Fiery Read Online Free Page B

been avoiding. The man she hoped would kiss her again.
    Alone, with his eyes staring up at her, she wished she were the water running over her palm and down the drain. With no escape, she averted her gaze from his and instead focused on his hair. She’d had her hands in his hair, felt the silky strands moving between her fingers, when he’d kissed her three days ago.
    If she’d been braver or more experienced she might have pulled him closer and asked for more. Swallowing regrets, she set the hose against his hairline and wet his hair. She tried to be professional and look at him like any other client. She failed.
    His dark hair darkened more beneath the water, became silkier. Her stomach knotted as she squirted shampoo into her palm. Sparks erupted along her hands as she worked the cleanser into a lather.
    Ryan’s eyes drifted closed, but his lids fluttered quickly. He kept them closed while she rinsed, but his fingers gripped the arms of the chair. He kept them closed while she reached for the conditioner, but his lips parted on a shaky breath when she slid her fingers into his hair again.
    Not seeing the intensity of his gray gaze suited her almost as much as getting to study him privately. Waves of awareness rolled through her with each stroke of the creamy conditioner gliding through his hair. An image flashed in her mind of her straddling him while she massaged his scalp.
    Shaking her head to clear the mental picture, she squeezed her fingers together, tugging lightly on his hair. He scrunched his eyes the slightest bit and released a tiny moan. His throat rippled with a swallow.
    Her mouth watered with the desire to have him stretched out, shirtless, before her. She bit back a moan of her own and rolled her hips as the picture of her straddling him returned. She could glide her slippery hands over his chest and down his stomach to the waist of his pants. To the buckle, button and zipper… Her eyes widened when she followed the path of her fantasy and saw the length of his arousal.
    Carmen shook her head—hard and fast—to clear the haze. Turning her face to the ceiling, she sent up a silent prayer for control. Needing to get a grip, and not on him, she quickly rinsed his hair and tugged at the towel around his neck.
    Ryan sat up and asked quietly, huskily, “Where do you want me?”
    Her brain shut down, allowing no thoughts or actions to be processed.
    “Carmen?”
    She blinked and then nodded to the second of the four chairs. Once he’d settled, and she’d recovered some control over her breathing, she followed him. Unsure of what to say, other than asking what kind of cut he wanted, she silently snapped the collar of the cape at his neck before pulling out her scissors, comb and clippers.
    “I hope you’re only using those clippers to clean up my neck.”
    She picked up the comb and began working it through his hair. “Sure.”
    “Damn, Woman. I’d almost forgotten the sound of your voice.”
    The demand that he stop calling her Woman in that degrading and militant tone of his lay heavy on her tongue. She’d always had a problem with overbearing men, though, for once, something had her gritting her teeth instead of giving him the pleasure of getting a rise out of her. 
    With his hair combed smooth, she picked up her scissors to begin trimming.
    “I like it short.”
    She nodded, meeting his gaze briefly in the mirror, but said nothing.
    “And she slips back into silence.”
    The salon was empty, except for the sound of her snipping blades. Her mind was full, though. Full of the man sitting before her. His scent. His size. The impression of his hair in her hands.
    Wet. Cool. Silken. She almost didn’t want to cut off the ends that had begun to curl around his ears. As militant as he was, the unruly look suited him. Not that he needed anything else to add to his appeal.
    “Are you pissed that I kissed you, or pissed that I stopped?”
    She set the scissors on the counter and then used her clippers