Don’t let this chance slip through your fingers.
According to the thriving small town gossip, he wasn’t seeing anyone, which gave her an excellent reason to use what she’d heard described as the oldest technique in the book to get over what happened with David. She was going to get under Lucas Ridgeway. Tonight. A single, uncomplicated interlude without any awkwardness because he’d leave for the town council meeting.
She should probably attend, too. Mrs. Battle, a lifelong Walkers Ford resident and her assistant at the library, would be there, providing continuity to the permanent hire, assuming the city council ever got around to choosing one. The relationship between the previous library director, the former police chief, and the fire chief was contentious at best. Efforts to usher the library into the digital age had stalled while Mrs. Battle struggled with cancer, and gone dormant in the months Alana served as the temporary library director while the council slowly weeded through applications.
Ushering libraries into the digital age was her research focus during her master’s program. At his request, she’d given Mayor Mitch Turner a fairly lengthy document outlining a wide variety of possible approaches to upgrading the library. It was an interesting challenge. The library, built with money donated by Andrew Carnegie in the early 1900s, was a beautiful old building dangerously near the point of being irreparable. Something would have to be done, soon, although she assumed the something would be done by whoever they hired full-time. . . .
But she had no long-term business in town. She’d committed to a short-term contract, which extended month after month as the council dickered over who to hire.
The wrench thudded back into the toolbox.
Stay focused.
“Do you want a beer?” she asked.
“Yeah. Thanks.”
In the time it took him to extract himself from his contortionist’s position under the cabinet, she went into the kitchen and snagged a bottle from the fridge. Back in the tiny bathroom she handed him the bottle. He twisted the cap off and tossed it on the counter, then tipped it back. His throat worked as he swallowed. Her heart skittered in her chest.
Then he turned sideways to step through the door just as Alana made the same move. They ended up chest to chest in the narrow door frame, her breasts brushing that rock-solid chest with each breathy inhale. An electric charge sparked between them, heating the air as she looked up at him. He didn’t move closer, or take her mouth. He simply stayed a breath and a heartbeat away, like he was waiting for her to close the distance.
She went on tiptoe and brushed her lips against his, slow and hot, striking sparks. One arm tightened around her waist, pulling her against his body as he leaned back into the frame, adding to her breathlessness. He wasn’t like any other man she’d kissed. He let her lead, waited for her tongue to touch his before responding, somehow both completely male and completely available to her all at once.
“What are we doing, Alana?”
She grew bolder, drawing back to nibble at the sensitive corner of his mouth, pressing herself against him, and felt his erection thicken against her lower belly.
“Okay,” he said with a growl, and backed out of the doorway and down the hall until the backs of his legs hit the boxy arm of the sofa. He tipped backward. She landed on top of him, forcing a grunt that became a groan as they shifted up until his head lay against a red throw pillow. The vivid color softened his brown eyes, or maybe that was the simmering heat radiating from his big body. She wove their legs together, gripped the armrest over his head, and kissed him through the groan into hot, sexy demand. He looped one leg over hers and rubbed his erect cock against her hip and belly.
Her hands found his lower abdomen, warm skin and ridged muscle that sent a hot zing along her nerves. She looked down. His pants had ridden down again, revealing the erection straining against the waistband of his boxers. She loosened his tie, pulled it free, and dropped it on the floor. Starting with the lowest button on his dress shirt, she worked her way up to his throat, then spread the fabric wide. He looked at her, his body bared to her, his gaze unapologetically, unashamedly sexual.
And for good reason. He was built, ripped, whatever the current slang was for not an ounce of fat under skin stretched over workout-honed muscles. She looked him over, her fingers winding in that tantalizing line of hair.
“That doesn’t tickle?” she asked.