Should they have mixed business with pleasure?

Almost broke. No. Make that completely broke, humiliated and ready to jump at any job that will pay. So when smart-as-a-whip blond bombshell and model Bridget Cole finds out Dr. Matthew Fox needs a CEO for his new textile company, Almost Naked, Inc., she practically jumps at the chance to teach him he can’t live without her, well, services.

Altogether sizzling. Super serious and seriously sexy Matt is harboring very unscientific fantasies about Bridget and her luminous, touchable skin. It doesn’t help that it looks so hot in the lingerie she whips up with his Almostnaked wonder fabric. But now her media campaign is destroying his reputation as a serious scientist and he’s got to find a way to keep her mouth closed. Maybe with his own.

July 2005 |  Buy It Here

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READ AN EXCERPT

Truth or Dare – Twelve years ago

Bridget Cole’s face was classically beautiful, and even from a distance her skin looked creamy and flawless. Her hair tumbled down her back to her waist, the color of opulent amber—a budding woman who was all pink cotton candy seduction and mouth-watering honey.

The focus of Matthew Fox’s fantasies stood at the bottom of the stairs talking to a dark-haired girl.

He noticed every shift her body made as she smiled and nodded her head at something the other girl said.

The short striped pink miniskirt left her smooth, slender thighs bare and fueled his imagination and male hormones. He knew it was one of her designs. She’d showed him the sketch of the skirt last week, saying softly that her mother thought it was just doodling. Deft with a needle and thread, she’d made the pink concoction from her own pattern.

But it wasn’t the clothing that interested him as he took in the view, his gaze sliding upward. His mouth went dry as he took in curvaceous hips, a slim waist, and a top that molded to ample, perfectly rounded breasts and showed the faint outline of her nipples pressing against the pink, stretchy fabric of her top.

At sixteen, he was now quite well aware of what it meant to want someone in the physical sense, except he had all these pent up feelings for her which were quite inconvenient. Hormones won out, a hard thing to swallow as Matt prided himself on his intellect. He cut himself a break, since he was, after all, a teenage boy.

She had soft, full lips and a sweet mouth designed to give all kinds of erotic pleasure. The thought caused his stomach to tighten with awareness and made other parts of his anatomy leap to attention as well.

He caught her eye and she smiled like an angel. Matt felt everything inside him tense. A jumble of feelings and emotions only made him all the more confused between his body’s needs and his mind’s awareness.

Bridget was a complication Matt didn’t know how to handle.

Bridget was his friend.

A very beautiful and sexy friend who had grown from a petite blond dynamo to a sleek, sophisticated sixteen-year-old girl.

They were worlds apart. She was on the beauty pageant circuit and he was headed for a prestigious college. Her parents were wealthy. His parents weren’t. He liked math and she hated it. A girl that was so far out of his league, he was crazy to even think he had a chance with her.

Her party was in full swing and they were all in the basement to play trivial pursuit. With her no-holds-barred attitude, Bridget had convinced her aunt to host this teen party without her mother’s knowledge. He couldn’t blame her aunt. He was also under Bridget’s spell.

Bridget had personally invited him. Since he lived next door, he was a frequent visitor whenever Bridget visited her aunt. He also tutored Bridget in math and let her look through his telescope.

He stood off to the side, his back to the wall, his hands buried deep in his pockets.

Her other guests started to gather in a circle. Bridget started across the room and he couldn’t take his eyes off her. The way she moved was a sensual feast. She stopped in front of him. “Let’s play.”

“Trivial Pursuit,” he said, getting lost in her big blue eyes.

“Truth or Dare. It’ll be much more fun.”

As effectively as if she’d thrown cold water on him, he shut down. Shaking his head, he said, “No. Not interested.”

“Come on, Bridget, leave the nerd alone. He doesn’t want to play,” said a spiky-haired blond guy who looked like he could crush bricks in his hands.

“Shut up, Mike and mind your own business,” Bridget said, turning to the boy with a fierce look on her face. When she turned back around, she said softly. “Don’t mind him. He can be a jerk.”

Matt suspected the guy was a jerk, but he could care less what the jerk thought of him. He shrugged.

“Matt, you don’t have to watch from the sidelines.”

“I’m not playing, Bridget.”

“Fine,” she said, her blue eyes snapping. “Suit yourself.”

Keeping his own counsel, he watched with a deep interest.

“Bridget since it’s your party, why don’t you pick the person who’ll go first?” the dark-haired girl said.

