A Will and a Way

to admit but had known for years. When she started to draw away, his hand locked on her arm.
    “Coward,” he murmured. He couldn’t have said anything more perfectly designed to make her march forward.
    “Good afternoon.” Michael smiled at the desk clerk. Pandora wondered briefly if the smile would have been so charming if the clerk had been a man. “Checking in.”
    “You have a reservation?”
    “Donahue. Michael Donahue.”
    The clerk punched some buttons and stared at her computer screen. “I’m afraid I don’t show anything under Donahue for the twenty-sixth.”
    “Katie,” Michael said on a breath of impatience. He sent Pandora a long suffering look. “I should never have trusted her to handle this.”
    Catching the drift, Pandora patted his hand. “You’re going to have to let her go, Michael. I know she’s worked for your family for forty years, but when a person gets into their seventies…” She trailed off and let Michael take the ball.
    “We’ll decide when we get home.” He turned back to thedesk clerk. “Apparently there’s been a mix-up between my secretary and the hotel. We’ll only be in town overnight. Is anything available?”
    The clerk went back to her buttons. Most people in her experience raised the roof when there was a mix-up in reservations. Michael’s quiet request touched her sympathies. “You understand there’s a problem because of the holiday.” She punched more buttons, wanting to help. “We do have a suite available.”
    “Fine.” Michael took the registration form and filled it out. With the key in his hand, he sent the clerk another smile. “I appreciate the trouble.” Noting the bellhop hovering at his elbow, he handed him a bill. “We’ll handle it, thanks.”
    The clerk looked at the twenty in his palm and the lack of luggage. “Yes, sir!”
    “He thinks we’re having an illicit affair,” Pandora murmured as they stepped onto the elevator.
    “We are.” Before the doors had closed again, Michael grabbed her to him and locked her in a kiss that lasted twelve floors. “We don’t know each other,” he told her as they stepped into the hallway. “We’ve just met. We don’t have mutual childhood memories or share the same family.” He put the key in the lock. “We don’t give a damn what the other does for a living nor do we have any long-standing opinions about each other.”
    “Is that supposed to simplify things?”
    Michael drew her inside. “Let’s find out.”
    He didn’t give her a chance to wonder, a chance to debate. The moment the door was shut behind them, he had her in hisarms. He took questions away. He took choice away. For once, she wanted him to. In a fury of passions, of hungers, of cravings, they came together. Each fought to draw more, still more out of the other, to touch faster, to possess more quickly. They forgot what they knew, what they thought and reveled in what they felt.
    Coats, still chill from the wind, were pushed to the floor. Sweaters and shirts followed. Hardly more than a foot inside the door, they slid to the carpet.
    “Damn winter,” Michael muttered as he fought with her boots.
    Laughing, Pandora struggled with his, then moaned when he pressed his lips to her breast.
    It was a race, part warring, part loving. Neither gave the other respite. When their clothes were shed, they sprinted ahead, hands reaching, lips arousing. There was none of the dreamy déjà vu they’d experienced the first time. This was new. The fingers tracing her skin had never been felt before. The lips, hot and searing, had never been tasted. Fresh, erotically fresh, their mouths met and clung.
    Her heart had never beat so fast. She was sure of it. Her body had never ached and pulsed so desperately. She’d never wanted it to. Now she wanted more, everything. Him. She rolled so that she could press quick, hungry kisses over his face, his neck, his chest. Everywhere.
    His mind was teeming with her, with every part of her that he could touch or taste or smell. She was wild in a way he’d never imagined. She was demanding in a way any man woulddesire. His body seemed to fascinate her, every curve, every angle. She exploited it until he was half mad, then he groped for her.
    She’d never known a man could give so much. Racked with sensations, she arched under him. Hot and ready, she offered. But he was far from through. The taste of her thighs was subtle, luring him toward the heat. He found her, drove her and kept her