Merry and Bright

by Jill Shalvis

  She stared at him for signs of deception and saw nothing but open honesty in his gaze. “I don’t know what to say to you. I think I should go home now.” She turned off the lights.

  Her office settled into darkness, but it wasn’t complete. From the windows came the glow of the seasonal lights, twinkling merrily, casting shadows across the desk and floor.

  Matt put his hands on her. She didn’t protest as he drew her in. The soft night fell over them—hypnotic, lulling, sweetly silent—and when he touched his mouth to hers, she settled into the soft, gentle kiss.

  “Night,” he whispered, and stepping back, he slipped his hands into his pockets, leaving her wanting more, damn him.

  The man was smart, she’d give him that, knowing when to push and when not to. If he’d kissed her senseless and then asked her to go home with him, would she have gone?

  Of course not.

  Oh, crap. She’d have gone in a heartbeat, and not because he kissed like heaven, but because he’d seen her at her compulsively organizing worst and hadn’t gone running. Grabbing her purse, she made the mistake of turning back to him.

  There was passion and heat swimming in his eyes, and something more—affection.

  Oh, God, but that got her. How often did a man look at her like that? Never. How often did she feel this way, sort of quivery and . . . desperately horny?

  Double never.

  Maybe . . . maybe she needed a New Year’s resolution—live life to its fullest, even if that means occasionally deviating off the known path. She could mark the deviating on her calendar for, say, once a month.

  Starting now. She dropped her purse on her desk. “Matt?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you carry condoms?”

  He blinked. “What?”

  “I assume a man like you carries.” She put her hands on his shoulders. “I’ve never made the first move before—”

  “Cami—”

  “Not because I’m a prude or anything, but because there’s never been anyone I wanted badly enough to risk the rejection.”

  His eyes went dark, so very dark, as his hands came up to her waist. “I want to be clear, very clear,” he said. “This is you coming onto me, right?”

  “Yes.” She swallowed hard. “It’s a New Year’s resolution sort of thing, a week early. Be kind, okay?”

  “Cami, I plan on being everything you ever wanted.” He lifted her against him and set her on the desk.

  “Here?” she asked breathlessly, her heart in her throat, her body on high alert, beginning with her nipples and ending with a dampness between her thighs.

  “Oh, yeah, here.” His big, warm hands settled on her thighs, pushing them open, and before she could decide how she felt about that, he stepped between them.

  “Wait,” she gasped.

  He went still. “Really?”

  Do it. Do him. “It’s okay. It’s a good kind of wait.” Twisting around, she swept an arm across her meticulously neat desk, knocking everything to the floor in one fell swoop—her phone, her desk pad, her notes.

  “Nicely done,” he said approvingly.

  She stared at the mess on the floor, chewing on her lower lip. The urge to pick it all back up nearly overpowered her.

  Matt’s mouth was solemn, but his eyes full of humor. “You want to take a moment and clean it up?”

  That he’d read her mind so easily was a little disconcerting. “No, I’m . . . good.”

  He tipped up her chin, away from the mess. “Sure?”

  “I want to be in the moment, damn it! Just once!”

  “In the moment is just where I want you.” His other hand slid down her spine to her bottom, tugging her closer.

  Pressed up flush against him, she could feel every inch of him. He was hard, and it made her heart beat faster, heavier.

  “Yeah, right here,” he said softly, his mouth only a fraction of an inch from hers. “Just tell me if you need to stop to obsess about anything.”

  “No, I’m fine.” Sort of. Pretty much. Oh, my God, he was big.

  His smile was slow and warm and sexy. “Yeah, you’re fine.” And this time when he kissed her, she sank her fingers into his hair and kissed him back, thrilling to his firm, quietly demanding mouth, which stirred instincts long suppressed. Living life to the fullest. In the moment. God, in the moment tasted good. But there were too many barriers between them—his clothes, hers . . . Impatient, she pulled his shirt from his waistband, sliding her hands beneath to touch his heated skin, stroking up his smooth, sleek back, loving the feel of his muscles, bunched and tight. Letting out a little sigh of pleasure, she shifted to touch his flat abs, feeling him tremble. For her.

  He knew her now, or he was starting to. He knew the real her, and he was still here, still wanting her. She could feel that wanting in his kiss, in the way he touched her, and the knowledge was so incredibly empowering and arousing, she gave herself up to it. To him.

  She wasn’t alone, not tonight, and marveling over that, too, she touched his mouth, feeling him smile beneath her fingers, his tense jaw, the muscles bunched beneath the wall of his chest. “I’m still fine,” she marveled, giving him a breathless update.

  He smiled and nibbled his way to her ear. She shivered, which he soothed away with his hands as he lifted her tank top. Looking into her eyes, he peeled the material over her head. Oh, God. Her inner fat girl surfaced for a brief flash.

  He danced his hands from waist to ribs, palming her breasts. “Okay?” he murmured, his thumbs rasping over her nipples.

  “O-okay,” she managed. Don’t think about him seeing your body, don’t think about it, just enjoy.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he said, banishing her inner fat girl for another day.

