.

But she’d set out to prove to herself they could go for two weeks without sex and still have a strong relationship. She wasn’t ready to give in yet.

Get a grip on yourself, Lissy!

She wanted to get a grip on Will. But that wasn’t going to happen, not for twelve long days and twelve longer nights—eleven if she didn’t count today. Which was almost over, so she really shouldn’t count it. Then again, tonight wasn’t over until she fell asleep. Twelve. Twelve long nights.

She rolled onto her belly, slid her hand beneath the mattress, pulled out her vibrator and rolled over onto her back. Then she flipped the switch—and nothing happened.

She shook it. Still nothing.

She sat up, turned on the light, saw the switch was set at Off.

“Well no wonder.”

She flipped it the other way. Nothing.

And then it occurred to her that the thing had been switched to On.

The batteries were burned out.

With an aggravated sigh, she got out of bed and padded down the hallway to get fresh ones. Had she left the darned thing on all night long? No, that was impossible. It was loud enough—and strong enough—that she’d have heard and felt it. Maybe her motions had accidentally turned it on when she’d gotten up in the morning and she’d been too busy to hear it buzzing away. Yet how could that be when the switch actually required a bit of effort?

She entered the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, its light spilling across her bare legs and into the darkened room. She reached for the side shelf where they kept spare batteries—only to find it empty. She groaned.

Will must have taken them for his—

She stood bolt upright and slammed the fridge door, making glass jars and bottles clink.

That bastard!

He had turned her vibrator on and let the batteries run out. And he’d taken the rest of the pack so she’d have nothing to replace them with.

For a moment she could do nothing but fume.

He was trying to seduce her! He was trying to make her give in! He was trying to make her wear the slutty wedding gown!

Well, he was a freaking idiot if he thought an act of vibrator sabotage and battery theft would be enough to force her to come crying for him. She was more resourceful than that.

Lissy tiptoed into the living room, picked up the TV remote and opened it—only to find it took AAA batteries, not AAs.

“Damn!”

The same was true of the stereo, VCR and DVD remotes.

She wracked her brain, tried to figure out what other appliances in the house took batteries. The alarm clocks? No. They were electric. Her iPod? No, it had its own battery. The smoke detectors!

She hurried back to the kitchen, picked up a chair and carried it into the hallway. Then she climbed up and, standing on her tiptoes, tried to remove the casing. It was on tight, and as she twisted and tugged, her hand bumped the glowing red Test button.

It let out a blaring beep, making Lissy grab her ears and look toward the bedroom. The last thing she wanted was for Will to catch her scavenging for batteries. She watched for a moment, waited. All was quiet.

She reached back up and removed the cover with a quiet click.

Nine volt.

Nine volt! The damned thing took nine-volt batteries!

“Lissy, what in hell are you doing?”

She gasped, found Will standing stark naked beside the chair. “I-it’s been a while since we changed these. I was just checking to make sure it still worked.”

“At one in the morning?”

“We don’t want to get caught with our pants down.”

“Uh, no. I guess not.” He glanced down at his naked body. “Why don’t you let me do that? I’m taller. Hand me the spare.”

Her face flushed red. She didn’t have the spare. “I-I think I forgot to grab it.”

“I’ll get it.” He walked off, his ass muscles shifting as he moved. “You get to sleep.”

Lissy swore she heard him chuckle.

Laugh all you want, Mr. Tricky Man. Two can play at this game.

On Tuesday, Lissy got up early, showered, then took her time dressing in the bedroom, being just loud enough to wake Will, but not so loud that it was obvious she was trying to wake him. As he watched from beneath sleepy lids, she slathered scented cream up the length of her newly shaved legs, across her belly and breasts, and down her arms, and over the naked mounds of her butt. She took her time doing it, massaging the cream into her skin as if she were caressing a lover, cupping her breasts, bending to give him a glimpse of her from behind.

Then she pulled a pair of garters and stockings out of her drawer of naughty lingerie and—with Will more fully awake—rolled the stockings up her legs and fastened them to the garters. Next, she put on a silk push-up bra, lifting her breasts with her hands so they filled the cups just so. Then she put on a slinky black wrap dress—but no panties.

“Where do you think you’re going dressed like that?” He sounded grumpy.

“Oh!” Lissy pretended she hadn’t realized he was awake. She slipped into a pair of black Manolo Blahniks. “To the paper, of course. Will you be working late again tonight?”

“No.” He was grumpy.

“Have a great day at Broncos camp. I hope Don the dickhead isn’t snotty to you on the air.” She leaned over far enough to give him a glimpse of what he wasn’t touching and kissed him on the cheek. “I love you, Will Fraser.”

Then she sashayed out the door, feeling like a million bucks.

“She caught on to me, guys. That’s the only explanation. She’s fighting back. If I thought I was hurting before, I’m dying now. I’m talking balls so blue they’re purple.”

Will had endured three days of sheer hell and had done the only thing a man could do under such circumstances: met his buddies after work for a beer.

Devon took a drink. “What makes you say she’s fighting back? What’s she doing?”

Will leaned in, lowered his voice. “She’s teasing me, playing stripper in reverse.”

“So she’s been getting dressed?” Devon looked unimpressed.

“It’s more than that! She struts naked into the bedroom while I’m still in bed. She rubs skin cream over her entire naked body like she’s making love to herself. She takes extra time on all the best parts, especially her ass. I’m telling you, she greases that thing so well she could put it on the grill!”

Devon, Scott, Robert and Nick stared at him, silent and openmouthed.

But Will had to vent, had to get it out of his system. “Then she gets dressed. Tuesday it was a push-up bra, garters and stockings—and no panties. Yesterday it was a red silk thong. This morning she wore a see-through teddy thing—white lace and ribbons.”

“Whoa.” Robert lifted his beer, missed his mouth.

Nick and Scott stared at him, mute.

Devon buried his face in his hands. “Man, I sense pink in my future.”

“Why don’t you just get up and walk out while she’s dressing?” Scott asked.

“I’d like to see you try that.” It wasn’t that Will hadn’t thought of that. But when the time had come, he’d found himself unable to move.

“You are wanking, right?” Nick had never been subtle.

“Of course I’m wanking! I’m a guy, right?”

“Just making sure you hadn’t overlooked an obvious solution.”

“Listen! I’m not finished.” Someone had to know what he’d been going through these past three days. “Tuesday night she picked up sushi—and fed me with her own chopsticks. Last night I came home early thinking I’d beat her at her game and cook my lasagna she loves so much, only to find her setting out oysters on the half shell. And the whole time we’re eating, all I can think about is that finely greased ass.”

“And so you just sit there, a testosterone train wreck, and do nothing to turn the tables?” Devon glared at him as if he’d done something terrible.

“Of course not!” He couldn’t tell them about running down the batteries on her vibrator. That seemed a bit too personal. Besides, she’d bought fresh batteries the next morning—and hidden the vibrator somewhere he hadn’t been able to find it. “I strut around as naked as a monkey at the zoo. I’ve been packing boxes, lifting all kinds of heavy shit with my shirt off. I’ve made a point of kissing her just the way she likes to be kissed. I’ve brought her flowers. Last night I gave her the ultimate neck rub. She was putty in my hands!”

For a moment no one said anything, the sound of Incubus drifting through the air above the cacophony of a hundred conversations.

Will drew deeply on his brew, knowing full well he was in shit-deep trouble. He’d called Lissy from Broncos team camp to tell her he was going out with the guys and that she shouldn’t wait for him for dinner.

