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  It took him far longer than he liked to puzzle out how to re-hang the cursed thing, and despite his efforts, he could not coax it to slide smoothly on the cleverly designed metal runners. He fell to brooding over the unconscious woman in the next room. And he didn’t recall abandoning the door, and striding into her room to stretch out atop the mattress. But here he was.

  He could not prevent himself touching her, winding a lock of her hair about his finger, stroking her cheek, curling his fingers about her wrist when he’d checked her pulse. She stirred both his protective instincts and his passions. And, when being so tantalizingly close to her became a torture he could no longer bear, he shed his clothes and gave in to the inevitable. He climbed beneath the covers, settled her against his chest, and closed his eyes.

  She felt good in his arms, right in a way that no other woman had felt. Sleep pounced, clawing him under. It was a welcome relief from the turmoil of his inner thoughts, and he did not fight it.

  ~~~

  Chalcey awoke to the wonderfully masculine scent of a healthy male in his prime. In fact, Wulf’s skin smelt slightly spicy Mmmm. If she could bottle that scent and sell it to all the lonely women out there, she’d make a fortune. She sucked in a deep, appreciative breath—

  Huh? Wulf’s skin?

  She lay on her side, cuddled up to him, her cheek resting on his chest and one leg flung possessively across his thighs. He’d ditched the pants and vest, and found a much more comfortable place to spend the night than the studio floor. Uh oh.

  She started to edge away but his arms caged her.

  She froze, wanting more, and terrified of that wanting and what it meant. He was a stranger—of dubious mental state. She shouldn’t be lusting after him, craving him, wishing he’d sink that hardness she’d felt nudging her leg into her lamentably willing body. “What happened? H-how did I get here?”

  “You swooned.” His lips tickled her ear as he spoke, and darned if she didn’t just about pass out again. “This seemed the logical place for you until such time as you awoke. How do you feel?”

  “Fine! P-Peachy.” God. She sounded like a flustered teen girl who’d just wandered into the wrong locker room and copped an eyeful of hot guy.

  Being a typical man, he didn’t take her at her word. He rolled her on her back, levered himself up on his elbows, and loomed over her so that he could brush back the tangles from her face and examine her through narrowed, thoughtful eyes. The sprinkling of coarse hair on his legs stroked her skin. Oh boy.

  “Happy now?” She took refuge in snark—better to go on the offensive straight off rather than face up to how much he was getting to her. And be tempted to give in and reveal how much she wanted him to take this ah, situation to its natural conclusion. One bed. One gorgeous guy and one horny, turned on woman. It wasn’t hard to do the math.

  “I’m fine,” she said. A straight-out lie. But he couldn’t know that. “Now please would you get off me, or so help me, I’m gonna kick your sorry ass!”

  He quirked a tiny smile. “Please, do try.”

  Stubborn to the last, she tried her very best. And after a humiliatingly brief struggle, she was still lying on her back. Only now, his lower body pinned her to the mattress. So much for girl-power.

  She stifled a gasp when he shifted and it became very obvious that he was very pleased to be on top. Her stupid mind chose that moment to run a few possible scenarios. All involving a variety of x-rated positions that required two naked bodies. His and hers.

  She squeezed her eyelids shut and tried to picture Dirty Dave, a guy with breath like a sewer and no comprehension of personal hygiene. Dave would regularly inflict his smelly self upon the other dance students before the girls banded together and refused to partner him unless he cleaned up his act. But the recollection of Dave’s disgusting odors had absolutely no effect on Chalcey’s inappropriate lust. Her heart raced. Her skin flushed with heat. Muscles in certain private places quivered. She was a goner.

  “I will make, as you say, a deal,” Wulf said. “Tell me by what name you are known and I will remove myself from your bed before you are forced to kick my sorry ass.”

  She opened one eye and squinted up at him. “You promise?”

  He nodded. “I am a man of my word.”

  That rang true. She allowed herself to relax. “Okay. I can live with that. My name is Chalcey.”

  “Chalcey.” He tried it out a few times, frowning and screwing up his face as though he didn’t like the sound of it. Then his expression cleared. “That cannot be your true name. Tell me your true name.”

  She blinked. “My given name is Chalcedony.”

  “Chalcedony.” He stiffened like he’d been stabbed in the back. He managed one loud groan before he collapsed…. Leaving her pinned beneath a really large naked man, whose dead-weight was impossible to budge.

