Naughty Or Nice. Rachael Stewart

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       PROLOGUE

      I TWIST MY hands in front of me, the heel of one stiletto grinding into the plush carpet of my father’s study.

      I know Lucas is going to follow me here. I saw it in his eyes. That same look I’ve caught several times over in the past few months…the same look I know I sport: want, desire—love.

      I’ve loved him for years—long before Mum and Dad became his guardians…long before I really knew what it was that had my heart trying to leap out of my chest, my body throbbing, my tongue tied.

      I’m eighteen. It’s my birthday party. It’s as good a time as any to tell him—or so I keep telling myself. I can’t go on keeping it locked up inside. But I’m scared. It doesn’t matter that I sense he feels the same, that I see the way he looks at me when he thinks no one else is watching.

      I pin his expression in my mind, focus on it as I grab my flute of champagne and throw back the remainder. The hit of alcohol makes me wince, but I need it—Dutch courage. I return it to the side as I watch the door.

       You love him. You can tell him. You have to.

      I hear footsteps in the hallway, louder than the music from my party, underway further down the hall, and I take a breath, pressing my hands into my thighs, forcing them to still and hoping their dampness doesn’t mark the bright white of my dress.

      The door opens and I can’t breathe.

      ‘Evangeline?’

      His voice sends blood rushing through my body, my pulse rate skittering out of control.

      ‘Yes…’ It comes out like a whisper, my fear coming through, and it frustrates me. I want to be confident. I want him to see me as a woman, not the little sister of his best friend, Nate.

       Get it together.

      His head appears around the door, his gaze hesitant as he looks from me to the hallway and back again.

      ‘Hey.’

      He steps inside but pauses, the confident twenty-one-year-old I usually see oddly absent. He’s boyish, uncertain, and my heart turns over.

      ‘Hey,’ I manage back, breathless.

      We don’t move closer. My knees feel like jelly and his fingers tremble a little as he rakes one hand through his hair, his other still hanging on to the door handle.

       Take control. You need to do this. You need to show him.

      ‘Close the door.’

      I’m surprised at the confidence I’ve injected into my tone—am surprised all the more when he does what I ask. But his eyes don’t return to me. They burn a hole in the floor at his feet.

      I take a small breath. ‘Why won’t you look at me?’

      His eyes waver and I can sense the fight in him.

      I step forward, my progress slow as the tight minidress restricts my movement, riding ever higher up my thighs. The moment I’d chosen it I’d had this in mind. To confess my love, maybe even seduce him. I want my first time to be with him and tonight would be so perfect.

      ‘Lucas?’

      He shakes his head, but then his eyes lock with mine and I feel their burn. Need is etched in the tightness of his jaw, in his hands fisting at his sides.

      ‘We shouldn’t be in here…alone.’

      ‘Then why did you come?’ I press.

       Please let him be torn. Please let him confirm what I suspect.

      ‘I—’

      He shakes his head again but his eyes are still fixed on mine. His internal СКАЧАТЬ