The Sapphire Affair (Jewel #1)

“Three things,” he whispered, his voice all rough and hot, turning her on before he even uttered another word. “One, I want to kiss you. Two, I’m going to kiss you. Three, if you don’t want me to, say no now. Otherwise . . .”


He inched closer. She parted her lips, and a small sigh escaped. “Yes.”

She closed her eyes and waited. In that second before his lips met hers, the wondrous thrill of anticipation weaved through her body. The hope that kissing a stranger named Jake in a bar would be worth it. That he wouldn’t kiss like a slobbery Saint Bernard, all tongue and exuberance. Nor like a schoolboy, hell-bent on vacuuming up her lips. Call her greedy, call her needy, or just call her a woman who hadn’t been kissed well in a long while.

But she wanted that kiss.

The kind that made your knees weak.

That sent your heart fluttering.

That spread warmth on a sweet, shivery path through your chest.

His lips met hers. His were so damn soft, and full, and delicious. He didn’t rush it. He took his time, exploring her mouth, brushing his lips over hers, tasting her. That tingly sensation sped up, shooting through her, like an injection of pure, unadulterated pleasure as she melted into his kiss.

He was snug against her, and she savored it—the delicious press of his body as he swept his lips across hers, his touch making her moan. The kiss deepened as he ran his fingertips along her bare arm, igniting her skin. He dropped his hand to her lower back, angling her closer, and oh, how she’d craved this kind of closeness. Badly. She wanted to climb him. She wanted to feel him above her, moving in her, holding her tight. This rampant desire was a matchstick. Roping her arms around his neck, she curled her fingers into the ends of his hair.

Oh, that soft hair. God, it felt good between her fingers as she slid them through his golden brown strands, tugging lightly.

He groaned and yanked her even closer. The quick shift in tempo moved the kiss up the heat ladder into something hungrier. He held her face in his hands, a thoroughly possessive gesture, as he kissed her so hard his stubble left a whiskery burn.

The evidence of a consuming kiss.

Her mind spun wild with images. Pictures of this night turning into something else. Kisses under the stars. Hips, legs, lips moving together. Him wrapping her tighter in his caress, whispering sweet, dirty things he wanted to do to her. In the heat of his kiss, in the urgency of his touch, she had the raw materials to feed her imagination.

Her heart raced. Her blood pumped. She craved him fiercely.

Which was absolutely loony, since he was a total stranger.

But maybe that’s what fueled her desire. They had no history. They had no past. There was no damage or pain between them. He hadn’t hurt her, he hadn’t lied to her, and he hadn’t tried to fling her business into the trash. No, he had one agenda, it seemed. The same one she had.

Let’s spend the night together.

He backed her up against the wall, next to the dartboard, her spine hitting the wood with a thump. The sound of it was like a door shutting. Like the moment when a kiss turns from we’re trying this on for size to this kiss won’t stop at kissing. He cupped the back of her neck, and his other hand clasped her hip, yanking her against him, so she could feel him.

She could feel all of him.

Lust skyrocketed in her, on a mad dash to cloud her reason, her judgment, to ambush all remaining sanity. To simply crush the logical, thoughtful portions of her brain. Lock them up and throw away the key, so she could go somewhere, anywhere, with Jake and let him—

His phone rang.

A Taylor Swift song.

Instantly, he broke the kiss and sighed deeply, a frustrated sound.

“One of your fishing buddies rescuing you from the woman in a bar who won’t give her name?” Steph asked, catching her breath as she arched an eyebrow.

He shook his head and scrubbed his hand over his jaw. “My little sister. That’s her ringtone.” He swiped his thumb across the phone. “Kylie, give me five seconds,” he said into the phone, then covered the screen. He quickly scanned the bar, on the hunt for something. Steph wasn’t sure what he wanted, and she was still punch-drunk on that kiss, so her brain wasn’t fully processing. He shot out his arm, grabbed a napkin, and handed it to her.

“Give me a number. So I can call you later,” he said.

Did she want to give him her number?

A sob sounded from the phone. Her heart raced with worry. She hoped his sister was OK. She pointed in the general direction of the bar. “I’ll leave it with Marie. I have somewhere I need to be now anyway. But you can reach me later, I guess,” she said, the words coming out in a stumble, like a car sputtering to turn on. Her brain clearly needed a few seconds, maybe even minutes, to string language together again.

“I’ll be back,” he said, then he walked out in a rush.

Steph let out a breath and stared at the empty space where he’d been, then she replayed the last few minutes and knit her brow.

On the one hand, he’d asked for her number.