Stolen Dreams by Marilyn Campbell

to do with the cold.
     
"Professor, I—"
     
"Don't
you think you could call me Gabriel, under the circumstances?" His hand
cupped her bottom as he said it.
     
She
kept her head against his shoulder to keep him from seeing her flushed
cheeks. "I suppose so ... Gabriel. Are you warm enough now?"
     
"I
still can't feel my toes. Can you?" He sucked in his breath as her hips
and thighs shifted to enable her toes to search out his.
     
"No
wonder you can't feel them. They're like ice. But the rest of you feels
. .. normal again, so—"
     
He
stopped her from squirming upward to get out of the pouch. "You don't
want to do that yet," he said, keeping his arms wrapped snugly around
her. "You may feel comfortable in here, but the heater hasn't raised
the overall temperature by more than a few degrees so far. Give it a
little more time."     
 
     
Shara
inched back down to her previous position, but she was no longer as
concerned about freezing to death as she was about incinerating. His
muscular body felt too good beneath hers and his fingers were awakening
all the nerve endings in her skin. Suddenly she felt a movement between
her thighs and realized her nerves weren't the only things standing at
attention.
     
Since there was nowhere for her to run at the
moment, she
opted for conversation. "I've never seen anything killed before. Did it
bother you to do that?"
     
His lips brushed across her forehead.
"When
I first started journeying, I tried to abide by the nonviolent
doctrines I'd been raised with. But I soon learned that civilized
ethics don't always have a place in primitive cultures. Sometimes
survival has to take priority."
     
"It never occurred to me to
bring a weapon. If I had been alone, I'd be dead now."
     
He
pressed a light kiss on her temple. "You can't know that for sure. You
might have found some way to frighten them away."
     
She
grimaced. "Then I just would have frozen to death slowly, instead of
being devoured instantly."
     
"There's also the possibility that
the security team would have stopped you from hopping at all."
     
Even
though he had to realize she was no longer chilled, his hands continued
to stroke her. Since it would be ludicrous to order him to remove his
hands from her while she was lying naked on top of him, she continued
to pretend that she didn't notice how sensual his touch was ... or that
he was aroused.
     
She rose on one elbow to meet his eyes for
what she
knew had to be said. "At any rate, I'm aware that I owe you an apology.
Two,
actually."        
 
     
"Oh?"
By lifting her upper body, she partially revealed the full breasts he
had only gotten a brief glimpse of earlier, and then he was too cold to
care. He knew it was rather primitive of him, but he really appreciated
a woman with a well-developed figure. He forced his gaze back to her
face and worked to keep it there.
     
When he had lowered his
eyes,
Shara wondered if he might be nodding off, but when he looked at her
again, she was immediately aware that sleep was the last thing on his
mind. "Um, yes, an apology. I, uh, was wrong to try to leave without
you. I am very obviously not prepared for this journey. Thank you for
preventing me from making a terrible mistake. And thank you for helping
me to avoid the security team." His hands eased slowly up and down her
ribs as she gave her little speech, and on each upward stroke, his
thumbs skimmed the sides of her breasts.
     
He watched the irises
of
her eyes change to chocolate brown and fought the smile that threatened
to give away his thoughts. "And the second apology?"
     
She
swallowed
hard, finding it more difficult by the second to ignore how he was
making her feel. "I was very rude yesterday and said things I didn't
mean."
     
"Which things?" he murmured as he rolled the two of
them onto their sides.
     
"It's
nice of you to act as though you've forgotten my insults, but I
haven't. You trusted me with sensitive information about yourself, and
I behaved