LITMIR.BIZ

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aura.

      “Oh, no. I like gunmetal, but I really love gold flecks,” he teased. “I like the green and red in your hair, too. I also like that you still have a nostril because of me. It evens out your face. Why don’t you thank me for saving it over dinner?”

      Marybell’s breathing became rapid and choppy similar to the function of her brain. “It’s ten o’ clock. Too late for dinner.” No, no, no. No dinner. No tea. No contact.

      But he doesn’t recognize me...

      And we’re going to keep it that way. How do you feel about losing everything plus putting the people you love in a circus of media?

      While she battled internally, they had somehow become pressed impossibly close together. His breath on her face, warm and minty. His thighs touching hers—thick and insanely hard. His scent—so Tag, clean, spicy. Tag’s everything mingled with her everything.

      Was there no mercy tonight?

      “But isn’t that what you were sneaking off to grab when you climbed out the window? Your dinner break is at ten, right?”

      “What makes you think I was sneaking off at all?” There was no sneaking about this. She was flat-out in hiding.

      “Simple deductive reasoning. It’s gotta be easier to get to the lunchroom by just opening the door of the phone-sexing room than by way of your office window, right?” he asked, his hips blending with hers and settling against them until the outline of him through her suddenly too-thin, zebra-striped leggings heated her whole body. “All that climbing out, climbing back in. Hard on the thighs.”

      Hard thighs. Lots of that to go round here.

      “Challenge is my middle name. I like a good one. The window seemed as good as any.”

      “So you’re not avoiding me or anything, right? Because even though your office window presents a good workout, it’s a little extreme.”

      “It’s hard to fit exercise in between takin’ calls. It was the obvious choice.”

      He shook his head. “That’s not what I asked you.”

      “What did you ask me?”

      “I asked you if you were avoiding me. I’d find it hard to believe, because who’d want to avoid a nice guy like me, but there it is. I think you’re avoiding me.”

      His point-blank stare was what was impossible to avoid. He’d pinned her with it, and he wasn’t letting her gaze go.

      Blatantly lying wasn’t her strong suit. Her strengths lay in running away. But here went nothin’. “I don’t even know you. Why would I do that?”

      “Only you have the answer to that, Marybell Lyman. What could the answer be?”

      Her silence deafened even her.

      “So, about saving your nostril...” he murmured, slow and easy, his gaze now roving over her face, taking in each feature with all-seeing eyes.

      Marybell nodded, forcing her voice to project around a thick knot in her throat. “It was amazing. So heroic and chivalrous. We should give you a superhero name. Nostril saving is hard work. It deserves at least a cape.”

      “You bet it does, and don’t the damsels in distress always have dinner with their superheroes?”

      A giggle almost erupted from her throat before she remembered hanging out with the subject you wanted to avoid and gushing about him isn’t exactly avoidance. Admiring the way their bodies fit together, soaking in his maleness like a sponge, wasn’t dodging disaster, either.

      She went slack in Tag’s arms, hoping, maybe even praying, he’d take the obvious hint. Because she couldn’t do this. This wasn’t allowed. It was just Marybell for always. No one was permitted in. Not even casually.

      She shrugged. “Do they? I thought they never did normal things with their superheroes because of the identity thing. It was always on the DL, full of subterfuge and innuendo.” Oh, the parallels to be had.

      “Then it’s a good thing I’m not like every other superhero, because I’m definitely available for dinner, and for the record, I don’t care if you tell people I’m the one who saved your nostril. No subterfuge here.”

      “You have chivalry down to a science, but I’m not dat—”

      Tag’s lips were on hers before she’d even formulated the rest of her sentence. Greedy. Hot. Firm. Demanding. Knee-buckling hungry. Tasting like mint and man.

      So much man. More man than even she’d dreamed up.

      Before her brain got in the way, Marybell was returning his kiss, melting against the solid wall of his chest, her nipples taut and rigid, pushing with need at her leather jacket.

      Tag’s breath mingled with hers when she inhaled sharply, acutely aware of every sensation he aroused in every nerve ending she owned.

      Her breasts swelled in her bra, driving against the material until her nipples tightened even harder. Things began to happen between her legs, too, wet, swollen things she’d long since left behind.

      Tag’s tongue slipped into her mouth on a low groan, silky and taut, driving, tasting, deepening their kiss. With his arm around her waist, he hauled her tight to his body until Marybell had to dig her fingers into his thick shoulders to keep from tipping them over.

      His arms tightened when her fingers sought the fringe of his hair at the bottom edge of his knit hat, the muscles in them flexing in firm ripples. She rolled the soft wisps between her digits, touching, memorizing the strands.

      Tag’s kiss was everything, forcing her to see, hear, feel only him.

      There was nothing but this kiss. This breath-stealing, mind-melding kiss. Everything about this kiss was wrong, but right. So right.

      No. So wrong, Marybell.

      But this kiss...

      Tag’s lips were leaving hers in a sudden release of suction and air, allowing the sounds of the chilly night to crowd around her.

      He looked down at her as though he wasn’t exactly sure what had just happened, either, but the emotion flickered and died, swiftly replaced with a grin that made the corners of his eyes wrinkle upward. “Dinner. Tomorrow night on your break. I’ll make it. All you have to do is show up. Bring your nostrils,” he said on a husky chuckle.

      There was no chance for protest. No time for regret. No time to do anything but watch Tag’s broad back exit the bushes, hear his footsteps hard on the pathway that led back to the guesthouse.

      Shaken, Marybell reached for the side of the house, pulling air into her lungs. It hit her chest in sharp, razorlike pangs.

      Panic began its deep dive into her stomach, clawing and burning until she almost choked on it.

      She couldn’t have dinner with Tag Hawthorne. She couldn’t have anything with him—ever.

      In fact, if he found out exactly who she was, her head would be a selection on the menu—not a dinner date.

      She’d seen him angry. In the one comment he’d made to a reporter at the courthouse just before the trial. Knew what true contained rage looked like in Tag’s eyes—in the clench of his fists. Marybell shivered at that rage.

      Like her, everything had once been taken from him. She understood what that did to you. Her core hurt from what that did to her.

      But Tag was unknowingly toying with the alleged enemy, and she had to find a way to keep him at bay.

      Her panic evolved into bitter disappointment.

      All because of that kiss.

       Four

      “You did what?” his

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