"I tried to tell you."

Yes, but she'd effectively distracted him with that soft, honey voice and even softer body. Unbelievable. He got up and shut the door, then stalked back to the bed. He lay flat on his back and stared at the dark ceiling, watching the last of the candlelight flickering shadows across the wood.

On the other side of the rolled sheet, Breanne was tossing and turning, and though he didn't turn his head and look at her, he imagined those silk shorts riding up, her top slipping down, and he nearly groaned. "Can't you just pick a position and stay there?"

"Sorry."

But she kept moving, and he kept picturing her, until he couldn't stand it. "Breanne."

"Do you really not wear underwear?"

A laugh choked out of him. "What?"

"I just-Never mind."

“No, this is a conversation I'm interested in."

“I saw your clothes earlier-there was no underwear. And you sleep naked."

“Yes. But I'm not naked now." Much to his annoyance.

She tossed around some more. "Sorry. It's just that every time I close my eyes, I relive my sucky day. I think about all the things that I could be doing right now."

"With your husband?" Odd how just the thought tightened his gut. He figured if she had said "I do," then she and her ex would right this minute be screwing every which way but Sunday. At least that's what Cooper would be doing if he'd married Breanne this morning. Hell, he wouldn't have waited until now, either; he'd have found a way to have her in the limo on the way to the airport, in the airport bathroom, in the airplane bathroom, on the ride into the mountains-

"Not with my husband," Breanne said softly in the night. "Because I'd have killed him by now." Her voice was steely. "The rat fink bastard."

"But if he'd shown up for the wedding, you wouldn't have had a reason to kill him," Cooper pointed out reasonably.

"Sooner or later he'd have shown me his true colors, and if he'd done it when I already had his name on my driver's license, I'd be even more pissed."

"Because hell, that's a damn inconvenience, right?"

"You're not kidding. You ever wait in line at the DMV?"

With another laugh, he turned on his side to face her. Holding up his head with his hand, he searched out her face in the darkness. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah." Her smile was sad. "Want to know a secret?"

"Sure."

"Today was my third time being ditched by a fiancé.".

"Ouch."

She laughed unhappily. "Yeah."

"What happened?"

"The first time?" She sighed. "I'd loved Barry since…well, since kindergarten. It seemed so natural, you know? Graduate high school, get married. But my parents thought we were too young. They offered him a chance to go to Europe to study foreign diplomacy as he'd wanted, paying him with a one-way ticket and a large stash of cash. Oh, and the edict that he not look back."

"Don't tell me he didn't look back."

"Okay, I won't tell you."

He swore softly. "You were better off without him, too."

"I did learn my lesson," she admitted.

"Which was what, not to date spineless assholes?"

"No. I decided no more engaging the heart."

"But you could still get engaged?"

She laughed a bit mirthlessly. "The second engagement, that was a favor. Franco just wanted to stay in the country, but he ended up getting deported anyway. So that one doesn't really count. Right?"

He stroked a strand of hair from her cheek. A mistake. Her hair felt like silk between his fingers, her skin just chilled enough that he wanted to leave his hand on her. "Did your dad get him deported?"

"No, overprotective dad and four brothers never found out about that one."

"Four brothers." He let out a low whistle. "You must have been quite the princess," he teased.

"You did call that one right."

"So do you get engaged to everyone you meet? Is that how that works?"

"Hey, I've resisted you so far."

"To my great consternation."

She smiled but looked away. "Obviously I have a terrible decision-making mechanism. I'm working on it. But believe it or not, there's a silver lining here."

"Yeah? What's that?"

"I won't be fooled again, not by another pretty face and hunky body, not by sweet words, no way, no how." She shook her head, her eyes luminous in the dark "Love does not exist."

“You really believe that?"

"Yes. You?"

He shook his head.

"You've been in love?" she asked.

He lifted a shoulder. "I guess I thought it might become love."

"Did it?"

"Nope." He shot her a smile. "Got my heart crushed like a grape about six months ago."

Her gaze softened. "Oh, Cooper." She reached out and touched his chest over his heart. "I'm sorry."

"I'm over it."

Shifting up on her elbow so she could see his face, she left her hand on him and looked at him intently. "So you got hurt, and yet you'd give it another shot?"

