by Noelle Adams
“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 way 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.”
***
Holiday Heat is part of the Christmas collection, Love for the Holidays. You can find out more information here.
About the Author
Noelle handwrote her first romance novel in a spiral-bound notebook when she was twelve, and she hasn’t stopped writing since. She has lived in eight different states and currently resides in Virginia, where she teaches English, reads any book she can get her hands on, and offers tribute to a very spoiled cocker spaniel.
She loves travel, art, history, and ice cream. After spending far too many years of her life in graduate school, she has decided to reorient her priorities and focus on writing contemporary romances. For more information, please check out her website: noelle-adams.com. She also writes under the penname Claire Kent
Other Books by Noelle Adams
One Hot Night: Three Contemporary Romance Novellas – Hearts can change in just one night…
A Negotiated Marriage – Sex wasn’t supposed to be part of the deal…
Listed – A marriage of convenience has never been like this.
Bittersweet – Love is as strong as death.
Missing – Sex would never be enough…
Revival – There wasn’t enough left of his heart…
Seducing the Enemy – She’ll never let him win…
Other Books Written as Claire Kent
Escorted – She hired him to take her virginity, but now she wants even more.
Breaking – He knows what to do with her body, but he doesn’t always know how to love.
Nameless – They named it anything but love.
Christening – Love can be harder than she thought…
Bundles
Love for the Holidays – My novella, Holiday Heat, is included in this collection of five Christmas romances.
Hearts in Hiding – 60% off the price of A Negotiated Marriage, Escorted, and Missing when you buy them as a collection.
