LITMIR.BIZ

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As if she wanted to encourage him sexually, letting him know he’d been all she’d had on her mind since the moment she’d met him.

      That she did, and he was didn’t change her decision to go for professional rather than come-hither.

      “Hi,” he said. “Found ya.”

      “So you did, Mr. Wallace.”

      “Nice to see you again…Miss Turner.” He glanced around her cluttered office, at the shelves laden with books and files and the stack of documents awaiting her signature in her in-box. Then he gazed past her at the window overlooking the city, one of the best views in the high-rise building. Whistling, he murmured, “I guess you do have a real job.”

      “What made you think I didn’t?”

      He met her stare, saying nothing.

      “Okay,” she acknowledged with a grudging smile. “I don’t suppose many of the bidders from the auction work on much more than their tans.”

      “But you don’t have one. Meaning you obviously work too much.”

      “It could be that I’m naturally pale-skinned and prone to burning.” And that she hadn’t had one of those lazy summer days on her father’s boat since last summer. She was going to have to remedy that.

      “I somehow suspect you spend twelve hours a day in here and just wave at the sun from your window as it goes by.”

      Smart man. And one who was right now making himself at home, sitting in a chair opposite her desk without being asked. Her office almost seemed to shrink around him, as if his big body had sucked up all the spare particles of air, leaving the two of them cloaked tightly in intimacy.

      Thank God for the desk. If it hadn’t been between them, Maddy might have been tempted to slide her chair closer, until their knees touched. Or their thighs. Or their mouths.

       Stop it.

      “Why’d you ditch me?”

      “Why did you pursue me?”

      “Ha. I asked you a complicated question and you asked me a very simple one.” He grinned. “I tracked you down because I owe you a date and I am not a welsher.”

      That was all. He wasn’t a welsher. Well, didn’t she just feel special, like an average everyday poker player waiting for a fivedollar payoff.

      “Now, your turn.”

      “It isn’t necessarily complicated.” She arched a brow and managed a bored tone. “Maybe I ditched you because I wasn’t interested.”

      His grin still confident, he immediately dispelled that possibility. “Twenty-five thousand bucks is a whole lot of disinterest.”

      “It’s for a worthy cause.”

      “So why didn’t you bid on somebody else early in the evening and get out right away?”

      “What makes you think I didn’t? Maybe you were my second-to-the-last chance to make a difference, so I made an outrageous bid.”

      “You didn’t bid on anybody else.” He leaned toward her desk, dropping his elbows on its surface. “Admit it.” The position sent muscle surging against cotton as his casual, washedout T-shirt hugged his arms. The flexing of his tanned skin against the black fabric was almost impossible to tear her gaze away from. She honestly didn’t think she’d ever seen a more powerfully built man in person.

      She knew she’d never slept with one.

      Most of the men Maddy had had sex with had been wiry young college guys who wanted any female they could get—especially wealthy, heiress females—or pale, soft businessmen she met in her usual circle. Those men—men like Oliver, her ex-lover, whom she’d kicked out of her life a year and a half ago—were generally toned from their weekend tennis game or occasional golf tournaments. Or, in Oliver’s case, from his frequent ski trips with his “best friend” Roddy.

      That Roddy had been a nickname for Rhonda, a twenty-yearold ski bunny, had been something he’d failed to mention. Maddy had found out the hard way when she’d decided to surprise him one weekend. She’d found Oliver in his room, engaging in some serious downhill action with the snow ho.

      There were no skis involved, but his pole had been getting quite a workout.

      She thrust away the memory, acknowledging that in the several months she’d dated the man, she’d never looked at him and immediately lusted the way she did with the guy sitting on the other side of her desk. Jake Wallace had the kind of massive, rock-solid body women dreamed existed but never expected to see in real life.

      And she coveted it. As he’d been coveting the other night.

      “I don’t think you bid on anyone else,” he murmured, speaking softly, as if aware she’d been struck a little brainless. “I was watching you from behind the curtain for a long time.”

      Feeling a bubble of air lodge in the center of her throat, Maddy struggled to swallow it down, but couldn’t quite manage it.

      He had been watching her. Watching. Her. With all the tall, elegant, skinny women in the room, she’d caught his eye…and had apparently kept it.

      In some contexts, hearing a man saying he’d been “watching her” could creep a woman out. But this didn’t. Just the way his hungry stare hadn’t the night they’d met.

      Instead, once again, he appeared so…honest. Open about his feelings. Jake sounded both confident and almost surprised by his own admission, as if he hadn’t meant to reveal his immediate interest in her, even though his presence here in her office confirmed it.

      He’s a pro at making women feel this way, a small voice in her head reminded her.

      “I even started asking the universe to let you be the one to win me,” he admitted.

      Startled into laughter, Maddy knew exactly what he meant. Tabitha had recently been touting the brilliance of the same selfhelp bestseller. She swore it was the reason she’d landed her latest fiancé, a well-known Chicago hotelier, who was nice, a bit dull, but richer than an oil baron.

      “You don’t strike me as the type who needs any secret when it comes to winning over a woman, Mr. Wallace.”

      “I obviously needed to find out one secret…your identity.”

      Smooth.

      “Fortunately, like Cinderella, you left a clue behind.”

      “I think I had both shoes on my feet when I got home.”

      “Your check. With your signature.”

      Frowning, she crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair. “They gave you my check?”

      “Just a quick peek. Then a helpful stranger told me the rest of what I needed to know.”

      How kind of the stranger.

      Honestly, though, considering she was edgy and excited, her pulse a little fast, her heart beating a little hard, maybe it had been a kindness. Maddy hadn’t dated anyone in a long time. The last scene with her ex had burned itself on her brain and left her skeptical of the sweet promises of any man. Oliver’s final words—when he’d insisted they could still be a great team with her money and his family connections, with no messy, intimate “emotions” attached—had replayed in her mind many times since then.

      She was a suitable candidate for the position of Oliver’s wife, with an acceptable pedigree and lots of cash. A great business prospect. Nothing more.

      Ouch.

      “Everybody knows everybody in your circle, huh?”

      “It’s the world’s biggest small pond.”

      “Yawn.”

      “You’ve

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