“You’re going to see them all Saturday night at your bachelor party,” she’d said, clearly disappointed he was evading whatever trap she’d laid for him tonight.

But he needed to regroup, to come up with a new game plan.

“If I were you, I’d just give up,” Scott offered. “Pink cummerbunds—what’s that compared to what Lissy’s got cookin’?”

“I’d have given up Tuesday,” Robert said, dragging a chip through dip.

Nick nodded. “I’d never have agreed to the stupid bet in the first place.”

Devon placed a reassuring hand on Will’s shoulder. “Don’t listen to these losers, Will. You’ve been outclassed, that’s all. But you can take her. You just got to give as good as you get. Tomorrow, when she starts to grease that fine thing, you go on over and help her out. Grease it for her.”

Will nearly choked.

Will was awake when Lissy came tiptoeing in the next morning. When she dropped her towel and reached for the scented skin cream, he turned on the bedroom lamp. “I was wondering when you’d get here. It’s time for my morning skin show.”

She whirled around and saw him just as he wanted to be seen—sitting up in their bed, his arms folded behind his head, his naked body fully exposed. He watched as her gaze traveled over him, felt the satisfaction of knowing she appreciated what she saw.

She lifted her chin, looked away, removed the lid from the jar of scented cream and scooped a creamy dollop with her fingers. She rubbed the cream between her palms, lifted a long leg to rest her foot on the bed and began to work her way from ankle to thigh.

“Now the other one,” Will said, already hard. “But stand at the foot of the bed—and spread your legs farther apart this time.”

Her green eyes flew wide, and a crimson blush crept up her skin from her breasts to her cheeks. But she did as he asked, moving to stand at the foot of the bed, her legs shoulder-width apart. Then she scooped more cream from the jar and lifted her other leg.

“I can see your clit—just the tip of it peeking out—and your rosy inner lips. Remember what it feels like when I suck them into my mouth? Hmm?”

He heard her breathing quicken, saw her hands falter. But she said nothing.

Then she reached for the skin cream again, rubbed it between her palms and slid her hands over her hips to her ass.

“Turn around. Yeah, like that.” He watched her hands slide slowly over her rounded, white ass cheeks and felt his erection thicken. “God, I love your ass, Lissy. I want to nip it. I want to squeeze it. I want to rub my hands over it while you’re bent over and I’m fucking you.”

Lissy heard the bed shift, felt his feet hit the floor, and spun to face him, certain now she’d made a terrible mistake. He was taking his revenge.

“Let me help with that, sugar.” His cock standing rigid against his abdomen, he strode over to her, then dragged his fingers through her scented cream.

A strong arm snaked around her waist, turned her away from him. Then his hands, hot and slick, began to move over her buttocks, cupping her, shaping her, making her shiver.

A rush of heat flared deep in her belly, leaving her wet and wanting. “This is cheating.”

“Don’t talk to me about cheating. You’ve been torturing me with this little display every morning. I’m just taking my due.” His hands left her body, returned with more cream. “I wonder—are you wet, Lissy?”

His slathered hands reached around, rubbed her inner thighs, then slid slowly upward, the tips of his fingers grazing her labia, parting her, flicking her already swollen clitoris. Her knees turned to water, and she sank back into him.

“Mmmm, you are wet. You want me.” Then he pressed himself against her, his cock a hard ridge against her back. “Just like I want you.”

He held her against him with one arm, scooped up more cream.

“I-I can do this myself.” It was a pathetic attempt, but it was the most she could do.

“You can, but I’m not going to let you. Not this time.” He rubbed his hands slowly over the curves and hollows of her hips and belly, moving slowly upward, inch by agonizing inch, until her nipples puckered in anticipation of his touch.

When he finally closed his hands over her, it was heaven, his fingers tugging and teasing her slippery, aching crests, sending sharp tremors of pleasure to her belly, making her inner muscles clench and her body shake with raw, flaming lust. Her breath broke, and she moaned his name. “Oh, God, Will!”

Without warning, he released her, and she heard a drawer slide open. She turned to find him digging through delicate, lacy lingerie as if it were tube socks.

“What—?”

“Perfect.” He held a black satin corset out to her, motioned for her to turn around.

She did as he demanded, raising her arms so he could tuck the satin and stays beneath her breasts, then gasping when he began to lace her with sharp tugs. Whether it was the corset or her level of arousal, she could scarcely breathe.

Next, he sat her on the edge of the bed, knelt between her parted thighs and rolled black silk stockings up her legs, fastening them in place with the garters. Then he sat back on his heels, caressed her naked inner thighs and raked her with his hungry gaze. “I bet you’re wet enough to take all of me in one thrust.”

Lissy’s answer was a frustrated moan. She felt the flesh between her thighs pulse, every nerve in her body aching to be fucked, words of surrender on her tongue. His cock was so close, just inches away, hard and thick. She bit her lower lip, felt her inner muscles contract as she imagined how it would feel to have him inside her—the sweet stretch, the slippery friction, the velvet-steel stroke. Oh, God, she wanted him, was more than ready to take him.

One more touch, just one more, and she’d give in.

He stood, pulled her to her feet and toward her closet, then jerked a periwinkle silk dress off its hanger. “Put this on.”

She bit back a disappointed groan, did as he asked, turning so he could zip her, her body thrumming with desire so intense it felt like torture.

He closed it with a jerk. “Have a good day at the paper. The coaches have some private time scheduled for the team today, so I’ll probably be home early.”

Then he kissed her on the cheek and walked off toward the shower looking like some kind of pagan god, bare-ass naked and still erect.

Lissy found it hard to concentrate at work. The rasp of lace against her thigh, the pinch of stays, the caress of silk against her bare bottom reminded her constantly of what Will had done this morning. Her body seemed to be in a state of constant arousal—hypersensitive, tense, burning. She’d been a single heartbeat from losing the bet. If he had pushed her any harder…

She was in trouble. How could she go home to him tonight when she was already wet and aching for him? How could she face him again when one touch was going to drive her over the edge? How could she possibly counter his latest strategy?

She needed help.

She cornered Holly at lunchtime and practically begged her to come over. “We’ll rent any DVD you want to watch, and I’ll buy your favorite ice cream. All you have to do is be there.”

Holly gave her a knowing smile. “He’s really gotten to you, hasn’t he?”

“Oh, God, you have no idea!”

“I wish I could help, Lissy, truly, I do. But it’s Friday night. I have a date. I hope to be getting laid myself.”

Of course. Holly always had a date. Why hadn’t Lissy thought of that?

Next she tried Sophie, but Sophie also had plans.

“I’m going to a movie with my brother—nothing exciting. Sorry, Lissy.”

Lissy found Tessa at her desk, poring over police reports and sipping a designer latté. She explained her situation and pleaded for Tessa’s help. “Please say you don’t have a date.”

“Me? Have a date? You must be joking. Sure, I’ll come over.”

Will was already home when they got there. Lissy parked next to his pickup, waited in the oppressive dry heat for Tessa to stow her car in visitor parking, then guided her through the Cone Zone, which seemed to have grown since this morning.

“What are they doing here? Prospecting for gold?” Tessa’s southern deb accent had a way of making everything she said sound charming.

“I think the flyers they posted said something about working on the gas main.”

Desperate to get out of the corset and stockings, Lissy hurried up the steps, unlocked the door and walked into refreshing coolness—and the delicious garlicky smell of Will’s lasagna.

