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How To Host A Seduction
Jeanie London


Step 1 - Know the target. After Ellen Talbot walks out his door, Christopher Sinclair vows to get her back in his bed. He remembers everything about their three incredible months together - all of her sexual fantasies and longings. Now he's using that to tempt her….Step 2 - Set the stage. What should have been a simple corporate training session turns intense when Ellen discovers her partner is the one man whose sexy memory she can't forget. And being with Christopher again just stirs up all that incredible heat…. Step 3 - Don't retreat. She can't resist him when he starts using his intimate knowledge about her to entice her again. So she'll indulge herself for these few days, then walk away at the end. But Ellen doesn't count on his determination to have her…for keeps!









“You’re brilliant.”


Christopher complimented Ellen. Then he kissed her. One solid kiss on the lips before he shot her that dimpled grin. That grin that made her stomach flip-flop. That grin that made her realize just how much she liked having him kiss her.

That craving again.

Leaning across the table, she kissed him back.

Christopher’s reaction was much more impressive than hers had been. Before she could back away he’d driven his fingers into her hair, locking her against him so he could kiss her once more. A real kiss.

His tongue plunged into her mouth, stealing her breath. Her insides swooped again and her thighs tingled. The only thing she could say was that kissing him back sparked her craving as if she’d tossed a lighted match into a puddle of gas.

Their tongues tangled with urgency. She grew dizzier and giddier as the tabletop cut into her rib cage. Or perhaps it was only his kiss that crushed the breath from her lungs. Either way, Ellen knew she had to have him…now.







Dear Reader,

I lived half my life quite happily north of the Mason-Dixon Line and even have the accent to prove it, which most people catch when I ask for a cup of coffee. Then I moved south and discovered that while I may be a Yankee by birth, I’m a Southern belle at heart. Something about the Deep South just captivates me…and writing One-Night Man, Blaze #42, set in the Big Easy, only sparked my desire to write a romance that took me into the sultry bayous south of New Orleans.

Enter Ellen and Christopher. Ellen is a romance editor who doesn’t believe heroes exist off the written page. Christopher Sinclair is a savvy businessman…a real-live hero who is determined to prove her wrong. To make his case, he has developed a strategy that breaks all the rules, a strategy he calls red-hot pursuit….

Blaze is the place to explore spicy romance, a place where you’ll find steamy journeys to happily ever after. I hope How To Host a Seduction brings you to happily-ever-after, too. Let me know. Drop me a line in care of Harlequin Books, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada, or visit my Web site at www.jeanielondon.com.

Very truly yours,

Jeanie London




How to Host a Seduction

Jeanie London








For the gypsy.




Contents


Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Epilogue




Prologue


SEX HAD ONLY CLINCHED THE DEAL.

Making love to Ellen Talbot had just proven what Christopher Sinclair had suspected since first meeting this remarkable romance editor at a friend’s wedding—no woman had ever affected him like she did. No woman had ever come close.

Ellen left his heart thundering, his muscles vibrating so hard that he collapsed against the sheets, unable to do much more than press his shell-shocked erection into the cradle of her warm thighs and try to catch his breath. His thoughts raced with the singularity of the event and just how shattering making love to her had been. Their first time. Damn.

Locking his arms around her, Christopher savored the feel of her bare curves, her long, long legs tangled with his, their skin clinging in a thin sheen of sweat. He’d never even realized he could feel the way he felt when he was with her.

The lack had nothing to do with experience. He’d just celebrated his thirty-third birthday and could honestly say he’d lived most of those years, had explored the challenges life tossed his way and added a few variations of his own. He’d experienced his share of incredible lovemaking and mind-blowing orgasms with some very lovely ladies.

Not one of those women had ever left him like this, so demolished he could only hang on tight until he recovered. And he needed to recover to gauge the effect he’d had on Ellen.

Pulling her closer, he inhaled the fresh scent of her hair, a shiny sheet of sable that cascaded over his arm and the pillow, cool silk to the touch. Her full breasts pressed against his chest, the tips he’d explored so thoroughly earlier sealed to his skin as if an extension of him. The lines had blurred. Christopher wasn’t quite sure where he ended and Ellen began.

“Mmm.” She breathed the sound on a sigh.

Even annihilated from the most awesome sex he’d ever had, Christopher managed a smile at the pleasure in her voice.

“Mmm, yourself,” he said.

Forcing his fingers from where they’d been idly threading through her hair, he hooked a knuckle beneath her chin and coaxed her to look at him.

She lifted her gaze…and his heart pounded impossibly harder. Her hazel eyes reminded him of a forest in autumn, a sultry, mysterious place where woodsy greens, browns and golds met in a striking clash of color he’d thought about often in the months since they’d started dating.

But now he found himself staring into eyes he didn’t recognize, eyes that seemed more golden than before, more mysterious. Eyes that reflected how contented Ellen was. And damn if he didn’t have the ridiculous urge to pound his chest in pride that he’d leveled her with their sex as much as she’d leveled him.

This was another singular sensation, and Christopher found himself grinning as her lashes feathered over those incredible eyes and she rested her cheek on his shoulder with another sigh, a breath that expelled across his skin in a soft burst.

He pressed a kiss to her brow, wanted to drift off with the scent of her filling his nostrils, to the whisper of her breathing. “Go to sleep. I want to wake you up with my mouth and make love to you while you’re still half asleep.”

Just the thought of this drowsy eyed beauty unfolding beneath him, of sinking into her moist heat in the quiet of late night, made his blood surge in a valiant effort at recovery.

But Ellen went rigid. The melting softness of her warm curves suddenly vanished, and before his orgasm-soaked brain could even register what was happening, she slid out of the bed.

“I never spend the night with anyone.”

In one fluid move she stood, every glorious naked inch of her bathed in the silvery moonlight streaming through windows that overlooked the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

The sight of her, almost unreal with her long slim curves and pale loveliness, distracted him. By the time he’d thought to grab her, she was halfway across the room.

Christopher shook his head to clear it, then forced himself up on an elbow to watch her snag her hose from where he’d draped them over the armoire after he’d savored the pleasure of peeling them off her shapely legs.

“Really?” Here was an interesting turn of events. “Never?”

“Never,” she shot back.

Flipping her hair over her shoulder, she sent it flowing down her back, then scooped up her cocktail dress from a chair. The black beads caught a moonbeam, glinted in the darkness. Every perfunctory motion belied the repletion she’d just demonstrated in his arms.

He recognized what was happening—Ellen was tossing up invisible walls and putting miles of distance between them.

“Why don’t you ever spend the night with anyone, love?”

Plucking her bra from where it had landed on the floor, she glanced up at him from beneath that incredible fall of hair and said, “Relationship rule number one—Senators’ daughters do not get caught sneaking out of anyone’s bed the morning after.”

Christopher watched her sashay toward the bathroom, an awesome display of moon-glazed skin and lithe motion, before she disappeared inside. The door closed. The lock clicked with a note of finality that echoed through his bedroom. Through him.

He sank back against the pillows, smiled. “Well, Ms. Talbot, damn good thing I’m not just anyone.”

And he wasn’t. He was a man who knew what he wanted.

Ellen.

As Senator Talbot’s youngest daughter, she had to weigh consequences more carefully than a woman from a less visible family. He understood and respected her situation, which had meant easing into their relationship slowly. No problem. Ellen was definitely worth the wait. And three months of dating, and waiting, had only heightened the chemistry between them, had let them become acquainted through very imaginative foreplay.

But Christopher was also a man who’d made a career of seeing possibilities where others saw dead ends, of turning impossibilities into successes. The solution to this problem was a no-brainer. Just like always, he’d meet a challenge with a challenge, play the odds, take the risks and get what he wanted.

Ellen.

When she emerged from the bathroom, completely dressed and coolly distant, he was ready.

“Marry me.”

She stopped short in the doorway, lifted her gaze, those fascinating eyes still glimmering with golden lights.

“Marry me, love.”

She blinked as though he must be some sort of mirage and she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Marry you?”

“Yes.”

She continued to stare, a frown slipping beneath her composure, the slightest crease between arched brows—a slip she’d never have made if not truly shocked by his proposal. “We’ve only been dating three months…we’ve only slept together once.”

“I’m ready to peel off that dress and go for round two.”

That seemed to wake her up again. “Christopher!”

“We’re right together.” Covering the distance between them, he reached out to trace her lower lip, was pleased when she shivered in reply. “Do you doubt that after tonight?”

For an instant, she looked as if the wind had been knocked out of her, but then she backed away so fast she stumbled. He reached out to steady her, but she shrugged him off.

“You’re crazy. No one gets married after sleeping together once. That’s against all the rules.”

He stared hard into those beautiful eyes, hoped she recognized how determined he was. “I’m not just anyone, love. And we need to establish right here and now that rules were meant to be broken.”




1


New Orleans—three months later

CRADLING THE CELL PHONE between her shoulder and ear, Ellen Talbot hitched up the hem of her beaded cocktail dress—a dress she hadn’t worn since he’d stripped it off her the night they’d made love. Of course, that had also been the night she’d received his marriage proposal and ended their relationship.

One very eventful evening.

But as she’d left him two thousand miles away in New York, Ellen deemed it safe to wear the dress again. Protecting her hose from snagging the beaded fabric, she sank into a chair in the bar of the Château Royal, the historic hotel in New Orleans’s French Quarter that was hosting the annual romance writers’ convention.

“Thanks for checking in with me.” She spoke into the receiver. “Have a safe trip home.”