  Somehow she stripped off his shirt as well, looking at him in the low light. The man had a body like a pagan god, and she wanted to touch it.

  Before she could, he dipped his head, forging a path of hot, open-mouth kisses down her shoulder as he unhooked her bra, baring her breasts.

  The heat within her spread. Fat girl stayed banished.

  “Still okay?” he wanted to know as he bent to a breast. Licked. Sucked. Bit.

  She panted for breath. “Yes.”

  “Good.” His hands curled around the hem of her skirt, skimming it up her thighs. Then his fingers hooked into her panties.

  She stared into his hungry eyes. “Um . . .”

  “Tell me you’re still hanging in,” he said, his voice not so light now.

  “Y-yes. Hanging in.”

  “Good. Now hold on.” He stepped back, tugged, and her panties vanished. Cold air danced over her legs, but then he was back between her thighs. With his usual bluntness, he looked down at her sprawled out for him like some sort of feast, letting out a hungry sound she felt all the way to her womb.

  Torn between the erotic sexual haze he’d trapped her in and a vulnerable embarrassment, she squeezed her eyes shut. Not as experienced as she’d have liked, she didn’t know the protocol here, or what to do with her hands. He’d told her to hold on, so she gripped the edge of the desk for all she was worth, struggling to remain calm. Should she say something? Tell him she didn’t often climax with a man because it was hard for her to give up her control? Or should she just smile sexily and fake it?

  Or do what she was already doing, which was panting for air because she could hardly breathe.

  He took the decision out of her hands when he sank to his knees and stroked his fingers over her.

  Her body jerked in surprise, in pleasure.

  “Shh,” he murmured, and with another rough sound of hunger, leaned in and tasted her.

  Reality had no chance then, no chance at all. At the first stroke of his tongue, she became incapable of smiling sexily, or even of blushing, incapable of doing anything except holding onto that desk and gasping for air between little whimpers of pleasure. Oh, God, this felt good, this felt amazing. She could actually—She was going to—“Matt!”

 
“I know. It’s okay. Come for me, Cami.”

  When she did come—exploded—with a shocked, breathless cry, he murmured his approval and did it again.

  Did her again.

  “Oh, my God,” she panted when she could speak. She was flat on her back, blinking at the bright stars dancing in her vision. “I think I’ve walked into the light.”

  His face appeared above her as he braced a hand on either side of her head. He wore a grin, albeit a tense one. “Those are the Christmas lights outside the window.”

  “Oh.” She smiled sheepishly. “That was . . . holy cow. You have no idea.”

  “Been a while?”

  “You have no idea. There’s more, right?”

  “Oh, yeah, there’s more.” He unzipped his pants, put on a condom from his wallet, a task most pleasurable to watch, Cami thought dimly, her brain not quite connected, her body still pulsing.

  “Still with me?” he asked.

  “So with you.”

  “Good.” Draping her thighs over his forearms, Matt gripped her hips and slid home, filling her to bursting, a feeling intensified by the low, serrated sound of desire that ripped from deep in his throat.

  She could feel her toes curl as he breathed her name in a husky, destroyed voice. “Cami.”

  She couldn’t respond, because within a few strokes she was clutching at him, panting, whimpering. Dying. Between the delicious friction and the expression of need on his face alone, she flew high, trembling, quivering, suspended on the very edge, until with a rough, guttural groan, he shattered. He was still in its throes when she took the leap with him.

  Again.

  6

  Cami told herself that she was fine, that she’d escaped from the experience in her office with Matt relatively unscathed. She told herself that all the way home, and all the way through her hot shower, and all the way through the next three hours in her bed, until her alarm went off at six A.M.

  Just a torrid affair, like she’d always wondered about.

  The after part had been a little rough, she could admit now—the coming-home-alone part. Matt had wanted her to go to his place, but she’d been unable to fathom repeating the whole mind-blowing experience and then walking away.

  Once had been hard enough.

  When her snooze alarm went off again, she got up and dressed. Christmas Eve. Most people wouldn’t be going into work, but she was going to. Dedication at its finest, she supposed.

  And a telling way to hold at bay the memories from last night. Or the loneliness she knew would hit her any minute now. The Christmas loneliness. She could try to forget, she could try to pretend it didn’t exist, but it always came.

  She entered her office and stopped short at the sight of her desk. The scene of her indiscretion, so to speak. Her momentary lapse in good judgment. Last night, she’d straightened it all up, she’d had to, but she didn’t need to see all her things on the floor to remember what Matt had done to her there.

  Pulling out her chair, she sat down and tried not to look at the blotter, which now contained an imprint of her butt. She dug into work, feeling very mature for doing so, but by mid-afternoon, she gave up. She had to get out, or lose her mind, so she headed downtown, where she wandered the long row of art galleries and unique gift shops to find her last-minute family Christmas gifts. Determined to be chipper and in the spirit, she hit them all.

  And found nothing for her picky parents or impossible-to-buy-for brother and sister.

  All around her, the trees and streets were lit with seasonal lights. Each storefront had been decorated, and Christmas music and delicious scents surrounded her. So did people. Everywhere. Couples, families, friends . . . everyone talking and laughing and having a ball, all in the holiday spirit.

