How To Succeed At Love. Susan Connell

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СКАЧАТЬ This sleigh bed’s an antique. Did you hear me?”

      When she grabbed his knees to steady him, their noses brushed. Startled by the playful yet intimate contact with him, she stopped moving.

      He smiled. “This was your bed when you were little, right?”

      Letting go of his knees, she pulled back. “How do you know that?”

      “Easy. Quality piece,” he said, running his hand along an inviting turn of wood. “Nice, solid curves.” Dropping back on the white-on-white, pin-striped comforter, he opened his arms and wriggled his hips. “Makes a little noise when it’s shaken...kinda reminds me of you.”

      She brought her fists straight down to her sides. “I am not laughing.”

      He kicked off his shoes, swung his legs onto the bed and folded his arms behind his head. “I know, but I am a patient man,” he said, easing back onto the bank of ruffly, white eyelet pillow shams.

      Avoiding his out-there-and-in-your-face expression, Jade dropped her frosty gaze over all six feet plus of him. Stretching, sprawling...standing, breathing; it didn’t matter. She’d never met anyone more comfortable with his own body. From the short time she’d known him, she was certain that Spencer Madison would be just as comfortable stretched out on that bed in his birthday suit.

      The breath-stealing image appeared out of nowhere, bolting her to the floor. All those strong lines and angles of inviting masculinity contrasting with the soft, white comforter...her soft, white comforter. A wave of body heat swept through her, singeing her flesh. If her face was half as red as the rest of her body felt, he was going to know in an instant what she was thinking. She willed her eyes to look away, but when that didn’t happen she rubbed at her forehead.

      “Headache?”

      She slowly lowered her hands. Something ached, but it wasn’t her head.

      “What’s wrong?” he asked, curling his torso up and toward her. Leaning on his elbow, he patted the mattress. “Did you want to sleep here tonight?”

      There? She swallowed. Right there in that warm spot? Where you rested your head on the pillow? Where you opened your arms and wriggled your hips? Where I pictured your naked body? “Not anymore,” she said, as she headed for the connecting door to the next room.

      “Jade. Hold on a minute.”

      From the corner of her eye, she could see him swinging his legs off the bed and planting his feet on the pale pink rug.

      “Why are you doing this? What are you up to?”

      “I’m making it clear to you that you’re leaving here as soon as I can manage it, and with as little fanfare as possible.”

      “That’s not what I meant,” he said, angling his head in gentle reprimand.

      She gave a huffy, impatient sigh. “Don’t you have plans to be with your family for the holidays?”

      “Not this year. They’re on a cruise somewhere in the Caribbean.” He pushed up onto his feet. “What are you trying to hide, Jade?”

      She slowed her steps as a tiny alarm bell jangled in her head. Was that genuine concern she heard? Or was he setting her up again to play another exasperating game of cat and mouse? Either way, it didn’t matter. She’d been through enough humiliation in the last few days to last a lifetime. And until she received that promised letter of recommendation from Sylvia Bloomfield so that she could move on finding another job, she didn’t need Spencer Madison around distracting her. On any level. “It’s none of your—”

      “It is now.”

      She could tell by the way he cut her off that Spencer Madison wasn’t about to back down. He had time on his side, too; he wasn’t going anywhere until breakfast. Sighing, she ran her tongue back and forth over the edges of her teeth. What had she expected? She knew he would ask this question sooner or later. She also knew she owed him some sort of an explanation, too. But that didn’t make it any easier to come up with an answer.

      “Well?” He raised a brow.

      Reaching to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear, she studied him carefully. He’d been sending her mixed signals since the first time he’d brushed against her. What he meant, what he wanted and who he was were as unknown to her as her own future. No way was she going to tell him that she’d just been fired when she couldn’t bring herself to admit it to anyone else. Not even her own family. There was only one thing to do. Since she was the world’s worst liar, she’d have to offer him an altered version of the lesser of two evil truths.

      “My boyfriend was supposed to have come on this trip, but we had this disagreement... this big, and... well, personal disagreement. It couldn’t have happened at a worse time, I know, yet I still found it necessary to break up with him.” She was starting to ramble, but she always did that when she lied.

      Spencer’s face contorted to a sympathetic frown. Too sympathetic. But there was no going back now, so she went on, effusing her explanation with a whine worthy enough to win an Academy Award. “I really can’t explain why I panicked this afternoon. Probably the stress of the breakup. I mean, it wasn’t easy after all the time I put into the relationship, and when he—”

      “Bull.”

      “Bull?” One hand shot to her hip and the other snapped toward him with the efficiency and speed of a karate chop. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

      “That means, I don’t believe you.”

      “You think this trip isn’t embarrassing for me? My parents have been hounding me to bring Richard for a visit. And at the last minute he’s a no-show. Believe me,” she said, pointing a thumb over her shoulder and toward the door, “they haven’t started their main interrogation session yet.

      “And in case you’ve forgotten, I’m facing having to attend my high school reunion alone. Not that it means anything to you, but I, the girl voted Most Likely to Succeed, am not looking forward to dancing with myself at that affair.”

      “That’s what’s got you coming off your spool?” He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

      “Why you insufferable, obnoxious, sanctimonious, know-it-all, you don’t know anything about me.”

      “Hold on, hold on,” Spencer said, raising his hands in surrender. “You’re right. I don’t know you and you don’t know me, but maybe that can work to your advantage.”

      She reached for the doorknob.

      “Jade, please. Hear me out,” Spencer said, working to gain her trust with the most concerned tone he could muster. A journalistic strategem he’d practiced for the better part of seven years. He took a few steps toward her. “We both know there’s a lot more to this than what you’ve told me. Whatever it is, you’re going to feel a lot better once you talk about it.”

      She looked cautiously over her shoulder at him. He took it as his cue to continue.

      “You know, sometimes a stranger can be a better listener than a friend or a family member. With a stranger, there’s no history, no expectations, no emotional connection to the person or the problem.” Shoving his hands in his pockets, СКАЧАТЬ