Tamed by the Outlaw

by Michelle Sharp

  Well…other than letting Jessie walk out of his life for a second time. “What’s the dumbest thing you ever did while running R and R?”

  “Besides putting my grandson in charge?” Gramps teased. “Relax I’m just joking, boy.” Gramps thought on it for a moment. “My biggest mistakes were probably with your grandmother. I paid plenty of attention to the business. I suspect I should have paid more attention to her. Luckily, a good woman who loves you will forgive your mistakes.”

  “That’s good,” Grayson said. “Because I think I’ve made some epic ones.”

  …

  Jessie waited for Lila in front of her Chicago condo.

  Lila pulled up in her little compact rental car and Jessie folded herself into it.

  “You didn’t have to rent a car, you know. We have these great new inventions in Chicago. They’re called taxis.”

  “King of Hearts has an office in a building outside of the city. It’s an hour or so away. That’s where we’re headed.”

  “I thought their corporate offices were in New York, about five minutes from R and R. This whole thing seems weird, don’t you think? Why wouldn’t we have just done this in New York?”

  Lila shrugged. “Publishers have offices all over the world. Plus, I might have mentioned your reluctance ever step foot in the R and R building again. Who knows, maybe King of Hearts just wants to cater to their favorite new author.”

  “Mmm,” was the only response Jessie could muster.

  “Could you at least try not to look like you’re going to a funeral? You need to make peace with the fact you write for King of Hearts now. They aren’t the enemy.”

  “No. They’re not. Trust me, I know all too well who the enemy is.”

  “Do you? R and R didn’t exactly throw you under a bus. You’ve gotten a hell of a contract offer out of this.”

  Jessie nodded. It wasn’t R&R, or King of Hearts, or the contract, or the money. It was the fact that Grayson had taken a belief she’d held onto since her parents had died and shattered it all to hell. He was right. Her love-will-conquer-all bullshit was exactly that.

  She thought she’d know when sex turned into making love. And when making love turned into something that was about emotion and connection. Turned out it was a little hard to connect with a corporate jack-hole who freely admits to caring more for money and business than people.

  And really, as badly as she hated to admit it, Grayson had a point. How many people did she know living the happily ever after? More people probably believed in aliens than love. “After I fulfill this contract, I think I’ll try my hand at an alien/horror type of book. What do you think?”

  Lila sighed. “I think if I’m lucky, I’ll be dead by then. You ever heard of sticking with what you know? No one wants to read about green creatures with antennae bumping uglies. It’s wrong. You write sex and love and you’re good at it. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel because Grayson yanked your chain.”

  Jessie shook her head, but couldn’t help smiling. Most people thought Lila had a cock-eyed and negative view of the world. It was a bit disturbing how closely Jessie related with her.

  “I guess you’re right. A new company and a new contract will be good. Let’s just sign on the dotted line and get this day over with.”

  But Jessie’s suspicions began to run wild the further they got from the city. “You’re not heading into corporate suburbia. I’m not stupid, Lila. What’s going on?”

  Lila turned onto a road that led to the airstrip where Jessie’s skydiving accident had happened.

  “Great.” Jessie folded her arms, enraged that this had been in the works and no one had told her. “Is this King of Hearts idea? To hold a press conference where I almost killed myself. Wow, they’re not going to miss any opportunity to sell a book are they?”

  Lila pulled to a stop in front of the skydiving school. Jessie got out and slammed the door. She stalked around to Lila’s side of the car. “I know your job is to make us both money. But this is low. You should have told me this is where they wanted to have a press conference. Do you know how hard it was to put this behind me? Reporters are still accusing me of—”

  “There’s no press conference. Can you just—” Lila made the motion of buttoning her lip. “Be quiet. For a minute or two. Come on.”

  Jessie firmly held her ground as Lila began to walk. “If you think I won’t march straight back to that highway and hitchhike back to the city, you don’t know me nearly as well as you think you do. You better spill it—”

  “For fuck’s sake.” Lila whipped around on her. “It’s Grayson. He wanted you here. He planned this. King of Hearts is not coming because Grayson is not selling to them. He decided to keep the romance line and you.” Lila threw her hands up in frustration. “Although at this point I’m questioning the logic.”

  Jessie felt a wild rush of emotion. Her legs began to shake and her eyes burned. A lump swelled in her throat, too large to talk around.

  “Jessie, Lila. You’re right on time.” Grayson Reynolds, Senior, approached them.

  Lila held out her hand. “Mr. Reynolds, always good to see you. How are you?”

  “Couldn’t be better,” he said. “With the exception that my grandson is getting ready to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.”

  Jessie’s heart raced. What on earth? Why would he do that? Grayson had scolded her, told her that jumping from an airplane had been a dumb risk. Considering how many months of therapy she’d endured to walk correctly again, she tended to agree.

  “Why is he doing this?” Jessie asked.

  Grayson’s grandpa shrugged. “I’m not sure. He mumbled something about taking a risk. Learning to live a little.”

  “This is completely ridiculous. Where is he?” Jessie stomped toward the building where the classes took place. “Wait until I get my hands on that ass, I’m going to…” She stopped, drew in a breath, and glanced at Lila. She’d just called the grandson of one of the most respected names in publishing an ass. “Sorry.”

  “Hey.” Grayson’s granddad put his hands up in defense. “I’ve been married for forty-five years. I know that look. I’m not about to get in your way of you going after the ass. But his plane took off a few minutes ago so you’re going to have to wait until he parachutes down.”