“I’ve always said the person who invented air conditioning should get the Nobel prize,” Tessa said. “Mmm, what’s that I smell?”

“Will’s lasagna.” So that had been his plan. A little homemade lasagna, probably some red wine and maybe some Italian ice. She’d have been toast. She set her briefcase aside. “Make yourself at home in the living room. What can I get you to drink?”

“Southern sweet tea if you’ve got it. Yankee iced tea if you don’t.”

“How about Yankee tea with lots of sugar in it?”

“Sounds lovely.” Tessa wandered off to the living room.

Lissy went into the kitchen expecting to find Will slaving over the stove. Instead she found a sink full of dishes. Then she saw the purple orchids. They sat on the table in a crystal vase. Tucked among the glossy green leaves was a card that read only, “For my bride.”

She was admiring the delicate shading of the flower petals when she heard Will striding down the hallway.

“Hey, Lissy, have you seen my—?”

She stepped out of the kitchen to find him standing just inside the living room, stark naked, a towel in hand, looking utterly astonished.

Beyond him, Tessa sat on the couch, her face pink, her eyes wide, her gaze gliding down his body to rest on his groin. She cleared her throat delicately, lifted her chin. “Yes, I believe she has seen it. And now so have I.”

Will knew he had it coming.

Lissy was on him the moment he got back from walking Tessa to her car. She looked genuinely angry. “You did that on purpose!”

“How could I when I had no idea Tessa was coming over?”

She rolled her eyes at him, put a hand on her hip. “That’s not what I mean, and you know it! You came out here naked, not knowing she was here, hoping to turn me on.”

He gave her his most charming grin. “Did it work?”

She glared at him, but her cheeks turned pink. “No, it didn’t work! It’s not like I haven’t see it all before, you know.”

He pulled her against him, nuzzled her cheek. “Then why are you blushing?”

She pushed him away. “I’m not blushing! I’m furious! You’ve been doing this all week—trying to get me so turned on that I come begging. You even sabotaged my vibrator!”

He grabbed her wrist, pressed it against his lips. “And what about you, sugar, teasing me with T and A? You’ve slathered so much cream on that delicious ass of yours I’m surprised there isn’t an oil slick on your chair at work!”

Her head dropped and she sank against him. “Oh, Will, this isn’t how the bet was supposed to work. It was supposed to make things romantic, not pit us against one another.”

He didn’t say what he thought the bet was really about because she was already upset and because he didn’t want to think about her mother. “We could just absolve one another and end the stupid bet.”

She pulled back from him. “You think romance is stupid?”

“That’s not what I said!”

“Kind of sounded like it to me. Maybe it’s all just about sex for you.”

Now he was feeling angry. “You know that’s not true.”

“Good night, Will.” She brushed past him and disappeared into the bathroom.

He stared after her, wondering how she had managed to twist his words so thoroughly.

Women!

They made up over breakfast—sort of.

Will apologized for accidentally walking into the living room naked in front of Tessa when he didn’t have the slightest clue she was there and for wanting so much to make love to Lissy. Lissy said she was sorry for overreacting to his apparent lack of interest in romance, something that really any woman would find irritating. Then, pretending that everything was fine, they got to work.

Lissy packed things they wouldn’t need until after their honeymoon—wedding gifts, financial records, winter clothes, camping gear, Will’s football memorabilia—cranking En Vogue on the stereo and singing along to “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It).”

Will seemed not to notice her or her pointed choice of music, hoisting heavy boxes onto his shoulders, carrying them outside and through the Cone Zone to his pickup and driving them to the new house without a word. But the third time she played the same song, he put on his iPod.

He was ignoring her.

She set about ignoring him, too.

They worked without speaking through the afternoon, taking a quick break over chicken curry and Thai iced teas, then showering alone, each getting ready for the night ahead. Holly was coming at seven to take Lissy to a private suite at the Adam’s Mark for her bridal shower/bachelorette party, while Devon was sending a limo to pick up Will and convey him and his groomsmen to certain unnamed establishments on East Colfax.

It was only after Will had left, looking like pure sex in black jeans and a silky black T-shirt, that it hit her: She’d sent the man she loved off to spend the evening with sexy strippers angry and without so much as a kiss.

Lissy made it through the chocolate buffet, the gifts and at least ten glasses of champagne acting as if she were having the time of her life. She didn’t want to ruin the evening for anyone else. They’d all gone out of their way to make the night special for her, even arranging for a trio of male strippers, whose pelvic gyrations, bare butts and flexing muscles sent some of the women—Holly among them—into estrogen meltdown and resulted in more than a few phone numbers being tucked delicately into bulging thongs along with dollar bills.

It was only after most of the guests had gone that Lissy found herself unable to hide her feelings. No sooner had Tessa asked her what was wrong, than Lissy found herself in tears.

She told them everything: how Will had tried to seduce her, how she’d tried to seduce him back, how she’d found herself on the brink of giving in and had asked Tessa to come home with her, how Will had walked into the living room, naked, right in front of Tessa, how they’d gotten into a fight and had ignored each other all day.

“And n-now he’s watching b-beautiful women shake their h-hooters, and I didn’t even k-kiss him good-bye!” Lissy blew her nose, sniffed, grabbed another tissue from the box Kara had handed her.

For a moment no one said anything.

Then Holly spoke. “You saw him totally naked, Tess? Is he as hot as he seems?”

“Holly!” Kara gave a disgusted snort and began to pack Lissy’s gifts in bags. “Your one-track mind gets a little old sometimes.”

But Sophie and Holly were staring at Tessa, clearly waiting for an answer.

Sophie cleared her throat. “Well, Tess, is he?”

Tessa nodded. “Oh, my gentle Jesus! Yeah.”

Lissy had started to cry again when she felt Kara sit down beside her.

“You know what I think these tears are, Lissy?” Kara slipped a comforting arm around her shoulder. “Champagne, sexual frustration and pre-wedding jitters.”

“R-really?”

“Yeah. Now let’s get you home.”

“I love her so much. She’s smart, and she’s funny, and, God, she’s so damn sexy. And she smells good and tastes good. I could taste her all day, everywhere. I really could.” Will took another sip of Scotch. “And I love her—more than anything. I love just being with her—holding her hand, talking, watching TV or whatever. I could listen to her voice forever.”

The woman he was talking to gave him an indulgent smile. “It sounds like you’re really in love with her.”

He nodded. “I love her so much sometimes it scares me. If Lissy were to leave me…”

The woman laughed. “That’s not going to happen, honey. Take my word for it.”

It was then Will noticed the woman wasn’t wearing…much of anything. “Did you lose your shirt somewhere? Are you cold? Here, you can have mine.”

He started to pull his shirt over his head; then he heard Devon’s voice and felt strong arms yanking him to his feet. “Okay, man, time to go. On your feet. That’s the way.”

“Devon, there’s a naked woman over there. I think we should help her.”

“It’s your bachelor party, Will, and she’s a stripper.”

The woman’s voice came from behind them, a mix of laughter and cigarettes. “A stripper who’s apparently losing her touch. Good night, boys. And thanks.”

A stripper? His bachelor party. Loud music. An endless stream of strip bars and single malt. “I’m drunk off my ass, aren’t I?”

“Oh, yeah. Watch your step. Nick, catch the door.”

The floor wobbled. His stomach lurched. “Devon, I want to see Lissy.”

“I know.”

Lissy woke, her head pounding, her mouth full of sand. She heard someone moaning, realized it was she.

“Here, sugar.”

