Fire And Ice. Tori Carrington

it looked like that “was”…well, was coming to an end. Life was intruding with Jena going off to work. And, he reluctantly admitted, maybe it was time he let some of his own life back in. He’d known this brief interlude was meant to be brief. Yet he didn’t want it to end just yet, whether Jena went to work or not. After all, she had to come home at some point, right? And when she did…

      Caramel pulled him out of his reverie by making a sound at his feet. He considered the fur ball. The two of them had come to a truce early on. He didn’t mess with her; she didn’t mess with him. He could, however, do without the smell that seemed to accompany her presence.

      He fished his cell phone out of his jeans pocket and reviewed his voice mail. Five messages from his agent. Two from his physical therapist’s office. One from his mother. He chose his agent first.

      “Jesus H. Christ, man, where have you been? I’ve been trying to get ahold of you forever. It’s like you dropped off the edge of the Earth, Brodie.”

      Tommy rubbed his brow. Maybe calling Kostas Volanis back hadn’t been the greatest idea. His time could be better spent coming up with ways to get Jena back into bed.

      He envisioned her smooth, clean skin under the spray of the shower and his mouth watered.

      “Tom?”

      “I’m here.”

      “And where exactly is there?”

      Tommy grinned. The question might appear innocent to others, but others didn’t know Kostas the way he did. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

      “Yeah, me and twelve other people. Hell, guy, you picked a helluva time to up and take off, you know? You’ve got the team owner wanting a status report on your rehab. Only the team doc said you didn’t make your appointment yesterday. Then there is the sports equipment contract. You know they start shooting the commercials next month, don’t you? That is, if you don’t land on the permanently injured list. Did you take off back to Minnesota? You did, didn’t you?” He sighed. “You’re at least keeping off the knee, aren’t you? Doing the exercises the therapist prescribed for you?”

      “I’m taking care of it.” Tom caught himself absently rubbing the knee in question and grimaced. Okay, so maybe he hadn’t been looking after it as diligently as he should have, and given his own background in medicine, the sin was doubly inexcusable. He heard the hair dryer click on in the other room, dimming his chances of getting Jena to stay home again today. Okay, so maybe even he could do with a brief break from their bedroom activities. Bum knee aside, he swore muscles hurt that he hadn’t known he had, fortifying his accredited knowledge that sex was one of the most strenuous physical workouts known to man.

      “Look, Kostas, I’ve got to run.”

      “Figuratively, right? You mean that figuratively. The doc said no running until—”

      Tom chuckled. “Figuratively.”

      “So I call your parents if I need anything, right?”

      Well, that explained the message from his mother. Likely mother hen Kostas had called Helen Brodie and made his disappearing act sound like a major event, which he supposed for all intents and purposes it was. He’d never taken off like this before without letting anyone know where he was. And given everything that had happened over the past couple of months, it was only natural that his agent and others would be concerned about him.

      He just wished they’d stop.

      “No, call my cell.”

      “So you’re not in Minnesota then?”

      “Talk to you later, Kostas.”

      “Wait, Tom—”

      Tom clicked the phone shut then tucked it back into his pocket. He’d wait until later in the morning to call back the doctor’s office and his mother.

      The hair dryer switched off.

      He grinned. Ah, Jena.

      He hadn’t quite known what to expect when he’d shown up three days before, but what he’d gotten had blown even that out of the water. He’d somehow forgotten how utterly hot she was. And he wasn’t talking just in the looks department. Between the sheets, up against the wall, in the shower, Jena was thick, molten lava, metamorphosing to fit whatever role she had in mind.

      Personally, he liked the wildcat the best. When Jena took charge, ordering him around, telling him to touch her just so, move like this, thrust like that, he was like a man gone insane. He hadn’t let his injury hinder him in the least. Only problem was his knee was letting him know that now.

      He opened the refrigerator door and stared at the slim pickings. Yesterday afternoon while she was napping he’d hit a nearby supermarket to stock up on the basics. Protein and complex carbs and plenty of them had been the order of the day. Plucking up the egg substitute carton and a package of turkey bacon, he turned toward the stove and started breakfast.

      He didn’t so much see Jena come into the kitchen as smell her. He breathed in the scent of her spicy perfume and said without looking, “Good morning.”

      “Bah humbug,” she said, though her tone was lighter than the words implied. “What, no coffee?”

      “I don’t drink it,” he said. He turned, taking in the neat, sexy lines of her short skirt and business jacket. “Neither have you for the past two days.” He reached around where she was filling the coffeemaker with grounds and water. “Try some OJ.”

      “That, too.” She switched on the maker then took the carton from him. Without breaking stride, she opened the top and drank straight from the carton.

      Tommy lifted his brows and chuckled. “You’re kidding me, right?”

      She shrugged and put the carton back in the fridge. “Why dirty a glass?” She smiled at him. “See. I got my vitamin C and saved on the water bill. Environmentally friendly, me.”

      Tommy gently grasped her by the shoulders and pulled her to him. He wiped a drop of juice from the corner of her mouth. “Sloppy you.”

      She made a face and he kissed her.

      “Hmm, citrus.”

      “Hmm, I’m late.”

      He chuckled and brushed his fingers through her silky hair, watching as the raven-black strands swayed back into place around her enchanting face. “What are the chances of talking you into staying home again today?”

      Jena pretended to consider the question, then said, “Oh, I don’t know. Between slim and none, maybe?”

      He lowered his hands to her collarbone, pressing a thumb gently against her pulse point. He was rewarded with a small leap of her heartbeat. “Need I remind you that’s what you said yesterday?” He placed a kiss to her temple then softly blew into the perfect shell of her ear. “And the day before that?”

      He heard the click of her swallow. “Yes, well, I didn’t have anything pressing on tap. Today…today, I have to go to the county jail to meet with a client.”

      “Hmm. Sounds ominous.”

      “Not if I get her out.”

      How was a guy supposed to compete with that?

      As if of their own accord, his hands slid down her elegant back to her pert tush then brought her up against his growing arousal.

      Behind her the coffeemaker stopped make spitting sounds. “Um, my joe’s ready.”

      “Your joe isn’t the only thing ready.”

      Her husky laugh heightened his desire along with the feel of her pressing against him. “Do you ever stop?”

      “Do you want me to?”

      She looked at him intently and he stared back. Her tongue ran the length of her lower lip. “Um, no.”

      But