by Joanne Rock
“Turned out I also didn’t know he was a newly elected congressman who had ticked off the gossip columnist in question.”
Keith’s jaw flexed. Tightened. She suspected he was beginning to see the potential difficulty she would have establishing a relationship with anyone remotely in the public eye.
“Did that bastard politician ask you to leave your job to help him cover up a scandal?”
“No. He was in the wrong, so I let him fend for himself with the wife and the papers.” She’d hung him out to dry, and she didn’t think adultery went over any better in the Midwest than it did in the Big Apple.
Technically, she hadn’t slept with him, but cheating was cheating, and back-alley kisses with married men never played well in the press.
“So why leave a job you loved?” He frowned. “I can’t picture the fashion world being all that uptight about an occasional scandal.”
“I left my job because I don’t care for scandal, and the design world invites tabloid journalism. The misstep with the congressman wouldn’t have been a big deal for someone else.” Another aspiring designer would have gotten a second chance. “But my parents are always in the papers, and they’ve been in and out of rehab more times than I can count. There was too much material for future scandals, and I didn’t care to remain in a world where I had to constantly look over my shoulder for fear of paparazzi trying to wreck my life.”
11
KEITH SIFTED THROUGH Josie’s revelations on the trip back to Boston, finally seeing the reasons for her reservations about dating someone like him. Back on the Vesta, when she’d told him about her party-girl past, he’d reacted poorly, but had dismissed the issue fairly easily, knowing that image of her didn’t match the woman she was today. But now he could better appreciate the deeper problem.
It didn’t matter that she didn’t fit the mold of a pampered socialite princess with a love of the high life. The media liked that image of her. She was beautiful and bound to inherit a small fortune, even if she never willingly took another cent from her dissolute parents. The Davenport name was well known in New York circles—probably the reason she’d opted to try her design business under a new name in Boston. An attractive heiress with money to burn who had the slightest inclination for scandal was a perfect recipe to sell newspapers and guarantee click-throughs online. The truth of Josie Passano would never compete with the myth of Josie Davenport, fashion diva and home wrecker. The story was just too juicy.
And certain to cause more trouble for her down the road. He knew it, and he suspected she knew it, as well. If anything, a relationship with him—a young entrepreneur on the rise, from a family with some wealth in their own right—would only hasten renewed interest in her. And by extension, him. The timing wasn’t great when he was eager to lock down the partnership with Wholesome Branding.
So how connected did he feel to this woman he’d known—and slept with—for the last two days? Two mind-blowingly incredible days. He didn’t know where they could take things from here, but he wasn’t ready to give her up.
“You can’t run from the past forever,” he observed as he wound through the South End toward the address on Harrison Street that she’d given him.
They passed rows of brownstones and a Venezuelan restaurant where the dinner crowd spilled out the door onto the street as they waited for tables. It was a vibrant neighborhood he hadn’t driven through in a while. Young couples walked their dogs in front of a bakery advertising organic pet treats. The music from a tapas bar drifted on the breeze.
“I didn’t run.” She pointed out her building, a brownstone painted white and sandwiched between a tailor shop and a Chinese restaurant. “I turned away from it and didn’t look back.”
“But you changed your name.” He parked the SUV on the street, wondering if he could find some way around her very public past if he dug deep enough. Searched hard enough.
He needed all the facts.
“The name change was actually long overdue,” she said, hopping out of the vehicle at the same time as he did, not giving him a chance to open her door.
“Will you at least let me take your bag up for you?”
She hesitated, clearly uncertain about his expectations.
“I’ll call for a cab to pick me up. I live by the river in Back Bay, so I’m not too far.” He wanted to put her at ease. No pressure. No obligations. “I won’t stay long if you don’t want me to, but I’m curious to see your studio, since your work is such a part of you.”
Nodding, she seemed to accept that statement at face value. And, of course, it was absolutely true. But if he saw any indication that she’d like him to stay…
Damn, but it had been too many hours since he’d had her in his bed. His hands ached to touch her, to wrap her up and pull her against him. Yeah, and if he continued on that train of thought, they’d never make it inside. Clearing his throat, he steered the conversation back to her run-in with the tabloid media.
“So you would have changed your name even if you hadn’t left New York?”
He pulled her bag out of the hatch, the canvas stretched to the seams because of the sample books she’d packed. The scent of Chinese food from the restaurant next door steamed through the air as the sunset turned the sky purple.
“Yes. I tried using Passano as soon as I turned eighteen, but the design house I worked for preferred to slide in the Davenport name wherever possible. It was a conversation piece for them that the daughter of a well-known New York family worked there,” she muttered darkly, unlocking the door to her building. She motioned him past a wall of mailboxes toward an ancient elevator in the small foyer.
While the building was hardly dilapidated, it was definitely old. Clearly, she hadn’t followed her parents’ lead in raiding the family trust fund to finance her work space. The Davenports owned a property on Central Park West, close to the upscale Manhattan hotel that had been in their family since the turn of the century. That kind of money would have bought Josie the best address in Boston if she’d cared to tap into it, and he couldn’t help but admire her refusal to take the easy path.
