Teaser Tuesday: Catch Me by Lorelie Brown

Yup! It’s a totally new teaser for all of you – an exclusive excerpt!

Catch Me by Lorelie Brown

Maggie Bullock’s father needed expensive medical care and if that meant stealing from their friendly swindling banker, so be it. Once her father was on the path to recovery she would face the consequences. The whole thing was surprisingly easy until she’s kidnapped by bounty hunter Dean Collier.
Collier is tired of tracking down worthless scum. He’s afraid he’ll lose his last scrap of humanity and become a stone-cold killer, just like the men he brings to justice. He jumps at the chance to become sheriff of Fresh Springs, Arizona. The one condition—capture Maggie.
He figured it’d be easy. Until beautiful, loyal Maggie breaks through defenses he’d thought cemented. His feelings for her run the range from fury to confusion to love, but if he doesn’t bring her in someone else will. Can there be a future between a sheriff and a fugitive?

He kept his breathing slow and deep, and didn’t move a muscle beyond slitting his eyes open. Years of keeping one eye on his back while hunting vicious criminals had honed his peripheral vision. He stretched it to his full capabilities now, expecting to see a sleeping Maggie putting lie to his paranoia.
Instead, he found her awake and watching him with the wide, frightened eyes of a jackrabbit. She had one hand free and was picking away at the length of rope that connected her to his gun belt.
He snatched her by the forearm. “Haven’t we been through this?”
She squeaked. Panic flashed over her face. Her toe connected with his hipbone, awfully close to his nearest and dearest. He grunted and flinched. Leave it to Maggie to take advantage— she yanked free at the same time she planted another kick in his ribs.
“Goddamn it,” he roared.
She scrambled away on her knees, but got tangled in the blankets as she tried to push to her feet. He rolled over, seized hold of her hips and pulled her flat with an oomph.
That didn’t stop her though. She did her damnedest to claw out his eyes.
He snatched her wrists and pressed them together. He jerked her arms up over her head, and over the curve of the saddle, the better to put them out of her use.
Her tight body stretched beneath him, ripe for the plucking. The last time he’d been in such an intimate position with a woman, face to face and so near he could smell her sweet breath wash over his mouth, it had been Annie. But he’d never been tempted to fuck Annie into submission like he was this little hellcat. His marriage had been about love and respect, not this angry, snarling lust that reared its head at the most inopportune moments.
Exhaustion trod over him like a weary horse. The fool woman kept fighting him, losing and coming back for more anyway. He remembered the way she’d stilled in the hotel room when she’d feared he was about to touch her bosom. It had been so many years since anyone had called Dean a gentleman; he wasn’t afraid of fighting dirty.
His mouth slanted over hers and he took. Took her lips, took her tongue, took her aggression. She tasted like fury, sweet and sharp at the same time, and—way down underneath—innocence. He poured in every bit of frustration he’d felt with her for tempting him by simply being. Her body went limp. Not with the welcoming comfort he was used to. Instead, she was limp with fear. Her lips trembled as he pushed and stroked, and the quick flash of his dying conscience made him ease up. He couldn’t resist one more teasing nip of her plump bottom lip.
But he’d learned Maggie wasn’t the type of woman to let a hint of weakness go by.
She kissed him back.

A very nice first kiss scene, wouldn’t you say? This book was published by Carina Press on July 18, 2011. What’d you think? Have you read it yet? Do you love first kiss scenes? Which has been most memorable to you?