So he wasn’t going to turn and run. He wasn’t going to hide in his gleaming stainless-steel kitchen, hacking at animal bones with knives sharp enough to do serious damage to anything they came in contact with.
Rolling the tight muscles of his neck through his strong fingers, Jason fingered his Stanford University Ten-Year Reunion badge. Then he got ready to show Emma how badly she’d messed up in college by
flaunting his fame, his money, and his fully intact hairline in her face.
Three
Emma saw the man she loved for the first time in a decade and forgot how to breathe as the final piece of her perfectly ordered world broke and fell to the floor. He looked the same as he had the first day she’d met him in their freshman dormitory, only wiser, stronger.
And even more gorgeous.
Jason Roberts was no longer a boy. He was a man. The most delectable man she’d ever seen.
Jason stood several inches over six feet, and his muscled limbs held the promise of incredible strength.
Emma’s memories told her what was beneath his shirt and slacks and she shivered at the decadent thought of seeing him naked. Even if getting naked with Jason was the world’s most unlikely scenario.
His arms and legs would be corded with muscles, the natural, powerful physique of an athlete. He still pulled his slight, dark waves into a short ponytail at the back of his neck. It was a hairstyle that would have looked ridiculous on any other man in the room, but on Jason, the too-long hair just accentuated his masculinity.
Emma knew for a fact that every woman in the room had the same what-would-it-be-like-to-get-
naked-with-him daydream running through their minds. He was the kind of man that women noticed on the street, or in a restaurant, and couldn’t take their eyes off of, even if they were with a lover or husband already.
His sensuality was raw and impossible to ignore.
Seeing him, here, tonight, was the final blow. Emma started to slide off the chair as everything went black. But before she hit the floor, strong arms caught her. She inhaled a wonderfully familiar smell of freshly cut wood.
Jason’s aftershave.
“Emma,” he said and all it took was the sound of her name on his lips for every cell in Emma’s body to rev up with a combination of desire, hope, and fear. But the tingling in her br**sts—plumper, fuller than they had been just five minutes ago—told her which of the three was winning out.
Desire.
Licking her dry lips, she croaked, “Welcome to the reunion.”
Jason’s face was hard. And so beautiful she thought she was dreaming. “Thanks,” he said, the sound of his voice sending shivers through her, from her toes to the tips of her br**sts.
Her eyes locked on to his and she realized that if she couldn’t feel his tanned skin under her fingertips, if she couldn’t taste his lips on her tongue, if she couldn’t wrap her thighs around his hips, she’d go insane.
More than ten years after their first kiss, Emma’s world came down to Jason. Just as she must have always known it would, his first kiss as vividly imprinted in her brain as if it had just happened.
It was freshman orientation day at the beach and Emma couldn’t believe she’d forgotten to bring a dry T-shirt to change into at the end of the day. Cold and feeling incredibly foolish, she decided to wait in the backseat of the dorm’s van for everyone to finish up and pile in. A few minutes later Jason poked his head in the door.
“Hey, loner. Wanna be loners together?”
She grinned as he scooted onto the long, fake leather bench seat to keep her company. Too shy to sit around in nothing but a towel and bikini top, and sure that she looked fat in her revealing clothes, she shivered in her wet T-shirt, partly from the dampness that was seeping into her skin, but mostly from being alone with Jason in such close quarters. There wasn’t enough air in the van for the both of them.
She was certain she was probably just imagining things, but even though they’d only known each other for a week, she already felt a special connection with Jason.
Particularly in the sexual sense.
Which explained why she couldn’t quite meet Jason’s eyes as he started stripping off his T-shirt.
“Here,” he said, startling a gasp from between her sun-reddened lips.
She looked at the bundle of fabric in his hands, uncomprehending for a moment. Dazedly, she realized he was offering her a chance to change into something dry.
“Thanks,” she said, as she took the shirt from him and slipped it over her head. His T-shirt, which saidNICE GUYS COOK on it, was huge on her slim frame. She scooted her butt off of the seat and slid the hem of the T-shirt past her hips, pulling the wet towel away from her legs as well, semi-decent again and blissfully dry.
Jason’s T-shirt was warm from the heat of his body. Emma was branded with his scent—an elementally male essence of clean soap and sunshine that set the tips of her small br**sts into tight buds. She sent up a silent prayer of thanks that she had his shirt on to cover up the telltale signs of her body’s sensual betrayal.
All throughout high school Emma had barely felt more than the slightest twinge of attraction for a guy.
But now, the slight scent of Jason on his T-shirt was making her feel warm and moist between her legs.
How embarrassing was it that she was falling for the first guy who was nice to her in college? Especially when a gorgeous guy like Jason could have any girl he wanted, and every girl in their dorm had been flirting like crazy with him.
Her hands were still tingling from the quick exchange, as if they were anticipating more touches. Peering at him from underneath her lashes, Emma admired Jason’s body in his bathing suit, sans shirt. His chest was rock-hard, his abs a well-defined six-pack, and the vee of his chest between his well-muscled pecs sported a light dusting of gold-tipped brown hair. Just enough chest hair to be sexy, she thought, as she ran her eyes over his toned, tanned legs as well.
Emma forcefully cut herself off. What was she doing ogling him so obviously? Her mother would be having a coronary if she could see her oversexed daughter now. Forcing a bright smile, she said,
“Everyone at Stanford seems really nice, don’t they?”
He grinned at her, saying, “They sure do,” and the force of his smile just about blew his T-shirt right off of her. For the first time in her life, Emma knew what it was like to yearn for someone. She felt as if she were in heat under the full wattage of his smile.
Just then, the hired driver slid into the front seat and called back to them, “Looks like it’s just the two of you heading back right now.” The driver shot off and as they rounded a sharp corner in an effort to keep from falling on top of him, she placed her hands up against his bare chest. But Jason’s arms were already around her, just barely keeping her from sliding off the seat.