STORY EXCERPT

Ripley took more than the minute she’d told him. She took more than the three required to run his license and plate through dispatch. She needed that time to get herself together. Holy mackerel! A speeder, or any other violator of the law, had never sent her body rocking or her mind on a fast train to get-it-on-ville the way Flynn Martelli did.

She consulted the information on his license. The birthday listed told her he was turning forty in two days. It told her he lived at 4628 Winding Mountain Lane. The plate on the back of his bike had told her he was a firefighter even before she’d run it through dispatch.

She toyed with the idea of not giving him a ticket. Both because he was simply too damn cute and because he was a firefighter. Winding Mountain Lane was in a fairly high-class neighborhood. The hundred and fifty the citation would cost him likely wouldn’t hurt his finances too badly. But the speed he’d been traveling on that motorcycle as he’d woven his way through the slower traffic keeping to the posted limit held the potential to hurt far more than his wallet.

Ripley scribbled the citation, gathered his paperwork, and headed back to his bike. His large hands were back on the handlebars, his forearms, biceps, and posture relaxed. His hair was jet black, his face handsome and chiseled, and she knew, even before he turned his gaze to hers, the effect those bright green eyes would have on her system.

“Here you go.” He straightened and took the items she held out for him. “I hope you aren’t late for your shift, firefighter.”

“It’s captain,” he corrected her as he shifted the items to one hand and opened his wallet with the other. His gaze dropped from hers as he replaced his license, registration, and proof of insurance in his wallet. He paused briefly when he got to the citation. Surprise followed by acceptance and a hint of amusement moved through his expression. “Thank you, officer…”

“Paxton,” Ripley supplied as she watched his attention drop to the bottom of the citation where she’d signed her name.

His gaze met hers and, wow, merely being the object of this man’s attention made her imagination soar. Ecstasy, hot and intoxicating, pumped off him in waves. She wondered if he realized it, if he somehow did it on purpose.

“Ripley.”

Her name rolled from his lips in a voice that was as hot and intoxicating as the rest of him. Everything about the man put her in mind of rumpled sheets and hot, sweaty sex.

“Enjoy the rest of your day, and stay safe out there, Captain Flynn Martelli,” she told him as she slowly started backing away.

The grin that unfolded on his lips as he turned his head to watch her over his broad shoulder made her step falter. It was a slow curve of a set of truly kissable lips that had arousal shooting through her like a harpoon. Her nipples beaded, cream soaked her panties, and she couldn’t look away.

“You, too, Officer Ripley Paxton.” He held her gaze for a long moment before he turned and started his bike.

Ripley whirled around and headed for her cruiser before she did something stupid like run after him, hop on the back of his bike, and demand he take them someplace they could fuck. What the hell was wrong with her? She’d just had sex, truly marvelous, rock-her-world sex, with an off the charts good-looking guy mere hours ago. She’d been doing her best not to fall asleep after a full night of mattress gymnastics with Xander Wayland last night when Flynn Martelli’s speeding motorcycle had set her radar beeping on the dash of her squad car.

She slid behind the wheel of her cruiser, alerted dispatch that she was back in service, and buried her face in her hands. “I am turning into a slut.”

She was turning into the worst kind of slut. A badge-bunny kind of slut. Flynn Martelli was a fire shift captain and, despite what she’d told Xander last night about his incapability to be a firefighter, she’d known that was exactly what he was. What were the chances Flynn and Xander worked the same shift at the same firehouse?

She consoled herself with the understanding that it didn’t matter. She would likely never see Flynn Martelli again, and, though she had agreed to see Xander tomorrow, what they had going was nothing but sex.

Sex you can’t wait to have again with a man you haven’t been able to get out of your head for more than a few minutes since he left your house this morning.

Damn it. The worse part of that whole thought was the realization that those few minutes she had managed to not think about Xander had been the time she’d just spent practically drooling over Flynn Martelli.

