New and…Improved? & Andrew in Excess

by Jill Shalvis; Jennifer LaBrecque

  But some of the wind left her sails when she realized she was a new woman who still had to ride home. Alone.

  FINALLY, KENT THOUGHT as relief washed through him. Finally. When Becca got off her bike, he rose off her top stair where he’d been waiting and worrying.

  She stood there in the light of the moon’s glow looking soft and vulnerable. Automatically, as if it was the most natural thing in his world, he reached for her, but at the last second, he stopped himself.

  She’d been crying.

  “You’re hurt?” he demanded in a voice gritty with concern as he took her arm to turn her toward him so he could get a better look at her. Years of nasty tumbles had him checking out her knees and elbows first, but she shook her head.

  “I’m not that pathetic,” she said. “I can ride a bike.”

  He knew then, without her saying it, that he’d given her that sad, haunted look. In light of that, he had no right to haul her close the way he wanted to do. To bury his face in the soft spot of her neck, to wrap his arms around her and hold on tight.

  While he was still standing there like an idiot, she crossed the threshold and surprised him by walking directly into his arms.

  She felt like heaven. “I’m so glad to see you,” he whispered.

  She simply pressed closer, put her cold nose to the crook of his neck and held on. “You threw away your lingerie catalog,” she said, her voice muffled. “How come?”

  The question completely baffled him. “What?”

  She pulled away and looked at him. “You’ve never thrown one of those away. You and the guys save them—I know where you hide them.”

  “Uh, yeah. Well.” Embarrassed, he cleared his throat. “I threw this one away, okay?”

  “Why?”

  He sighed. “Wouldn’t you rather know why I’m here?”

  She lifted a shoulder. Studied her feet. Blew out a breath. “Okay.”

  “So enthusiastic.”

  “Okay, fine. If you must know, I’m a little nervous you’re here to say something like, ‘you drive me crazy, Becca. You ruined a good pair of my shoes, twisted my ankle and got a ticket in my car. You’re too much trouble, so stay out of my life.”’ She flashed an uncertain smile that both warmed and broke his heart. “That’s what I’m thinking you should be saying to me.”

  “You can’t really think that.” But she did, he could see that more clearly than the nose on his face. “Okay, I’m not good at words, but I’ll try. For you, I’d try anything.”

  “You…you would?”

  “I let you drive my car, didn’t I? Come with me.”

  “Where?”

  “Your bedroom,” he said, his voice already husky at the thought of her there.

  Her eyes darkened, her lips parted. “You want to show me something?”

  “I want to tell you, with those words you want, but it has to be there.”

  She bit her lip and nodded, and he scooped her up in his arms. There was no wild kissing this time, no forays in the hallway, no pressing each other against the wall in desperate hunger.

  But she looped her arms around his neck. “I can walk.”

  “Maybe I want to hold you. Makes me feel tough,” he said, huffing only a little. “Manly.”

  She laughed, then grew quiet when he pushed open the bedroom door, carried her to the bed and slowly let her slide down his body until her feet hit the floor.

  With a hand that was suddenly unsteady, because this was so important, he reached out and touched her face. “I can run a company. Manage a staff. I can do just about anything that needs to be done in my lab, but formulating my thoughts and putting them into words where you’re concerned is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

  She closed her eyes. “I understand—”

  He pressed gentle fingers to her soft lips, then leaned close to whisper, “Let me show you.” He touched her hair, then took a step closer, eased out the clip that kept everything so neat and sank his fingers into the thick, glorious depths.

  She made a sound of wanting. He bent to kiss her. She made another sound, of desire this time, and her eyes fluttered closed again. The pulse at the base of her throat matched his racing heart.

  He kissed that throat now. “I love your hair,” he murmured. “Love it up, love it down, love it any which way, but I especially love it stuffed into that baseball cap of yours, with all those little strands hanging out.”

