by Katee Robert
“He has.”
Oh shit. “Oh. Ah... Okay. Maybe we can pretend it never happened and move on with our lives?” She looked around the hotel room and her gaze settled on the hot mess the mirror reflected at her. Eyes red from crying, hair in a permanent case of bedhead, still wearing the same pajamas she’d changed into when she’d left her training on Friday.
“Is that what you really want?”
She didn’t have an answer to that. Not one that had any kind of solution. Did she want to move on with her life without Cameron? Hell no. But she didn’t see a way forward for them, no matter how hard she’d tried. “I don’t—”
“Honesty, Trish.”
She could do this. She could be honest with him. Trish clutched the phone to her ear. “No, I don’t want to move on with my life.”
“What do you want?”
“I want you.”
He exhaled harshly. “Thank fuck for that.”
A knock sounded at her hotel door. She froze, half-sure that she was imagining things, but it came again almost immediately. “Just, uh, one second.” She climbed off the bed and padded to the door. Maybe it was the maid service? Though it should be too late in the day... Trish opened the door and stared. “Cameron.”
“Hey, Trish.” His voice echoed in her ear where she still held the phone. She gave herself a shake and ended the call. “I don’t... What are you doing here?”
He glanced past her into the hotel room and raised his brows. “Can I come in?”
“Oh. Yeah. Of course.” She skittered back and wrapped her arms around herself. He was here. Why was he here?
He only moved into the room enough to shut the door. “I read your letter.” He pinned her with a look. “What the fuck kind of cowardly shit was that? You wrote me a letter, Trish. A phone call would have been a hell of a lot better, if only because it would have given me a chance to respond.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. Had he come all this way to yell at her about the stupid letter?
“I’m not.” Still, he didn’t approach her. “I found a solution, though your brother thinks I’ve lost my damn mind. I don’t care. I watched you walk out of my life once, and I’ll be damned if I sit back in New York knowing that you love me and I love you. Fuck that. I choose you, Trish.”
What was he saying? Hope fluttered cautious wings in her throat. “A long-distance relationship—”
“I split the company. It’s past time we had a West Coast base of operations, and Aaron is more than capable of handling anything that pops up in New York by himself with his new assistant. We’re going to each build a little at a time and expand Tandem Security accordingly. Right now, I’m working remote until I figure out where we’re landing, but that’s the deal—I land where you land, Trish.” He hesitated, something vulnerable creeping past his customary confidence. “That is, if you still want me to find a solution. If you still want me. I know I was a dick before and—”
“Shut up.” She threw herself into his arms and kissed him with everything she had. By the time she came up for air, she was shaking. “You’re serious. You moved across the country for me.”
“I haven’t actually moved yet. But the plans are in place.” He gave a soft smile. “I wanted to be sure you hadn’t changed your mind before I chased you down and branded myself a stalker.”
She peppered his jaw with kisses. “Of course I didn’t change my mind, you crazy man. How could I? I love you. I love you so much, and I’m sorry I never told you. That stupid letter—”
“I’m framing it.”
“What?”
“The letter.” He lifted her into his arms and started for the bed. It took Cameron all of three steps to reach it in the small hotel room. “I’m keeping it forever. I’m keeping you forever.” He tumbled her back onto the bed and settled beside her. His gaze snagged on the television and he frowned. “Sandra Bullock?”
“The movie makes me think of you. She’s this cranky boss who overworks her hapless assistant and they end up falling in love.” She leaned up and kissed him. “You’re cuter than she is, though.”
“Thanks.” Cameron pushed her curls back from her face. “I’d like to take you to meet my parents next weekend.”
“I’d like that.” She cupped his jaw. “I bet they’ll be happy to know that you’re in the same state as they are.”
“Probably.” He gave her a wicked grin. “But, mark my words, my mom is going to start in on when we’re going to give her grandchildren.”
Trish laughed. She couldn’t help it. She hadn’t dared think there might be a way for her and Cameron to be together, yet here he was, in her bed again and offering her the solution to everything. She snuggled closer to him. “It’ll be at least a few years.”
“No doubt.” He sounded a little choked, as if the thought of kids panicked him, which only made her laugh harder.
She wrapped her leg over his waist and pulled him closer. “But there’s no reason we can’t practice in the meantime. Lots and lots of practice.”