“You were a scandal waiting to happen,” he observed, following her into the old-fashioned lift.
“Exactly. I was on a collision course with disaster from the moment I set foot in a field soaked with gossip and fueled by name recognition.” She inserted another key into the elevator control panel to send them up to the loft level, and they began a surprisingly smooth ascent. “I haven’t given it much thought since I moved to Boston and left my fashion aspirations behind, but I’m pitching an interior design television show to a local cable network and I’ve been bracing myself for the issue to resurface.”
She bit her lip as she stared at the needle on the wall pointing out the floors they passed. Coming to a slow stop, the elevator opened directly into the loft space. She flipped a switch before they entered a high-ceilinged artist’s dream studio, illuminating the exposed brick walls and tall windows with night lighting. A low-level blue glow emanated from a handful of pendant lamps suspended over a massive fabric table in the center of a two-person work space. Two desks faced opposite sides, their respective views littered with bulletin boards and easels full of notes and drawings, color photographs and bits of fabric trim pinned at odd angles.
Beyond, Keith could see a client meeting area with love seats, and a wet bar with an espresso machine. And past that, an archway stenciled with a fairy-tale rose arbor seemed to indicate the transition to the loft’s private space, where Josie’s living quarters must be.
“Come on in.” She dropped her purse on a table by the elevator door and left her shoes on a jute mat to one side of the entryway.
Toeing off his loafers, Keith followed her, absorbing her world as he took in the details of the place where she spent so much of her time. As he neared the rose arbor painting, he could see delicate fairies and hideous goblins hiding side by side in the greenery.
“Did you do the artwork?” he asked as sh
e flipped on a light inside the kitchen on the other side of the archway, bringing the layout of the living quarters into focus.
The kitchen backed up to a dining area and living room. He’d guess the bedroom and any other space must be down a short hall around the far end of a bookcase near the television. As much as he hoped to make it to her bedroom tonight, he liked learning more about her, too.
“No. That was my assistant’s birthday gift to me.” Josie pulled glasses out of the cupboard and poured them each a seltzer.
“She must be very talented.”
“You have no idea.” Josie gestured toward the breakfast bar at one end of the small kitchen. Neat white cabinets occupied two walls, streamlined and modern. “I’m so fortunate to have her. She’s been instrumental in helping me come up with a unique pitch for a television design program. We think that kind of exposure will really grow our business.”
“How soon are you marketing the show?” He took the seat she’d pointed out—a bar stool tucked under the butcher-block countertop—determined to find a place for himself in her life.
“As soon as we have some photos from Chase’s boat redesign.” She leaned a hip against the sink and sipped her water. “Next month, I hope.”
“So you’ll need to come up with a plan to handle the inevitable buzz in the tabloids by then, right?” His eyes followed her feminine curves.
But if they could contain the fallout from her past, it would make a future a hell of a lot easier.
“With any luck. I have to admit I feel a lot more confident in my design abilities than my skills with media spin.” She swirled the ice cubes in her glass.
“Would you consider help from the public relations department at Green Principles?” He had invested a significant part of the company budget in the marketing department early in the process of building his business. “I’ve assembled a solid team over the years. They could assist you in managing the release of information and—if necessary—administer damage control.”
He could tell it hadn’t been the right tactic when she met his gaze over the rim of her tumbler. There was a cool stillness in her eyes.
“Absolutely not.” Straightening, she set her glass in the sink. “I’ve built my business from the ground up, with no help from the deep Davenport pockets. It’s a fact I’m proud of, and I don’t intend to give control away to anyone for the sake of making my job easier.”
He put up his hands to halt the outpouring of strong emotion. “Wait. I think what I said must have came out wrong.”
“This is something I feel very strongly about.” She crossed her arms. Immovable.
“I see that. But would you just hear me out?”
He took her silence as a green light.
“You wouldn’t be giving up anything. And it would be a direct benefit to me, since our business identities will be inevitably linked if we continue to see one another.”
“No handouts,” she asserted, shutting him down. “I’ll handle any tabloid interest on my own. It’s one thing to insist on paying for dinners. It’s another altogether to suggest I use your company resources.”
Her clipped words reminded him of how emphatic she’d been about not taking the sailboat voyage with him initially. But he’d talked her around to his way of thinking then, hadn’t he? And she deserved some professional PR advice now even more than she’d needed a vacation from her seven-day workweek. Maybe if he set the argument aside for now, he could revisit it more successfully later.
“I understand.” He carefully didn’t agree or disagree, knowing he might need to call in the help eventually if she got in over her head with the tabloids. “I respect that you’ve built your business on your own.”
Setting his empty glass on the counter, he came around the bar to confront her about where they stood now that their feet were on dry land. It had been too long since he’d touched her. Her eyes widened as he neared. He stopped inches from her, standing toe-to-toe with her on the blue wool throw rug that covered a polished hardwood floor.
