Midweek Peek - My Most Brazen Virgin...

I've a little e-treat for you this week - a snippet from my next Mills and Boon release - FIRST TIME LUCKY?

I've written a couple of virgin heroines but Roxie is my favourite. She's a virgin by circumstance rather than choice - and now she's choosing to do something about it! She wants her new neighbour Gabe to help her out... so how does he react to the idea?

“I want you to be my lover,” she drew her lip in with her teeth and breathed the last. “My first.”

His eyes widened. “What?”

She waited, knowing full well he’d heard.

His hands gently shook her. “Your first?”

A different kind of tension rolled off him now.

Okay so maybe mentioning the ‘first’ had been a mistake. But she’d wanted him to know. Thought it was better to be honest. Thought it might tempt him all the more. Only a look of sheer panic scrunched his face. Now he dropped his hands and took a step back.

“Isn’t it every man’s fantasy?” she asked, suddenly a lot less confident.

“Not mine.”

“No?”

His jaw clamped for a moment, she saw the deep breath he dragged in. Then he lifted his chin “No. I don’t want some total novice who doesn’t know what she’s doing. Who’ll lie like a log expecting me to do all the work.”

Ouch. How to shoot her down. “I’m not a total novice. The actual virginity bit is a mere technicality,” she flung at him, furious that he could go cold so quick – and be so damn brutal about it. Chelsea had been right about him being harsh, he had really offensive kind of defence. But it was an act – she knew it. She’d felt the need in his body. “I know you’re interested,” she said defiantly. “I’ve seen the way you look at me.”

“How do I look at you?”

“Like you want to touch,” she moved forward, her boldness returning when he didn’t walk away. And damn it, she’d come this far, there was nothing left of her dignity to lose. So she wasn’t just flirty, she was shameless. “And I do know how to touch. Won’t be any kind of cold stone.”

“Really?”

She nodded. Hoped her hammering nerves weren’t obvious.

He stood like an immovable mountain. In fact she didn’t see any part of him move as he murmured, “Prove it.”

Roxie's story is available now direct from the Mills and Boon UK website. It'll be on the shelves in January and in the US as a Presents Extra in May.