Especially since he couldn't push the fantasy image of her in the bathtub, the warm water and soap suds sliding over her naked curves, out of his head.

Nine o'clock found him sitting in the bar with a couple of guys having a burger and drinking a beer, listening to them talking about the girls they'd been hitting on out on the slopes that afternoon.

"Hey," one of them said after they'd all gotten another refill from the well-endowed waitress that both of his buddies were clearly hoping to get it on with later, "Did you know Zach is doing house calls now?" At Gabe's frown, d.i.c.k explained, "I dropped by to have my tires rotated and while we were shooting the s.h.i.t, he was talking about some girl he'd met the night before who had the same tires. Got a flat so he went by her place to fix it for her."

Gabe stopped with the beer halfway to his mouth. He'd forgotten all about his brother's offer to fix Megan's tire.

"Jesus," their other friend John said, "she must have some great a.s.s for Zach to head over to her house to change her tire."

Gabe slammed the beer down so hard on the table it sloshed out onto his hand. They all knew what a dog his brother was, that the only reason he'd go change a woman's tire was as some kind of screwed-up foreplay.

Seconds later Gabe was in front of Megan's hotel room door. He couldn't think straight, couldn't see anything but Zach pulling Megan into his arms and seducing her.

Oh, h.e.l.l no.

She was his.

He slammed his fist into the dark brown wood and when she opened the door, he stepped inside, caught the edge of the door in his hand, and pushed it shut behind him almost before she could register what had happened.

"Gabe?"

She was standing in front of him wearing nothing but a towel, her hair wet, her shoulders and arms still covered in droplets of water.

"You can't date my brother," he growled. "Any of my brothers ."

"What are you talking about?"

He advanced on her even as she backed up to get away from him. "Zach. He went to your house on Sunday ."

"He fixed my flat tire."

"I'll bet that's not all he wants to fix." He had her almost pinned against the wall by then. "He's going to ask you out. The answer is no ."

Surprise turned to outrage in a flash of her green eyes. Instead of continuing to retreat, she was the one advancing on him this time .

"I'll say yes if I want to."

"Like h.e.l.l you will."

She moved a step closer. "Just because you saved my life doesn't mean you can tell me how to live it."

Everything went still for Gabe. "Do you want to say yes? Do you want to date my brother ?"

Megan stopped, too, right where she was, her eyes wide, her breath coming in short pants against the towel she was gripping closed at her throat .

"No."

The breath he hadn't let himself take came rushing through him in a flood of relief. "I swear," he said, hearing the pure raw need in his voice and knowing he couldn't do a d.a.m.n thing to stop it, "I tried to have self-control ."

Megan's lips were wet where her tongue had just come out to lick at them. "Me too," she admitted in a whisper .

As he reached for her hips and took a handful of the towel in each hand to pull her body into his, Gabe admitted to himself that jealousy over Zach changing her tire was just the final excuse he'd needed to take what he wanted all along.

Megan.

He wanted Megan.

And tonight he was finally going to have her.

Megan stood in the circle of Gabe's arms, knowing everything she wanted was just a breath away-and that, at the same time, it could all be gone just as fast. He'd kissed her before and still left.

Right or wrong, she knew that if that happened tonight, she'd be left needing, wanting, without him.

She'd never been a woman to trade on her looks for anything in her life. Just as she'd never deliberately acted against what she knew she should do. She shouldn't seduce Gabe into staying. Not when she knew better. Not when a whole lot more than just one hot night could end up on the line.

But there was a first time for everything, she was starting to realize...even listening to that wily and seductive little voice in her head that told her everything would be all right, that it wouldn't hurt anyone or anything for her to take this one night and enjoy every single second in his strong arms until the sun rose again in the sky.

Maybe if that sensual woman buried so deep inside of her hadn't been lured out little by little over the past few days by this beautiful man, she might have been able to ignore the voice. The need.

But, for one night, desire insisted on getting its due.

She lifted her gaze from Gabe's mouth to his eyes just as she loosened her grip on the towel. She felt him still against her as he realized what she was doing. And then, he was shifting his grip on her hips to give her the room to let go of the towel completely.

White cotton fell away from her damp skin and landed in a heap on the ground...leaving her completely naked before Gabe.

"Sweet Lord, you're beautiful."