“Thank you.” She stared up at him with that steady gaze of hers. She wasn’t an eyelash batter like Brooke. And he appreciated that when Josie played games, she brought him along for the ride. But she seemed serious now.
“So where do we go from here?” he asked, settling his hands on her waist. “I’m not ready for our time together to end.”
She went still and he found himself holding his breath.
“I’m not, either,” she admitted finally, the lapels of her blazer parting as she lifted her hands to rest on his chest. The clean scent of tea rose drifted up from her skin, light and delicate.
Thank You, God. Relief kicked through him with surprising force.
He moved to pull her closer, but she splayed her hands on his chest, not finished with their conversation.
“But maybe we should wait until you firm up your deal with Wholesome Branding and I lock down the television show.”
He ground his teeth together, not liking that answer one bit. Releasing her, he turned away in frustration. His need for her had grown by the hour since they’d met. He hadn’t realized the depth of that hunger until he’d seen her so-called cousin touching her. Residual possessiveness still burned his gut.
“And after those deals are closed, we’ll have others lined up that we won’t want to disrupt. As work-oriented as we both are, there will always be something important happening when it comes to our jobs.”
“So what do you suggest?” She came up behind him, her fingers walking a path up his back.
Heat flared where she touched him and spurred a deeper burn where she didn’t. He turned to face her.
“Maybe we can keep things quiet for a few weeks.” He worked the buttons on the front of her blazer, needing to touch more of her. “Just between us.”
“A secret affair?” She quirked a brow and he heard the teasing note in her voice.
“We can finish the vacation we didn’t get to have on the Vesta. Long nights alone. Late dinners where I cook decadent things and feed you with my fingers.” He reached up to stroke her lower lip. “You don’t have to worry about who picks up the check because you’ll be too busy thinking about me picking you up and carrying you to bed.”
“Sounds tempting.” She leaned closer, nipped his finger. “But I don’t want to be the cause of you losing your deal. I know it could really expand Green Principles into global markets.”
“I’m not going to lose anything.” He’d pursued Wholesome Branding for too long. It was a win-win situation for both parties. “Whereas I’ve got everything in the world to gain.”
He punctuated the statement with a kiss that left them both a little breathless.
“I’m sure they call themselves ‘Wholesome’ for a reason,” she reminded him, her breasts grazing his chest.
“And nothing we do is going to take that away from them.” He’d retreated from dating for too long, denying himself a basic human need.
Besides, Josie wasn’t just a date. She was special. Sexy and smart, confident and ambitious. The total package. And he had no intention of letting her slip away just yet.
Slanting his mouth over hers, he took his powers of persuasion to the next level.
SHE’D NEVER INVITED a man here.
Not once in the two years since she’d bought the place. Her dates had been casual, her romantic life beyond reproach after the colossal mishap that had led to a tabloid frenzy. Now, Keith Murphy was crumbling defenses left and right, striding into her life and her space as if he belonged there. Making her forget all the great reasons she had for keeping guys at arm’s length.
Trouble was, Keith wasn’t just any guy.
And she was falling for him hard. Fast.
His kisses rained down her neck and over the neckline of the camisole she wore beneath her blazer. The jacket slid from her shoulders and off, an early casualty of his bold touch. She knew they were playing with fire to have an affair, even if they kept it out of the public eye.
But Keith wasn’t a married man and she wasn’t cut from the same cloth as her pill-popping, martini-swilling parents. The tabloid media had scared her out of a career once. They wouldn’t do it again, no matter the outcome of her time with Keith.
“Don’t think about anything but this moment,” he whispered in her ear, reading her mind as easily as he’d talked her into this crazy secret romance. He lifted his head from where he was raking the camisole strap down with his teeth. “Okay? Just us. Just this.”
Right. She could do that. She wanted to do that. Keith was too amazing a man for her to approach this with anything less than her undivided attention.
“Got it.” Rising on her toes, she brushed a kiss along his jaw, the scent of his aftershave like an aphrodisiac as it brought back vivid memories of other times they’d twined around one another. “But be forewarned that I plan to scour your ex-girlfriend from your brain tonight.”
Arching her hips to his, Josie cradled his erection there. He throbbed against her, the hard length more than ready for freedom from his khakis.
“I wouldn’t worry about—” He broke off midsentence when she slipped her fingers under the waistband of his pants and worked the fly open. “But if you insist…”
“Don’t worry,” she purred, kissing her way down his chest, his abs, until she knelt before him. “This won’t hurt a bit.”
She couldn’t quite smother a smile when his eyes drifted closed at the brush of her fingertips along his shaft. She could feel the thick vein running the length of him right through his boxers.
Never before had it occurred to her to be so bold. But meeting Keith had unlocked deep, hidden hungers inside her. Now, it felt perfectly right to nuzzle him there with her cheek as she knelt on the woolen rug. To place a kiss on the tip before she slid his cotton boxers down and off.
His body was magnificently made and his sex proved no different. He stood stiff and ready, his skin richly colored there. After skimming the taut shape with her hands, she wrapped her fingers around him and drew him to her lips.