  His chest rose and fell, rose and fell. Still breathing, thank God. Chalcey heaved and pushed, trying again and again to shift him before fatigue forced her to give up. She lay there, feeling somewhat squashed, wondering what the freaking bloody hell to do next.

  The phone out in the studio rang, its strident tones echoed by the softer ones of the kitchenette phone. After the requisite number of rings, the answering machine picked up.

  Dammit. Why hadn’t she gotten a bedside extension? She would just have to hope Wulf woke up before the workmen arrived and discovered her embarrassing predicament.

  The workmen. Her floorboards. Crap!

  She was girding her loins—so to speak—for another go at rolling Wulf off her, when she heard someone calling out.

  Sam. Thank you, God.

  “Help!” she screamed. She heard Sam’s footsteps pounding across the studio floor and sagged with relief—so much relief that she didn’t even care if Sam was wearing heels again and making more holes in her floorboards.

  “Chalcey, when the hell are you gonna get a cell-phone? That was me ringing, by the way, so you’d come down and let me in. And then I realized you’d left the street door unlocked. How many times do I have to— Jeez! What the hell’s up with this door? Chalcey?” Sam shoved the sliding door aside and burst through the doorway like a pocket-sized avenging angel. “Hey. What’s wr—? Ohhh!”

  “Don’t ohhh me. Just get him off me, will you? Before I’m completely smothered. Pleeease?”

  Sam didn’t hesitate, thank goodness. She braced herself on the mattress and grabbed Wulf’s hip. She heaved, while Chalcey pushed, until finally, she managed to wriggle out from under him. She collapsed on her back atop the mattress, exhausted all over again. “Samantha Greenwood, you’re a lifesaver.”

  Sam tore her gaze away from Wulf’s gorgeously sculpted ass to give Chalcey owl-eyes. “Way to go, Chalce,” she said. “I never knew you had it in you.”

  “I didn’t— We didn’t… uh… you know.”

  “You brought him home with you and didn’t let him screw you senseless?” Sam raised her gaze ceiling-ward and clucked in a despairing fashion. “God, why the hell not? Look at him.” She slapped his ass for emphasis.

  “Don’t do that!”

  “Sorry. Not. He’s totally out to it, huh?”

  “Uh. Yeah. Sure seems that way. He—”

  “What did you do, then? Chat? And then invite him to get naked and use you as a mattress? You chickened out at the last minute, didn’t you? Jeez, Chalce.” Her gaze slid back to Wulf’s butt and lingered, leaving Chalcey in no doubt that Sam would have had her wicked way with Wulf. And then some.

  Mickey’s gloved hands informed Chalcey it was just gone six. No point in trying to get any more sleep. She massaged her temples with trembling fingers. “I need a caffeine fix.”

  “If you didn’t wear Sleeping Beauty out by jumping his bones, what’s up with him?” Sam asked. “Don’t tell me you tried some weird-ass martial arts thing on him and stopped the blood-flow to his brain. I told you those self-defense classes were dangerous to your health.”

  If only. Weird-ass mart
ial arts things sure would’ve come in handy with Ray. Chalcey crawled off the bed and was forced to lock her knees against wobbly legs. “Blowed if I know what happened to him. One minute we were having, uh, a conversation. The next? K-O. No warning.” Panic squirmed down her spine. “Shit. What if it’s like, a brain aneurism or something? Do you think I should call for help?”

  Sam leaned in close to observe the steady rise and fall of Wulf’s chest. “Nah. If it was an aneurism, he’d be dead and he looks healthy enough to me. Probably party drugs. Or maybe someone slipped him something. He’s a big boy. Give him a couple of hours to sleep it off and he should be sweet.”

  Chalcey mentally bowed to Sam’s superior knowledge. She was way more experienced with the club scene.

  “Where did you pick him up, Chalce? I thought you went straight home.”

  “I did. He sort of… um… followed me here.”

  But Sam was no longer paying attention. She’d gone back to raking her hot gaze down Wulf’s body.

  Could have been worse, Chalcey supposed. He could have been lying on his back with all his considerable masculine glory on display. Not that she’d seen his masculine glory, but she’d felt it. And it’d felt pretty darned considerable. But right now, she felt increasingly discomfited by this situation. They were treating Wulf like a himbo whose sole role in life was to titillate women. She grabbed a spare sheet from her wardrobe and flung it over him. When he woke up, he could wear it, too.

