Cinderella's Christmas Affair by Katherine Garbera Page A

was so soft and so fragile, he thought. Sleeping next to him her guard was down and her vulnerability was apparent. Rolling onto his side, he pulled her toward him, wrapping his body completely around her.
    He wanted to wake her up and vow to be her protector. To make a noble speech the way knights of a more chivalrous age had. But he wasn’t a chivalrous knight. He was a twenty-first century man who had vulnerabilities he didn’t want the world to see.
    Marrying her seemed more dangerous now than it had before. The first time he’d proposed it had been straightforward. He liked her, he wanted to sleep with her, she was someone his parents would adore. But these new protective urges she was inspiring puzzled him.
    She moaned a little in her sleep, shifting in his arms. Her buttocks rubbing against his hardening shaft. He swept his hands over her body, and she mumbled in her sleep again, undulating against him.
    “Wake up, sleeping beauty,” he said, nuzzling the vulnerable curve of her neck.
    “Tad?” she asked.
    “Who else would it be?”
    “No one else,” she said. She rolled over to face him. Her hands came up to cup his jaw. Her fingers stroking over his beard stubbled cheeks.
    She was pliable right now, still more asleep than awake. Leaning down he kissed her. She twisted against him, bringing her thigh up over his hip. He thrust against her center. Not entering her just letting them both feel each other.
    He rocked them both back and forth, bodies moving together until they climaxed. It wasn’t a huge world-rocking orgasm like the one they’d shared in the night, this one was more suited to the soft morning. He tucked her closer to him.
    “This can’t be real,” she said.
    “It can be.”
    She groaned, opening her eyes. “Please don’t bring up marriage now.”
    “Why not?”
    She tried to push away from him but he refused to let her budge. “Tad.”
    “I’m not letting go until you talk to me. I know there’s more to your hesitation than the flimsy reasons you’ve given me.”
    “How do you know that?”
    He shrugged. He wasn’t sure of the right words to use. The ones that came to mind felt crass and too harsh for the woman in his arms.
    “Why is this so important to you?” she asked turning the tables.
    He didn’t want to talk about himself. But she stared at him with those deep brown eyes of hers. “Uh…it’s complicated.”
    “My point exactly.”
    “I’m not like you—afraid of marriage. It’s just that…I’m going to sound like a sap when I say this.”
    “I won’t think you’re a sap,” she said, leaning up to kiss him.
    At least she wasn’t trying to leave the bed. He took a deep breath. “Have you been home lately?”
    “Not in four years. Marnie lives in St. Louis and my mom’s buried in Orlando so there’s no reason to go to Auburndale. Why?”
    “My mom’s been having some heart problems, she spent three weeks in the hospital last summer.”
    “I’m sorry to hear that. What does she have to do with your wanting to marry me?”
    “My parents are tired of waiting for grandkids and are always bugging me to settle down. Until my mom went into the hospital I didn’t take it seriously. I felt like I had all the time in the world, but I don’t. My folks are older and this would make them happy.”
    She leaned up on her elbow. “What about your happiness?”
    He grabbed her and pulled her down on his chest. “I’m happy with you.”
    “Really?”
    “Really. You’re so open, honest and fun-loving.”
    “You sound like a personals ad.”
    A niggling thought at the back of his head warned him that things weren’t going as smoothly as he thought they would. He knew he should tell her more—maybe let her glimpse that dream he had in his head of her as his wife and two little kids playing at their feet. But instead of being quiet he said, “You’re just what I want in a wife.”
    She pushed out of his arms and stood next to the bed. “But I’m not any of