Guarding Temptation
A Dirty British Novella
Talia Hibbert
Read More by Talia Hibbert
Copyright
GUARDING TEMPTATION
Copyright © 2020 Talia Hibbert
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or within the public domain. Any resemblance to actual events or actual persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
No portion of this book may be reprinted, including by any electronic or mechanical means, or in information storage and retrieval systems, without express written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review.
Published by Nixon House.
For everyone who kinda misses the simpler disasters.
Contents
Newsletter
Author’s Note
Content Note
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by Talia Hibbert
Newsletter
Do you love sexy, diverse romance? Join my VIP list to grab a steamy Talia Hibbert novel for free! Just tap the link below, or type it into your browser.
taliahibbert.com/viplist
Love,
Talia x
Author’s Note
Guarding Temptation was previously published as Resisting Desire in the Rogue Nights anthology. Since then, the story has been revised and expanded to twice its previous length. This book takes place in Spring 2019.
Content Note
On the whole, Guarding Temptation is a cozy, forced proximity romance with extra helpings of steam and angst. However, the political backdrop for the story includes potentially triggering content, such as:
Online abuse.
Racism.
Sexism.
Corrupt policing.
All of these things are condemned by the narrative and by the main characters, who win the day and secure their happy ending despite it all. Still, while reading, please take care of yourself.
Prologue
“We shouldn’t have done it.”
Nina wanted to tell herself that she’d misheard. That James Foster, her brother’s best friend and her actual dream guy, hadn’t just said those words thirty seconds after making her come on his sofa. But he was sitting with his elbows resting on his knees, his massive shoulders slumped and his shaven head bowed—which was universal body language for Wow, I have so many regrets right now.
So, she definitely hadn’t misheard. Shit.
Her heart dropped, hit the floor, and cracked right in two. She probably should’ve stayed silent, should’ve maintained some sort of dignity—but Nina Chapman had been born mouthy, and her twenty-three years of life had only exacerbated the issue. So she leapt to her feet and demanded, “Are you serious?”
James’s head snapped up, surprise written all over his handsome face. “You disagree?”
What the fuck was that supposed to mean? Like it should be painfully obvious that she was a bad idea, right after he’d licked her to orgasm? Face burning, Nina snatched her jeans up off the floor—where he’d dropped them. “At least let me get my clothes on before you start complaining.”
“Nina.” Now he had the audacity to look upset, his full mouth pressed into a severe line, deep furrows marking his brow. God, he was irritating. And worse, when he stood, she saw the hard-on tenting his suit trousers.
Only James would be wearing suit trousers and a crisp, blue shirt on a Sunday morning. Only James would get rid of a woman—after doing that filthy thing he’d done with his tongue while wearing said suit trousers!—and seem surprised when she didn’t want to leave. As if he honestly had no idea how attractive he was.
And only James could make her think fond thoughts about him even when she wanted to punch him in the face.
Yes, Nina definitely wanted to punch him in the face. Because not only had he made her come, he’d apparently—physically—enjoyed it. Yet even unfulfilled desire wasn’t enough for him to actually fuck her.
Honestly, it was becoming painfully clear that nothing would be enough to make him fuck her. She’d gone all out with this silly seduction plan, hoping he’d finally see her as Nina instead of the kid she’d been back when they first met. Hoping he’d stop treating her like a little sister or a best friend and start treating her like a grown woman. Well, he’d treated her like a woman alright, and look what it got her: battered pride and pitying looks.
At least, she thought that was pity in his eyes. It was something bleak and awful, anyway.
“I’m sorry Cupcake,” he said, and the childhood nickname just made everything worse.
“Don’t apologise to the woman you just slept with, James. It’s very déclassé.”
He winced. “We didn’t—”
“I recommend you shut the fuck up before I throw you out the window, okay?” It was an empty threat, of course, and not just because she’d never hurt him. Nina wasn’t exactly a lightweight, but he had at least a hundred pounds on her. There was no way on God’s green earth she could ever throw James fucking Foster out of a window. He knew that, and yet he nodded solemnly and kept quiet.
That was the kicker, you see. She didn’t just want to sleep with James. If she did, this rejection wouldn’t have bothered her. There were plenty of guys she could sleep with, plenty of guys she did sleep with. But none of those men were sweet and serious and generous and open and determined and protective and James. None of those men had gone from being her brother’s best friend, just part of the furniture, to someone she might actually—nauseatingly—love.
Maybe this whole thing had been doomed from the start, anyway. Nina knew very little about love, which was why her reaction to it had been a mortifying attempt at seduction rather than, say, a heart-to-heart.
She’d take this romantic failure as a sign, she decided. Clearly, this wasn’t meant to be.
