“Who are you with?”
“I’m sorry?” She finally met his eyes, and he had his first good look at her. What he saw was entrancing. She was pretty, wholesome, Irish descent, probably, with that reddish hair and the blue eyes. Her sleek black dress showed off a great figure, hourglass but lithe. She looked fresh, innocent. Girl next door, the kind you grow up crushing on, your best friend’s older sister. And then you become old enough to bed her legally, and the tables turn. This one, though, still had the suburban stink all over her. Intern, he thought.
“I meant, what house are you with?”
“Oh. None.”
“What are you doing here, then?”
“I...” The way she dropped her eyes when she was embarrassed, like a courtier looking up at him from her lashes, was maddening, in all the best ways. She took a deep breath. “Okay. We’re at the same house. You’re light-years ahead of me, though.”
A small zing. “You’re not an intern?”
“I’m a writer.”
“Do you have a name?”
The blush deepened. “Sutton. Sutton Healy.”
Irish all the way, though she wasn’t accented. Second generation, then, but he’d bet a pound her family was recent. He knew the name, but he wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of that knowledge. He was enjoying her discomfiture. Most women he met went all sycophant on him within moments. This one was truly tongue-tied, and eyeing him like he was a juicy steak. He thought it was cute. Check that, he thought it was hot.
“Can I buy you a drink, Sutton Healy?”
“From the open bar? Sure.”
She’d touched his arm again then, slower this time, and he’d known. He was going to take her upstairs, and they were going to spend the night together, and he was going to get to know Sutton Healy biblically, and he was going to enjoy every minute of it.
He heard Bill’s voice behind him, a harsh whisper overlaid with laughter. “Sucker.” Ethan flipped him off behind his back.
Sutton Healy wanted Macallan, too, so he ordered doubles. They wandered off to a corner of the ballroom. He turned her to face the room so his back was to the crowd. They managed to stay that way, uninterrupted, for half an hour. He may have run his hand through his hair a few times. He was a little fuzzy on that, but it usually drove women crazy.
Two drinks later, he admitted he’d heard of her work.
“Historical romance, right?”
“Did your agent slip you a note with that information?”
“I read.”
“You read historical romance? You have to be kidding me.”
“It’s very soothing. Besides, I like seeing how women think heroes should act. Gives me guidelines. I need all the chivalry schooling I can get, especially now, with the sensitivity training they make us do. It can get very confusing, where the lines are supposed to be drawn. If we acted toward eighteen-year-old virgins the way your heroes do, we’d be jailed. Can you imagine the juice the press would get out of it?”
“You, Ethan Montclair, are full of crap.”
“Maybe I am. Maybe I’m drunk.” Yes, he had run his hand through his hair then, knowing the thick waves would stand up a bit, mussed, as his mother used to say. He’d given Sutton Healy a slow, lazy smile. “Or maybe it’s the way you’re affecting me. Speaking of crossing lines, you want to get out of here?”
He worried for a moment he’d shifted gears too quickly, sounded too wanting, but she hadn’t hesitated. “God, yes. I can’t stand these parties. Can we go now?”
He remembered every one of the fifty steps it had taken to get to the elevator, anticipation buzzing in his veins. He had a hand on the small of her back—gentle, proprietary—could feel the smooth column of muscle where her spine met her finely shaped rump. He waited until the doors slid closed to kiss her. Her mouth was sweet and smoky from the Scotch, and when she threw her arms around his neck and pulled him deeper into the kiss, he felt his heart begin to race. It was more than the usual turn-on, too. There was something about this woman that was absolutely intoxicating. He had a feeling he would remember this trip to New York for a long time to come.
They had rooms on the same floor, the conference block. He motioned toward his door, but she shook her head. “I need ten minutes. Give me your key.”
He swiped the small plastic card, opened his door, and handed her the key card. “Don’t disappoint me.”
She grinned, eyes a wee bit unfocused. “Never.”
She scooted off down the hall. He paced. He brushed his teeth. He debated pouring another drink from the minibar, decided he was pretty well pissed and would ride the buzz a while longer.
And true to her word, she returned eight minutes later. He couldn’t remember the last time he was so happy to see anyone.
Inside the room, she rubbed up against him like a cat. He quickly discovered she’d taken off her knickers, and he was so turned on by the juxtaposition of naughty and nice he barely got her to the bed before he was inside her.
At four in the morning, sated, sitting naked in the rumpled sheets with an array of strawberries and chocolates and champagne he’d managed to have delivered from a very grumpy front desk overnight manager, watching his dress shirt fall off her pale, freckled shoulder, he decided that he loved her.
DISCOVERIES ARE MADE
Now
He left the Scotch in his office, grabbed the semiwarm cup of tea from the kitchen counter, went to Sutton’s lair on the other side of the house, and booted up the desktop. The banking was always done on her computer. She had the tax files, so it made sense that the financial info was in the same place. Sutton had never shown an interest in the money Ethan brought to the marriage—she paid her mother out of her earnings, as he insisted—but was diligent about making sure the quarterlies and annual taxes were paid.
His family money. Most of it was gone now anyway, eaten up by the price of the house and subsequent renovations. They should have gotten a mortgage, it was insanity to pay $1.4 million in cash, but Sutton wanted to be free of debt, so Ethan had signed on the line and handed over his nest egg.