Bridget nodded and smiled easily. “How about you, Stephanie?”

“Okay,” Stephanie said, singling out a curly redhead. “Tonia. “Truth or Dare.”

The girl thought for a moment and said, “Dare.”

Stephanie said, “The two closest members of the opposite sex get to slap your butt as hard as they want to! Bend over and take it with a smile!”

Tonia giggled and looked at the two boys next to her. Turning around, she presented her backside to them and each slapped her bottom. One boy harder than the other.
The redhead turned back around and said, “Brittany, truth or dare?”

The petite, blond smiled shyly and said, “Truth.”

“What was the most passionate moment you have ever experienced? Describe it for the group.”

As the girl started talking, Matt watched Bridget who kept giving him surreptitious, frowning looks. As the game progressed, inevitably someone called out Bridget’s name and she, of course, said, “Dare.”

The person who called her name, a guy that Matt knew was friends with Mike said, “French kiss Mike locking tongues for 15 seconds.”

Matt tensed, his back pulling away from the wall, his hands tightening into fists deep in his pockets.

“Hey, it’s time for party snacks,” her aunt yelled from the top of the stairs, a few seconds warning before she started down. Bridget looked over her shoulder, gauging the time it would take her aunt to make it to the bottom. She turned back to the boy then looked up at Matt. Their eyes met and clung. Bridget’s eyes widened as she stared at him. He was sure the fierce need to do bodily harm to a guy twice his size was clear in his eyes.

For the first time in his life, his withdrawal mechanism failed him. His innermost desires were visible in his eyes and Bridget finally knew how he felt about her. What he didn’t know was how she felt about it.
Her smile faded. She pulled away from the boy’s advance and sat back on her heels.

Her aunt appeared and began to usher everyone up the stairs. “Bridget?” she said, looking at her niece.

“I’ll be up in a minute, Aunt Ida.”

Her aunt took one look at Matt and nodded. She followed behind the retreating teens.

She rose in that graceful, sexy way she moved and walked towards him. Stopping in front of him, she looked deep into his eyes. “Truth or Dare, Matt?”

Caught off guard, he simply stared at her.

She stepped closer and her voice dropped an octave. “Truth or Dare?”

He didn’t know what made him say it. It came out of his mouth in a hoarse whisper. “Dare.”

Blue fire danced in the depths of her eyes. “Kiss me.”

Matt swallowed hard, caught up and held in that blue flame until it engulfed him completely. Lifting his hand, he touched the side of her throat. Her skin felt like rich warm velvet. She licked her lips and he honed in on them, dipping his head, moving slowly to savor each second, breathe in her scent, absorb the heat of her skin, anticipating the taste of her mouth.

“Matt,” she breathed softly, the blue flames in her eyes burning hotter, kissing him with intense heat.

The feel of her lips beneath his was exquisite, warm and heated and undeniably demanding. When their tongues touched, then tangled silkily, fire licked through him, deep and low. She tasted forbidden and decadent, like wild, untamed lust, and he felt an amazing sense of himself as a boy on the brink of manhood.

He groaned at the incredible surge of hot, carnal lust that kicked up his adrenaline a few notches. He felt primal and possessive and ravenous: burning up from the inside out; unable to get enough of this girl who affected him not only sexually, but on a deeper level he’d yet to fully define. All he knew was he had to have her, all her sass, her devil-may-care attitude, and her curvy, enticing body.

“Bridget!” her mother called from the top of the stairs and Bridget jumped away from Matt.
“Oh dammit. She never lets up,” she cried, giving Matt an apologetic look before she headed for the stairs.

Too late. Her mother materialized at the bottom. She took one look at Matt and Bridget. Her mouth thinned as she shot daggers at him with those scary eyes.

She grabbed Bridget by the arm and dragged her up the stairs. He could hear her mother railing at Bridget for going behind her back and having a party.

Matt stood in the basement getting the terrible feeling he was never going to see her again. Dread formed a lead ball in his stomach as he leaned against the wall and closed his eyes.

There was something to be said for looking but not touching.

Now that he knew what it was like to touch her, he would never be the same again.

From the book: Almost Naked, Inc.
By: Karen Anders
Imprint and Series: Harlequin Blaze
Publication Date: 07/05
ISBN: 0-373-79197-6
Copyright ©: 2005
By Karen Alarie

® and * are trademarks of the publisher.
The edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S. A.
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