Sara dropped the mangled napkin and looked at her reflection in the window—dark now, except for the flickering lights of the city beyond—and frowned. Crap, she’d almost adopted a cat last week!
Taking a deep breath, she blew it out slowly and stared at the woman in the glass. If this were a story you were writing, you know what you’d have the heroine do.
She picked up her glass, downing the remainder, and nodded at the face staring back at her then got up and headed for the elevator.
They were right. It was time Sara Gardener stopped living vicariously through her characters. According to her sister, she needed a real life, and she was going to start by taking a run at seducing Ryan Sheridan tomorrow night, damn it.
Chapter Four
The Centennial Ballroom was the biggest in the hotel, and Sara doubted they could squeeze one more person in tonight. And yet, with all these people around, Ryan still stood out from the crowd. At the moment, he was in a lineup for the bar, and Nicki had slipped into his vacant chair. “Looks like the ibuprofen helped.”
Sara tore her gaze away from Ryan’s tall form, where she’d been admiring how well his designer suit showed off his broad shoulders, and leaned in so Nicki would hear her over the noise in the huge space. “Thank heavens, yes. I even felt well enough to have some champagne with dinner.” Sara had woken up that morning with a killer hangover. Still, she’d survived the morning TV show spot, despite having a fuzzy head, and with the help of the extra-strength medication, this afternoon’s photo shoot had gone off without a hitch. Unless you counted her insides melting every time Ryan looked at her.
“Good to hear, then I won’t feel guilty for doing this.” Nicki swatted Sara’s hand.
“Ouch!”
“That’s for not telling me how frigging hot your wolf man is.” She did it again.
Sara swatted her back then pulled her hand out of range. “Nicki! He’s not my anything, and I wish you guys would quit referring to him like that.”
“That one was for not taking me dress shopping with you. And the way your wolf wrangler has been devouring you with his eyes tonight, he will be your something before long. Damn, girl, you are on fire in that number.”
“I’m sorry, but there wasn’t time. We only had an hour before we had to be back here and get ready.”
Had he really been watching her? If yes, she was suddenly glad she’d let her sister bully her into buying the outfit. The front was sleek with a boat cut neckline and the full-length fall of slinky black fabric flowed nicely over her frame. But it was the dress’s thigh-high side slit and open to the waist back, which her sister had insisted was Sara’s style, only hotter, that had her pulling out her credit card. “Hailey informed me it was classy, yet daring enough to push me out of my comfort zone.”
Hailey grinned. “I also said it would make the wolf man drool.”
*****
Zander was an idiot. Ryan was still indecisive after their earlier talk. Talk, ha! More like lecture. His head was already messed up after spending the last couple of days with Sara, and every moment they’d been together, he’d enjoyed her company more. Not only was she beautiful, she was smart as well as funny and had a unique way of looking at the world through her writer’s lens. Hell, she even got his warped sense of humor.
“It’s not like you’re in a real relationship, whelp. Yours is a business arrangement at best, and one you know full well has no out clause on your side.”
The bartender handed him his order, and Ryan dutifully dropped a tip in the man’s jar. “Thank you.” He turned away, his gaze automatically drawn to Sara.
“And, I must say, it’s seems your little author is as tied up in knots as you are.”
Was she?
“Hell, every time you two are near each other, the rest of us could die from pheromone poisoning.”
Zander’s prodding had been plaguing him for hours, and looking at her now, it was all he could to do to not give in. Gods, she looked amazing tonight. That dress hid as much as it hugged and hinted at, and all he could think about was getting her out of it.
You can’t do that.
His wolf snorted in disgust over that idea as Ryan wove his way back toward the source of his dilemma, and Zander’s earlier lecture picked up in his head where it’d left off. “Ryan, don’t be an ass. You know why you wanted to rip out that studio jerk’s throat? You’re a Wulver male in his prime who hasn’t gotten laid since the last blue moon, that’s why. Your wolf is on the scent of something it wants, and it ain’t hard to see it’s not the only one feeling that way.”