She said goodbye to her mother, disconnected and flipped her phone shut. It might be three in the morning in this time zone, but her mother was currently in Bosnia, where she’d just concluded a breakfast with the Goodwill delegates from several foreign countries. As her mother wasn’t only a loving parent who stayed in touch with all four of her grown children but a United States Senator, phone calls often came at odd hours.

Ellen didn’t mind. She hadn’t been sleeping. Far from it, as she’d just broken free of a post-award ceremony party where both the winners and the nominees had gathered to celebrate. But now the party was over and, for the first time since she’d arrived in New Orleans, Ellen was practically alone. She checked to make sure her battery wasn’t running low, returned the phone to her purse and willed herself to relax.

The muted glow of chandeliers sparked off the floor-to-ceiling windows that reflected the city beyond, shadowed by a black velvet night. Only a few guests still milled through the bar and the adjoining front lobby—stragglers from the award ceremony, she guessed by their formal wear. Ellen closed her eyes and let the calming hush filter through her. She could finally lose this smile that had been plastered on her face since she’d left her hotel room at 7:57 a.m. yesterday morning.

Exhaling slowly, she allowed her smile to fade, felt the tightness in her cheeks begin to ease.

Ah…

As an editor for the Brant Publishing Group, a corporation that published mass-market romance novels, the thick single-title historicals that readers devoured, Ellen’s workdays didn’t usually involve the spotlight or never-ending smiles. Her days involved meetings with the editorial, marketing and art departments. When she wasn’t in meetings, she spent time on the telephone with any one of her thirty authors. Or reading through manuscripts that demanded her skill at recognizing story potential and writing pithy cover copy to entice readers into picking up a book from an already crowded shelf and buying it.

But during these industry conventions, smiling was as fundamental as breathing, because Ellen was a hot commodity—a romance editor with buying power. She spent her days conducting appointments with eager writers, presenting publishing-related topics to rooms filled to capacity, and socializing with people she only recognized by their name tags.

She preferred life out of the spotlight, so this moment alone was welcomed, would have been perfect if not for the thoughts of him that kept intruding on her overworked brain. She sighed. Maybe she shouldn’t have worn this dress, after all.

Hindsight is twenty-twenty, her mother was fond of saying.

Ellen heartily agreed. Had she had clearer vision about him, she’d have turned down his first invitation for a date and saved herself a lot of heartache.

Marriage.

Ellen had thought he’d been kidding. He hadn’t been, so he’d been history. At best, the man was a daredevil who lived life to test limits. At worst, he was certifiable. No person in her high-visibility situation would ever consider marriage after three months of dating, a lot of foreplay and one night of incredible sex. No matter how incredible the sex had been.

And it had been beyond anything she’d ever experienced.

She’d had to get away from him fast. Before his too-blue eyes, dimpled grins and steamy kisses had melted all her defenses. She wasn’t willing to live with the sort of consequences that happened whenever she let her guard slip….

“Here you go.”

Ellen opened her eyes to find a steaming mug of latte on the table. She glanced up at Lennon Eastman, one of her authors and a very close friend, despite the fact that she and her nutty great-aunt were the reasons Ellen kept winding up in the Big Easy, where she’d first met him.

She couldn’t hold that against Lennon, especially not when her friend looked so happy. Even after a long night in heels that by all rights should have crippled her, Lennon looked ready to go for another round of schmoozing.

“Thanks. I so needed this,” Ellen said. “I think my jaw is locked. I can’t seem to stop smiling.”

“Just let me know if you need to see my dentist.” Lennon had settled into a wing chair opposite and shot her a less-than-sympathetic glance.

“I just might. Suffering is not on my vacation itinerary.”

“Then we shouldn’t be drinking espresso at three o’clock in the morning. We’ll pay for this sleep deprivation tomorrow.”

“Are you kidding?” Ellen rubbed her jaw to ease the stiffness. “I won’t make it across the courtyard without the caffeine. The bellhop will find me asleep behind a potted palm.”

“You can always ask him to load you onto his luggage cart and haul you up to your room.”

“Then I’d wind up in a potted palm because I can’t tip him. I gave you the last of my cash for these lattes.”

Lennon laughed. “Maybe we should sit right here and pound espresso while the sun comes up. I’ve got that Regency writers’ panel at eight. Don’t you have plans to meet your new author for breakfast at Café du Monde?”

“I do.” But Ellen couldn’t tackle the thought of another day filled with marathon smiling just yet. Even when there were beignets involved. A favorite.

She raised her mug in a toast, instead. “Saluté. You deserved this year’s RAVE Award for Milord Spy. The publicity should shoot your sales through the roof. The book distributors love that award. And you were very gracious when you accepted.”

“Thank you, but winning hasn’t even hit me yet. I’m still stuck on the fact that you actually let me keep my title.”

“No offense, Lennon, but you’re not title gifted.”

“You say that to all your authors. I know, I’ve heard.”

“No, only to you and Stephanie. Did she tell you what the working title of her latest book is?”

“Lord of the Ravished. I know, pretty dreadful. Tell me mine are never that bad.” When Ellen didn’t reply, Lennon relented with a sigh. “I’ll be satisfied that my gift lies in writing orgasms.”

“No argument there, but take credit where it’s due. You picked a great title this time, born out by your award.”

Lennon beamed. This award was just one more good thing to happen in a run of good things, starting with Lennon marrying her handsome new husband. Ellen knew of no one more deserving.

“Congratulations to you, as well.” Lennon tipped her mug in salute. “Couldn’t have done it without your exceptional editing ability. You were very eloquent while accepting your accolades. I thought we were an impressive team. And we looked so good.”

“Thankfully, because I guarantee you the picture of our acceptance is going to make the cover of next month’s Romance Industry Review Magazine. The RAVE is big, big news.”

Not only for Lennon, but for her, too. A RAVE-winning author meant another feather in her cap, and collecting feathers happened to be one of Ellen’s pastimes. She was currently collecting enough feathers to earn the position of senior editor at Brant Publishing, the goal she’d been working toward since accepting a job as an editorial assistant in college.

“Is the RAVE big enough to get me some perks?” Lennon asked. “Like a renowned cover model or a reprint?”

Lennon might be a creative wonder, a rising star who knew how to write women’s fantasies to the delight of her readers, but she was also a businesswoman who didn’t miss a trick.

Ellen scowled. “I’ll see what I can do. Just don’t forget I was the one who battled the marketing department to print your name bigger than the title on your covers.”

“You know I appreciate it immensely, but that was two books ago. How long do you expect me to let you rest on your laurels?”

Ellen laughed, a heartfelt sound that took her by surprise. By all rights she should be too sleep deprived to feel anything but exhaustion right now, yet she felt more relaxed, more content than she’d been in a long time. Too long.

Lifting her mug, Ellen savored another swallow. It felt so good to be away from home, away from the office, away from him. She was a woman on the fast track—although her family didn’t consider her career to be in the same league as those of her lawyer siblings, chief justice aunt, campaign manager uncle, political analyst and lobbyist cousins…

Or her Senator mother and former Cabinet-member father.

In a clan that boasted enough high-power careers to rival those of the Kennedys, Ellen’s decision to go into publishing—albeit with a Fortune 500 company—still had the ability to make all of her relations scratch their heads in bewilderment.

She deserved a break from the hectic pace, the constant pressure…from thinking about—

“Look, it’s Lennon and her gorgeous editor!”

Glancing up, Ellen couldn’t miss the group that had just entered the front lobby, returning from a night of reveling on Bourbon Street, if their costumes were any indication.

“Oh, bloody hell. It’s Mr. Muscle-Butt and his entourage. Oh, Lennon, look at him, he’s wearing a cape.”

“Be nice,” Lennon admonished. “He’s trying to impress you.”

“By looking like Zorro?”

“By looking like a romance hero. You’re a romance editor—see the connection?”

Ellen saw, all right. Was not interested. Romance heroes didn’t exist outside of books and even if they did, she’d had her fill of men recently, thank you very much. This one swept through the lobby with a dramatic flourish that demanded the attention of every person in the place, including the sleepy-eyed desk clerks.

His brown hair fell to his waist and the black cape flew out behind him as if he were striding off a windswept moor. Not to mention his thoughtlessness—his entourage, a gaggle of model-thin women dressed in outlandishly sexy costumes, was forced to gallop to keep up with his long-legged strides.

“Oh, no. He’s not wearing his name tag. Who is he again? I can’t very well call him Mr. Muscle-Butt.”

“Vittorio,” Lennon whispered beneath her breath while standing to greet the new arrivals. “Congratulate him on winning first place in the cover model competition tonight. He’ll be crushed if he thinks you didn’t notice.”

“Got it.” Ellen set her mug on the table, slapped on her professional smile again and followed Lennon’s lead. “Good evening, Vittorio. Congratulations on your win.”

He extended his hand, and she had no choice but to offer hers, while he smiled what had to be a smile even more professional than her own. She had the unkind thought that he’d probably devoted days to practicing that smile in front of a mirror. Going for charming…dashing…roguish—ugh!

“My lovely Ellen.” He bowed and his mouth grazed her knuckles gallantly, while she struggled to keep a straight face. Lennon rolled her eyes in her periphery. “Congratulations on your success this evening, as well.”

He reluctantly let her hand slip away before turning to kiss Lennon on both cheeks.

“Where’s Josh? Surely your new husband isn’t neglecting you on your special night.”

She waved a hand dismissively. “He came for the award ceremony and offered to stay, but I could tell he was antsy. Too much estrogen flying around for his taste.”

A frown drew Vittorio’s brows together. “Too much estrogen?” He swept an expansive glance at the groupies who’d settled into silence behind him. “No such thing.”

No doubt. Ellen wasn’t sure whether he referred to her or his entourage, but when he flashed another smile—definitely aimed at her—she suspected the former and bit back a groan.