  When his fingers brushed against the curve of her ear, she drew an audible breath. “Nice earrings,” he said softly, carefully unscrewing the back of her gold hoop and setting it on his dresser. “Without is even better.” And then he put his mouth to the sensitive lobe and sucked.

  She clutched at him, but managed to say, “You seem to have plenty of words now.”

  “You inspire me.” He took her face in his hands and tipped it up. The room was fairly dark, all he could see clearly were those eyes of hers, but it was enough. He kissed her, stealing what little breath he’d managed to save up, a deep, slow, soulful kiss. When he finally raised his head, they were both shaky.

  He went to work on her elegant sweater next. “Mmm, you look good in clothes…” The soft material slipped down her arms and hit the floor. His fingers went to the zipper on her skirt. “But I love the way you look without them even more.”

  Now her skirt lay pooled on the floor, too, leaving Becca standing in nothing but a silky camisole, matching panties and thigh-high stockings. She was breathtaking, so much so that he had to stand there looking at her in awe. “You’re so beautiful.” Gently he slipped the straps of her camisole down her arms. “And that’s without the veneer of all the fancy clothes, or any part of the makeover, which by the way, has absolutely nothing to do with my desire for you.” He sank to his knees before her, running a slow hand up the back of her calf.

  She let out a trembly smile, but she crossed her arms over her chest, holding the flimsy material of the camisole to her.

  He didn’t tell her she’d just emphasized her full breasts, their rosy peaks, hard and begging for his attention.

  They wouldn’t have to beg long. He tipped his head back and smiled at her. “Have I ever told you how much I love those torn jeans you used to wear?”

  She shook her head, sucking in a harsh breath when his fingers played over her skin.

  “You have the greatest legs, all long and lean. Your jeans really show them off.”

  Air seemed to get stuck in her throat when his fingers danced along behind her knees, then up the backs of her thighs. His fingers dipped between those thighs and she gasped.

  While she was still trying to catch her breath, he tugged on her camisole, gently and slowly, until she let it free. Immediately, she crossed her arms again, covering her bared breasts, but he’d get to them in good time. “Step out of it,” he whispered, coaxing her to lift one foot, then the other, slipping off her heels.

  He tossed the silk over his shoulder and moved in close, kissing her quivering belly. While his mouth made its way to her hipbone, he rolled her stockings down until she stood before him in nothing but panties.

  Sitting back on his heels, he reached up and took her hands in his, holding them at her sides. Her face was flushed, her eyes limpid pools of desire he could happily drown in. “I have some more words,” he told her softly. “Lots of them. We’ve had fun. We’ve had adventure. Both were nice. Great. But I don’t want to go back to the way we were. I’d miss you too much.”

  Her hands clutched his.

  He held her tight. “You said you wanted more. I want more too. The grandest adventure of all. You and me. Together.”

  “You…really think of me that way?”

  “I think about you every moment of my waking day,” he said honestly. “I dream about you all night long. I wake up hard and aching and dying for you. I love your body, every inch of it, but I love what’s inside even more. We’re magic together, Becca. We’re soul mates. Please, if you believe nothing else I’ve told you, believe that
.”

  Her hands flexed in his, but he held them tight. Again, he kissed her softly, high on her thigh now, then higher still, in that smooth, sensitive groove between her thigh and hip.

  “Kent…” Her voice wavered, nervous and excited. “Did you just tell me…”

  “Yeah. I love you.”

  She let out a sigh that stirred his blood, stoked the fire burning with him. Gently he nuzzled at her, and instinctively her hips undulated. When he did it again, a helpless sound escaped from deep in her throat. Then he slipped his tongue between the edge of her panties and slid it over her.

  She cried out then, and when he opened his mouth on her, she shuddered violently. “I can’t…Kent, my legs…they won’t hold me.”

  Surging to his feet, he lifted her against him and laid her in the center of the bed.

  She watched as he undressed, her chest rising and falling shallowly, her eyes on his magnificent body. “You were right…you had plenty to show me.” Her voice was low, her eyes dark and direct.

