LITMIR.BIZ

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in the grin. “Scheherazade.”

      “You’re not serious.”

      “I am.”

      “Your real name is Scheherazade?”

      She shrugged, and the movement made him aware of the shawl she had around her shoulders. During the whole conversation, he hadn’t even noticed. It was dark gray, and even without touching it, he knew it was pashmina. She’d never settle for second best.

      “And who am I supposed to be? Sinbad? Aladdin?”

      She took a step toward him, invading his personal space. Which was fine, except that he had some trouble breathing.

      “Who do you want to be?”

      “Right now I wouldn’t want to be anyone on earth but me.”

      “Excellent answer.”

      “So what do people call you? Sher?”

      “No. But you may.”

      He was about to comment, but a single finger touched his lips. An incredibly intimate gesture, something a lover would do. Not a stranger using a false name. Not a woman so beautiful it hurt.

      She leaned over until her lips were close to his ear, close enough for him to feel her breath once more. “Why don’t we talk about this Wednesday night. At the Versailles hotel bar. Eight o’clock.”

      Then she did the most remarkable thing. She nipped his earlobe. It didn’t hurt. It only lasted a second. But it was the single most erotic thing that had ever happened to him. By the time he was cogent enough to exhale, she was gone. He spun around, just in time to see her slip out the boutique door.

      What in hell? Was that for real? Was she?

      Wednesday night he had dinner plans with his friends Charley and Jane. He liked Charley and Jane. His dinners with them were the highlight of his week. He never cancelled.

      He rubbed the shawl between his hands.

      They’d get over it.

      FIVE BLOCKS FROM THE BOUTIQUE, Susan slipped inside a coffee shop and found an empty booth. Her heart rate was in the scary zone, pumping with enough adrenaline to jump-start a dead battery. What the hell had she just done?

      Okay, he was very handsome. But handsome men were a dime a dozen in Manhattan. Handsome didn’t explain her outrageous behavior. Well, there was that lower lip. Full in just the right way. Exceedingly kissable. And his eyes. Hazel leaning toward green. Bedroom eyes. Knowing eyes. Not to mention long, beautiful hands.

      Which was not the point. Not at all. Wasn’t she just bitching about the fact that all men saw were her looks? That she was more than her parts? Did she just pick up a strange man because he was pretty?

      No. That he was gorgeous was a bonus, not the reason. She couldn’t pinpoint her real motivation, not in words. It had been more of a feeling. A compulsion. The moment she’d laid eyes on him, she’d felt…something.

      The waitress approached on squeaky shoes and took her order for coffee and a plain bagel, no cream cheese, no butter. When Susan was alone again, she got her cell phone from her purse and hit speed dial two.

      “Hello?”

      “Lee, it’s me.”

      “Hey.”

      Susan opened her mouth to tell her girlfriend about what she’d done. Only no words came out.

      “Susan?”

      Why was she hesitating? She told her friends everything. In detail. So what was the problem? This whole thing was nuts.

      “Susan, are you all right?”

      The concern in Lee’s voice snapped her out of her mini fugue state. “Yeah. I’m fine. Just distracted for a minute. How are you feeling?”

      “Huge.”

      “This too shall pass.”

      Lee sighed. “Yeah? When?”

      “In about two months.”

      “Susan, what’s going on? You don’t sound like yourself.”

      “I walked away from a pair of Jimmy Choo mules. I didn’t even try them on.”

      “Ahhh. Now I get it. That was very brave. Very empowering.”

      “Empowering, my ass. They were the exact color of my duchess jacket.”

      “If you still feel that way, go back.”

      “No, no. I can be strong.”

      “Good girl.”

      The waitress came and filled her cup with coffee.

      “My food’s here,” she said. “I’ll call you later.”

      “’Kay. Bye.”

      Susan disconnected, then stared at the phone for a few moments. Mighty peculiar. She’d never made an excuse to get off the line with Lee. Or any of her friends. But the man in the camel coat wouldn’t let her alone.

      Tall, lean, broad-shouldered, brown thick hair her fingers ached to touch. She lifted her cup to take a sip, then nearly spit a mouthful all over the table.

      She’d bitten his earlobe!

      A perfect stranger. Not a lover. Not even a friend. She’d bitten him. He must have thought she was a lunatic. Or a call girl. Either way, she hadn’t come out smelling like a rose.

      She’d propositioned him. Teased him. Pretty much offered herself up on a silver platter. Which was ludicrous. She couldn’t possibly go to the Versailles Wednesday night. Sure, she talked a good game, daydreamed with the best of them, but the reality was, sex wasn’t an easy answer for her. She tended to confuse it with love, and then she tended to trust the son of a bitch, and then she tended to get her heart broken. Her dismal track record was reason enough not to pursue this.

      He was a stranger. A good-looking stranger, but a stranger nonetheless. He could be a bank robber. A spy. A car salesman.

      She smiled, thinking about the name she’d given him. Scheherazade. It had been the scarves, the music from the bookstore. Just a lark. A whim.

      But she had to admit, the idea of being someone else held appeal. Would Larry have pursued her so single-mindedly if he hadn’t known she was Susan Carrington, heir to the Carrington fortune? Probably not. Definitely not.

      The fact of her inheritance had been the death knell to every relationship she’d had since college. Even when she’d gone out with men wealthy in their own right, the money thing became a problem. It was her personal albatross. She avoided society parties like the plague. In fact, all her friends were just normal folk. Not a multimillionaire in the bunch. But it didn’t matter. As soon as a man found out her name, the jig was up. They tried to impress her. Act as if it didn’t matter, which meant it mattered a whole lot. They stopped seeing her as their brains clouded over with dollar signs.

      At least she’d managed to temper some of her bitterness. Not that she wasn’t still cynical. She just didn’t want to neuter the male population any more. It wasn’t all of them that were bad, just the ones she chose.

      The worst part was, she couldn’t complain. Not in good conscience. She had it all, the American dream, the brass ring. Except that all it had done was make her feel different, separate. She felt safe with her gang, and that was about the only place she felt safe. Thank goodness for them.

      But Ben was married to Katy, Trevor was married to Lee and Peter was gay with a significant other of his own. No hope for a happy-ever-after there. They’d tried setting her up. Over and over, Katy and Ben in particular had played matchmaker. Nothing clicked.

      At twenty-seven, she had no prospects. None at all. She could buy Jimmy Choo shoes until she got blue in the face, and it wasn’t going to help. It was all about money. Spending

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