SINFUL LOVE
Book #4 in the Sinful Nights series
by Lauren Blakely
Copyright © 2016 by Lauren Blakely
LaurenBlakely.com
Cover Design by © Sarah Hansen, Okay Creations
Photography: Steffen Lachmann
Ebook Formatting by Jesse Gordon
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. This contemporary romance is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners. This ebook is licensed for your personal use only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with, especially if you enjoy sexy, emotional, romance novels with alpha males. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
COPYRIGHT
ALSO BY LAUREN BLAKELY
ABOUT
DEDICATION
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
CHAPTER FIFTY
EPILOGUE
PREVIEW OF SAPPHIRE AFFAIR
MISTER O SNEAK PEEK PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
CONTACT
ALSO BY LAUREN BLAKELY
The Caught Up in Love Series (Each book in this series follows a different couple so each book can be read separately, or enjoyed as a series since characters crossover)
Caught Up in Her (A short prequel novella to Caught Up in Us)
Caught Up In Us
Pretending He’s Mine
Trophy Husband
Stars in Their Eyes
Standalone Novels
BIG ROCK
Mister O
Well Hung (Fall 2016)
Far Too Tempting
21 Stolen Kisses
Playing With Her Heart (A standalone SEDUCTIVE NIGHTS spin-off novel about Jill and Davis)
The No Regrets Series
The Thrill of It
The Start of Us
Every Second With You
The Seductive Nights Series
First Night (Julia and Clay, prequel novella)
Night After Night (Julia and Clay, book one)
After This Night (Julia and Clay, book two)
One More Night (Julia and Clay, book three)
Nights With Him (A standalone novel about Michelle and Jack)
Forbidden Nights (A standalone novel about Nate and Casey)
The Sinful Nights Series
Sweet Sinful Nights
Sinful Desire
Sinful Longing
Sinful Love
The Fighting Fire Series
Burn For Me (Smith and Jamie)
Melt for Him (Megan and Becker)
Consumed By You (Travis and Cara)
The Sapphire Affair
The Sapphire Heist
A two-book series releasing Summer 2016
ABOUT
Intense. Devoted. Protective.
Michael Sloan is all of the above, with a hard tough edge to boot. He's not the guy he used to be. Years ago, before all the s&%t went down, he was laidback, carefree, and even happy-go-lucky.
Life changed him. Hardened him.
There's one woman though who can break down his walls. Someone who knew him then. Who can reach inside to that heart he protects fiercely...because she's the only one he ever gave it to. When they collide, it's tender and savage, gentle and rough, and makes them both hungry for more of this electric, once-in-a-blue moon kind of sexual chemistry. But it's a battle of wills between Michael and the woman he loves, with words and emotions held close to the vest.
She doesn't believe she can ever move on from her own heartbreak, but when Michael makes her feel for the first time in years, it's both thrilling and scares the hell out of her, setting off all her flight instincts. He's determined not to lose her again, but he'll have to learn to let her in if he ever wants to fully heal from the past...
The problem is, she knows something about the night his family shattered. She has the missing puzzle piece...but neither one of them realizes it.
YET.
DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to the women who helped shape and refine the Sinful Nights series – Jen McCoy, Kim Bias, Lauren McKellar, Crystal Perkins, Trish Mint, and Candy’s amazing editor. And, as always, to my dear friend Cynthia.
CHAPTER ONE
The letter smelled like her. Like rain.
He ran his thumb over the corner of the paper and closed his eyes briefly. Memories rose to the surface, bringing with them feelings of hope and possibility.
Things that were far too risky when it came to her.
Michael shut them down, opened his eyes, and stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows of his penthouse on the Strip, trying to focus on the here and now, not the enticing lure of what if. Tonight the lights of Vegas would blink like a carnival unfolding below him, from the miniature Eiffel Tower, to the pyramid, to the blazing signs adorning the Cosmopolitan. Neon, glitz, and billboards ten stories high whispered of the best nights ever.
But he had to stay fixed on the minute details of the present, not be seduced by the past and how good it was, or of how much he’d longed for a future with her.
He wasn’t having the easiest time of that. From his vantage point, twenty stories above the concrete ribbon that beckoned millions of tourists, he brought the lett
er to his nose for one final inhale.
The scent of falling rain.
