Her Enemy Protector by Cindy Dees Page A

frown. Questions raged in his eyes, but he dared not voice them aloud for fear of the bugs that he rightly guessed peppered this room.
    “Come to the bathroom with me,” she announced. He stared at her in surprise. “I need help with my zipper. It’s stuck and we’ll be able to see it better in there.”
    “Uh, okay,” he mumbled.
    She turned the water on full blast in both of the sinks as soon as he closed the door behind them. She swallowed her pride and stepped close to him. She leaned forward reluctantly and confessed in a whisper, “I’m afraid of my bed. I haven’t slept in it since…” Her voice cracked.
    “Ahh.” Enlightenment dawned in his eyes. And that looked like relief, too. “So it’s not me you’re afraid of?”
    She blinked, startled. “Of course not!”
    He exhaled hard. “Thank God. I was trying to figure out what I’d done to freak you out so bad.”
    Her cheeks heated up. “You’re fine. It’s just the idea of lying where all that blood was…”
    He drew her into a hug. “Aww, baby, I understand. You don’t have to explain. You’re authorized to freak out over that.”
    She collapsed in relief against his shoulder. “I feel like such a wimp.”
    “That kind of a shock has broken strong men. You’re no wimp, Cari.”
    She smiled against the warmth of his silk shirt. “You don’t hate me?” she asked in a small voice.
    His chest rumbled with a chuckle. “Of course not.”
    “So maybe you’d kiss me again?”
    He went rigid beneath her. Cleared his throat. “You think that’s a good idea?” he asked dubiously.
    She buried her face in his neck rather than look up at him as she muttered, “I happen to think it’s a great idea. But if you don’t want to, I get the picture. I won’t bug you again…”
    A finger hooked under her chin, nudging her face up. “I happen to think it’s an outstanding idea, too.”
    His smile positively incinerated her. And then his mouth swooped down, capturing hers with just enough aggression to make it crystal clear exactly how good an idea he thought it was. Somewhere in the background, she heard the water go off and the bathroom door open, but she didn’t care.
    His lips were warm and smooth, rubbing across hers with finesse. Enough of the gentleman, already! She didn’t want finesse—she wanted the inferno from the nightclub.
    She clenched her fists in the fine silk of his shirt and tugged him closer. “I want a real kiss, dammit!”
    He laughed, deep in his throat. And complied. Oh, God, did he comply. His whole body wrapped around her, bending her backward beneath him, the heavy thickness of him pressing against her belly, his arms impossibly strong as they supported her. This was no refined gentleman, dipping his tongue in and out of her mouth in the rhythm of wet, hot sex. This was an alpha male, powerful and in control.
    Oh, how she liked that. She got so sick of college boys kissing her like they were scared to death her father was going to burst in at any second and break them in half. And then there were the types that styled themselves great lovers and got so caught up in being suave they forgot to enjoy it. And, of course, she couldn’t forget the selfish jerks who treated her as if she was little more than a life-size plastic doll.
    Joe’s hands stabbed into her hair, pulling her head back, opening her to him as he leaned down, kissing and licking and sucking his way down the column of her neck.
    “You taste so good,” he rasped. “I can’t get enough of you.”
    She tugged on his hair, pulling his mouth back up to hers. “So do you,” she mumbled against his mouth. “You taste like coffee with cream and a shot of whiskey.”
    “Baby, you taste like great sex,” he growled back.
    One of his hands slid up her naked thigh to her hip, pushing her flimsy skirt aside and tracing the route of her thong downward toward her throbbing center. Her thighs went soft and she moaned as she took a step, spreading her feet