  He let out a groaning laugh. “This isn’t the half of it.”

  “No?” Her breath quickened even more, and he thought he just might lose it right there.

  Simply because she was getting hot looking at him.

  Then her gaze met his and there was far more than just hunger and passion there in those green depths. “Did you mean it?” she whispered.

  “Yes.” Leaning over her, bracketing her hips with his hands, he looked deep into her eyes. “I love your wit, your smarts, your voice, your eyes, your everything.”

  “Except the way I drive.”

  “I’ll get used to it, I swear.”

  She lifted her arms. He sank to the bed, slipped into them and covered her. Her mouth sought out his. The scent of her hair, the need in her gaze, the urging of her hands, it all swamped him. She was everything he’d ever wanted, everything he ever would want, and since he could no longer remember why he was afraid of this, he poured himself into the kiss.

  She moaned his name, pressed closer still, giving him everything she had. With tenderness and lust driving him, he ran his hands over her breasts, her belly, to the throbbing spot between her legs, and when she opened them further and arched up to him, he filled her. She was gloriously wet and hot, and though he was on the edge, though she thrust her hips impatiently, he held them both still. “Look at you,” he whispered. “You take my breath away, Becca.”

  Gazes locked, she lifted slightly, driving him more deeply inside her. He could see her, all of her; her warm spirit, her compassion, her need for him.

  It was the last that had his heart overflowing. Hunger and passion and so much more roared through his veins. He was deep inside her, in her body, her heart. She was most certainly in his. It was almost too much, this joining of the body and soul, so much pleasure and sensation, he could hardly take it.

  Planting his forearms on either side of her head, cupping her face, he kissed her, lost himself in her taste, in the feel of her. “I love you,” he said again, in a voice so thick and raspy he hardly recognized it. And he moved within her.

  With a small cry, she arched back. He thrust again, and again. Claiming. Staking. Promising. In the most intense moments of his life, they moved together, mind and body. When she came, her body rippling with blinding pleasure, it triggered his own earth-shattering release.

  14

  KENT WAS HUMMING when he walked into the lab the next morning. He was also grinning like an idiot, just because he could see Becca’s car in the parking lot.

  Yeah, he was gone. Far gone.

  And it felt damn good.

  She’d slept with him all night, not that there’d been much sleeping involved. Which brought a dreamy smile to his lips, and he walked past Cookie with a wave, thinking he’d been a fool to put off combining this friendship with this new, wildly satisfying element.

  “Hold it,” Cookie said, snapping her gum, narrowing her eyebrows.

  He stopped at her desk. “Yes?”

  “Are you…singing?”

  “Nope. Humming.”

  “You got lucky last night,” she guessed.

  “Depends on what you call lucky,” he called, moving down the hallway to the tune of her surprised laughter.

  Though he didn’t really need the jolt of caffeine—who would, after having made love with the most incredible woman all night—he grabbed a cup.

  The only thing that could hurt his mood was if he dwelled on the fact that Becca hadn’t told him she loved him. But he refused to agonize over that. Yet.

  DRAWING A DEEP BREATH, Becca entered the lab. Memories of last night danced in her head, of Kent telling her with words, with kisses, with his incredible body, just how much she meant to him.

  It had been magical, perfect. Well, nearly, because she had made one crucial mistake.

  She’d neglected to tell him just how much he meant to her in return. It was something she intended to fix, today, right this minute if possible, despite the butterflies wreaking havoc in her belly.

  Then Kent was standing at her work station, staring at her in that heated way he had, the one that told her he was remembering last night, and thinking of many nights yet to come, and those butterflies morphed into stomach-liner-eating dragons.

  He watched her approach and a slight frown marred his brow.

  She knew why. She’d dressed carefully for this morning. Jeans, backward baseball hat, glasses, the white lab coat with at least six pencils, the works.

  The old Becca.

