Free Out of Control by Suzanne Brockmann

me. All during dinner, I was having these real freak-out moments, you know? But then you turn your head to the right and there’s that grease under your left ear, and I think, well, okay. This is all right. I think, she’s here because she’s not afraid to get her hands dirty, because she’s not afraid to get up to her neck in things, because she’s willing to take chances, to go for it, to get real.”

    Savannah gazed up at him, unable to respond.

    People usually saw her quietness as timidity, her politeness as conservativeness. But when Kenny looked at her, he actually saw someone strong.

    And instead of running for the bathroom, she kissed him.

    It was quite possible that she was never going to wash her neck again.

    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Three

    Slow down. Slow. Down.

    But, great holy God, when Savannah slipped her hands up underneath his T-shirt, when she kissed him just as eagerly as he was kissing her, slowing it down was the last thing Ken wanted to do.

    No, the sensation of her cool fingers against the heat of his bare back was not one that would normally evoke feelings of caution and deliberation.

    She was pressed full against him, and sweet mother, the idea of taking a step back from that . . . Well, he’d have to be a saint or a madman, and he was neither.

    “Savannah,” he managed to say. “I don’t want to wait until tomorrow.”

    She stood on her toes for another soul-shattering kiss. He took it as a good sign. But her real answer came when she slipped one of her hands out from under his T-shirt, and down beneath the elastic waistband of his swim trunks to cup his buttocks. Talk about mind-blowing surprises. This woman knew what she wanted and, thank you, thank you, Jesus, it sure as hell seemed as if she wanted him.

    “I don’t want to wait either, Kenny,” she breathed, looking up at him with those incredible eyes.

    Kenny. It was what Adele used to call him, and for two-tenths of a second, it threw him. But this woman was not Adele. In fact, she was the opposite of Adele. She was small in stature, slight in build, while Adele had been tall and stacked. Savannah was sweet and polite and honest.

    They were as different as two women could be.

    Except, of course, for the fact that, like Adele, Savannah lived on the freaking other side of the country. If he let himself fall for her too hard, he’d either wind up broke or frustrated as all hell.

    Or both.

    Ken tried to stay cool as he swept Savannah into his arms and carried her into the house, into his bedroom.

    But she laughed as he kicked the door closed, as he dumped her onto his bed, and he knew he was screwed. This wasn’t going to be a one-night or even three-night thing. He was going to New York. A lot. And it was going to be okay. Somehow, some way, this time, he’d make it work.

    Savannah was too freaking amazing for him not to try.

    She pulled him down with her and he found himself exactly where he wanted to be—between her legs. All they had to do was lose the few pieces of clothing they had on between them, and find a condom.

    Bedside table, top drawer. He kept a stash there in the eternal hope that Sarah Michelle Gellar would come to San Diego for a party, meet him and follow him home.

    He pulled off his shirt—Savannah helped.

    He pulled off her shirt—she helped with that, too.

    God, he loved everything about women, but he especially loved breasts. Savannah was not voluptuous in any sense of the word, but she was so perfectly feminine, he briefly considered weeping with joy at the sight of her, lying there, bare-breasted in his bed. But that would’ve taken way too much time.

    Instead he kissed her, caressed her, licked her, touched her. She smelled like his soap, like the chlorine from his pool, like his clean laundry on top of her fancy perfume. She smelled like he’d already, at least partially, claimed her as his own.

    God, what a