  Jessie rounded the building and hanger. She looked up and saw Grayson’s plane. Logically, she knew that skydiving accidents were rare. You’re more likely to be killed by a bee sting than skydiving. She remembered that comment from her own instructor.

  But she also remembered the violent jerk and loud pop as her parachute had attempted to deploy. Then spinning, round and round, over and over, and knowing that the all the blood rushing to her feet was not how it was supposed to go.

  “Grayson’s jumping,” his grandfather said. “Will you look at that?”

  She did look, barely, mostly unable to breathe through the first few seconds of Grayson’s free fall. Then his parachute opened in a perfect canopy and he floated easily to the ground.

  By the time she barreled toward him, he had unhooked his shoot and was smiling like a kid who’d had his first successful ride without training wheels—until she plowed her hands into his chest and knocked him on his ass.

  “Did you see that?” he asked from the ground, with a big, goofy grin. “It was so amazing. I could see for miles and miles. It was like flying, only more exhilarating.”

  “What on earth are you trying to prove? You know what? Never mind. I don’t care.”

  Grayson shot to his feet and caught her around the waist. “Jessie wait. Don’t you get it? I’m taking a chance I wouldn’t normally take. I’m trying to live. Not like I normally do, but like you do.”

  He turned her around. “I don’t know what you did to me in that room in Vegas, but I can’t stop thinking about it. I can’t stop thinking about you. I’m not selling the romance line. You were right—part of it was for spite. The rest of the decision was ignorance.”

  Sh
e felt her chin tremble. “And you thought jumping out of an airplane would accomplish what?”

  He was quiet for a long moment. “I wanted to be more than I normally am. I wanted to feel alive, like you make me feel.” He shrugged, looked up at the plane still circling in the air and then back at her. “I came home from that conference after spending a couple of days with you and realized that I work, but I don’t do much living.”

  He tugged on her hips and pulled her close.

  She put her hands on his chest to push him back, but didn’t quite manage it when he tightened his grip.

  “The thought of living my whole life and never again feeling what I felt while making love to you scares the shit out of me.” He whispered the words against her ear. “I tried like hell to move on, you know? I buried myself in work, tried to break the Guinness Book of World Records for beer drinking. Nothing helped.”

  She swiped at the tears rolling down her cheeks. “And when the newness wears off, and you get bored with me?”

  “You’re the one who told me there are no guarantees, but I think I could search the whole world over and never find anyone less boring than you.”

  She smiled. “That’s probably true.”

  He brushed his lips over hers. “I’m keeping the romance division. And I’d really like to keep you, for as long as you’ll have me.”

  Losing herself in Grayson felt like the most natural thing in the world, but he’d been honest in Vegas. Quite simply, he was a workaholic. How much could someone really change in a week? “Are you sure you have time for a girlfriend? Especially one who lives in a different state?”

  “Well, here’s the thing about that. My place is pretty big. I was thinking about getting a roommate. I hear authors make good roommates. You don’t happen to know any writers who’d be willing to relocate to New York and shack up with me, do you? I might have a spare bedroom they could use. As an office, not a bedroom.”

  “You’re not serious?”

  “I couldn’t be more serious. And, those personal assistants you were talking about? Turns out they really do exist. I’m interviewing people for that position next week.”

  Stunned, she backed up and looked at him. “Who are you, and what have you done with Grayson?”

  He took her hands. “I’m falling in love with you, Jess. I think you were right. When you find that one person you care enough about, you make the changes you need to make. I can’t promise you that I know exactly how to do this. But I can promise when I screw up, I’ll try to make it up to you.”

  She put her arms around his neck and thoroughly kissed him. He was trying—really trying—to take a chance. “I love you too, Grayson.”

  “So you’ll try it? Moving to New York and staying with me?”

  “You know the outlaw. I never walk away from a good challenge.”

  He put his arms around her and squeezed tight enough that her feet left the ground. “Come on. Let’s get you back home and pack up some stuff. He took her hand and started walking back to the hanger. “By the way. I read your books.”

  She stopped in her tracks. It was hard to tell how a guy would feel about having his sex life exposed in a novel. “Are you mad?”

  His brows drew together. “You mean because you wrote down, verbatim, the sexiest night of my life and put it in a novel that a million people have read—including my grandma and grandpa?”

  She winced and waited for him to let her have it. Instead he said, “Not mad so much as curious. If I inspired that Ian sex scene, who inspired the sex scene with the swing and the whip in the other book?”

  She smiled and winked. “An outlaw never tells.”

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  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to my little “Cosmos with a Twist” family. Tammy Day, Claudia Shelton, and Linda Gilman, you are wonderful critique partners and even better friends. Thank you Dana Waganer for dropping everything and doing a read through with no notice. You rock. And a big thanks to my editor, Lisa Bone, and the whole Entangled team.

  Most of all—to my wonderful husband, kids, and mother. Thank you for all you do and being patient while I lock myself away to write. You are the best, and I love you more than words can say.

  Michelle

  About the Author

  Michelle Sharp is a romance author from the Midwest. Although she has a degree in journalism from Southern Illinois University, she finds weaving tales of danger, deception, and love much preferable to reporting the cold, hard facts. Her goal in life? To team resilient, kick-ass heroines with the sexy alpha’s who love them. As most writers probably are, she is an avid reader. Her first choice is usually a story with a thrilling combination of danger and love, but any book with a great voice and intriguing story will keep her turning pages well past any reasonable bed-time.

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