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EXCERPT
I wouldn’t
sleep with you if you were the last man on Earth.
“Damn it!” She
threw the paper at the metal wall of her bunk and growled. A few of her
roommates glanced at her and laughed.
“Who’d you get? Sam
the man with a plan?” Darcy chuckled, tossing her red curls as she crossed over
to pick up the paper. Like everyone, she wore a t-shirt and loose cotton pants.
Today she went for a combination of black and green. Of course, black and green
were their only options. She uncrumpled the letter.
“Holy crap!”
“What?” Ginger and
Lucy asked in unison.
“Hagan! You get to
sleep with dark, sexy, descended-from-warrior-gods Hagan!” Darcy exclaimed,
inciting a round of jealous gasps and semi-hateful glares in Rena’s direction.
“Every woman I know has tried to get into his pants.”
“Seriously, if you
don’t want him, I’ll trade you,” Lucy said. “I got some mechanic from the
underside. I barely know him except that we’ve had mandatory gym time together
like twice and I think he had brown hair.”
The room full of
military cots seemed to close in on her more than usual. The city felt like the
inside of a submarine, but was more spherical in design and stacked five levels
tall.
“I got a fisherman
from the pit,” Ginger added. The pit was the pressurized room in the bottom
center of the city used to catch their meat supply.
“He’s cute enough but can you imagine what he’s going to smell like at the end
of a shift? Rena, girl, you got the freakin’
jackpot. Hagan is smart. Sexy.”
“Sexy,” Lucy
repeated.
“Freakin’
hot,” Ginger said.
“Seriously, I want
to trade,” Lucy insisted.
“You can’t trade.
It’s all genetic matching,” Darcy stated, ruining the catlike smile that had
begun to form on Lucy’s mouth. “Apparently, I’m genetically matched to that
strange guy who talks to himself. You know, the one
they’re always asking to leave the mechanics area because he takes supplies
without authorization.”
“Do you mean Dr.
Van—Dr. Von…?” Lucy asked.
“Von
Sibenthal,” Darcy said.
“He’s not, ah, all that, um,
bad,” Lucy said, trying to sound positive.
Rena pushed up and
headed toward the door. “I’m going for a run before my shift.”
“You just got back
from a run,” Darcy called behind her.
Rena ignored her.
I wouldn’t
sleep with you if you were the last man on Earth.
*
* * * *
I wouldn’t
sleep with you if you were the last man on Earth, Dr. Hagan!
Micco took a deep
breath, not for the first time wondering if he’d made a mistake. The words still
stung, even after everything that had happened. Whatever it was that put them on
the same life rescue list, he couldn’t help but think that maybe, just possibly,
it was fate. Even now, even years after her rejection, he wanted her as badly as
he had that night in Houston.
Rena had been so
soft and sweet-looking back then with the deep brown eyes that made a man melt a
little on the inside, and medium brown locks bleached by the sun to create
blonde streaks. Now, after the health mandate, her body had hardened with toned
muscles from her workouts, and the sunlight had faded from her hair to leave it
a lush flow of darker waves. Like everyone on the base, there was a strain to
her gaze, an aging that came from surviving so much tragedy.
He’d tried to talk
to her, but she avoided him when she could, ignored him when he managed to get
into the same room with her, and always looked at him as if she didn’t remember.
Oh, but he knew she remembered him. Once, five months ago, in an isolated
corridor, he’d run into her. He hadn’t been planning it, as he paced through the
halls to get away from his roommates to think. The whole future matchmaking
scheme had just been placed on his shoulders and he needed some time alone to
process the full impact of what he was being asked to do. Not only did he have
to marry people who potentially would not like to be married, he also had to
reassign their living arrangements. As one of the head scientists on the base,
he was to have one of the larger quarters for himself and his new bride—which
wasn’t saying much since it only afforded about two more square feet on each
side.
“You,” she’d said
to him when he almost ran her down.
“Me?” he’d asked,
trying to be playful and bring one of her smiles to her full lips.
In that moment, as
she glared at him, he knew she remembered. He’d been an ass. He knew it. She
knew it. Hell, the whole bar had known it. If he could take it back, he would.
But none of that mattered now. Nothing from those days mattered now.
Mumbling, he
returned his attention to the holographic screen floating above his desk and
tried not to feel the fact that his cock was hard—again—from thinking about
Rena. “Well, you might not sleep with me if I was the last man on Earth, but
let’s see if you sleep with me as your last option on Atlantis.”
BUY
EBOOK
REVIEWS
"4 HEARTS! A sexy read" -
Night Owl Romance, October 2009
"Ms. Pillow never disappoints and this is
another example of how to cram a lot of story into few pages.... Don’t worry
about post apocalyptic Earth. Ms. Pillow has found a way to save humanity. Lots
of smokin’ hot sex!"
Seriously Reviewed, October 2009
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