Her expression grim, she shoved on her boots and patted her pockets, making sure her phone and keys were there.
“Don’t go,” James said. As always, his deep voice held a tone of command. Which, as always, made her determined to ignore him. “I need to talk to you, Nina. We—” He broke off, which was odd enough to make her pause. James usually spoke like a statesman. He did not hesitate and he did not stutter. But he recovered quickly, and she was too pissed to wonder about it. “We need to talk,” he finished, kind of redundantly.
“Don’t worry,” she gritted out. “I won’t tell my brother.”
He actually flinched at the last word. Then he shut his eyes and ran a hand over his jaw and sighed, “Ah, shit. Markus.”
Well holy fucksticks in a bleeding blue canoe. He hadn’t even thought about her brother. He hadn’t pulled the brakes because of anything to do with Mark’s protective instincts, or some weird, bro-code, don’t-sleep-with-my-little-sister thing, or because years ago, when Mark joined the Royal Air Force, he’d asked James to “look after” her.
James really just straight-up didn’t want her. At all.
Great.
She strode out of the room.
“Nina!”
“Nina, sweetheart, you’re so fucking wet, let me taste you, I need to taste you…”
She pushed the painfully fresh memory—the lie—away and practically ran t
hrough the flat. He followed her, of course. He’d never let her disappear when she was upset. He was way too fucking nice for that.
God, she hated nice.
She wrenched open James’s front door, then turned to face him. The sight of him was like a slap. Somehow, despite the fact that his actions had made her all cold and hard inside, he didn’t look different at all. He was still gorgeous, with his gentle eyes and strong jaw and full lips—God, those lips—and his soft, bear-like bulk that she wanted to sink into…
But wouldn’t, ever again.
“Nina,” he said, “I’m not explaining this very well. I’m sorry.”
The apology tore through her flesh like a blade. She blinked, her eyes stinging with something hot and prickly that surely couldn’t be tears. Surely. God, she couldn’t let him see that she was on the edge of crying. The only thing more embarrassing than what had just happened? Would be James knowing how deeply it hurt.
He could never, ever know how deeply it hurt.
Her words rapid and desperate, her nails carving into the palms of her hands, she lashed out. “If you really don’t want to upset me, James, then don’t talk to me. Ever. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to hear from you. Unless my brother’s home and we have to play nice, stay the fuck away from me. Please.”
He stared at her with a sort of devastated horror, his umber skin taking on a greyish tinge. He looked so unhappy, she actually had to fight the instinct to comfort him—which was ridiculous. He was a grown man, for one thing, seven years older than she was. And anyway, what the fuck did he have to be upset about?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Message delivered, she stepped out into the hall and slammed the door shut in his face.
Chapter One
Six Weeks Later
“Heads up,” Benny grinned. “Shadow’s here.”
James tensed, staring blankly at the carburettor in front of him. Shadow was his technician’s nickname for Nina. But she hadn’t been James’s shadow for a long while, now.
Actually, it had been just over a month since he’d ruined everything between them. But somehow, it felt like forever.
He bent deeper under the hood of the Morris Miner he was working on and ignored Benny’s bullshit. The guy was notorious for his ‘practical jokes’; no doubt James’s employees wanted to see how pathetically eager he’d become if he thought Nina was around. Well, he wouldn’t give them the satisfaction. It was obvious to anyone who knew him that he was miserable without her. They didn’t need to know any more than that.
“Big man,” Benny called. “You hear me?”
Unfortunately. James gritted his teeth and attacked a rusted-on bolt. The classic car had been… neglected, and now even penetrating oil didn’t seem to be helping. He didn’t mind though. In fact, he’d taken on this job as a favour for his dad’s old mate because the force it required was an excellent distraction. He threw himself into the task, letting physical exertion pull him away from his near-constant thoughts of Nina.
Then an achingly familiar voice hit him, harsh and flat and music to his fucking ears. “You busy or what?”
He straightened up so fast, he smacked his head on the Moggy’s bonnet. “Shit.” Holding a hand to his now-throbbing skull, James emerged from under the hood with a scowl. But the expression melted away when he realised his ears hadn’t deceived him—and neither had Benny. Nina was here. Standing just three feet away, in fact, and glaring at him like he’d eaten her firstborn.
Her hair was shoved on top of her head in a knot, her heavy-lidded eyes were shadowed, and her jaw was tight. Her clothes were oversized, fraying, and entirely black. She looked like heaven. And if things were different—if he weren’t such a thick-headed dick—he could be throwing an arm over her shoulders and taking her to lunch right about now. James wiped his oily hands off on his coveralls and lowered the hood. Calm. He would stay calm. He was always calm.
Only she ever threatened his peace. Only she could ever make him wild.
