Cold Hearted: Bad Boy Romance

by Amy Faye

  He squeezed his stomach tighter and closed his eyes and tried to figure out how he was supposed to do this.

  Well, the first part was easy. He called his lawyer. The man was a professional and a half, and fifteen minutes later a small stack of papers was coming through the hotel fax. He had them in his hands, still warm from the printer, not a minute later.

  He stepped out through the door, flagged the car down and slid into the back. The entire thing felt odd; he'd been putting it off for so long. It was easy to do what you had to do when there was no alternative, but now it seemed as if the veil had been lifted and had to seriously answer the question of why it had taken him so long.

  The second part, on the other hand, took a little longer. Once you made the first call, the others started to get made for you, but there were still dozens of first calls to make.

  The past days had involved a lot of silent driving. Today was the exception, though. Too much talk, it felt like. Too much to be done, and not enough time to rest and really think about what his options were.

  When he stepped out of the car, he wasn't surprised to find that somehow the press had beat him there. They seemed to smell blood, and he'd been calling people the whole way, so some had nearly as long as he had to arrive.

  He forced himself to wait, because there were others who weren't there. People who it was very important he have there. So he waited, sitting in the back of the car and rubbing his forehead, waiting. A van drove up, black, and a man stepped out, looked around like he had someplace important to be any moment, and something important to see.

  Another joined it a minute later. This time, the rear doors didn't wait long after the front ones to open, and a petite woman with looks that had once almost been pretty stepped out, her face twisted up in a mask of fury. She searched the crowd and didn't see him, because he wasn't there to see.

  With all the players gathered he stepped out and took a deep breath, rapped a small stack of index cards on his leg and stepped out into the lazy afternoon heat.

  Helen moved quickly up behind him and said something he ignored. That was the only way to deal with her, he knew. Ignore whatever you could, and whatever you couldn't… ignore that, too.

  The cameras started flashing before he hit the podium. Once he was there he stood by as he watched his wife come up beside him, expecting him to turn and kiss him for the cameras as well. She was in for an unpleasant surprise.

  "I suppose you're all wondering why I've called you here today," he began. He held a long pause. "And I suppose you have all been wondering, as well, why we've been sleeping at the wheel, with an election on."

  That got him a laugh.

  "Well, you know what? I've had a lot of soul-searching to do. I talked recently about my friend, my very good friend. A little boy, ten years old, who has been traveling with me the past couple of months. He's very sick, and without surgery, the doctors… well, they're optimistic. They're always optimistic. But they're very cautious about the optimism, we'll say.

  "Since I met that little boy, I've had to do a lot of soul searching. Since he fell sick, a little over two weeks ago, I've had to do a lot more." He stopped and clicked the cards against the podium, though he hadn't looked at them again since he had written everything he wanted to say down.

  "A lot of thinking about what I'm doing here. What it means to me. What I want out of the Presidency. There are problems. Hell, nobody needs to tell me that. But I have to ask, am I the man to solve them?"

  There was another pause. He frowned. There were a thousand questions he should have been asking himself. Questions he'd been ignoring because, well, someone had to be President. Someone had to try, and why not him?

  But the answers were becoming less and less clear. It wasn't hard to guess the reason. He hadn't been asking them at all, and now that he thought to actually ask, he was realizing that he'd never had a good answer to any of it.

  "The bible says, 'why do you notice the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?' I've spent the last ten years looking at the country and seeing everything that I thought I could fix, but… the truth is, I was ignoring the log in my own eye. I was pretending that things were fine in my house, that I could afford the time and the effort to go out and straighten up the lives other other people. Tonight, I'm ashamed to say that I was wrong."

  He let out a breath. There had been so much work to get here already, and it hurt to have to unmake all that effort. At the same time, the weight falling off his shoulders felt remarkable. Better than he had imagined it would.

  "So it's with a heavy heart, and more apologies than I can ever give to my party, my running mate, and the American people, that I have to withdraw from the election, and from the wider political sphere. I can only hope that one of my very capable colleagues can fill the position as well as I had hoped to do."

  He stepped off the podium. Too many questions would have to be answered if he stayed. Many of them questions he couldn't answer if he'd been asked.

  Lara waited off the side and he drew his arm around her as Robbie, per Paul's instructions, handed the stack of papers, stuffed into a thick manila envelope, over to Helen.

  "What is this?"

  She had an incredulous look on her face. Apparently none of what he had said had quite dawned on her yet.

  "Helen, I'm sorry to spring this on you, but I think we both know it's been a long time coming."

  "You can't leave," she said. The idea seemed to be going through her mind for the first time. As if it had been well and truly impossible up to that instant.

  "You can't stop me," Paul answered.

  "I need you." There were hints, however faint, of desperation and even real feeling in her voice, and for a moment Paul sympathy, strong enough that he started to reconsider. Her voice fell lower. "I need you campaigning for me. If you don't…"

  He frowned and turned again. Part of him had waited for her to tell him that she was going to miss him. That had been a mistake.

  Helen wouldn't miss him; he'd never been there in the first place, not really.