Shaking his dubious friend’s assessment from his thoughts, Ryan shifted to his right where it looked like he had a better chance of getting clear of the bar’s congestion. Consequently, he bumped into a tall blond woman wearing something…stiff? “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”
“Are you blind or just stupid?” Her voice was as sharp and pinched as her face. “This dress cost more than you make in a year.” She tilted her platinum bleached head to the side and sneered. “Make that two years.” With a look of disgust, he was sure she gave every offensive thing with the nerve to stick itself to her designer shoe, the ice-queen sailed off.
Damn it. The ice-queen had an evil twin, and he was about to enter an irrevocable mating bond with her. He’d end up impotent with anyone but her, while Niola, after the one coupling needed to fulfill the contract, fully intended to do whatever she pleased, with anyone but him.
Ryan looked at Sara laughing, so full of warmth and life, and the chill receded. Why was he hesitating again? Maybe he shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss the idea of enjoying each other for the time they were here. He cut a path toward her, and with each step, his previous reasoning on the subject fell farther behind and the wolf inside him quit snarling. Besides, if he didn’t try, wouldn’t he end up wondering if something might have happened and regret not giving it a shot?
Maybe Zander wasn’t such an idiot after all.
*****
Sara spotted Ryan parting the crowd with their drinks in his hands and a gleam in his eye.
“Hailey! Stop calling him that. Here he comes.” Sara had to admit her sister had been right about the dress. Ryan’s reaction tonight had given Sara several giddy moments. Ones that were hard to overcome during their part in the promotional portion of the evening. Dinner next to him had been another level of distraction, and she’d discovered she wasn’t all that hungry, at least not for food.
Was she really going to try to seduce him tonight?
“Here we are.” Ryan put the cocktails down then leaned close and spoke in her ear so she’d hear him over the music. “Do you like to dance?”
Rather than yell, she nodded as giddy charged back onto the scene undermining Sara’s tissue-paper confidence. It had been a lot easier deciding to seduce someone with a belly full of liquid courage and twenty-four hours to go before you had to act on it.
“Sara?”
Damn, she was doing it again. Sara tuned back in, willing herself to ignore her cold feet and placed her hand in Ryan’s much larger one as she stood. “Sorry. Yes, I do. Thank you.”
A wide smile split his handsome face, bringing out the laugh lines near his eyes. “Whew, you had me worried for a second. The way you were staring, I thought I had some dessert hanging from my lip.”
Hailey, who was sitting in the chair next to Sara’s snorted. “That’s not what she was picturing hanging off your lip.”
Ryan’s brow wrinkled. “Pardon?”
Sara glided between them and pinched Hailey’s ear as she passed behind her chair. Ignoring her sister’s colorful protest, she smiled up at Ryan. “She said not to worry, there was nothing hanging from your lip.”
His eyes squinted, but thankfully, he dropped it. Hailey, the brat, on the other hand, didn’t and was sticking her tongue out at Sara as they made their way to the dance floor. Ryan’s deep voice rumbled in her ear. “Your sister’s quite the character, isn’t she?”
&nb
sp; Sara shivered at his warm breath caressing her skin, and the touch of his fingers on her exposed back had the nerves beneath it purring like a kitten. Sara lifted her lips closer to his ear, hoping he’d have a similar reaction. “You saw that, did you?”
Ryan spun her into his arms and expertly eased them into the sultry waltz currently playing. “Right now, all I see is you.”
Sara’s breath caught and her heart rate sped up. “Really?”
He pulled her closer with one hand and lifted the other to brush her hair back over her shoulder. “Yes, really.”
Wow, maybe this seducing thing wasn’t going to be as hard as she thought.
His outdoorsy scent wove around her, and she had the sudden urge to press her lips to the beating pulse in his neck. “I hope you like what you see.”
