she declared, happy she had wondrous magic to help her keep that vow.
“Wait a minute.” Mack was suddenly looking at her real funny, staring at her mouth.
Uh-oh. Had he finally figured out she wasn’t really brazen Camryn, but shy Cammie Jo? A moment of fear licked through her before she remembered her wish.
Reaching out, he smoothed his thumb over the corner of her mouth.
Cammie Jo shivered. What was he doing?
“Cookie crumb,” he said.
“Oh.”
But the crumb was gone and he was still here, his face so very close to hers.
“Not so fast.” His arm snaked around her waist and he pulled her flush against the length of his body.
Good thing there wasn’t a maximum speed limit for pulses. She’d be liable for the highest fine imaginable.
Then he lowered his head and took her mouth with his own.
She was in heaven. But when he pressed his tongue to her closed teeth, she jumped back startled.
Mack blinked. His initial thought was one of complete surprise. Camryn Josephine knew next to nothing about kissing. But how could that be? Surely this hot, sassy babe had kissed dozens of men, if not hundreds.
Maybe she’d given him the weird, platonic-but-not-quite kiss because she was uncertain of her feelings. Mack scratched his head and looked down at her.
She was such a cute little thing. All curves and dips, so different from his own hard, angular body.
The woman might not be clear on her feelings, but he was clear on his. He wanted to taste more of her, go deeper, explore. See if she could indeed be the woman he was searching for.
He hooked his index finger under her chin, lifted her face up to meet his again. He watched the pulse in her neck jump with anticipation. Slowly, he lowered his lips to that throbbing beat and kissed her exposed throat with the lightest touch he could manage, heightening the anticipation.
Her skin was hot and getting hotter by the minute. The more his tongue laved over her rapidly pounding pulse, the faster it beat.
Mack felt her tremble. Her escalating excitement matched his own. Did her quest for adventure include those of the flesh?
He wanted her with a sharp spike of desire that stabbed straight through his groin. But letting lust rule his head was not the way to go.
No. As much as he might want to, he wouldn’t drag her home to his bed. But he would sample another taste of those lips. Just to give himself something to think about.
He took her mouth in a heated rush. She gasped into him. She tasted so exquisite he almost groaned.
The feminine scent of her filled his nostrils. He felt her chest raising raggedly against his own. He threaded his fingers through that mane of golden brown hair, cupped the back of her head in his palm.
Camryn wriggled in his arms, every nerve ending in her body on full alert.
It was too much, too soon. She was in sensory overload and she couldn’t absorb everything that was happening.
Yes you can, silly, you’ve got the totem. She reached up to caress the necklace, to draw strength from its power. But when her fingers crept to her throat she felt nothing but her own skin.
Panic-stricken, she jerked away, leaving him looking dazed.
“What…?” he asked.
Cammie Jo stared down at her chest. The totem was gone!
Without it, she was not brave enough to kiss a virtual stranger. On her own, she was not the type to flirt and bat her eyelashes and volley innuendoes.
She was her old self. Vulnerable, scared and way out of her league.
In desperation, she cast her gaze to the ground, looking among the flowering lupine at their feet for her missing necklace. Her breath came out in frantic wheezes, as if she was an asthmatic in a room full of ragweed pollen.
“Camryn? What’s wrong?” Mack reached out to put a hand on her shoulder.
His touch sent her over the edge. She had to get away. Had to leave before she ruined everything. Had to hide from him so he wouldn’t see her for the timid spinster-in-the-making that she really was.
Later, after the party was over, she would come back and try to find the necklace. But for now every phobia she’d ever experienced was gelling into one major fear. That of being found out a fraud before she’d ever had a chance to really live her great adventure.
Get out. Get away!
“I…I can’t do this.” She spun on her heels and took off at a dead run.
“Camryn,” Mack cried. “What’s wrong? Talk to me.”
She never hesitated.
“Wait!” His footsteps thundered behind her.
Clippety, clippety, clippety—stumble. Her ankle turned sideways in the impossible heels but she ignored the bite of pain and kept going.
Hurry, hurry. You’ve got to give him the slip. Except she could hardly see where she was going with this darned hair bouncing free and unfettered about her face and she didn’t know the area. She rounded the building at a dead-on sprint, hoping he’d give up the pursuit. For heaven’s sake, if a man was running away from her she’d take the hint and not chase after him.
But Mack stayed right on her tail.
Was the man part bloodhound? Jeez Louise. Talk about relentless.
Where could she go to get away from him? She leaped over some shrubbery at the edge of the side-walk. A well-dressed crowd was just walking into the entrance of the community center. Cammie Jo barreled past them, using human bodies as a shield between Mack and herself.
“Excuse me. I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to step on your toe.” She heard Mack apologizing but she never slowed, not for a second.
Lungs bursting. Stitch in her side. Throbbing ankle. She could endure all that but not a totemless face-to-face encounter with Mack.
Rabbit quick, she darted through the front door, spun past a startled Kay and clattered upstairs to the relative safety of the ladies’ room.
Okay, don’t panic, don’t panic.
Lovely advice. About as useful as telling a hostess not to panic when she’s got ninety-nine guests coming for Thanksgiving dinner in fifteen minutes and a hundred pounds of Turkey à la Froufrou just exploded in her brand new rotisserie oven.
Cammie Jo paced the tiled bathroom, arms folded across her chest. What to do? She couldn’t stay in here all night.
Or could she?
Tempting