His reverent whisper ran over her, through her, caressing the nerve endings at the peaks of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the throbbing heat between her thighs, all the way into that spot in her heart she'd vowed to keep safe from a man like Gabe.

She waited to feel his hands come back around her hips, naked skin against naked skin. She knew what would happen now, that in a matter of moments she'd be beneath him on the bed and they'd be going after each other without any preliminaries necessary.

But a moment later, as his hands slid gently into her wet hair, she realized her mistake. Gabe Sullivan wasn't like other men, who would have gone straight for the ultimate prize .

On the contrary, he was surprising her with- oh my!- a sweeter kiss than any other man had ever given her .

His mouth covered hers, molding her lips with his so softly she almost couldn't feel anything at all. Just warmth. And so much pleasure as he deepened the kiss, as he found the curves of her lower lip with his tongue and slowly slid across it, that she couldn't hold back a whimper.

"Gabe, please."

She didn't realize that she was begging-already, with nothing more than just a soft kiss-until he said against her mouth, "Slow, baby. That's how we're going to do this tonight."

"I don't know if I can do slow," she said, her body reinforcing her words by moving closer to him so that her bare b.r.e.a.s.t.s were pressed into his chest .

The rough gauge of his long-sleeved wool shirt rubbed so deliciously against the already hard points that she gasped at the incredible sensation of rubbing her naked body up against his fully clothed one. There was something so deliciously naughty about it all. Megan had only ever been naughty, had only ever let herself get that close to danger and the adrenaline that came with it, in her private fantasies .

But something about Gabe made her suddenly want to see all those dangerously seductive fantasies come to life.

"Megan ."

He groaned her name, sounding like a man lost, just as lost as she knew she already was to him. His hips ground against hers, backing her up against the wall, her thighs opening to let him in. And oh, how she loved the way the thick bulge behind the zipper of his jeans pressed into just the right spot .

She shouldn't be this close to the edge, shouldn't be only the barest touch, the slightest caress away from coming apart for him. But the truth was that every moment they'd spent together not touching, not kissing, trying to keep their distance from each other, had been foreplay. Some of the most intense foreplay of her life.

"I could take you now, could be inside of you in seconds." His voice was rough at her ear, his words blunt and oh-so-s.e.xy, making her heart race with wanting what he was describing. "Just like this, up against the wall, your legs wrapped around my hips, with you coming around me as I take you hard and fast."

Yes! That was what she wanted. What she needed .

Only, instead of doing any of those things, he stilled his hips against hers and lifted his face from that spot beside her ear where he was filling her head with naughty visions. His blue eyes seared her with heat .

"But that's not how we're going to do this tonight, Megan."

Her eyes widened at the confident statement. "But what if that's what I want?" came from between her lips, barely above a whisper.

"You'll want this more," he said, and then he was bending his head to lick into the hollow of her shoulder .

She arched her neck into his sweetly sensual kiss, her skin trembling beneath the tender onslaught .

No man had ever talked to her like this, told her what to antic.i.p.ate, promised her ecstasy if only she'd follow where he led. She was just pragmatic enough, had taken care of herself for long enough, to think that she shouldn't like whispered promises from a man who clearly knew exactly how to drive a woman wild with wanting. And yet as his mouth traveled up her neck, alternating soft little bites with the warm press of his tongue over the small hurt, she knew the truth for what it was .

She loved it.

He pulled back and slid his hands from her hair, down her arms to take her hands, and that slow glide of the calloused skin on his palms across the inside of her elbow, her wrist, was just about as good as any o.r.g.a.s.m any other man had given her.

Gabe threaded his fingers intimately through hers and even though she was already naked, even though she'd all but been begging him to take her up against the wall moments before, the feel of being held like that-like more than just a lover for the night-rocked all the way past her skin and bones, heading straight to the core of her heart. And, amazingly, even though he'd shifted away enough to easily take in her nudity, he never looked away from her eyes for a single second.

It was crazy for tears of emotion to rush at her and she tried to blink them away before he noticed, but maybe it was the hitch in her breathing that gave her away.

"You and me, we're going to talk to each other tonight. You're going to tell me when I make you feel good...or if I don't."

She licked her lips, knew he was right. They weren't kids taking a tumble together. "It's good so far," she said in a soft voice. "Really good."

"But?"

Any other man would have pushed past her obvious emotions, but Gabe was doing just the opposite .

