"Mercedes?"

The voice. She knew the voice. Sam. Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. He was silhouetted in the doorway, his hand holding the doorjamb, as if poised for flight. Her expression was probably goofier than she wanted, but she was so happy to see a familiar face. His face. Okay, there was nothing wrong with goofy.

"Hi, Sam."

"Ready?"

"Sure," she lied. Mainly she needed to find a bathroom, because in a few seconds she might possibly lose her lunch.

"Good. See you in about twenty-five minutes."

"Sounds great," answered Mercedes in a faux-cheerleader voice, even though she had never been a cheerleader, and had never wanted to be a cheerleader. She watched him leave.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Oh, G.o.d.

KRISTIN WAS COUNTING DOWN, Mercedes was seated across from Sam, a mere eighteen inches across from him, and all he could do was study the tiny silver ring on her finger. Why did she have to wear a silver ring?

He swallowed, got a last glimpse at his notes, and prepared for the camera.

"Back in three, two, one."

"And we're live." Camera three picked him up, and Sam blinked before his innate skills kicked in to save him. "Tonight, we have as our guest, Mercedes Brooks, author of The Red Choo Diaries, a work of rather steamy fiction. Ms. Brooks, welcome to the show."

"It's good to be back."

"So, I caught a glimpse of your book in the store, read some, and when I was reading, all thoughts worth anything flew out of my head. National debt? Not a problem. Trade deficit? No big whoop. Failure of the educational system? What's that? Within two pages, my brain was pretty well smashed."

Her full lips curved into a warm, welcoming smile. "I think that's the point, Sam. We have so many serious problems in the world now, it's nice to forget sometime. To get so carried away with a moment, that you don't have to worry about the national debt, the trade deficit, failure of the educational system, or even carting clothes to the laundry."

"It was nice to get carried away, certainly. But we're getting messages like yours on a daily, heck, hourly basis. Advertisers are using s.e.x to sell every product from soup to health insurance. Now how is that going to help anything? s.e.x shouldn't be thought of strictly as entertainment. What happened to the emotion behind the act?"

"Done correctly, it's still there."

He wanted to change topics to something less heated, and something less Johnson-hardening, but s.e.x was the point of this segment. It'd been his idea. Stupid idea. However, he had to stay on point. Sam swallowed and gathered his thoughts. Quickly he dove right into the mix. "But s.e.x is one of those primitive drives. It's not a corporate brand; it goes much deeper. If everything uses s.e.x to sell, s.e.x to entertain, s.e.x to tease, then it becomes nothing more than a brand." There, that one was safer.

"But you're forgetting that we need s.e.x. We need s.e.x to procreate, to reduce stress, to live longer, to keep our heart healthy, to make us happier, more functional people."

"But if we're busily engrossed in all things s.e.x, the function goes out the window."

"Has your function gone out the window, Sam?" she asked, the wicked gleam flickering in her eyes, and Sam's brain function went out the window. Every inch of him was focused on her, the gleam in her eyes. He had to see that gleam when they were making love.

He tried not to smile, but camera 2 might have caught it. "Do you ever feel bombarded by s.e.xual messages, Mercedes?"

"Sometimes."

"But after being filled with all that pressure, doesn't it diminish the desire for s.e.x? Maybe not for men, of course, we're not that a.n.a.lytical when it comes to it, but what about for women?"

"There are ways to relieve that pressure," she reminded him in a schoolteacher's voice.

Sam shifted uncomfortably, because he didn't need a hard-on right at that exact moment. Not now. He glanced up at the clock behind the cameras. Three more minutes. All he had to do was get through three more minutes. Quickly he charged into another question. An even safer question.

"Does it bother you that you write about s.e.x? Does anyone tease you about it being cheap or degrading to women?"

Mercedes flicked back her hair, and he glimpsed anger in her eyes. Anger was much better than that s.e.xy, come-hither gleam. "s.e.x is empowering to women," she started. "It may take us longer to get where we want to go, but the end result is just as sweet. Why can't women be aroused? Why should we be afraid to admit it?"

"Personally, I don't think you should be afraid to admit it. Do many women feel that same way? Afraid?"

"I know I'm not the only one."

"So, when you write about s.e.xual freedom, from a woman's point of view, you're celebrating the woman's desire and control of s.e.x? Interesting. Do you believe in love, Mercedes?"

"Absolutely."

"How do those two work together? From an empowered, s.e.xually liberated woman's point of view?"

He watched her small, white teeth nip into her lower lip. She was fascinating to watch, thoughts flying across her face, until the dark eyes widened, and the full lips split into a satisfied grin. "We all crave love as much as we crave s.e.x. In some ways, even more. That's deeper, more insidious than s.e.x. People kill for love. Not so much for s.e.x. s.e.x can be an expression of that love, or it can be a hit of pleasure, but just because you're not in love with someone, doesn't mean that s.e.x is wrong."

"And the dangers of s.e.x?"

"You talk about responsibility all the time on your show. There's nothing wrong with s.e.xual responsibility."

"But when you get carried away? When your brain gets smashed, how do you remember? What if you forget?"

"You can't forget."

"But sometimes you do."

"That's not good, and that's not what I want to represent to my readers. s.e.x has consequences. Good and bad, and you have to prepare for those consequences. If you're not prepared, you shouldn't have s.e.x."

"But isn't that the silver, uh, bra.s.s ring for erotica? Two people so carried away that they forget the stresses and the responsibilities and they act on very deep, primitive impulses, stimulated by the very media messages that you provide."

She laughed. "I just write books."

"So did George Orwell and Sinclair Lewis. They changed the world with their books."