The vulnerability in her voice made him ache. It'd been easier, far easier, to resist her when she wore her sarcastic edge like a coat, because this softer, kinder, caring Breanne tore through his defenses in a way he hadn't anticipated. "Hell, Breanne, I'm just saying it exists."

She flopped to her back, staring up at the ceiling. "Well, it can exist all it wants, as long as it stays far, far away from me."

Cooper lay back down as well, joining her in the study of the ceiling. He'd spent much of the recent past feeling exactly the same, but for some reason he didn't like to think that this vibrant, exciting woman, who had so much to offer, was going to hold back from love the next time it came around, simply because she'd been burned.

"Cooper?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you really unemployed?"

The sixty-thousand-dollar question. "I am."

"Where do you live?"

"In San Francisco."

"So what are you doing out here in the mountains? Alone?"

"My brother thought I needed to ski my brains out for a week and get over myself." And get laid by a pretty, warm, sexy ski bunny.

"Why?" she asked.

"Too many reasons to get into."

"We have all night."

"Maybe I'm tired."

"I thought guys liked to talk about themselves."

"Not this guy. Tell me about you. What do you do?"

"Bookkeeping for a big CPA firm." She frowned. "At least at the moment."

"At the moment?"

"I'm going to have to find another job."

"Why?"

"Because I'll have to see Dean there-that's rat fink bastard to you and me-and I still have an uncontrollable urge to kill him. That won't look good in my review, plus it'll be hard to get another job from prison."

He tried to see her in the dark. "You're not going to let him take that job from you, are you?"

"It doesn't matter," she said with a sigh. "You should see my resume. It'd make you dizzy." She sighed. "Truth is, I don't sit still for long anyway."

"No? What jobs have you held?"

"Receivables, payables, payroll-you name it in accounting, I've done it."

"So you like numbers," he said, nodding. "Makes sense. You like order."

"How do you know that?"

"This whole setting makes you nervous because it's not what was planned."

"You can say that again," she said with feeling.

“And I've seen your journal. Very organized. Like an accountant's brain."

“I wasn't that organized when it came to staying with one job."

"Nothing wrong with that, as long as moving around makes you happy."

Now it was her turn to come up on her elbows and peer through the dark. "You really believe that?"

"Sure," he said, leaning in closer for a better look, because for a second he'd have sworn that her eyes went suspiciously bright with a sheen of tears. But then it was gone. "Breanne?"

"I'm tired," she whispered. She turned over, curling up into a tiny ball facing away from him. '"Night."

'"Night." He was confused as hell, but when it came to women, that was really nothing new. Nothing new at all.

He was just drifting off when he heard her soft whisper. "Cooper?"

"Still here." Maybe she'd changed her mind about the sheet. The thought made his body twitch. Yeah, she was going to toss that damn thing aside and roll toward him. She'd wrap that hot little bod tight to his, and he'd-

"Thank you," Breanne said very quietly.

He blinked. Thank you? He slid his hand down to cup himself. Still hard. Nope, he hadn't missed anything. "What are you thanking me for?"

"For chasing my boogeyman. For making me feel safe." Her smile broke his heart. "For letting me sleep with you."

Ah, hell. "No problem." But as he lay there, aching for reasons other than physical discomfort, reasons he couldn't seem to put words to, it was a very long time before he followed her into slumber.


***

Cooper was having the dream of his life, and he hoped he never woke up. In a bed of the softest down, surrounded by the gentle glow of dawn, she lay in his arms, the woman of his fantasies. She was scantily clad in silk that seemed to mold to her skin in an erotic, seductive way, and he couldn't keep his hands off her.

And because this was a dream, he didn't have to.

She was his. He couldn't quite remember how or why, but in dreamland, what the hell difference did it make? Around them, the air seemed thick. Spicy. Erotic. He dragged some of it into his taxed lungs and cupped her face, trying to see her through the haze all around him, but he couldn't quite-

A sound escaped her, a sort of breathy, wordless plea, and he smoothed his fingers along the line of her jaw, sinking into the lovely disarray of her hair, letting it drape over his forearms as he leaned over her, lowering his mouth toward hers.