She forced her eyes open, saw Will sitting on the edge of their bed beside her in his boxers, a glass of water and what she hoped were aspirin in his hand, though arsenic would have been fine, too. She vaguely remembered getting into bed with him, both of them too drunk to do more than fall asleep. She sat up with a groan, took the tablets, popped them into her mouth, then drank.

The water felt like salvation. She drained every drop and fell back on her pillow, in agony. “How come you’re on your feet? You were in lots worse shape than I was.”

“Practice. Some rumors about football players are true.”

The next time she awoke, her face was pressed into Will’s chest, his arms wrapped around her. She might have enjoyed being close to him had the throbbing in her head not been so terrible. It was pounding so hard, she could hear it.

Pounding. Ringing. More pounding.

Someone was at the door.

Will groaned. “Christ!”

Because he’d brought her water, she forced herself out of bed and into her robe, then stumbled through the darkened condo toward the brain-piercing noise coming from the front door. She glanced through the peephole, felt her stomach hit the floor.

More impatient pounding.

Reluctantly, she slid back the bolt and opened the door. “Really, Melisande, did you have to keep me waiting?”

“Mother.”

“We should set her up in a hotel.” Will ran the comb through his wet hair, his temper only slightly worse than his hangover. “It’s not like she warned us she was coming.”

“But what if she really has accepted our marriage and just wants to get to know you?”

He heard the hope in Lissy’s voice, and anger with Christa Charteris swirled black in his gut. He knew she hadn’t changed her mind about the marriage and suspected she’d come to make trouble. But he wouldn’t be able to explain his hostility toward her without also letting Lissy know the woman had tried to bribe him, and he didn’t want to hurt Lissy.

“Then I guess she can stay in the guest room.” He set the comb aside, pulled Lissy into his arms and kissed her forehead. “If she hurts you or tries to interfere with the wedding, I’ll stuff her and her designer luggage into a cab bound for the airport. I mean that, Lissy.”

“Don’t worry, Will. I can handle my mother.”

Will worried, but then something occurred to him. If Mrs. Charteris slept in the guest room, Lissy would have no choice but to crawl back in bed with him.

Lissy shut the door behind her, the bedroom now a refuge. She undressed, put on the old T-shirt she’d been sleeping in and hung her clothes in the closet. Then she crawled into bed and tried to relax, listening to the rumble of approaching thunder.

A part of her wished she’d followed Will’s suggestion and banished her mother to a hotel. Her mother had been with them for four days, and Lissy’s patience was shredded. Though her mother hadn’t done anything unforgivably horrid and had even managed to be pleasant at times, she hadn’t been easy to have around.

The first thing she’d done was to insist upon meeting with the wedding planner. When Lissy had assured her everything was in good hands and declined even to give her the phone number, she’d acted insulted—as if being the mother of the bride meant something after six months of trying to get the bride to call off the wedding. Then she’d watched with a knowing look on her face while Lissy had changed the sheets on the bed in the guest room.

“Sleeping apart already, I see.”

“It’s not what you think, Mother. Will and I are simply abstaining from sex until after the wedding in order to make things a bit more traditional and romantic.”

Her mother hadn’t said a word, but the look on her face hadn’t changed.

After work on Monday, they’d taken her to their favorite seafood place, where they’d had a good enough time. Her mother had asked Will polite questions about his job at the paper and what it was like to do live television. Though she’d complained about her salmon and the service, she’d also complimented Will’s choice of wine. But when they’d taken her for a stroll down the 16th Street Mall, she’d turned up her nose at everything from the street performers to the store displays. By the time they’d gotten home, Lissy felt ready to scream.

On Tuesday, her mother had taken the liberty of arranging a lunch for herself and Lissy at an exclusive restaurant near the federal court building, ignoring Lissy’s desire to share her lunch break with Will as well. Then she’d proceeded to name every quality about Will she liked and every quality she didn’t like. He was well-mannered. He was intelligent. He was articulate. He was good-looking—too good-looking. He was arrogant. He had no family. He’d grown up grasping for money. He didn’t even know who his father was.

Lissy had cut her off by standing and dropping a twenty on the table. “You’re forgetting the thing you hate most about him, Mother. I love him.”

Then she’d walked out of the restaurant, fighting tears, leaving her mother to take a cab.

Today, Lissy had avoided her mother by pleading a busy day at work. It wasn’t entirely untrue. This was her last day at the paper before leaving for three weeks of vacation, and she’d needed to make certain the fall fashion special was organized and moving forward before she walked out the door: cover design, photo shoots, articles. She and Will had enjoyed their only real time alone together since Sunday over a couple of Chicago-style hot dogs they’d bought for lunch from a vendor on the street. Being with Will for those few minutes—just sitting beside him—had been heaven.

Will had worked late taping a special Broncos team camp wrap-up and still wasn’t home. She and her mother had spent an uncomfortable evening in front of the television. Lissy had tried to enjoy Will’s segment, while her mother had whined about every aspect of football and sports she found disgusting. When her complaining had interrupted Will, Lissy had snapped and asked her to be quiet or leave the room. Her mother had sulked off and gone to bed early, leaving Lissy with her anger and guilt.

Through the closed curtains came a flash of blue light, followed by a peal of thunder.

Only three days.

The thought bolstered her. Tomorrow, she and her bridesmaids were spending the day at a downtown spa. Friday afternoon was the rehearsal, followed by the rehearsal dinner. Saturday morning she would become Will’s wife, and they would leave for two weeks in France. Then all of this—the bet, Tessa seeing Will naked, her mother—would be far behind them.

Lissy closed her eyes and tried to sleep, listening as the bluster of wind and thunder turned at last to rain.

Will hurried through the downpour, up the steps of the darkened condo, unlocked the door and let himself in. He’d spent more time at the station than he’d intended and wasn’t surprised to find Lissy and her mother already in bed. At least he wouldn’t have to face his soon-to-be mother-in-law.

The woman spread poison every time she opened her mouth. She hated him—that much was clear. She rarely made eye contact with him, and when she did, her eyes were full of rage and bitterness. He knew she’d been young when she’d married Lissy’s father, and that she’d desired the bank account more than the man. He knew, too, that her husband had been unfaithful almost from the start and that she had answered in kind, avenging infidelity with infidelity until she was worn and hollow. He’d have felt sorry for her if her venom hadn’t been so harmful to Lissy and aimed at their marriage.

He set his briefcase aside and slipped out of his shoes, and then checked the mail before heading off to the bathroom to brush his teeth and get ready for bed. He found Lissy lying in the dark, still awake. He slipped into bed beside her, made room for her to snuggle up against his chest, pulled her close.

“What are you still doing awake, sugar?” He thought he knew.

For a moment she was quiet. “My mom and I got into a bit of a tiff.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” He could feel the tension in her body.

“No. I want you to kiss me.”

He traced the fullness of her lower lip with his thumb. “Well, okay, but when you kiss and make up, aren’t you supposed to kiss the person you argued with?”

She gaped at him for a moment, then burst into giggles, burying her face in his chest to mute the sound. “Oh, Will, you always make me laugh!”

“No, sugar. Sometimes I make you scream.” He ducked down, took her mouth with his.

He kept the kiss light, more about lips than tongues, comfort than lust. The bet was still in full force, and though going twelve days without sex had left him as randy as a frat boy, her mother’s presence had left no doubt in Will’s mind that there was more at stake for Lissy in this little wager of theirs than which one of them caved first. She was trying to prove something to herself about him, about their relationship. He didn’t want to let her down.