  Kent wore a white lab coat, too, but his showed amazing shoulders, the chest that only hours before, she’d covered with kisses.

  She stopped a few feet away, vividly aware of everyone’s direct interest, as they pretended to work while unabashedly eavesdropping. “Good morning,” she said, her voice unintentionally husky.

  “Thanks to you, it’s a great morning.”

  Around them, everyone shifted closer, trying to capture each and every word, while still pretending to work.

  “Nice jeans,” he said. “What’s the occasion?”

  She shrugged nonchalantly while her heart raced. “Maybe I just wanted to make sure I had your attention.”

  “Oh, but you most definitely have my attention,” he assured her, his own voice warm and thick. “You always have.”

  Acutely aware of everyone’s undivided attention—they’d given up even the pretense of being busy—she lowered her voice to a whisper. “Are you sure?”

  “You can doubt it? After what we shared, especially last night?”

  Heat flooded her cheeks, but she’d started this, she would finish. “I was just wondering, you know, because before the makeover, you never looked at me in that way that makes…my knees buckle.”

  “I make your knees weak?”

  She nearly smiled, but there were those dragons working at her stomach. “Oh yeah, you make everything weak. But—”

  “But it comes down to the makeover,” he finished for her. “And why we didn’t go out before that. Right?” He sighed and shook his head. “The truth is, I had it in my head I couldn’t have both your friendship and your love. And they were both so important because I’d never had both before.”

  “Of course you can have both.”

  “Can I?” he asked softly. “I wanted you before, Becca, you can believe it. But the most important part of our relationship had nothing to do with sex.”

  Someone snickered. Kent dropped his arms to his side and glared at his staff, all of whom immediately ducked their heads and looked busy.

  He turned back to Becca, who bit her lip.

  “I liked the sex part,” she admitted in a whisper.

  He let out an agreeing laugh. “Me, too.” Purposely, he removed her glasses, put his big warm hands on her arms and shook lightly. “And for someone who wanted the words, you’ve been awfully miserly with your own.”

  Within her, courage and hope blossomed painfully. “I just didn’t think I had a chance.”

/>   “Take one now,” he suggested, dropping his hands from her to cross his arms over his chest.

  Take a chance. Her biggest adventure of all. Could she?

  Biting her lip, she took that last step between them and blinked him into focus, not easy without her glasses. She touched him and could tell by the warmth and affection that filled his eyes that he truly felt all he’d told her.

  He loved her, no matter what.

  It was empowering. And awe inspiring.

  To be loved for herself! Not for her brains, not for her looks, but for herself. To be loved by a man she loved back, with all her heart. It was the thrill of a lifetime. No, it was the adventure of a lifetime, and all she needed. “Okay.” She drew in a deep breath. “Here’s me, taking a chance.” She swallowed, licked her lips. “I know I’m the same woman on the inside, no matter what the outside looks like. I just wanted to know that you love me regardless of that outside.”

  “Then know it.”

  “Well, I think I would if…”

  He looked at her, for the first time allowing his hope to show through. “If…?”

  “If we were married.” She smiled, a bit wobbly, but then again, how often did she ask a man to be hers forever? “I was wondering if, considering all that you’ve said about us being soul mates and all, if you’d like to have me change my name to yours.”

  He didn’t move a muscle. “Are you asking me to be your husband?”

  Why wasn’t he jumping for joy? Saying yes? Kissing her? “Yes,” she whispered.

  “Because you know, it really didn’t sound quite like a marriage proposal.” His voice was solemn, not a trace of his thoughts showed on his face.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well for one, I haven’t heard you say you love me.”

  Drawing in a shuddering breath, she lifted her head, tossed back her hair. “Okay, I’m trying too hard,” she muttered. “Give me a minute here.”

  Gently he squeezed her hand, and desperately, she searched his gaze. She found what she was looking for in a small, barely there twinkle. “I’m sorry. I’m not very good at this.”