“Lovely Ellen—tell me you’re not planning to run off right after the convention. I want to tour you around the Big Easy. Show you all the secret places only the locals know.”

He may have said secret but he meant intimate, and his suggestive tone made her swallow back yet another groan. “I’m not running off. Not right away,” she said.

“My good fortune, then.” Another roguish smile, this time accompanied by a slight flaring of his nostrils that just screamed testosterone. “You’ll make time for me.”

No question. No politely asking. Just a you-will-make-time-for-me declaration that jump-started her half-sleeping synapses.

“I’m sorry, Vittorio. We’re going to need a day planner to keep up with all we’ve got scheduled,” she said, lying so easily it was scary. “Lennon’s Auntie Q has this murder-mystery thing planned. We’ll be leaving New Orleans on Wednesday.”

That wasn’t a lie. She’d committed to some corporate-training-murder-mystery event for Miss Q’s—Miss Quinevere McDarby’s—latest business venture. Ellen still wasn’t clear on the details, but Lennon and a few of her other authors would be attending, and she figured solving mysteries would provide an interesting diversion.

She needed a good diversion right now.

A quizzical lift of dark brows hinted that Vittorio wasn’t turned down very often. Ellen would have felt bad, but the man appeared to have enough women fawning over him. So technically she was saving him from disappointment—because she didn’t fawn. Ever.

“Right. Okay.” He eyed her as though something had taken place and he hadn’t yet figured out what.

His groupies obviously recognized the power shift, though, and stopped glaring long enough to console him, enveloping him in a press of bodies and a cloud of expensive perfume. Vittorio took his cue to leave, with a dashing smile and a jauntily delivered “Good night.”

Ellen watched him go, marveled that not one of those women had objected to him asking her out in their presence. No, they’d glared at her, instead, like she’d forced him to flirt.

“Why me?” she asked.

The question had been rhetorical, but Lennon obliged her, anyway. “It’s your hair. That swingy new style.” Her gaze shot straight to the hairstyle in question. “I love it.”

“My stylist gets the credit.” Ellen sat back down and reached for her mug. “He promised me something different.” She shook her head, still enjoying the way her shorter, fuller style swung around her face when she moved.

“What made you decide to cut all your hair off?”

“A change to celebrate my upcoming thirtieth birthday.”

She wouldn’t admit that he’d been attracted to her long hair, but a line from an old song echoed in her memory.

I’m gonna wash that man right outta my hair….

Well, Ellen had cut him right out of hers.

“Your new style makes your face softer somehow,” Lennon said. “And it’s amazing how the change draws attention to your skin. You’ve got this whole creamy Snow White thing going on. No wonder Vittorio is smitten.”

“I hope I didn’t put you in an awkward position,” Ellen said, though she didn’t feel the least bit repentant.

“He doesn’t need my help to get a date. Besides, his ego is rock solid. I don’t think he even realized he was in over his head.” Lennon sank back into her chair and grabbed her latte. “So what didn’t you like about him?”

“You know my family. Can you see me bringing home a man who uses more cream rinse than I do?”

Lennon burst into laughter, drawing the attention of a nearby bartender. “That’s not difficult with your new hairstyle. But you’re selling Vittorio short. He may have an ego the size of the Southern Hemisphere but he’s got a heart of pure gold.”

A heart of pure gold would not make the difference. Her family was already tolerant enough of her foibles. Bringing home a man with whom the media would have a field day would cast doubt on her sanity. She could already see the headline: Senator’s Daughter Plays Fantasy Games with a Hero From a Trashy Romance Novel.

Her mother, of course, in an effort to help, would likely direct her wayward youngest to the nearest psychiatric facility.

It’s for the best, Ellen, really. Let’s give you a chance to take a deep breath and clear your head, reassess your priorities and reexamine the objective. We’ll tell the press you’re suffering stress from your bohemian career….

All for Mr. Muscle-Butt?

She’d pass, thank you.

Sometimes Ellen thought that as an infant she must have been left in a basket on the front doorstep. In a family of high achievers, she always seemed to be a step behind. Her siblings had all gone into law, yet she’d chosen publishing. They were all still scratching their heads over that one. Perhaps if she edited more literary fare, or even better, nonfiction…

Her parents had assured her long ago that she hadn’t been a foundling they’d taken in as a charitable publicity stunt for some campaign. And given that she resembled other family members, Ellen was forced to take them at their word.

But she still didn’t feel like she’d ever make the cut.

None of her siblings had ever been questioned about whether they were the “right fit” for the fancy private schools the Talbot children had attended while growing up. But Ellen had.

She’s very creative, the administrators had said, not sufficiently goal-oriented. Perhaps she’d be better suited to a school with a less ambitious curriculum.

With the clarity of that twenty-twenty hindsight, Ellen thought the administrators might have been right. Especially after the summer debacle when her older sister Leah had been chosen student ambassador for their school. Their parents had decided the family should accompany Leah on her tour of the continent to support her in her new duties. A great plan that the whole family had quickly embraced.

Until Ellen’s report card had arrived.

Her grades had nosedived so much during the previous two semesters that the school had considered retaining her. Of course, her grades had only nosedived because she’d been struggling so hard to grasp pre-algebra and she’d only gotten so far behind because she’d been determined to solve the problem herself….

The choices had been to leave Ellen home with her grandparents for a stint in summer school or to hire a tutor to travel with the family. Believing in always keeping a united front, her parents had opted for the latter solution and amended their travel arrangements to afford Ellen time to study in the hotel rooms during the mornings.

That was just one example. Unfortunately, the list went on and on. And after this latest episode with him…

Lennon peered at her over the rim of her mug. “I want you to have fun while you’re in town. What was it Mr. Bingley said to Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice? ‘I wouldn’t be as fastidious as you are for a kingdom’?”

“Humph.” Ellen dismissed her with a laugh. “Spoken by a woman who just married a hero straight off the cover of one of her books.”

“A man you said existed only in books, incidentally.”

“So you found the only one who didn’t, lucky girl.” Ellen managed to keep a straight face. Josh Eastman was a doll, definitely the perfect man for Lennon—but a hero? Well, Lennon thought so and that was all that counted.

Lennon’s smile faded. Leaning forward intently, she tapped her manicured nails on the tabletop, and her sudden intensity put Ellen on red alert.

The subject of romance heroes and whether such beasts actually existed off the written page was a topic much debated, and one that would logically lead to…

“Auntie Q found you a hero, too, but you threw him back,” Lennon said, right on cue.

Ah, here they were, at the place Ellen had been sidestepping for three months. Only, this time she couldn’t hang up the phone. She would finally have to face the subject of him.

Rule number one of Ellen’s sound business strategies: A strong offense was more effective than a strong defense.

“The real question here is, why did your great-aunt feel compelled to set me up with a man at all?”

“You’ll have to ask Auntie Q yourself. I can’t speak for her, and trying to second-guess her is always risky business.”

Truer words had never been spoken. Lennon’s diminutive great-aunt, the woman Ellen had come to know as Miss Q, was definitely an odd duck. A woman who believed in passion and crusaded for everyone else to believe, too. Ellen might have smiled if the memory of him hadn’t been quite so fresh.

“Christopher Sinclair is a romance hero incarnate,” Lennon said. “And he was perfect for you. Executive-level management. A talented businessman who’s sharp enough to appreciate a strong independent woman without being pushed around or intimidated. He’s from a respectable Southern family. Not to mention that he’s financially successful enough to keep up with your rather upscale interests.”

Ellen arched a skeptical brow. Okay, so it was no secret she preferred slumber parties at the Plaza Hotel to those in tents, art painted on canvas as opposed to lithographs, but that didn’t necessarily mean she was an expensive date….

“I also happen to know Christopher isn’t the kind of man to fawn or cling or crowd you, and he’s absolutely gorgeous,” Lennon continued. “His parents loved you, and not only did your family approve of him, Ellen, they liked him. Your mom told me so.”

Yes, her family had liked him, which had translated into awkward explanations. She wouldn’t share her real reason for breaking up with him and have them question her judgment, again.

“So what happened?” Lennon was saying. “I’m not buying that lame excuse you gave me. I’ve waited to hear the truth in person because I care about you, but be forewarned, Auntie Q wants answers, so you’d better have them handy. You’ll be a captive audience during this murder-mystery training. Think four days and five nights in an antebellum plantation with no escape.”

There usually wasn’t any escape when it came to Miss Q. Not even her own great-niece had managed to outrun the little schemer’s matchmaking. Her efforts to bring Lennon and her new husband together could have made a RAVE-winning book.

“It’s old news now. We dated…”

Three months where he could make me tingle with the slightest touch…and that one red-hot night.

“…and realized we were heading in opposite directions. We have different goals…”

Marriage? After three months? Was the man crazy?

“…so we went our separate ways.”

I ran screaming because he wouldn’t play by the rules.

A lifetime of dealing with the high-profile baggage she brought to a relationship had taught her the hard way to be careful. She’d learned to walk the straight and narrow. And to force her creative brain into remembering the rules, she’d devised a method of making lists just to keep them straight in her head.

Her latest rule for survival: No dating impulsive men.

Lennon frowned as though she wasn’t quite buying this explanation. “What do you mean ‘opposite goals’?”

“He wanted to get married.”

Lennon dissolved before her very eyes into one of those melting oh-how-romantic expressions Ellen was very familiar with after eight years of working with romance authors.

“And you turned him down?”

“Of course I turned him down, Lennon. Honestly.”

“But why? You were crazy about him.”