  No one seemed to be alone.

  Except her.

  She ended up back at her car, arms empty. Damn it. Determined, she sat there waiting for the defroster to work, wracking her brain. Finally it came to her. Ski-lift tickets. Her parents would love the excuse to dust off their skis, and her siblings would think the present original and cool. Cami let out her first smile of the day, because she just might have hit upon the perfect gift and the perfect way to impress her impossible-to-impress family on Christmas morning.

  Congratulating herself, she drove the seven miles out of town to Eagle Ski Resort. There she purchased the tickets, and had just put them in her purse when someone said in her ear, “Well, look at that. You tore yourself from work.”

  The last time she’d heard that voice, he’d been standing between her sprawled thighs whispering wicked-sexy-nothings to her. Turning, she faced one Matt Tarino, dressed in black board pants and jacket, wearing a Santa hat and aviator reflector sunglasses, and holding his snowboard. He should have looked ridiculous. Instead, he looked fun-loving and carefree, not to mention incredibly sure of himself, and sexy as hell for it. Belatedly, she remembered his brother owned this place, so of course he’d be here. Or, maybe not so belatedly. Maybe she’d known—hoped—to see him. Disconcerting thought. As she stood there staring at him, wondering at the odd ping in her belly—and between her thighs—two women skied by and sprayed Matt with powder from their skis, laughing uproariously, flirting with their smiles and eyes.

  Cami dusted herself off, surreptiously watching Matt as he waved back, turning down their offer to join them. Instead, he moved closer to Cami and brushed some powdery snow from her cheek. “So. What brings you here?”

  Now that they’d had raw, wild, animal sex on her desk, he made her feel even more off balance than usual, and she was painfully hyperaware of his every move. Even her nipples were hard. It was ridiculous, and to counteract the phenomenon, she stopped looking at him. “I came by to purchase some lift tickets for my family for their Christmas gifts.”

  “Nice gifts.”

  Let’s hope they think so.

  “Enjoying your Christmas Eve?”

  “Sure.” Less than she would a cruise to the Bahamas, but more than, say, a root canal.

  Matt shoved up his sunglasses to the front of his Santa hat. “You’re looking pretty uptight for someone who’s enjoying herself. Come join me for a few runs before the slopes close.”

  She looked down at her long maroon skirt and sweater. “I couldn’t.”

  “What’s your preference, skis or board?”

  “Skis, but I’d planned on going back to the office to finish going through those computers—”

  “I’ll help you after.”

  “But I don’t—”

  He tugged her close. She stared resolutely at his chest.

  “Was last night so awful, you can’t even look me in the eyes?” he asked quietly.

  Surprised, she lifted her head. “No. No,” she said again into his rueful and, damn it, hurt gaze. “It was . . . well, you know what it was. It was incredible.”

  His eyes smoldered. “So let me show you another good time. On the slopes.”

  She looked at him for a long moment, because she knew herself. She was falling, and falling for a man—especially him, the one man to make her feel things, the one man to get inside her and care about her—was dangerous. It gave him all the power he needed to hurt her. Scary, scary stuff.

  On the other hand, it was only a few runs on a ski hill, something that was shockingly tempting . . . “Maybe for a little while.”

  With a smile that melted her resolve and very nearly her precious control, he led her inside the small lodge. “My brother runs the show here,” he said, waving at yet another group of women who called his name from across the large room. “I just help out when I can. We’ll get you all set up.”

  The next thing she knew, he had her in borrowed gear and on skis from the demo shop. And then out on the slopes.

  Having a ball.

  Truthfully, much of her fun came from just watching Matt. The man was sheer poetry in motion, all clean lines and easy aggression, with a wild abandon that aroused her just looking at him. Who’d have thought such a
sharp-witted, politically driven man could move like that?

  After last night, she should have known.

  She wondered what he thought of last night, but they didn’t talk about it. They just took the slopes with an easy camaraderie and laughter and . . . fun, and by the time the lifts closed two hours later, she felt chilled to the bone but exhilarated. For a few hours, she’d been like the people she’d seen in town, not alone . . . happy.

  “Thanks,” she said when she’d turned her equipment back in and he’d put his board in his locker. “I really needed that.”

  Standing in the lodge, he stroked a strand of hair off her face and smiled. “You’re cold. I have a cure for that, too.”

  “I think you’ve cured me enough.”

  “Come on, Cami. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  That he would offer to warm her up, maybe in his bed, and she might be just weak enough to let him. And then she might not want to ever leave.

  “Do you trust me?” he asked.

  She stared into his eyes. She’d seen them stormy and furious; she’d seen them soft and heated. They were somewhere in between now, filled with an honesty and affection that took her breath. Did she trust him? She knew she didn’t want to. “I wouldn’t follow you off a cliff, but at work . . . maybe I trust you there.”

  He laughed. “A start, I suppose. What about personally? Do you trust me outside of work?”

  Back to that jumping-off-a-cliff thing. “That’s more complicated.”

  “Ah.” He nodded agreeably, then shook his head. “Why, exactly?”

  “Well . . . you like women.”