Under Fire. Jamie Denton Ann

is nothing to be ashamed of.”

      She set her glass on the damp napkin. “I never said I was inexperienced. There’s a difference.”

      “Not if you’ve never had an orgasm,” he said as he leaned forward. “Your lovers must’ve been damned selfish.”

      She cleared her throat. A sharp stab of self-consciousness pierced her, then she quickly chastised herself for being so silly. Ben was absolutely right. Why should she be embarrassed by their conversation or because she’d had lousy lovers? Tonight, she could say or do anything. It wasn’t as if she’d ever see him again.

      “You must find this all very entertaining,” she said.

      The color of his eyes deepened to the color of the ocean. “I have a feeling you’d be a very entertaining woman.”

      The air practically crackled with electricity around them at his quietly spoken words. She felt a sharp tug of desire in her abdomen. “I was thinking the same thing,” she said brazenly, unable to look away. “About you.”

      Oh, good grief, why not just write Take Me Now, Stud on her forehead in bright red lipstick? It’d certainly be direct, but nowhere near as fun and liberating as flirting so outrageously with such a gorgeous hunk.

      A slow, lazy smile curved his mouth. He had such a great-looking mouth, too, with a full bottom lip she was dying to taste.

      Her breath caught, then came out in a rush. If just the thought of kissing him nearly stole her breath, she couldn’t wait to see what would happen if she tried to cure her orgasm problem.

      “You’re evading the subject again,” he teased. “Tell me how close you’ve been to having an orgasm.”

      What she wanted was to tell him exactly how close she’d like to get with him. Past the clouds. Over the moon. Fireworks, bursting stars, the whole enchilada.

      Or so she’d heard.

      “Jana?” he prompted.

      “I felt…” The tempting quirk of his lips combined with the husky note in his voice snatched her breath again, halting her capacity for rational thought. “Tingly,” she finally blurted.

      “Tingly.” He repeated the word slowly, as if absorbing it with care. “Just tingly?”

      She nodded. “Just tingly.”

      He cleared his throat, then shifted slightly in the booth, leaning forward to brace those drool-worthy forearms on the lacquered table. “Anywhere in particular?”

      Moon, stars and fireworks fizzled like an interrupted daydream when her cheeks heated as if she were a teenage virgin. “Now there you go again,” she chastised him. “Asking me to reveal the secrets of being a woman.”

      He reached across the table, peeling her fingers from the stem of the wineglass one by one. Gently, he lifted her hand to his mouth and brushed his lips across the inside of her wrist. Awareness skittered across her skin as he lightly feathered his tongue against her pulse before releasing her.

      “That kind of tingly?” he asked in a voice reserved for lovers.

      A jolt of electricity shot to the tips of her breasts and sizzled, warming her entire body with the heat of immediate arousal. Exactly who was seducing whom here? Forget his B.V.D.s. Her suddenly moist panties were close to becoming history.

      She cleared her throat. “Those were some pretty high-grade tingles.”

      “So was I close?”

      “You were beyond close.”

      Satisfaction filled his expression. She’d probably just inflated his ego, times ten, but she didn’t care. When it came to tingles, the man was an ace.

      “I’d say that narrows the field. So what exactly did you feel?”

      Jana knew what she was feeling now, and she’d zipped right past tingle to outright arousal. When she’d first approached Ben, she’d had absolutely no intention of embarking upon a one-night stand. Now, she was no longer certain she possessed the willpower not to see how far this night would go.

      She considered her last sexual encounter in hopes the reminder of what had never happened for her would derail her treacherous thoughts and halt their break-neck pace. It’d been nearly two months before she’d allowed the relationship to move to the next logical step. All in all, the experience had been…nice, she decided. Pleasant, even. She’d been turned on, but miles from the simmering heat Ben had managed to stir with that cute little tongue-on-the-wrist trick.

      “After what you just did, I’m sure tingly was the wrong adjective,” she finally told him. “Maybe it was closer to how your feet feel when you take your shoes off at the end of a long, hot day. You know what I mean?”

      His attempt to hold back a grin was obvious, but eventually he did. “Sounds more like relief than sexual gratification to me.”

      She drained the last of her chardonnay, then shook her head when he attempted to signal for the waitress. “Considering that lack of sexual gratification is under debate here, it seems appropriate. Now, will you please answer my question?”

      “Which was?”

      “Is it really everything everyone says it’s cracked up to be?”

      He settled back in the booth, looking completely at ease and oh-so-sexy. “Yeah. It really is,” he said with a slight inclination of his head. “With the right person.”

      Dozens of erotic images cluttered her mind, each more enticing than the last. Images that all ended with three basic elements—her, Ben and the closest bed. “Tell me what it’s like.”

      He regarded her with such close scrutiny, she started to fidget with her napkin, nearly knocking over her empty glass. She adjusted the set of her shoulders and aimed for a relaxed appearance. She almost succeeded, too, until he said, “What if I showed you instead?”

      BEN TOOK the key to Jana’s apartment from her and slid it into the lock. He didn’t bother debating the wisdom of his decision or waste time with self-recrimination about allowing his testosterone to rule his actions. Even the twenty-minute drive from the Ivory Turtle to her place in Culver City had failed to lessen the need that had been clawing his gut since Jana had uttered those magic words—let’s talk orgasms.

      Although his motives weren’t entirely chivalrous, he did feel a connection to Jana. Only, it existed on a level he understood and even welcomed—basic animal attraction. It’d been a long time since he’d experienced such an intense need to be with a woman. After the last few days of hell, he wasn’t in the frame of mind to summon an argument for why he shouldn’t exploit the sexual tension that had been simmering between them since the moment their eyes had first met.

      At the very least, he had to taste her, see for himself if her lips were as soft and welcoming as he’d been imagining. And there was the issue of the near physical pain he’d been feeling since she’d slid from the seat of his pickup truck. Her long skirt had caught on the seat, hiking the length far enough upward to reveal slender calves and the barest hint of a shapely knee. Not much by way of exhibitionism, but still too incredibly sexy for him to ignore.

      He unlocked the door, then turned toward her and handed her the key. The faintest hint of her unique perfume raised his awareness one more notch. His body flexed as he breathed in the exotic combination of floral and spice.

      She moved in front of him to rest her back against the doorjamb. Desire brightened her gaze. Beneath the yellow glow of the light in the small alcove, he caught sight of the rapid beat of her pulse at her throat. The urge to press his lips to her delicate skin, to feel the staccato rhythm against his tongue, had him narrowing the already miniscule distance between them.

      “Are you coming in?” Her husky voice, and the way her warm breath feathered against his lips, filled him with an anticipation not even a saint could ignore.

      His gaze shifted