That was before she’d found out he was crazy. “Listen, Lennon, he’s past history and I’m looking to the future.” Plastering her smile back on, Ellen tried to look reassuring. Her cheeks stretched. Her jaw creaked. “I’m waiting to meet the one, and when I do, you’ll be the first to know.”

“The one?”

“The man who’ll love me for who I am, with no questions. The man who’ll respect my situation enough to play by my rules.”

Lennon looked thoughtful. “Unconditional love. Are you sure you believe that exists?”

“Of course. I couldn’t edit romances if I didn’t. But I’m not going to sit around waiting for it to happen. I’ve got things to accomplish and goals to reach. Worrying about whether or not a man fits into the equation is simply not something I’ll do. If I meet the one, so be it. If not, well, so be it.”

“You’re sure Christopher isn’t the one?”

“Completely.”

“What convinced you?” Lennon insisted. “A man that intense and that gorgeous has to be amazing in bed.”

“I am not sharing the details of my sex life, so don’t bother badgering me. You and Miss Q might discuss how much and how good over dinner, but I prefer to keep my sex life private, thank you. That’s the second rule of the Talbot family code of conduct—no discussing sex at the dinner table.”

“Note to self—” Lennon grimaced “—have a handy excuse to decline the next Talbot family dinner invitation. Just out of curiosity, what’s the first rule?”

Ellen patted her purse. “Always be accessible, which means the cell phone stays on.”

Talbot family code of conduct rule number four: Don’t pry. Ellen could almost hear her mother explaining, Prying shows a decided lack of manners, and unless you’re interested in answering similarly private questions…

She wasn’t.

Unfortunately, Lennon wasn’t versed on Talbot family code of conduct rule number four. She sighed so heavily that Ellen knew she was in for a lecture about making time to have fun. Another conversation they’d had before.

She switched gears, fast. “I will tell you it’ll be a frosty Friday before I involve myself with another impulsive man.”

Lennon set her mug down on the table with a thunk, leaned back in her chair and smiled. And kept smiling.

“What’s so funny?”

“Finally.” She made a visible effort to curb her amusement, though not much of one, judging by her smothered laughter. “You are the most stubborn person I know.”

“I’m not stubborn. I just like stability and constants. He’s an adrenaline junkie who lives life to test fate. The press would have a field day, and that wouldn’t be fair to him. Or me, for that matter. I can’t handle living my life worrying about what sort of stunt he’s going to pull next and what the fallout will be. Marriage! We’d only dated three months.”

“I accepted Josh’s marriage proposal after three days.”

“Your decisions aren’t subject to public scrutiny. If I accept a marriage proposal after three days or even three months, my mother’s parenting skills come under fire. Her party spins my acceptance to mean she raised a confident daughter. The opposing party spins it to mean she has no control over her wild child. I prefer not to start the debate. I don’t enjoy the spotlight in my face, and the media loves writing about guys who flaunt the rules.”

“Christopher is one of the neighborhood kids, Ellen. I’ve known him since I was ten years old.”

She might have laughed at Lennon’s casual description of “neighborhood kids,” which brought to mind a motley gang riding bikes or playing ice hockey on frozen ponds in the winter. But like Ellen’s own, Lennon’s upbringing hadn’t exactly been traditional. She’d been raised in the exclusive Garden District of New Orleans, where kids lived in mansions and toured the continent during summer breaks.

“What’s your point?”

“My point is that I’ve known him a long time. Christopher may enjoy adventurous hobbies, but he’s no adrenaline junkie. He just likes to have fun—which is something you could use a little help with, I don’t mind saying.”

She should have known Lennon would drag her back here despite evasive maneuvers. “You call driving a car in circles at a hundred miles an hour fun?”

“He plays hard, but that’s only because he works so hard. He’s incredibly driven. Just like someone else I know.”

Her pointed stare left no doubt that she considered Ellen guilty of the same crime.

“Well, I don’t spend my weekends jumping out of airplanes, or scuba diving for sunken treasure.”

“I don’t always go into the Gulf with Josh on his week-long fishing excursions—and we make out just fine. A couple can enjoy individual interests. What’s wrong with that?”

“I don’t equate the risk factor of deep-sea fishing with rappelling down a mountainside in the Rockies.”

“It could be dangerous if Josh was caught in a hurricane.”

“Josh won’t be caught in a hurricane unless he’s an idiot. They have meteorological satellites that track storms.”

Lennon was still battling that smile when Ellen slugged back the last of her latte and set the mug on the table.

“He thrives on breaking the rules,” she said. “I was just his challenge du jour.”

“You don’t believe Christopher cares about you?” That wiped away the last of Lennon’s humor. “Ellen, the guy’s crazy about you. I know because he told me.”

He told me, too.

With a sigh, she decided to make the argument she’d intended to reserve for herself. “If he was so crazy about me, then why couldn’t he compromise and do things the right way? Why did he just let me go? He made a few token phone calls and that was it. I haven’t heard from him in three months.”

“You wanted him to chase you?”

Ellen winced at how petty that reasoning sounded. And yes, she would even consider that her need to know he was the one might be petty in some regards. But she’d spent most of her life trying to prove herself—to her family, to the press, to her supervisors, to herself. Was it really so much to ask to be reassured that the man she married would always, always believe in her, no matter how rough-and-tumble life got? No matter how much baggage she came with?

“If he’d been the one, he would have been willing to compromise, Lennon, willing to find some way of accommodating both our needs. He wasn’t.”

It was her most fundamental rule of sound business: Choose your battles and only fight for what you believe in.

She obviously hadn’t been worth fighting for.




2


“THERE YOU ARE,” a familiar female voice called across the lobby, shattering the tense moment and buying Ellen a welcome reprieve. “You guys should have come with us. We had a blast.”

Blast appeared to be the equivalent of a rip-roaring time on the town, judging by the size of the tumblers the trio of women held. Hurricanes, if Ellen correctly identified the color through the plastic.

“Looks like we should get the waiter to bring espresso,” Lennon whispered as the women started toward them.

“It’ll only wake them up and make them even louder.”

Lennon grimaced. “Can’t you control them? They’re your authors.”

“They’re your friends.”

“I’d never have met them if you hadn’t taken us all out to that show at the Reno convention.”

Ellen’s rebuttal was lost when the trio descended, plunking down sweating plastic tumblers and dragging chairs around the table amid a chorus of hellos.

Susanna St. John, Tracy Owens and Stephanie Kondas were all successful romance authors at very different stages in their careers. Industry-savvy women, when they weren’t indulging in mobile Hurricanes, they hosted a Web community with Lennon, a place where readers could chat on bulletin boards, enter various contests and generally keep tabs on author news between book releases. Ellen enjoyed working with each of them.

“Oh, Stephanie pinched some man’s ass. I am so telling her husband,” Tracy, a die-hard glamour girl, informed them as she swept around the table, as dramatic as ever in a pale gold chiffon that swirled around her ankles.

Stephanie, the newest author of the group, was a slim, athletic-looking woman who admirably held her own with the three more experienced authors she’d embraced as friends. She plopped down with a scowl. “You dared me. I do not back down on a dare.”

Tracy winked slyly. “She had a death grip on his biscuit.”

“Well, he had some mighty fine biscuits. What can I say?”

“Save it for the husband.”

Ellen chuckled at the thought of sweet Stephanie trying to explain her antics to her equally sweet husband and kids.

“We’ve been drinking,” Susanna stated unnecessarily while arranging her black taffeta gown and maneuvering unsteadily into a chair. “Hope we’re not intruding.”

Screwing her smile back into place, Ellen ignored the way her jaw ached and decided she’d make out better by just leaving the smile on until the convention ended. “Of course not. Shall we order coffee?”

“And ruin this divine buzz?” Tracy asked incredulously. “I’ll just keep sipping my too-sweet alcoholic beverage, if you don’t mind.” Then she swept an unfocused gaze around the table. “Do you all realize this is the first chance we’ve had to talk privately? Between the publisher’s functions and the awards ceremony tonight, I’ve moderated three author discussions. Can you believe it?”

Actually, Ellen could. “Don’t you know how to say no?”

“Say no? You’re kidding, right?” Susanna shook her head. “Tracy’s been schmoozing the convention committee for months to be invited to fill these slots. She’s a glutton for attention.”

“My name looks good printed on the program.”

Lennon laughed. “With all your promotional efforts, I don’t know when you find the time to write. You put us all to shame.”

“That’s my job, dear.” Tracy glanced at her manicured nails, preening.

Ellen laughed, another one of those heartfelt, liberating chuckles that she hadn’t enjoyed nearly often enough of late. That was, of course, until she found herself the recipient of Susanna’s button-black stare.

Susanna St. John had been in the romance industry for years, writing for various publishing houses before becoming Ellen’s author. She routinely enjoyed a place on the New York Times bestseller list, and Ellen considered having acquired her a major feather in her cap.

But Susanna was also older than Ellen by almost a decade, had been in the business longer and possessed an unsettling knack for calling a spade a spade.

She wore one of those no-nonsense looks now. “What’s been up with you lately?”

An innocuous question in itself, but there was something less than offhand in her tone that caught Ellen’s attention. “Nothing much. Swamped as usual.”

Silence. A trio of tipsy gazes fixed on her, waiting…

“You’d tell me if I wasn’t living up to expectations, wouldn’t you?” Stephanie asked, a not-so-innocuous question.

As she was currently revising her third contracted book, Stephanie’s curiosity about her editor’s expectations was natural. But this question came out of left field, reinforcing Ellen’s impression that this conversation was headed somewhere.

“Of course I would. But wretched title aside, your latest book is coming along beautifully. You’re not letting these jaded old hacks worry you with their war stories, are you?”

