“I want to kiss you, but I’m not sure it’s worth the risk.” Hunter’s voice was both smooth and rough, honey poured over gravel.
“Wh-what do you think will happen?” Millie was shocked at the sound of her own voice—whisper-soft, breathless with anticipatory excitement. Breathless with lust.
He nudged one side of her mouth with his lips, just a gentle bump of flesh on flesh, and yet it created a storm of sensation. Tingles, fizzes, darts of need that traveled straight to her core. His lemony aftershave intoxicated her senses. She felt tipsy—no, flat-out drunk and out of control. “Well, let’s see... One, you might slap my face.”
“I abhor violence of any type.” Who was this person sitting in the car with him, almost kissing him? Acting coy and coquettish, as if she had written the handbook on flirting?
“Two, you might kiss me back.”
Millie double blinked. “And th-that would be a problem?”
He smiled against the side of her mouth and a wave of incendiary heat coursed through her body.
“Yes. I might not want to stop kissing you.”
Wanted: A Billionaire
What a woman wants...
Ivy, Zoey and Millie know what they want. They just never imagined that they might need the help of a billionaire to get it! Or that the arrival of Louis, Hunter and Finn would make their ordinary lives, in an instant, extraordinary!
Still, it’s the ultrarich businessmen’s lives that will truly change. They’re about to learn that life is about more than just their next business deal. This time, it’s not their money that they’ll have to put on the line... It’s their hearts!
Lose yourself in...
Louis and Ivy’s story
One Night on the Virgin’s Terms
Available now!
Millie and Hunter’s story
Breaking the Playboy’s Rules
Available now!
And don’t forget to look out for Zoey and Finn’s story
Coming soon...
Melanie Milburne
Breaking the Playboy’s Rules
Melanie Milburne read her first Harlequin novel at the age of seventeen, in between studying for her final exams. After completing a master’s degree in education, she decided to write a novel, and thus her career as a romance author was born. Melanie is an ambassador for the Australian Childhood Foundation and a keen dog lover and trainer. She enjoys long walks in the Tasmanian bush. In 2015 Melanie won the HOLT Medallion, a prestigious award honoring outstanding literary talent.
Books by Melanie Milburne
Harlequin Presents
Tycoon’s Forbidden Cinderella
The Return of Her Billionaire Husband
Conveniently Wed!
Bound by a One-Night Vow
Once Upon a Temptation
His Innocent’s Passionate Awakening
Secret Heirs of Billionaires
Cinderella’s Scandalous Secret
The Scandal Before the Wedding
Claimed for the Billionaire’s Convenience
The Venetian One-Night Baby
Wanted: A Billionaire
One Night on the Virgin’s Terms
Visit the Author Profile page at Harlequin.com for more titles.
To all the dedicated frontline medical workers soldiering on during the COVID-19 pandemic. You are all amazing to put your own lives on the line to help others. You sacrifice time with your own families, you work punishingly long hours and you support those who work alongside you. You are the true heroes of this era.
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
EXCERPT FROM HOW TO UNDO THE PROUD BILLIONAIRE BY JOSS WOOD
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS THE first time in her life Millie had asked a man to meet her for a drink and now she was going to be late. Seriously, embarrassingly, late. But this was no ordinary date. This meeting with hotshot celebrity divorce lawyer Hunter Addison was not for herself but for her mother.
Her mother collected ex-husbands like some people collected coins. And, sadly, it was going to take an eye-watering amount of coins to get rid of husband number four—money that Millie could ill afford to lend her mum right now. Hunter Addison wasn’t the cheapest divorce lawyer in London, but he was reputed to be the best.
And, for her mum, Millie wanted the best.
Millie walked as quickly as she could towards the wine bar where she’d asked Hunter to meet her after work. She hadn’t spoken to him in person, only via text message. The thought of talking to him on the phone after their disastrous blind date two months ago was too confronting. So too was the prospect of meeting him again in person but this wasn’t about her—it was about her mother’s welfare. She could not bear to see her mother screwed over by yet another self-serving, narcissist ex.
Millie pushed open the front door of the wine bar and stepped inside, quickly scanning the room for any sign of Hunter. Couples and small groups were sitting at the various tables in the front section but there was no sign of a man sitting by himself. Of course, it would be incredibly rare for a man as good-looking, wealthy and sophisticated as Hunter ever to sit in a bar by himself. He had a reputation for being a fast-living playboy. Hardly a week went past when he wasn’t snapped by the paparazzi with yet another gorgeous supermodel-type woman draped on his arm.
Interestingly, in the couple of months since their blind date, there had been nothing in the press about his sexual antics. Maybe Millie’s immunity to his attractiveness that night had bruised his overblown ego. Not flipping likely. Men like Hunter Addison had industrial-strength egos. Trying to put a dent in his ego would be like trying to crack a brazil nut with a feather boa. Not going to work.
‘You’re late.’ A deep and crisp male voice rich with censure spoke from behind her.
