Nancy Warren - Underneath It All

Kate asked in a hushed tone. “When I…When you…”

“When we kissed?” Darren finished for her.

“Yes.”

“I felt like this,” he said, pulling her to him. He put his hands on her shoulders and lowered his mouth to hers.

This time there was no accidental brushing of lips. He kissed her with everything he had, taking her mouth with gentle persuasion and making it his.

He kissed her until she swayed against him. She let her hands climb to his chest and link behind his back. Maybe they couldn’t indulge in anything too sexual in a public park, but foreplay could take all sorts of forms.

She reached for a grape and slipped it between his lips. “When we get home, you’ll get your real dessert.”

Dear Reader,

I don’t know about you, but I’m fascinated by those reality TV shows where people are in public dating contests to win the rich guy or gal. I always wonder about the men and women who are drawn to do that sort of thing. Naturally, as a writer, once you start wondering about people you begin to create characters who might find themselves in a certain situation. What if the “prize catch” was unwilling and had been manipulated into being a celebrity bachelor?

A theme that I explore a lot in my books is appearance versus reality. Most of us create images of ourselves that we project to the world. Sometimes these are very close to the “real” us and sometimes quite different. What if my celebrity bachelor ran away from his unwanted fame and chose a disguise that was a lot truer to who he really is? What if he ended up falling for a woman completely different to the woman he thought he wanted? And what if this one didn’t fall at his feet?

Darren and Kate were a lot of fun to write about. I hope you enjoy their story.

For info on my upcoming releases, contests and to join my e-mail fan group, come visit me at www.nancywarren.net.

Happy reading,

Nancy Warren

Underneath it All

Nancy Warren

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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This book is dedicated to Robin Taylor: a voracious reader, supportive fan, thoughtful reviewer and all-around nice person.

Thanks for everything, Robin.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

DARREN KAISER was literally on top of the world. He was chatting to one of the hottest-looking women—and there was stiff competition—at a rooftop cocktail reception in Manhattan.

“I’ll call you,” Darren Kaiser’s new friend, Serena, said, her shoulder-length blond hair swinging against athletically sculpted shoulders perfectly displayed in a clingy black halter dress. She leaned forward to give Darren a kiss that promised a lot more than phone conversation.

“You do that,” he said, giving her a kiss back that let her know he could keep up his end of whatever she had in mind. From the rooftop deck, all of New York City was laid out in noisy, sparkling splendor, far beneath the well-heeled feet of upwardly mobile twenty-and thirty-somethings.

He nodded to a couple of acquaintances, then decided he’d stayed long enough. He pulled out his cell phone to call his car service for a pickup, then slowed to redrape a sexy young woman’s shawl over her shoulder from whence it had dropped. She rewarded him with a blindingly white smile and an air kiss.

Not being much of an air-kisser himself, he winked at her and kept going.

Darren Kaiser loved being a single man in Manhattan. There were so many beautiful, smart, sexy women. He was crazy about the new female power-babes who were totally up-front about what they wanted, when they wanted it and with whom.

Especially when they wanted it with him.

He whistled as he left Studio 450, where the benefit for fibromyalgia was still in full swing. The benefit was a thinly veiled excuse for singles to check one another out. Darren was here on a corporate ticket paid for by Kaiser Image Makers, and he still felt as if he was working, since he was expected to hand out a few business cards and schmooze.

So, he’d schmoozed a beautiful woman. Or, more accurately, she’d schmoozed him. These days, a man didn’t even need to take a pen and paper with him to the dating-and-mating hunting grounds. If a woman was interested, she’d do what Serena had done—pull out her Palm Pilot and enter him into her database.

Thoughts of the sexy Serena almost made Darren contemplate blowing off work tonight. But he was anxious to get a few hours in—before his pseudo work in the morning. He’d found a glitch in the educational software program he was designing and he’d suddenly had an idea for how to fix it right about the time he sipped his first martini and chomped his first hors d’oeuvres.

He’d have bolted home right then, except that Serena had appeared with a toss of blond hair, an it’s-your-lucky-night smile and her hand extended.

He’d enjoyed chatting with her and exchanging speculative eye contact, enjoyed the first few steps of a dance he never tired of: the dance of seduction. Unlike the bulk of Manhattanites, old and young, she hadn’t wanted to talk exclusively about herself. Serena Ashcroft had seemed genuinely interested in him. His politics, his tastes in fashion, music, movies, clothes and women. Not being stupid, he’d described his ideal woman as someone a lot like Serena. He’d looked into her cool, patrician blue eyes and said, “My ideal woman is blonde, articulate, slim and sexy, and isn’t afraid to go after what she wants.” He leaned closer so he could smell her expensive scent. “Especially when what she wants is me.” She’d looked so enthralled with his answers he almost expected her to take notes.

Still whistling, he jumped into the black limo that pulled up just as he hit the pavement, wondering how long it would take Serena to call.

Serena was pale, blonde and patrician—the sort of woman whose ancestors had traveled over on the Mayflower. His forbears had come over steerage-class—if they hadn’t stowed away—on some overcrowded European steamer. Their first taste of America hadn’t been Plymouth Rock, but Ellis Island.

He felt his blood quicken as he challenged himself to prove to this sexy blonde that he was worthy. He loved a challenge.

As he’d expected, Serena called, not the next day, but the day after, and suggested they meet for a drink after work. And for the next couple of months, they got together sporadically. They never seemed able to coordinate their schedules for serious dating, but he was busy, anyway.

She was in publishing, she told him, and he imagined her editing the memoirs of famous men and women of letters. It was an occupation that would suit her.

A couple of times they were photographed by one or other of the paparazzi that hopped around the social scene like fleas. As a VP and son of the CEO of one of the hottest ad agencies in town, Darren was used to the attention, but usually tried to blow it off. Serena seemed to enjoy having her photo taken when they were together, however, so he put up and shut up, knowing that his father would get a thrill seeing the company name mentioned in print and his son’s picture in the paper.