Tracy huffed. “Watch who you’re calling old there, Ms. I’m-getting-ready-to-turn-thirty.”

“You’re right behind me, Ms. I’m-getting-ready-to-turn-thirty-a-month-after-me.” Ellen forced a laugh, but she caught Lennon’s frown across the table.

“What else did you do on Bourbon Street tonight, besides pound Hurricanes?” Lennon neatly diverted the conversation.

“Visited a few sex toy stores to get ideas for our books,” Tracy said.

“And pinched a few cute butts.” Stephanie grinned.

“The usual Saturday night fare for horny women,” Susanna added. “You’ve been so busy that we haven’t had a chance to chat. How’s the family? Parents, siblings, all those aunts, uncles and cousins doing okay?”

Ellen nodded. “Everyone’s fine. How’s Joey making out?”

Susanna’s son had recently started summer session here in New Orleans at Tulane University, leaving Susanna, a divorcée of many years, with an unusually quiet house in Shreveport.

“Great. Except that life without mom-the-maid is coming as a shock. For me, too. I’m astounded at how much I’m not running the washing machine.”

Susanna laughed, but Lennon eyed her narrowly. “Don’t let her fool you, Ellen. I happen to know she just dropped big bucks on a laptop so she can still work when the urge to hop in her car and visit Joey strikes.”

Ellen guessed this might have something to do with Lennon’s invitation for Susanna to participate in Miss Q’s murder-mystery training. “A laptop is a good idea with your tight schedule.”

“My schedule,” Susanna said, “wouldn’t be nearly so tight if I hadn’t forgotten how to write a decent hero. But alas…” She heaved a dramatic sigh. “I have, which means I’ve been riding my deadlines because I’m rewriting half my books.”

“You, too?” Tracy chimed in, peering at Susanna with what had to be feigned astonishment. “I’ve forgotten how to write a decent hero, too. I don’t know what’s going on. If I’d turned thirty already, I might worry about senility, but as I’m still in my twenties—”

“Oh, thank goodness!” Stephanie covered her eyes with a shaky hand. “I thought I was the only one having this problem. The rewrites on this book have been so extensive that I’m completely off schedule with my other projects. And if I miss my deadline, I’ll never sell another book.”

“Try not to let revisions undermine your confidence,” Susanna suggested pragmatically. “Revisions are just part of the process. Right, Ellen?”

Ellen stared at the three tipsy faces, recognized high drama at its finest, and knew this scene had been staged, rehearsed and fortified with alcohol.

“Okay, ladies.” She steepled her fingers before her and assumed a professional mien. “What’s on your minds?”

“Heroes,” Susanna said.

Not surprised that Susanna had been appointed the spokesperson of the group, Ellen asked, “What about them?”

“Our normally brilliant and insightful editor doesn’t seem to like them anymore.”

The woman didn’t pull any punches, but it wasn’t her delivery that blew Ellen away, but her allegation. “What on earth makes you think I dislike heroes?”

The trio stared at her, but they suddenly didn’t seem so tipsy.

“The fact that you hated my last one,” Susanna said.

Tracy nodded. “And mine.”

“And mine, too,” Stephanie added.

Ellen stared, expression carefully schooled as her mind raced to assess the accuracy of this accusation.

Susanna’s last hero…the medieval bastard—no, baron—who kept abandoning the heroine to run off to battle.

Hmm, Ellen remembered him well and Susanna was right, he’d required some serious revision. She wouldn’t say exactly half a book’s worth, but abandoning the heroine was not a quality she or the romance readers considered heroic.

Who wanted a man who would leave at the drop of a hat, a man who wouldn’t hang around long enough to fight for his heroine when the going got tough?

Tracy’s last hero…the Elizabethan nobleman who’d gone to court as a spy and made love to the heroine without revealing his true identity.

Lying to any woman suggested a character flaw that was tough to tackle successfully in any commercial book-length novel. But lying was especially dastardly when it involved an affair of the heart. It was never easy for a woman to let her guard down, to trust a man enough to become vulnerable, especially knowing she might wind up heartbroken.

Stephanie’s last hero…the Scottish lord whose heroine had been kidnapped by a rebel clan. His lame attempts to rescue her had spanned several chapters.

If Ellen had been Stephanie’s heroine she’d have been disappointed in a hero who couldn’t manage a decent rescue in a timely fashion. Any hero who left the heroine alone for so long was lucky his woman didn’t run off with the villain. A true hero would have pursued his heroine at all costs, quickly….

Okay, so she’d had some problems with their heroes. Valid problems? Ellen had thought so. But writing was a subjective business, a creative business. Even at their most professional, her authors were still artists, emotionally attached to their work. Editing often required performing a delicate balancing act of compliment and critique, to get the job done.

Okay, she saw where they were coming from, knew they wouldn’t have approached her unless sure their concerns were valid.

She glanced at Lennon, who’d risen, hightailing it toward the bar. The coward. She’d known this conversation would invariably circle around to her latest hero.

…The Regency smuggler who was more interested in his wants and needs than his heroine’s.

A true hero would have found a way to satisfy both. And even all those scrumptious orgasms in some very steamy cave scenes didn’t make up for the lack.

Uh-oh.

Ellen stared into the trio of worried faces whose careers were currently riding on her ability to be as brilliant and insightful, and reasonable, as they believed her to be.

And they must have seen something encouraging in her expression because Susanna threw a hand across her forehead in true Sarah Bernhardt fashion and sighed breathlessly.

“Woe is me, I’ve forgotten how to write a hero and now my publishing house will stop buying my books. My agent will have to hit the streets, scrambling for new offers—”

“At least you’ll get offers.” Tracy shot her a dubious look. “You’re a New York Times bestselling author. Publishing houses will be fighting over you. Even with all my promotional efforts, I’m still only in the mid-list with seven books.”

“But at least you’ve got numbers.” Then Stephanie met Ellen’s gaze with a look of entreaty. “My third book isn’t even out yet. I’m completely at your mercy.”

Folding her arms across her chest, Ellen tried to smile at their theatrics, but not so surprisingly, the smile that had seemed etched on her face had done a disappearing act, because a terrible, terrible thought had just occurred to her.

If these ladies were right about her lack of objectivity—and Ellen had the sinking suspicion they might be—there could only be one explanation….

He was interfering with her work, too.

Félicie Allée—three days later

THOUGH THE PLANTATION wasn’t quite an hour south of New Orleans, Félicie Allée might have been on a deserted island. The shady oak-lined alley leading to the circle drive and majestic front entrance transported Ellen from the reality of well-traveled highways baking beneath the sun to a shadowy fantasy place cooled by the bayou breeze.

Sunlight streamed through the leaves overhead to play shadow-and-lace games along the columns and metalwork enclosing the double-tiered balconies around the plantation.

She’d first visited Félicie Allée after Lennon’s wedding. Perhaps her second visit was even more breathtaking, because this time Ellen knew what to expect. Her awe was tempered with simple appreciation for the way the plantation had been built to bring a touch of elegance and civilization to the wildly lush setting. Crepe myrtles, azaleas and camellias all burst in bright bloom on the grounds, and to a woman like Ellen, reared beneath the often leaden skies of Manhattan and Long Island, the scene resembled a living oil painting.

“Leave it to your great-aunt to turn boring old corporate training into a game,” Ellen said, as Lennon steered her sport utility vehicle down the oak-lined drive leading to the plantation. “Corporate training and murder-mystery events. Who’d ever have thought of combining the two?”

Lennon shot her a sidelong glance. “No one has ever accused Auntie Q of lacking imagination.”

Ellen couldn’t help but smile. Lennon’s great-aunt believed in having a good time and didn’t make apologies, an odd attitude to Ellen, whose family operated in such a different manner. Chatting with Miss Q always proved refreshing, very different from the in-depth business strategy sessions she had with various relations during family functions.

“So who’s my partner?” she asked Lennon, who slowed her SUV in front of the entrance. “Did you put a bug in your great-aunt’s ear to give me Susanna? Nothing against Tracy but she doesn’t travel light. I won’t stand a chance if I have to room with her. And you know how weird I am about sharing my space.”

“I know, but Auntie Q had already made the arrangements. She promised you’d be comfortable, though.” Lennon paused with her hand above the door handle. “You okay?”

Okay? No, she wouldn’t go straight to okay. Not when the first few days of her vacation had gone bust because all she could think about was him. The man had a power over her that was nothing short of scary. Whether involved with him or not, he consumed her thoughts, influenced her actions, sneaked right past the barriers she worked so hard to maintain in her life.

But all was not lost yet. She still had almost a week of vacation to let the fantasy of murder and mayhem clear her head so she could return to reality with some brilliant idea about how to put all thoughts of him firmly behind her.

“I’ve just spent the last three days listening to you preach about how I don’t make enough time to have fun,” Ellen said. “May I enjoy the rest of my vacation, please? Without any mention of work, or him.”

“You got it.” Lennon shoved her door wide and climbed out. “No more reality, as long as you promise to turn off your stinking cell phone. You can survive a few days without it. We’ll do fantasy this weekend and— Oh, how timely. Here comes the queen of make-believe herself. You can ask her who you’re rooming with.”

Miss Q strode across the gallery toward them, looking as if she’d stepped off the pages of a historic costume book in an oversize plaid dress with leg-o’-mutton puffed sleeves.

“Welcome to Félicie Allée, my dears.” She captured each by an arm when they reached the top of the steps and maneuvered them around toward the door. “I’m so pleased you’re a part of our opening event.”

After kissing Lennon on the cheek, she clasped Ellen’s hands in a paper-thin grasp. “Thank you for accepting my invitation. I wanted Southern Charm Mysteries’ grand opening to be a special event among friends.”

