LITMIR.BIZ

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know when I’ll see them, now that the school year has started.”

      Tempest smiled. “Thank you.”

      Shaman went to get the address, and she followed him into the house. He handed her a piece of paper. “Cat started school in the middle of August in Diablo. She’s real happy there.”

      “I’m so glad.”

      He decided his visitor was even more beautiful close up. The hot-red suit fit her curves to perfection. She didn’t wear a wedding ring or jewelry, just some gold hoop earrings that kissed her cheeks.

      “She’s a sweet girl,” Tempest added.

      Shaman nodded, suddenly uncomfortable and not sure why. His first thought was to seduce this angel—what man could resist?—but she was too perfect for him. How dumb was that?

      Ten years in the military, most of them spent in Iraq and Afghanistan, might have left him hungry for female companionship, but it had also left him with scars on his back, a chunk missing from his shoulder and a red slash across his sun-browned cheek. He was lucky those were his only visible scars. Many of his buddies hadn’t fared so well.

      A little less perfection in a woman would suit him better. “Sorry I couldn’t be more help.”

      Tempest smiled and turned on her heel. “I was hoping to see Cat and Chelsea, but I suppose they won’t be back until the semester is over?”

      “Can’t say.” He wasn’t familiar with Cat’s routine. “Chelsea and Gage just announced that they’re expecting a baby, so I don’t know how often Chelsea will be out here.”

      Tempest glanced back at him, looking pleased. “That’s wonderful! I’m glad to hear it.” She opened the front door before he could do so. “I didn’t get your name?”

      “Shaman Phillips.” He held the door for her, and as she walked out, caught a tease of a light flowery perfume. “You staying in Tempest, Tempest?” He grinned. “I didn’t realize you were named after the town.”

      She leaned into him, catching him off guard. “It’s a stage name. My real name is Zola Cupertino.”

      His brain tried to process that information, along with the distracting fact that she was dangerously close to him. And he didn’t think it was an accident. If he didn’t know better, he’d think she—

      “Soldier...” Tempest murmured.

      “Yes, ma’am?” he said, out of habit. She must have seen his military bag, and his combat boots in the living room.

      “I just got off a plane from Italy,” she announced. “I wonder if you might be interested in taking me out to dinner?”

      He blinked. “Certainly,” he said, trying to be chivalrous and not sound as surprised as he was by her unexpected invitation.

      She smiled at him, a sweet, slow, sexy smile, her angelic eyes free of artifice, but holding a silent plea. Maybe he didn’t want to see it. But she was still standing oh-so-close to him, and the next thing he knew, he’d taken the statuesque blonde in his arms and was kissing her like a dying man.

      She kissed him back hungrily.

      “Wait a second,” Shaman said. He was a lucky guy, but not this lucky. Angels didn’t just drop from the sky into his hard-edged world. “How did you say you know Gage and Chelsea?”

      “Met them this summer. Don’t stop what you’re doing, soldier.”

      He kissed her again, his mind trying to find the hook in the sweet deal she seemed to be offering him. She could have any guy in the world. Why would she choose him, instead of running from the sight of his scar-streaked face?

      What the hell. A man didn’t get too many gifts in life, and if this angel wanted to fly into his arms, he needed to quit acting like a skittish horse. “Hey, you want that dinner or not?” he asked, giving her one last chance to back away.

      “After,” she murmured, melting into him.

      He carried her to his bedroom, taking his sweet time, being careful with the soft suit and delicate white camisole. Her bra and panties were angel-wing white and breathlessly lacy, the kind that didn’t do much for support but everything for a man’s libido. Keeping the lights low, he whispered to her in soothing tones, expecting at any moment for her to tell him she wanted out of his bed. But she let him do whatever he wanted to her, and she was sweet like he’d never tasted sweet before.

      And when he finally entered her, Shaman thought he’d died and gone to some magical place he’d never known existed. In all the dirty, lonely nights he’d been scared out of his wits—and he’d been plenty scared, tough guy or not—he’d fantasized about a woman. Any woman. A soft, sweet woman to take away the pain.

      This woman was a velvet-soft gift from the gods, and whatever he’d done to deserve this time with her, Shaman wanted the moment to last forever.

      Tempest cried his name, and he lost himself in her. She grabbed at his shoulders, and he didn’t even think about his wounds or his scars. He held her and kissed her, savoring her like a treasure.

      Then they slept—maybe for an hour; he wasn’t certain. A glance out the window showed a moon that was huge and high in the sky. Getting out of bed, he said, “Let me shower. I’ll take you for that dinner.”

      She smiled at him in the moonlight. “Thanks, soldier.”

      Afraid to keep the lady waiting, he took the world’s fastest shower, dressing like a madman. Yet he wasn’t all that surprised when he came out and all that was left on the bed was the little Louis Vuitton bag, and a note that read, “Just remembered I have a meeting in town. Rain check for the dinner? Tempest.”

      He grunted. She’d signed the note as if it was an autograph for a book or a photo. “A meeting,” he muttered. Shaman glanced at the note again, massively disappointed. Rain check.

      I’ll just bet.

      * * *

      “WHO IS HE?” Tempest asked her dearest friends, Shinny and Blanche Tuck, after they’d hugged each other. It was so good to be here, in the Ice Cream Shoppe where she’d spent so many happy hours. The couple had been parents of sorts, shepherding her through difficult times as a child. Shinny could always be counted on to give her one of his delicious “specials,” a frothy chocolate milkshake she’d adored as a kid. Now she knew he’d simply been trying to put meat on her scrawny bones, but back then she’d thought she was the luckiest girl in the world when he gave her the scrumptious treats.

      Shinny and Blanche sat across from her in the lipstick-red booth. The store was closed, and soon they’d go home. But for now they were enjoying catching up.

      “He’s one of the Phillips boys from Hell’s Colony,” Blanche said. “Seems to be a good family, if his brother Gage is any indication.”

      Shinny was happy to let his wife tell the story, but filling in the details was his forte. His balding head with its white tufts of hair shone under the fluorescent bulb overhead as he leaned back in the booth. “Gage comes out every once in a while. Shaman and he are trying to fix up Dark Diablo. They’re the ones Jonas Callahan hired to bring the place to a working condition.”

      “Why’d you go there?” Blanche asked worriedly. “You don’t want to be around Dark Diablo. Nothing good can come of it, even with him there.”

      Tempest conceded she wasn’t quite sure what had happened tonight. Seduction wasn’t her style, and she hadn’t had a lover in years. But the man at the ranch had seemed so defenseless, so...sexy. Sexier than any guy she’d ever seen, in some way she couldn’t identify. His coffee-colored

      eyes had had a faraway, lonely, almost vulnerable look in them, and for some reason she’d sensed in him a safe harbor. “I wanted to take Cat a present. I thought she and Chelsea would be there. Funny that everything changed in the two months I was gone.”

      “Yes,”

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