Lifeline Echoes by Kay Springsteen Read Free Book Online Page B

motionless for a moment. Finally, she angled a look over her
shoulder to meet his intent scrutiny.
    Her own gaze swept a fiery path down his
body, then back up again and she greeted him with a leisurely,
steamy smile. "Have you been there long? I didn't mean to keep you
waiting." Like a calculating cat, she rose gracefully to her feet
and slid her foot into her sandal.
     
    ****
     
    Ryan took off his hat and set it on the end
of the bar, holding her eyes with his own as he sauntered across
the room. "No hardship." His voice was low and sizzling with the
barest suggestion of sex.
    When he was standing directly in front of
her, well inside her bubble of personal space, she had to resist
the sudden urge to lean in and kiss that incredibly sexy mouth.
    Then thoughts of resisting temptation faded
to nothing as he took the initiative. Ryan leaned closer, paused
for an instant, then leaned again. Sandy lifted her face, her
eyelids heavy, her breath hanging up in her throat. The first brush
of his lips was subtle, a butterfly hovering. Only their lips were
touching. It was a relatively chaste kiss, but Sandy's reaction to
it was anything but. She steadied herself with her hands on his
waist as little zings of pure wow factor traveled to her brain.
    Ryan deepened the kiss only slightly, but he
lingered for a long moment with his lips on hers. His hands slid up
her arms to cup her bare shoulders, his thumbs drawing tiny
circles, which sent flashes of electricity rocketing to all the
appropriate places. When he leaned back, she moaned in protest. Her
grip tightened on his waist, willing his mouth back to hers. Ryan
eased back another inch, running his hands down her arms to her
hands, squeezing lightly before breaking the contact.
    "What was that?" she whispered.
    He touched a finger to her nose. "If you
have to ask, I must not've done it right."
    Sandy laid her fingertips against her lips.
"Oh no," she breathed. "You did it right." Maybe a little too
right, considering she no longer felt she had the upper hand in the
encounter.
    His eyes lit on her fingers and Ryan's
roguish grin faded into a look of pure physical hunger, which
painted fiery brushstrokes of need into Sandy's brain. She wasn't
used to needing. But her pulse skipped into high gear with the
certainty he'd intentionally shown her his hunger, and just maybe
that meant he was feeling as off balance by whatever was happening
between them as she was.
    "Fact is, Chicory, I've wanted to do that
since about two seconds after you called me a jerk." The playful
grin returned. "Thought I'd get that first one out of the way so
it's not hanging there between us anymore."
    She felt a little dizzy. "And now that you
have?"
    He tipped his head and slid a glance over
her lips. "I'd like to go back for seconds at some point," he said
softly. "Would that be a problem for you?"
    "I'd say there's a good chance I won't have
a problem with that. In fact. . ." Sandy pushed her hair behind her
ear, leaning toward him. She froze, stepped back and looked up.
"What did you just call me?"
    Ryan winced. "Chicory. Bad habit of mine, so
I'm told. Nicknames."
    Sandy wrinkled her nose.
"I remind you of a coffee substitute ?"
    He shrugged and then smiled one of those
devastating, toe-curling, dripping-with-desire smiles. Sandy felt
herself salivating and it had nothing to do with lunch.
     
    ****
     
    Apparently she wasn't thrilled with being
compared to a substitute anything, let alone a substitute some
folks considered less satisfying than the real thing. "Not the
root," he corrected. "The flower. Your eyes are the same blue as a
chicory flower. It's what I first noticed. Out there on the road
the other evening."
    As he stood there, lost again in those eyes,
they flashed with something that might have been irritation or
arousal, or maybe something else. Ryan wished he knew which, but
before he could discern, she was turning away.
    Ryan caught her hand and tugged her closer.
"Hey, it's just a nickname. I