Page 42 of Baby It's Cold Outside

Chapter Two

Fourteen hours, thirty minutes ’til midnight

Ten minutes later the cabin was toasty warm. Not surprising, given it was the tiniest cabin Tamara had ever seen. There was a small living area with a compact kitchen attached, an elegant arched entrance to an alcove dominated by a massive feather bed, and a bathroom made for hobbits. It wasn’t exactly the family-sized cabin she’d been expecting. More honeymoon retreat or lover’s hideaway. But she was grateful to Georgia anyway for offering it as a place to hide from the frivolity and temptation of New Year’s Eve.

“So what’s the reason?”

Tamara opened her eyes when he nudged her shoulder. She looked up—all the way up—at temptation personified. No. She couldn’t think like that. She’d only known Georgia for six months, but they’d become quite close, which made Luke—her friend’s little brother—a no-go zone. Not that she would call the hot man standing in front of her little. But, the point was, he was off-limits.

So what if he’d shed his hoodie to reveal a white T-shirt that clung to flat abs and nice pecs? So what if he had the most fascinating number one buzz cut in all of existence and a face that belonged on a Calvin Klein billboard? So what if his faded jeans clung to legs that could tempt a perfectly good girl to turn bad? So what if she was so horny every cell in her body was drowning in lust? It wasn’t terminal.

The fire’s glow danced across his tanned biceps as he handed her another glass of eggnog. He smiled, displaying a very sexy cleft in his chin that made Tamara’s nipples scrunch into tight little balls. Luckily they’d been rendered almost extinct from the layers pressing down upon them.

“What’s what reason?” she asked as she took the drink. She should probably refuse—she’d already had way too much and God knew her inhibitions had fled at the sight of all those muscles.

He sat beside her again, their knees almost touching. She noticed he had a beer so she didn’t feel like she was one step away from a park bench so much. “Why aren’t you in Times Square watching the ball drop with Georgia?”

Tamara stared at the nutmeg floating on top of her drink. She could have told him it was the weather. The roads were treacherous—she’d barely made it to the cabin this morning before the blizzard had landed. But it wasn’t the truth.

She pressed the chilled glass to her flushed cheek. “There’ll be kissing,” she said.

Luke laughed. “That’s bad?”

Had there been one infinitesimal part of her where the heat from the fire and the burn from the rum had not reached, his laughter took care of it, licking warmth into every last cell. She set the glass down so she could strip off her gloves and push the hoodie and knit cap off her head. “It’s been so long, I may just get arrested for public indecency.”

It wasn’t the real reason, although it had been a while, but she doubted a fine piece of man-flesh like Luke would understand how depressing New Year’s Eve could be with no one special to kiss.

He laughed again and took a sip of his beer. Tamara was aware of the long tanned ridge of his throat and the press of his pulse as his head tipped back. He swallowed and his eyes twinkled—yes, twinkled!—at her. “I’ve got nine months, the length of my deployment. How long you got?”

Tamara snorted. “Piece of cake, soldier boy. Try twelve.”

He whistled. “Okay,” he conceded. “You win.”

“Great,” she huffed into her drink, then took a sip. “I excel at abstinence. The nuns at my all-girls’ school would be so proud.”

He frowned. “If

it’s been so long, wouldn’t New Year’s Eve in New York City be the perfect place to be?”

Tamara knew twenty-something men did not understand the powerful dictates of biology. That traipsing from one relationship to another got very old very quickly and that at some stage, commitment stopped being a dirty word. That being with one person was more exciting than playing the field. That the yearning for a home and a family could hit you out of the blue.

Twenty-something men had it easy.

And with him looking at her like that, with a puzzled look and the confidence of a male in his prime, her temperature soared from hot to smoking and her hormones whispered him.

So she stood to deliver herself from temptation. Another win for the nuns.

The room spun a little as heat, alcohol, and sexual deprivation played havoc with her equilibrium.

When it righted itself he was looking at her expectantly with that blue, blue gaze, looking fit and vital and so damn muscle-y and male she wanted to gnaw on his perfectly delineated, denim-clad quad. More heat flowed through her at the thought and she tried to remember what they’d been talking about but God, she was so freaking hot now she felt like her brain was boiling.

She unzipped her parka. Where were they? Oh yes...

“I made a resolution last New Year’s Eve”—she shrugged out of her puffy coat and slung it on the lounge—“after waking up with some guy who seemed so with it and together the night before...”

His gaze dropped to her body and roved around for a bit and the heat inside her turned to flame, her clothes seemingly catching on fire. She started to pace as she pulled at the layers, trying to get them off.

Luke couldn’t believe his eyes as the heavy woolen sweater hit the couch, revealing another sweater of a finer knit and weave.

---