"That's some pretty big company I'm expected to keep."

Out of the corner of his eye, he got the signal from Kristin. Thank G.o.d. "We're almost out of time, Mercedes. It's been a pleasure, and I suppose we'll agree to disagree."

"I don't think we disagree on everything," she said smoothly. Her voice was polite, almost perfunctory, but he knew. There was no invitation in the words, not even an invitation in her eyes. But he knew.

She turned to camera 2, seducing America as effectively as she had seduced him.

He smiled, a little too confident, a little too male, a little too s.e.xually charged, but he couldn't help it.

Something had happened twelve months ago. A flash of lightning, a magnetic pull. And for twelve months it had stayed buried. But no more. Tonight they were going to finish it.

MERCEDES GOT UP ON WOBBLY legs, parts of her swelling that shouldn't be swelling under the hot lights of the television cameras. She gave Sam a wobbly smile.

"You did good."

"It was fun. I thought I was going to be nervous. I was nervous. h.e.l.l, I was terrified, but then it got fun."

"I'm glad," he answered softly. She loved his voice, the smoothness, the power, the comfort. She wanted to say something witty and seductive, but her synapses were as overloaded as she was. She needed to leave, run away, and turn back into the confident, successful person that she was supposed to be. She started to go.

"Mercedes?"

She turned, looked at him, and saw the heat in his eyes. "Yeah?" she squeaked.

"You free for dinner? It's a tradition here on the show."

Oh, that was a nice touch. Make it look like it was merely business. Nothing more than a polite gesture. "I'd love to. All that talking and I'm suddenly hungry."

This time she did leave, walking unsteadily into the waiting room, her teeth chattering from the air conditioned cold. Her fingers tapped on her knees as she contemplated the depth of her over-the-headness. Sam Porter was no Andreas. Sam Porter was no plaything. He was all man, and tonight she was going to hear that seductive voice whispering heady, seduce-me words against her neck. Tonight she was going to feel that big body thrusting inside her. A moan escaped her lips, with only the clock as a witness.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

THEY HAD DINNER AT Fisherman's Wharf, at a seafood restaurant perched on a dock that reached out far into the bay. It was dark, warm, and intimate, much nicer than the waiting room at the television studio. This was a place a man took a date for privacy and romance. Across the way, the moon lit up the island prison of Alcatraz, giving it a ghostly glow. This was a place that Mercedes would write about in her book.

Sam was a wonderful companion, telling her stories about his guests, making her laugh all the way through dinner. His eyes lit up as he talked, and she could see how much he loved what he did, how pa.s.sionate he was about his work.

She liked that about him, his pa.s.sion. So many people punched a clock, and didn't care, but Sam cared. It was there in his words, his face, in the intensity that radiated from him.

It was that intensity that drew her like a magnet.

"So what've you been doing for the past twelve months-besides writing a book?"

"Not a lot. This. That."

"Nothing else to keep you busy? No personal obligations, huh?"

"Are you asking if I'm involved?" she said, meeting his eyes squarely. Mercedes had never been one to tiptoe around something; she wanted people to know she was coming.

One side of his mouth curved up, a rueful look that shouldn't have touched her like it did. Mercedes knew her way around men, she knew her way up, down, and four-way sideways. She didn't trust them as a rule, but that small hitch in his mouth tempted her to bend her rules. Just a little.

"Yeah, that's what I'm asking," he said, surprising her with his honesty.

"Free as a bird," she answered easily, her tone light.

He nodded once, only once, a supremely male nod of satisfaction, and her stomach knotted, excitement and nerves all pitching together into one tangle. She pushed the hair from her eyes with a shaking hand. It was s.e.x.

Just s.e.x. The one reason she had flown across the country was because she wanted him. Even after twelve months, that ache hadn't eased, it ate at her, pouring into her fantasies, her dreams, her writing, turning into something living, breathing inside her. Something more.

Abruptly she pushed that thought away, needing to regain her footing. "Thank you for asking me to dinner."

He leaned in closer, the candlelight touching off the tawny streaks in his hair. "Don't thank me, Mercedes. I really don't deserve it."

"This bothers you, doesn't it?"

He laughed, a rusty sound without humor. "You have no idea how much."

She flashed him her best smile. "Yeah, I think I do."

She watched as he deftly made patterns with the last of the silverware, and was pleased to see him uncomfortable, pleased to know she wasn't the only one whose nerves were shot to h.e.l.l. Finally he raised his head, his jaw tight. "I didn't plan to have this conversation over dinner."

"Is there a right time and a right place, Sam?"

His eyes glittered, more brown than green in the dim light, his desire apparent. Mercedes shifted in her seat, trapping the pulse between her thighs. "Yes," he said harshly, his carefully modulated television voice now gone.

Mercedes smiled. "In bed."

"Preferably before then."

"Maybe I like to know what I'm getting into."

"Mercedes," he started, then stopped. "No. Would you like some dessert?"

"What's on the menu?" she asked.

He closed his eyes. "Are you going to behave?"

"Dinner was your idea, not mine."

He pulled some cash from his pocket and laid it on the table. "Can we go?"

"Now we're in a hurry?" she asked.

He lifted their jackets from the coat hook at the table. "Dinner was a stupid idea. In a long line of stupid ideas. But I've waited twelve months, and right now, every minute counts."

Mercedes felt a sharp pull of excitement in her stomach. He held out her jacket, and she backed against him. Closer than she should. Close enough to brush against him. Close enough to feel him jutting thickly against her bottom. Close enough to hear his indrawn breath.

"I guess you're ready?" she asked.

He swore softly, took her arm, and hurried her out of the place.