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  Or great sex.

  Matt kissed like he did everything else—intense, completely focused—and it felt a lot like a cup of coffee. Strong. Dark. Bracing.

  And scorching hot.

  Two

  Three months later

  It was so hot Carrie felt like she might suffocate as she slowly awoke.

  She sucked in a deep breath of stifling air and shifted on the lumpy bed. She was vaguely conscious of the fact that she was naked, lying face down on a well-worn sheet. The top sheet was draped loosely over her legs, and her hair stuck damply to the back of her neck.

  Something hot and heavy pressed down across her back.

  Carrie shifted under its weight, but it didn’t move. Sweating and flushed, she groggily determined that the weight across her back was making her even hotter. She moaned uncomfortably and shifted again.

  “What’s the matter?” The male voice was low and slurred slightly from sleep.

  “Hot.”

  “Me too.”

  She squirmed again, trying to dislodge the thing draped across her bare back. Her damp skin clung to it resiliently.

  “Are you having convulsions over there?” Matt’s voice was dry now and fully alert. He’d obviously woken up.

  “Move your arm. It’s too hot for touching.”

  To her relief, he adjusted the arm he’d unconsciously slung across her as they slept. Before she could roll to a cooler spot on the bed, however, he’d moved over and above her. She felt his lips on the bare skin at the back of her shoulder.

  “It’s too hot,” she whimpered, as he skimmed his lips delicately along her shoulder blade. Then she sucked in a sharp breath when she felt his teeth graze the ridges of her spine. But it was sweltering in the stuffy room, distracting her from what otherwise would have been enjoyable. “God!” she burst out. “Why is it so hot?”

  “Because this fine establishment you chose still has the heat running, even though it’s over seventy outside.

  Carrie groaned, both from discomfort and from a ripple of pleasure at the way he was trailing kisses down her back. “It’s ridiculous,” she grumbled, arching up to raise her head and try to catch her breath. “We can’t even open a window in this dump. It’s like hell.”

  “That’s what happens when you pay only thirty-seven dollars for a room.”

  His mouth had reached the small of her back now. Every spot he kissed was deliciously cool for a moment—until the moisture from his mouth dried. Then her skin blazed with heat once again.

  “I would have chosen a different hotel,” he added. “One with adequate temperature controls.”

  “Don’t be snotty. You’re the eccentric artist who doesn’t show his face in public anymore.”

  “I can manage to find a decent hotel room without announcing my presence to the whole city.”

  Carrie sniffed, having no response to his comment. She hadn’t gotten this room to preserve his privacy, after all.

  “You know what’s hot?” he asked, the timbre of his voice altering as he slid his lips even farther down her back.

  She grunted her inquiry, torn between oppressive heat and building desire, spurred on by the husky note in his voice.

  “This curve here,” Matt murmured, grazing his fingertips along the dip just where her back met her ass. “It’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.” He followed his light caress with a line of kisses.

  Carrie shivered in response. “You’ve clearly been isolated too long, if that sort of thing turns you on.

  He chuckled deliciously as he squeezed the soft flesh of her bottom, pushing the sheet off her all the way.

  “Don’t be getting any ideas,” she added. “It’s too hot for any more sex.” Despite her words, she was squirming now with something other than discomfort.

  “Such a condition doesn’t exist.” He massaged her shoulders and back with a sensuous touch that made her moan.

  Her cheeks blazing, she mumbled, “I think I’m going to melt.”

  “No objections here.”

  Matt raised her hips with strong, experienced hands and then explored between her legs. She was wet and ready for him, and she gasped with pleasure as two fingers penetrated her.

  He stroked her with his fingers for a minute, until Carrie was shaking with desire and frustration. “Damn it, Matt,” she rasped. “It’s not enough. I want you.”

  “No objections here.” His voice was thicker now than it had been when he’d said those same words just a moment before. Even though she hadn’t turned her head to look at him, she knew he was aroused. Just as aroused as she was.