“Everything coming together?” Lennon asked.

“All the clues have been placed. The red herrings planted,” Miss Q said. “The cast is in character, and you’re all going to have a grand time playing the detectives to solve the mystery.”

“I’m sure we will, Auntie.”

“Of course,” Ellen said, distracted by their entrance into the grand hall.

The octagonal rotunda extended three stories of sheer visual majesty with curving staircases and intricately carved balustrades. Evidence of the plantation’s new ownership could be seen in woodwork that had been refinished to a gleaming luster and plank flooring so highly polished that light from the cut-crystal chandelier sparkled off it.

“It’s even more beautiful than I remember,” she said, recalling her first visit after Lennon and Josh’s wedding.

Miss Q beamed. “Just wait until you see everything we’ve done with the place.”

“We?”

“Quite a few of us have been involved in pulling together Southern Charm Mysteries.”

“Is Josh here yet?” Lennon asked.

Miss Q nodded. “I’ve installed him in the sky suite. I thought he’d be more comfortable with a floor all to himself, even if you did have to hoof it up three flights.”

“Who am I rooming with, Miss Q?” Ellen asked.

“Your roommate is a surprise, dear, but I will tell you this—you’re staying in the garden suite, the loveliest of all our accommodations. And you won’t have to hike up any stairs because it’s right here on the ground floor. So come along.”

A surprise? The thought of a Miss Q surprise was enough to make the bravest soul quake in her sandals. She exchanged a curious glance with Lennon, but was cut off from further questions when Miss Q motioned them through the hall.

“You’re the last to arrive and everyone is getting into their costumes. We’ll meet for cocktails on the lower gallery at seven, before heading into the parlor for the introduction. Dinner will be served afterward and you’ll have a chance to meet the other guests and begin your investigations. I believe I’ve given you time to unpack, meet your partners and get settled. Oh, and your wardrobes have been filled with the appropriate costumes and everything you’ll need to get into character.”

Without pausing to inhale, Miss Q drew a chain from her bodice and peered down at the gold timepiece attached. “Now I’ve got to run. The cast is assembling in the library so I can make last-minute addresses. Lennon, up to the third floor. Ellen, you head down the west wing.” She pointed to a nearby hallway. “The suites have nameplates so you’ll know which is yours. Ta-ta, dears.”

Lennon rolled her eyes. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

Before Ellen had a chance to reply, Miss Q shooed them off. “Go. I want you to see your suites.” Then, with a swish of her huge plaid skirts, she hurried off in the opposite direction.

Easily locating the garden suite, Ellen knocked tentatively, reluctant to meet whoever was inside. Lennon had explained that this grand opening training session hosted Josh’s company, Eastman Investigations, where two of his investigators were in serious need of teamwork training. Knowing Miss Q, Ellen might very well wind up rooming with a total stranger.

After receiving no response, she tried the handle, and found the room unlocked and her luggage already in the entry.

“Hello, anyone home?”

No answer.

From the doorway, she could see a sitting room with two sets of French doors opening onto a garden. Through the windowpanes, wisteria bloomed, lush against the backdrop of an ivy-covered wall that enclosed the garden to a courtyard.

The sitting room was simply furnished with several antique pieces in a deep gold upholstery, a sofa, a small dining table, a desk and a set of artfully arranged chairs in front of the fireplace. A spacious area that made her feel a little better about sharing her space.

The suite passed muster. Would the surprise roommate? “Hello?”

Still no answer.

Smooth strains of a familiar jazz piece emitted from within the bedroom, and while Ellen silently complimented her new roommate’s musical tastes, she recognized the sound of the shower running in the bathroom. Great. Should she call out to let her roommate know she wasn’t alone? Or close the door?

Ellen hated awkward situations almost as much as she hated surprises. She’d just decided on the closed door, when a pair of Top-Siders beside the bed caught her eye.

Top-Siders?

What woman wore Top-Siders? The thought stopped Ellen cold. The last time she’d accepted Miss Q’s hospitality after Lennon’s wedding, she’d been set up….

Heading into the bedroom, she took in the toiletries on the dresser and the garment bag hanging from the closet door in one glance. She stopped in front of the shoes.

My, what big feet you have, my dear.

Ellen knelt to inspect them, staring at the well-worn shoes as if they might actually launch into dialogue to explain who they belonged to. But in keeping with the theme of solving mysteries, Ellen had already divined two telling clues.

One, that slightly gamey aroma suggested their owner wore them frequently without socks, and two, her new roommate was a man.

Why on earth would Miss Q ensconce her in a one-bed suite with a…

An awful, awful thought struck her when she remembered Mr. Muscle-Butt from the convention. Surely Lennon wouldn’t have colluded with Miss Q when she’d known Ellen wasn’t interested.

I want you to have fun while you’re visiting.

Staring at those shoes, Ellen wished they could talk, because she needed to know if she’d been set up again.

The shower spray shut off, and a quick glance revealed the bathroom door wide open. Whoever was in there—and she desperately hoped it wasn’t who she thought it was—would step out of the shower—naked—and see her.

Ellen had this wild urge to drop the shoes and race out of Félicie Allée, not stopping until she hit the highway. But she just knelt there, shoes in hand, panicked, like a squirrel staring down a two-ton SUV.

The shower door skidded across the track and a hand—definitely male—reached out to grab a towel from a nearby rack.

Then her roommate stepped from the shower.

One gorgeously muscular leg appeared at a time, silky dark hairs shimmering with water, dripping onto the mat. He unwittingly flashed her glimpses of flexing thighs, toned abs and strong biceps as he wrapped the towel around his waist to cover a very nice butt.

He shook his jet-black hair—not waist-length hair that needed more cream rinse than her own, but neatly short hair—sent more droplets flying and turned toward her….

Ellen’s breath and her heartbeat collided.

It wasn’t Mr. Muscle-Butt.

It was him.




3


The Garden Suite

ELLEN HADN’T SEEN HIM in three months, yet her soul drank in the sight of this tall, athletic man as though she’d thirsted for this glimpse. His broad shoulders, the silky hairs nestled in that strong chest, the rippled lines of his stomach.

Though he enjoyed sports—he was an avid ice hockey player—Christopher Sinclair spent an equal amount of time indoors and outdoors. His skin flushed healthily, neither pale nor tanned, a combination that made him look so incredible in a tux that he’d have been an easy contender for Vittorio’s cover model prize.

If she actually believed heroes existed anywhere except in her authors’ stories, Ellen might just be convinced Christopher was one. At least looking at him didn’t break the rules, which was a good thing since his polished good looks and striking coloring—black, black hair and blue, blue eyes—still tied her in knots. His piercing gaze had an amazing ability to sear through her.

His gaze seared through her right now.

She let her eyes flutter closed in self-defense and forced herself to breathe, to stand, to whisper. “Oh, please. Don’t tell me you’re my roommate.”

The very idea was appalling, ludicrous; exactly the type of surprise Miss Q might spring on her. But Lennon?

She couldn’t reason this through, couldn’t get past the fact that he was standing just a few feet away—practically naked—clear across the country from where she’d left him.

What was he doing here?

Someone needed to explain they were over. Finished. She forced herself to face him, found him staring at…her hair.

Suddenly she remembered the feel of his hands skimming along her scalp as clearly as if he’d just touched her. She remembered how he’d threaded his fingers through the long strands when they’d kissed, how he’d fanned it out over the pillows, over their naked skin on the night they’d made love. How he’d suddenly flipped her on top of him when she’d least expected it, cocooning them inside the drape of her hair, shutting out all stimuli, he’d said, to create a place where only the two of them existed.

In a last-ditch attempt to exorcise this man from her system and obey the rules she’d never break again, Ellen had cut her hair, refashioned her appearance as a cathartic exercise to transform herself into a new woman who wasn’t hung up on Christopher Sinclair. It had been working.

Until she stared into those too-blue eyes…

All she could do was stand there, unable to breathe, waiting for him to say something. Anything.

And hoping, damn it. Hoping he liked what he saw.

All she could see was surprise. She knew she should say something, do something to take control of the moment, to stop this horrible vulnerability that was bridging the distance she’d worked so hard to put between this man and her emotions.

This man was against all the rules.

She should send him packing. Couldn’t. And Christopher remained silent, moving toward her. Then he reached out….

Ellen watched as he threaded his fingers into her hair, just like he’d done so long ago, tipped her face toward his.

He took in her hair, his eyes caressing her with a look of such tenderness, as if he’d waited forever to see her.

And just like that, the months melted away, along with any will to resist him.

His mouth came down on hers, hard.

Ellen had the fleeting thought that even he seemed surprised by the intensity between them, the sudden rush of longing that swelled in their first exchange of shared breaths. But that was before his grip tightened. He tilted her head and held her firmly, revealing without words just how much he approved of her hair, how much he approved of her. In the process making a total lie out of her belief that any haircut would exorcise him from her system.

Without asking permission, without so much as a question about whether she wanted his kiss, he flaunted every rule of civilized behavior by plunging his tongue into her mouth as if he had the right to kiss her.

Experience told her she should shove him back. Experience told her that being with him would end in disaster. Experience told her to slap his face.

She kissed him, instead.

Reason scattered. How could she remember the rules when her tension liquefied into a heat that flooded her like a wave, warmed her blood and made her pulse with awareness and awakening.

Ellen recognized this sensation, grew amazed that she’d survived so long without it, that she’d convinced herself this dizzying rush she only knew with Christopher hadn’t been real.

It was all too real.

