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The gun Noah brought her this time was a small revolver that looked like something Nero Wolfe might have carried. She still didn’t like guns, but at least this one didn’t look like something favored by guys named Vinnie and Sal.

“It’s a thirty-eight, not a six-and-a-half,” he said as he extended it with the barrel aimed to the side. “But try it on anyway.”

She eyed it warily, still reluctant to touch it.

“It’s not loaded,” he told her.

But it was still an instrument created to kill someone. Marnie preferred instruments created to make beautiful music. So she was understandably hesitant. Finally, she took the gun from him, her arm immediately falling in response to the surprisingly heavy weight of the thing.

“It will be even heavier when it’s loaded,” he said as she lifted the weapon again. “You should come to the range every morning this week to practice. The muscles in your shooting arm will hurt at first, even with a small firearm like that, so you’ll need to get in a regular workout.”

Wow. Never in her life had Marnie suspected she would someday have a shooting arm. What would be next? A decoder leg?

“Okay,” she said cautiously. “Show me what to do.”

He started with the basics, loading and unloading the revolver, which he made Marnie do a dozen times because her fingers kept trembling and fumbling with the pieces. When she finally managed to insert all six bullets in just over thirty seconds—a new record Noah told her, since even newbies in training for the first time could do it twice as fast—she strode to the nearest range to actually fire the damned thing.

“We forgot to turn on the lights,” she said as she preceded him into a tiny room. It was barely big enough for one person to be comfortable shooting, let alone two.

Automatically, she spun around to look for a light switch, and ran face first—or, more accurately, chest first—into Noah, who had already entered and closed the door behind himself. He—likewise automatically, she was sure—caught her by the upper arms to steady her, but did nothing to move her away from him. Because there wasn’t enough room in the confined space, she was sure. Though that didn’t explain why he seemed to be curling his fingers more intimately over her arms and pulling her even closer….

“Noah,” she said softly, splaying her free hand over his chest in a halfhearted—and, she had to admit, reluctant—effort to stop him. He did, but not before she felt her body pressing against his from chest to shin. She swallowed with some difficulty and added quietly, “One of us needs to turn on a light.”

He shook his head. And still didn’t release her. “The light’s supposed to be dim,” he said. “I want you to be able to aim in all situations.”

“Wouldn’t it be better for an amateur to start off with bright lights? All the better to see you with?”

“It’s better with the lights low the first time. Trust me.”

Funny, but she was beginning to think he was talking about something other than shooting. A gun, she meant. Or, at least, a mechanical one. “I, um, I never heard that before,” she said.

“Trust me, Marnie.”

He definitely seemed to be talking about something besides the weapon in her hand, but Marnie figured it probably wasn’t a good idea to ask for clarification just then. Mostly because she was hoping for the sort of clarification he had assured her wouldn’t happen again. So she nodded and turned around, focusing on the black silhouette of a paper man at the end of the range instead of the flesh-and-blood man who stood behind her. That became a tad more difficult, however, when the flesh-and-blood man behind her stepped close enough that his body was touching hers again, and the sandalwood scent of him surrounded her.

“Your first time,” he said softly, “you want to take it slow and easy, and make sure you do it right. Notice everything. The way the weapon feels pressing against your palm, the weight and size and shape of it. Feel how the surface warms in your hand as you close your fingers over it. Grip it gently, but firmly.”

Marnie’s heart began to pound in her chest for some reason, and heat rushed through her body, warming parts of her that had nothing to do with the gun in her hand.

“Don’t rush into anything the first time,” Noah said softly from behind her. “Get to know the weapon intimately. As you let yourself get accustomed to the feel of it in your hand, think about how you’re going to handle it, how much pressure you want to exert when you curl your finger over the trigger. Take your time touching it and investigating it the first time, Marnie. Take all the time you want.”

A hot fist clenched her belly, squeezing tight. There was no way he could be talking about what he seemed to be talking about. Her errant thoughts just made his words sound sexual. Even erotic. The weapon he referred to was the weapon she held in her hand right now. Just because she was thinking about an entirely different kind of gun…

“The first time can be a little intimidating,” he told her.

Whoa, yeah, she thought. It sure could. Especially with a man like him.

“That’s why,” he continued, “for the first time, you should let go of all your inhibitions and claim the weapon with confidence.”