But the connection between them had always been a live wire, and without meaning to, he found himself kissing her hard, cupping the fullness of her breast in his hand, teasing her hardened nipple with his thumb.

He pulled back from her, brushed the hair from her face and chuckled when she whimpered her frustration. “I’m starting to remember what it’s like to be a teenager and stuck at second base—tits but no tail.”

She laughed, smoothed her hands over his chest, her thumb catching one of his nipples. Then her face grew serious. “I don’t know why you’re putting up with her, Will.”

So they were to back to her mother again.

He pressed his lips to her cheek. “I put up with her because I’m madly in love with her daughter.”

Her body relaxed in his arms. “Her daughter’s madly in love with you, too.”

Soon, she was asleep.

“Surely you have some kind of mineral water that doesn’t come in cheap, plastic bottles. And I’d like lemon—fresh, sliced lemon.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but that’s the only brand of bottled water we carry.”

“That is simply unacceptable.”

Lissy tried to ignore her mother’s complaining, willing the tension to leave her shoulders as the aesthetician wrapped her hair in a towel and prepared to give her a facial. Beside her Holly, Tessa, Sophie and Kara lay on treatment tables, dressed in thick, white terry robes, their hair also wrapped in towels. Soft music drifted over the sound system like clouds, but it was no mask for the barbed wire of her mother’s voice.

This was spa day. It was supposed to be fun. It was supposed to be relaxing. But her mother was ruining it for all of them with her constant criticism, her mood a chilling frost. Nothing was good enough: not the music, not the size of the dressing rooms, not the décor. Now the bottled water was below her standards, as well.

Lissy had felt obligated to bring her mother along and had been naïve enough to think this sort of pampering would make her mother happy. But it seemed nothing made her mother happy.

“When I pay for a full day at the spa, I expect to be treated like a princess!”

“You’re not paying for it, Mother.” Lissy tried to sound calm, as if her mother’s whining weren’t plucking on her last nerve. “I’m paying for it, and I like this bottled water just fine.”

“Then you’re wasting your money, Melisande.”

An uncomfortable stillness fell over the room.

Tessa spoke in her most sophisticated Savannah drawl. “You know, the last time I visited this establishment, I found the Venetian mud bath to be most enjoyable.”

“I heard they have the mud flown in straight from Venetia,” chirped Holly.

“You mean Venice,” Sophie corrected.

“Oh. Yeah.”

“I quite enjoyed the Venetian mud bath, as well,” Kara said, the tone of her voice strangely snobbish. “It was a gift from my husband, the senator, after Caitlyn was born.”

“Your husband is a senator?”

“Why, yes, Mrs. Charteris. Didn’t Lissy tell you? He’ll likely be our next governor.”

The spa offered mud baths, but not Venetian mud baths. And Kara’s husband, Reece, had sworn he’d never run for governor. Lissy had no idea what they were talking about. Had they all gone wacko?

And then it hit her. She decided to play along.

“It’s too bad the Venetian mud baths are available only to Platinum Spa Members. I only have a Gold membership.”

“Oh, really, Lissy? What a shame!”

Lissy nearly laughed out loud at the feigned dismay in Tessa’s voice.

As if on cue, her mother spoke. “Well, given the sloppiness of their service so far, I feel entitled to an upgrade in my services.”

“Would you like a Venetian mud bath, ma’am? I believe I can arrange it with management.”

Lissy opened her eyes to find the staff person her mother had yelled at standing by the door, a wide, beaming smile on her face.

Her mother nodded, the white towel on her head bobbing slightly. “Yes, I would.”

“If you would await me in the lounge, ma’am, I’ll prepare the facilities.”

“I think the rest of you should insist on the same.” Her mother stepped down off her treatment table and into her courtesy flip-flops, then walked out the door.

The smiling staff member looked apologetically toward Lissy. “I’m sorry she’s unhappy with our services.”

But it was Lissy who felt sorry. “I don’t think she’s happy with much of anything.”

Then Tessa spoke, her eyes closed, her face covered in white goop. “There’s a hundred-dollar bill in it for you if you keep her occupied for the rest of the day. Right, girls?”

Lissy, unable to help herself, burst into laughter.

Will turned onto their street and jerked the truck to a stop. “Give me a break!”

The Cone Zone had expanded while he’d been at work, reducing their street to a single, cramped lane. What in the hell was the city trying to do? If they weren’t done by the time he and Lissy got back from France, getting a moving van through was going to be a bitch.

He steered carefully into the parking lot, grabbed his briefcase and picked his way through orange cones toward the front steps. He’d ended up working late again, trying to tie up loose ends so that both the paper and Channel Four would be set while he was in France with Lissy. The sports department had given him a send-off that had included putting up streamers made of hundreds of linked condom packages around his desk. Bunch of lunkheads.

He slipped his key in the lock, heard shouting coming from inside. Quietly, he opened the door and stepped into the hallway.

“You don’t know him! He’s nothing like my father!” Lissy’s voice was trembling.

Protective rage flared in Will’s gut, hot and immediate. He put down his briefcase, headed straight for the kitchen.

“They’re all like your father, Melisande! You might as well plan for it now, because sooner or later he will cheat on you!”

“I’m sorry you think so, Mrs. Charteris.” Will fought to control his temper.

Both women gasped, and he saw the blood drain from the older woman’s face. Tears stained Lissy’s cheeks, her grief fueling his fury.

He walked slowly toward her mother. “I’m sorry you married the wrong man for the wrong reasons. I’m sorry he hurt you by sleeping around. I’m sorry you cheapened yourself by doing the same. I’m sorry for whatever it was that made you such a heartless, miserable human being. But I’m done tolerating your poison in our home. Pack your things, and get out!”

Lissy’s mother gaped at him. Then her face turned to stone, her voice to ice. “At least have the decency to call me a cab.”

Will met her frigid gaze with steel. “My pleasure.”

Lissy watched through the guest room window as the cab wound its way between orange cones and disappeared around the corner. Tears she didn’t want to cry ran warm down her cheeks, her mind a riot of conflicting emotion. She heard the soft tread of feet on carpet and felt Will’s hands against her shoulders.

“I’m sorry, sugar. I know that couldn’t have been easy for you.”

“Or for you.” She wiped her tears away. “I really feel sorry for her, Will.”

“She’s to blame for her own situation. No one forced her to marry your father or to stay with him. She made those choices herself.”

I’m sorry for whatever it was that made you such a heartless, miserable human being. But I’m done tolerating your poison in our home. Pack your things, and get out!

She heard Will’s voice in her mind, saw the anger and hurt on her mother’s face. “I wish you hadn’t been so hard on her.”

“Hard on her?” Will stepped back, ran a hand through his hair, shook his head. “God, Lissy! How many men would tolerate half as much as I did? I think I went pretty easy on her, considering what I heard her say. I don’t care if she doesn’t like me, but I won’t have her standing in our kitchen, upsetting you and accusing me of fucking around on the wife I haven’t married yet! I’m not that kind of man!”

She heard the rage in his voice, beneath it the hurt. “I know that, Will. You don’t have to tell me that.”

“I think maybe I do. That’s what all this is about. Be honest, Lissy. You didn’t decide to stop having sex until after the wedding for the sake of romance. You did it because some part of you doubts us—doubts me!”

Lissy felt the heat of anger rush to her face. “That’s not true! But isn’t it interesting that going two weeks without sex is such an issue for you that we end up fighting about it?”