Ryan tilted his head back and gave her a look that could melt butter. “I’d have to be blind and an idiot if I didn’t, and for the record, I’ve been dying to hold you close like this since we met.”
“You have?”
His gaze traveled over her heated face as though committing it to memory, turning Sara’s knees to mush. No one had ever looked at her like that before.
“Absolutely, and there’s something else I’ve been dying to do.”
Sara involuntarily licked her lips, drawing his attention to them like a laser locking on target. “Oh?”
His head slowly dipped, bringing his lips to within a hair’s breadth of hers before pausing, sending her already accelerated pulse into overdrive.
“Oh, a-and what might that be?”
“Kiss you.” He closed the gap more, but again, not all the way. “May I?”
Sara’s brain was beyond coherent speech, so she closed her eyes and bridged the gap herself.
Suddenly getting Ryan back to her room as soon as possible seemed like a brilliant idea.
Chapter Five
Ping. Swish.
“Get a room for crying out loud.”
Ryan’s eyes flew open, and Sara’s shock-filled ones stared back at him. A heartbeat later, she broke their kiss with a squeak and turned her face into his chest. Ryan quickly tucked her under his arm and shimmied sideways to exit the elevator past the rotund woman pushing her way in with a scowl on her face.
“You two should be ashamed of yourselves, carrying on like a pair of horny teenagers. No morals anymore, that’s what’s wrong with—”
Swish. Ping.
Her voice carried even after the elevator took off and Ryan smirked. “Horny teenagers?”
Sara lifted her face off his shirt and sputtered with laughter. “I would’ve thought it was evident we were getting a room.” She hiccupped halfway through another bout of giggles. “I think this might end up in a book somewhere.”
Still chuckling, she pulled at his lapels and started to move backward down the hall. “Come on. We better get out of here before she comes back with the school principal or something.”
Ryan sped up and snugged her back under his arm where he wanted her. “Or worse, she could be out by the pool looking for a willow switch.”
Sara stopped in front of the fourth door down and dug inside her evening bag. “Oh, no, she’s the type who would make you go cut your own, then leave you standing in a room alone, dreading the moment she’d come to use it.”
“No doubt.”
Sara inserted the keycard, activating a blinking green light, and the lock clicked. She glanced up at him through her lashes with a shy smile, stepped inside, and tugged him along behind her. Ryan pushed the door closed with the heel of his boot, and she dropped his hand, moving deeper into the darkened room.
Able to see her clearly thanks to his Wulver genes, Ryan watched her, amazed by how fascinating and beautiful she was to him. If only things could be different.
Ryan clenched his fists. Without physical contact to distract him, the head on his shoulders took back the driver’s seat. Would he be here right now if she knew there was no possible future for them beyond the next few days? Given what he’d gleaned about the kind of person Sara was, he couldn’t be sure. Doubted it in fact.
Damn it, as much as he wanted this, and gods knew he was desperate for her, he needed to be honest with Sara before anything else happened. He owed her that. His wolf’s lip curled, and it mentally shook Ryan by the ruff.
Light flooded the suite’s living area, and Sara flitted to the mini bar. “Would you, um, like something to drink?” She glanced toward the bedroom then back to the fridge with a blush. “Or a snack, maybe.”
Ryan crossed to her and took her hands in his before his attack of conscience died a quick death in the jaws of his libido, but the words stalled somewhere between his brain and mouth.
“Ryan?”
If only they were free to discover if there was something more going on here. Right now, he wanted more than anything to be the one to take that kind of leap with her.
“Is everything okay? You look so serious.” A crease formed on her forehead, and Ryan had to stop himself from smoothing it away. He could never be that man for her, and she needed to know that.
“Sara. Before we…uh.” Ryan’s voice cracked, and her brows reversed direction. “Before anything else happens.” Unable to touch her and still make his mouth work, he released her fingers and raked his own through his hair. “There’s something I should tell you.”
“Ryan.”
His heart screamed, abort! abort! His innate honesty wouldn’t let him. “Please understand, I didn’t intend for us…well, of course I thought about it, hoped for it in fact.”