Well, if he insisted…

“Get to know the weapon.”

Here? Now? Was he serious?

“Take possession of the weapon.”

Marnie’s mouth went dry as he skimmed his fingers down the length of her arm to the hand that held the gun. Gently, he lifted it, guiding it upward, toward the target at the end of the range. She barely saw it, however, because her eyes fluttered shut the moment Noah’s hand connected with hers. He must have felt it trembling, because he closed his fingers more insistently over hers as he extended both of their arms forward, then moved his other hand to her waist to help keep her body balanced.

At least, that was what she thought he was doing. Until the hand at her waist continued its forward motion, and his arm followed, roping completely over her midsection to pull her body back against his.

She felt him all along her then, his front pressed into her back from her shoulders to her thighs. At the small of her back, she felt the evidence of his arousal. Evidently, they
had
both been thinking about the same weapon during his instruction, and now she wanted nothing more than to carry through with everything he had told her to do. Instinctively, she moved her hips backward in response, something hot and frantic splashing in her belly when Noah’s arm around her waist tightened, pulling her back even more. He growled something unintelligible under his breath and dipped his head to the curve of her neck, pressing his mouth to the skin above her collar. She sighed as she tipped her head to the left, to expose even more of her skin for him to taste.

He must have sensed she was about to drop the gun, because he closed his fingers over it, and she heard a soft metallic click she recognized as the safety being replaced. He set the weapon on the shelf in front of them and turned Marnie around to face him, capturing her mouth with his, covering her breast completely with one hand. He massaged her tender flesh as he thrust his tongue into her mouth, tasting her as intimately as he touched her. She opened one hand over his back and wedged the other between their bodies, cupping the part of him that swelled to even greater arousal.

The moment she touched him, he spun their bodies a quarter turn and pushed her against the wall, bracing his legs on both sides of her as he pressed himself harder against her hand. Marnie gasped at the ferocity of his response and his utter lack of inhibition, then realized it only mirrored her own. Because without even realizing what she was doing, she had dropped her other hand to his taut buttocks in an effort to push him harder into herself. As had happened the last time, they seemed to be warring for possession of the kiss. And as had happened the last time, neither seemed to care how long it would take to win. This time, however, they weren’t battling in the privacy of her home. This time, anyone could walk in on them and see what was happening.

It was the only coherent thought that permeated her brain, and it only stayed long enough for her to consider the consequences of what would happen, should they be discovered. She managed to move both of her hands to his chest, and she managed to push hard enough to make him take a step backward, so that she was able to tear her mouth away from his. Immediately, he stepped forward again, cupping her shoulders with insistent fingers, dipping his head to hers.

Until she told him, “Noah, we can’t do this here. Someone might come in and see us.”

But even then, he didn’t release her. He only gazed down into her eyes as if he couldn’t quite understand what was going on. Marnie sympathized completely. She couldn’t fathom her own behavior. Never in her life had she had such an intense response to a man. Noah Tennant had come at her from out of nowhere and turned her world, her emotions, her very self, upside down. And something told her she would never be quite the same—quite…right—again.

“I thought you said this wasn’t going to happen again,” she said softly, surprised she was able to manage the admonition, so badly did she want to succumb to it.

He continued to search her face, still looking confused. “Yeah, well…I stand corrected.”

His heartbeat battered the hand she had splayed over the middle of his chest. “So what are we going to do about it?” she asked him.

His heart rate nearly doubled at that. “There’s a hotel not far from here,” he said.

She shook her head. “No. No hotel.”

“Why not?”

Because if they went to a hotel for this, it would only be physical sex, and not…Not what she wanted. But she knew if she told him that, he’d refuse to go anywhere with her.

“Come to my house for dinner,” she said. “Tonight.”

Immediately, she sensed in him the very unease she had feared, and she knew by his expression she’d done something wrong. What, she couldn’t imagine. But she suddenly worried he was about to reject her offer—and her.

The hands on her shoulders relaxed, and she feared he was about to push her away. Especially after he pulled her forward long enough to drop a soft, almost chaste kiss on her forehead.

But when he pulled back, his eyes were still dark with wanting. “How about we go out to eat?” he asked.

She shook her head again. She wanted Noah to herself tonight. All night. Somewhere private. Where there would be no interruptions, no second-guessing, no excuses to leave. She only told him, though, “I want you all to myself.”

