Need you Now (Top Shelf Romance Book 2)

by Laurelin Paige

The black Toyota changes lanes, oh so casually, the next lane over. “Ten? I don’t know. It took you almost twenty yesterday.”

  The light turns green, and I grin. “Ten.”

  “Prove it, little bird.”

  I press the pedal to the floor, and we fly.

  Thank you for reading HOSTAGE! We hope you love Stone and Brooke’s story!

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  The price of survival… Don’t miss Skye Warren’s bestselling Endgame series, starting with the critically acclaimed The Pawn! Gabriel Miller swept into my life like a storm.

  “Edgy, provocative and deeply erotic, The Pawn is one of my top reads of the year! Skye Warren brings you a sensual battle of wills guaranteed to leave you gasping by the end.”

  ~ New York Times bestselling author Elle Kennedy

  He’s a devil in Armani…and he’ll do what it takes to reunite his long-lost brothers—even kidnap his enemy’s daughter. Check out Dark Mafia Prince.

  “Twisted, sexy and dark—Dark Mafia Prince is everything I love in a stay-up-all-night-can’t-put-it-down read!”

  ~author M. O’Keefe

  Books by Skye Warren

  Trust Fund Duet

  Survival of the Richest

  The Evolution of Man

  North Security Trilogy

  Overture

  Concerto

  Sonata

  Endgame Trilogy & Masterpiece Duet

  The Pawn

  The Knight

  The Castle

  The King

  The Queen

  Underground Series

  Rough Hard Fierce

  Wild Dirty Secret

  Sweet

  Deep

  Stripped Series

  Tough Love

  Love the Way You Lie

  Better When It Hurts

  Even Better

  Pretty When You Cry

  Caught for Christmas

  Hold You Against Me

  To the Ends of the Earth

  Criminals and Captives standalones

  Prisoner

  Hostage

  Standalone Dark Romance

  Wanderlust

  On the Way Home

  His for Christmas

  Hear Me

  Take the Heat

  CLICK HERE for the complete Skye Warren book list, along with boxed sets, audiobooks, and print listings.

  Books by Annika Martin

  Enemies to lovers Romantic Comedy

  Most Eligible Billionaire

  The Billionaire’s Wake-up Call Girl

  Breaking the Billionaire’s Rules

  Dark Mafia

  Dark Mafia Prince

  Wicked Mafia Prince

  Savage Mafia Prince

  Romantic Suspense standalones

  Against the Dark

  Off the Edge

  Into the Shadows

  Behind the Mask

  MM Spies

  Enemies like You

  Criminals & Captives (with Skye Warren)

  Prisoner

  Hostage

  Ultra dirty romantic comedy series

  The Hostage Bargain

  The Wrong Turn

  The Deeper Game

  The Most Wanted

  The Hard Way

  Click here to see a complete list of Annika’s books.

  Sinner

  Sinner

  By: Sierra Simone

  To Renee Bisceglia:

  This isn’t the first book I’ve dedicated to you, and I’m sure it won’t be the last.

  Prologue

  With the right pen, a man can rule the world.

  You wine them, dine them, flash them smiles, slip them gifts, massage them with compliments and praise and give them the old hey-buddy-buddy. You play golf or see the ballet or compare four-thousand-dollar suits and ten-thousand-dollar watches, and then you casually apply the leverage, the bladed facts against the soft underbellies, and handshake by handshake, you build yourself something new and shimmering and golden.

  And when they’re at the precipice, the point of no return, when they are looking behind them and see their last chance to back out—that’s when you hand them the pen.

  And they take it into their hands and it’s solid and weighty and cool to the touch, and they uncap it to see the engraved gold nib ready to drip with the promise of money and power. And when they press the pen to the paper and the ink flows so crisp and dark, like some kind of inky, terrible blood, that’s when it’s done.

  That’s when you rule the world.

  I’m not a good man, and I’ve never pretended to be. I don’t believe in goodness or God or any happy ending that isn’t paid for in advance.

  What do I believe in? Money. Sex. Macallan 18.

  They have words for men like me—playboy. Womanizer. Skirt chaser.

  My brother used to be a priest, and he only has one word for me.

  Sinner.

  Chapter 1

  Armani tuxedo, Berluti shoes, Burberry watch.

  Blue eyes, blond hair, a mouth a little too wickedly wide.

  Yeah, I know I look good as I step out of my Audi R8 and walk into the hospital benefit.

  I know it, the valet taking my keys knows it, the girl working the complimentary bar knows it. I give her the classic Bell dimple as I take a scotch from her, and she blushes. And then I turn and face the crowd of milling wealth, sipping my Macallan and thinking about where to start first.

  Because tonight is my fucking victory lap.

  First of all, I inked the Keegan deal this afternoon—which is this sexy stack of papers transferring a deserted downtown block of nothing to a New York developer—and my God, you would not believe the money these people have. It’s not normal money. It’s like oil money. It’s not only making my firm a shit-ton, but it’s going to anchor my position at Valdman and Associates, just in time for Valdman to retire and need someone to sit in that coveted corner office and count all the gold coins.

