Drake Sisters 02 - The Twilight Before Christmas

love of his life in his arms. His world had been guns and sand and jungles and an enemy fighting to kil him. Women like Kate were not real and they didn’t wind their arms around his neck and rain kisses al over his face and tel him he was too sexy to be alive.
    They lay together just holding one another, trying to get their heart rates back to normal and to push air through their lungs. Kate lay stretched out on top of Matt, pressing her soft body tightly against his. Beneath her, he suddenly stiffened.
    “What the hel is that?” he growled, hearing a noise outside the house.
    Kate gasped and rol ed off of him, landing on the pile of blankets. “We have company, Matthew,” she whispered, gathering the sheets around her.
    He sat up abruptly, his breath hissing through his teeth. He’d asked for a night with Kate, he should have asked for the entire damned week. He was never going to get enough of her, never be sated. “I thought I’d at least get you for a few more hours,” he groused as he padded naked across the floor. He suddenly halted halfway to the door and uttered a string of curses. “It’s my parents.”
    Kate’s eyes widened. She clutched the sheet to her naked breasts. “What?”
    “My parents,” he announced. He reached down to help her up. “Why is it that even when you’re grown, parents can make you feel like a teenager caught in the act?”
    Kate wrapped the sheet around her and hurried toward his bedroom while Matt scooped up the blankets and fol owed her. “Did you get caught in the act often?”
    “Are you laughing at me?” he asked, a dangerous glint in his silver eyes.

    “Only because I’m disappearing into the bathroom to leave you to face the music alone. You might get dressed.” She grinned mischievously at him as she gathered up her clothes and retreated behind a securely locked door.
    Matt caught sight of the wisp of peach-colored lace that lay on the floor and found a wicked smile stealing over his face. He stooped down and picked it up, bunching it into his hand before shoving it into the pocket of his jacket, which was lying on the back of a chair. He dragged on clothes as fast as he could, combing his hair with his fingers just as the polite knock on his door came.
    He could hear Kate laughing, and it was contagious. He couldn’t wipe the grin off his face as he opened the front door. Victoria Granite threw her arms around her son and hugged him hard. “You frightened us, Matt! We cal ed and cal ed and you never answered. First there was a fire here and Danny told us about that horrible incident at the store and then a cal went out and…”
    “Victoria, take a breath,” Harold Granite advised. He smiled lovingly at his wife, used to her run-on sentences. “We heard the fog came in last night, and El e Drake went over the cliff. Victoria was worried.”
    Matt’s mother made a face. “Real y, Harold, I knew he was perfectly fine; you were the one who spent the entire morning trying to cal him and pacing back and forth like a wild tiger. I was fine!”
    Matt met his father’s gaze over the top of his mother’s head. They both stifled a knowing grin. “I’m sorry, Dad. I should have remembered after al these years, how you worry.”
    Victoria smiled and patted Harold’s arm. “There, dear, you see there was nothing at al to worry about. Al that pacing.” She shook her head, stopping in midsentence as she looked up at the mantel and the candles that had burned down to the holders. “Oh my goodness.” She looked around careful y. “Matthew Granite, you had a woman here last night, didn’t you?”
    “Mom, once I turned thirty, I thought we agreed I didn’t have to talk about women with you.”
    From the bedroom came the sound of a door closing. His parents exchanged a long, satisfied look. Victoria arched her eyebrow at her son.
    “She’s stil here?”
    “As a matter of fact, yes. And don’t start on her, Mom. I don’t want her scared off. This is the one.”
    There was another startled silence. “Kate’s here?” Harold asked, clearly astonished. “Kate Drake?”
    “Of course it’s Kate,” Victoria said.
    Kate came out of the bedroom with a bright smile and desperation in her eyes. She was wearing one of his shirts over her thin white blouse.
    Matthew was instantly mortified. He thought he would tease her, and at the same time, he’d have the added pleasure of knowing she was sitting beside him in the warmth of his car without a bra.