He smiled, and some of her uneasiness ebbed. “Then I’ll bring dinner with me to your house,” he said.

He was offering her a compromise. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she did. He didn’t want to come to her house at all, but he would, if she declined to cook for him. She supposed she understood. Cooking was such a homemakerish thing to do. And no way were the two of them looking to make a home together. She wasn’t honestly sure what they
were
looking to do—something between physical sex and emotional commitment, evidently. If such a thing even existed.

In spite of her troubled thoughts, she said, “All right. You can bring dinner to my house tonight.”

He nodded, but she could tell he still wasn’t quite happy with the arrangement. Then again, neither was she. So they were even. And in the long run, both of them would get what they ultimately wanted. To find some release for whatever was burning up the air between them.

“I’ll see you tonight then,” she said.

“I’ll be there at seven.”

Neither seemed to know what to say after that. The gun she was supposed to be learning how to use lay neglected on the shelf while the two of them continued to stare at each other, her hands opened on his chest, his roving idly up and down her arms.

“So what do we do in the meantime?” Marnie asked. “I mean, you’re supposed to be teaching me how to shoot a gun.”

He smiled at that, in a way that let her know he understood the double entendre. “Then I guess we better get started.”

A
T EXACTLY SEVEN O’CLOCK
that evening, a soft rap sounded on Marnie’s front door. Which she had no trouble hearing, since she was standing roughly two inches away from her front door when the rapping sounded, exactly where she had been standing for the past thirty minutes, trying to fend off hyperventilation and nausea.

She still couldn’t believe she had invited Noah to her house tonight for the sole purpose of having sex with him. She’d never done such a thing in her life and was still questioning her sanity in having done it today. All right, yes, she was an adult woman with adult needs and desires, and she was attracted to an adult man who was perfectly willing to satisfy all of them. And yes, it was the twenty-first century and women had earned the right to have sex on their own timetable, under their own terms, with whomever they chose. That didn’t make what was about to happen any less important. Or exciting. Or scary.

She inhaled a deep breath and checked her appearance as well as she could. She’d dressed in an effort to look sexy but not desperate, finally opting for a swingy circular skirt the color of tobacco and a clingy off-the-shoulder top in cream. To accessorize them, she’d added gold hoop earrings, a thin gold chain necklace and bracelet and brown flats. She knew flats didn’t exactly scream rutting, relentless sex so much as they screamed
I’ve been working all day and, man, are my dogs tired,
but she’d had to make do. She’d done better, she hoped, with the black lacy panties and translucent black bra, both of which were held together—barely—by red velvet ribbon. Well, a girl had to have
some
sexy lingerie, didn’t she? Even if she didn’t wear it very often. Or, you know, ever.

She reached for the doorknob just as a second series of soft raps sounded, but hesitated long enough to quell the ripple of nerves winnowing through her belly. Telling herself she was as ready as she was every likely to be, Marnie took a deep breath and slowly pulled the front door open. She almost didn’t recognize him at first, so accustomed had she become to seeing him in his nondescript black suits. Tonight, Noah was dressed in a way that was much more casual, and much sexier.

She wondered if he’d been digging through his closets and drawers all evening, too. Because if he had, and if she was even half as sexy as he was at the moment, then she was very sexy indeed.

His gently faded blue jeans were topped by a lightweight sweater the color of a winter forest with a shirt collar the same hue peeking out from beneath. Somehow the combination of indigo and forest brought a darker hue to his blue, blue eyes. The sun had disappeared into the trees on the other side of the street, staining the purpling sky with streaks of amber and ocher that somehow got tangled in his tawny hair, too. In one hand, he carried a bottle of wine—something red by the looks of it—and in the other, he held an oversize shopping bag emblazoned with the logo for an upscale, and very expensive, eatery presumably from his part of town.

She should be famished, she knew. But her appetite fled the moment her gaze connected with his and she saw the raw, unmitigated desire burning in his eyes. That was when her hunger took a turn toward something else. Wherein she became ravenous indeed.

“You, um, you look different,” she said by way of a greeting. “I never would have pegged you as the blue jeans sort.”

He lifted a shoulder, let it drop. “Consider it my rebellion to the prep school uniforms I always had to wear growing up.”

