by Joanne Rock
“You left word with the ranch manager and the front desk, like a good climber should,” he explained, peeling off his gloves and shoving them in the pocket of his jacket.
The weather was still cold, but the climb could warm a body up.
“You went to the lodge?”
He must have gone there long before dawn for him to be here now. She studied him closer in the morning sunlight, noticing the shadowed bristle along his jaw. She wanted to tuck herself into the hard planes of his body and stay there.
“I went looking for you a little after two o’clock once I figured out that I love you.” He clasped her arms in a tender grip, his gaze steady on hers. “I needed you to know that before you left. For whatever it’s worth.”
Her brain turned all of his words after “I love you” to static. She couldn’t hear anything else.
“You love me?” She wanted to tell him so many things. How she was on her way down the mountain to tell him she was wrong. That she wanted another chance.
But her heart beat so loudly it filled her ears and made her legs weak. Tears stung her eyes, but they were the good kind.
“I love you, April,” he repeated slowly, stepping closer to her so he could slide his hand around the back of her neck, stroking her there lightly with his thumb. “I appreciate that you might think it’s too soon to feel that way. But I know it’s true, and I need you to know that you mean everything to me. I realize you will need time. Just please don’t give up on us. Give me the opportunity to show you how good we can be together. Forever.”
“Oh. Weston.” She tipped her head against his, breathing in his presence, his love, his certainty. She envied him his ability to be so at peace with feelings that had terrified her when she’d feared they wouldn’t be returned. “I’m so sorry I didn’t give us a chance last night. I’ve been holding all my own feelings at bay this week, scared they’d level me faster than any avalanche if I acknowledged them. But it was so foolish of me when the feelings were there anyway, silently killing me from the inside out.”
“You’re so much tougher than you know.” He kissed her face, and it was even more beautiful than sunrise on a mountain, the best sort of fresh start that she could imagine.
“I think I got tangled up by needing all the answers before I could allow myself to feel like this was real.” She tucked her head into his chest for a long moment, feeling his heartbeat there, steadying her. Grounding her.
“You deserve to have answers. And I can’t wait to figure them out with you so they all add up.”
She glanced up to find him smiling down at her. Teasing her gently.
“I wasn’t always this way, so afraid,” she whispered against his jaw, kissing him there.
“You’re strong and brave. Just cautious. And that’s okay. I love you just the way you are.” He cupped her chin in one hand, a breeze stirring the snow around them like a snow globe, the sun glittering on the icy bits. “And it just so happens I brought the key to a cabin the ranch owns near Gem Lake.” He produced a key card from his jacket pocket and held it up for her to see. “What do you say we head over there and work on our plans for the next few weeks?”
She was so tempted. More than anything, she wanted to retreat to a cabin on the mountainside with him. Preferably for days. “My mother expects me home tonight. I feel like I should check in.”
“Of course you should,” he agreed, brushing a touch along her cheek and then following it with a kiss. “But I didn’t have the chance to tell you that the ranch has a private airstrip that makes flights really simple. And fast. We can still go to the cabin and spend the day there. After dinner, I’ll make sure you get to Denver for however long you need to be there.”
April’s heart turned over for this man, touched that he accepted how much she still wanted to be there for her mother, to help her on her journey to recover one day. “Thank you for understanding. And yes, I’d love to visit this cabin with you.”
For days, she’d craved his touch and denied herself the pleasure, fearing that she’d fall hopelessly in love with him. Now, she could fall as far, as deeply, as she wanted.
She couldn’t wait.
“You’re going to love the view,” he promised her, tucking her under one arm.
“That’s not all I’m going to love.” Stopping, she arched up on her toes to kiss his lips.
A long, lingering kiss that tasted like forever.
* * *
Will Elena take her revenge on Gage
with a hit piece about Mesa Falls?
Find out in
Heartbreaker,
coming in March 2020!
Dynasties: Mesa Falls
Don’t miss a single installment!
The Rebel
The Rival
Rule Breaker
Heartbreaker
The Rancher
The Heir
by USA TODAY bestselling author
Joanne Rock
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One Little Indiscretion
by Joss Wood
Prologue
1. Mountain Climbing. (Thanks, altitude sickness.)
2. Marriage. (Nope. Once was more than enough.)
3. Riding a mechanical bull, like she had during Spring Break. (Four tequilas and being bucked like a rag doll resulted in the nickname “Pukey” for months.)