“I’m never too busy for you,” he said.
She huffed out something too bitter to be a laugh, turned on her heel, and stomped off in the direction of his office.
Things were rarely easy with Nina. But they were always worth it.
“I’m getting death threats,” she said.
James blinked. His mind, usually so smooth and methodical, ground to an abrupt halt. He used the lull in mental activity to stare at her—to devour her, in fact, all the tiny details he’d missed so fucking much. She was bold and beautiful in the grimy little afterthought that was his private office, sitting in her uncomfortable, spindly seat as if it were a throne. Around her, everything was exactly as it should be. His old, wooden desk had a huge, chipped dent in it where he’d once dropped a wrench. The paperwork strewn about was stained with engine oil he hadn’t quite wiped off his palms. The tiny, black-and-white CCTV monitor in the corner was playing crackly footage. There was nothing to suggest that he’d recently fallen into another dimension or that he was currently experiencing a mild stroke.
Which meant that he’d heard her correctly.
“Death threats,” James repeated, his mind lurching back to life.
“Yes,” she said, utterly expressionless. “Death threats. Definition: a typically anonymous threat made by a person or group of people regarding the planned murder of another person or group of people, usually—”
“Nina, stop it.” He ran a rough hand over his jaw, barely feeling the rasp of his own stubble. Barely feeling anything. His pulse raced as the implications sank in. Death threats? Nina? Who the fuck…? But losing his temper wouldn’t help. She hadn’t come to him because she needed a big strong man to punch a hole through the nearest wall; she’d come to him, presumably, for help. So James shoved down the volcanic explosion inside him and tried to stay focused. Detached. Logical. Even though his primary instinct, right now, was to wrap her in his arms and never let go.
That is not an option. Move on.
“Alright,” James said briskly, thinking fast. “I’m assuming this has something to do with the site?”
“Yep.”
Nina was the anonymous founder and editor of Reality Check UK, an independent political news site dedicated to explaining current events, human rights, and British law in a manner that average citizens could understand. Her work… upset certain people. To say the least. Nina was, supposedly, a radical. But most of the things she believed seemed like common sense to James.
“My article about Brexit’s Leave campaign breaking electoral law went viral,” she said. “Millions of hits. The Sun called me a black rights extremist.”
He frowned. “…What does the Leave campaign have to do with—?”
Nina rolled her eyes, waving a hand tipped with chipped, black nails. “Don’t try to make it make sense. It’s The Sun.”
Fair point. James’s temper rose again at the thought of Nina targeted by that rag. She’d had minor issues before, angry commenters and fascist trolls, but this… A thought, a glimmer of memory, struck him, cutting through the anger. “Wait. You published that Leave article, what, a month back?”
For the first time all day, her face betrayed a fragment of emotion, barely enough for most people to decode. But he’d met Nina when she was a permanently disgusted teenager heavy into her Goth phase; she couldn’t hide from him. He understood the slight flicker of her lashes, the way her direct gaze darted away for a moment. She was shocked. Apparently, she hadn’t expected him to keep up with her work while they weren’t speaking.
He had no idea why. They’d gone from texting constantly and talking every day to absolute fucking silence; he’d read more of her website in the past six weeks than he had over the last two years, just because he wanted to feel like he was with her. Which was probably pathetic. But not as pathetic as the fact that he’d been driving by her house every night just to check she was okay.
Her brother had asked James to keep an eye on her, after all. Thou
gh Mark probably wouldn’t approve of just how hard James had been looking, recently.
“I published the piece a while ago,” Nina hedged, which was a non-answer if he’d ever heard one.
He took a deep breath, because he had a feeling he’d need to concentrate on staying calm during this conversation. “And the death threats started when?”
“A few weeks back,” she mumbled.
So much for staying calm. James stood up so fast, his chair hit the floor with a harsh clang. She jumped slightly, but he couldn’t even bring himself to care. He was too busy trying not to breathe fire, the sudden fury in his chest burned so hot and bright. “Weeks, Nina? Are you serious?”
She folded her arms, glaring up at him. “Sit down. You look like a bloody brick wall.”
He ignored her, planting his hands flat on the desk and leaning forwards. “You’ve been getting death threats for weeks, and I’m hearing about this now?”
Her cheeks hollowed, which meant she was biting down on the insides. Hard.
Little hurts. She was always hurting herself. He hated it. But he’d hurt her too, hadn’t he? He’d made a decision he wasn’t ready to deal with, touching her, and when it all got too real and he came to his senses he’d pushed her away.
Funnily enough, women didn’t like to be pushed away during sex. Maybe if he hadn’t been dizzy with forbidden horniness at the time, he would’ve remembered that and been more tactful.
Guarding Temptation: A Dirty British Novella Page 1