“Ah,” she said. Then, remembering she’d invited him here for rutting, relentless sex, which wasn’t going to happen as long as he was out on her front porch—not without the police being called, anyway—she opened the door wider and said, “Come in.”

He entered, but never took his eyes off her face as he strode past, turning his body until he was walking backward as he headed down the hallway toward her kitchen. So Marnie brushed past him to take the lead, not wanting him to trip and break a leg. That would ruin any chance they had for rutting, relentless sex. And she congratulated herself when, at the end of the hall, she made herself turn right into the kitchen instead of left into her bedroom. No easy feat, that, coming on the heels, as it did, of that rutting, relentless sex thing.

She’d set the table in the dining room for dinner—with her china, crystal and silver, no less—so Noah was able to place the bag and the wine on the kitchen table. Immediately, he began digging into the former to withdraw foam and paper cartons in several shapes and sizes, arranging them haphazardly as he went. There was no way the two of them could consume all that for one meal, and Marnie found herself wondering if he was planning to stay the week. If so, yay.

“Noah?” she said as he withdrew the last of their dinner and set it on the table, then began to fold up the big bag.

“Yeah?” he said, reaching for the wine.

But he looked up at her before he grabbed it, and his expression changed drastically. Evidently, he could tell what she had on her mind. Because one minute Marnie was leaning against her refrigerator door watching him, and the next, she was wrapped in his arms, his mouth slanted over hers. For a long time, he only kissed her, his hands skimming along her spine, curling over her nape, tangling in her hair, opening over her back. She lifted her own hands to his rough face, his smooth shoulders, his silky hair, savoring his different textures, relishing the heat and strength and barely caged power beneath her fingertips.

There was so much of him in that moment. He towered over her and surrounded her, seemed to touch her everywhere. Every time she inhaled, she consumed great gulps of his scent, and her mouth was filled with the taste of him. His heart pummeled against her own so fiercely she fancied she could hear its ragged thump-thump-thumping mixing with the rapid gasping of his breath.

Then she ceased to think at all. Because the hands he’d settled on her hips crept lower, inching over the curve of her fanny, curling over the lower swells to drive her body forward into his. Marnie responded instinctively, rubbing herself against him, sinuously, seductively, reveling in the growl of satisfaction he emitted in reply. He bunched the fabric of her skirt in both fists and began to pull it upward, and she felt the cool kiss of air on the backs of her legs with every new bit of flesh that was exposed. When he’d managed to jerk the garment all the way up, he drove his hands into her panties, cupping her bare flesh with confident fingers, dipping one into the sensitive cleft of her behind.

“Oh,” she murmured against his mouth. “Oh, Noah…”

But he captured her lips again before she could say more. Not that she really wanted to say anything else, since she was much too consumed by the feel of him. And the taste of him. And the scent of him. And the sound of him. As he kissed her, he palmed and kneaded her flesh, pushing her against his ripening erection again and again, until she wedged a hand between their bodies to cup that part of him herself.

He growled his enthusiasm, moving his hips against her hand. He was so big, so hard, so much more than she had anticipated he would be. Eagerly, she unfastened the button at his waist and tugged down the zipper, tucking her hand inside his jeans, then his boxers, to cover him more intimately. Flesh to flesh, the way he was touching her. He sprang even more fully erect at the contact, his full head pressing into her palm, hot and velvety and smooth.

“Let’s skip dinner,” he murmured into her ear. “There’s something else I’d rather eat.”

She very nearly climaxed right there.

Instead, she somehow managed to whisper those three very important words: “Refrigerator. Reheat. Later.”

Instead of following her instructions, Noah kissed her again, covering her mouth with his, thrusting his tongue inside, pushing her body against his own once more. Marnie let herself succumb for long moments before reminding herself that the sooner they stowed their meal, the sooner they could forget about it and move on to other, more insistent, appetites.

Tearing herself away from him, she jerked open the refrigerator door and began stuffing containers inside, not bothering to see where they landed. Then she closed the door and leaned back against it and said softly, “So. Where were we?”

His eyes darkened and he took a step toward her. Marnie’s heart raced in anticipation of what he would do or say. But he only lifted a finger to her mouth and traced her lower lip with exquisite care. And he only said, “I believe you were about to invite me into your bedroom.”

As if he needed an invitation.