Try as he might to fight it, a reel of sensory images rushed back to him from years ago, like the snap, snap, snap of old film. How many times had he kissed Annalise in the rain? Brushed her wild red hair off her cheeks and touched her soft skin? Listened to her laugh?
Countless. Just like the times his mind had lingered on her over the last eighteen years, including that heartbreaking day in Marseilles, which had damn near slaughtered all his hopes in the world.
Carefully, he folded up the letter, slid it back into the tiny envelope postmarked from France, and stuffed it into his wallet next to a crinkled, faded, threadbare note from his father that he’d carried with him always. Her letter had arrived two weeks ago, and he’d read it a thousand times already. He could read it a thousand more, but it wouldn’t change his answer—the same one he’d emailed back to her.
Yes.
It was always yes with her.
Dear Michael,
I hope this note finds you well. I will be in Las Vegas for business in a few weeks. I would love to see you again. Would you like to have a coffee with me? Come to think of it, do you drink coffee now? If memory serves, you were never fond of it. Perhaps a tea, or water, or martinis at midday? Any, all, or some would be lovely.
My information is below so you can respond. I would have emailed, but a letter seemed more fitting. And, truth be told, easier to ignore, should that be your preference.
Though I will be wishing to see your name pop up in my email soon.
xoxo
Annalise
As if he stood a chance of not emailing her. As if there were any universe, parallel, perpendicular, or otherwise, where he wouldn’t take her up on her offer for coffee, tea, liquor, or a few minutes in a café.
Any, all, or some.
He turned away from the midday view of the city he loved and headed to the stereo system above his flat-screen, which piped music through his home. Thank Christ for the soundproof walls—they allowed him to blast his tunes. This Sunday afternoon, following a long, hard run and an even longer workout at the gym, he’d cued up his favorite playlist as he got ready to see her, methodically picking music he’d discovered in the last year, rather than the music he’d shared with her when they were younger.
Not that he didn’t still love his late 90s tunes. He just knew he’d be a goner if he let himself trip that far back in time.
He turned off the fading guitar riff from The Foals, and silence descended on his home.
He grabbed his keys and his phone from the entryway table, locked the door behind him, and headed down the hall, wishing his pulse wasn’t already competing in a race.
The ride down the elevator was both interminable and not long enough. Anticipation curled through him as he left his high-rise building, crossed the big intersection, and headed toward Las Vegas Boulevard. The air had cooled; late October had rolled into his hometown. This brief walk in the crisp air would surely quell the nerves that bounced in his chest.
He didn’t fucking want to feel them. Nor did he want to experience this wild sense of hope rattling in him like a marble sliding down a chute. Dragging a hand through his dark hair, he tried to focus on anything but what might happen when he saw her.
Later this afternoon he had a meeting with a client, then this evening he’d review some new contracts for work. Sometime this week he’d meet with the detective working his father’s case, touching base with him before he left for a trip. He also needed to check in with the private—
His phone bleated from his back pocket, and he grabbed it quickly. His friend Mindy’s name flashed across the screen. “Hey there,” he said, while winding his way through the throngs of visitors on the sidewalk.
“Whatcha wearing?” she singsonged. “Wait. Don’t tell me. You went for your favorite jeans and a lucky T-shirt.”
He laughed. “I assure you I don’t have a lucky T-shirt.”
“Well, you should. I would get on that right away.”
“Duly noted. I’ll order up one lucky T-shirt after this meeting.”
“Meeting. You make it sound so businesslike.”
“How should I make it sound?”
“Like you’ve been counting down the hours for this since you received the letter,” she said, making the note sound ominous. An information Hoover, Mindy had a way of wheedling details out of him, ever since they’d graduated from professional colleagues to good friends over the summer when they’d paired up on a moonlighting project.
“Speaking of counting down the hours, I’ll see you early evening still?” he asked, sidestepping her far too accurate assessment of how he’d measured the time since Annalise’s missive had arrived.
“Yup. I’ll be there at five. I fully expect you to tell me every dirty detail.”
“There won’t be any dirty details.”
She scoffed. “Oh, I bet there will, and I plan on extracting them all.”
“Good-bye, Mindy,” he said.
The thought of seeing Annalise Delacroix had pretty much played on a loop in Michael’s mind since he’d flipped through the mail on his desk two weeks ago, the lavender envelope sliding from the top of the pile into his palm, the past thundering into the present. He had a shoebox full of her letters from years ago. He hadn’t looked at the others in ages. He couldn’t bring himself to chuck them, but he also wasn’t interested in inflicting the kind of self-torture that reading them would bring.
