Excerpt
Kate's contribution to NORTHERN HEAT: Best Canadian Erotic Romance Stories features an excerpt from the first love scene in A LITTLE WILD, Kate's single title erotic romance (Samhain Publishing).
Saturday night, Tess was a bundle of nerves—pure adolescent silliness. She and Zach had eaten dinner together before. First, at Northview with Sydney and Teddy, then the pizza at her place. Neither of those meals had qualified as an actual date, though, no matter what she’d allowed Chloe to believe. The golf dinner had been about building Tess’s client list. Despite her and Zach’s panty-melting couch romp, last Sunday had revolved around revamping his business plan.
Tonight, however, was about them. Solely. No pretending.
Her sandals removed and her sundress swathing her crossed legs beneath the polished Japanese pine table, she scoped out the traditional décor of the tatami room in Tanaka’s. Now that Zach wasn’t a paying client, being seen in public as his potential date didn’t carry the same professional taboo. But she still appreciated his thoughtfulness at securing the private room on short notice, not to mention asking Rob to let them use the restaurant’s back entrance. She loved the sinful way all this sneaking around made her feel. Like last night at the art gallery…
A sensual ripple gripped her. Needing to distract herself from mooning over the previous night’s events, she watched Zach dip his ceramic spoon into the last of his miso soup. The memories assailed her regardless. The afterglow of her orgasm had warmed her long after their separate escapes from the under-stairs closet. It was a wonder she’d survived the evening without blushing furiously every time somebody had glanced at her.
His head lifted. “You don’t like the soup?”
“It’s very tasty.” She sipped a spoonful. “I’m just saving room for the sushi.”
“Talk about great timing. It’s here.” His gaze moved to a shadow-figure at the tatami room’s rice-paper door. A light rap rattled on the bamboo cross-frame. At Zach’s murmur of acquiescence, their kimono-clad waitress slid open the door. She placed the plates of sushi and yakitori on the table, then retrieved the soup bowls and left. The door closed again.
Mouth watering, Tess snapped apart her chopsticks.
Zach didn’t touch his set. “Mind if I use my fingers?”
“What’s the matter, Halliday? Cat got your dexterity?”
“I’m mighty dexterous with chopsticks, I assure you. I just prefer the feeling of the sticky sushi rice on my fingers. It’s a texture thing, you know.”
The man made “sticky” and “sushi” sound X-rated. And the way his mouth wrapped around “texture”—particularly the “tex” part—scattered erotic vibrations along her nerve endings.
She drew in a slow breath intended to dissipate her tension. It didn’t work very well, though. Heat pooled between her legs, and her nipples stiffened.
It was going to be a long wait until she got what she wanted—the natural follow-up to last night. She wanted Zach to feel every bit as marvellous and decadent as she’d felt then.
“By all means, use your fingers,” she murmured. “In fact, I think tonight you should do…whatever comes natural.” She smiled.
An expression of enjoyable discomfort crossed his face. He shifted on his woven mat. Had his jeans grown tighter?
She curved her hair behind her ears so it wouldn’t fall into her food. She picked up a tuna roll with her chopsticks, dipped the roll in soy sauce and lifted the delicacy to her mouth. The salty seaweed sparkled on her taste buds. For her second roll, she added a dab of hot wasabi then doused the flames with a swallow of smooth Kirin beer.
Zach chose a rice-studded shrimp roll with his fingers. When he finished eating, a grain of sticky rice clung to his thumb. He licked it off.
Tess pouted. No fair. She’d wanted to do that for him.
“Care to share?” she asked. “I’d love to taste…your rolls.”
He chuckled. “Want me to use chopsticks?”
“No.” Her voice flowed as soft and warm as the sensation flooding her body.
He groaned. “The things you do to me.” He indicated his plate. “Wasabi?”
“Please.” The dulcet strains of a Japanese guitar drifted from concealed speakers. The combination of the soothing music and the primitive nature of their sitting positions—thighs open to each other beneath the table, shins crossed, feet shoeless—cloaked them in a cozy intimacy she’d never experienced with another man. Every sense she possessed zeroed in on Zach. It was almost as if his soul had stolen into hers and held her hostage. She dared not imagine the exquisite sensation of finally having him deep inside her. |