They covered the distance in a half-dozen strides, but Marnie halted just inside her bedroom, trying to see it from Noah’s point of view. She’d always thought it a comfortable room, but suddenly it seemed unbearably feminine, the sort of room that would make a man recoil in fear for his testosterone levels.

She’d left on the lamp by the bed—the frilly Victorian one with the silk, fringed shade—so the room was softly illuminated with buttery light. Flowered chintz curtains covered both windows now that darkness had fallen, their pattern reflected in the overstuffed parlor chair in the corner. She’d turned down the bed in preparation for the evening—well, what was the point in pretending?—but the crocheted coverlet seemed tidy in the extreme. A hooked rug with more flowers spanned the hardwood floor between the door and bed, and the cherrywood furnishings were decorated with scrollwork and—oh, dammit—even more flowers.

Noah ought to be fleeing for the front door any moment…

Instead, he entered the room behind her and slipped an arm around her waist, then pushed her hair aside and placed a soft kiss on her nape. Oh. Okay. So he obviously had enough testosterone to ward off even a room like this. That became obvious when he encircled her waist with his other arm and pulled her backward, because his arousal surged against her backside, something that sent heat rocketing through her entire body. When he buried his head in the curve where her neck joined her shoulder, Marnie arched backward, reaching behind herself to thread the fingers of both hands through his hair. The position left her vulnerable—which, of course had been her intention—and Noah took advantage of that vulnerability, moving his hands to her breasts.

First he gently kneaded her through the fabric of her top as he drew his mouth along the bare skin of her neck and shoulder. Then he dropped his hands to the hem of the garment and dragged it up, over her head. Then he cast it aside and unzipped her skirt, letting that slide down over her hips and legs. When it pooled around her ankles, Marnie stepped out of her shoes, too, and kicked everything aside, laughing softly when Noah starting kicking impatiently, too.

She turned to face him, waiting for the shyness she thought would overcome her at being half-dressed when he was still fully clothed. But when she saw the look on his face, she felt strangely empowered instead. His gaze raked over her from her face to her feet and back again, only his eyes seemed darker on the return trip than they had been before.

“Nice,” he said. Though whether he was referring to her lingerie or what lay beneath it, Marnie couldn’t have said.

“Very, very nice.”

Before she realized his intention, he had jerked off his sweater and began to unbutton his shirt, but she covered his hands with hers to stop him before he had the chance. “Let me do it,” she said softly.

Immediately, he dropped his hands to his sides, and Marnie took her time slipping each button through its hole. When the last one was open, she tucked her hands beneath the shirt at his shoulders and pushed the garment off him, her heart pounding faster when she viewed the collection of muscle and sinew revealed beneath. He was spectacular, with broad shoulders and a sturdy torso that tapered into a lean waist. Tawny hair covered his chest from shoulder to shoulder, narrowing at his navel before disappearing into his unfastened jeans. His arousal was more than evident there, and Marnie’s mouth went dry at the thought of the night ahead.

“You’re not so bad yourself,” she managed to whisper.

When he curled his fingers over her waist and kissed her again, she hooked her hands in the loose denim and pushed down, skimming it over his hips and thighs. And as she returned Noah’s kisses, she danced him slowly backward, toward her bed. When his legs bumped against it, she cupped her hands over his shoulders and pushed down, making him sit on the edge of the mattress. She straddled his lap and roped one arm around his neck, covering his mouth with hers, tasting him as deeply as she could. Her other hand fell to his hardened cock, which she stroked leisurely, methodically as she kissed him. Noah cupped his hands under the lower curves of her fanny, caressing the sensitive flesh in time to the stroking of their tongues.

The combined touches and kisses aroused Marnie to the point of near-completion, so she abruptly ended the kissing and levered herself off Noah’s lap. He opened his mouth to utter an objection, but halted when she kneeled before him and cupped her hands over his powerful thighs. Gently, she pushed his legs open, and with great care, she bent her head over him and drew him fully into her mouth.

Noah hissed his approval as she sucked him in deep, then sighed with pleasure when she released him enough to circle the head of his shaft with her tongue. She felt his fingers in her hair, sifting, threading, petting, heard his ragged respiration as she moved her mouth over him again and again and again. She tasted the erotic, musky strength of him against her tongue, felt the rapid pulsing of his blood beneath her fingertips. And in that moment, Marnie knew she had complete control of him.