She had never given much thought to her underwear, since no one had ever seen it.

She had never worried about how frilly anything was. Or whether or not it matched her bra.

She liked sports bras, which kept everything kind of locked in and had generous elastic bands around the bottom.

She imagined a sports bra wasn’t considered hot lingerie by men, either.

Oh, well. She was here. She was here, and she was committed to doing this.

Plain white cotton panties, lime-green sports bra and all.

She took a breath and charged up the steps. And then she knocked. Firm. Sure. She heard footsteps, and then saw the top of his head through the window on the entry door.

It opened, and her stomach did a free fall down to her feet when those blue eyes connected with hers.

Gabe leaned against the door, his muscular forearm propping him up. “Under most circumstances, I wouldn’t have to ask a woman what she was doing at my house at this hour. But with you, I feel like I do have to ask.”

“Well, since I impacted on your ability to get laid earlier, I thought I would stop by and let you know that I’m available.”

There. She’d said it. About as open and honest and matter-of-fact as she could possibly be.

She was not going to play the part of blushing virgin. That just wasn’t in her. It wasn’t who she was.

Gabe had given her a taste of physical ecstasy up against that brick wall, and she wanted the rest of it. No need to be wobbly voiced and embarrassed about that. Especially not when she knew the guy was into her.

“Come in,” Gabe said, stepping to the side and allowing her entry. “Couple of things. You have to understand that this never had anything to do with your job. You don’t have to be here, Jamie. And you don’t owe me a damn thing.”

“I understand that,” Jamie said. “In any case, if you’d tried to hold my job hostage for sex I would have told you to go fuck yourself, because you certainly wouldn’t be fucking me.”

A smile tugged at the corner of his lips, and she had a feeling that she had said something right. “Fair enough.”

“What’s the second thing?”

He frowned. “What?”

“You said you had a couple of things. That was one thing. What’s the other thing?”

Something about his demeanor changed. His smile going laconic. His posture intentionally relaxed. “I’m not a relationship guy,” he said. “I like to have a good time, and nothing is off-limits in the bedroom for me, baby. But outside that I don’t have anything else, understand?”

She laughed. “Okay.”

He looked stunned. “Did you just roll your eyes at me?”

“You made that grand announcement like I might have thought something different about you. Like maybe I was going to be disappointed? Gabe, if I wanted to get married and have babies I would hardly be aiming to start a professional career in barrel racing. And if I wanted to get married and have babies, I sure as hell wouldn’t be here with you. Like I said. I know about your type. I know about rodeo cowboys.”