“That’s not why we’re arguing, and you damned well know it! Don’t try to turn this around.” His gaze went cold, and she could tell he was truly angry with her now. “It’s not the bet that bothers me—it’s your lack of faith.”

His words felt like a slap in the face, perhaps because some part of her knew she deserved them. But she was too overwhelmed, her emotions too raw, to think it through just now. “I defended you! I stood by you when you told her to leave. Why would I do that if I didn’t trust you?”

Then, a sob caught in her throat, she ran to their bedroom and shut the door behind her.

Keys jingled, and Lissy’s heart sank as she heard Will walk out the front door and lock it behind him.

Lissy woke to find she’d slept in their bed alone. She sat bolt upright, suddenly alarmed. She’d sat up waiting for him until after midnight and then had gone to bed furious. But what if something had happened to him?

Then she heard the rasp of the coffee grinder.

Will was home, but he had chosen not to sleep beside her.

The realization left her feeling almost sick. She fought the urge to dash into the kitchen to confront him or to beg for his forgiveness, instead slipping into a hot shower. When she entered the kitchen a half hour later, she found him reading the papers.

He looked up from the page, dark circles beneath his eyes. “Morning.”

She stood there, looking at him, wanting so much to tell him she was sorry, wanting to shout at him for leaving her alone all night. “Morning.”

They didn’t talk about it at breakfast. They didn’t talk about it in the car on the way to lunch with the wedding planner. They didn’t talk about it while they waited for everyone to show up for the wedding rehearsal. And although the rehearsal went as smoothly as Lissy could possibly have hoped—her mother attended and didn’t complain once—Lissy knew all was not as it should be.

Will was sweet and attentive, standing with his arm around her shoulders, rubbing his thumb over the bare skin of her arm, kissing her on the cheek now and again, but there was a remoteness to his affection that made the lingering pain of their argument even harder to bear. Still, it was the evening before her wedding, and Lissy was determined at least to seem as if she were having the time of her life. So she kept a smile on her face, laughed at people’s jokes, chatted cheerily with friends and guests.

Rather than a formal rehearsal dinner in a restaurant, Lissy and Will had opted to have a catered buffet in the park near their condo. They’d wanted their friends to be able to bring their kids and to dress comfortably, strictly weekend casual, though Lissy had opted for a sleeveless dress of black linen and sandals. They’d all get their fill of being dressed up and formal at the wedding and reception tomorrow.

A big white tent had been set up to shelter the food and tables in case a late-afternoon thunderstorm rolled in over the mountains, as so often happened during the summer. But the sky was clear, and as their guests finished eating, they spread through the park to enjoy themselves, just as Lissy had hoped they would.

Kara’s husband, Reece, was playing soccer with their son, Connor, while Kara bounced Caitlyn, their eleven-month-old baby, on her lap and talked with Lissy’s mother about the trials of being a senator’s wife. The groomsmen and ushers were trying their luck with a Frisbee and discovering why they preferred football. Tessa and Sophie were lost in a discussion about some investigation they were working on. Devon and Holly were…all over each other.

Lissy looked up at Will, expecting to share a laugh with him, only to find herself looking at his back as he walked away. He was still angry with her. They were about to be married, and they weren’t even speaking.

A bleakness Lissy had never known crept into her belly. Tears pricked behind her eyes. She stood, suddenly needing to think, needing be alone. Knowing her mother would see beyond whatever lie she concocted, she threaded her way among the tables toward Tessa and Sophie.

“I’ve got a really nasty headache,” she told them. “I’m going home for a while.”

Then, before they could ask too many questions, she hurried out of the park toward the condo, tears spilling down her cheeks.

Will tossed the ball gently to Connor, saw a smile of surprise cross the boy’s face when he caught it. “That’s the way. Hug it tight, and run for the end zone.”

The child ran as fast as he could on six-year-old legs toward the two trees that marked the end zone, through a gauntlet of former football players who couldn’t seem to catch him.

“Whoa! Touchdown!” Devon shouted. “High five, little man! Now spike the ball!”

Will stepped out of the game and strode toward the keg, pretending to want another beer when what he really wanted was to be alone with Lissy. He’d spent all day trying to ward off his growing sense of guilt, trying not to notice the shadows in Lissy’s eyes or the way she kept looking to him for some kind of reassurance.

But there was no way around it. He’d been an ass. He’d known Lissy was upset, but still he’d forced the issue, trying to make his point.

That’s what all this is about. Be honest, Lissy. You didn’t decide to stop having sex until after the wedding for the sake of romance. You did it because some part of you doubts us—doubts me!

She’d reacted as if he’d hit her.

I defended you! I stood by you when you told her to leave. Why would I do that if I didn’t trust you?

And she had. She’d stood up to her mother for him, and she’d stood beside him when he’d kicked her mother out. She’d shown him respect, something she’d surely never seen her parents give one another, something her parents had only rarely shown her.

A voice in his mind started offering excuses. He’d only told her the truth, after all. How could he be blamed for that?

Because you hurt her, you fricking idiot!

He’d been so angry with her mother, every inch of him burning with frustration after four days of putting up with insults and innuendo. And he’d taken it out on Lissy, first by ramming his point of view down her throat, then by leaving her alone most of the night while he’d sulked and watched ESPN at a damned sports bar.

He felt a surge of regret, looked about the park for her. He needed to talk to her. He needed to apologize. Tomorrow was their wedding day. It was time to set things right.

The sun was squatting fat and orange atop the purple silhouette of the mountains, stretching long shadows across the grass. But he didn’t see Lissy anywhere.

He walked up to Kara, ignoring Lissy’s mother. “Have you seen Lissy?”

“I think she went home,” Mrs. Charteris answered.

Kara adjusted the sleeping baby in her lap. “She told Tessa she had a headache.”

“Thanks.”

He could see city utility trucks parked at the edges of the Cone Zone, their yellow work lights flashing. They were working late. He was halfway down the block when he smelled it—just the faintest whiff.

Gas.

It happened as if in slow motion. A deafening blast. A rush of heat. An eruption of orange flame. Their condo exploded, spewing fire and knocking Will to the ground.

He stared for a moment in utter shock, then leapt to his feet.

“Lissy!” His heart beat like a sledgehammer in his chest. “No!”

Then he was running toward the blaze, oblivious to the heat, to the pain in his knee, to the cries of friends in the park behind him. He had to get to Lissy.

Lissy slipped the key into the lock and opened the heavy oak door. She’d been halfway back to the condo when she’d found her feet carrying her instead down the bike path to their new house. She needed to feel the future, to feel hope, to feel the life she was about to enter surrounding her.

She stepped inside, smelled the mingled scents of floor polish, new paint and moving boxes. She walked slowly through the rooms.

Here was the living room with its gleaming wood floor where they would put up their Christmas tree. They’d talked about how it would sit in front of the big bay window, where everyone could see it and feel its cheer. Here was the dining room, where they’d teach their kids to hold their forks properly and not to talk with their mouths full. Here was the kitchen, the pantry, the laundry room.

She climbed the wide staircase, her hand trailing over the polished wooden banister Will had so painstakingly restored, then walked around boxes toward the three smaller bedrooms. One day children would sleep here. Boys? Girls? She’d be happy with either. Or both.

She wandered from room to room, until she found herself standing in the master bedroom. It faced the front of the house, a wide window opening onto the branches of the cottonwood tree outside. Dappled light filtered through the leaves onto the wood floor around her feet, bringing with it a sense of contentment.