  She was going to miss what he could do for her. And that wasn't enough for him, not any more. There were more important things than politics. He had to meet with a doctor to talk about a very serious and very expensive surgery.

  Epilogue

  Lara eyed her boys with the same bemused expression that seemed to characterize everything that she felt about them. She listened for the sound of wheezing coming from Tim, watched his movements as he twisted and writhed on the ground in a vain attempt to out wrestle his father.

  If he hurt, if he came close to pulling something, then she would stop them without a second thought. He always seemed to forget that it hadn't been so many years ago that he'd been sitting there with his stomach open wide enough for a grown man to stick both hands in and pull out large chunks of his insides.

  If he remembered it, then he made no sign of it. He had barely spoken about being sick at all since he'd recovered from surgery; if he thought of it as any different than any other time he'd had the flue, or a cold, then he made no sign of that, either.

  Her hand rested on her belly; it seemed to fall there naturally, regardless of what she did. Something inside her felt like it was twisting up again. This time, at least, she knew what it was, and she knew why she was so tired all the time.

  It was nice to know that it wasn't just anemia, that she ten hours of sleep was probably enough and she wasn't tired for no reason. It wasn't that she was sick, though the possibility was always there on some level. That was a very serious risk, when you were pregnant. Any illness that would be unpleasant for you, was liable to kill the child.

  Twelve years ago, she'd been young. Too young for a child, by today's standards. Now, she was a little old for it. Somewhere in the past century, the window for having children had shrunk until you only had barely enough space and time to have one child, maybe two if you had them back to back.

&
nbsp; Now she was older. Paul seemed to notice her watching and slacked his grip on their son. Tim wasted no time scrambling out of his grip and wrapping his arms around, trying to find a grip. Paul smiled at her and for a moment she thought he wasn't going to notice the boy who was at that very moment twisting Paul's arm behind his back by the wrist.

  Then, as if totally by surprise he twisted the arm back and slipped it free, dived in and his fingers found the sensitive area under Tim's arm and teased him until he was a writhing and gasping mess.

  Paul left Tim there, breathing hard. "Is everything alright? You need to go to the hospital?"

  She shook her head. "I'm fine. You're fine. Go on, Romeo, before Tim decides to start playing dirty."

  "I wouldn't do that," Tim protested. She winked at him.

  "Of course you wouldn't, sweetheart. But I have to make sure that your father plays fair, too."

  The words felt strange, even now. Even after two years and nearly six months. Tim stalked over as well, seeming to have lost interest for the moment in continuing their roughhousing.

  "Can I feel her?"

  "Sure," Lara answered. Tim put his hand on her belly. He seemed tentative, even nervous, and it gave her a warm feeling in her belly that made her glow with delight.

  "I think I felt something," he said.

  "She's kicking," Lara answered. She put her hand over Tim's. "Sweetheart? Can you go get me a glass of water? I need to talk to your father for a minute."

  Tim looked up at Paul uncertainly, as if he might suddenly run off again. It wasn't as if Lara didn't have the same fear, deep down, but she managed to convince herself it was irrational; at least, most of the time, she did.

  "You did this to me, mister."

  He leaned down and pressed a kiss against her neck. "I suppose I did. Is that going to be a problem?"

  "That depends," she answered. She moved her head and allowed him better access to the sensitive flesh of her throat.

  "On what?"

  "You better not run off again."

  He pressed another kiss against her neck, one that made her shiver as the beginnings of arousal started to light deep down in her belly. He pulled away at the sound of the back door sliding open.

  "I won't," he assured her in a voice that she found it hard to disbelieve. "Not ever again."

  Walking Disaster

  Bad Boy Romance

  Isabella Faye

  Published by Heartthrob Publishing

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  Here’s a preview of the sexy love story you’re about to read…

  Adam can feel the moment that she gives into him. Her body, suddenly pliable in his arms, like putty. And then she seems to find herself again, out of the blue. She stiffens and pushes back. Not to stop him, per se, but a fire lights inside and her mouth starts to move as well, wrestling for control of the kiss.

  He smiles a grin that's full of teeth and scrapes them against her neck, biting down hard enough to pull a gasp from her lips, close to his ears. He shivers hard, the threat of growing arousal that's already well past the point of creeping down his spine.

  It runs through him, his cock twitching painfully. He leans into her and his arms wrap around her hips, pulling her closer as his knee slips between her thighs and spreads them. She lets him, he knows. He can feel the heat, pooled at the place where her legs meet, as she presses herself down onto him, trying to take what she wants.

  Adam starts to lean, pressing her back into the sofa behind her. She acquiesces. The older man continues to press his advantage, his hand finding her breast and squeezing down on her sensitive nipple. Another gasp, hot and moist, inches from his ear. He lets his eyes close as another shiver of need runs down his spine.

  It's been far, far too long. He'd like to take his time, but the fire inside him is burning too hot. There will be time later, to take it slow. To explore every inch of her body with his lips, with his fingertips, with his teeth and his tongue and to show her exactly what he wants from her.

  For now, his fingers dig into the soft skin of her hips and pull her down, laying her out as flat as she can be laid out on the seat of the sofa.

