Free Love Letters, Inc. by Ec Sheedy Page B

talk him into taking the damn thing off today.
    Feeling unrepentantly sorry for herself, she walked over to where Kent sat waiting. He looked up and smiled. "Something looks different," he said, nodding at her neckwear.
    "I had a tune-up He lowered it a bit."
    He stood, then leaned down to plant a brief kiss just to the left of her mouth. "It must feel better," he added, holding her by the shoulders and studying her updated hydraulics.
    What felt good were his lips grazing hers, the hum of his deep voice in her ear, the scent of him tickling her nose. She had the insane urge to wrap her arms around him and ask for a hug. And more kisses, definitely more kisses. She wanted to feel like a woman again instead of a space needle spin-off. She wanted to be cuddled, and then some.
    In the car, he turned to her, his green eyes questioning and intent. "Anything else you need to do before going home? Anywhere else you want to go?"
    How about the nearest motel with clean sheets? Hormone leered, snapping a lace-fringed garter. Troublemaker.
    "No, just home," she said, emphatically enough for him to give her a puzzled glance. Rosie settled back in the car and sent an SOS to Lady Brain. She arrived brandishing a full color set of baby pictures. Triplets. Rosie concentrated on naming them during the ride home. Kent picked up his cell phone and started talking to Marlene about a man called Packard and a barbecue.
    Rosie, now able to turn her head without swiveling her upper body, kept stealing peeks at him, admiring his knuckles; one set curved around the phone, the other on the steering wheel. She studied how he compressed his lips on one side of his mouth when he was thinking. She noticed how decisively he drove, the way he dipped his head to look in the rear view mirror instead of adjusting it. She noticed everything she could and imagined the rest.
    She wondered if he could hear the sigh curling around her heart and nudging her stomach, if he could sense her difficulty in drawing all but the shallowest of breaths? Rosie couldn't remember this kind of wanting. Ever.
    In less than forty minutes they were pulling into her yard, and in that same time Rosie's imagination had them upstairs tangled in her country-rose sheets. With no trouble at all, she'd cranked the heat from simmer to pre-boil.
    Rosie hesitated, but only for half a nanosecond, then said, "Want to come in for awhile?" Her mouth was dry and her heart pounded like a drum. Every wayward nerve in her body jangled.
    Kent turned his full attention on her. He was reading her mind, she just knew it. She forced a smile.
    Then Summerton made the perfect move.
    He glanced at his watch.
    The hot tide of passion engulfing Rosie seemed to disappear. Lady Brain took over in one big hurry.
    Rosie exhaled the remainder of her self-manufactured heat, and said, "Then again, maybe not. I'm tired. I think I'll just go in and stretch out."
    Kent turned the car off and, one arm draped over the steering wheel, turned to study her, his gaze thoughtful. Finally, he nodded. "Good idea. I've got a dinner meeting. We wouldn't have nearly enough time to do it right."
    "Do what right?" She had no doubt his "it" and her "it" were two different species.
    Summerton smiled. "Make love. That is what's on your mind, isn't it?"
    "Excuse me?" Haughty. She needed to be haughty here. She gave it her best shot, and figured she carried it off.
    Kent tilted his head but didn't move. "Come here, Red. That brace isn't going to stop me."
    She looked at him, his gaze set on her as if she were a chocolate cake and he was icing. The man was a macho, arrogant, smug, overconfident, presumptuous, egotistical—
    "Red?"
    "Do you have any idea how outraged I am?"
    He didn't shift a bone or stretch a sinew. He just sat and waited.
    "You really, honestly think I'm going to fall into your arms like a needy, sex-deprived female who hasn't a brain in her head?"
    "A guy can hope."
    She didn't intend to laugh. She truly didn't. The damn