She turned, faced the empty space where their bed would go, imagined the nights—and mornings and afternoons—they would spend together there. It was there their children would be conceived. They’d already made love on the floor in that spot just to break it in—or to sanctify it, as Will liked to say. As if just by having sex they could make things pure, clean, holy.

That’s certainly how it felt. Sex with him was like nothing she’d ever known before. She supposed it was because she loved him—with everything she had, she loved him.

Would it be enough?

The very walls around her seemed to wait for the answer to that question.

Her mother and father had never loved each other, not really. They’d turned marriage into misery, not only for them but for Lissy, too. How many nights had she fallen asleep to the sound of her mother’s crying and her father’s shouting?

That wasn’t the kind of marriage Lissy wanted.

Be honest, Lissy. You didn’t decide to stop having sex until after the wedding for the sake of romance. You did it because some part of you doubts us—doubts me!

The sharp edge of regret pressed in on her.

Will was right. The bet had nothing to do with romance. It was about fear. Fear that somehow she wouldn’t be enough to keep Will for a lifetime. Fear that his love would wear away with time. Fear that she’d find herself bitter and old and alone.

I’m not that kind of man!

She heard the desperation in his voice, saw the plea in his eyes, and the weight of her regret doubled. She owed him an apology—for not trusting him, for not being willing to face the truth inside herself, for putting them both through two weeks of unmitigated horniness. She’d just turned toward the stairs, eager to return to the park, when she heard it: an explosion.

She whirled toward the window, glimpsed smoke and the orange glow of fire.

The fire was a few blocks west. Near their condo.

She ran for the stairs.

Will stood by the fire engine, his gaze on the burning condo, an anguished cry stuck in his throat where it had died along with the rest of him the moment he’d realized he wasn’t going to be able to reach her.

Lissy, oh, God, Lissy!

The fire had been hot, too damned hot. Though his mind and heart had been willing, his body had not. The heat had driven him back, even as he’d told his feet to move forward. The city utility crew had done the rest, tackling him, then dragging him off to a safe distance until the fire crews arrived.

“You crazy son of a bitch! Tryin’ to get yourself killed?”

“My fiancée is in there!” he’d shouted at them.

“Not anymore, she ain’t.”

Will might have beaten the man’s face in if his words hadn’t driven the air from Will’s lungs, sapping him of everything but grief and regret.

He wasn’t sure why he was still standing, how he managed to say “thank you” when a fireman handed him a plastic cup of water, why he didn’t simply collapse on the ground. He’d felt this bleak only once before—on the day his mother had died. No, that had been different. He’d had months to prepare himself, months to know in his mind, if not in his heart, that the woman who’d sacrificed everything out of love for him was dying.

Nothing could have prepared him to lose Lissy.

Lissy ran down the creek path, the sound of sirens echoing off the houses and apartment buildings around her. She could see her friends gathered at the edge of park, watching the fire. She knew before she reached them that the condo was gone.

“Lissy!” She heard Holly shout, saw a sea of tear-streaked faces turn her way.

Then she was surrounded, being hugged by one person after the next, until her mother pulled her close and wouldn’t let go.

“I thought…I thought you…” Her mother wept softly against her shoulder, bringing tears to Lissy’s eyes. “Oh, God, Lissy!”

They’d thought she’d gone to the condo, Lissy realized. They’d thought she’d been caught in the fire. They’d thought—

It slammed into her with the force of a fist.

“Where’s Will?”

“Oh, no! No, no!” Her mother stepped back, pressed her hands to her face. “He went looking for you, Lissy. We all thought you’d gone home and…”

“I-I went to the house. I…” Lissy looked toward the condo, saw flames rolling against the sky, saw the winking lights of fire trucks and police cars. “Will?”

The ground seemed to roll beneath her feet. She felt strong arms encircle her waist, heard Reece’s voice in her ear. “Easy, Lissy. Come sit down.”

“He can’t be dead.” She said it as Reece led her to a chair. She said it when Devon put his hand on her shoulder. She said it when Holly sat down beside her and took her hand.

Then she saw a potbellied cop making his way toward them. “Are you the folks who reported the man and woman missing in the fire?”

Reece stepped forward, gestured toward Lissy. “We found the woman, officer, but her fiancé is still missing. We’re afraid he was in the building.”

The cop nodded, his expression grave, and reached for the radio clipped to his shoulder.

Lissy only half-listened as the officer spoke to dispatch, her mind colliding against the terrible possibility that Will had been badly burned or perhaps even killed going after her. If only she had stayed. If only she had spoken with him earlier. If only…

The cop was speaking to her. “They’d gotten a report of a gas leak before the explosion and had evacuated the building. While it’s possible he got past someone, the city people are telling me the building was empty when it blew.”

Hope.

Lissy stood, her pulse racing. She was about to ask the officer if he would please, please look for Will, when a call came over his radio.

“Did you say female? Over.”

“Roger that,” the cop answered.

A tinny voice crackled over the speaker. “We’ve got a male here, approximate age thirty, named William Fraser, who says his fiancée was inside. Any chance of a match? Over.”

The cop looked to Lissy for an answer, but relief had left her unable to speak. No matter. Her friends were already cheering. “Roger, we’ve got a match.”

Lissy would have taken off running at that moment, had the cop not stopped her.

“They’re bringing him around the block in a squad car. Stay put, ma’am.” Then he grinned. “I just love a goddamned happy ending.”

Tears of joy streaming down her face, Lissy hurried to the edge of the park, watched and waited. And then she saw it: a black-and-white squad car, lights flashing, slowly rounding the corner. The car hadn’t yet stopped when the passenger door flew open and Will leapt out.

She ran.

And then his arms were around her, lifting her off her feet, his lips kissing her hair, her cheeks, her lips, as she held him close, sobbing out her fear and happiness against his chest.

Will couldn’t let go of her. She was the most precious thing he’d ever held, and he just couldn’t let go. “My God, Lissy, I was sure I’d lost you!”

“Th-they told me you went in after me. I thought…Oh, God, Will, I’m so sorry! It’s my fault! It’s my fault!”

“No, sugar, I’m sorry. I should have—” But he didn’t get the chance to say more because the small crowd of their friends engulfed them.

Devon drew them both to his chest in an awkward bear hug. “Next time you scare the shit out of us like that I’m going to kick both your asses.”

Will endured as many handshakes, weepy kisses on the cheek and hugs as he could stand. Then Lissy’s mother appeared before him, her eyes red and swollen from crying.

“You went after my daughter, Will Fraser. I saw you run toward the fire. There aren’t many men who would do that.” She laid her hand on his shoulder, her chin wobbling just like Lissy’s did when she was on the brink of tears. “I just want you to know…how much that means to me.”

Then she turned and walked away.

Will looked down at Lissy, saw the utter surprise on her face, and wanted desperately to be alone with her. He thanked everyone and told them as politely as he could that he and Lissy were leaving. Now.

“Let me just get my purse.” Lissy hurried toward the tent.

Will grabbed Devon by the arm. “I want you to go back to the tux rental place and switch the cummerbunds.”

Devon lifted his mirrored shades, his brown eyes filled with amusement. “Let me guess—pink.”

“Mauve. It’s what my lady wants.”

“You got it, man.”

Will managed to persuade the cop to drive them to their house. It took only a minute, Will sitting in the back with Lissy, holding her tightly, lost in the miracle of being beside her. They thanked the officer, and Will handed him a ten, which he refused.