  Second of all, I inked the deal, not Charles Northcutt—fuck that guy—and I would like to rub it in his stupid face tonight. I know he’ll be here because he can’t resist free drinks and bored trophy wives.

  And third of all, I’ve been clocking a lot of late nights on the Keegan thing, which has severely cut into my sex life, and I’m hard up for it. I’ve got a few regulars saved to my phone and there’s always the exclusive club I’m a member of, but tonight’s my victory lap. That deserves something special. Something new.

  I take another look around the room—Valdman’s in the corner with his wife, laughing and red-faced even though the benefit’s only just started, and Northcutt is right at his elbow, of course.

  Fucking suck-up.

  But tonight is mine, and there are gorgeous women everywhere, and maybe I’m just another white guy with too much money in a sea of white guys with too much money, but I’ve got the advantage. I’m a sinner with a dimpled smile and perfect hair, and I know how to make sin feel like heaven.

  I swallow my scotch, set the glass down, and head off into the fray.

  An hour later, I feel a nudge at my elbow.

  “Dad’s here. Just so you know.”

  I turn to see a man my age offering me another drink and giving me a convenient excuse to lean away from my current conversation and examine the room.

  Sure enough, Elijah Iverson’s father is across the room, surrounded by the usual cluster of hospital mega-donors and society leeches. Dr. Iverson is the physician-in-chief of the hospital’s cancer center and an ever-present figure at these kinds of events, so I shouldn’t be surprised he's here, but my skin tightens uncomfortably all the same, sending prickles of heat down the back of my neck. I close my eyes, and for a minute, I hear the clatter of casserole dishes and my father’s raised voice. Elijah’
s mother murmuring pleadingly. And I can still smell all of those flowers, white and cloying and needy, funeral flowers for a funeral that shouldn’t have been needed.

  I open my eyes to Elijah’s knowing, rueful smile. He was there that day too, the day our families went from beyond close to something else. Something cold and distant. Elijah and I had stayed close—we’d bonded over Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in kindergarten, and a TMNT bond is a bond for life—but the rest of our families peeled apart, as if there hadn’t been two decades of shared barbecues and Pictionary nights and babysitting and slumber parties and late-night card games filled with wine for the adults and as many snacks as could be quietly snuck up the stairs for the kids.

  “It’s fine,” I say. It’s only a half-lie, because even though Dr. Iverson reminds me of that day—of the awful hole my sister’s death punched through my life—we’re always civil and polite when we see each other, which is often enough in a city as small as this.

  “Hey, the event looks great,” I add, mostly to change the subject. The Iverson-Bell schism is an old wound, and Elijah’s under enough pressure tonight as it is. It’s his first big hurrah as the event coordinator for the Kauffman Center after leaving the art museum where he started out, and I know he’s anxious for tonight to go well. And the fact that it’s also the one event of the year his father and all his father’s colleagues attend…I know I’m not imagining the lines of exhaustion and stress on Elijah’s brow and around his mouth.

  He nods faintly, whiskey-colored eyes scanning the room. With that efficient, peremptory gaze and squared jaw, he is a striking twin to his father—tall and black and handsome—although where Dr. Iverson frowns, Elijah has always been a person of smiles and laughs. “Everything seems to be running smoothly so far,” he says, still assessing the space. “Except I lost my date.”

  “You brought a date?” I ask. “Where is he?”

  “It’s a she,” he says, sending a grin my way, and then he laughs at my face, because Elijah hasn’t had a she date since he came out in college. “I’m teasing, Sean. It’s actually—”

  A harried woman in a catering uniform scurries up to Elijah brandishing a seating chart, interrupting whatever he was about to say. After a flurry of whispers and a muttered dammit from Elijah, he gives me an apologetic wave as he runs off to put out whatever fire is igniting behind the scenes of the benefit, leaving me alone with my scotch. I glance back over to Dr. Iverson, who is staring at me. He gives me a nod and I nod back, and I don’t miss the cool compassion in his expression.

  I know exactly what that cool compassion is for, and a screw tightens somewhere deep in my chest.

  Get yourself together and get back to the victory lap, Bell.

  Except I suddenly don’t feel like the victory lap right now. I feel like more scotch and some fresh air, and even with the massive glass wall overlooking the glittering skyline, I feel claustrophobic and restless—and the trilling melody of the string sextet in the corner is so fucking loud right now, expanding like gas to fill every alcove and balcony. I work my way to the terrace door almost blindly, frantically, just needing

  out

  out

  out—

  The night air drenches me in an abrupt cool quiet, and I take a deep breath. And another. And another. Until my pulse slowly rambles back to normal and the screw in my chest loosens. Until my brain isn’t a juxtaposed mess of casserole dishes and flowers, some from fourteen years ago and some from last week.

