The winner of the gift certificate is Belinda Baker! Belinda, email me to arrange delivery of your prize. Congrats!

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Today, just to entice you to keep reading, I’m offering a small gift, a $5.00 Amazon eGift certificate, to one lucky commenter. Just enough to buy a Kindle version of this book with a little something left over. *wink*

Yes, there’s spooky, creepy happenings throughout this book. Funny moments, too. But you want to know about Sam and Cait, whether they work as a couple and an investigative team. They’ve been on-again, off-again since their divorce. Their last separation was nearly a year. Sam is resistant to trusting Cait to keep it together, and she’s caused him worry and heartbreak. Cait loves Sam, but hasn’t trusted him with her secrets. The one thing that neither has control over is their overwhelming lust for each other. Take a peek inside their lives.

Here, Sam is delivering Cait to her front door after they’ve reviewed the day’s discoveries at Cait’s favorite bar. Sam’s already irritated because Cait withheld some information and insisted on meeting at O’Malley’s, even though she drank Cokes rather than her usual scotch. It’s been raining…

The Excerpt

The parking brake grated. A car door slammed behind her.

She grinned, careful to wipe her face clear of amusement as she unlocked her apartment door. Before she could push it open, a hand reached past her and shoved it wide. Another hand slid around her waist and forced her over the threshold.

Shrugging away from his hold, she pretended to resist. The door slammed behind her, and before she could face him, his wet body crowded hers against the wall of the foyer, hands gripping her wrists and gliding them upward.

“Gonna pat me down?” she gasped, wishing those hands were caressing her.

“Just shut up,” he ground out, pressing close enough she felt his rigid cock grind against her buttocks.

Anger chasing desire was a heady cocktail. Cait knew all too well that the madder Sam got, the brighter the fireworks. “This is my house,” she bit out, “and I didn’t invite you in.”

“I’m not a fucking vampire, and you left me a key,” he whispered in her ear. “Invitation enough.”

So he’d figured that out. “Maybe I just forgot it was there.”

“You’re a lot of things, but careless isn’t one of ’em.”

The low, sexy rumble of his voice was doing a number on her, rasping nerve endings, igniting her arousal like kerosene poured onto smoldering coals. “Whatcha gonna do, Detective Pierce?” she asked, letting him hear the breathless excitement in her voice.

“Not what I should, that’s for sure,” he growled.

The whispered regret stung.

Stiffening, she muttered, “I’ll make it easy for you to do the right thing. I want you to go.”

“Liar.” His hand slid between her waist and the wall, then skimmed upward to cup her breast. He squeezed, shaping its fullness with his broad palm.

Another hand glided between her legs, and fingers strummed over her clothed sex.

Cait bit her lip, trying to hold back a moan. But her body betrayed her in a very obvious way.

“You’re wet, O’Connell,” Sam drawled beside her ear.

“So, it’s been a while. Coulda happened with anybody.”

“Sorry I’m not Jason?” he whispered, pinching her nipple.

The sensual torture earned a throaty groan. Then she remembered he’d asked something. “Jason?”

“You been playing with a partner again?”

If she’d had an ounce of pride left, she would have said yes. Just to prick him. He was already getting pretty sure of himself by the way he crowded closer, his hips grinding against her backside. “We’re just friends,” she gasped, then rocked her hips side to side to rub against his cock.

He nuzzled into the corner of her shoulder, and she tilted her head, encouraging him to slide warm lips along her skin.

“You planning on staying the night, Pierce?”

His teeth gently bit her earlobe. “Only if you beg me.”

“Beg!” she snorted. “I don’t have to beg for it. I get hit on all the time.”

“Wrong answer,” he growled.

The button at the top of her slacks popped. Her zipper scraped down. A hand slid over her belly, and a single, thick digit slipped between her slick folds. Sam circled on her clit then pinched it and circled again, stoking her arousal.

Cait’s entire body quaked. Sweet Jesus, she wasn’t gonna last a minute. When fingers twisted her nipple, the intense pleasure arched her back. Another second and he’d have her climbing the wall. “Uncle, already.”

“What’s that, sweetheart?” Fingers glided down, tucking inside her entrance then thrusting in maddening little strokes.

“God, you’re an asshole.”

“Just making sure you really want me here.”

A soft, ragged sob escaped her lips, and Cait surrendered, slumping against him. “Please, Sam. Please finish it, now.”

He pulled away his hands and gripped her hips. Taking one step back, he turned her. Standing face-to-face and supported by his strength, Cait lifted her head.

His taut, hungry look took away her breath. The half-lidded gaze blazed midnight blue; his stare was unrelenting.

“It’s just sex,” she blurted, needing to pull back a little emotionally.

“Agreed.” His stare flitted to her lips.

