Christmas on 4th Street (Fool's Gold #12.5)(29)

“Then you can join Ana Raquel in being right.”

“The possibility doesn’t change your mind?”

“No.”

Not a surprise, she thought. He’d seen too much to have faith. She wondered why he’d chosen to go there, rather than where she had—with the belief that all opportunities were welcome.

“It’s getting late,” he said, rising to his feet. “I should go.”

She stood, ignoring the whimper from her feet. “Are you mad?”

He smiled. “No. I’m not mad.”

Do you want to have sex?

She wasn’t sure where the question came from, but once formed, it didn’t want to go away. Not that she was going to speak the question. Her fearlessness had limits.

Still, the kiss yesterday had been very nice.

“Thanks for all your hard work today,” she said. “It was even more than I expected. We’ll be busy through the season, but I think this is the worst of it.”

“This is making me appreciate my day job,” he said, carrying his plate to the sink and putting his bottle into the recycling bin.

“You’re saying you don’t want a career in retail?”

He faced her. “There are things I like.”

“My sparkling wit and charm?”

She was standing by the table. He walked toward her and put his hands on her waist.

“That’s part of it,” he murmured even as he lowered his mouth to hers.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as he pulled her against him. In her stocking feet she had to shift her head back a little more than she had before, but the kiss was worth it.

His mouth was warm and hungry against hers. He moved back and forth a couple of times before settling in and brushing his tongue against her bottom lip. She parted her lips for him, welcoming the sensuous stroking along with the clenching low in her belly.

She tilted her head. Their tongues circled in that age-old dance of sexual need. He slid his hands up her back. She stepped even closer so that they were touching everywhere possible. Her br**sts flattened against his chest, her belly pressed against his groin and in a matter of seconds she felt proof of his arousal.

Her fingers instinctively tightened their grip on him. What she really wanted to do was cup them against his need. Which would first require undressing him. She remembered how he’d looked in jeans and nothing else and had to hold in a moan.

Her bedroom was just down the hall. All she had was a full-sized mattress, which meant there wouldn’t be a whole lot of room for both of them. They would have to snuggle close and that could be fun.

He broke the kiss to nibble his way along her jaw, then over to her ear. He drew her lobe into his mouth and then bit down gently. Shivers raced through her.

They definitely had to go to her room, she thought, desire making her frantic. Get in her bed and—

“I should go,” he said, dropping his arms to his sides and stepping back.

She blinked at him. “What?”

“It’s late.”

“It’s eight.”

“I know, but if I stay...”

They were going to have sex. She was fully aware of that. It was kind of the point.

“I don’t understand,” she admitted.

“I don’t have an IRA.”

Had she been drinking more than she realized? She glanced into the recycling bin and saw that no, she had only finished one beer and started a second. Even with her empty stomach, that shouldn’t be enough to get her into an altered state of consciousness.

“An IRA?”

“I’m not what you’re looking for,” he said.

Really? Because the quivering in her belly said otherwise.

“It’s not that I don’t want you,” he continued.

“Oh, good, because if you’d tried that one, I would have pointed out the obvious.”

He gave her a slow, sexy smile that had her quivering. Then the smile faded. “I like you, Noelle.”

Crap. She might have been out of practice with the whole dating thing but even she knew that any conversation that began with “I like you” was not going to end well.

“But?” she asked, bracing herself.

“But you want things I don’t believe in. You want forever. You want love. I can’t give you that. I’m leaving and even if I weren’t, that’s not me.”

“And if I just want sex?”

She happened to be glancing down as she asked and had the satisfaction of seeing his erection surge slightly.

“I don’t think my luck is that good,” he told her.

“You’re saying I’m not that kind of girl?”

“Something like that.”

She wanted to say he was wrong, only he wasn’t. She was old-fashioned. In her world, sex and love went together. Or if not love, then extreme like with the possibility of love.

Did she want to make an exception? Hold her heart carefully apart while giving Gabriel her body?

The girl bits were screaming “Yes, please. Take me now.” The rest of her was more cautious. Did she want to have what it took to be that disconnected from her feelings? Did she want making love to be that casual?

He brushed another kiss across her mouth. “You know I’m right,” he said firmly.