How could she have forgotten this intensity, the almost violent swell of need that made thinking impossible, that made the careful deliberation she prided herself on diffuse like snowflakes in a blizzard? What was it about this man that dragged her down to an elemental, primitive level, where instincts ruled common sense?

He wasn’t the one. No matter how much she’d wanted him to be. He was a wild guy who meant trouble. No question. And she’d taken the reckless road before. Reckless roads usually led to mistakes that left her feeling as if she’d disappointed everyone again, most of all herself.

But when his hands were on her, Ellen’s entire world pared down to what felt good and what didn’t. Christopher’s hands anchoring her face close, his approval, and the longing he didn’t even try to hide, all felt too good.

She slipped her arms around his waist.

Her actions weren’t a concession. They simply were. A necessity. A fact. The chemistry between them was too potent to ignore. No point in even trying, although Christopher had always found this easier to acknowledge than she had. Perhaps because he’d simply been looking for a woman who challenged him. He hadn’t been looking for the one.

At this moment, Ellen wasn’t, either.

Dragging her fingers along his damp skin, she explored the contours, recalled the sleek strength of trim muscles, the way his waist veed into the broad lines of his back. She remembered this man. The feel of him. The scent of him. The taste of him.

Her tongue sought his and she answered his demand with a demand of her own. Kiss me. Touch me. Want me. Not an admission of how much she’d missed him, not a surrendering to his boldness, but simply a kiss that explored their desire.

His hands trailed from her hair, following the lines of her face, his touch gentle and searching, as though he was refreshing his memory or perhaps proving to himself she was real. She was very real. And she savored the feel of his fingertips against her skin, the hot minty taste of his mouth, her body’s explosive reaction to him, his explosive reaction to her.

Christopher had always reveled in the chemistry between them, had held his hunger up as proof of how great they were together. She’d been the one overwhelmed by her need. Trying not to break the rules and sleep with him before enough time had passed had been a balancing act of anticipation and longing, where she could too easily lose all control in his arms.

She’d been sure this sort of passion meant he was the one.

He wasn’t. But when his hands rounded the curve of her neck, tipped her chin just enough to deepen their kiss, Ellen forgot the past, forgot the rules. She knew only excitement when he crowded her back against the sturdy post of the tester bed, sealed their bodies together. Inch upon inch of hard, damp muscle crushed her, awakening all sorts of hunger.

Her hands raked his shoulders and trailed down his back, recalling the smooth flexing of muscle when he’d thrust on top of her, beneath her, from behind her.

Her sex began to clench with hot little aches.

And when he drove his thigh between hers, hard muscle into yielding skin, Ellen knew, oh, she knew exactly what Christopher wanted. He wasn’t going to stop with a kiss. He wasn’t going to waste their first meeting in so long—not when he was almost naked. Apparently time hadn’t lessened their chemistry.

Lifting her, he anchored her along his hard thigh. Her filmy skirt was only a whisper of protection separating skin from skin, nothing against the need making her sigh against his lips.

He caught the sound with his kiss and she felt his mouth curve upward, tasted his smile. He had the upper hand and he knew it, as he always had. Three months hadn’t changed that.

Sanity cried out, a mental scream reminding her that she’d left this man for a good reason. The right reason. But reason didn’t exist when he touched her. Nor did rules. Apparently time hadn’t changed that, either.

But she wasn’t the only one who lost her mind when they were together. Ellen may have sighed. She may have melted against him. She may have spread her legs to ride his thigh, the pressure kneading just the spot to feed that pleasure inside.

But Christopher’s breaths were as ragged as hers.

His fingers dug deep as they dragged the curve of her shoulders, her silk tank top only inviting him to caress the length of bared arms, to slip below and reacquaint himself with her breasts. He did. A gentle weighing of her fullness that was at once appreciative and reverent.

And so needy. He was as caught up in this moment as she, clearly unable to resist the pull of their bodies or burying a hard-as-steel erection against her stomach.

His hot shaft was an insistent, demanding pressure, greedy for her attention, straining against the flimsy barrier that barely separated them, promised such ecstasy….

A promise Ellen couldn’t ignore. Not when his hands traveled through sheer silk with such skill. Not when her breasts filled with an eager heaviness that made her swell into his palms, made her so sensitive she gasped when he flicked his thumbs across the tips.

Not when she hadn’t had sex in so long, when she’d never had sex like she’d had with him.

But wasn’t she already two steps ahead in the game since she knew he wasn’t the one? Wouldn’t knowing that protect her when she had to leave him all over again?

Damn Miss Q.

Damn her own disobedient body for this desperate ache that wouldn’t consider denial, even though everything about him wrought havoc on her emotions.

And Christopher knew—damn him—pressing his advantage by trailing his mouth along her jaw, down her neck, nibbling, sucking, tasting her skin as though he planned to savor every inch of her at his leisure.

Tingles chased behind his kisses, the steady flicking of his thumbs over her nipples making her tension coil tighter.

He bent low, nipped her shoulder with exactly the right pressure to make her tremble. The sight of his dark head poised over her brought her emotions so close to the surface, made her recall with almost painful clarity how much she’d enjoyed having her world blocked out by the breadth of his wide shoulders, his dark head, his laughing kisses.

Slipping her hands beneath his towel, she dislodged it, and he assisted by shifting his hips to bare himself to her.

Skimming her hands along his skin, Ellen explored, cupping the tight curves of his butt, drawing him closer, his hot erection branding her through the sheer silk of her skirt.

He shivered, a vibration that ran from head to toe, and his teeth flashed white as he nibbled her nipple through her blouse.

She gasped.

He lifted his gaze, those blue eyes meeting hers with his mouth parted over her breast, over the faintest trace of wetness on silk.

All she saw in his darkly handsome face was desire.

Christopher wanted her.

No matter that he’d let her go with only a few token phone calls and no fight. No matter that they’d lived in the same city and he’d never shown up at her office, or her apartment, never suggested a compromise that could satisfy his impulses and her needs. No matter that he hadn’t followed the rules.

Christopher wanted her, and right now she wanted him.

So what if Miss Q had manipulated her—and most likely him—into this situation? They were together, the weekend’s training session provided the perfect cover to protect her from the media’s attention. Here they could play in privacy and safety.

There was a bed. And they weren’t expected in the parlor until seven.

All hurt faded beneath the strength of their attraction. Nothing mattered beyond how explosive they were together. Every inch of her skin tingled, made her want to peel away her clothes and melt against him.

Letting her eyes flutter shut, Ellen pressed a kiss to the top of his silken head.

It was all the permission he needed.

Drawing the hem of her blouse up and over, Christopher peeled away her bra before his arms came around her, pulling her close. She melted into the strong circle of his embrace, breasts crushing his chest, bare skin against bare skin.

Then his mouth found hers again, his kiss urgent, as if he had something to prove. To her. Maybe even to himself.

Driving his fingers into her hair, Christopher cupped her head and braced her entire body upright, his free hand sliding down her hip, dragging her skirt up around her waist.

She’d worn only a thong, the temperature making even the thought of panty hose unbearable. But the sultry bayou heat was nothing compared to the fire raging inside her as Christopher sank his free hand between her thighs. He brushed aside the skimpy panties. His fingertips curled into the folds of her skin, separating, testing, finding her moist, ready for him.

With one bold stroke he slipped a finger inside.

Ellen’s world narrowed to that fiery thrust. Her sex greedily tried to hold him steady, but Christopher controlled the moment, pressed his palm against her core of nerve endings, stroked her tenderly, knowingly, just the right pressure to coax her hips into motion.

Running her hands up his back, Ellen pulled him close and deepened their kiss. She rode his hand, each roll of her hips feeding the friction, coiling her tension tight.

Another finger circled lazily, intimately stoking new sensations to life, feeding her pleasure until she was wild with need, convincing her that Christopher did have something to prove. He would prove he could take her apart at the seams, unglue her until she was a mass of sensation.

Her body played right into his hands.

Ellen exploded, her moan swelling softly between them. He broke their kiss, stared down at her with eyes half hooded by pleasure, as though watching her climax was a wish granted. He held her entire body balanced with only a hand in her hair and another wedged between her thighs as he rode out the echoes of her orgasm with smooth knowing strokes and a big smile.

Only when she’d regained her senses enough to focus again did she follow his gaze to a very unique feature of the room that she hadn’t noticed before.

A mirror. The reflection of Christopher standing dark and tall over her, her body arched erotically against his, her skirt wadded up around her waist to expose her parted thighs. Not one reflection, but many, each a little smaller, receding into infinity. She glanced in the opposite direction to see an identical mirror positioned on the other wall.

Ellen had seen vis-à-vis mirrors before, with Christopher in fact, when they’d toured an art exhibit at a New York museum. The interesting effect of multiple reflections had fascinated her at the time, but couldn’t compare to the sight of their bodies twined together, as exotic as a living sculpture.

The reflection of the two of them together, forever.

Before she had a chance to react, Christopher drew his hand away, hiked one of her legs around his waist. She followed their reflection in the mirror with her gaze, the way his muscles shifted powerfully as he positioned himself.

The breath stalled in her throat as she watched him arch his hips purposefully, felt his erection searing, stretching as he pressed in, his throaty growl colliding with her gasp as their bodies joined.

Their gazes met in the mirror, his reflecting a longing that surprised her and her own heavy with desire, drugged by the feel of him inside her, the power he commanded over her.

Without one word spoken between them, Christopher proved their bodies recognized each other no matter how much time and space Ellen had put between them. His muscles flexed as he pulled back and thrust again, a deep beautiful stroke that dragged his name from her lips.

She had no balance save what he allowed her, with his hand cupping her head and her leg wrapped around him, but she could arch her hips to meet his thrusts. She lent her efforts to the cause, because each of his ragged breaths, every drumbeat of his heart meant she savaged his composure as he savaged hers.

