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  His gaze turned to the woman in his bed. Her hair fanned across the pillow slip, silky black tangles against pristine white. A vague image of burying his fingers in that hair stirred at the back of his memory, yet he couldn’t quite grasp it.

  She rolled onto her side. Her eyes were closed, her lashes casting a shadowed crescent on her cheekbones. Her lips curved into a smile of wistful bliss that had his gut knotting as she nuzzled the sheet as if inhaling its scent.

  Abruptly she stilled. A frown creased her brow. Then she shot up off the bed, giving him nothing more than a glimpse of bare back and curvy bottom before snatching a blanket over her nudity. Eyes as wide and frantic as a stormy sea searched the room. “Oh my gosh,” she whispered. “Oh my gosh!”

  Through bleary eyes, he watched her throw a wrinkled chemise over her head, then wriggle into a pair of ruffled pantaloons. Seeing her in the undergarments had as much an impact on him as the red corset he’d taken off her last night.

  At least, he thought he’d taken it off her.

  Jess frowned and strained to put the night in order in his mind. He distinctly remembered soft skin and hot kisses that could turn a man inside out. And he remembered laughing when Honesty spilled whiskey on his chest, then moaning when he made her lick it off. . . .

  It got a little hazy after that. Nothing more than sensations of heat and dampness, and the most insane need to possess that Jesse had felt in his life.

  The last thing he could recollect with any clarity was climbing atop her soft and willing body, feeling her arms wrap around his back and her legs around his waist, and hoping like hell to not explode the minute he buried himself inside her.

  But then . . . nothing. Not even a glimmer to tell him what transpired next.

  “What . . .” He licked his lips, then glanced around for something to get rid of the chalky taste in his mouth. There was half a glass of whiskey on the table. It tasted watered down and stale, but it was wet. “What happened last night?”

  She paused in the act of tying her chemise to look at him. “Last night?”

  Was it his imagination or did she look as confused as he felt?

  “Yeah. Did we . . . you know . . . finish?”

  “What kind of question is that? Of course we did!” She bustled about the room, plucking her dress off the chair and a petticoat from the floor. “Twice, in fact! We might have gone for a third time, except you had me so plumb wore out . . . well, let’s just say that now that I know the extent of your talents, I’ll be more prepared next time. Have you seen my shoe?”

  Something about the way her words gushed out and she kept avoiding his eyes struck Jesse as odd, but his mind was too damned fuzzy to sort it out. How much had he drunk? Surely not enough to wipe his mind clean. Hell, he could out-drink an Irishman.

  “Gosh, I can’t believe I fell asleep in your bed. First time I’ve ever done that.”

  It was the first time he’d ever had a woman fall asleep in his bed. That was one thing Jesse had always prided himself on—and what had always made him so good at his job—clearing himself of the scene before it became incriminating.

  “By the way, you owe me three dollars.”

  “Three dollars!” he cried, then immediately re gretted raising his voice when a thousand ice picks seemed to stab themselves behind his eyeballs.

  “Surely you didn’t expect a poke for free.”

  No, but he expected to at least remember it. How did he know he’d been given his money’s worth?

  Yet how could he prove he hadn’t?

  “Aw, hell and damnation.” Jesse ripped his trousers off the floor and plunged his hand into the front pocket. Pulling out a handful of coins, he blinked, then narrowed his eyes. Was this all he had left?

  She snatched the required amount from his hand so fast his head spun, then dropped the coins into the valley between her breasts before heading for the door. She paused with her hand on the knob. “Thanks, cowboy. You really were incredible.”

  At least one of us enjoyed it.

  Copyright

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  AVON BOOKS

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  Copyright © 2000 by Rachelle Nelson

  Excerpt from untitled teaser copyright © 2001 by Rachelle Nelson

  ISBN: 0-380-80921-4

  EPUB Edition AUGUST 2014 ISBN 9780062381446

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  First Avon Books paperback printing: August 2000

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