Captured By You: A One Night of Passion Novella by Beth Kery

soon. Chance was a gypsy, given the nature of his job. It was just that in addition to the mind-blowing sex they’d had, she was starting to get used to his warm, natural male grace.
    “It must be so exciting for you, going to countries like that . . . seeing those different cultures and ways of life,” she said wistfully.
    “I guess it’s been hard for you to travel, bringing up Derek the way you did.”
    She nodded. “But not just because of Derek. He’s in college now anyway, and gone for the majority of the year. The diner won’t run itself, though.” She realized she might have sounded maudlin as she nibbled on her bread thoughtfully and gave him a smile. “You know, it’s never been closed once, except for Sunday afternoons, since my folks died.”
    “You’re a hard worker.”
    “Or maybe I just haven’t got anything better to do in this excuse of a town,” she said, laughing.
    After dinner, Chance insisted on cleaning up, claiming he had to earn his dinner. He shooed her into the living room with a cup of spearmint herb tea. Sherona leafed through a magazine, grinning every once in a while when she heard his boisterous efforts resounding from the kitchen—cupboards slamming closed, dishes rattling, and Chance singing a rousing, off-key tune as if to bolster his energetic cleanup.
    He joined her ten minutes later carrying his own cup of tea and sank down next to her on the couch. Earlier, as they’d eaten dinner, it had occurred to her how easy it was to talk to him, perhaps because some of the sexual tension between them had broken after their first encounter. She’d even wondered if his down-to-earth insouciance wasn’t the reason she’d felt intuitively comfortable enough with him to do something as risky as she had.
    Now that they sat together sipping their tea and talking on her couch, however, Sherona realized that her intense sexual awareness and attraction to Chance Hathoway hadn’t disappeared; it had just ebbed slightly following their charged encounter. As she sat there with her feet curled beneath her, admiring his profile and the shape of his long legs and his lean, muscular torso and just about everything else about his appearance, sexual anticipation mounted by the second, even surpassing her former attraction.
    “So,” he said once nightfall was complete and the lamp next to the couch glowed in the windowpane of her picture window, “will you be able to get away tomorrow evening to finish the photo shoot?”
    “I probably shouldn’t,” she said quietly, studying her ceramic mug. Even at the mention of the photos and her wanton behavior, arousal curled in her lower belly and tightened her sex. “I’d have to find someone to watch the diner.”
    He set down his tea on the table and drew one knee onto the couch, turning to the side to more fully face her. “We can do it another time,” he said so levelly that she glanced up in surprise. She’d thought he’d try to coax her. He smiled, as if he’d known what she expected.
    “I’m not going to push you, Sherona,” he said, his voice low and compelling. “You know I’d like to finish the photos, but it’s not the most important thing to me at the moment.”
    “What is?”
    “Getting to know you better. Making love to you in the way a man normally makes love to a woman for the first time.”
    She smiled. “What way is that?”
    “Well, I don’t want to give too much of a pat answer, but I’m pretty sure it usually doesn’t involve having her strip down, tying her up and ordering her to pleasure me.”
    “I just thought maybe you Aussies didn’t like to mess around with niceties on first dates,” she murmured. He chuckled and reached out and stroked her elbow.
    Their gazes held. His grin lingered on his lips. Her heart throbbed in her chest.
    He was an incredibly sexy man.
    “I want to take off all your clothes and touch you everywhere, Sherona,” he said as he slid closer to her on the couch and his arm