Page 113 of Perfectly Matched: Harbor Falls Romance Collection

Three days later, at twenty minutes before midnight, Jillian stood watching the fondant beater hammer the hell out of a large mixing bowl full of sugar and corn syrup goo. Chocolate was tempering to her left, a cooling station to her right, and her prep station all set out before her.

With the back of her hand, she swiped a shock of hair that had escaped her ponytail out of her eyes. Sugar crystals fell from her hand to her cheek as she did so.

A messy cook, she didn’t care. For three entire days she’d been at it. Keeping her mind on work had always made her forget unpleasant things. Besides, she was driven. She had a goal to get a variety of the chocolates in her store by tomorrow. Hence, the working late and around the clock. She glanced down at herself. Had she even showered this morning? Surely, she had. Her apron was none the worse for the wear, however; chocolate had dripped and streamed across it as she had dipped a batch of raspberry creams.

Shit.

Every time she thought of raspberry creams she thought of Scott and his succulent-as-berry lips. Which was the real reason, if she cared to admit it, why she was working her ass to a bone-tired state every night.

She didn’t like seeing Scott walk out the door on her the other night and damned if she could get the man out of her mind for one second. The thought of him made her twitter with attraction and over the past three days, question a few things in her life.

Yes, until recently, Jillian Bass had led an easy life. Her every whim for years was catered to and she generally got everything she wanted. Her bills were paid. She had the best schools, the best clothes, and even the best potential boyfriends were laid at her feet. Her grandmother had always been at her side, her confidant and mentor. And it was her Grandma Jean who had always encouraged her to think outside the pretty pink and expensive box her father and mother had placed her in.

So, when Grandma Jean had died, she did just that. Thought outside of her New York lifestyle box. She left her family, job, fiance, and the city she loved to move to the unknown, Harbor Falls, North Carolina, and start a new life.

And all of that wasn’t an easy thing to do, in fact it was quite uncomfortable at times, but she did it with a lot of forethought, planning, and patience. And it had all worked—so far at least. And she was proud of that and it made her feel good about herself.

But for some odd and crazy reason the discomfort she felt in her chest and held deeper in her gut that night three days ago when Scott Matthews ripped his warm, sexy body away from hers and walked out her door was more than she wanted to tolerate—and that feeling still lingered inside of her today.

She’d toyed with spontaneous. It hadn’t worked out so well for her three days ago.

“Spontaneous just doesn’t work for you, Jillian,”

she muttered.

But something about that niggled in the back of her heart. Maybe she hadn’t been spontaneous, enough. Maybe she should have jumped his bones and made him stay. Maybe she should have fluttered her eyelashes more like Southern women do and wooed him into her bed.

What?

Someone rapped hard on the glass of her back door, the one that led to the alley, interrupting her attention to the fondant and her daydream.

“Who in the world?”

Wiping her hands on a kitchen towel, she glanced once again to the tempering chocolate and the fondant. They should both be okay for a second or two. Looking again to the door, she noticed a shadowy figure there, and hobbled cautiously toward it. Both ankle and heel were better, but still not perfect.

The reflection of the glass made it difficult for her to see clearly, so once she reached the door, she flipped on the back-porch light.

Scott?

She took a breath and paused for a second, her hand on the doorknob. Then gathering something from deep inside, she opened the door. He stood there leaning into the doorframe, his arms crossed over his chest, staring at her like she was a succulent piece of…

Chocolate?

No.

Ass.

Yes. He was staring at her like he wanted to jump her ass. Right there. In her kitchen. With his eyes all bed-roomy and needy and sexy and...

How dare he?

With both fists, she grabbed his shirt, jerked him inside the door, locked her lips with his, and kicked the back door shut.

There. Was that spontaneous enough for you, Jillian?

****

Scott had stood at that back door for fifteen solid minutes and watched her before he finally garnered enough nerve to knock on the door. As she moved closer, something in his gut gave way and he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that should she give him one hint of a green light, he was going to be a goner.

Perhaps that’s why he’d waited so long. For three days, he could not get Jillian Bass, her soft lips, her petite frame, and the way his hands fit over her hips, out of his head. Could not forget that. So, throwing all caution to the wind, he escaped his solitary cabin, borrowed his brother’s Jeep again, and there he was.

As the door opened, her gaze hooked into his and held, but for only a few seconds. When her fingernails raked across his chest and she fisted his shirt in her hands, something in his libido jumped into overdrive, and he knew at that very second that this was all over.

All of it. Over.

He couldn’t fight it any longer.

The door slammed behind him and suddenly he found his fingers fumbling with the clasp that held her hair. They spun across the room and crashed into a counter, Scott pinning her against it. Their lips fused, fingers groping, Jillian had somehow snaked out of her apron. Then they flipped, turned, stumbled a few feet the other way while Jillian practically climbed his frame.

She laid hot licks right behind his ear and pushed him into the pantry door.

Oh, God... This was going to be good.

With a pop of suction, she broke away from their frantic kiss and said.

“Chocolate.”

“Not now, sweetheart.”

Tugging him away from the pantry, she said.

“No. Come here.”

“I’m here, babe.”

Again, she pulled him and rotated to their left. A mixing bowl clattered to the floor. Scott clung to her, his hands under her shirt now, and they rolled toward the stove.

“Hot...boiling…”

“Yes, yes sweetheart. We’re hot, boiling.”

“No. No... Chocolate...”

she said, and then flipped off the switch on the gas stove, where the chocolate was bubbling madly.

