LITMIR.BIZ

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the trick. Her insides melted, and desire pooled warmly between her thighs.

      “Mmm.” She exhaled the sigh on a breath.

      “Like that, do you?” Michael sounded very pleased with her response.

      “You know I do.”

      He squeezed again, this time earning a shiver. “I can think of a few other things you like, too.”

      “Be still my heart.”

      He chuckled. “Uh-uh, Jilly. There’s going to be nothing still about you by the time I’m through.”

      To prove his point, he caught the elastic waistband of her pants and tugged them over her hips and down her legs. Then he reared back and raked a hungry gaze over her.

      “As gorgeous as ever.” He dragged his fingertips lightly over her stomach, a teasing touch that made her tremble. Then he toyed with the edge of her cotton panties, easing his fingers inside just enough to make her sound breathless when she said, “I’m very glad you think so.”

      “Oh, I do, my beautiful bride. I do.” To prove his point, he gazed down pointedly at his crotch, drawing her attention to the promising bulge there.

      “If I had free hands, I’d undress you, too.”

      “Allow me.”

      She thought he might free her, but he began a careful striptease instead. So, lying in his dental chair, nearly naked and definitely aroused, she watched him peel away clothes that showed the effects of the long day to reveal all the tantalizing secrets below.

      He was just thirty-two, two years older than she was, and she could still see the boy she’d fallen in love with inside this more mature version. He’d been the high-school football star. The handsome homecoming king. The proud fraternity president. A devastatingly romantic groom.

      Jillian still felt a tingle when she thought about all those yummy memories, still admired his strong features, the glossy black hair that contrasted so sharply with his blue eyes.

      Michael.

      She’d been involved with him for most of her life. She supposed it was only natural that their relationship ebbed and flowed. They’d weather this lull just as they’d weathered tough years during college and dental school and a financially difficult start to his practice.

      Of course they would.

      1

      Several weeks later

      THE WHINING of the high-speed drill hadn’t faded to silence before Michael Landry heard his wife say, “I’m leaving now.”

      Glancing up from his patient, who reclined in the dental chair with his open mouth exposing a problem molar, Michael found Jillian standing in the doorway. He couldn’t help but smile at the sight of her, looking all brisk and businesslike in her colorful smock and white pants.

      She wore the same uniform as his staff, although she’d applied her business degree toward managing his office ever since he’d set up his practice after dental school. Several years might have passed since they’d bought this old building in downtown Natchez, but Jillian looked the same as the sparkling-eyed young girl he’d fallen in love with so long ago.

      She was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

      Strawberry-blond hair waved around her face, and she had warm brown eyes that could melt with pleasure or twinkle with laughter. She could still catch him off guard with her smile.

      “You remember we have an interview with the caretakers from New Orleans at the camp tonight,” she said.

      “What time is it again?” He wasn’t about to admit he hadn’t remembered.

      “Seven. If you lock up right after your last patient and leave with the staff, you should have plenty of time to get through traffic.”

      “To Camp Cavelier?” Louis Bernard lifted his head from the headrest, almost nailing the equipment tray before Michael made a quick save. “You’ll make the camp by seven if you’re driving on the shoulder up State Road Twenty.”

      “Not if he leaves with the staff,” Jillian said firmly. “Are you sure you don’t want me to wait for you?”

      “You said you needed to look over their paperwork. Go ahead. I’ll be there.”

      He could hear Charlotte snicker from behind her paper mask and shot his nurse a look he hoped would deter her from comment. He was already in enough hot water with Jillian about their latest investment venture.

      But Charlotte O’Brien wasn’t in the habit of being deterred by him. This sixty-ish, pixie-ish dynamo had been a nurse since long before Michael had even thought about going into dentistry. She had a lot of know-how, and despite their years together, he still hadn’t decided why she worked for him. Some days he thought she was impressed with his skill and chair-side manner. Other days, he suspected she felt it was her duty to tell him what to do to keep his patients safe.

      She didn’t even bother trying to hide her amusement now. “What your wife wants here is confirmation. Go on and tell her you’ll let us drag you out the door when we leave before she gets a gray hair.”

      “Now that’s where you’re wrong.” He slid his stool back and stood. “Jillian’s just doing what she always does—keeping my schedule straight so I can devote myself to my patients. Don’t know what I’d do without this woman.”

      He caught her around the waist and waltzed her through the cramped space in the exam room. With a gasp, she melted into his arms the way she always did, as if her luscious body had been designed exclusively to fit close.

      “Michael!”

      “Yes, my beautiful bride?”

      “You’re crazy.”

      “Only about you, love of my life.”

      “Oh, Michael.”

      He whirled her to the sound of Charlotte’s chuckles and Louis’s deep-throated guffaws. Unable to resist, he dipped her over his arm for good measure, one of those dramatic, romantic gestures that never failed to make Jillian sigh those breathless sighs that caught him hard in the gut.

      She melted over his arm in a liquid move and exhaled a gasping laugh. That had been the first thing to attract him to Jillian—her laughter. Unrestrained, glorious laughter. He couldn’t resist kissing the sound from her lips.

      So, flipping up his paper mask, he did.

      Her mouth yielded beneath his, her kiss so natural and welcoming that he felt that twist low in his gut. He resisted the urge to deepen their kiss and taste the sweet greeting he knew would be his.

      That was the way it had always been between them—right. Ever since he’d stolen his first kiss on the high-school football field after a particularly tight win, he’d responded to Jillian in a way he had no other.

      He still did. She was such a tidy armful with her hands wound around his neck to hang on, her warm breaths clashing with his in easy rhythm. She made him think about sex.

      They only parted after attracting an audience. His two hygienists stood in the hall beyond the open doorway, their applause muffled by their sanitary gloves.

      “Show’s over, folks.” He waved everyone back to work.

      With laughing comments, his staff disbanded, and Jillian rolled her eyes, pecked him on the cheek and said, “Now back to work before you get totally off schedule.”

      “Or my anesthetic wears off.” Louis shot a worried glance at the drill.

      Michael got back to his own work before Louis’s anesthetic did indeed wear off. He pointedly ignored the amusement glinting in Charlotte’s eyes above the mask.

      He wasn’t entirely sure how he’d earned this open conspiracy, but his wife

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