by Joanne Rock
Even before he reached her, she knew she was toast. She’d stood up for herself to Idris Fortier. Held her ground with Delaney the nosy reporter. Danced the best piece of her life.
She didn’t have the reserves for the temptation that Quinn McNeill presented.
He paused a few inches away from her.
“We need to talk.”
Thirteen
Quinn had had his driver circle Lincoln Center for the last hour so he wouldn’t miss Sofia after her audition. Jeff had promised to keep an eye on the exits so Quinn could work, but he couldn’t have concentrated on anything else anyway.
Thoughts of the woman now standing in front of him had consumed him ever since he’d walked out of her apartment the night before. He’d felt that she’d needed him to leave, so he had. And he’d been offended that she’d reduced their relationship to economic differences that didn’t matter. But, apparently, they mattered to her. Today, he realized that if he was serious about her, he needed to take her concerns seriously, too. That meant he was going to do a better job listening and paying attention, not just lining up his questions while already thinking ahead to his next move.
He had a few ideas for how to show her he was committed to her and not some temporary marriage to fulfill the terms of a will. But that’s all they were—vague ideas. And he hated not having a solid game plan to win her back. In a short space of time she had become his most important priority and he was shooting from the hip with her.
She defied business logic.
She was art.
She was magic.
And, by God, he wanted her to be his.
“I was going to take a walk,” she told him, looking so damn beautiful in her dark bomber jacket with a shearling collar pulled up to her heart-shaped face. Her hair looked like it had been in a ballet bun at one point, the ends all wavy and still a little damp. Tall boots covered most of her leggings, so she looked warmer than the last time they’d taken a walk together. Her bright yellow mittens reminded him of the sunny teacups she’d used the night before when she’d made him tea. But she was full of those contrasts—the worldly sophistication next to her more bohemian tendencies made her who she was.
A very special woman able to stand on her own feet.
Or tiptoes.
“I’ll go wherever you like,” he assured her. “But if we walk through the park again, we might have more privacy.”
Also, he hoped traveling that route held happy memories for her, too. He needed every advantage at his disposal to ensure she didn’t turn her back on him forever.
“That’s fine.” She nodded, heading toward Central Park the way they had after the meeting at Joe Coffee the week before.
“How was the audition?” he asked, knowing how much it meant to her. He reached for her bag, but she didn’t give it to him to carry and he didn’t press her.
“I nailed it,” she said flatly, snowflakes swirling around them. “He offered me the role.”
“That’s incredible, Sofia. Congratulations. But I would have thought you’d be more excited.” Maybe she was as tired as him.
Had she spent half the night thinking about the way they’d parted, too? He wished she would have agreed to join him in the Escalade where he could have spent his time watching her expression and gauging what she was feeling instead of looking out for traffic.
“It was clear to me that he expects to have an intimate relationship with his feature lead.” She shoved her yellow-mittened hands into her coat pockets. “I made it clear to him I would be thrilled to work with him if our relationship is strictly professional. But honestly? I didn’t like him, and I’m not sure I’d work with him even under the best of circumstances.”
Anger surged through Quinn and he vowed right then and there he would make that man pay. Somehow. Some way.
But for now, he needed to focus on Sofia.
“Bastard.” He wanted to pound the crap out of the guy. “Who the hell does he think he is?”
“A man who hasn’t heard ‘no’ very often.” She walked fast, giving away how angry the incident had made her. “An entitled, self-centered man who has let his reviews go to his head.”
“I’m so sorry you had to deal with that. For what it’s worth, it sounds like you handled it well.”
“That reporter, Delaney, was lurking behind stage and overheard what happened.” They crossed Central Park West and headed south to find entry onto a walking path. “At least if Fortier tries to discredit me or lie about what happened, I have a witness.”
Hell. That hadn’t even occurred to him. Sofia really could take care of herself and he respected the hell out of her for that.
“Would she tell the truth?” Quinn didn’t know what to expect of the journalist who had seemed happy to sell anyone out for a story.
“To my surprise, I think she would.” Sofia turned into the park ahead of him, still walking fast, as though demons followed close on her heels.
“Sofia.” He took her arm gently, needing to get a better handle on what was happening here. “Please slow down. Should we go back there now and confront him? I’d be glad to—”
“No.” She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, as if she had too much energy and didn’t know where to put it all. “Definitely not. I’ll call the ballet mistress tonight and tell her what happened. But I wasn’t nervous. I was cool and professional. I danced the best I ever have. So, on some level, it was a good day because I drew on new strengths I didn’t know I had.” She stood still again, her wide blue eyes landing on his and seeming to really see him for the first time. “I’m only getting nervous again now because...you’re here. And you said we needed to talk?”
