by Amy Andrews
“No.”
Ivy nodded. It was a good answer. “So…you love me?”
“Yes.”
Her heart flopped in her chest and she steeled herself against its crazy tap dance. “And you decided this when?”
“Today. Outside a patisserie on the way to probably the biggest business meeting of my life. I saw this basket of croissants in the window and I knew, I just knew that I loved you and I had to come and get you.”
“Croissants?”
He nodded. “All I could think about was that day we were at the beach house and you had croissant flakes stuck to your mouth and I wanted to kiss you so damn much.”
Ivy’s pulse leapt at the memory but her well-trained head beat it down. “So you miss kissing me? Having sex with me? What a surprise.”
“No.” He shook his head vehemently and took her hands.
Ivy blinked. He didn’t miss having sex with her?
She missed it so bad she could think of little else these past couple of months—considering it had only been once, that was saying something!
He must have seen her disappointed face because he hastily said, “I mean yes…I do, but this isn’t about sex. I can get sex anywhere, Ivy.”
Ivy glared at him, wrenching her hands back. “I’m sure you can.”
He sighed. “Crap…I suck at this. I haven’t and I don’t want to. I just miss you…”
“Missing isn’t loving, Seth.” God knew she’d learned that. Missing and loving were certainly entwined but still very separate things.
Missing made you sad.
Loving made you crazy.
He nodded. “I’ve had my fair share of women, but I’ve never loved any of them. Trust me, I know the difference.”
Ivy’s insides squeezed tight. He was saying all the right things and from what she already knew about him it seemed to be true. She wanted to throw herself at him. She’d gone from making mental voodoo dolls of him and stabbing pins into his dick to wanting to believe him with every cell of her being.
But she was too much her father’s daughter to just jump in. “You said I was a mistake.”
“No, you weren’t.” He shook his head emphatically, his forehead furrowed in denial, pain stamped in every pore of his face.
“But I was an obligation, right? Because you owed my father. How do I know this isn’t some kind of reverse Stockholm syndrome thing?”
“No. No, Ivy.” He reached for her chin and angled her face to look at him. “Yes, I did owe your father and looking out for you was a favor I gladly did. But falling in love with you?”
His blue eyes meshed with hers and Ivy was lost. She loved him so damn much she could barely breathe.
“I was already halfway gone before we even ended up in that hotel room.”
“You were?”
He stroked her face. “And then that day you cried for me and my childhood. No one’s ever cared about me like that. Not even the people who should have. I just didn’t know it until I’d lost you.”
Ivy’s eyes burned hot from a sudden build-up of tears. She should be giving him a harder time than this. She shouldn’t be so damn easy. She covered his hand with her palm, holding him to her cheek.
“I think I knew the night you saved me from Jamie.” Looking back at it now, it was definitely the moment her infatuation turned to something much more real. “But”—she blushed—“I had a huge crush on you from the second I laid eyes on you.”
He smiled down at her, his thumb brushing her cheek. “You did?”
“Oh God, yes. I could barely keep my eyes off you, didn’t you notice?”
He grinned. “I was trying not to notice you at all. At the same time I was trying to keep an eye on you. It was exhausting. But I was totally, absolutely, completely”—he brought his index finger to her lips and stroked it across them—“obsessed with your mouth from the very beginning.”
Ivy’s heart skipped crazily in her chest as she turned her head to press a kiss to his palm. Seth loved her. Their beginnings had been dubious but maybe something good could come from it?
“Does this mean you’ve forgiven me?” he asked.
Had she? A couple of months ago, maybe not. But now she’d had some space and some yearning time and been able to look at it more objectively, she could see her father’s role in all of it and the part she’d played, too. “I didn’t exactly make it easy for you, trying to entice you out of your honor at every opportunity.”
He laughed. “If you had any idea how badly I wanted to tie you to my bed and have my wicked way with you, you’d have locked yourself in the bathroom and never come out.”
Ivy smiled. “The cops might have had something to say about that.”
How could she not admire Seth for holding out as long as he did, especially knowing that he’d had a thing for her going into the hotel and how persistent she’d been?
She rose up onto her tippy toes, her mouth hovering close to his. “Yes, I forgive you,” she muttered as his lips met hers and the whole world flared to life, the beat of her pulse catching like wildfire in her blood.
He loved her. And she loved him. Yes was the only answer.
Even if the logistics of a relationship sucked.
She pulled back at the thought. “Wait,” she said as he groaned in protest, his lips going to her temple and lighting spot-fires there. “How do we even manage this?” she asked, her head thrumming with a wild sexual pulse.