  He straddled her thighs and teased her entrance with the tip of his erection. Carrie’s cheek was pressed down against the mattress, and her eyes squeezed shut as the sensations flooded her body with new waves of heat.

  “Damn it, Matt,” she gritted out. Then she said his name again on a taken breath as he finally entered her.

  He pushed into her slowly, and her body both clung and resisted the intrusion. When he’d buried himself inside her, he held himself perfectly still, his body braced on straightened arms and his hands splayed against the mattress on either side of her.

  Carrie could hear his quickened breathing, feel his hot presence, a simmering energy barely reined in. As always, it spoke to her, compelled her, ignited an answering fire inside her.

  She lay still, indulging the erotic tension of the moment, the two of them joined in the most intimate of ways, poised on the edge between desire and action.

  Then she released her breath in a low moan as he started to move—not in long thrusts but in a rhythmic rocking, pushing his hips forward against her bottom.

  She was limited by her position on her stomach, but she matched his motion as best she could, fisting her hands in the sheet and trying to breathe through her rising heat and pleasure.

  The room was quiet except for their loud, choppy breathing and the shameless squeaking of the bed.

  When an orgasm coiled tight at her center, Carrie whimpered, her body shuddering uncontrollably. “Faster, Matt. Harder. I need it harder.”

  “Yeah.” His voice was breathless, and he adjusted his position behind her. “Yeah.”

  He intensified his motion, and the resulting sensations pushed Carrie over the edge. Her body tightened around him as she rode out the orgasm, and she heard a rough exclamation from Matt in response.

  Before she’d fully come down, he pulled out, still hard, and turned her over onto her back. For the first time since she’d awakened, she looked up at him.

  His skin was flushed, and he was perspiring just as much as she was. He kept his hair cropped close but didn’t shave every day, so he had about the same amount of hair on his head as on his jaw. His expression was deliciously tense, and his blue eyes were hot and hungry as they raked over her red face, messy hair, and naked body.

  To hide the strange flash of possessiveness awakened by the sight of him, Carrie scowled. “Hey! I barely had time to enjoy coming.”

  He arched one eyebrow. “You only have yourself to blame. If you weren’t quite so hot and tight, I wouldn’t risk losing it every time you come.” His voice was dry, but his words left her blazing with pleasure just the same.

  “Nothing’s wrong with losing it. And I don’t like when you yank yourself out. I like having you inside me when I come.”

  An almost predatory smile appeared on his face. “Then we’ll have to try it again.”

  Matt pulled her thighs apart and then positioned himself at her entrance again, this time settling securely between her legs. She arched her spine as he pushed into her once more. Her channel was tighter now from her climax, and the sensations were intense.

  She wrapped her legs around his middle, trying to get them higher so he’d sink into her more deeply. In response, he bucked his hips against hers a few time, his face twisting.

  “Good?” she asked, trying for a teasing smile.

  “You have no idea.”

  His thick,
erotic words silenced them as they both focused on their motion—tense, increasingly urgent, almost primitive.

  Carrie clawed lines down his back and pumped her hips as another orgasm developed inside her. She gasped as sweat collected at the edges of her hair and between her breasts.

  Her gasps changed to urgent whimpers as their rhythm intensified even more. The cheap mattress was squeaking loudly.

  It was so hard to believe. Carrie Morgan—always a good girl—screwing Matthew Lynch like an animal in a cheap motel.

  The knowledge that this person was her, her, finally pushed her into another climax.

  “Oh fuck,” Matt bit out, his lips going white with tension as he froze above her. Then his hips jerked clumsily as he came.

  He collapsed on her afterwards, his weight pressing her into the mattress until she finally squirmed beneath him. “Too hot.”

  He rolled off her with only a mild grumble. They lay side by side then, staring at each other and occasionally wiping some of the sweat off their skin.