With each driving stroke he lifted her, until her sex clenched in huge drawing pulls. His legs began to tremble and then…she was airborne.

In one powerful motion, he lifted her off the floor. He dragged her other leg around his waist, circled the bed and sank to the mattress on top of her, his erection still fast inside, his tongue never slowing a wild exploration of her mouth.

“Oh, Christopher,” she whispered against his lips as his weight pressed her into the mattress. A sound of longing that acknowledged how his body filled hers in all the right places, how his broad shoulders blocked out her view of the world.

She’d forgotten how agile he was despite his size. All those years playing hockey. Speed and quick reflexes while sporting heavy equipment had developed his natural athleticism, a graceful strength that startled her. She wasn’t particularly tall, but she wasn’t short, either, and something about the way he could physically maneuver her lent an edge of excitement to their lovemaking.

When he smiled, a dashing grin that drove pinpoint dimples into his cheeks, emphasized the smooth definition of his freshly shaven jaw, Ellen could only smile back. Nothing mattered except this man. This moment.

And he knew. That flash in his lightning-blue eyes, that devastating grin proved he enjoyed her wildfire responses, that he’d anticipated her reaction to him completely.

Her first orgasm had only been an appetizer, a prelude to the one building. Three months of deprivation welled up inside her, made each thrust more poignant than the last, made her savor each taste of her mouth on his shoulder, his neck, his jaw, his freshly scrubbed skin, luscious on her tongue.

And when he rolled to his side, propped up on an elbow to stare down at her while he lazily continued to thrust, Ellen knew he liked the power he had over her, enjoyed this opportunity to wield it again.

She’d have to take him down a little, shift the balance back in her favor, but right now, she let him grin, too caught up in the feel of him inside her. There was no escaping the sensual indulgence of his hands on her skin, the strength of that smooth erection stretching, filling, driving deep, blinding her with the strength of her need.

Hiking one muscular thigh over hers, he anchored her hips against him, reared back until he almost completely withdrew. Then he plunged in. A thrust that made her gulp air, made her skin tingle. She’d played into his hands…and she didn’t care. She’d been gifted with another chance to experience this man and the magic they made together, no matter how high the price she’d pay later. And she’d definitely pay.

He wasn’t the one.

But as her muscles gathered and tightened again, her sex throbbing in time with his thrusts, Ellen could only hang on as another orgasm swelled inside. She went over the edge again with a throaty moan.

Christopher smiled, clearly very, very pleased.

Ellen closed her eyes, unable to face him, not with her sex gripping him greedily in the aftermath of orgasm, not with her chest heaving and her breasts quivering and her skin hot and wet from exertion. He still felt magnificently erect inside her, and she wanted him to say something—anything—to give her an anchor to latch on to.

But he didn’t say a word. Maybe he didn’t want to invite reality in on the moment. Or maybe his silence implied that what they shared was beyond description. Ellen didn’t know. She only knew that his touch was oh so tender when he brushed away the damp hairs from her temple.

Damn him, he wasn’t the one. Why wasn’t he the one?

The disappointment that had dogged her for so long reared up inside, and she wrestled it down. Christopher might take apart her senses. He might eradicate her will when his hands were on her, but she wouldn’t let him take apart her emotions. Not after the long months of beating them under control.

She wouldn’t give him that. Not when he was playing her, holding himself back just to watch her go to pieces. And she was annihilated, barely able to lift an eyelid, while he toyed with her nipple and waited for her to catch her breath.

She remembered this feeling from their night together, too, and didn’t have to open her eyes to know he looked all smiley and happy as though everything was just dandy in his world. But she was going to wipe that smug look from his face to prove he wasn’t the only one with power here.

She opened her eyes and one glimpse into his smoldering expression told her he’d been counting on her to do exactly that. And seeing that look, knowing Christopher’s need was as great as her own, was all it took to infuse her with new energy.

In an inspired motion, Ellen disconnected their bodies and shimmied away. Christopher groaned as his erection bobbed wildly, but she bit back her smile, shielded her expression beneath the fall of swingy hair as she rose to her knees and surveyed the tangle of fabric around her waist.

A visit to her dry cleaner would definitely be in order before wearing this skirt again. But she decided making love to Christopher was worth any expense.

The emotional cost would be another matter entirely.

Dragging a pillow beneath his head, Christopher settled back, his body spread out before her, his erection draped across his abdomen, primed and ready. Ellen wondered if a skirt and panties were enough to make a good show, and decided she’d find a way to make a Broadway-worthy performance of nothing but earrings and a wristwatch if it meant earning that hungry look in his eyes.

Tossing her shoulders back, she reached around for the clasp of her skirt and twisted it around. Her back arched, breasts lifted high for his pleasure, and the motion made them sway heavily, eagerly, taut with her arousal and still swollen from his touch.

Working the clasp at her waist, she unfastened the zipper slowly, slowly, letting the fabric fall open to reveal more bare skin as she rocked her hips back and forth to the soothing jazz music. The skirt slid over her hips and fell into a filmy puddle around her knees.

Sinking back to the mattress, she drew the skirt along her calves and past her feet, leaving her clad in only a thong.

It wasn’t much of a prop, but it was all Ellen had to work with and she was determined to make it go a long way. Rolling to her side, she slid off the bed, rose in an easy motion. The sultry air caressed her skin. Her short, full hair swung jauntily around her neck.

Keeping her shoulders arched, she turned just enough to give Christopher a shot of her in profile as she hooked her thumbs into the strings of her panties, began a leisurely swaying of her bottom to drag them down…down. With her own arousal damp between her legs, she moved languorously, her every motion, her every breath designed to hold his attention.

His hungry gaze followed her as she stretched out the moments, savored the feel of his gaze, arousal pumping a flush of heat into her skin, making her sex tingle with the memory of his hard thrusts, inspiring her to new boldness.

And when that little scrap of fabric fell to her feet, Ellen breathed deeply…and bent over to grab it.

Once upon a time, her long hair would have shielded much of her body during a move like this, played a sexy game of peekaboo she thought he would have enjoyed. But now her hair just swung forward onto her cheeks, leaving her exposed to his view—his pleasure, if the breath he sucked in was any indicator.

Grabbing her panties, she slung them off her finger like a slingshot aimed at his head. Quick as ever, he caught them, shooting her a wicked grin as he brought the scrap of lacy white fabric to his chest, pressed it directly over…his heart.

Damn him!

Everything inside her melted like winter’s first snowflakes hitting the pavement. Why did he try to turn a sexy game into something more? He was the one who couldn’t play by the rules, who’d been perfectly content to let her get away. No coming after her. No fighting to keep her.

This was just sex, damn it.

Diving for him, she straddled his hips before the surprise faded from his face. Slipping her fingers around that hot erection, she took aim…and sank down, taking him all the way inside her moist body in a sleek stroke. Gratified by his loud grunt and the way he bucked hard at their joining, she arched her back and rode him.

Of course he wasn’t content to let her control the game. Fastening on to a nipple, he drew her into the rough-velvet recesses of his mouth with a hot pull. She moaned, her whole body shuddering in reply.

This man and the effect he had on her was undeniable and utterly amazing, and she pressed a kiss to the top of his silky dark head, a stupidly tender urge she shouldn’t have given in to.

She couldn’t help herself. Not when his mouth drew on her nipple, first one and then the other, unfurling crazy ribbons of sensation inside. Not when he lifted his hips to meet her strokes, his heat branding her, making her drive down a little harder, a little faster to increase the friction.

And when he drew away from her breasts, leaving her nipples peaked and wet and tingling, he slipped his hands under her bottom, drove his fingers deep with his eagerness to quicken her pace. His thighs began to vibrate. His hips came up off the mattress, and he speared into her with a force that sent pleasure straight to her core.

His ridiculously thick lashes shuttered over those piercing eyes as he sucked in a hard breath and pressed his head back into the pillows. Ellen watched, unable to lift her gaze from the sight of his features sharpening with pleasure, that strong jaw clenching tight, the thick cords in his neck compressing as his body bucked hard.

He reached his own fulfillment with a low growl, and the sight and sound and feel of him coaxed another impossible climax from her, a liberation of senses that should have been depleted but were almost painfully intense.

Then Ellen collapsed on top of him, lay draped across his body, clinging, remembering the feel of his heartbeat throbbing against hers, the way her face fit perfectly into the curve of his neck, the way he smelled of their passion on his damp skin.

Why, oh why, couldn’t he have been the one?

And when he ran his strong hands over her body as if memorizing her, as though he’d been deprived for too long, she acknowledged that he’d broken her heart, that she’d wanted him like she’d never wanted another man in her life.

He wasn’t the one.

When he pressed gentle kisses into her hair, Ellen knew the time had come to make her escape. Before she went to pieces right here. But Christopher wouldn’t let her. He held her close and toyed with her hair, her breasts, her sex.

When she resisted, he moved in for another assault, pinning her on the mattress and raining hot kisses over every inch of her skin, proving that he hadn’t forgotten any of the sensitive spots he’d discovered during months of foreplay.

When she tried to regain her senses, he simply pulled out the big guns. Wedging his shoulders between her thighs, he reacquainted himself with her most intimate places, his mouth and tongue curling into her heat sensuously, decadently, making her cry out with such heady attention.

The light faded beyond the French doors. The music continued to play, a sultry combination of songs that filled the quiet, worked into her subconscious. Christopher’s touch blurred sound and sight and taste and pleasure in a way only he had ever done. He inspired her to unrealized boldness. He devastated her with his tender touches and caring kisses.




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