Right. He’d asked for this audience, not realizing she’d just had one of the hardest days of her life. He tried reaching for her bag again.
“Please. Let me carry this for you.”
She bit her full bottom lip for a moment, then passed him the bag. He felt like some medieval knight who’d just gotten his lady’s favor tied to his sword.
They kept walking east, roughly following the same path as last time without ever discussing it.
“First, my IT connection put me in touch with the web site that posted—”
“I saw Olena, the matchmaker my father hired. She is just his old friend, by the way, and not a professional. That’s probably why my father didn’t tell you anything about her when the two of you spoke. I’m sure he didn’t want to throw a friend under the bus. But she was the one who gave Cameron my contact details.” She waved away the incident like it was no longer a concern. “She didn’t understand the kind of site where she posted my photo. She meant well, but she knows I’m taking over my dating life. I will be choosing all future dating prospects.”
The words punched a hole through his chest. He felt the sting of cold winter air right in the center of it as they walked down the slope near Tavern on the Green. This time, there was no talk of beauty surrounding them. No mischievous attempts to taste beauty on her tongue.
“About that.” He willed all his persuasive powers to the fore. “I didn’t sleep last night, thinking about what you said.”
“That makes two of us.” She wrapped her arms around herself.
He hadn’t expected that hint of vulnerability from her after the way she’d ended things the night before.
“Sofia, I didn’t mean to mislead you,” he said, his boots crunching the frozen patches of snow. He’d dressed casually in boots and jeans today, taking the day off from work to focus on her. He’d take all damn month off if he needed to. “I understand how it might seem that way, but everything between us happened so fast. We went from planning how to stop a media storm to figuring out our dating history, and then getting to know each other for real in those phone calls—which I very much enjoyed—to trying to
figure out where the matchmaking leak came from.”
“I was focused on recovering from jet lag and impressing a lecherous ass.” Her voice wound around him with a comfortable intimacy that he wished could last a lifetime.
She was that damn special to him.
“But we never lacked for conversation, did we?” he prodded, trying to justify his actions. “I didn’t mention my grandfather’s will at first because I didn’t plan on following through. I planned to put his feet to the fire about the thing when he got back from China. Make him see reason. Marriage is too important to use as some bargaining chip in a business transaction.”
Sofia glanced at him, giving him an assessing look through her lashes.
“If you really believe that—”
“I swear it. I sat up all night thinking about how I could convince you of it. I woke up my attorney and had her write up contracts to show you where I would renounce all rights to McNeill Resorts so you’d believe me.” He opened his coat to show her a sheaf of crumpled papers. “I signed them, then discarded them an hour later, remembering how dismissive you sounded about using contracts in a personal relationship.”
She nibbled a snowflake off her bottom lip. “Was I?”
“You suggested we should be able to arrange for dates without the help of a legally binding agreement.” He withdrew the crumpled papers and handed them to her. “I’m only showing them to you now to illustrate how hard I tried to figure out how to convince you.”
Heading east onto quieter pathways, they passed a horse-drawn carriage full of tourists snapping photos, but other than that there wasn’t much traffic here.
“Convince me of what, exactly?” Sofia stopped near a field full of halfhearted snowmen, a few of which wore empty coffee cups for hats.
“I hadn’t thought through what it meant to bring up marriage last night since I was wrecked after hearing about Gramps’ condition.” He reached for her free hand, pulling it from her pocket so he could hold it in both of his. “You haven’t known me for long, so you couldn’t know how unusual it is for me to talk without having any kind of agenda. But that is what has been so great about you. I got comfortable thinking we could talk about anything. But I had no business putting you in that kind of position.”
“So you never meant to propose.” She seemed to be tracking the conversation carefully, making him realize she was very much paying attention now.
Because she cared? Because she shared some of his feelings?
Fresh hope filled some of that hole in his chest and he took his time to get the words right for her.
“My brain was telling me to find any way possible to keep a ring on your finger so that that we could keep exploring whatever is happening between us. I sure didn’t want to break off our fake engagement right when I realized I’m falling in love with you.”
* * *
Sofia held a contract in her hand—signed by one of the country’s wealthiest men—that stated in no uncertain terms he would relinquish all rights to his grandfather’s legacy.
For her, he’d done that incredibly foolish thing.
That had floored her on a day when she thought she couldn’t be any more surprised by life.
But then he told her he was falling for her and it was like what her mother had told her about beauty—you didn’t see it. You experienced it all around you. She stood inside one of those beautiful moments right now with a man so important to her she could no longer imagine life without him.
