Naked Attraction. Jule McBride

      Chapter One

      WHEN ELLIE LEE STRETCHED and opened her eyes, she found herself staring straight into Robby Robriquet’s baby blues. They captivated her gaze, warmed her insides, then continued holding her attention as surely as his arms had held her the previous night. “How long have you been watching me?” she croaked sleepily.

      “All my life.”

      “Impossible. You were born first.”

      “All your life,” he corrected.

      Shifting her gaze, she let it drift down a hard, muscular bare chest coated with wild, tangled raven hair. She eyed the sheet wound around his torso, then returned her attention to his face, her lips parting in frank appreciation of his heart-stopping good looks.

      Damn, she thought. They just didn’t make many studs like Robby, especially not around Banner, Mississippi. He had a strong, Romanesque nose, unusually full lips, a face so sculpted that it could have been crafted from marble. His eyes were as piercing as the rays of a hot sun, as blue as a summer sky, and as deep as an ocean.

      She had blue eyes, also, and dark hair, just as he, and if the truth be told, she’d started dreaming years ago about how cute their babies would look. She’d had a crush on Robby since she’d first laid eyes on him, when she was twelve years old, but only in the past year, since he’d finished his M.B.A. and returned to Banner, had he finally realized she’d turned into a woman.

      So much for all the heartbreak years ago. Countless times, she’d put on sexy hot pants and halter tops, hoping to wow him if he came to the Lees’ house to visit her middle brother, Cordy, often with J. D. Johnson in tow. Ellie’s best friend, Susannah, had been just as lovesick, but J.D. had been her focus. The two girls had tried everything to get the boys’ attention, whether getting stuck while climbing trees, or shrieking like banshees while practicing gymnastics in the yard.

      Nothing had seemed to work. The boys would run off, to hunt or fish, totally oblivious. Everything was different now, though. J.D. and Susannah had been married for six years. And exactly six months ago, Robby had dragged Ellie to bed, acting as proprietary as a caveman. Ever since, they’d managed to meet at every possible moment, despite hectic schedules.

      That was the other great thing about Robby, she thought, still eyeing him. He worked even harder than she, a trait she’d never found in another man. In fact, she thought Robby worked too hard, something she’d previously never guessed she could see as a flaw in another human being. But how could she help it? Business was important, but she wanted Robby in bed all the time, too, and because he always said he had to work, it could be downright maddening.

      Yes, now she understood all the young men she’d discarded during her own college years. Often they’d complain, calling her a workaholic, but now…

      Robby was gazing at her bare breasts, his dazed eyes darkening with lust. “Hey, gorgeous,” she whispered. “I think I’m reading your mind.”

      “What? Like Mama Ambrosia?”

      Mama Ambrosia was a local fortune-teller. Ellie shook her head. Lifting her hands, she squeezed his shoulders, drawing him closer, enjoying the warmth and smoothness of his skin. “No. What I see in your thoughts is far too suggestive for a stranger’s clairvoyant eyes, even a professional’s.”

      He glanced at the clock, his glistening teeth flashing as he smiled. “Well, sweetheart,” he drawled, “I figure we’ve got time for a quickie before we get to work and have to pretend we’re only colleagues.”

      “You’ve been a bad boy on the job,” she returned, stroking his pectorals with a fingernail.

      He was all innocence. “Bad?”

      “A hand up my skirt during a meeting. Pinching my butt at the water cooler. A box of condoms appearing magically in my purse,” she enumerated.

      “That wasn’t me,” he defended. “That was the condom fairy.” She smiled. “If we don’t tell my father about our affair soon,” she said, dragging his mouth down for a quick, wet kiss, “he’s going to guess.” Her father, otherwise known as Daddy Eddie, was the owner of Lee Polls, a century-old family-run polling company for which both she and Robby worked.

      “Then we’d better hurry and have sex, so you’ll have time to run home, change and do something about your mussed hair.”

      She smirked. “You really are a workaholic. It’s Saturday.”

      “And I’ve got to work, anyway.”

      Frowning, she considered. She loved Robby, she really did, but she was beginning to wonder if he’d ever feel completely comfortable in his own skin. He’d been so young when he’d lost his mother, only three, and he scarcely remembered her. Worse, his dad, Charlie, had seemed to go off the deep end after the loss, taking up drinking and gambling. At least, that was the story around town.

      He’d been