by Lisa Childs
Miranda couldn’t agree more. But she was afraid she had more heart than her sisters realized, more heart than she could risk going out with Grant Snyder.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’m not going out with him. I’m much too busy.”
“That’s why you need to go out with him,” Tabitha said. “You have to have some fun. It’s gotta be killing you to be all work and no play nowadays.”
“It’s killing us,” Regina said. “You’re working us to death, too.”
Maybe she did keep Regina busy with the website updates and social media marketing. And Tabitha had been putting in some long hours at the reception desk.
“It’s only because I want the business to be successful,” she said.
“Then you shouldn’t have set up our most impressive member with a freebie date with your best friend,” Regina said.
“If you were going to set up the Italian billionaire with a freebie, it should have been one of us,” Tabitha said. “Not Blair...”
Her sisters had always resented her close friendship with Blair Snyder. They’d wanted her to be their friend like they were to each other. But as the oldest, she’d always felt responsible for them—more responsible than their mother had ever felt for any of them. Her matchmaking business, and the marriages it had led to for her, had always been her baby more than her daughters.
“I’m not going to have this argument again,” Miranda said. She’d already grabbed her laptop bag and purse as she’d shown out the latest potential member, so now she pulled open the door to the hall. But she couldn’t walk through it—not because of her sisters but because of the man filling it. The man who wanted to be a member.
And her date...
* * *
“Aren’t you eager?” Grant teased, knowing full well that Miranda had probably been trying to escape before he’d returned for her. That was why he’d returned even earlier than he’d told her.
“Yes,” she agreed—much to his surprise. Then she added, “To go home and have a glass of wine—a big glass of wine.”
He shrugged. “Okay, if you want to skip the date and go straight back to your place, I’m not going to complain.”
She glared at him. “You are not invited to join me.”
“Yet...” But he intended to charm that invitation out of her. Hell, he wanted to make her beg him to come home with her.
But this was Miranda Fox...
She was going to be a far greater challenge than any he’d ever faced.
“Ever,” she said.
“We have an agreement,” he said. “You agreed to give me a trial run to prove that I’d make a great addition to your dating service.”
“I did not agree to anything,” she insisted.
And he chuckled at her indignation.
“You did,” her red-haired sister chimed in from behind her. She was much taller than Miranda, but then, pretty much everyone was. He felt massive standing in front of her.
“Did not,” Miranda said, her words clipped as if she was gritting her teeth.
“You should have,” said the dark-haired woman who appeared beside the red-haired one.
Her other sister. He couldn’t remember her name, but then, he hadn’t seen her very much. She’d only come out of their house once in a while. They’d lived just a few houses down the block from Grant’s family; that was how Blair and Miranda had become such close friends.
“A trial run is a great idea,” she added.
“Not for me,” Miranda said.
“You’re the boss,” the dark-haired one said—with a trace of resentment. “You’re the one who makes all the decisions on who can join. You have to do this.”
Miranda turned to glare at her sister now. And the red-haired one reached over her shoulder toward him.
“Here’s her passport,” she said.
Grant grinned. He liked that the other women had ganged up on Miranda. He wasn’t sure if they were doing it to help him or piss her off, though. “I’ll make sure she has a good time,” he assured them. “A real good time.”
The red-haired one smiled and winked at him. “I’m sure you will.”
He chuckled.
Miranda turned her attention to him, reaching for her passport. “Give that back to me,” she said—in that haughty princess tone she’d adopted as an adult.
He liked it. “After our little trip,” he told her.
“Does she need a suitcase?” the red-haired sister asked.
He shook his head. He hoped she would soon need no clothes at all. “Just the passport.”
“So this is going to be short?” Miranda asked. “Just showing off your airplane?”
“Something like that,” he said.
She sighed and begrudgingly agreed. “Okay then...”
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” the dark-haired one told them.
“Don’t listen to her,” the redhead said. “There’s too much uptight Regina wouldn’t do. Don’t do anything either of you wouldn’t do.”
“That makes no sense,” Regina said.
“It makes perfect sense,” the redhead said and chuckled. “There isn’t anything the two of them wouldn’t do.”
“Neither of you makes any sense,” Miranda admonished them. “And you wonder why I’m the boss...” Seemingly disgusted, she shook her head as she stepped out into the hall outside her suite of offices.
Now he wondered if she was only leaving with him to escape her sisters. He didn’t care what her reason was, though. Once he had her on that plane...
He was going to take her for a great escape and prove to her that she would be lucky to have him as a member of her dating service.
Not that he intended to actually join...
But his pride was still stinging a bit over her outright refusal to let him join, as if he wasn’t good enough for her clients—or for her.
Just as he wanted her to beg him to go home with her, he wanted her begging him to join Liaisons International soon. But that he would refuse to do.