“I know it sounds crazy,” he started.
She tucked the contract into his pocket and squeezed his hands tightly through her beautiful yellow mittens that made her happy.
The mittens that made her think she had inherited some of her mother’s joyous outlook on life.
“It doesn’t sound crazy. I was there, remember?” She echoed his words from the night before when she’d told him the sex was so good the first time she’d thought she dreamed it.
“I remember.” His voice deepened as he stepped closer.
“I was falling in love, too,” she admitted, her voice hoarse in a throat clogged with emotions.
“Was?” He stood toe-to-toe with her now. She had to look up at him.
“Am.” She breathed the word between their lips as they stood together in the snowfall. “I am falling in love with you, Quinn. And I do see you for the man you are.”
He kissed her, answering all her questions and easing all her doubts. Her heart swelled with new joy that crowded out everything else, making her wonder how she could have ever believed there was any other place for her in the world than at his side.
His arms wrapped around her, sheltering her. She breathed him in, his scent and touch already so familiar to her.
“I don’t want to lose you, Sofia,” he said between kisses. “Whatever it takes to convince you, to keep you, I will do it.” He sealed his mouth to hers and only broke the kiss when an older lady rode past them on a bicycle, ringing her bell at them and giving them a thumbs-up.
Sofia laughed, feeling a ghost of her mother’s happy spirit in that sweet, romantic gesture.
“You’re not going to lose me.” Her whole world felt new and full of possibilities, their lives as mingled as their puffy breaths merging in the cold air.
“Then it’s the happiest day of my life so far. How should we celebrate?” he asked, tucking her under his arm to walk past the pond toward East Sixty-First where the Pierre waited.
His home.
“First, we’re going to burn that contract.” She patted the pocket where she’d shoved the papers. “Because I want you to support your grandfather’s business and fulfill his legacy with your brothers.”
“That’s generous of you, but it sounds too tame for a celebration.” Quinn dropped a kiss on top of her hair.
“Then we’re going to make love all day,” she whispered in his ear as they walked.
“I can’t wait for that.” The husky note in his voice assured her how much he meant it.
“Then we’re going to come up with a plan to help me find a way to have a career after dance that doesn’t involve Idris the Idiot.”
“I hope it involves me punching him into next year.” Quinn’s jaw flexed.
“Probably not, but we’ll leave it open for negotiation.” Sofia let him lead her into the beautiful building where he lived, wondering if she’d ever get used to this kind of opulence.
“Can I make a suggestion?” Quinn asked, hitting the button for his private elevator.
“Of course.” She bet he had a hot tub in that extravagant place of his. Her knees, at least, would get used to luxury in a hurry.
“I’d like to replace that monstrosity of a ring from my brother with something that looks more like you.” He must have seen the surprise she felt because he rushed to explain. “Not that it’s a proposal. We can take all the time you want to date. But as long as the world thinks we’re engaged...”
“You weren’t kidding about keeping a ring on my finger, were you?” She stepped into the elevator, grateful when the cabin doors shut behind them, sealing them in privacy.
“We don’t have to comment on it, or issue any statements, or explain anything to anyone. We can just date and be mysterious about our plans.” His blue eyes sparkled with a happiness she hadn’t seen in them before. Also, a hint of sensual wickedness that she had seen before. And thoroughly enjoyed.
She had the feeling it was the same look in her eyes.
“Right. Because what we do is no one else’s business. And we each have a partner we can trust.” She felt dizzy from the rush of the elevator up to his floor. The rush of love for a man who knew her better than any other.
A man who had spent all night thinking about how to show her he loved her.
When the elevator door opened and
let them out into his apartment, Sofia fell into his arms, dragging him toward the first bed she found.
“I’m going to make you happy, Sofia.” He kissed the words into her neck while she walked backward, peeling off her coat.
She smiled against his shoulder as she pushed off his jacket, too.
“You already have.”
* * * * *
If you loved this story, don’t miss the next two installments in THE McNEILL MAGNATES:
THE MAGNATE’S MARRIAGE MERGER
(June 2017)
HIS ACCIDENTAL HEIR
(July 2017)
then pick up these other sexy and emotional reads from Joanne Rock!
HIS SECRETARY’S SURPRISE FIANCÉ
SECRET BABY SCANDAL
Available now from Harlequin Desire!
and
PROMISES UNDER THE PEACH TREE
NIGHTS UNDER THE TENNESSEE STARS
DANCES UNDER THE HARVEST MOON
Available now from Harlequin Superromance!
* * *
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Keep reading for an excerpt from A BEAUTY FOR THE BILLIONAIRE by Elizabeth Bevarly.
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