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not to ask for them. She hadn’t wanted to cause him more pain. So she’d shut down her own emotions and memories as well, learned to temper her expectations.

      “It wasn’t right, Joy, and it obviously affected you—question is how long are you going to let your past dictate your present?”

      “Rafe, Christmas is one thing, but I’m not passionate about anything! I’m good at my job, but I’m not wild with excitement about it. I was in a meeting today about the best color for new toys and I could not have cared less. I don’t have hobbies or boyfriends, and I’m not even that good at sex, because I’m lacking basic passion. That’s it. That’s the bottom of it.”

      Rafe was stunned at the tirade, and not entirely sure how to respond.

      “You were led to this conclusion because?”

      She dropped her head back, groaning. “Ken, my boss, he told me I was a strong contender, maybe the best, for the new position I wanted.”

      Rafe smiled, unsure how this fit in, but going with it. “That’s terrific news!”

      “Yes, but he also suggested that while I am very good at my job, I don’t have passion for it. Ken says maybe I should rethink if I want the new position, because it demands passion.”

      She made a face when she said the word, crossing her arms tightly in front of her in what Rafe recognized from life with his sisters as a classic female defensive posture. “This is the one thing that I do not have, apparently, across all areas of my life. I’m passionless.”

      Rafe wasn’t sure how to respond, but he took in her deflated, disgruntled posture as she slumped away from him on the sofa, and did the only thing he could do, under the circumstances. He burst out laughing.

      He laughed, in fact, so hard that he started to tear up, and could hardly defend himself against the repeated thumps with the bolster pillow that Joy was hitting him with.

      “What is so funny, exactly?” she demanded, up on her knees and lording over him with the pillow, her face fierce, which made him laugh all the more—she made quite the picture.

      “You—you are. The fact that you think you don’t have any passion is one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever heard.”

      “I don’t have it, Rafe, I really don’t. It all makes sense now—the job, the sex, everything.”

      “I personally disagree, especially about the sex, but do you think maybe you might have grown up thinking passion was a bad thing? Passion was the reason your mother left your father, and took off to Europe with another man. So it got a pretty bad rap even when you were a kid.”

      She sat up straight, and he could see the thought take root in her mind.

      Joy sat back on the sofa, stunned by the revelation. She was a thirty-year-old woman who’d spent her life, even as a child, holding tightly onto any emotion, not letting anything squeak out, lest it lead her down the same path her mother had gone. She’d been living her life by rote, and she’d never even known it.

      “Joy?”

      “Oh, God, Rafe … I’ve been so stupid. I never even realized what’s been missing in my life, how afraid I’ve been of everything that’s asked me to make any small emotional investment. It’s all been locked up inside, all this time….”

      “Coming out in your dreams, though … I guess it was time for you to have this realization. My mother always says things happen when we’re ready for them to happen.”

      “I don’t know how I could have lived this way for so long, not really caring about anything, just going through the motions.”

      “Well, maybe it’s not quite that drastic. You cared about your father enough to set your own needs aside, and you care about your friends, like Pam, obviously, and you care about Second Chance—you seem pretty passionate about that to me. You’ve been really excited about the party, and even about Christmas, the last few days,” he offered.

      “I do feel differently about my work at the shelter. I never thought about it as work, per se, so I didn’t make the connection to how much more involved I am there than at my regular job. I guess that’s what Ken means about passion. I had it, have it, I just didn’t see it.”

      “Well, it can go both ways—I loved my job with complete passion, and I think I might have been a little too obsessed with it, to a degree that I burnt out, and now I have nothing else to do. It’s not a great feeling.”

      She lifted her eyes to his, and the zap of heat in her gaze, of understanding, sympathy, and passion, had his heart thumping madly.

      “I think you were probably astonishing at your job, but maybe when one passion flags, there’s a reason, and it’s time to find another,” she said softly, reaching up to touch his face. Something good—something very good—was happening between them, and for the moment, Rafe didn’t care to talk about work anymore.

      “I never knew passion before. Until you,” she confessed.

      Rafe rubbed his hands lightly up and down her arms. “You’re a passionate woman, Joy. I’ve known it from the moment I … heard you. Definitely when I touched you.”

      “Rafe,” she whispered as he eased back the jacket from her arms and started unbuttoning her shirt, dragging his knuckle along her collarbone.

      “You’re so soft…. Your skin is like butter, but you’re strong, too. It’s very sexy,” he added, unhooking her bra and working it downward.

      “Rafe … how can you be thinking of sex right now? When we’re having this serious talk?”

      “I think of sex whenever I look at you, think about you, and most definitely when I’m next to you. You’re the first woman to turn me on in a long time, Joy—you have no idea. The insomnia, and the stress from the job … I haven’t been with anyone in a while. My passions were robbed from me, too, but you’ve helped bring them back to life.”

      His hands covered her breasts, massaging gently, and her heartbeat quickened.

      She wound her arms around his neck. “Really? You haven’t been with anyone since you started losing sleep?”

      “Before that, even. I haven’t been in the mood. I don’t know why. I still can’t sleep, but I sure enjoy being awake more than I have for a long time,” he said against her skin as he bent to plant kisses across her midriff. “I am most definitely in the mood.”

      “Rafe, what about the tree?” she asked, relaxing into his touch and encouraging him to continue his exploration.

      “Later,” he said as he pulled her close in a deep, promising kiss.

       11

      RAFE HAD THE MOST gorgeous shoulders she’d ever seen. She loved running her hands over them, squeezing them, watching the muscles bunch and relax as she stroked his skin. A physique like his was built from the hard work of carrying stretchers and lugging heavy equipment. He was solid … everywhere. She slid her hand down between his taut thighs and rested it against the ridge in his jeans, sighing. Yep, solid.

      “Tempt me all you want, lady, I’m bound and determined to hold out against your feminine wiles,” he quipped, tugging the firm tip of one breast between his lips. When he sucked the tender flesh, darting his tongue over her as he did so, the sensations ignited a desire so fierce that she couldn’t think clearly.

      “I don’t think either of us will hold out for long,” she panted. Her clothes gone, she could finally glory in the touch of his lips and hands on her skin. He scraped his beard-roughened cheek against the side of her breast, and she loved it. She wound her hand around the back of his neck, urging him on.

      She’d never had sex on her living-room floor—or any floor—before. Lame, but true.

      “Hey, what about you?” she

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