He intended only to set her straight about his sister once and for all—so she would stop interfering in Blair’s life. He’d overheard some of the sisters’ comments about the freebie she’d given Blair. Did she intend to take it back?
Didn’t matter what she intended, though. He damn well wasn’t going to let her. But instead of lecturing and threatening her, he was going to charm her into agreeing to whatever he wanted. Like her.
Even annoyed—either with him or her sisters—she looked beautiful. Her lips, pursed into a slight pout, shimmered, and her blue eyes sparkled. And her body...
She was small but shapely and so damn sexy.
Damn, he wanted her.
But could he, the professional gambler, take such a risk? Miranda Fox wasn’t a woman a man would easily walk away from.
CHAPTER FOUR
HE’S UP TO SOMETHING... Something that was not going to end well for her.
Miranda had never been a nervous flier, until now. For the flights she’d taken, she usually had a different Snyder as the pilot. The one she trusted. As she settled into the passenger side of the two-seater plane, she remarked, “Before we take off, should I check to see if you’re wearing a parachute underneath your jacket?”
Grant’s brow furrowed with confusion. “Why would I need it? I’m a great pilot.”
“I was thinking that maybe you intend to bail out and let me and the plane crash into the ocean,” she said.
He chuckled. “I hadn’t thought of that. Not a bad plan...”
“So you do want to get rid of me!” she accused. She’d known he was up to something.
He flashed that wicked grin of his. “Would I have asked you out if I wanted to get rid of you?”
“I don’t know why you asked me out,” she said.
>
“I told you—it’s an audition so that you can see what a great date I will be and let me join your service.”
She shook her head. “I’m not buying it.”
“Then maybe it’s unrequited love.”
She laughed at his blatant lie. “I’d sooner believe you were trying to get rid of me.”
He shook his head. “Not by bailing out and ditching this baby. After what we just paid for it, Blair would kill me.”
The plane was quite luxurious, with a leather seat so comfortable that Miranda had sunk deeply into it. The control panel was trimmed with mahogany. And when he started it up...
The engine wasn’t loud at all, not like in the other small planes Miranda had ridden in with Blair. Or like the helicopter they’d had to take from Monaco to the airport in Nice. Grant hadn’t been at the controls of that, though. He’d been a passenger like her.
She hadn’t been nervous with that pilot, either. She’d been more nervous about the big man sitting so close to her that she’d felt the heat of his body. He had seemed nervous, though, so maybe he didn’t like it when someone else had the controls.
If that was the case, he wasn’t going to want to go out with her again. Not that she wanted to go out with him again. Hell, she hadn’t wanted to go out with him now. She didn’t even know why she’d agreed.
Except that it had been a long, taxing day...and she’d wanted a distraction from thinking of her current business woes.
And Grant Snyder was distracting, with his big, muscular body and deep golden hair.
“It is nice,” she agreed, but her gaze had slipped down to his heavy thighs. She cleared her throat. “The plane is nice. But I don’t think Blair would be upset about just it.”
He glanced at her with a twinkle in his dark blue eyes. “Really? What else would she be upset about?”
“Me,” she said. “I am your sister’s best friend, you know. If you do anything to hurt me, she’s going to hate you.”
The twinkle dimmed, and he turned back to the controls. He was definitely up to something...something that neither she nor Blair was going to like.
He didn’t look at her again until after takeoff, which she had to begrudgingly admit was extremely smooth. But still, her suspicions were not alleviated, and he must have noticed, because when he glanced back at her, he chuckled. “Stop being so nervous! I’m not going to hurt you.”
She narrowed her eyes even more.
He chuckled again. “Seriously, I am going to be the perfect gentleman for this perfect date.”
She laughed now. “So you’re going to perform a miracle and turn into someone else?”
He wiggled his eyebrows. “Maybe I already have, and you just haven’t noticed.”
Was that possible? Was he different than he’d been when they were kids? He was bigger, more handsome, but his personality?
It seemed much the same.
Miranda had changed, though. So it was possible...
She was no longer the wild child she’d once been. Now she didn’t seek to escape from responsibilities she hadn’t chosen. The responsibilities she had now were ones that she’d chosen. Like making the business a success while staying true to her friendships.
Making Matteo Rinaldi and Blair the perfect match was more important than having him available to date more clients even though they were starting to lose clients.
“So it’s going to be like that?” Grant asked.
She shook her head to clear her mind of the doubts her sisters had planted and focused instead on the one Grant had planted. Could he have really changed?
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“The fact that you’re not talking,” he said. “You’re going to make this audition tough on me, huh? Or is this what the women with your dating service are like? Suspicious? Uncommunicative? Uninteresting?”
She sucked in a breath as his insult struck her like a slap. “Did you just call me uninteresting?”
He sighed. “Well, I have to admit... I’m kind of bored.”