  I wish it were just the memory of Lizzy’s death doing this to me. I wish there was no reason for Elijah’s dad to look at me with pity. I wish that there could be one shower, one meeting, one fuckfest with a gorgeous woman when I didn’t need to have my phone close by and my ringer turned up in case of an emergency. I wish that I could just be happy that I landed this Keegan deal, that I have obscene amounts of money and a sleek new penthouse, and a nice body and an even nicer dick and hair that does a thing.

  But it turns out there are some things money and great hair can’t fix.

  Surprise.

  I drink the rest of my scotch, set the glass down on a high-top table, and venture deeper onto the grassed terrace. In front of me, the city rolls up a hill in a gentle flutter of lights; behind me is the stark curtain of glass and steel that marks my kingdom. Where I live, work, and play. And the air is filled with the summer music of cicadas and traffic, and I wish, just for a fucking moment, that I could remember what it was like to listen to those noises with a sense of peace. That I could stare at these lights and not remember the blare of hospital fluorescents, the beep of monitors, the smell of Chapstick.

  There’s hardly anyone else out on the terrace—although the night is young, and I’m certain drunk socialites will be laughing and tippling here as soon as the dessert plates are cleared away. Whatever the reason, I’m grateful for the moment of solitude before I head back into the victory lap, and I suck in one final grass-scented breath before I go inside, and that’s when I see her.

  It’s the dress I see first, actually, a glimpse of red, shivering silk, a flicker of a hemline dancing in the breeze. It’s like a red cape waved in front of a bull; within seconds, I’m Sean Bell again, victory lap and all, and I reverse direction, following the seductive glint of red silk until I find the woman it belongs to.

  She’s facing away from the glass and the milling rich people on the other side of it, leaning against one of the massive cables anchoring the top of the building to the terrace. The breeze plays with the silk along her body, ruffling the skirt and painting mouthwatering outlines of her waist and hips, and the city lights gleam along the warm brown skin of her exposed arms and back. I follow the groove of her spine down to where her dress sweeps over the swell of her ass and then back up to the delicate wings of her shoulder blades, which are crisscrossed by thin red straps.

  She turns at my footsteps, and I almost stop walking because fuck, she’s pretty, and double fuck, she’s young. Not like jail-young—but maybe college-young. Too young for a thirty-six-year-old man, certainly.

  And yet I don’t stop walking. I take a spot leaning against the thick anchor cable next to her and put my hands in my pockets, and when I look at her, both our faces are completely illuminated by the golden light spilling out from the benefit.

  Her eyes widen as she looks at me, her lips parting ever so slightly, as if she’s shocked at my face, as if she can’t believe what she’s seeing, but I quickly dismiss the notion. More likely she can’t believe how great my hair is.

  Unless—do I have food on my face or something? I surreptitiously run a hand over my mouth and jaw to make sure, and her eyes follow the movement with an avidity that kindles a hot, tight heat low in my belly.

  In this light, I can finally see her face properly, and I see that she’s not just pretty. She’s stunning, she’s incredible. She’s the kind of beautiful that inspires songs and paintings and wars. Her face is a delicate oval of high cheekbones and wide brown eyes, a slightly snubbed nose with a stud glinting at the side, and a mouth I can’t take my eyes from. Her lower lip is smaller than her upper one, creating a soft, lush pout. The entire picture is framed by a spray of corkscrewed curls.

  Jesus Christ. Pretty. What a stupid word to have used for her, what a bland shadow of the truth. Cakes and throw pillows are pretty—this woman is something else entirely. Something that makes me blink and glance away for a moment, because looking at her does this weird thing to my throat and my chest. Looking at her gives me this feeling like my hand is on a veil shrouding some powerful mystery, the way I used to feel looking at the stained glass windows of my church.

  The way I used to feel about God.

  Thinking of church and God brings with it a habitual spike of cold irritation, and it forces me to compose myself. I’m sure this woman thinks I’m nuts, coming up to her and then not even sustaining eye contact. Head in the game, Sean, I coach myself. Victory lap, victory lap.

  “Nice night,” I offer.

&nb
sp; She turns her head even more, the ends of her curls kissing her bare shoulders as she does, and suddenly all I want to do is kiss her bare shoulders myself, brush her hair aside and kiss along her collarbone until she whimpers.

  “It is,” she finally answers, and God, her voice. Sweet and alto, with just the tiniest bit of husk to the edge of her words.

  I cant my head back toward the party. “Doctor or donor?” I ask, trying to subtly warm my way to the real question—did you come here alone?

  Her eyes widen again, and I realize my words have surprised her, although God knows why, it seems like a normal enough question. And then there’s a flash of something unreadable in her eyes before she tamps it down.

  “Neither,” she says, and I know I’m not imagining the guardedness in her voice.

  Fuck. I don’t want to spook her—but then again, I don’t know that what I do want to do is that much better. She’s so young, too young to invite back to my place, too young to pull up into a hidden balcony so I can drop to my knees and find out how she tastes…

  God, I should walk away. Stick to my usual buffet of socialites and strippers. But even though I straighten up to go, I can’t actually make my body move away from her.

  Those copper-tinted eyes. That luscious mouth.