All Through the Night by Shannon McKenna, Lori Foster, Suzanne Forster, Thea Devine Page B

it would be nice if we had some light in here.”
She half-expected him to point a finger at her table lamp and zap it on. Instead, he walked over and began to tinker with it while she gathered up the comforter and created her own igloo. She watched him expectantly, waiting for the moment when light flooded him and she could finally see the details of his face. She was dying to know what he looked like in the flesh, how he dressed and carried himself.
The shadows gave him a graceful, fluid presence, but she was very aware of his height. He was a good-sized man, and as darkly gorgeous as the winter night. She had an instinctive feel for the dimensions of her bedroom, and she could just make out the substantial contours of his hand as it worked the switch of her antique table lamp. She could also remember how it felt on her arm, how much area it took up, how commanding it was.
A slave bracelet encircling pink satin skin… a slave bracelet, his hand.
Warmth rushed up Kerry’s throat. She loosened the comforter, and had a momentary flash of him reaching for her, lifting her out of her igloo and into his arms. He could do it easily, she realized. He was tall enough that her feet would never touch the floor. Tall enough to curl your bare legs around and ride like a wave to its crest. Tall enough to bounce your head in the clouds with every rip and swell .
Wooooooo… where was she going with that one?
She lifted her head and felt the dizzy weight of her own eyelids. The warmth had flooded her face and gone straight to her brain.
“I think you’ve blown a fuse,” he said.
She didn’t dare laugh. “I have candles somewhere.” They wouldn’t need light the way she was glowing. She was steamy enough to throw off the comforter and start fanning herself. It was an odd thing having a strange man this close to her in a darkened bedroom. She wondered if he knew how intimate it was, or the effect he was having on her.
If she could find a way to have that effect on him, she could free him from any old curse in a matter of minutes.
The candles were in her closet. She rose from the bed to get them and wondered what he would do. The answer might have frightened her if she hadn’t sensed from the first that his purpose was not to do her harm. When she turned, he was there, standing behind her, close enough to feel his heat and breathe in his male scent. It startled her, but he seemed to anticipate her concern.
“Shhhhh,” he whispered as he took an armful of votive candles from her. “It’s okay.”
He began to arrange them in small circles around the room and light them.
For some reason it pleased her to watch him do that, but she wondered about the matches in his pocket. Where did a cursed man who lived in a computer get those? You’re having a dream, Kerry, she reminded herself. A revelatory dream. That’s why you’re going along with it, and that’s the only reason. Your unconscious is trying to tell you something, and you’re going to listen, even if it makes you want to squeal and hide under the bed.
Her questions vanished as she realized he was gone. She looked around the room, bewildered, and saw him returning from the living room, absent the blue aura. He’d turned the TV off, but he was carrying the one remaining candle, and she was finally able to see him. The sinuous flame played its tricks, but she was certain this was the same man she’d seen on her screen.
She wondered if the sexy dark curls on his head had been cropped short to tame them. His lashes were equally dark and feathery. His mouth was even moodier and more sensual than she remembered, given its width, the curvature of his upper lip, the tilted corners. He was better looking than on the screen.
“You bring a word to mind,” he said.
“I do?”
“Beauty. You have so much of it.”
“I was thinking that about you,” she said.
“How difficult is it?”
“Shuddering? It’s not hard at all. There are so many ways. Your voice,” she said. “Your