Page 33 of Breaking the Ice

Samantha didn’t bother to answer – she just smiled.

“Wow. That good, huh?”

“Not bad,” she admitted. “Quite nice, actually.”

“Not bad? Quite nice? Sam… I thought we’d talked about this.”

She frowned. Way to kill the buzz,Nick.“There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Sure, but wouldn’t you prefer fantastic, amazing, unforgettable? I mean… the first kiss is a guy’s selling point. You give it all you’ve got. If Paul’s starting withnicethen it’s not going to improve from there.”

“Nick do you know how many yuk, blah, boring kisses I’ve had this last little while? Nice is a major step up. Trust me.”

“Yeah, you’ve not had a great run.”

“And we’re going out again tonight.” She smiled to herself at the thought. “You never know.Anythingcan happen.”

Tonight could be the night she ended her epic dry spell!

Something that was certainly on Samantha’s mind when she stopped at the drug store on her way home. Nick was right about women taking responsibility for their own protection. Okay, maybe tonight wouldn’t be the night but… what if?

She located the condom stand a minute later and stood in front of it staring, completely nonplussed. There wereseriouslythis many choices? And she’d thought tampon selections were ridiculous. No wonder men couldn’t be bothered if they faced this choice every time.

Colored, ribbed, lubricated, flavored, vibrating.Vibrating? Extra-large.Crap.What if she chose the wrong one? Was shesupposedto buy extra-large? Would Paul be insulted if she didn’t? Would his dick strangulate and suffer permanent damage if she didn’t because he was hung like a horse? Damn it, she should have brought Nick with her.

On this she really needed a man’s perspective.

Reading the back of the boxes didn’t really help her either. They were fabulously descriptive of the amazing powers of the particular brand and one even had a nutritional panel.

Dear God. She had to count calories while having sex?

Wasn’t it supposed to burn them?

Glancing at the time, Samantha realized she’d been dithering for fifteen minutes. After another five minutes passed along with two offers of help from staff she thought,screw it, and put one of each packet in her basket and took them to the counter.

The assistant looked bug eyed. “Are you sure?” she asked politely and Samantha just smiled and asked her to hurry.

“I’ll have what she’s having,” an amused male voice said.

Samantha turned to find a middle-aged cowboy waiting patiently while they tallied her purchase. He was wearing a big old hat and a friendly smile.

“If you need a hand using any of those, just holler.”

He reminded Samantha of an aging Larry Valentine and she smiled. The crazy thing was, had he been twenty years younger, she may just have taken him up on his offer. Instead, she paid the money, stashed the condoms in her large DKNY holdall, thankful that she’d thought to take a roomy bag to work this morning, and hurried out of the store.

Paul took her to a movie and then to dinner. She’d dressed more casually tonight. A pair of Prada three-quarter length denim pants and a beautiful floaty Colette Dinnigan top in grays and greens which matched her eyes, sat wide on her shoulders and low on her cleavage.

A pop of cherry on her lips and some Louboutin pumps completed the picture.

And the date went well. The movie was good. The meal was nice. They laughed. And talked. And laughed some more. And he came up for coffee again. Samantha put on some Adele and sat on the couch next to him as the amazing sultry tones full of ache and dysfunction floated around them.

They talked some more as they drank but, thirty minutes later, they werestilltalking.

Okay… why hadn’t he made a move yet? Samantha was pretty sure he found her attractive but, had she been reading him wrong?

Or was she putting out the wrong signals?

The holdall with the condoms, that she had diligently taken out of their packets and individually separated, was stashed conveniently down beside the lounge. All systems were go.

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