Sexy, Single And Searching: Sexy, Single And Searching / Eager, Eligible And Alaskan. Lori Wilde
didn’t know if Camryn possessed all the qualities he needed or not. They’d shared a connection, a moment. Only getting to know her better would tell if their initial attraction was anything more than superficial sexual awareness. He didn’t have time to waste on meaningless affairs. Been there, done that.
He’d just turned thirty-one and while he’d never heard of men having biological clocks, damned if he didn’t hear this strange ticking in the back of his head.
He didn’t want to be an older single parent like his father. Pop had been forty-two when Mack was born and in a wheelchair with rheumatoid arthritis by the time Mack was thirteen. He wanted to have his kids while he was still young enough to pitch a baseball and hike a mountain and shoot a hockey puck. Mack had learned that experiencing life to the fullest was the only way to live. Because you just never knew what the future held.
Well, buddy, you won’t find out anything about Camryn standing here on the sidelines. Get out and get into the game.
The band switched tunes, going from a jazzy rock beat to a slow, dreamy waltz at the same moment Mack tapped his buddy on the shoulder.
“Do you mind?” he said to Jake, then to Camryn, “May I have this dance?”
Jake shrugged, nodded. Camryn smiled and held out her arms to him.
That’s what he liked most about her, the way she met his gaze head-on. Clear and straight, with nothing to hide. She didn’t act coy, nor did she present an overly aggressive demeanor like that grabby UNLV sorority sister. She was honest, open, flexible.
On the surface she seemed to be everything he’d been dreaming of when he placed that advertisement with his friends.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hello.” Simple, direct, no game-playing.
Camryn pushed a tendril of hair from her face and tried her best not to drop her gaze. Mack looked unbelievably handsome in a tux.
Don’t be scared, she coached herself. You’ve got the treasured wish totem around your neck and you’re having the adventure of a lifetime.
She was no longer meek little Cammie Jo, but fearless Camryn Josephine, up for whatever life might throw her way. And she was loving her new self.
Mack took her in his arms. Oh yes! He was all brawn and muscle and sinewy male.
Being held like this was an eye-popping experience for her, startling and novel. His body heat, so incredibly thermal, slipped into her skin roasting her from the inside out. His smell clobbered her senses, left her addled with yearning. Oh, she was falling too fast, stumbling too quickly out of her element and her normal comfort zone.
Dazed, Cammie Jo just stared at him. Her brain had turned to banana pudding.
“I’m not a very good dancer,” he apologized. Oh baby, I don’t care.
Lucky for them both Aunt Kiki had once been a professional dance instructor, otherwise Cammie Jo wouldn’t have known a fox trot from a fox hole.
Then she realized Mack thought she was staring at him because he’d just crunched her toe, but honestly, she’d barely noticed. She was concentrating on those sultry eyes that smoldered with a banked sexuality.
“I might not be much of a hoofer,” Mack continued, and here his gaze roved downward to peruse her lower extremities with obvious appreciation. “But you’ve got legs just built for dancing.”
In the past, she would have blushed at his compliment but tonight she accepted his appraisal as a matter of course. By gum, she did have rather nice legs. It was about time someone noticed.
Don’t hide your light under a bushel. One of her mother’s favorite sayings sprang to mind. Even when she was little she recalled her mother worrying that she was too shy, too modest, too introverted by half, and she’d struggled hard to draw Cammie Jo from her shell.
“So,” he said. “What do you do for a living, Camryn?”
Should she tell him the truth? Would he be impressed or turned off by an academic? But she couldn’t lie even if she wanted to. She couldn’t think fast on her feet.
“I’m working on my Ph.D. in information science. And I teach undergraduate classes at the University of Texas.”
“Really? That surprises me.”
“Why? Do I look dumb?”
“No, no. Of course not. It’s just that information science seems like a profession that would attract an introvert, not a gregarious lady like yourself.”
“You think I’m gregarious?”
Oh lovely, Cammie Jo. Tip your hand on the first day.
“Sure. You’re so at ease in a crowd.”
She almost laughed out loud. No one had ever paid her that particular compliment.
Mack was studying her, his eyes hot. So hot her clothes stuck to her body. Everywhere his gaze landed she seemed to burst into flames as if he possessed a kind of libidinous pyrokinesis.
His gaze slid from her eyes to the bridge of her nose.
Ka-pow!
Her nose burned.
Hungrily, he examined her lips.
Ka-bang!
Her mouth became an inferno. Visually he caressed her jaw.
Ka-blewy!
Her chin was toast.
Wait a minute, where was he going with that naughty stare?
Ka-bam!
Her breasts erupted in sparks.
No, no, don’t go any lower. Please.
Ka-sizzle!
Her abdomen caught ablaze.
He raised his eyes to hers briefly, then with a devilish grin he dropped his gaze to the lowest point yet.
Her pelvis. Oh her pelvis!
Whoosh!
Backdraft.
The Yellowstone forest fires had nothing on what was raging down there. Help! Call 9-1-1. Get the fire department over here pronto. Camryn Josephine was in nuclear meltdown.
They were moving around the dance floor, albeit not in time to the music. They could have been handcuffed together in solitary confinement, so oblivious was Cammie Jo to any stimuli other than Mack’s dangerous eyes. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration should look into labeling those incandescent orbs with a high octane warning.
“Thirsty?” he asked when the band took a break.
She nodded, her insides nothing but vapor. No, not thirsty. Parched, scorched, desiccated.
“Let’s grab some punch, get some fresh air.”
“Sounds good,” she murmured and was shocked to hear her own voice come out as seductive and husky as a whiskey-voiced blues singer.
He wrangled them a couple of glasses of punch and a few cookies and steered Cammie Jo to the back door of the community center. When the heavy metal fire door clanged closed behind them, she took a deep breath and looked up at the sky, surprised to find it was still bright daylight despite being past nine o’clock at night.
Summer in Alaska.
Cammie Jo gazed at the mountains in the distance and nibbled on an almond cookie to collect herself. The breeze blew cool against her skin and that helped soothe her feverish thoughts, until Mack came to stand directly behind her.
She could feel his manly presence.
Felt his gaze drop onto her body, her hair, every darned where.
Talk about sensory overload. If she didn’t have the