4. Oh, and lusting after Carrick Murphy. (That was the biggest no-no of all.)
Sadie Slade added having an emergency tracheotomy to her mental Things-I-Never-Intend-To-Do-Again list and touched the small gauze dressing on her neck. She’d never been more scared in her life.
Back in her apartment after an overnight stay in the hospital, Sadie took a couple of deep breaths—beautiful air!—and took stock. The doctors had assured her that the temporary lack of oxygen when she’d choked at the Murphy cocktail party the evening before hadn’t compromised her mental faculties. But she recited the facts anyway.
She was twenty-nine years old, had a PhD in art history, owned her own business providing art valuation and provenance tracking. Her best friend was an Arabian prince she’d met in college. Another good friend, Beth, was also her virtual assistant and business manager. Sadie was in Boston to track down the provenance of what might be a lost Winslow Homer painting for Murphy International.
And ever since she’d taken the job, she’d been trying to deal with her annoying desire for the sexy CEO of Murphy International, Carrick Murphy—he of the ripped body and gorgeous face but terrible reputation.
Why couldn’t she be attracted to a guy who was both successful and honorable, someone she could respect? For once in her life she wanted to fall in lust with someone who wasn’t a player, cheater or weasel.
Apart from the inconvenience of imagining Murphy naked, she was fine.
Sadie flopped back in her chair and covered her eyes with her forearm. Last night, before the ambulance arrived, she’d kept her gaze firmly focused on Carrick’s face. His eyes were an unusual shade of grape-green, shot with gold and silver and surrounded by a ring of forest green.
Those amazing eyes rested in a face that was deliciously masculine—strong brows and jaw, a once straight nose that had, obviously, at one point been broken and was ever so slightly crooked, a stern but sexy mouth and a body able to make angels weep.
He was tall and ripped. And smart.
&
nbsp; All excellent qualities...
Except for the fact that he was a carbon copy of her ex-husband. Or so she’d been informed by Beth, who was Carrick’s ex-sister-in-law.
Sadie tried to avoid the type, after having separated from and then divorced her own philandering, work-obsessed penis of a partner. So when Murphy International approached her to investigate the authenticity of what could be a lost Winslow Homer painting, she’d seriously considered turning down their request.
Purely because she was violently allergic to rich, entitled, sexy men who believed they could do what they wanted, when they wanted, with no thought to who they hurt.
But emotions didn’t pay the bills, and her business brain insisted that it was an offer she couldn’t turn down. Murphy International was one of the top three auction houses in the world, with mega-rich and established clients. The company commanded power and respect in the art world, and consulting for them would be a solid gold star on her résumé.
So she’d temporarily relocated from Paris to her hometown of Boston and, as she’d expected, going to work at Murphy International, seeing Carrick Murphy every day, was pure torture.
Because, when she was in Carrick’s company she forgot about his past—forgot that he was the type of man she avoided, that he’d been a miserable husband to a woman she called a friend. Instead, she enjoyed his sharp mind, his acerbic wit and his gorgeous looks.
When she was alone, she either fantasized about him being naked or castigated him for being a philandering, made-his-ex-miserable jerk.
Veering from lust to disdain and back again was freakin’ exhausting. But as much as she wished she could blame all her exhaustion on her troublesome attraction to Murphy, it was nearly dying that had pushed this volcanic tide of mixed emotions to the surface.
Gratitude, fear, loneliness, vulnerability...
Sadie slid down farther on her sofa and closed her eyes. One way to avoid facing herself, and those pesky emotions she usually ignored, was to slip into sleep...
* * *
After Carrick had been banging on her door for a couple of minutes—he’d seriously considered applying his size thirteen foot to the lock—Sadie opened the door to her apartment, looking a little dazed and a lot sexy.
She’d been sleeping. There was a crease from a cushion on her cheek and her eyes were foggy. He should feel bad for waking her up, she’d had twenty-four hours from hell, but he was so damn grateful to see her standing, to hear her breathing, to look into her Persian-blue eyes.
Seeing the terror in all that blue the night before had scared the crap out of him.
Carrick stepped back to look at her, his hand gripping the jamb. He had no connection to her except through work, but for the first time in eighteen hours, his heart stopped careening around his chest cavity and settled down.
He didn’t have the slightest clue why she affected him this way, this woman he barely knew. It had to be because she was sort of a Murphy employee and he felt tangentially responsible for her. That was the only reason he could come up with because they didn’t have an emotional connection.
