A Sinful Trap
Three Sinful Wishes, Book 2
R.G. Alexander
A Sinful Trap
Copyright 2020 by R.G. Alexander
Formatted by IRONHORSE Formatting
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite e-book retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Author’s Note: This book has been completely rewritten, based on a novella in the 2011 Three Sinful Wishes anthology by R.G. Alexander. Only the location and character names are the same. Also, it’s 3 times longer than the previous version. I can’t stress this enough; this is a completely different, brand new novel. I hope you enjoy it.
Dedication
This year more than ever, love is the reason. It's why we fight through illness, isolation and depression. Why we struggle over real and imagined obstacles. Why we keep getting up every time we fall. Sedona is the perfect place for second chances. It gave me mine when I lived there, and it gave Bailey and her bffs theirs as well.
Maybe there's enough magic in this book to keep that trend alive.
I want to dedicate this one to Robin, who stayed with me through this year even though it was THIS YEAR. To all my readers who have been patient and kind, I hope you love Cam and his mates as much as I do. May next year be a better one for all of us.
And to my Cookie...Your love is my reason.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Thanks for Reading!
Other Books from R.G. Alexander
About R.G. Alexander
Chapter One
Bailey dangled from the attic wearing nothing but a t-shirt and her lucky Wonder Woman boxers. Her first thought—after a few surprised shouts of disbelief—was that she’d made the wrong wish on that falling star she’d seen a few months ago.
Instead of a pair of Ewan McGregors, she should have asked for a handyman. A threesome with the handsome actor’s celebrity look-alikes could have been fun, but in hindsight, someone whose steady shoulder could be tapped when things went bump in the night made a lot more sense. Someone, for example, who might have noticed that the attic’s ladder at the small inn where she lived and worked was too old to survive 130 pounds of irritated innkeeper stomping to the top.
She adjusted herself, elbows braced on the sides of the opening and boobs smooshed on the dusty ledge in front of her, wondering if this day would ever end.
At five o’clock this morning, she’d been fixing a clogged toilet. By eight, she’d lost her appetite and was haggling with the plumber on the phone while helping a guest find his teeth so he could have some complimentary muffins.
They’d been in the linen closet. (His teeth, not the muffins.) And no, she hadn’t asked why.
Things had spiraled from there. Cyndy, her part-time help, was too sick to cover the desk, which meant missing lunch with her best friends, Kaya and Dani, as well as a much-needed stop at the grocery store. She’d had to settle for the last slice of leftover pizza while her guests fended for themselves.
Cooking wasn’t in her job description. A good thing, since the stove had been on its last legs for more than eight months and she’d never learned how to use it to begin with. If she couldn’t microwave or toast it, her meals usually came in a to-go box.
Thinking of food made her stomach growl as she considered simply climbing the rest of the way up and sleeping in the attic for the night.
“This is ridiculous.”
You should have wished for wings.
She slid the swoop of bangs out of her eyes and thought again about the falling stars she and her friends had wished on. Was that the night it happened? When she’d started to lose control of her life and her infamous five-year plan?
Until then, everything had been on track. When she’d shown up in town at sixteen, she’d been focused on the future. At first her only objectives were shelter, food and gainful employment. But each success since then, each obstacle she conquered, had led her to the next, reinforcing her safety net until nothing and no one could threaten it. Or so she’d thought.
Now The Enchanted Inn, her beloved problem child of a bed-and-sometimes-breakfast, had a new owner—that wasn’t her—and the last girls’ night she’d shared with Kaya and Dani had started with sangria-soaked wishes and ended barely a week later with a handsome wanderer turning into a coyote before Bailey’s eyes.
A fucking coyote.
That happened months ago and she still wasn’t over it.
Maybe you should focus on getting over your fear of falling first.
“Good plan.” Who cared if no one had come out to investigate her shouts of terror? That didn’t mean she’d spend the night broken or bleeding in the hallway until one of her guests got up for the day.
It probably didn’t mean that.
She only had three visitors at the moment, a couple in their late seventies and one shy woman from North Carolina who believed aliens from Sirius had told her to come to Sedona. The first two were deaf without their hearing aids, and the other fell asleep to recordings of pulsars and quasars whizz-beeping in her headphones. Of course they hadn’t heard her.
This was one of those moments when she wished she weren’t running this place entirely on her own. Another wish? Why not? If magic was real, it was about time it started working for her. She’d even welcome that coyote, Stax, right now if she could. Though as far as she knew, he only put out if someone had already returned the favor—the way Dani and her boyfriend Liam had.
