“What do you mean?”
“I have a little gift for you. It certainly pales in comparison to your gift,” she said with a self-conscious laugh, then became serious again. “I was going to give it to you when we said good-bye. But…” Pulling away from him, she went to sit on a stone bench, opened her purse, and pulled out a small blue box. When he sat down beside her, she offered it to him, then abruptly pulled it back. “Just remember: this is purely symbolic. It’s not meant to be used.”
She offered the box again, and he took it, sliding his fingertip under the tape that secured the lid on opposite sides. He removed the lid, then a layer of thick cotton. For a long time, he simply stared, recognizing the significance of the gift immediately. What would it take for her to let him tie her to the bed? he had asked one sunny morning in her bedroom, and she had replied, Nothing. Nothing could convince her to do that. Trust would, he had insisted. If you trusted me, if you believed in me with all your heart and all your soul… you would let me do it. You would trust me to keep you safe. Knowing that he’d earned that kind of trust would give him a tremendous sense of power.
He’d been right, he thought as he stared at the length of braided cord nestled on a bed of cotton in the box, and he had been wrong. Knowing that she did trust him, that she believed in him with all her heart and all her soul was, indeed, tremendously empowering. It was also tremendously humbling. He wasn’t sure that he deserved such an exquisite gift… but damned if he was going to give it back.
He replaced the lid on the box, then pulled her to him for a hard, hungry, passionate kiss. When he finally raised his head, he said fiercely, “I love you, Teryl.”
She smiled that heart-tugging smile again. “I love you, too.”
“Will you marry me?”
“I will. When?”
“As soon as possible.” He drew his fingertip across her mouth, then down her throat to the V where her blouse buttoned. “In the meantime, will you fulfill one of my fantasies for me?”
Bless her heart—and her sweet, sweet faith—she didn’t remind him that her gift was symbolic, didn’t hesitate or falter at all. “If I can. What is it you want?”
“Just once…” He undid the top button, drew his fingers lower, and opened the second button. “Just once I’d like to be…” The third button slipped free with only the slightest nudge, and he slid his hand inside her blouse, gliding it over the powdery soft skin of her breast to her nipple, already swelling and needy of his caresses.
“Wicked,” she prompted him, and then she kissed him, stealing the rest of the words from him, setting the fulfillment of his fantasy in motion. Being wicked in New Orleans.
Sweet damnation, yes.
For the rest of their lives.
ONE MAN WAS REAL. ONE WAS AN IMPOSTOR. ONLY A LOVER WOULD KNOW THE DIFFERENCE.
Still single and nearly thirty, Teryl Weaver is a successful literary agent. Yet somehow, her life seems unexciting, empty, loveless. Then she joins her agency’s top writer, the reclusive Simon Tremont, for his first ever public interview in New Orleans. And when a handsome stranger crosses her path, she dares to say yes to a night of exquisite, breathtaking ecstasy… one that may prove to be a fatal mistake.
Her new lover claims he is the real Simon Tremont. Is the “author” Teryl brought to New Orleans a liar? Or is the man whose touch she craves a desperate, dangerous man? Caught between terror and desire, Teryl must discover the truth about her lover’s identity and the feelings neither can deny: the longing, the hunger, the love.
“A WONDERFULLY WICKED WEB OF INTRIGUES
AND PASSIONS AS HOT AS A LOUISIANA SUMMER.”
—Tami Hoag, author of Night Sins, on In Sinful Harmony
“WELL-PLOTTED TALE OF TWISTED PASSIONS AND
MURDER… A DARK AND INTRIGUING MAINSTREAM
ROMANCE THAT IS AS SULTRY AS ITS SETTING.”
—Library Journal on In Sinful Harmony
Passion Page 44