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He’d been counting down the minutes until he never had to see Bianca the Perfect again. She was a control freak. And like most control freaks, she was positive she knew everything.

He’d watched the florist try to escape her; the bandleader get a panicked look each time she approached. He’d seen the caterer flinch when she eyed the wedding cake and again when she went from table to table, surreptitiously straightening forks and knives that didn’t need straightening.

Okay. He had to admit she’d seemed polite enough in dealing with all those people, but didn’t it occur to her they knew how to do their jobs? Her every action said she was the person who should be in charge of the world, that nobody else was up to it.

She’d dealt with him like that too.

No. Not like that.

Worse. She’d abandoned any pretense at politeness with him.

Disdainful glances. Icy words. An attitude that said he was in her way. Man, she was all attitude. And by the time the party was winding down, he’d been longing to see the last of Bianca Bellini Wilde.

That was what he’d been thinking when he and all the other guests went outside to see off the bride and groom.

“Goodbye,” the guests shouted. “Be happy. Be well.” And some of the guys from the unit had shouted more basic things, things that made everybody laugh.

Everybody but the Tigress, who’d been as aloof and apart as if she were alone on the crowded porch.

The guests, the Wildes, the Bellinis had all gone back inside.

Bianca hadn’t.

For reasons Chay still couldn’t explain, neither had he.

They’d exchanged a few words. Chilly, not nasty.

And then…and then, he’d kissed her.

Okay. Not the smartest, smoothest move he’d ever made. He certainly hadn’t had a real desire to kiss her. What man would want to kiss such a self-centered, know-it-all ice queen?

To this day, he couldn’t come up with an answer for why he’d done it.

Impulse was the best he could manage, just a reaction to her looking at him as if he were a lesser form of life. He wasn’t into the me Tarzan, you Jane thing, but if that was how she thought of him, so be it.

Or maybe she’d flattened his male ego one time too many. Whatever the reason, he’d reached for her, hauled her none too gently into his arms and kissed her.

Stupid? Of course, but no-think moments were usually stupid.

He hadn’t even considered how she’d respond. If he had, he’d have figured she’d slug him.

But she hadn’t.

Yeah, she’d struggled to get free. Struggled for maybe a tenth of a second. Then, she’d made a little sound that had gone straight through him.

And she’d melted in his arms.

Her body had softened against his.

Her lips had clung to his.

She’d lifted herself to him, clasped one hand around the nape of his neck and parted her lips to the demand of his, and then it was over, it was done…

Except…the taste and feel of her had been in his head all these months and wasn’t that a bitch that he should remember a woman, a kiss, a moment that should never have happened, and now here she was, all that same disdain, that same fire, that same lush mouth and soft body and, Jesus, he could show her that what she felt for him wasn’t disdain at all…

A fist pounded against the door.

It had been pounding for a while, Chay realized.