"I don't know that I am," Ren said, grimacing. As much as a vacation sounded like an appealing idea, there was the issue of Cilla to consider. Finding her sharing the pillows had been a surprise, and a bigger shock came when he realized she'd gone from the coltish adolescent he remembered to a lovely, blue-eyed blonde with a tight body and an adorable tendency to blush.
It scared the hell out of him.
No, scratch that. His reaction to the succulent small package that was Cilla Maddox was what alarmed him. And the intensity of that alarm was only further alarming.
Shit.
She was too sweet for a man like him. Too good for what he'd wanted to do to her, with her, the minute he'd put his eyes on her. But her bare legs and the touch of her pink tongue to her lush upper lip had made him ache like a raw nerve. As much as he found her worry about seemliness amusing, she had a point.
Two single people, one a man, one a woman, sharing close quarters...
Too bad it sounded so damn tempting.
A crackling noise came over the line from Payne's end. Likely the sound of him breaking into a package of his favorite breakfast of strawberry Pop-Tarts with sprinkles. "You came all this way just to take off again?" his brother asked around a mouthful of unhealthiness.
"Cilla's here."
"Yeah?" Payne munched again. "Cami ran into her at a club where she was playing a couple months back. She's into costume design or something."
"Mmm." Ren swung around to glance at the cottage and his gaze instantly found the woman in question. She'd wandered out of the cottage too, and stood in a shaft of sunshine. It caught all the gold in her cap of wavy, bouncy hair. A pair of cropped jeans hugged her curvy hips. The outside seam on each side of light denim was embroidered in a dark blue pattern that was repeated on the straps of the sleeveless, peasant-y top she wore. The hippie-chic style suited her. A dozen narrow bracelets circled one wrist and he remembered that each of her fingernails had been painted a different color.
The Byrds T-shirt had looked damn good on her too, the logo of five swirly letters in red and yellow on black cotton draping her high breasts.
"She had a boyfriend with her," Payne added.
Ren went instantly alert. "What?" Maybe that was why Cilla wanted to get rid of him. She was at the canyon for nookie-time with the man in her life.
"They broke up, though. Cami and Cilla made a date for coffee and when that day came, Cilla said the guy was history. Cami figured she'd really decided to move on because she'd also lost her long mane of hair."
Something about that story sent a cold finger down Ren's spine. He shrugged the uneasiness away and ran his palm over his clean-shaven cheek. "She's not a big fan of being at the compound with me."
"What's the big deal? You're practically a brother to her."
Except Ren wasn't, he thought, closing his eyes. He was seven years older and back in the day, he'd had little contact with her. And no man who was practically a brother to a woman would be experiencing this unsettling and powerful surge of raw horniness every time he looked at her.
Maybe he should have gotten laid more often in Moscow.
What warned him next, he couldn't say. But he opened his eyes in time to see a couple of scruffy young men summiting the ten-foot wall that separated Gwen's cottage from the narrow, one-lane road that led to the compound. Cilla still remained in her ray of sun, unaware of the strangers invading her bucolic moment right behind her back.
A wave of protectiveness welled in Ren's chest and he started toward her at a run. "Gotta go, Payne," he told his brother. "But just so you know, Cilla's no sister to me."
Buy Light My Fire
Excerpt: First Comes Love
Published by Christie Ridgway
© Christie Ridgway 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
From Celeb! magazine, Volume 26, Issue 7...
CELEB!RATED HERO IN HOT WATER
No, the man our readers rated number one as "larger-than-life hero material" isn't in trouble (that we know of!), he's back home. FBI Special Agent Dylan Matthews has returned to his hometown of Hot Water, California, just weeks following his latest dramatic rescue, and Celeb! is itching to know why.
What kind of excitement drew the gorgeous G-man to the former gold-mining town (population 2,000), now known best for its living-history re-creation of boom-town life? Sure, his roots go deep there—a forefather founded the town—but Agent Dishy, uh, Dylan, hasn't been back in eight years. Can it have something to do with rumors of his impending marriage?
After our hunky he-man recently recovered kidnap victim and heiress Honor Witherspoon, 27, from her captors, her father was talking up a congressional medal. But we've heard whispers that gazillionaire Warren Witherspoon might be awarding Dylan his daughter's hand in marriage instead. Can it be that Dylan's gone home to mine for just the right way to say "yes" to Warren's "Won't you marry her?"
The FBI Press Office claims dashing Dylan is taking time for some R and R. "No one deserves it more," gushes Annalise Bordeaux, another woman with a debt of gratitude to the sexy agent. Last spring, the Parisian model-turned-Hollywood-actress was stalked by a fan for months until Matthews broke the case. Posing as Annalise's new love interest, he made himself the jealous fan's target. "I'd give Dylan anything he asks!" Annalise affirms. "Anything!"
