LITMIR.BIZ

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air began to arc between them, almost visible, coiling and floating like warm breath in the chilled night.

      New life. New love. New year.

       Nineteen. Eighteen. Seventeen.

      Totally entranced, Ian slid his right hand behind her neck, twining it in her hair with a lingering sigh. Her lips touched his even before he asked, even before he begged. Soft, sweet, and tasting like a new beginning.

      When the crowd jostled her closer, Ian didn’t complain, his left hand riding under her coat, finding the glorious skin of her back, the inviting curve of her waist. Around them, the world blew by, showers of confetti, bursts of cold wind and the joyous shouts of millions of not-quite-sober partiers. Ian ignored them all, because in the midst of these millions, it was only he and this woman, and the rest of their life.

      Her generous mouth opened, her tongue merged with his, coaxing, seducing. Oh, yes, he was so seduced, no coaxing necessary. His nerves fired, pulsing with life, pulsing with ideas that were older than time. He would take her home. He would make love to her. He would marry her. It was the Frank Capra way.

      Impulsive arms locked around his neck, burying her fingers in his hair. He could feel the insistent touch of her restless hands. Against his greedy mouth, she moaned. Music. Bells. Chimes. Somewhere he’d died and was kissing an angel.

      His hand slipped lower, pressing her against him, soft to hard. Her hips curled into him, her thigh rocking between his. His eyes crossed. Nope. No angel. They didn’t have moves like that in heaven.

      An irritant vibrated against his leg—not his cock, nor his pulse, which were both buzzing in their own overjoyed condition. She broke away, her breathing heavy, then lifted the phone, the exact phone he’d found for her only moments before. Which, if he had not found, she would not be talking into. No, they would still be kissing. Man, he was such a stupid dweeb.

      Next to them, one of the tourists shot him a look of male approval, but Ian ignored it, trying to restart his brain. Here was the inspiration he’d been seeking.

      As she talked, her gaze scanned the length of his cashmere coat. For the first time, he could see that elusive recognition flicker in her eyes—seeing him as a man who was worthy—financially viable. Possibly insecure, but there it was. Maybe the male code had some unwritten law saying it was cowardly to trade on his past life, but did geeky Clark Kent ever want to throw open his jacket, exposing the all-powerful S? Hell, yeah.

      The shouts of the crowd fell away. Only her words touched his ears. She was talking, trying to reconnect with her date. Date? No!

      Ian wanted to yell at her to hang up because this was kismet, karma, and the entire outcome of his postlay off life rested upon this one moment—no pressure. Instead, he kept his mouth shut, a confident grin plastered on his face as if this didn’t mean a damn thing.

      When she looked at Ian again, the soft blue eyes were so lonely and sad. He wondered if she had sensed the pull, too. Ian had never felt it before, never met a woman who stepped out of his dreams and into his arms. It should have been fate.

      “I’m over here,” she said into the phone, waving a graceful hand in the air for someone other than Ian. Other than Ian. He wanted to stop her because she couldn’t be with someone else. This was a new year. New opportunities. New loves…

      “I have to go. He’s my date,” she apologized, dashing the final vestiges of his hope to the ground much like last year’s sodden confetti.

      “No surprise there,” answered Ian, his voice faux cheerful. “Have a good year.” Have a nice life.

      One heartbeat later, her expression turned to the well-mannered smile given to a stranger on the street. Without another word, she politely asked her beefy neighbor to move out of the way, and then she moved out of Ian’s life.

      All before he’d even gotten her name.

      The winds of change blew cold and heartless, and Ian stomped on Hans’s foot, hard—international-incident hard—and Ian was gratified when the giant oaf muttered something in another language that probably involved mothers and copulation, not that he cared. Tourism was overrated anyway.

      As he made his way home, Ian looked back at the ball that was glittering like a fallen star, making outrageous promises it wasn’t going to keep.

      Happy New Year.

      In a crowd of two million, Ian had never felt so alone.

      Damn.

      Chapter Two

       12:41 a.m.

      ROSE HILDEBRANDE WANTED TO wind back the clock to last year, when Remy wasn’t sipping his champagne and discussing in elaborate detail his latest performance in the operating room.

      Rose wanted to return to that unforgettable instant when the stranger had been kissing her with such desperate need, as if he couldn’t get enough of her. As if with one kiss, he had found something golden and fleeting inside her. Romance—that was what they called it.

      The people, the crowds, the fear. Everything had been a black, paralyzing blur—except for the feel of that strong body holding her tight. Not to punish, no, it was protection.

      On a normal day, Rose knew exactly when she wanted to be touched, when people expected it and how she was supposed to react. That blood-pounding, swept-away sensation should have terrified her. But it was tempered by something new. Something almost…warm.

      Quickly she shook off the weakness. Control. Always in control.

      Now, sitting in the lobby of the Four Seasons with New York’s crème de la crème, her blood was neatly congealing back to its more reserved state. Her date for the night, world-renown pediatric cardiology surgeon Dr. Remy Sinclair, was cheerfully describing his day. The rest of the universe was planning a celebration, and Remy was slaving over the operating table, saving the lives of small children. Heroic, handsome, charming and rich. The man had zero flaws.

      So, why was Rose merely nodding at suitable intervals with a polite bob of her head, while her mind clicked back to that dazzling feeling inspired by one exquisitely hard, hungry mouth? No, she thought, pushing the dazzle aside. More hocus-pocus that had no basis in anything real.

      Idly, she shuttered her lashes, an indication of perhaps not actually listening, but a sincere pretense of it.

      It was a look she’d perfected by the age of six, when Rose had been primped, painted, powdered and coiffed, and then ordered to skip down the charm school runway with bubbly poise and a lollipop smile. Her parents had had big dreams for her—beauty pageants, charm school, marrying well. Rose Hilde-brande’s heart-shaped little face was their ticket to a better life, and Rose had quickly learned to fall in line. There was no little girl better at perfection, a concrete diamond mined from the worst of hell.

      The suffocating blackness filled her, but she took a long, purging breath. This was safe. This was good, and Remy was everything she had always dreamed of. He was a fourth-generation Sinclair, heir to the Sinclair fortune, in case being a heart surgeon wasn’t secure enough. And there was something princely about him—a chiseled profile, the Roman nose. His dark hair was carelessly brushed back from his face. The dove-gray suit was tailored perfectly to show sculpted shoulders and a tapered torso.

      Best of all, the man was on the wrong side of thirty and trolling for a wife. A beautiful blonde to hang up on his wall along with his summa cum laude diploma from Columbia, his medical license from the State of New York and the live-action photo of the impala he’d seen on his last safari in Tanzania.

      “Have you thought about the auction?” she asked, shifting the conversation from surgery toward a more stomach-surviving topic. She had promised the countess she’d deliver, and it was a promise Rose intended to keep. Sylvia was her boss and her friend; Rose owed her a lot more than a charity auction.

      “Yes, I’ve thought. The answer is no.”

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