"I expected hot." She slid her thumbs against his palms. "I was ready for hot."

His eyebrow quirked up at that. "Really?"

She shook her head slightly. "Well," she admitted, "maybe not exactly ready for it, but I'm not surprised."

"Me either," he said, and then, "Tell me what's surprising."

She didn't know how to put words to it, other than to say, "Everything else."

His eyes darkened, his fingers tightening on hers. "I wish I were surprised," he said in a low voice, raw with need and something else she was afraid to dissect. He lifted her hands to his mouth and managed to kiss them both at the same time.

Oh G.o.d, what this man was going to do to her...how would she ever recover from this night? she wondered helplessly as he slowly brought her hands back down and began to move them apart. If it were just hot s.e.x, that would be one thing. But what if he were looking to seduce more than just her body?

What if he was going for her heart, too?

His eyes moved slowly from her face down to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and held. The seconds ticked by, one after the other, as he took in every inch of her skin. She couldn't stop herself from following his hot gaze to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and both of them watched as her nipples puckered up hard, pulling her full b.r.e.a.s.t.s up higher on her chest .

"Touch me," she begged, desperate to feel his hands, his mouth on her. "I need you to touch me."

Gabe gave no indication of having heard her, nothing but the way he took their joined hands and placed hers on either side of his jean-clad hips. He didn't rush as he slid his fingers from hers, and those painfully drawn out moments of waiting only added to her need .

And then- finally! -he was reaching for her, his fingertips feathering out across her stomach and then up her rib cage. She sucked in a hard breath at the intense pleasure of Gabe's touch. He hadn't even come close to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s yet, but already she felt insanely good.

She bit her lip as he continued his sinfully slow path of sensual destruction up her body .

"So soft," he murmured, just at the lower swell of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "So pretty." His palms shifted that final inch to cup the full flesh. "So perfect."

There was no holding back another moan as his thumbs both moved across her nipples at the same time, not a chance of keeping her back from arching her chest further into his big hands.

But when he lowered his head and blew across one of her nipples, she nearly came right then and there. His eyes met hers, full of approval and unabashed pleasure at her reaction. "You're sensitive, aren't you ?"

He rubbed his thumb over both nipples again, which completely forestalled her being able to answer him, as it was taking every ounce of her concentration just to keep breathing.

"Megan ?"

His low voice urged her to answer him, just as he bent slightly to blow a hot patch of air against her other breast.

"Yes," she gasped out as he followed up the breath with the sweet pinch of his thumb and forefinger over her tightly aroused flesh.

And then, before she realized what was happening, he was lifting her into his arms and carrying her over to the bed .

"I don't want your legs to give out when you come for me," he explained in a matter-of-fact voice that didn't take away from the sensual promise even one little bit .

She had already pulled back the covers before he'd arrived, and he laid her down on the clean sheets. She wouldn't let her hold around his neck go, wouldn't give him any choice but to move onto the bed with her. Who knew how he'd tease her otherwise? Maybe he'd make her touch herself while he watched and that was when she'd come so hard, with his eyes on her, all the while knowing his hands, his mouth, his shaft would be there soon...

She forcibly stopped her imaginings on a shudder, but Gabe had already caught it all, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s peaking against his chest harder than ever as the naughty vision continued to a.s.sault her already l.u.s.t-addled brain.

"Tell me what just got you so worked up."

"You."

And it was true, Gabe was all she could think about, all she could feel, all that existed for the night. But he was quicker than that, could clearly scent her evasion.

"What else?"

His gentle but firm question, that small upturn of his beautiful lips as he watched her expression carefully, had her answering, "I was wondering what you were going to do to me to-" She swallowed hard, not having ever had any practice at talking dirty in bed. And yet, even though it was another thing she shouldn't want, that sensual woman deep inside made her say, "-to make me come so hard."

He shifted over her and she had to close her eyes at the wonderful press of his muscles into her, the feel of roughened fabric over her sensitive skin.

He lowered his head to the other side of her neck from where he'd licked before and pressed circles of pleasure against her skin with his tongue. Only this time, he didn't stop there, thank G.o.d. Instead, he moved lower, the slow slide of wet heat over the upper swell of both b.r.e.a.s.t.s taking her breath away in a rush of sensation. Closer and closer he came to her nipples, licking shockingly soft circles over the soft flesh, heading in toward the peaks like a bull's eye .