Riding the storm - By Julie Miller Page 0,48

half a laugh, she smiled right in his face, offering him one of those dazzling wonders that made him think of long summer days and sunshine.

Nate tried to laugh, but an onslaught of emotions rose inside him, and the sound came out in a choked, heated gasp.

“I don’t know…” She bent over at the waist to inspect the stitched-up wound. The front of her blouse gaped open, giving him a glimpse straight down to heaven.

Nate tried to look away, tried to blink. But he seemed to be a greedy son-of-a-gun when it came to Jolene’s maternally enhanced figure.

“It’s functional, but not very pretty,” she observed.

“It’s fine.” Everything he could see was very fine.

“When we get back into Turning Point, I want that Dr. Sherwood friend of yours to take a look at it.” Jolene probed the skin around her handiwork and Nate struggled not to wince. But goose bumps unrelated to pain prickled the instant she stroked her cool fingers across his heated skin, as if the caress hadn’t been motivated by professional curiosity.

Jolene straightened to reach her supplies, hiding Nate’s view of her cleavage, but she drifted even closer. Her thigh pressed against his and Nate groaned as inappropriate thoughts filled his imagination.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

Thank God he was beat up enough to camouflage the source of his pain. “Fine.”

She cut lengths of tape and babbled on. “Hopefully, Dr. Sherwood has some dissolvable sutures she can replace these with. Otherwise, I’m afraid you’re going to have a scar that looks like something Dr. Frankenstein pieced together.”

Then she was smoothing gauze across the wound. Smoothing tape across his skin. Touching. Caressing. Pressing.

Nate gripped the back of the couch and the cushion beneath him, desperately trying to maintain some sort of distance. He could use a little help here. He might not be the most whole man on the planet. But he was still a man. The parts worked. The needs were there. She had the power to drive him nuts. He dipped his head, trying to connect his gaze to hers. “You do know what you’re doing to me, don’t you?”

Jolene pushed against his shoulder and stood bolt upright. Misunderstanding his question, she retreated a step in a noisy huff, her eyes sparkling with combat. “I might not have all the experience you do, but I am a trained volunteer. The only reason that cut doesn’t look the best is because it was so ragged—”

“You have no idea, do you?” Nate frowned, his raging hormones on hold for the moment. She wasn’t arguing the right topic. “I’m not talking about your medical skills.”

“Then what are you accusing me of?”

“Nothing.”

He thought he’d been teasing her, flirting, surviving. But she’d heard an accusation. It wasn’t the first time he’d gotten the sense that Jolene wasn’t as experienced as he would expect a married woman to be. Hadn’t Mr. Angel ever had it so hot for his wife that he’d given her signals she couldn’t miss?

Nate shifted to a more comfortable position, stretching his arms out to either side, inviting her perusal. “Do you notice anything at all about me?”

The light behind him flickered off, casting her into shadow. When it came back on, her cheeks were flushed with color. Her gaze danced over his chest, lingered on the obvious swelling in his jeans, and drifted back up to meet his unblinking eyes.

“Oh.”

Now she understood.

He wasn’t reading sympathy or even anger in her expression now. Confusion twisted her mouth. Despite the evidence that he was completely turned on by her, she still tried to dismiss the tension radiating between them as a medical problem.

“You’re breathing faster.” She picked up his wrist and pressed two fingers to the underside. “Your pulse is racing.”

“Is yours?”

The sudden catch of her breath told him it was. She hadn’t let go of him yet. “Do you need me to get you something?”

“No.” Forget clinical thoughts and good intentions. He was a man on a mission, as serious as could be. Those blue eyes never broke contact with his, even as he reached for her. “This is what I need.”

Nate pulled her into his lap, tunneled his fingers into her hair and fixed his eyes on her lips. “You’re what I need.”

He kissed her once, lightly, reverently. Her mouth remained still beneath his, and she braced one hand at the center of his chest to keep her distance. But there was something hopeful in her eyes, something sweetly nervous in that habitual tuck of her hair behind her