  “Spoilsport,” Sam said.

  Chalcey ignored her to play Florence Nightingale again, and check to make sure Wulf’s pulse was strong and steady. It seemed to be—not that she knew much about pulse-rates. She figured Sam was right. He’d wake up in a few hours and then—

  Then she could give him his marching orders.

  If she wanted to.

  She mentally slapped herself upside the head. Of course she wanted to get rid of him. Didn’t she? Gahhh! “I’m making coffee. You want one? Or are you going to try bouncing up and down on him to see if he wakes up?”

  “Mmmm. Tempting.”

  Chalcey grabbed Sam’s arm and towed her from the bedroom. “I was kidding. Leave him alone. When he wakes up, then you can have him.”

  Now, why the heck had she said that? The thought of Sam and Wulf together made her want to gnash her teeth. And slap Wulf. Not to mention pull Sam’s hair.

  “Really?”

  “If you want,” Chalcey let her hair fall across her face to hide her expression from Sam’s speculative narrow-eyed gaze.

  “Don’t you want him?”

  “Me? I don’t think so!” Her laughter sounded forced, brittle. She cringed, waiting for Sam to call her bluff.

  To her relief, Sam didn’t appear to notice anything amiss. “You sure?”

  “He’s hardly my type. And it’s not like we’ve slept together or anything, is it? He’s all yours if you want him.” Sheesh! Just give me a wall to bang my stupid head against. She bit back a groan. Why couldn’t she keep her big mouth shut?

  Sam chewed her lower lip in a childlike gesture completely at odds with the, ah, subject matter being discussed. “Maybe an hour or two with— What’s his name, Chalce?”

  “Wulf.”

  “Right. Wulf could be just the thing I need right now.”

  Chalcey pinched the bridge of her nose to dismiss the unwelcome visual of Sam and Wulf rolling around on her bed. Naked. “I sooo need coffee.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  Chalcey blinked at her friend’s tone and peered at her more closely. “Don’t take this the wrong way, hon, but you look like crap.”

  Sam wrapped her arms about her middle. Actual tears glittered in her eyes.

  Sam, crying? Sam never cried. Whatever had happened, it had to be pretty bad. Chalcey put an arm around Sam’s shoulders and guided her to a chair in the kitchenette. “Just let me put on the coffeemaker.” She broke all speed records with coffee filters and such, and then flopped into a chair opposite. “Now, tell me what happened.”

  “M-Marcus happened.”

  Chalcey fumed. First the scumbag tried it on with her, then he had a go at Sam? He better pray she didn’t come face-to-face with him again or she would—

  Hang on, halt the rave. Marcus? “Um, Marcus? The dark-haired guy from the club, right? The one who seemed like a halfway decent human being?”

  Sam gave her “Well, duh!” eyes. “Yes. Marcus. The guy who told Ray to get off his ass and offer you a lift home. Ray jumped at the idea ’coz he figured you might, you know, be grateful?”

  “I would have to be a whole lot more than just grateful to sleep with Ray.”

  “But he’s sooo hot-looking.”

  “Hot or not, he’s an asshole. Period.”

  Her curt tone provoked a startled frown from Sam. “Did he try something on?” she asked. “I thought his story sounded a bit off.”

  “Huh?” Chalcey rubbed the bridge of her nose and prayed the coffee would be ready sooner rather than later. “I’m not following you. What story?”

  Sam sniffed and blotted her eyes with the heels of her hands. But instead of meeting Chalcey’s gaze, she pleated the skirt of her dress with her fingers. “When Ray came back to the club, he told me he had caught up with you, but you acted like a total bitch. He said you tripped and fell, and when he tried to help, you went bat-shit—decked him one and ripped his shirt, and told him to piss off. He claimed he had to go home and change because of you.”

  “Huh. Asshole sure knows how to spin it.”

  Sam’s head flew up, all big worried eyes and quivering lips. “What happened?”

  “Nothing.”

  Those worried eyes turned “Don’t fuck with me” hard. “Tell me.”