  “God, that was good,” Carrie said, when she had breath enough to form a sentence.

  “Definitely.” His voice sounded cool and composed, but she checked his face. He looked just as worn out as she was from their exertions. His skin appeared tightly stretched over his well-chiseled features, and his face was soaking wet.

  “Why is it so hot in December?” she wailed, forcing herself past a faintly tender pull at the sight of his sated eyes and relaxed body.

  “Heat wave. Some sort of tropical front. It’s moving up the east coast, from—”

  “Oh, shut up.”

  Matt’s lips quirked at her grumpy tone, but he didn’t continue his discourse on the unseasonable December weather.

  She shouldn’t enjoy his company so much. She shouldn’t like him. She certainly shouldn’t trust him with her body—or anything else.

  There was no future with him. He’d told her the first night they met that a real relationship was impossible for him, and nothing about that had changed.

  Being with him wasn’t anything like being with Henry. It didn’t feel safe and familiar, even after three months. She had no delusions about a future with Matt. She never would have had sex with him at all if there had been any possibility of a future.

  “Next time, I’ll pick the hotel,” he said, his eyes resting on her with a gaze that was almost soft.

  “No, I told you before. When you’re involved in a sleazy affair, then you pick a motel that’s appropriate for the occasion.”

  He cocked an eyebrow, obviously amused. “Is that what we’re doing? Having a sleazy affair?”

  “Of course.”

  “Neither one of us is married. I’m not sure ‘affair’ is the correct term.”

  “Of course it is. You don’t have to be married to have an affair. It just needs to be secret.” No one knew that Carrie was regularly screwing Matthew Lynch, and she intended to keep it that way.

  “I see.” He looked eminently unconvinced. And still amused. And definitely superior.

  “Don’t be an ass.” When he opened his mouth to respond, she spoke over him. “You know exactly what ass-like behavior I’m referring to.”

  Since that first night, they’d gotten together at least once a week for sex, although recently they’d been getting together more often.

  Matt was her hot secret. Her shameless indulgence. Everyone thought she was quiet and withdrawn—keeping to herself, working in her coffee shop, never taking risks. No one would dream she’d have a casual affair with a gorgeous, notorious, wounded artist.

  She knew she’d have to let him go eventually—you didn’t have sex indefinitely with a man you could never be in a real relationship with. She assumed eventually she’d be ready for a real relationship. But not yet.

  “What is it?” Matt asked. His vivid eyes were knowing and astute. Sometimes she wondered how far inside her soul they could see.

  “Nothing.”

  “Feeling guilty about your sleazy affair?” he asked with light irony.

  His question was perceptive—just shy of the truth—and it left her feeling a little uneasy. To hide her response, she raised her eyebrows. “I thought you said ‘affair’ wasn’t the appropriate word.”

  He chuckled and reached over to skim his fingers along her back again, lingering on the spot he’d admired before—the deep curve and dip just above her bottom.

  She watched him in silence. He was looking at her body with an expression that was both amused and strangely hungry. His coloring had evened out, although he was still wet with perspiration. Her eyes dipped from his face to his chest, and she couldn’t help but notice the lines of faint scars there. There were a lot of them. And more on his arms. Plus the two deep ones on the side of his head.

  He’d barely survived that car accident two years ago.

  Matt’s body wasn’t perfect—wasn’t flawless and invulnerable. His muscle development was lean, masculine, and efficient, but he wasn’t a body-builder. And he was scarred. Scarred so deeply. Scarred in so many ways.

  “Why don’t you have any tattoos?” she asked, trying to drag herself away from the soft feelings her reflections had prompted.

  “Why would I have tattoos?”

  “I don’t know. You seem like the kind of guy who would have tattoos. You’ve got that hard edge, you know.”

  He chuckled. “When an activity is so common that college kids do it when they’re drunk, I think it’s time to admit that the activity has lost its edge.”

