Forbidden Pleasure

Chapter One

Scotland Neck, North Carolina

Three years later

"Mac, did you see my comb?" Keiley called from the bathroom, her voice a little sharp with irritation and simmering with impatience.

"I have my own, Kei," he reminded her in the same tone.

She moved from the bathroom, naked as the day she was born, water still beading on her shoulders, her cap of dark hair mussed around her face as she began searching the tops of the dresser, the vanity, the bedside tables.

Delicate and fragile. That was his wife. At twenty-six she still captivated him, made him harder than hell, and made him think of fairies on a fantasy night. A sensual, sexy fairy sandwiched between two male bodies and gleaming with moisture.

He shook the image away, frustration surging through him as his control weakened further.

"It was just in there yesterday," she muttered as Mac cinched his belt and considered uncinching it just as quickly.

If he moved fast enough, he could be undressed, have her flat on her back and his cock sinking into the fist-tight heat between her thighs.

He was loosening his belt when her gaze sliced to him.

"Don't even think about it." Hazel eyes were still dark with lingering anger.

"I'm still in the doghouse, then?" Mac grinned as he fastened the belt before sitting down on the end of the bed to pull on the scarred work boots he wore on the farm.

He tended to indulge Keiley whenever he could, but he had to admit, there were times he was tempted to indulge more than just her feminine wiles. That glimmer of confrontation and defiance in her eyes often tempted him to indulge a dominance he had so far managed to keep strictly under control.

"However you want to consider it." She bent down, her delightful little tush sticking up in the air as she looked beneath the bed.

"Keep flashing that ass at me and I'll show you how short that stay in the doghouse is going to be."

He felt he owed her at least a warning. She had good reason to be a shade upset with him, after all. Standing a woman up for an intimate dinner at home, complete with candlelight, because he had become distracted at a horse sale wasn't a good idea. Especially when he had been warned to be home on time. He hadn't forgotten a damned thing. His control was just that shaky. He hadn't dared show up on time.

She had waited up on him, too. Dressed in scarlet red silk, thigh-high stockings, and heels. She met him at the door, told him good night sweet as sugar, then went to bed.

His dinner had been in the oven. The candles had burned to nubs. She had obviously eaten. And he had managed, for one more night, not to mention the hungers tearing him apart.

"Touch my ass and you'll lose your hand," she informed him as she straightened and looked around the room with an expression of confusion. "That was my favorite comb, Mac."

"Did you look under the cabinet?"

She had so much fussy female stuff in there that he sometimes wondered how she found anything.

"Of course I did." She shot him a frown that warned him he should have already known that.

He flashed her a grin that had better warn her that he was getting damned horny watching her run around naked. He wasn't above seducing her. She could protest until hell froze over, but they both knew that after the first kiss she was going to cave. It was a given. He knew it, she knew it, and his cock knew it.

She did beat a hasty retreat back to the bathroom as Mac drew in a silent breath of relief.

"You know, you need to get a handle on yourself," she told him, causing him to catch his breath again minutes later as she left the bathroom.

"That waistband is too damned low." He glared at the sight of her lovely hip bones above the elastic band of the shorts. And the so-called t-shirt wasn't much better. It flashed too much belly, and showed her navel ring. A navel ring that had been driving him crazy the past few months.