Take Me for a Ride Read Online Free PDF Page A

faced him and tilted her head back. “Do you want to?”
    “Er,” said McDougal, looking helplessly down at her and trying to ignore the softness of her body snugged up against him. In an effort not to respond, he tried to think of the homeliest woman he’d ever seen . . . his mother’s friend Miss Eunice, who looked exactly like a grouper. But he couldn’t ignore the fact that it wasn’t Miss Eunice who was pressed against his—
    “Are you gay?” Natalie blurted, just as that part of him sprang to attention.
    Hell, no, I’m not gay. I’m just planning to rob your sweet little granny. “What do you think, sweetheart?”
    “Wow.” She grinned impishly. “I think I’m glad you’re not gay.”
    To his bemusement, her hand began a journey up his thigh and then took a sharp turn toward the center. “Do not touch that,” Eric said through gritted teeth. “Or you won’t make it home safely.”
    Her hand stilled but remained just to the left of his hip bone. “Um. Well. That was kind of the point.”
    A loopy little giggle followed. Natalie Rosen was the cheapest drunk he’d ever encountered; that was for sure.
    The top of her head came barely to his shoulder. He stared down at her, and she up at him. In the bright light of a streetlamp, he saw that her eyes weren’t dark brown at all, but closer to navy. The color of deep, deep water.
    “I haven’t even kissed you yet,” he said, feeling mildly outraged. Why? Because he was supposed to be the wolf, not the sheep?
    “You don’t strike me as the kind of guy who waits for permission.”
    “I’m not.”
    They stood there like that, with her wanting to touch him and his cock straining to be touched. It was ironic. It was damn close to painful. And yet he wanted to draw out the moment, savor it for some reason. Clearly he was insane.
    She lifted her eyebrows in an unspoken question.
    “Oh, hell,” McDougal said. “Look, you’re drunk. I don’t want to take advantage of you.” He could hear, in his mind, every guy he’d gone to college with—or hung out with since—roar with laughter. Laugh until they either fell over or pissed themselves. He was not known for having a conscience.
    “I know perfectly well that I’m drunk,” Natalie said. “Do you think I’d do this sober?”
    “Um. Well. That’s kind of the point.” He smiled down at her and tapped her small freckled nose once, then twice, with his index finger.
    Natalie blinked. “Wow,” she said unsteadily. “Ch chivalry is not dead. ’S been run over a few times; it’s diseased and dirty; ’s hooked on Boone’s Farm and m-meth . . . but holy cow, iss still st-stumbling along in rags, raising ’s ugly head just when you least expect it—or want it.”
    She looked so disenchanted that McDougal threw back his head and laughed so hard that he almost coughed up a lung.
    Natalie just stepped out of his jacket and wrapped her arms around herself in the cold. Her air of disgust made him laugh all over again. And then he spied a cab with its light on a couple of blocks away. He put his hand in the air to hail it.
    “Can I have your number?” he asked as the yellow car pulled over next to them.
    She pursed her lips and tapped her foot a couple of times as he opened the door. Finally she said, “No. ’S now or never.” And then she put her arms around his neck, stood on tiptoe, and kissed him.

Four
    Natalie’s mouth was sweet and still whiskey wet and thoroughly unexpected when it touched McDougal’s. At the contact he felt a shock of electric pleasure that went straight to his now doubly enthused groin.
    McDougal had done his share of kissing. Event planners, lady stockbrokers, lawyers, business owners, teachers, actresses, models, professional dancers . . . even a French would-be murderess with a bad chain-smoking habit.
    In his not very humble opinion, kissing was usually overrated, something to get out of the way before he got to the good stuff.
    Kissing Natalie profoundly