“I don’t care,” he said, his lips nuzzling her ear. “I just never want to be apart from you ever again.” He pulled away and looked at her. His eyes were blue hot, like the ocean under the midday sun on a clear day. “I can move the whole damn business here if need be.”
But Ivy knew she didn’t want that. She hadn’t liked her internship at the newspaper since starting it a couple of months back and she wanted to start her life anew, away from the things that had kept her anchored for so long.
It was time to stretch her wings and fly.
“I want to live at your house by the sea,” she said, suddenly so sure it was like the ocean was pounding though her veins. “I want to walk around naked in front of those windows all day long and I want to get a job on a local paper and I want to…buy a dog and…learn how to surf.”
She blinked as a list of things she’d never even thought about before stacked up in her brain. She’d been so conditioned into living the life that had been planned out for her she’d never stopped to think about what she really wanted.
The trip had been the beginning.
But she had to credit Seth for the rest. Her life began now and even if Seth said no, she was going to start living her life her way because he’d prodded her to look outside the square.
“If you’ll have me, of course?” she added rather belatedly.
“If I’ll have you naked in my house all day? Hmmm”—his smiling mouth brushed hers oh so lightly—“let me think about that.”
Ivy smiled. “I’ll probably need to get dressed to go to work, but other than that…”
He kissed her full on the mouth and she clung to him like ivy as her whole world tilted.
“I would love you to live with me in my house by the sea,” he muttered against her lips. “Even with your clothes on.”
“That’s very magnanimous of you,” Ivy said, between the soft teasing brush of his lips.
“I’ll have you any which way you like, Ivy Danforth. Whatever makes you happy.”
She smiled. “Even if I ask you to paint my toenails a different color every day?”
He laughed against her mouth and it vibrated to interesting places. “Anything.” And he kissed her deep and hard until Ivy could barely stand upright.
“God,” she moaned, pulling away. “We need to find a bed.”
“Not sure your father will be keen if I ask to borrow one of his. How far is your new place?”
Ivy smiled. “Fifteen minutes.”
“Do you think the Colonel would mind if I whisked you aw
ay now?”
Ivy laughed. “Yes.”
He grinned back. “Good. Let’s go, you can ring him from the car.”
He grabbed her hand and Ivy followed him down the path, out the gate into the rest of her life.
The End
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Acknowledgments
For years now I’ve wanted to write a bodyguard book. It’s one of my favourite tropes—CJ Cregg and Simon anyone??—and I’ve always been going to write one, when the perfect idea came along. I just didn’t realise it was going to take ten years and the Men of the Zodiac series before inspiration finally hit!
This book, though…this book kicked my arse (as we say here in Australia) It was a giant, unwieldy tome by the end of it and kudos to Liz Pelletier for cracking the whip and helping me bring it under control. It is a much better book for her input and I thank her for her insight and editorial instincts which were, as always, spot on. Also for the cover…Liz gives great cover! Thanks as well to Candace Havens whose input helped polish the book until it gleamed.
Thank you to all the people behind the scenes at Entangled who worked on the book at varying stages. Special thanks to Curtis and Anita who are always so prompt and such a pleasure to deal with.
As usual, thanks to my little band of family and friends who are there for me always.
Finally I’d like to thank all romance authors over the years that have ever written a bodyguard story – please keep them coming!
About the Author
Multi-award-winning and USA Today bestselling author Amy Andrews is an Aussie who has written fifty romances, from novellas to category to single-title in both the traditional and digital markets for a variety of publishers. Her first love is steamy contemporary romance that makes her readers tingle, laugh, and sigh. At the age of sixteen, she met a guy she instantly knew she was going to marry, so she just smiles when people tell her insta-love books are unrealistic because she did marry that man and, twenty-odd years later, they’re still living out their happily ever after.
She loves good books, fab food, great wine, and frequent travel—preferably all four together. She lives on acreage on the outskirts of Brisbane with a gorgeous mountain view but secretly wishes it were the hillsides of Tuscany.
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Discover the Men of the Zodiac series…
Impulse Control
Sign: Ares
The Millionaire’s Deception
Sign: Taurus
The Millionaire’s Forever
Sign: Gemini
Ten Days in Tuscany
Sign: Cancer
The Millionaire Daddy Project
Sign: Leo
Revenge Best Served Hot
Sign: Virgo
The Prince’s Runaway Lover
Sign: Libra
Also by Amy Andrews
No More Mr. Nice Guy
Ask Me Nicely
Taming the Tycoon
’Tis the Season to be Kissed
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