“Hey, how often do I get to carry a bride and a groom in my unit?”

They found the door unlocked and left ajar.

“I guess I was in a hurry.”

No sooner had he shut and locked the door behind them than they were on each other, kissing, their hands tearing at clothing, searching for soft skin. He yanked the straps of her dress down over her arms and ripped off her bra, hungrily cupping her breasts, while she tugged at his zipper and slipped her hand inside his boxers to stroke his erection.

She arched her soft breasts deeper into his hands. “Now, Will! Oh, God, now!”

He shoved her back against the door, pushed her dress up above her hips and lifted her off her feet. She wrapped her legs around his waist, kissed him as if she’d been starving for him and ground her hips against him.

He reached down, moved the irritating cloth of her panties aside, and guided his cock into her. “Jesus Christ, Lissy!”

She was already wet, and she closed around him like a fist. He thrust into her with a desperation he’d never felt before. Two weeks of wanting her. Two weeks of needing her. Long, hellish minutes of thinking her gone.

Already he was careening toward the edge, his balls drawing tight, his groin heavy and hot. He reached between them, sought between her slick folds for her perky little clitoris and stroked it. In a heartbeat, her breathing was ragged, her cries frantic. Her nails dug almost painfully into his shoulders, and her legs clamped around him like a vise.

Faster, harder. She felt so damned good. Slick. Tight. Pure heaven.

He felt her back arch, as the tension inside her peaked and shattered. Her breath caught, she cried his name. “Will!”

He pounded into her with his cock, overcome by the fierceness of his need for her, lost in the hot rush of orgasm.

For a moment, they stayed as they were, Will holding her up against the door, his cock still pulsing inside her, her body still contracting around him, wet and warm like molten honey. Then taking her full weight in his arms, he turned them so his back was against the door and sank to the floor so that Lissy straddled his lap.

Lissy couldn’t help the tears that filled her eyes. To be here like this with him when she’d thought him hurt or worse…

“I love you, Will Fraser. I’m so sorry I ever made you feel I don’t trust—”

He pressed his fingers against her lips. “Shhh! It’s okay. You don’t have to explain, Lissy. I shouldn’t have pushed you so hard.”

For a while, neither of them said anything, their mingled breathing, the feel of skin against skin, the joining of their bodies more than enough.

It was Will who broke the silence. “When my mother died, I felt so completely alone. The one person I’d known all my life was gone. But today, when I saw the condo blow and thought you were in the middle of it…Christ, Lissy, it nearly killed me! I never want to—”

“—feel that way again. I know.” She’d felt the same blinding horror.

Lissy lifted her head from his chest, brushed her lips against his, slipped her tongue between his lips to taste him. Then she pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it aside.

The corners of his mouth turned up in a sexy smile, and he returned the favor by removing her dress, his hands returning to palm her breasts. Then he frowned.

“I guess I lost the bet. I’m the one who started this.”

“I’m the one who asked for it.” She lifted her hips, let him slide her panties down her thighs, then giggled as they awkwardly pulled them first off one leg and then the other. “I’m the one who should pay the price.”

“We could just forget the bet.” He tossed her panties aside, lifted his ass off the floor to slide his jeans down his legs, and threw them over with the rest of their clothing.

She straddled him again, ran her fingers through his hair, then pressed his mouth against a hot and aching nipple. “It was a stupid idea anyway.”

He licked her, tugged her puckered bud with his lips, sucked. Heat speared through her, made her shiver.

“Do you realize that everything we own except for what’s in this house is burned to a cinder?” For some reason, the thought made her laugh.

His fingers searched between her thighs, slipped inside her. “The only thing that matters to me is in my arms.”

Lissy descended the stairs toward the lobby of the Tabor Mansion, Holly and Tessa in front of her, Kara and Sophie behind her, fussing with her train. From inside the main ballroom came the sweet strains of Bach’s Air on a G String, played by a string quartet. When it ended, she would enter the room, and the quartet would begin to play Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring. And then she would become Will’s wife.

Her mother waited for her at the foot of the stairs dressed in beaded lavender silk, her eyes puffy. Her gaze traveled over Lissy’s gown, her finely penciled brows lifting slightly. “You look lovely, Melisande. Truly lovely—a beautiful bride.”

“Thanks, Mother.” Lissy shifted her bouquet of lily of the valley to one hand and gave her mother a hug.

“I just wanted to say I might have been wrong about Will. I hope with all my heart I was.” Her chin quivered, and Lissy knew she was on the brink of tears. “I’m sorry I haven’t been a better mother to you. Maybe I’ll be a decent grandmother.”

Then, without giving Lissy a chance to respond, her mother motioned to the usher, took his arm and entered the ballroom with the bearing of a queen.

Lissy stood there for a moment, too stunned to speak.

“Don’t you even think about crying, Lissy!” Holly smoothed her gown. “They haven’t invented a mascara yet that’s foolproof against tears.”

Lissy smiled, looked into her friends’ eyes. “Thank you so much for everything.”

“You look truly beautiful.” Sophie looked like she might cry.

“Sophie, don’t!” Tessa plucked at the strap of the Badgley Mischka. “What made you change your mind about the gown?”

Lissy took a deep breath, tried to put it into words. “When I thought I’d lost Will, a lot of things went through my mind. I realized that nothing really matters but having him with me. If it makes him happy to see me in this gown, then I’ll wear it. It’s such an easy way to please him. This is his wedding, too, you know.”

Kara smiled at her. The only married woman in the group, she understood—Lissy could see it in her eyes. “He’s going to flip.”

The song was drawing to its close. The bridesmaids got into line.

Holly hazarded a peek through the door, her face lighting up with a smile. “Oh, wait till you see, Lissy!”

The music ended, and for a moment there was silence, punctuated by a cough and the sound of a baby’s babble.

“Sorry!” Kara whispered. “Caitlyn’s a chatterbox today.”

But Lissy didn’t even hear, her mind on Will.

The lilting sound of a violin floated through the air, the beauty of the music making Lissy’s throat tight. Ahead of her Kara walked through the door with graceful steps. Sophie went next, turning to share one last smile with Lissy.

Then Tessa turned and stared at Lissy as if seeing her for the first time. “Good God almighty, Lissy, you’re getting married!”

Lissy smiled, and the tightness in her throat became a lump. “I guess I am.”

Tessa turned and walked down the aisle.

“Oh, hell! I think I’m going to be the one to lose it!” Holly dabbed at the corners of her eyes with her fingertips, then turned and started after Tessa.

Clutching her bouquet to keep her hands from trembling, Lissy counted to ten, drawing deep, steadying breaths, and then stepped into the doorway.

There at the end of the aisle stood Will dressed in charcoal gray Armani—and a mauve cummerbund.

She stared at him in amazement, the sweetness of his gesture making her heart constrict, leaving her only vaguely aware that the crowd had stood and was waiting for her. She smiled at him, took one slow step after the next and felt his astonishment when he realized what she was wearing. His gaze slid over her like a ray of golden sunshine.

Then his gaze met hers, and his lips moved silently. “I love you.”

And in that moment, any lingering doubts Lissy might have had melted away, leaving nothing but hope and joy and love.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Pamela Clare began her writing career as an investigative reporter and columnist, working her way up the newsroom ladder to become the first woman editor of two different newspapers. Along the way, she and her team won numberous state and national journalism awards, including the 2000 National Journalism Award for Public Service. A single mother with two teenage sons, she lives in Colorado at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. Visit her website at www.pamelaclare.com.