Hollywood insiders say that the 22-year-old beauty ultimately settled on giving the special agent something pretty special to remember her by … a case of expensive champagne and a life-size portrait of herself—nude. No word on how the fab FBI-ster responded to either, or to the buzz going around the studio backlots about a TV series centered on his heroic exploits.
So maybe Dylan has more than one offer to ponder this summer, all the while dodging the mock gunfights, gold-thirsty miners, and lusty madams populating historic Hot Water. We can't wait to see what bubbles to the surface!
LetCeleb! know if Dylan strikes gold! If you discover the real deal on Dylan Matthews or any other celebrity,Celeb! wants the scoop. Call us at 1-900-555-0155. ($.99 per minute, average call 5 minutes.)
CHAPTER ONE
Running a brothel was hot, sweaty work.
Awaiting the arrival of her next round of guests in the overheated parlor, Kitty Wilder figured she should know. She'd been doing it for the past seven summers, ever since her great-aunt Catherine was hospitalized with her first stroke. Before that, everyone in her hometown of Hot Water, California, including Aunt Cat, thought Kitty was too young to dress in satin and feathers every day. Of course, they expected she would eventually—after all, there had been a Doc Watson and a Judge Matthews in town for over one hundred and fifty years, so who other than a Wilder woman belonged in the local bordello?—but modern mores had postponed Kitty's debut at The Burning Rose until it was absolutely necessary, when she was nineteen years old.
She hadn't been what you'd call "eager" to take on the work. It certainly wasn't a conventional summer job—and conventional was Kitty's soul-deep desire—but in Hot Water, where the past was so tangled with the present, there wasn't much point in bucking century-old traditions. Though at nineteen Kitty had already been coveting minivans, wanting nothing more than a super-size white one with wood side panels, a stroller spilling out the back and a bronzed male forearm propped in the driver's window—oh, she especially longed for that bronzed forearm and the rest of the family man that went with it!—she had accepted the responsibility and donned a floozy's dress and some feathers with fatalistic calm.
This seventh summer was little different from her first. Though Kitty was now twenty-six, the brothel's parlor smelled as always of old wood and lemon oil. The sluggish air conditioner battled against Hot Water's late-July heat with minimal success. The black lace edging the low-to-the-point-of-embarrassment neckline of her gold satin costume itched.
This summer the only difference was in Kitty. What was missing was her fatalistic calm. That was why, when the town's Gold Rush-era living-history district closed its doors on the summer tourist sea
son, Kitty was going to quit playing madam. For good.
Heat had nothing to do with it. Sweat was a mere inconvenience. But six months ago Kitty had seen how futile that soul-deep ambition of hers was. Though for three-fourths of the year she held the responsible position of "head" of the one-person advertising and PR department of the Hot Water Preservation Society, she'd realized she would never be considered conventional. She'd realized that the two thousand residents of her hometown would always see her as a Wilder—would only see her as a Wilder.
That was why it was a sadder but wiser Kitty who now pushed a damp lock of hair off her forehead with the back of her wrist, then consulted a mental calendar, ticking off time by touching thumb to forefinger, tall man, ring finger, pinkie, forefinger once more. After today's last tour, she had five weeks left as Hot Water's madam. In five short weeks she'd be pointing her packed car north, because the only way to escape her past was to leave home behind.
Buy First Comes Love here!
Christie Ridgway’s Book List
Rock Royalty
Light My Fire
Love Her Madly
Break on Through (Coming Soon!)
First Comes Love
Then Comes Marriage
Must Love Mistletoe
Not Another New Year's
The Thrill of it All
Out on a Limb
The Three Kisses Trilogy
Crush on You
Then He Kissed Me
Can't Hurry Love
Malibu & Ewe Knitting Trilogy
How to Knit a Wild Bikini
Unravel Me
Dirty Sexy Knitting
The Wisegirls
An Offer He Can't Refuse
The Care and Feeding of Unmarried Men
Wish You Were Here
This Perfect Kiss
Do Not Disturb
About the Author
Christie Ridgway is the author of over forty-five novels of contemporary romance. All her books are both sexy and emotional and tell about heroes and heroines who learn to believe in the power of love. A USA Today bestseller, Christie is a six-time RITA finalist and has won best contemporary romance of the year and career achievement awards from Romantic Times Book Reviews.
A native of California, Christie now resides in the southern part of the state with her family. Inspired by the beaches, mountains, and cities that surround her, she writes tales of sunny days and steamy nights. For a complete list of books, excerpts, and news on the latest going on with Christie:
Visit Christie’s website
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Love Her Madly Page 24
