Expose Me. Кейт Хьюит

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СКАЧАТЬ grimly, he headed into the hotel.

      * * *

      Chelsea slid off her coat and handed it to the young woman at the coat check, barely aware of taking the ticket or getting in the elevator that would take her up to the thirty-fifth floor where Michael’s party was being held. She closed her eyes, breathed in deeply.

      That impromptu meeting with Alex Diaz had left her dazed and breathless. A little buzzed, too, and a lot wary. She’d learned too many lessons the hard way not to wonder when a man wanted something.

      And Alex Diaz definitely wanted something.

      Adrenaline pumped through her as she thought of the way he’d filled the space of the limo, arms stretched out along the back of the seat, legs casually sprawled. Fingers brushing her shoulder. Even through the thick cashmere of her coat she’d felt it. And Alex had too; no way had that little caress been unintentional. It had taken everything she had not to shiver.

      She didn’t like being so responsive to a man, any man, but especially one like Alex Diaz. He was overwhelmingly, inarguably male, potent and primal. And her body had responded even as her mind had raced from his words, the obvious implication.

      I’m interested in your show.

      Not her chat show, but the prime-time interview she’d worked her ass off to get. Ever since she’d started Chat with Chelsea she’d known she wanted more. She wanted to be taken seriously as a journalist, and that wasn’t going to happen as long as she sat on a pink velour sofa and interviewed weepy country singers and washed-up soap stars. It might be popular and it might have made her rich, but it sure as hell didn’t mean anyone actually respected it...or her.

      She knew what people said about her and Michael; she was neither stupid nor deaf. But even Michael couldn’t give her an hour-long interview with a serious subject. If she nailed the interview with Treffen, if it became the iconic interview of the decade as she hoped and planned, that wouldn’t be up to Michael.

      It would be up to her. And everyone would know it.

      She let out a long, slow breath. And if the interview with Treffen led to something on Diaz News? Anchorwoman, or even her own serious interview slot? Her stomach tightened and her mind started racing again.

      No, she couldn’t think like that. Not yet. Not till she knew what Diaz really wanted. She thought of the bulge she’d seen in his trousers before she’d left the limo, left him hungry just as she’d intended. He was attracted to her; that had been, at least to him, painfully obvious. She wasn’t above using that attraction. Hell, no.

      But life had taught her to be a skeptic, a cynic. To watch her back. And she wasn’t about to jump into bed with a man like Alex Diaz, not even for a job.

      Especially not for a job.

      Even so just the thought—the remote possibility—of being on Diaz News made her heart beat harder and her fingers curl into determined fists. Diaz’s news network was the most respected on TV, and was the only one that managed to rise above the petty, political squabbling and scaremongering of other networks. “Facts, not opinions” was Diaz News’s motto, and made it the most-watched news channel on television.

      And she could be on it, as a serious, respected journalist...

      Her mouth twisted cynically. Or maybe Alex Diaz just wanted her in bed.

      Which wouldn’t be such a bad a place to be...

      Maybe not, but Diaz was so not her type; he was too arrogant and controlling. She liked her men a little meeker. They were meant to do her bidding.

      But if she could get Alex Diaz to do her bidding...

      Now her smile curved in anticipation. Wouldn’t that be satisfying. Alex Diaz in front of her, on his knees. Begging.

      As she once had.

      But never again. She didn’t beg, plead or even say please. When it came to sex, she took.

      But she needed to stop thinking about sex.

      Chelsea took another deep breath and then raised her chin a notch as the elevator stopped at the thirty-fifth floor.

      If Diaz did have something legitimate in mind, he’d seek her out again. Legitimately. She wasn’t about to go running to him, asking for favors.

      The party was in full swing as the elevator doors opened onto the private room with wraparound views of Manhattan, Central Park an oasis of darkness amidst the endless lights of the city. Chelsea stepped into the room, head held high as she nodded at a few acquaintances. People who would say they were her friends, but Chelsea knew better. She knew a million people like that, but nobody knew her. She didn’t give them the chance.

      Still, she worked the room, laughing and chatting, air-kissing and waggling her fingers. The effort was exhausting, but that was something else nobody knew.

      In any case, most people at the network were jealous of her meteoric rise to talk show host by age twenty-eight, and the rumors that she’d slept her way to that position still swirled around her four years later, although she ignored them with the airiness of someone who didn’t give a damn. And she didn’t. Wouldn’t.

      That route to success might have worked for her once—or not—but she was a different woman now. Harder. Smarter. And nobody’s fool—or plaything.

      “Chelsea.” Michael came toward her, hands outstretched. Chelsea took them and leaned in as Michael brushed his lips against her cheek. She could feel people watching them, eyes narrowed, ears pricked for some overheard salacious snippet. Not that they needed any; they could just make them up. She never denied anything. Denying rumors put you on the defensive, and ended up just stoking the fires of gossip higher. Let people wonder. Let them smirk. She’d still come out on top.

      “Your hands are cold,” he said, and she laughed lightly.

      “It’s freezing outside, Michael.” She slipped her hands from his, suddenly conscious of someone watching them. She didn’t need to look to see who it was. She’d felt his gaze on her ever since the elevator doors had pinged open after her, had felt his presence, dark and forceful, even though she’d refused to look at him even out of the corner of her eye.

      Alex Diaz was there. And she felt him.

      Michael leaned back, studying her for a moment, concern making his eyes narrow and the dignified crow’s-feet at their corners look more pronounced. He was always worried about her, even though Chelsea told him not to be. Pretended as if she didn’t need someone’s concern or care, because admitting to that was both weakness and need and she never showed either.

      But she did need Michael. He’d discovered her when she was twenty-two: desperate, damaged and determined, and she’d told him more about herself than she had anyone else, even her sister. Yet she still hadn’t told him everything, and never would.

      “You look tired,” he said, and she laughed again.

      “Thank you very much.”

      “And gorgeous, of course,” he added with a smile. “It goes without saying. But I hope you’re not working too hard.”

      “Don’t fuss.” Despite only eight years between СКАЧАТЬ