  Chalcey heaved a sigh. “Yes, Ray tried something. No, I wasn’t keen. But I didn’t deck him. I didn’t get the chance. The guy who’s currently in my bed dealt to him for me. And he had to go home to change because when Wulf confronted him, he pissed his pants.”

  Sam’s eyes did the whole owl-thing again. “Ohhh!” She clapped a hand over her mouth and giggled. “Serves him right.”

  Chalcey’s weary hand-rolling motion encouraged Sam to elaborate. “Ray got really POed at how well me and Marcus hit it off. He tried it on with me but Marcus told him to get lost.” Sam sighed, her face going all soft and dreamy. “It was sooo hot watching Marcus stand up to him. And after we left the club, we went back to his place.”

  So Marcus had slept with Sam on a first date. Typical. Ah, who was she kidding? They were talking men, here. Of course Marcus slept with her. Not that Chalcey could take the moral high-ground. She’d spent the past hour or so with a naked man she’d only just met draped all over her. “And?” she prompted.

  Sam’s eyes filled with tears again and she blinked them back. “A-And what?”

  “What did Marcus do to get you so upset?”

  “I still can’t believe he did it.”

  Sam’s face had dissolved into an expression so woebegone that Chalcey suspected Marcus must have committed the most heinous act in the history of Sam’s illustrious dating career. Her mind boggled, envisioning handcuffs and whips and chains and the like. “Did what?”

  “Made it really clear he’d really like to see me again.”

  Huh. “That’s it?”

  “Not quite. It was the expression on his face when he said it. He was, you know, deadly serious. Like, wanting a relationship serious.”

  Chalcey gaped at her. “And that’s heinous? I would think you’d be, well, you know, bloody thrilled to bits.”

  Sam managed to stop sniffling enough to enlighten her. “God, Chalcey. You are so freaking clueless. I’ve spent my entire life trying not to be the sort of girl a guy wants to settle down with. I work my ass off to keep myself in shape. I make it clear upfront I prefer no strings attached sex and—”

  “Gee, Sam, we’ve been friends forever and I did not know that about you.”

  Sam ignored her. There was a lot of that
going around lately.

  “For Marcus to see me as potential girlfriend material—” Sam uttered the G-word like it was the worst epithet in the English language “—means I’m slipping. I’m putting out the wrong vibes, potential wife vibes instead of party-girl vibes. I don’t want to be a carbon copy of my mother, getting sucked in by the romance of it all and leaving behind a string of ex-husbands. I don’t want to settle down with one man. Not now, maybe not ever.”

  Chalcey suspected she was going to regret it but she just had to ask. “What’s so wrong with wanting to settle down?”

  “What? And end up like you?”

  She jerked back like Sam had reared up from the chair and tried to bitch-slap her. Although she did her utmost not to feel offended that her best friend believed ending up like her was actually a bad thing, it hurt. She silently counted to five. Slowly. “And what’s wrong with ending up like me?”

  “I didn’t mean— Oh, you know what I mean!”

  “No, I don’t.” Chalcey rose to grab the coffee mugs so she had something to do with her hands. It was either that or ruin their friendship by shaking Sam till her teeth rattled. “Why don’t you explain it to me? In simple terms somebody like me can understand.”

  Sam paid no heed to the sarcasm and launched into another tirade. “Well, look at you! Even when you were teaching at a proper dance academy, you barely earned enough to make ends meet. You live in your dance studio because you can’t afford an apartment. You don’t have a boyfriend. So far as I know, that vibrator I bought you for your last birthday is the only action you get. Then this incredibly hot guy follows you home, ends up in your bed, and you don’t even jump him. And why? Because he’s not the perfect man. Because he’s not potential marriage material. Well, I’ve got news for you, Chalce, and it’s all bad. There’s no such thing as the perfect man. So you’ve got to stop living like a hermit and get out there and have some fun. If you don’t use it, you’ll lose it.”

  By “fun” Chalcey guessed Sam meant letting random guys feel her up and drool all over her cleavage. Been there, done that. Sure wasn’t her idea of fun. Still, it was hard to stay pissed at Sam when she’d had such a “traumatic” experience. And Chalcey suspected that all the not wanting to settle down palaver was BS, because Sam had protested just a wee bit too much. All this wasn’t about Chalcey’s search for the right man, and her love life—or lack of it. This was about Sam. Specifically, Sam getting all freaked out over a guy.