  She burst into giggles when the words processed. Sometime in the last three months, she’d learned how to laugh again—although she couldn’t really pinpoint when it had happened.

  “You’re not that much older than college kids, you know. You shouldn’t sound so superior.”

  “If you say so.”

  Still smiling, she reached over to stroke his chest, her hand gliding over the smoothly rippling muscles and scattering of coarse hair.

  “Do you want me to get a tattoo?” he asked, a different note in his voice.

  “No.” Her fingers lingered on a jagged scar that slashed through the curve of his ribcage.

  “I guess my body is marked enough.”

  She sucked in a sharp breath. “Don’t say that. I like your body as it is.”

  When she realized what she’d said, she blushed a little—although there wasn’t any good reason for feeling self-conscious.

  Her eyes darted up, and she saw Matt was almost smiling. “You know what I mean,” she added.

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  Her fingers kept playing along the scar, and she felt that same unfamiliar tenderness overwhelming her.

  He cleared his throat. “Don’t.”

  Carrie frowned, startled from her reverie and a little embarrassed by it. “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t feel sorry for me.”

  “I wasn’t doing any such thing.” She wanted to trace the line of the scar that ran from his right shoulder toward his nipple with her fingers or her mouth, but she resisted the silly impulse. “You’re far too smug to pity.”

  “Good.”

  “Do you—” She broke off the question, confused by the sudden impulse to ask it.

  “Do I what?”

  “Do you think it’s…unhealthy. What we’re doing, I mean. We both should be trying to heal emotionally, and maybe having sex like this is really just a…”

  His brows drew together. “A crutch?”

  “Yeah. Do you think it is?”

  “Does it feel like a crutch to you?”

  “I don’t know.” She sighed and couldn’t quite meet his eyes. She had no idea why she was blurting all of this out, but it had been on her mind more and more lately. “I’m just sometimes afraid we’re with each other like this because it’s never going to go anywhere, because we’re both too scared to get close to anyone. And it’s keeping us from moving on, finding someone for real.”

  Something felt strange about the wa
y he was watching her, but she still couldn’t look him in the eye. “Do you want to be with someone else? Someone you feel like you could have a future with?”

  “No,” she admitted. “I don’t want to be with anyone but you.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “I don’t know.” She felt better at his matter-of-fact question. “I guess there isn’t a problem.”

  “Okay, good. Now tell me this. Do you want to be with me just because you think I have a hard edge?”

  The question surprised her, as did the almost diffident look in his eyes when she glanced up to check his expression. The truth was she’d gotten together with him at the beginning only because of that edge—because he was new, dangerous, exciting, completely different from Henry, completely different from anything her life had ever been before.

  It wasn’t why she was with him now, though, and the realization was so terrifying she immediately pushed it out of her conscious mind.

  To force the conversation back into their normal pattern, she stroked his chest again and said in a lilting voice, “Oh, no. I like you for your other hard...qualities.”

  Her hand slid farther down, over his flat belly, and lower toward his groin. Her eyes widened as she saw he was partly erect again. “Damn, Matt, you’re insatiable. Have you always been this horny?”

  “Honestly, no,” he admitted.

  She was vaguely comforted by the fact that he hadn’t been this way with every woman he’d ever been with. All she said was, “Hmm. Maybe cheap motel rooms turn you on.”

  He stifled a burst of laughter. “That must be it.”

  Feeling rather soft at the sound of his laughter, Carrie smiled and reached out to take his shaft in her hand. It was still only partly erect, and she rubbed the length of it with her thumb. His flesh twitched in her grasp, but he didn’t harden any further.

  She stared down at her small hand, wrapped around him in such an intimate way. A feeling swelled up inside her chest, and she recognized it as pride and possessiveness.

  Entirely inappropriate feelings. And they disturbed her to such an extent that she released him. With a groan, she rolled over and saw that it was after six in the morning. “I better get up. I’ll have to get going soon.”