Free Kisses After Dark by Marie Force

her, he moved across the kitchen until he was standing right in front of her. “Being around you makes me feel better, too. In fact, you make me feel better than I have in more than twenty years.”
    “Is that right?” she asked with the warm smile he’d come to adore, especially when it was directed at him.
    “Yep.” He put down his glass and placed his hands on the counter on either side of her hips. “You’ve got paint on your cheek.”
    “I do? Where?”
    He ran his finger over the spot where a dot of navy blue paint had landed. “Here.”
    She leaned into his touch, her eyes closing and her lips parting.
    Frank couldn’t resist the powerful need to kiss her, and her enthusiastic response made him groan with desire for more of her. He’d kissed her for the first time after their friends Seamus and Carolina’s wedding, and their physical relationship had been confined to kissing thus far. But he couldn’t deny he wanted much more of her. “Betsy…”
    “Hmm?”
    “I really like kissing you.”
    “I really like when you kiss me.”
    He shifted to her neck, breathing in the earthy, feminine scent of her. Taking a chance, he moved his hands from the counter to her hips, bringing her in closer to him. There’d been other women, here and there, since his wife died, but never anything serious. Until now. Until her. And this was starting to feel awfully serious to him.
    When her arms encircled his neck and her body molded to his, there was no hiding his reaction to her.
    He found her mouth again in another kiss, his tongue tangling with hers as her fingers combed through his hair. “It’s been,” he said between kisses, “a very long time since I’ve wanted a woman the way I want you.”
    “How do you want me?”
    The question as well as the sexy tone in which it was asked only added to his desire for her. “Naked in a bed, under me.”
    “Well…” Her nervous laugh had him wondering if he’d been too blunt. “Tell me how you really feel.”
    “I think I just did.” He kissed her again, softly this time, but that packed no less of a wallop than their earlier, frantic kisses had. “I’m sorry if that’s too much too soon.”
    “It’s not. It feels like just enough at the perfect time.”
    Frank raised his head to meet her gaze. “It does? Really?”
    She nodded and then shocked him when she took hold of his hand to lead him into her bedroom.
    “Where are you taking me?”
    “Where you said you wanted to go.”
    “Is it what you want, too?”
    “It’s what I’ve wanted for a while now.”
    “You might’ve clued me in,” he said with a chuckle.
    “You figured it out—eventually.”
    He put his arms around her and drew her into his embrace, gazing down into her beautiful, smiling face.
    “What’re you thinking?” she asked.
    “That it’s been such a long time since I felt this way.”
    “How do you feel?”
    “Happy, content, excited about the future, intrigued, curious, eager…”
    “Eager for what?” she asked with a coy smile.
    “To hold you and make love to you.”
    She kissed him. “Mmm, I’m eager for that, too.”
    “I should take a shower. I’ve been out in the sun all day.”
    “I could use a shower, too.”
    “How about we conserve on water and take one together?”
    “I’m all for conservation.” She gestured for him to follow her to the bathroom across the hall from her bedroom. After she started the water, she turned to him, her smile suddenly shy and uncertain.
    “What is it?” he asked.
    “I’m not twenty anymore. I hope you aren’t disappointed.”
    Frank couldn’t believe she would say such a thing. Disappointed? In her? Never. “Betsy, honey, I think you’re gorgeous and vivacious and amazing. And speaking of not being twenty anymore, how do you think I feel? I’m fourteen years older than you—an official senior citizen cavorting with a youngster.”
    “Cavorting? Is that what we’re doing?”
    “Call it what you will.”
    She pulled