The idea of seducing him hadn’t even occurred to her before now. She loved to flirt, but she hadn’t really wanted anyone—supernatural or otherwise—in years. Not that she had time for a relationship.
Bailey shook her head to get her focus off her celibacy problem and back to the immediate one that was likely going to land her in the hospital.
There was no way around it. She was going down. She was already halfway there anyway, pointed in the right direction and wearing her lucky superhero boxers. Maybe they would help.
“Let it go, Elsa,” she told herself firmly. The worst that could happen was a broken bone or two. As long as it wasn’t her neck, she’d be fine. Eventually.
“Well, Elsa, I have to admit this wasn’t the welcome
I was expecting.”
She jerked in surprise, nearly losing her hold on the ledge. “Who’s there?”
And why was he calling her Elsa with a deep, silky voice that made her think of porn instead of Disney? “How did you get in?”
“The door was open.”
“No, it wasn’t.” She’d locked it herself.
“I’m afraid it was. I was about to leave a note about it for the manager, when I saw your legs from the bottom of the stairs and decided to investigate.”
Thank God someone did. “However you got here, your timing is perfect. I wasn’t sure how I was going to get down on my own.”
A feeling of vulnerability knotted her stomach when he didn’t immediately respond. Perfectly normal, she told herself, considering a stranger was currently eye-level with her bare legs and floating ass. “Hello?”
“Hello. How did you manage to get up there in the first place?”
“There was a ladder.” Why was he asking questions instead of offering to help her down? That would have been her first instinct if she’d seen someone hanging from a hole in the ceiling. It sounded like he was smirking. Can you hear a smirk?
Who was he?
She didn’t recognize his voice, so she knew he wasn’t a local, and she didn’t have any reservations on the books for another week or two. She twisted awkwardly and looked down over her shoulder to spy a pair of very fine boots. They weren’t covered in grime or blood, so at least she could rule out serial killer or homeless wanderer.
Bailey knew her footwear, and no one walked long distances or ran from nefarious acts of violence in boots like that. They were created for short-term, inside swaggers only. Which, she supposed, was about as comforting a thought as she could have in this situation.
“I see a pile of sticks on the ground. Was that your ladder?”
Sticks? Shit. She added the replacement costs to her mental budget. “That’s the one. Unfortunately, even if I knew a repairman who’d be willing to help me this late, or a fireman who specialized in treed cats, I appear to have left my phone in my other pants.”
She heard a muffled sound of amusement. “You do own pants then.”
Was he teasing her? Flirting? Now?
Sexy voice or not, that kind of made him an asshole. But she was a professional, and if there was the smallest possibility that he could be a paying guest, she had to keep her tone pleasant.
“Believe it or not, this has never happened before. Usually I’m at the front desk saying something like ‘Welcome to the Enchanted Inn, your home away from home in the most beautiful place on Earth. We don’t serve meals, but we can get you a coupon for the Tlaquepaque Arts and Shopping Village as well as a discount on one psychic reading.’”
Yes, she’d said it often enough that she could welcome anyone, even in a situation like this.
“That’s a mouthful. And fortunes instead of food?” He scoffed. “Your manager should know better. People prefer all-inclusive destinations. If not twenty-four-hour room service, at least two meals a day.”
Oblivious. Ass. Hole. “I’m sure this is a fascinating topic we should be discussing face to face. If you wouldn’t mind helping me down before I fall?”
“Oh. Of course. Give me a minute to sort out the logistics.”
He was laughing at her. “Maybe I’ll get lucky and grow those wings I wished for while I wait.”
She heard his swanky boots kicking the ruined ladder out of the way.
“Thought you could fly already,” he muttered. “Or is there kryptonite in your attic?”
Excuse me? “Look, Boot Boy, if you aren’t going to help me, and you don’t even know the difference between Superman and Wonder Woman, I’ll kindly ask you to leave so I can take this tumble on my own. Just call 911 on your way out the door.”
“I won’t let you fall.” He stepped so close she could feel the heat from his body. “Boot boy?”
She hated how everything inside her perked up and said hello when he spoke. And that chuckle… She should be insulted at his rude familiarity and general assholery, but instead she was tempted to say something clever just to hear him laugh again.
Cut that shit out.
It had to be low blood sugar and adrenaline. No one could be held accountable for their thoughts while clinging to a damn attic ledge. His hand was barely on her hip when her attention was snagged by a dim flash of blue light several feet away. Then something big moved in the darkness of the creepy old attic. What the—
“Holy shit.”
“What’s wrong?” he demanded. At least he wasn’t laughing anymore.
