By the Horns by Rachael Slate Read Free Book Online Page B

in Nat’s refusal. He turned to her, hopeful she’d come up with a surefire argument against them kissing.
    “It’s just a kiss, okay?”
    Hell, she agreed with the Matchmaker? Clearly, he’d stumbled into the twilight zone, because he bloody nodded. Without hesitating, Nat gripped his shoulder with one hand, the back of his neck with her other, and slanted her mouth across his.
    His body hardened as his cock thickened and strained against his jeans. And his heart, it fucking rammed into his throat.
    She tasted even better than she looked. Her soft lips parted to allow him access, and damn, but he accepted. He slid his tongue inside, but kept his hands fisted at his sides. He didn’t dare embrace her, yet he couldn’t resist the kiss.
    A taste. Just one. He closed his eyes and drowned in her coconut fragrance. The sweet, sensual sparks between them electrified his body. Three long years, he hadn’t touched a woman, so he must be responding to his long-denied libido.
    Not to Nat. Definitely not to Nat.
    A bored sigh hummed at his right. “Convince me.”
    He jerked open his eyes. The Matchmaker stared at them, her head tilted as though evaluating their kiss. Like this was a bloody audition. Hell, maybe it was, but he refused to put on a show.
    As he was about to pull back, Nat moaned into his mouth and ground her hips against his.
    Apparently, she was determined to get the part.

Chapter 5

    The Matchmaker demanded more. Dammit, Nat craved more too, but not at this price.
    Still, her entire future rested on how well she kissed Kassian, so she threw her whole body into it. The recesses of her brain scrambled to scan the Lotus handbook for the right maneuver—a sweeping crane or a backward lute?
    Trying and failing to ignore the thick ridge pressed into her belly, she tangled her tongue with Kassian’s. Once this kiss ended, she’d have a talk with him about his acting skills, and his “celibacy.”
    Immune to baser urges, my ass.
    Like she was any better? Grinding against Kassian’s hard body had not only made her panties wet, she inched toward an orgasm. Well, that would convince the Matchmaker, wouldn’t it?
    Even for a guy three years out of practice, he was a hell of a kisser. His firm, sensual lips and talented tongue teased hers in ways that made her forget this was a test.
    That kissing Kassian shouldn’t be this enjoyable.
    Her entire body refuted the notion, her blood heating through her veins as the spark of contact with Kassian electrified her. Just as it had when they’d kissed six years ago. Only, the real thing was a thousand times more intense than her memory recalled.
    A mantis entrapment? Yes, that technique might work.
    She curled the fingers of one hand into his short locks, while raking the nails of her other down his chest, across his hard pecs, and trailing them to rest low on his hip. His muscles jerked in response, and the hands fisted at his sides broke free, sliding around to grip her ass.
    Lust pounded through her core as his large, masculine hands lifted her hips to grind his neglected erection into her belly. She wrapped her legs around his waist and moaned.
    How had a man as sensual as Kassian ever chosen to deprive the world of his talents? She lost the train of thought as he broke free from her mouth to trace his lips and tongue down her throat. She tossed her head back in abandon, struggling to maintain even the slightest awareness that this was a test.
    Nothing more.
    Just like every other.
    Test. Test. Test. Oh, man . His thumb grazed her nipple as he felt her up, or rather down, smoothing his hands over her body. She caught his lips again, desperate to connect with him, unable to get close enough. The chemistry between them was more addictive than any drug.
    His fingertips brushed across her hips, then slowly, tortuously, ascended. She had to end this or she’d put on more than an audition for the Matchmaker. She dragged one eyelid open. Then the other. The woman surveyed