Cait wet them with the tip of her tongue. “Doesn’t mean we’re together again.”

“That will never happen.”

His expression, tight, intense, told her he meant it. Part of her wanted to howl with disappointment. The other part was revved and ready to take anything she could get.

“Fuck buddies it is.” She rose on tiptoe and grasped his collar, pulling him down until his lips rubbed against hers. Cait moaned and stroked her tongue into his mouth, greedy for a taste.

Sam pushed his tongue against hers, forcing it back, and followed, rimming her teeth then stroking deep while his lips suctioned and rubbed.

She thrust her hands into his short-cropped hair and lost herself.

His breath was minty, like he’d popped a Tic Tac before he’d followed her to the door. She smiled against his mouth. This seduction was premeditated. No way could he claim she’d driven him to break.

Sam ended the kiss, then spun her by the hips and shoved her toward her bedroom.

“You still haven’t learned the joys of foreplay,” she muttered. Secretly she was thrilled. Cait rolled her hips as she strode toward her bedroom. She unbuttoned her blouse and tossed it over her shoulder. The rustle of clothing behind her told her he was making quick work of his own clothes, so she kept going until she was nude and crawling onto the mattress.

She still hadn’t glanced back, wanting to be horizontal when she took her first good look because her legs felt rubbery already. She lay against the sheets, closing her legs, one thigh angling over the other because suddenly she felt a little shy about giving him a glimpse of her sex.

Cait, however, took her fill of Sam, her gaze raking every inch of his body. Time apart had dulled the memory of his masculine perfection. But now every detail seared her mind.

The dim light from the hallway defined Sam’s rugged body with a shadowy underscoring of rippling muscle. Wide shoulders, a tapered waist, thickly muscled arms and thighs…her gaze snagged on his cock, which thrust upward, rigid and pulsing.

Moisture spilled from deep inside her pussy to moisten folds thickening with arousal.

Sam took a step toward the bed, then halted. “Are you still on the pill?” he asked in a gruff voice.

Her mouth had gone dry. She nodded.

“Been sleeping with anyone else?”

She snorted. “None of your damn business.”

On a harsh rasp, his chest rose swiftly, his lips crimping in irritation. “Cait, do I need to wear a condom?”

Her pride deflated like a punctured balloon. “No. Do I need you to wear one?”

Sam’s square jaw flexed, and he set a knee into the mattress.

Cait had her answer and shouldn’t have been so damn happy about it. Nor did she have any doubts he’d told her the truth. At least with sex, they’d always been completely honest. So neither of them had been in a hurry to find another partner. Maybe they still had too many raw wounds to risk their hearts again.

Sam crawled over her, nothing except his thick cock touching her skin. It glided over her mound then rested against her belly, heavy and warm.

Cait slowly parted her legs, scraping beneath hairy thighs, until she lay open beneath him.

He came down on his elbows and cupped her cheeks.

Then he bent to give her a slow kiss that melted the tension she hadn’t known rode her body. Her lips parted, and she surrendered herself, giving him the lead as she always had because, when it came to sex, Cait yielded everything, body and soul.

Sam groaned and lifted his mouth away. His hips rose as he dragged his cock down her belly and pushed it between her legs, prodding her sex. When he found her moist entrance, he paused. “Wider,” he rasped.

Instantly, she obeyed, lifting her knees and letting them splay open as far as was comfortable. Her hips tilted, cupping upward, angling her pussy for the prime angle, the one that would force the ridge around the head of his cock to stroke her magic spot.

Her whole body quivered with anticipation as he circled his hips and began to screw slowly inside her. Air hissed between her clenched teeth. God, she’d forgotten how big he was.

“You OK?” he said, his voice thick.

“Ego need a little stroking?”

His mouth curved, and he pushed deeper. Then his head sank. Forehead to forehead, he groaned again. “Goddamn, you’re wet. And so fucking tight.”

Sam rarely cursed, except when she got under his skin. Cait tilted back her head and kissed him hard. “Don’t go easy on my account.”

Like a greyhound leaping out of the starting gate at the crack of a pistol, Sam thrust deep, pushing the air from her lungs in a harsh gasp.

Cait didn’t care. She clutched his shoulders, her fingers digging deep. She bounced her hips off the mattress, her movements opposing his, until their bodies slammed noisily together.

Sam began the rapid-fire pistoning that never failed to get her off. His strokes powered into her, rough and targeted—aimed straight at her core.

Unbidden, tears filled her eyes. She savored every moment—the taste and scent of his clean sweat, the tensile strength of his hard, muscled frame, the thrusts that churned her juices like silky butter as he rammed past her rippling walls.

Sam filled her up in more ways than the obvious. How could she let him walk away again?