All Fired Up
Her sweetest mistake...Cool as a Chicago winter, private events planner Cara DeLuca is a model of self-control . . . until she meets the one temptation she can't resist: Shane Doyle. The sexy, Irish pastry chef is too hot, too sure, too young, and after a crazy night in Vegas—her new husband. While at first Cara wants nothing more than a way out of her sham marriage to Shane, she soon finds that beneath his farm boy demeanor lies a man who can match her drive, both in and out of the bedroom. How can the wrong guy feel so deliciously right?
...Tastes so, so good
Shane has carefully structured his career and life around one goal: connecting with the family that doesn't know he exists. Marrying a woman with more issues than a magazine stand wasn't part of the plan, but melting Cara's icy exterior is so worth the detour. Now as the annulment date nears and long-buried secrets are revealed, Shane will have to fight for the one thing guaranteeing the perfect life he craves . . . the current Mrs. Shane Doyle.
Excerpt
“You’re hiding, Cara. There’s something happening here and you’re scared because it doesn’t fit into that neat box you’ve constructed. You thought you got the lid back on after Vegas but now the edges are straining and what you’re feeling in here”—he touched her forehead, then coasted his fingertip down her cheek, her jaw, her neck until he reached the top button of her shirt—“and in here is too big for that box.”“Let me go,” she said, the words out of her mouth before she realized how ridiculously melodramatic they sounded. As if he were somehow keeping her prisoner on this step in this quasi-relationship. She was free to leave any time.
Then why couldn’t she move?
She backed up, but her heel caught on the step, and her vision filled with a wide-brimmed hat and shining brown eyes. Warm fingers hooked around the bare band of skin between her shirt and her jeans. His scent settled inside her, smoking through her blood.
Please, oh, please.
“Don’t hide from me, darlin’. I’ll just find you.” He brought his mouth down on hers and stole her breath, balance, and any chance she had of keeping that lid screwed on tight.
His tongue stroked hers hungrily, an insistent push that left her greedy for more. Had they kissed when they got married? Surely she would have remembered this warmth, this color, this feeling. Surely she would have remembered the bristled rough around his lips sparking her to life. Whatever happened, its imprint was lost in a sea of competing tastes and sounds from that craziest of nights. Now, she had time to savor, to taste, to enjoy a true consummation of hunger, unlike anything she ever felt for food. Who needed a full stomach when her heart was brimming to ripeness in Shane’s kiss?
Her improved dance moves stood her well as she pushed him back into the stairwell and then flipped against the wall of the church, the support of the brick necessary until the anchor of his body could kick in and hold her fast. Their slanting mouths twisted, mapping untrodden paths of pleasure. The push and pull of tongue-on-tongue ramped up her desire. His hard body pressed against her, slotting in from neck to knee, and she almost cried out at its perfect symmetry.
Skin. She needed to feel it. Just to check if those hard muscles contouring that henley were as defined as they looked. Yanking up his shirt, she trailed her hands across his abs and a corresponding thrill trailed across her skin as his stomach tautened under her touch. Maybe those abs were tight before but she liked to think her fingers were giving his muscles a nice workout.
At her exploration, he groaned a deep, chest-filling sound, which she took as an invitation to take things to the next level. Gripping his shirt, she tugged it higher. The shadows kept him safe from her grasping eyes, so her imagination filled in the blanks. Not an inch of fat marred that terrain. Her investigations ended at his nipples, already erect, inviting her to rub and stroke. And lick. Bending, she flicked her tongue across one stiffening bud.
So maybe she’d skipped a couple of levels.
Her gaze crept up to meet his, now trained on her mouth just scant millimeters from his chest. He was holding his breath, a forever breath she recognized because she was holding one, too. His tongue skated across his lower lip, a little puffy after their kiss.
“Please,” he rasped, needful and low.
Her hot mouth sealed over his nipple and sucked, her ears alert for his reaction, needing to know this felt good to him. When both his hands cupped the back of her neck and held her fast, she knew he liked it. When a very male sound escaped his throat, one he had been clearly shoving deep, she knew he loved it.
“Your mouth, Cara. God, your mouth.”
Now she knew he was hitching a ride to heaven right with her.
His rough fingers massaged the nape of her neck, and she moaned. And he moaned, a sound so heartfelt she felt its pulse between her legs. A feedback loop of pleasure. Gently, he drew her back and shaped her head to his palm, directing her up to face him. He was smiling, a big crescent of a grin. Making a guy smile during an intimate moment was not part of her usual skill set.
“Do you like that?” She’d always been a get-it-in-triplicate kind of girl.
His smile stretched wider. “You have no idea.”
Oh, she did. Good thing she was wearing a dark-rinse jean because her panties were so drenched she could feel the damp. He brought her in for a kiss, a long plundering one. Her blood bubbled like champagne. Drunk on him, her senses lurched toward chaos. Just like in Vegas, except tonight, there was no alcohol to blame, only an acute case of dirty lust outside a church.
Yes, she was on a fast train to hell.
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About the Author
Kate Meader writes contemporary romance that serves up delicious food, sexy heroes, and heroines with a dash of sass. Originally from Ireland, she now makes her home in Chicago, a city made for food, romance, and laughter—and where she met her own sexy hero. When not writing about men who cook and the women who drool over them, she works in an academic library. Visit her website at http://katemeader.com and follow her on Twitter @kittymeader
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