ADULT EXCERPT

Ripley’s heart skipped a beat. Just like that, Xander had gone from playful to serious. She supposed he’d had to, especially given the handcuffs in his hand and the obvious intent in his eyes to use them.

“That’s an interesting question coming from a man I’ve known for barely more than two hours.”

He shot a pointed glance around the room before meeting her gaze again. “I’m in your house.”

Ripley gave him a half laugh. “You’re in my bedroom.”

Xander didn’t crack a smile. “But do you trust me enough to have my way with you and know that I won’t hurt you in any way that doesn’t give you absolute and total pleasure?”

Ripley’s heart didn’t just skip a beat this time. It stilled. Holy smokes, the intensity on his handsome face coupled with the mixture of hope and confidence in his tone had juices leaking from between her feminine lips. She wanted this man. She wanted him to have his way with her, and, mother of hormones, she wanted him to do anything and everything to her that would give her that absolute and total pleasure he was talking about.

She shifted, putting the weight of her upper body on one elbow so she could reach for him with her other hand. “Yes, Xander. Call me crazy, but I trust you.”

“I would never call you crazy or give you a reason not to trust me,” he said, still so serious, so confident, and, oh, wow, those words shouldn’t have made her insides go all warm and fuzzy, but they did.

Wanting to put them back in their playful mood from moments ago, needing to, Ripley asked, “Do you need me to show you what to do with those handcuffs?”

He snorted. “Baby, I’m going to show you how these handcuffs can be fun.” He waited a beat and added, “Lay down and stretch your arms over your head.”

Ripley obeyed even as an excited whip of trepidation slashed over every erogenous zone in her body.

He leaned over her, glanced down, and asked, “You’re right handed, aren’t you?”

There was only one set of cuffs. He couldn’t bind both of her wrists to the headboard like he obviously wanted. Knowing it would throw him off, she told him, “I’m ambidextrous.”

He gave her a withering look that had her struggling not to laugh. “Work with me, Ripley, unless you’ve got another pair of these laying around.”

She let a half giggle escape. “I don’t, and I shoot my gun with my right hand, if that helps.”

“So, just in case that’s lying around the room and I didn’t see it…” He muttered the words, but she heard the humor in his tone as he stretched her right arm toward the headboard and secured it to one of the wrought iron bars.

Still laughing, Ripley waved her left hand in the air in front of his face. “I still have a free hand.”

“Not for long.” He grabbed that wrist as he sat up and guided her left hand between her legs. “You’re going to play with your pussy until I get down there to take over.”

“Wh—” A sudden rush of uncertainty had Ripley needing to swallow before she could make the question come out. “Where are you going to be?”

He shifted next to her, threw one powerful leg over her thighs, braced the weight of his upper body on his hands at her sides, and dipped his head. “Right here for starters.” The tip of his tongue touched the side of her neck and danced its way down.

Ripley shuddered, every sensory nerve in her body anticipating the next lick, the next touch of his mouth, and the bites he’d given to her breasts in the living room.

“Are you playing with your pussy like I told you to do?” The warmth of his breath fanned her flesh as his face hovered over her collarbone.

She wasn’t. All of her attention had been fixated on him, every particle of her being waiting for him to touch her, to taste her, and to fuck her. She pushed a finger between her sodden folds and couldn’t stop the moan that escaped her lips.

His lips unfolded in a smile against her flesh as he lowered his mouth to her collarbone and gave it a tender nip. “Now you are. Don’t stop until I tell you to.”

“You should be doing it for me.” Ripley could finger herself any time the mood struck. Right now, she wanted his large, callused fingers between her pussy lips, fondling her clit, and pumping inside her channel.

“You have to beg me to first.”

Ripley let out a quick burst of disbelieving laughter, but the moan that broke through it when his tongue touched her flesh again ruined the effect. “I don’t beg, Slick.”

His head lifted, his gaze slammed into hers, and the calm authority shining among the flames in her eyes brought her inching toward the edge. “You will.”