He didn’t do connections, emotional or otherwise.
Not for a long time and not ever again.
“Hi,” Sadie murmured. “Carrick? Um, why are you here?”
“Just checking up on you.” He’d been aiming for casual but missed it by a mile.
“You look...” Carrick stumbled again, searching for the correct word. She was dressed in a red, off-the-shoulder, slouchy sweater over black leggings, and fluffy black socks. Her face was makeup free and her hair was tied up in a messy tail. A tiny dressing covered the cut on her throat.
He’d never seen anyone more beautiful. And, God, alive...
Sadie stepped back to allow him into the apartment. “Sorry, I’m a hot mess. I wasn’t expecting company. Come in.”
Why did women think being a hot mess was a bad thing?
Sadie shut the door behind him and looked down to the huge bouquet of flowers he carried. He wasn’t sure what she liked so he’d told the florist to give her everything. The result was a riot of color and fragrance.
“Are those for me?”
Well, yes. Of course.
Carrick nodded and when he handed it over, Sadie disappeared behind the blooms and the greenery. No, he needed to see her face, to keep looking at her...
Why?
This wasn’t like him and he didn’t understand it. Long and happily divorced, he marched to the beat of his own drum, had no time for complicated emotions and didn’t do clarifications, explanations or elaborations, to himself or to others.
He loved and protected his siblings and was loyal to the few close friends he had...
But Sadie Slade was neither family nor friend. So why was he reacting like this?
Sadie looked at him across the heads of the multicolored blooms. “Are you planning on talking to me?”
Talking was overrated; he could get his point across in other ways. Pulling the expensive bouquet from her arms, he dropped it to the floor. He hesitated for a moment, waiting for her to protest. When none came, he covered her mouth with his, drinking in her heat, her spice...her goddamn alive-ness.
Carrick moved her back so that she rested against the wall and then rested his palm against the cool plaster above her head. He wouldn’t touch her with anything but his mouth. Because if he did, he wouldn’t stop until he had her naked, panting and screaming his name.
Sadie had no problem using her hands, and he felt her tugging his shirt from his pants, and then her hands were on the bare skin above his belt, skimming across his spine. Every muscle in his body contracted and he wondered where all the oxygen in the room had gone.
But it didn’t matter because Sadie was kissing him. And kissing him with a lot of enthusiasm.
Sadie’s tongue pushed into his mouth and she wrapped her arms around his waist, silently telling him that she wanted him—this—as much as he did. Unable to keep his hands to himself, not for one more second, he floated his palm across the bare skin revealed by her oversize sweater and marveled at the softness. Would she be this soft everywhere?
“Touch me, Carrick,” Sadie murmured. Her breathy words, punctuated by kisses, was all the encouragement he needed. He pulled her sweater up so he could access her fragrant skin. No bra, thank God. Dropping his head to kiss her throat, he told her exactly what he wanted to do to, and with, her.
Her excited, low pitched murmurs encouraged him to do all that. And more.
When she pulled his hand up to cover her breast, he groaned at the feel of her taut nipple pushing into his hard palm. Needing to taste her, Carrick pulled her sweater up and over her head, looking down at sheer perfection when she was exposed to his hot gaze.
Firm, high breasts, pretty pink nipples...
“I can’t wait to taste you.” Carrick bent his head and laved her with his tongue before sucking her into his mouth. Perfection. Carrick moved on to her other breast and after paying it the same attention, stood up and tunneled his fingers into her hair. “I want to take you to bed.”
Sadie reached up to hold his wrist with her hand. “I know.”
Carrick bent down to lean his forehead against hers. “That’s not a yes, Sadie.”
Sadie took his hand and led him down the hallway to her bedroom. Inside that china-blue and white space, she pushed her pants down her hips, taking her underwear with them. Stepping out of her socks, she stood before him, naked.
“Make love to me, Carrick. You make me feel so damn...”
Hot? Horny? Turned on?
“Alive,” Sadie whispered. “I so very badly need, right now, to feel alive.”
He could give that to her. And so he did.
Copyright © 2020 by Joss Wood
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To Theo Nestor, whose creativity never stops growing! You’ve inspired me as a mother and a teacher and now as a writer and an artist.
ISBN: 9781488062704
Rule Breaker
Copyright © 2020 by Joanne Rock
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in
any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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