He threaded through the crowds outside the Bellagio as sprays of water from the fountains arced in their daytime ballet, his shoes clicking against the stone pathway that curved around the man-made lake. He stepped into a wedge of the revolving door, which whisked him into the hotel lobby with its polished marble floors, glass sculptures, and grand archways.
As he cut a path toward the casino floor, he tried to pretend he was here at this hotel for business. Meeting a potential client. Seeing an old friend. But the way his heart tried to torpedo out of his skin, he was going to need some much better tricks to fool himself.
When he reached the hostess stand at the upscale Petrossian Bar, he simply resigned himself to the storm brewing inside of him. Besides, how else was he supposed to feel right before he was about to see—as his brother Colin had so aptly called her—his “what if” girl?
“Like this,” he muttered to himself. Like a case of what if bombs had exploded inside his chest.
“May I help you?”
The even-toned, sweet-sounding voice jarred him because it was so normal. How could anyone feel fine this second? He felt the opposite of fine. He felt a mixed-up, jumbled mess of emotions that boiled down to two warring ones—a fervent wish that this meeting would not be a repeat of the airport in Marseilles, and the hope that all his ex-girlfriends were incorrect in their diagnosis of his heart trouble.
He was not hung up on her. No matter what they had said to the contrary.
The hostess in her trim gray suit cocked her head, waiting for him to answer.
“I’m looking for…someone,” Michael said, his voice gravelly, as if words were new to him.
“Would you like to have a look around and see if…” She trailed off, letting him fill in the blank.
“Yeah. I’ll take a look.”
The pianist in the bar tapped out an old Cole Porter song. Michael turned the corner, scanning the lounge-style seating for a tall, willowy woman.
Briefly, he wondered if he’d recognize her. He’d first known her when they were teenagers, then he saw her again at age twenty-four in Marseilles. That was ten years ago, and surely he didn’t look the same. He had crinkles at the corners of his blue eyes, and his hair, inexplicably, had darkened. His sister Shannon joked that it was turning black, like his heart.
He was also sturdier than he had been before. His shoulders were broader, arms more defined. At twenty-four, he’d been in the army, working in intelligence; now, he was a twice-daily fixture at the gym a
nd had the bigger muscles to show for it.
But whether Annalise Delacroix had dyed her hair or shaved it all off, he was pretty confident he’d find her easily without having seen a photo of her recently. He hadn’t stalked her on social media, but he had researched the most important detail before he’d emailed her back.
He’d found the obit.
The one that gave him permission to have a cup of coffee. He shuddered. He still didn’t like coffee. But coffee was the only path to her. Follow the roadmap, turn this corner, and see the first woman he’d ever loved. It had taken him forever to fall out of love with her, but he was there. He was absolutely there.
He hummed to distract himself as his eyes roamed over the crowd at the upscale establishment. He spotted auburn hair swept high in a twist, long elegant fingers, and the cut of her jawline. Her right collarbone was exposed; her black top had sloped down one shoulder, revealing soft flesh.
His heart thundered, and his blood roared.
Trying desperately to tamp down the riot inside of him, he inhaled, exhaled, then walked the final feet to her side. Her back was to him. When he reached her, she turned fully, and her green eyes lit up.
Gorgeous green eyes, like gems.
Carved cheekbones.
Lips, so red and lush.
She held a cup of espresso and had just brought it to her lips.
That lucky fucking mug.
She finished the gulp and laughed lightly. “Some habits never fade.”
Truer words…
CHAPTER TWO
Annalise hadn’t been in Las Vegas since she was a foreign exchange student during her junior year of high school, living with a host family and perfecting her English on American soil.
Odd, in some ways, that her job hadn’t taken her back to this town even once in all the years—but perhaps that wasn’t so strange, considering business was plentiful in Europe. For now, for a few days at least, business was here, and so was the man she’d fallen madly in love with as that teenage foreign exchange student.
He was more handsome than ever.
Imagine that.
The prettiest boy in America was now the hottest man she’d laid eyes on in a long, long time. But lusty admiration wasn’t all she felt as she drank in the sight of Michael Sloan. A myriad of emotions she wasn’t prepared for swam through her, and it was as if she’d become a host for a chemical concoction of regret, loneliness, and wistfulness, topped with excitement.
Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4) Page 1
