The Stranger In Room 205 (Hot off the Press! 1)

She’d reflected before that few men like Sam ever found their way to Edstown. She didn’t expect another to come along anytime soon. She remembered something Kara had said during their conversation earlier that evening. “The real regrets would have come if I’d chosen not to take a chance on love.”

Despite Serena’s usual almost obsessive caution, Kara wasn’t the only one who could take chances occasionally.

It was only a few steps across the tiny living room to the equally small bedroom. The tousled queen-size bed took up most of the floor space. Serena paused beside it, turning to face Sam. The three-way lamp on the nightstand had been left on, its bulb so dim that it barely made a difference. Sam’s face was partially shadowed, making him look as mysterious and enigmatic as she now knew him to be.

She should probably be nervous at this point. She should at least have a few qualms or misgivings. But she didn’t. Whatever happened tomorrow when the truth about Sam’s condition came out, she would always have this night.

He took a step toward her, his mouth so close to hers she could feel his breath like a warm night breeze against her skin. But he kept his hands at his sides. “It just occurred to me,” he murmured, “that there’s something you forgot to buy when you shopped for me. I’m sure you didn’t realize we’d be needing protection, but it’s rather inconvenient at the—”

She pulled a hand out of her shorts pocket, letting the dim light reflect from the shiny plastic packets in her palm.

Letting his words trail away, Sam lifted his gaze from her hand to her face. She couldn’t quite read his expression, but there was approval in his voice when he said, “Never mind.”

She tossed the packets on the bed. “I thought you’d realized by now that I don’t believe in taking risks.”

He lifted his hands to clasp her hips, holding her lightly against him. “You don’t consider this a risk?”

She slipped her arms around his neck. “I consider this a temporary lapse in judgment,” she replied candidly. “I understand everyone has them occasionally.”

“Then let’s make it worthwhile,” he murmured, and crushed her mouth beneath his.

Even as they sank together to the bed, Serena knew exactly what had clinched this decision for her. It was that air of deep-seated loneliness about him. The sadness in his bright blue eyes that had caused LuWanda to speculate that he’d survived a tragedy of some sort. Looking out from her bedroom window, she had seen him sitting alone in the garden swing, and her heart had ached in response to the downward curve of his shoulders. He needed someone tonight. He needed her.

Whatever he faced tomorrow, perhaps it would be a bit easier for him after tonight. He would know that for now, at least, he wasn’t alone.

It had not been wise of her to fall in love with a strang

er, but she would worry about that later. She had more important things to concentrate on now.

The few clothes they’d worn were easily shed. Seeming to understand that Serena needed to take this at her own pace, Sam was relatively patient while she explored him. She pressed her lips softly to assorted scars and scrapes, brushed her fingers gently over the fresh bandage on his knee, ached in sympathy for every twinge of pain he’d suffered. And then she reveled in the strength of the lean muscles beneath his bruised skin. He might be a bit battered and confused, but there was no doubt he was a strong, vibrant male in his prime—and Serena was woman enough to appreciate that.

So there, Kara.

Sam drew her mouth to his, driving all thoughts of her sister—all coherent thought, actually—from her mind. He’d obviously been patient for as long as he could. He shifted her onto her back, giving him the freedom to do some exploring of his own. His hands and lips raced over her body, pausing here and there to elicit gasps of startled pleasure from her. There were obviously some things he hadn’t forgotten at all….

He kissed her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, her knees—and then kissed her with an intimacy that stole whatever breath she’d had left. By the time he returned to her mouth, her limbs were rubbery, her skin almost overly sensitized, her breathing raggedly uneven. A fire burned somewhere deep inside her, its heat almost unbearable. She squirmed from the intensity of it, craving relief even as she relished the sensations.

She tried to help him don the protection she’d provided, but her hands were shaking too hard to provide much assistance. That startled her. She rarely allowed herself to be overwhelmed with emotion.

His eyes locked with hers as he held himself poised above her. Battling a sudden attack of nerves, she searched his face, trying to read his thoughts. In so many ways he was still a stranger to her. She knew so little about him. So few solid facts. She didn’t even know his name. And yet, in some ways, she felt as if she knew him very well. And the characteristics she had observed in him during the past three weeks had been nothing but admirable.

She couldn’t believe he was a man who didn’t deserve her respect…her love. Whether he was free to accept it—well, that was something else she would have to worry about later. With a heartfelt mental apology to anyone who might be hurt by her selfish actions, she reached out to pull Sam to her.

Murmuring her name, he gathered her close, his mouth covering hers as he joined their bodies in one smooth thrust. She arched to meet him with a muffled cry of pleasure.

There were no thoughts about who he was or where he’d come from. For this night he was just Sam, the man who had come into her life so dramatically, so unexpectedly and had so effortlessly illustrated everything she had been missing. Funny. She hadn’t been fully aware that there was anything missing until she’d met him.

Even as she threw herself into the maelstrom of emotions his lovemaking evoked in her, she was aware of a slight niggling of fear at the back of her mind that after he left, she would be all too aware of the emptiness he left behind.

The dream was different this time. The woman he’d seen before was in it, but she wasn’t crying. She was laughing, as were the people who surrounded her. Men and women of about his own age, their faces as familiar to him as his own, their identities as lost to him. They were laughing, talking, gathered around a table—playing a card game, perhaps? He could almost hear their voices, almost catch their names. Did someone say the name Michael? Was someone called Kelly?

One of them, a man, spoke to him in the dream. Sam almost recognized him—was he the same man he’d imagined at the other end of a fishing boat? Tanned, brown-haired, blue-eyed, lanky. Shane. The guy’s name was Shane. Sam could almost hear him speaking in a lazy, deep drawl, calling him by name. The name Sam—no, wait, it wasn’t Sam. It was—

“Sam?”

A woman’s voice this time, disturbing his sleep, making him frown and try harder to hang on to the images.

“Sam?” More insistent this time.