Millie spun round and, even though she was wearing vertiginous heels, she had to crane her neck up, up, up to meet Hunter Addison’s whisky-brown eyes. It was hard not to feel a little flustered coming face-to-face with such arrant masculinity. Such heart-stopping male perfection. Broad-shouldered and tall, with a lean and athletic build, he exuded strength and potency. At a virile thirty-four, he was in the prime of his life and it showed.
And every female cell in her body sat up and took notice. ‘Yes, I know. I’m sorry but—’
‘Something wrong with your phone?’ The smile that wasn’t really a smile matched the cynical gleam in his eyes.
Millie mentally counted to ten, trying to control her desire to snap out a biting retort. What was it about this man that made her feel so prickly, on edge and so...so combative? Her experience around men was limited. She had only ever had one lover and, since her childhood sweetheart Julian had died three years ago after a long battle with brain cancer, she hadn’t dated again.
Well, apart from the wretched blind date with Hunter, which had been an unmitigated disaster from start to finish. But then, she had wanted to sabotage it. She had done everything in her power to give him the cold shoulder and hot tongue routine. She was not going to be set up by friends to ‘move on’. She was not going to be flirted with and charmed by a man who hadn’t heard the word ‘no’ from a woman his entire life.
But now she
needed Hunter’s help and she had no choice but to swallow the choking lump of her pride. And boy, oh, boy did it taste sour.
Millie straightened her shoulders and forced herself to hold his gaze. ‘There was, actually. I forgot to charge it overnight and it ran out of battery just after I left work. Then there was some sort of security incident involving the police on my way here and I had to take a six-block detour.’
In flipping sky-high heels and a tight-fitting pencil skirt, she wanted to add, but managed to restrain herself.
It was hard to tell if he believed her or not. His expression was now largely inscrutable and yet there was something about the way his eyes drifted to her mouth for the briefest of moments that made the backs of her knees tingle.
‘Come this way. I have a table in the back where it’s more private.’ His tone had a commanding edge that made her want to insist on a table out front instead. He probably thought she regretted giving him the brush-off. He probably thought she wanted a rerun of their date.
But no. No.
This was not a cosy little tête-à-tête. This was not a date in any shape or form. This was a meeting to convince him to act for her mother. But she found herself—meekly, for her—following him to the table in the quieter back section of the wine bar.
Hunter waited until she was seated before he took the chair opposite. She was conscious of his long legs so close to hers under the small table and kept her knees tightly together and angled to the right to avoid any accidental touching. Millie was also conscious of the way her heart was beating—deep pounding beats that echoed in her ears as if her blood was sending out a sonar warning. Danger.
Hunter picked up the drinks menu and handed it to her across the table. ‘What would you like to drink?’
Millie took the menu and gave it a cursory glance before handing it back. ‘Just mineral water, thank you.’
He made a soft sound of amusement and a sharper glint appeared in his eyes. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve gone teetotaller on me?’
Millie could feel a hot blush stealing over her cheeks. She had drunk three glasses of wine during their date, as well as a lethally strong cocktail, in an effort to get through the ordeal. The day of their disastrous date had been the anniversary of Julian’s death, and each year she struggled to get through it—which was why her friends had organised the blind date with Hunter, hoping it would distract her and help her to move on. It had distracted her all right. Everything about Hunter Addison was distracting, back then and now. Especially now.
But it wasn’t grief that had made that day so hard for her.
It was another G-word. Guilt.
Millie aimed her gaze to a point above his left shoulder rather than meet his probing gaze. ‘No. I just don’t feel like alcohol right now.’
Hunter signalled the waiter and ordered Millie’s mineral water and a gin and tonic for himself. Once the waiter had gone to fetch the drinks, Hunter leaned back in his chair with a casual ease she privately envied. He was dressed in a smart grey suit and snowy-white business shirt, the top button undone above his loosened, finely checked grey-and-white tie, giving him a chilled out, laid back air. He was devilishly handsome with short black hair, a straight nose and a sculptured mouth—the lower lip fuller than the top one. His late-in-the-day stubble shadowed his chiselled jaw and around his mouth, and he had a well-defined philtrum between his nose and top lip.
A sensual mouth...
Millie sat up straighter in her chair, shocked at her errant thought. She wasn’t interested in his mouth. She was interested in his professional expertise. And the sooner she engaged it, the better. But right now it was almost impossible to get her brain into gear, to be logical and rational and stay on task. Every time he looked at her, flutters and tingles erupted in her flesh, as if he had closed the distance between them and touched her with one of his broad-span hands.
One thing she knew for sure—she must not let him touch her. That would take her pretence of immunity way out of her skill set.
‘So, here we are. Again.’ Hunter’s gaze went on a lazy perusal of her face, and something in her stomach turned over. And the way his voice leaned ever so slightly on the word ‘again’ made the roots of her hair tingle, as if tiny footsteps were tiptoeing over her scalp.
