Really Hot!. Jennifer Labrecque

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СКАЧАТЬ from Surviving Sarah and Charlie Cuesta and Sam Ryan from The Great Chase weren’t flakes either. Thank goodness, though, for all those other quirky people in the world because it meant she had a job.

      “You’re here for a love fest. I’m here to make sure it goes well for you. End of story.” She smiled, but they both knew she meant it.

      Honestly, if she hadn’t known better, she’d swear hurt flashed in his eyes before he answered her smile with his own. “You’re absolutely right. I apologize for overstepping boundaries.”

      Now she felt even more awkward, as if she’d extracted an apology that wasn’t owed. “Don’t worry about it.” She checked her watch, relieved to see it was time to end this. “Okay, I should let you get back to your room to shower and change.”

      How many times had she said that to a man in similar circumstances and never thought a thing about it? What was wrong with her that she suddenly had a disturbingly erotic image of O’Malley naked, dripping wet, surrounded by a thick cloud of steam? And found it totally, inappropriately arousing.

      She glanced back down at the clipboard in her hands, not because there was anything important there, but because it gave her somewhere to look other than at him. “Wardrobe will be along to your room in an hour or so. And I’ll meet you there in an hour and a half to go over any last-minute questions.”

      O’Malley’s smile held an edge. “Ah, yes, so you can expertly orchestrate my—what was it?—love fest.” He gave her a nod of dismissal and walked away.

      Portia stood in the middle of the room and watched his broad-shouldered retreat, until the door closed behind him.

      “So, are you the newest member of the fan club, Portia?” Terry called from across the room, his voice teasing.

      Startled, she almost dropped her clipboard. Damn, she’d been so caught up in watching him walk across the room, she’d forgotten about Terry and Jeff.

      “You boys know better than that. I don’t do fan clubs.”

      Bottom line. She orchestrated. He participated. And that was that.

      “HOLD STILL for one more second…” Cindy from wardrobe tugged his black tie into place. She stepped back and surveyed him with a critical eye. A knock sounded on his bedroom door.

      “Come in,” he called over his shoulder. Portia had said she’d arrive in an hour and a half. She was punctual. Behind him, his bedroom door opened and closed.

      He knew without turning that it was Portia. Yeah, she was scheduled to be here, but he could feel her. Tiny hairs stood up on the back of his neck and adrenaline surged through him.

      Cindy tweaked his tux jacket and smiled. “Your mama will be proud and those women don’t stand a chance.” Cindy, with her cheerful attitude and nonstop chatter, rather reminded him of his mother. “Honey, you are yum-my.” She winked outrageously at him and looked over his shoulder. “Makes you wish you had a spoon so you could eat him up doesn’t it?”

      Laughing—how could you not laugh at such outrageous hyperbole—and she was obviously teasing him rather than flirting—he turned to face Portia.

      Her answering smile struck him as a bit forced. “He’s lucky I left my spoon in my room.”

      Her cool gaze flickered over him, having just the opposite effect on his temperature. Forget a spoon, he mentally urged her. His body tightened and his heart pounded at the thought of her mouth against his skin, her scent mingling with his. What was it about her that drew him to her? She wasn’t beautiful in the accepted sense of the word, but she was arresting, exotic, intriguing, frustrating—and she got under his skin.

      Cindy’s two-way radio went off. Tamsin, the lead makeup artist, came across after the initial squawk. “Cindy, Ms. Freeman needs you ASAP.”

      Rourke had skimmed through the dossiers again, after his shower and before Cindy arrived. Lissa Freeman was heiress to a mind-boggling real-estate fortune, who’d spent the last year hanging out in Europe. What the dossier didn’t include, but the media had more than adequately covered, was the havoc Lissa had wrecked along the way. She was a dark-haired, petulant time bomb given to explosions when things didn’t go her way. Of course, he as well as anyone knew you couldn’t and shouldn’t believe all the media hype.

      The radio clicked again. “I don’t need you ASAP, I needed you five minutes ago.”

      Okay. Maybe you could believe the media. That peremptory tone could only belong to Ms. Freeman.

      Cindy headed for the door, smirking. “Bet she doesn’t have a clue you heard that. Bet she’ll use a different tone with you.”

      Rourke chuckled. “No doubt.”

      The radio clicked again. “Are you on your way? I don’t have all night.”

      “Okay, I can’t resist and she deserves it,” Cindy said to Rourke and Portia. She clicked the two-way. “I’m almost finished with Mr. O’Malley and then I’ll be right there.”

      “Oh. Take your time. There’s no hurry.” Butter wouldn’t have melted in Lissa Freeman’s mouth this time around.

      Cindy laughed and shook her head. “Take care of him,” she said to Portia. “We’re putting a guppy into a tank full of sharks.”

      A guppy? He laughed to cover his sudden nervousness. Him, patently incapable of small talk, among twelve socially adept women. Right. “I object to being called a guppy.”

      Cindy waved her radio. “You know what I mean. Take care of him, Portia.”

      “I have the utmost confidence he’ll be fine,” Portia said. He was glad one of them did.

      The minute the door closed behind Cindy the mood shifted and Rourke was aware of being in his bedroom alone with Portia Tomlinson, a woman he found both bewitching and aggravating.

      He was aware of the bed with its massive carved headboard and gossamer curtains tied back with silken cords, the lush carpet underfoot, the sensual suggestion of the entwined couple in the gilt-framed reproduction of Gustav Klimt’s “The Kiss” adorning the wall, the copy of the Kama Sutra on the bedside table, the muted lighting, the sheer elegance of Portia’s upswept blond hair, her no-nonsense suit paired with sexy designer shoes, and most of all, her scent.

      Rourke spoke to fill the space with something other than the sexual tension strumming through him and permeating the room. “Lissa Freeman just narrowed my choices down to eleven.”

      “You should meet her with an open mind. She’s probably got a bad case of PDS, predate syndrome,” Portia said.

      “Would you talk to someone like that even if you were nervous over a date?”

      “No. Probably not, but you should still give her another chance.”

      What would Portia be like on a date? Cool and reserved? What did she do for fun? To relax? What excited her?

      “Okay,” her voice came out low and husky. She stopped and cleared her throat. Maybe she was as affected by him as he was by her. “So, we should go over any last-minute questions you have.”

      Rourke СКАЧАТЬ