  Her skirt rides up her hips easily when he pushes it. She's wearing tights that tear easily. He's got the money to replace them, and she doesn't fight him. Her hips press up to meet his exploring fingers. He pushes her panties aside. They're already moistened by her arousal.

  His fingers only probe her for a moment before he's working the zipper on his pants, freeing his hardness from the confines of his trousers. Her eyes go a little bit wide and her hips open a little wider, knowing what's going to come next.

  There's no gentleness in the way that he takes her, rough and fast in a single swift motion that pushes all the way inside. She gasps and her legs wrap around his hips before she can stop herself.

  He pulls back and thrusts again into her, the searing heat and tight grip forcing his eyes to flutter shut. His hands don't slacken, though. His hips move, hard and fast, his thumb between them working as fast as it can on her hard clit.

  Linda's hands grab at the air, trying to find something to grip on, until her hands land on the cushion of the sofa. It wouldn't be the first time that a hole has been torn in it. If he works very hard, then it won't be the last.

  Adam can feel the edge approaching. Can feel the temptation building to take what he can, as fast as he can. To wrench every ounce of pleasure. His hips do the thinking for him, his rhythm speeding up, the teasing of his fingers between them moving to match.

  Her body tenses around him, her ankles crossed on the other side of his hips and locking him in as deeply as possible. He doesn't need any more permission than that, as his own orgasm rips through him. He can feel her milking him as he cums. His breath comes in short, sharp gasps as the need leaves him.

  He's not a teenager any more, he thinks. He may need twenty or thirty minutes before he can go again.

  But he's never let that stop him before.

  Chapter One

  Linda Owens sits at her desk and closes her eyes and tries to ignore the fullness of her bladder. This has always been a big job. There's nothing new about it. She shouldn't be letting herself get this worked up over it, but worked up is exactly what she's getting.

  Normally, her clients knew how to hide old girlfriends. They'd just go the hell away. Sure, sometimes they'd pop up as suicides—two bullets in the back of the head, classic suicide.

  But the one thing that they sure as hell didn't do, at least not usually, was have those girlfriends just show up on national television, hoping for their five minutes of fame as the woman who used to fuck Adam Quinn.

  Well, apparently, Adam Quinn was the exception. Sure, maybe Marilyn and John Kennedy had their thing, but nobody talked about it.

  Well, apparently, if Quinn had been in Kennedy's place, there wouldn't be much secret. It creates a bad image. It makes you look like a philanderer to have a thousand ex-girlfriends come out and say, well, sure, we used to play around. What's the big idea anyways?

  Then they get passed around until someone manages to get them to say something that isn't positive.

  Then it just makes Linda's job that much harder. Which is why, right now, she should probably have been working, but she just had her head stuffed into her hands. Because clearly, her hopes to settle into the new job weren't going to happen.

  She'd only been in the office for twenty minutes, and she was already thinking how she was the only person on the face of the earth who could bring Quinn out the other side of it looking squeaky clean. She's had three cups of coffee, and there hasn't been time between segments to run to the bathroom.

  The media will start with the girlfriends, of course. They haven't said anything yet. Adam Quinn is a real ladies man, he's a great guy, he never said a bad thing toward me. So far, nothing but positive coverage. Which is good.

  It can only last so long.
Nobody's a saint. Adam Quinn, doubly so. You only have to spend five minutes in a room with him to know that he's never going to be a saint and you're never going to paint him as one.

  He just has to look presidential. He just has to seem like he's going to be able to pull it back. And right now, Linda is looking at her options, looking at the future, and trying to figure out where things are going from here.

  Which leaves the bigger problem. This is going to be big, it's going to be frustrating, and there's not a whole hell of a lot that she can do about it.

  There's an incredible amount of media about him now. If her previous campaigns have been any indicator, then that will continue. She's got to watch just about all of it. A 24-hour news cycle on three channels, with only so many hours in the day.

  Then she's got to figure which parts can be safely ignored. There are two TVs talking at once, now. The audio on the left one is turned up, the right one is muted. They were never going to get good coverage on Fox in the first place.

  So there's not much point, as long as it doesn't say they've got breaking news that's going to ruin Adam Quinn's career, it really isn't a big deal. CNN, on the other hand… they could have favorable coverage. Or unfavorable.

  Which is why you have to watch them. Because they'll lie if they think they can get away with it, and Linda's job is to make sure that none of it sticks. And if some of it does stick, wash it away by throwing money at it until it comes unstuck.

  It's a good gig, all told. With the one problem being, of course, the candidate that she's dealing with now. Or, at least, the candidate they tell her she's dealing with. Usually, they meet beforehand. With a ten million dollar paycheck coming at the end of the election cycle, and another ten million bonus if he wins, though…

  Linda let it slide.

  She taps her thumb on the hard wooden desk to try to get her mind off the discomfort in her gut. It makes her nervous to think about leaving, but the pressure is starting to build into frustration as well, and that's honing a fine edge of nerves that makes it seem like every little cut of the camera is suddenly going to be met with disaster.