“I love you, woman.”
“Say it again.”
His lips brushed her ear. “I love you,” he whispered. “And I’m never letting you go.”
“Good,” she breathed. “Now take off your clothes.”
* * *
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His Innocent Seduction
by Clare Connelly
PROLOGUE
HE ALWAYS COMES in alone, and more often than not leaves with a different woman. The first few weeks I worked at O’Leary’s bar, a little subterranean speakeasy in Dublin’s finance district, just a stone’s throw from Trinity College, I simply watched him.
I don’t really know why, but I went out of my way not to serve him.
There was something about him that told me to steer clear. That warned me off.
At first I told myself that it was his easy arrogance—I don’t like anyone who has that air of complete self-confidence. I mistrust it.
But as the days trickled into weeks and I became more and more accustomed to it, I’m still keeping my distance.
Then I thought, maybe it’s his appearance? I mean, there’s hot and then there’s walking-on-the-surface-of-the-sun hot. This man is easily over six feet tall, muscled through his shoulders yet slim at his waist, with skin the colour of caramel, eyes that glow like the sky on a bright, starlit night, hair that’s thick and dark, and a square jaw that is always devoid of stubble, as though he insists on controlling every element of his life, even the hair on his face.
He wears suits. Always suits, and expensive ones, I’d guess, if the gleaming gold watch at his wrist and the hand-stitched leather shoes are any indication.
It’s been two months since I started working at O’Leary’s, two months since I first saw him, and in almost three weeks I’ll be leaving Ireland and moving on to the next stop in this ‘experience of a lifetime’ trip of mine. This tribute trip to mum—for mum, who never got a chance to do any of this.
It’s been one month since I first served him a drink.
He ordered a Desert Ray, the most expensive whiskey we have in stock—which is saying something, as this bar is seriously high-end. He ordered it neat, with an iced water back, and he spoke in a thick Irish brogue and looked at me as though we’d met before and were sharing an old secret joke. He looked at me in a way that made my blood heat up and my throat dry out, that made my heart pound so much harder than is wise, and I realised then why I’ve really been avoiding him.
This man is not just the most handsome man I’ve ever seen, he’s also the most sensually distracting human on the face of the planet, and I am definitely no match for him.
I have no skills in that department and even less experience. I’m a twenty-three-year-old virgin and one look from him makes me wonder what it would be like to be kissed by him. Held by him. To have him strip my clothes from my body and...
I can’t think like that while I’m at work.
One month since that first look that spoke of secrets shared and intrigues to enjoy, and I have just about learned to control my outward appearance of temptation, if not the cacophony of my pounding blood. The instincts are there, but not the indications of them.
I have learned that he is a lawyer—and a very good one too. He has his own firm and is renowned across Europe for the cases he wins.
I can see he’s wealthy, in that very rare way. A one percenter. When he pays for his drinks, he slides a crisp note from a folded selection of euros that would easily value in the thousands.
I gather that he is whip-smart, arrogant, and has a dry wit. He knows anyone worth knowing in Ireland. Politicians, celebrities, tycoons. And when he is drinking alone he reads the broadsheets on his tablet, one leg crossed over the other, his pose relaxed, mind absorbing all of the facts contained within the articles.
And I can only imagine that he is an incredibly skilled lover. He simply has to look at a woman to have her stroll to his table and take the seat opposite, to lean forward and smile, laugh at something he’s said, and then stand when he’s ready to leave, curve her body into his side and exit the bar with obvious plans for a night in his bed on her mind...
Yes, he must be quite something in bed, if experience translates to skill, which I suppose it doesn’t necessarily. And yet even just his smile is sensual and I know, in a way that makes no sense at all, that his body would be an absolute gift.
I have learned all these things about him in the last two months, and I still haven’t learned how to handle the growing certainty that I want him.
All of him.
For one night only.
In less than three weeks I’m leaving Ireland. Nothing is going to come between me and this trip—the date of my departure is set in stone. In just under three weeks I’m leaving Dublin, this pub, this man, this opportunity behind. The nights I have left to turn fantasy into reality are dwindling. It’s time to act.
His name, I have learned, is Michael Brophy, and I want him to be my first lover.
Copyright © 2019 by Clare Connelly
ISBN-13: 9781488048685
Make Me Need
Copyright © 2019 by Katee Hird
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