“Ryan.”
Fool, too late now. His shoulders drooped and he tried again. “I can’t…we can’t have more than—”
“Ryan.” Sara’s grasp was warm and firm on his cheeks and a whisper of her breath graced his face. “Shut up.”
Huh?
She traced her thumb over his lower lip. “There are only two things I need to know, and even though the time we’ve spent together has been short, I’m certain I already know the answers.” She brushed his hair back without breaking their gaze. “First, are you married?”
He frowned. “What?”
“I said…are you married?”
It was his turn to frown. “No—”
She pressed her finger to his lips. “Good, me neither. Second, are you in love with someone?” She lifted her finger a fraction.
Ryan shook his head and attempted to pull his face away from her grasp. “No—”
She pressed down again, but it was the banked passion in her eyes that stilled him. “Me neither, so as far as I’m concerned, nothing else matters.” She shifted closer. “Let’s not complicate things. Can’t we just enjoy the time we have?” She brushed her lips over his.
Ryan’s heart rate shot up, and he was sorely tempted to let the topic drop, but had to try once more or end up hating himself later. “Sara, I don’t want—”
She kissed the corner of his mouth and brought her lush body up against his, and he groaned out loud. “Don’t want what, Ryan?” She kissed the other side. “Me?”
Ryan’s head snapped back and he glared at her. “Are you kidding? Of course, I want you.”
Sara gaped at him. Damn, he hadn’t intended to bark at her. Shoving his own conflicting feelings aside, he leaned his forehead into hers and spoke softly.
“Gods, Sara, I’ve wanted you from the second I saw you, and the more time we spend together, the stronger it gets.”
Her response was husky with desire. “Then prove it.”
His libido cheered and bit off any further argument. Ryan hauled Sara tight against him and took possession of her sweet mouth with no more doubts to hinder him.
*****
Sara wanted Ryan any way she could get him—even if it would only be this once.
It won’t be enough.
Stifle it. You can deal with that later.
Ryan’s mouth came down on hers again, and Sara shoved at the lapels of his jacket, needing it out
of her way. “Off.”
He dropped his arms, and she helped him out of it, then she went after his shirt. “More.” He broke their kiss long enough to yank it over his head without bothering to undo the buttons, then was back to kissing her senseless.
The hard muscles under Ryan’s supple skin rippled under her fingertips as Sara explored the broad expanse of his back. Ryan made progress baring her skin as well, running his hands along the sides of her neck and down over her collarbones, sliding her dress off her shoulders in the process.
Sara gasped as his lips followed the reverse path to end with a tiny nip of his teeth and the soothing swipe of his tongue. Her head fell back, giving him more room, and she savored the growing tension between her legs.
“You’re so soft and sweet. I want to touch and taste you everywhere. Would you like that?”
His voice, like warm caramel over smooth chocolate conjured erotic scenes in Sara’s mind and had her breasts begging to be first in line to grant his wish. “Yes.” She grabbed his shoulders and arched her back to convey their message.
Ryan’s nostrils flared, and he licked his lips as though he could taste them already. “We need a wall.”
What? Before she could decide if she’d heard him right, Ryan swung Sara up off her feet and headed for the bedroom. He glanced sideways at her through his ridiculously long lashes with a wicked grin. “There’s something else I’ve been fantasizing about, that involves a span of open wall.”
Her insides fluttered with a trill of excitement. “Um…okay?”
He carried her around the corner and turned her away from the one he picked and slowly let her body slide down his until her feet touched the floor. Lust and mischief danced in his eyes and his expression was…hopeful?
“Trust me?”
Did she know him well enough to? Her gut said yes and told her common sense to get lost. Besides, how could she not when he looked like a little boy itching to tell a big secret? Who would’ve guessed a man like Ryan would be inclined to, well, play? Sara squinted at him and resisted the urge to giggle. “It’s nothing kinky, is it?”
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