She glared at him.
“And you, you haven’t even noticed the view? You’re just sulking over there.”
Heat rushed to her face. She had been sulking. About her sisters, about him.
She glanced out the window, and while her stomach flipped at the height, she sighed over the beauty of the water beneath them. It was such a crystal-clear turquoise.
“Beautiful...” she murmured.
“Yes,” he agreed, his voice gruff. But he wasn’t looking out the window; he was looking at her.
She narrowed her eyes again. “And I have every right to be suspicious of you,” she reminded him. “You haven’t ever been nice to me.”
His gaze ran over her like a caress, from her silver-tipped toes peeping out of her silver sandals, up her bare legs, over her body, until finally he stared into her eyes. And his mouth curved into a slight, sexy smile. “I would enjoy being nice to you. Very, very nice to you...”
“And,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, because she really, really wanted to ignore what he’d just said. While she didn’t react verbally, though, her body reacted to his words and to his gaze, which had been so hot—so wicked—that she’d nearly felt the heat of it. Her nipples tightened against the lace of her bra. And he hadn’t even touched her...
And she didn’t want him to. She really, really could not want Grant Snyder.
“And?” he prodded her.
Making her realize she’d lost her train of thought because of him. As usual.
“And,” she said, “I never agreed to this audition.”
“You must have changed, too,” Grant said.
“What—why?”
“Because the Miranda Fox I knew never did anything she didn’t want to do,” he said.
If only that had been true...
But her mother’s flightiness had made it necessary for Miranda to grow up fast—too damn fast. She let a wistful sigh escape before murmuring, “You didn’t know me at all...”
* * *
Her statement jarred Grant, so much so he inadvertently jerked the yoke, and the plane, in her direction.
A little squeak escaped her lips now like that wistful-sounding sigh had moments ago. “You are trying to kill me,” she exclaimed as she pressed a hand over her heart. But with the words coming through the smile curving her lips, she didn’t sound afraid; she sounded excited as she stared out at all the gorgeous water.
That was the Miranda he knew: the daredevil who’d always gotten Blair into trouble with her many misguided adventures. But had there been more to Miranda Fox than he knew?
There was certainly more to her now: a sex appeal that had tension gathering low in his belly, in his groin. When had she gotten so damn hot? It radiated off her—totally at odds with that pale blond hair and those pale blue eyes. While she looked like an ice princess, she was too sassy, too smart, too sexy to ever be mistaken for one.
While he easily righted the plane, he struggled for control of his body, of his desire for her. Because another thing she’d said earlier kept reverberating inside his head: I am your sister’s best friend, you know. If you do anything to hurt me, she’s going to hate you.
He hadn’t considered that.
For some misguided reason, Blair really did love this woman and considered her the sister she’d never had. It had just been him and Blair...
Their mom had been too busy trying to make their dad happy, and their dad had been so unhappy despite all their mom’s efforts that neither of them had had any time for their children. So he and his sister were close, so close that she would understand.
Wouldn’t she?
Not that he intended to hurt Miranda. He wasn’t even sure that was possible. He’d been eavesdropping outside the office door before she’d opened it
and slammed into him. He could still feel the softness of her body against his.
But her body was the only soft thing about Miranda Fox. Even her sisters didn’t think she had a heart. So there was no way he could hurt Miranda, even if he wanted to. And he didn’t want to...
He only intended to make sure that she didn’t hurt his sister. And if she messed up Blair’s relationship with Teo, like she’d messed up every other relationship his sister had had, she was going to hurt Blair very badly.
“I’m not trying to kill you,” he assured her. “That would be a horrible first date, and there would be no way for you to enroll me in your service then.”
She chuckled. “That might be your plan, though. You would be able to talk my sisters into anything.”
“But not you?” he asked.
“Have you ever been able to talk me into anything?” she asked.
“I haven’t tried...” She’d been too young for him to even look at the way he was looking at her now.
She snorted. “Every time you saw me you tried to talk me into making other friends and leaving your sister alone.”
While Blair had had other friends than Miranda—giggling, happy friends—Miranda had seemed to have only her. He’d wondered then if that was because she’d been so dark and brooding back then. But Blair had always laughed more with Miranda than she had any of those giggly, happy girls.
“Let’s say I haven’t tried then the way I’m going to try now,” he amended.
She studied his face. “I knew it...”
“What?”
“You’re definitely up to something.”
“Six four,” he said.
Her brow furrowed for a moment before she laughed. “Smart-ass.”
“Takes one to know one.” She was smart—as smart as she was sexy. So of course she’d already guessed that he was up to something.
He could have just come clean and told her what it was—that he didn’t want her messing up his sister’s new relationship. But as she’d just pointed out, every time he’d tried talking her into something in the past, she’d ignored him. He was going to make sure that she couldn’t ignore him this time.