Millie licked her suddenly too-dry lips. She smoothed her skirt over her knees with her hands and tried to ignore the way her pulse was leaping. ‘I feel I should apologise for how I behaved the last time we met.’
She chanced a glance at him and found him looking at her with studied concentration. Was that his lawyer face? The steady and watchful legal eagle quietly assessing his client. Reading between the lines of what his client said and what they did. But she wasn’t his client. Although, she wasn’t exactly a friend asking a favour either, was she? They had disliked each other on sight...or at least she had made up her mind she would dislike him.
She swallowed and continued. ‘I wasn’t in the best mood that night and I fear I might have taken it out on you.’
‘You fear?’ The edge of sarcasm in his voice was unmistakable.
Her chin came up and her gaze collided with his. ‘Well, you were hardly Mr Dream Date yourself.’
Something shifted at the back of his gaze, as if he was mentally recalling that night and didn’t like what he saw. A dull flush slashed high across his cheekbones and his lips twisted in a self-deprecating smile. ‘Point taken. My charm button was on pause that night.’
As apologies went, it wasn’t the most gracious, but then, she had been the one who had acted with the most appalling manners that night. He had been a little broody and distant, but she had been downright rude. She’d been annoyed at the matchmaking attempt of her friends, who had been at her for over a year to get out more. Beth and Dan were well-meaning, but they didn’t know the real reason she found the prospect of dating again so difficult.
Julian had been sick for six years before he’d finally succumbed to his illness, diagnosed just before he’d turned eighteen. The treatment had been gruelling, the first operation changing his personality from loving and kind to grumpy and short-tempered. But Millie had hung in there, hoping month after month, year after year, that things would get better. They hadn’t. The thought of breaking up with him had not only crossed her mind, it had taken up residence and patiently waited for a good opportunity for her to raise it with him. It had never come. Julian had always been too sick, too depressed or in one of those rare but wonderful phases when the cancer seemed to be in remission.
How could she have destroyed him by saying she wanted out?
Millie was pulled out of her reverie when the waiter appeared with their drinks and it was a moment or two before she and Hunter were alone again. Millie picked up her glass for something to do with her hands. She took a sip and covertly studied him. There should be a law against men looking so hot without even trying. He exuded male potency and she wondered what it would be like to be in bed with him, those gym-toned legs entwined with hers. Her mind ran wild with X-rated images of his naked body in full arousal.
Sex with her late fiancé had been difficult due to the ravages of his illness and his limited stamina. She had cared for Julian rather than loved him and had allowed him to find quick pleasure in her body without insisting on her own. It had made her annoyed with herself rather than him, knowing he couldn’t help being so ill. Since his death, she’d had fleeting thoughts about sex, but had never gone any further than occasional self-pleasure. Somehow, over the years with Julian and since his death, she had begun to associate all things sexual with disappointment, dissatisfaction and faint tinges of despair.
But now, sitting opposite Hunter, all she could think about was how it would feel to have his body thrusting within hers. She was pretty sure he would never leave a partner dissatisfied or disappointed. His sexual competence was an aura that surrounded him. Every time he locked gazes with her
, she felt a jolt of electricity shoot to her core. She wriggled in her seat, her lower body restless, agitated, hungry, her cheeks feeling as hot as fire.
A slight frown settled between his ink-black eyebrows and, though he picked up his drink, he didn’t take even a token sip. ‘One wonders, if you had such a miserable time on our blind date, why on earth would you want to repeat it?’ Hunter said, holding her gaze with his steely one.
Millie pressed her lips together. ‘I don’t. I wanted us to meet to discuss something...else.’
One of his eyebrows rose in a perfect arc. ‘Go on.’ His eyes never left hers—steady, strong, searching, sharply intelligent.
She ran the tip of her tongue over her parchment-dry lips, trying to ignore the way his gaze drifted downwards, as if he found the shape of her mouth fascinating. She drew in a breath and it shuddered through her chest like air in a damaged set of bellows. ‘I want to engage your professional services.’
His eyes flicked to her left hand, where Julian’s engagement ring still sat. Truth be told, Millie didn’t especially like the ring, but she continued to wear it out of guilt. She knew Beth and Dan had told Hunter about Julian’s death for he had mentioned it on their blind date. She had refused to discuss it with him and had abruptly changed the subject. ‘You’re not married. I’m a divorce lawyer. Not sure how I can help, unless there’s something you’re not telling me?’
There was a whole lot Millie wasn’t telling him, or anyone else for that matter. She had a reputation among her friends as being a sniffer dog for other people’s secrets. The thing was, she wasn’t all that good at keeping them, unless they were her own secrets. She knew the tells of someone trying to keep something hidden, because for years she had being keeping things hidden. And doing a stellar job of it too.
She had not been in love with Julian. And, worse, she had actually felt something akin to relief when he had died three days before their wedding. She played the role of tragic heroine so well. Heart-sore and unable to love again after the tragic loss of her childhood sweetheart. Still wearing his modest little engagement ring after all this time. Still grieving her one and only love. Her soul mate.
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