Ruined. Damn.

But only one thing worse than ruining hot and steamy, top-grade chocolate—was ruining hot and steamy, top-grade sex. And he wasn’t about to let that happen tonight.

Groaning, his hands skimmed to her ribs and dipped beneath her bra. Jillian reacted with a whimper and a gasp. She pointed behind him.

“Stop that thing.”

Reluctantly he glanced over his shoulder to see a big wad of fondant whining its way around the beater. “Oh.”

He stretched, which was difficult, since her hands were now jerking at his belt. “Got it.”

The whining stopped.

“Good,”

she breathed. “Now…”

“Now?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Here!”

All right!

In one motion, Scott lifted her onto the counter, and Jillian wrapped those sweet, sweet thighs around his waist and squeezed.

****

“Wait!”

A momentary panic settled across Jillian’s chest. Her hands gripped Scott’s shoulders, her legs were securely anchored to his hips, and his tongue was making a beeline for her cleavage.

More than anything at this moment, she wanted their clothes gone. And now. But...

“What?”

“The light.”

“Dammit. Where is the switch?”

“By the door.”

“Leave it.”

“No! Everyone in the apartments across the alley can see.”

“Grr…”

Scott raised his head from her chest and glanced about.

“Windows. Lots of windows,” he said.

But she already knew that. “Yes.”

Scott slipped his hands under her rear and lifted her off the counter. She held onto his waist with her legs, and her lips found his again as he stumbled toward the back door and the light switch. His palms squeezed her ass, and her crotch was more than throbbing now as she sucked on his neck.

God, she wanted this man!

“Not that door. The other one.”

“Christ, Jillian!”

“Over there!”

She pointed, and he twisted, knocking into a bag of open powdered sugar on the counter at his left elbow. Unfortunately, it toppled over and spilled out on the counter and waterfalled to the floor.

“Hells bells.”

But Scott would not be deterred, Jillian noticed. He forged ahead, carrying her weight with his to the other door, slapped the light switch, and the kitchen went dark. It took her eyes a moment to adjust, must have Scott’s too, because they both paused for one split second. Then the streetlight from the alley filtered in.

“Finally.”

He placed her on the nearest counter. In a flurry, he ripped her t-shirt over her head and slid her bra straps over her shoulder.

“Let me.”

Reaching behind, she deftly unhooked her bra and her breasts fell into his hands.

“Nice,”

he hissed, lowering to catch the peak of a nipple in his teeth.

Jillian moaned.

“Oh, God, yes…”

The touch of his rough tongue to her nipple sent flames scuttling through her. Passion raised; she clutched his head to her chest.

Scott passed from one breast to the other, balancing their weight in his hands, tugging her nipples one-by-one into his wet, hot mouth. She could barely sit still on the countertop.

“Oh, Scott...”

His big hands grasped her at the waist, and he pushed her further back onto the counter.

In one swift movement, he peeled the black stretch pants she wore over her hips and lifted her to be done with the things. Her bikini panties were stripped away in the same motion.

And there she was, alley light filtering over them, naked and legs spread wide on the counter, with Scott ogling her from the tips of her breasts to the goodies between her legs like she was some sort of confection. On a whim she reached to her right and scooped up a handful of powdered sugar and watched it sift through her fingers.

“Would you like sprinkles on that?”

she asked.

His wide-eyed gaze met hers, and she watched his mouth move but wasn’t sure he was able to speak. Finally, he did.

“Yes. Let me.”

She obliged and watched as he grasped a handful of the sweet stuff in his palm. With one hand he pulled her bottom closer to the edge of the counter, and with the other he sprinkled her body from nipples to Brazilian wax job with the fine, white powder. And with no hands remaining, the only thing left for him to do was use his tongue.

Which he did.

Licking. Tasting. Sampling. Savoring.

No erogenous zone on her torso was left un-sugared or un-tongued.

Working his way lower, he knelt in front of her, his fingers splaying her apart, his tongue gritty with sugar, lapping over her folds, dipping into her slit, rolling over her sensitive clit, and teasing her like there was no tomorrow.

Was there a tomorrow?

Hell, she was not thinking about that now.

“Syrup,”

she eked out.

Scott lifted his head. “What?”

Reaching upward to her right, she pulled down a small glass bottle.

“Best you’ll ever eat,”

she told him.

“Good stuff.”

“You’re driving me absolutely friggin’ crazy,”

he mumbled. She watched his wild gaze travel to the syrup bottle and then back to her body.

“You’re not kidding, right?”

“No.”

“What kind is it?”

Her voice rose.

“Does it matter?”

Quickly he grasped the thing, made short work of drizzling the cool liquid over her tummy and lower, and then wasted no time in making short work of her.

The thrill that shot through her at the touch of his tongue to her clit. He made wicked, wicked love to her pussy while standing there amidst sugar and chocolate and other assorted kitchen paraphernalia until she exploded into a molten lava-like eruption of pleasure that wouldn’t let go. Just as she was coming off her orgasmic high, Scott stood and tugged her even closer to the edge of the counter, pulled her into his arms.

Breathing hard, she bit into his shoulder and shuddered in his arms. After a moment, he lifted her up off the counter and said one word, “Shower.”

She pointed toward the stairwell and he carried her off that way.

Glancing back at the counter, her last thought before being whisked away to what she hoped was the remainder of a night filled with decadent sex and self-indulgent pleasure, was I gotta disinfect that.

Tomorrow.