“Give me a minute.” She almost swallowed her tongue as she took in eight legs, too many eyes, and a body roughly the size of a toy terrier. It was covered with strange geometric markings that she could barely make out in the light filtering up from the hallway.
If it weren’t moving, she wouldn’t believe it was real. She’d never seen anything like it. But she’d heard about something exactly like it a few months ago. From Dani.
That was impossible. Wasn’t it? There was no way this was Dani’s disappearing spider, the one Kaya said was a messenger from some grandmother spirit guide or something.
“You are not here,” she whispered to the creature.
“I am. I’m right here and I’m going to help you down, okay, Elsa?” She wanted to tell him not to call her that, and not to talk to her like she was having a mental break, though at this point she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t.
“Just wait,” she told him impatiently.
The spider was pacing and flailing its many arms as it looked at her. Strange. Dani hadn’t mentioned it being angry. If it was some sort of mystical messenger, it seemed less than thrilled to be meeting her.
“If you don’t like it here, why don’t you skip me and head over to Kaya’s place?” she invited helpfully. “Then we can both forget this ever happened.”
In retrospect, it was the wrong thing to say. The sharp pincers on the spider’s face snapped menacingly.
Shit.
It didn’t matter that she knew what was coming. It was physically impossible to stay calm, cool and collected when a super-spider was making a kamikaze-like run at her head. She could actually hear the rapid clacking noise its legs were making on the plank floor as it sped toward her face. “Fuck!”
Her hands shot up defensively, her acrophobia replaced by the more immediate fear of having a magic spider plastered to her face like one of those face-hugger things from the Alien movies.
Before she could plummet to her death or, more likely, a bruised ego and behind, she was caught by a pair of thickly muscled arms. The rescue still jarred her bones and stole her breath, but it could have been worse.
Muscles. So many muscles.
“I’ve got you.”
It was either the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to her, or relief had made her giddy. The fact that he’d caught her like it was nothing and he looked like the perfect combination of giant lumberjack and GQ cover model didn’t help the situation.
“Spider,” she breathed out on a sigh, unable to look away from him.
His expression of fascinated interest probably mirrored her own. Then his brow furrowed in confusion. “You saw a spider? Was that who you were talking to?”
“It was big,” she said, still shaken by her first look at his face. It was a good face. Strong. Stubbled jaw. Dimpled chin. Good cheekbones. His eyes were almost gunmetal gray, silver really, beneath a set of stern eyebrows. She’d never seen eyes like that before. “I was trying to reason with it.”
“You must have said something it didn’t like,” he murmured, his arms tightening around her. “They’re easily insulted.”
“You speak spider?”
“You don’t?”
“You can be charming then,” she said, echoing their earlier exchange.
His lips curved in a bemused smile. “I’m as surprised as you are.”
I’m half naked with bits o
f dust and who knows what else in my hair, I can’t remember if I shaved today, and this is when you send the spider and this glorious specimen my way? You’re fired, spirit Granny.
She wasn’t even wearing lip gloss, for crying out loud.
The way he was looking at her, like a lion lazily eyeing his evening meal, told her he didn’t mind. It should have raised all her internal alarms, but instead, she was ready to volunteer for the role of gazelle. This wasn’t like her at all. She didn’t even know his name.
“Did it bite you?” He squeezed her gently and she shivered in arousal. He was asking if she was okay, but based on her reaction, he may as well have said, “Can I bite you?”
Yes.
“No. It charged me. Like a bull.”
“A chatty bull spider drawn to that pink stripe in your hair. Makes sense to me.”
They were talking, but the words had no meaning for Bailey. All her attention was focused on the warm fingers flexing into her skin, the heat of his body engulfing her, the eyes that were tempting her with secrets. And he smelled really good.
Bailey had never bought into the pheromone thing, but now she had to wonder. Her body recognized his and wanted, without reason. “You feel nice.”
The words slipped out without her permission and she immediately wanted to slap herself.
Pull yourself together, woman! This is embarrassing.
“I mean I feel fine. I’m nice. I’m good.” She clasped hands in her lap to stop herself from touching his chest. “Now, is there something I can do for you?”
“Loaded question.” The rough pads of his fingers slid beneath the leg of her boxers and pressed into the bare flesh of her ass, branding her with his touch. “There was something, but you’ll need to give me a minute. You feel nice, too, and I’m distracted.”
“Take your time.”
Was this really happening?
Back when she wasn’t living like a nun, she’d usually required a drink and a minimal exchange of information and banter before she got to this point with anyone, male or female. Was she really ready to drag this complete stranger to her narrow, lumpy bed and keep him there for hours? Days?
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