Isabel Sharpe - What Have I Done For Me Lately?

“Isn’t it obvious?” Jenny murmured over the phone line.

“Just sex?”

“It’s as good a place to start as any. Tell me, Ryan, what have you done for yourself lately…?”

He frowned even as he started picturing all the possibilities. Like her, moving beneath him. “Why do you want this?”

She took in a long deep breath, let it out and even managed to make that sound sexy. “Ryan…”

He should hang up the phone now. Right now. “Yes?”

“I’ll be at the corner of Fifth Avenue and East Ninety-sixth at exactly 2:00 a.m. this morning in a white Volkswagen Passat. And I’ll be—”

“No.” He was already shaking his head. “I’m not going to—”

“I’ll be wearing a black lace bra, a low-cut red top and high-heeled shoes.” She exhaled on a low mmmm that made him immediately harden. “And that’s all.”

A click and the line went dead.

Dear Reader,

I’ve always loved the juxtaposition between shy/demure and bold/wild. Shy girl meets dangerous bad boy or quiet guy meets hot-blooded vixen. It’s an irresistible opposites-attract chemistry.

So I started thinking, what if you had the shy/wild combination in each character? How about if my heroine, Jenny Hartmann, grew up shy and became wild, and my hero, Ryan Masterson, was a bad boy who sobered up later in life? Add in that they, ahem, knew each other back when they were opposites, and are bumping into each other now, years later, when they’ve switched character traits, and the fun starts.

Enjoy their wild ride!

Cheers,

Isabel Sharpe

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my mom and dad,

whose side-by-side battle against one of life’s

unfair challenges was more romantic

than anything I’ve ever written.

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

“MY WIFE PATTY has done a lot of needlework in her time.” Mr. Jed Baxter sent the sour-faced woman beside him a look of adoration.

Ryan Masterson raised his eyebrows as if this was the most exciting thing he’d heard in nearly forever, mind spinning over the absolute nothing he knew about needlework to try to come up with a follow-up question. He’d been sitting in the Union Square Café for the better part of two hours with Jed and Patty Baxter, a middle-aged couple who’d just moved to Manhattan from Dallas. The point of the meal was to get to know them, let them get to know him, and to interest them in his firm’s latest venture-capital fund, for female- and minority-owned businesses in the city. However, the ebb and flow of conversation had been heavy on ebb and light on flow. He’d already struck out on the topic of rodeo, a passion of Jed’s. Ditto barbecue, because what could be said after your guest emphatically denied you could have an opinion being from the North? They’d had to resort to a discussion of tax law, a subject he could only b.s. his way through at best.

“Needlework. Really. What kind?” That had to be a safe and relevant question, didn’t it? Wasn’t there more than one kind of needlework? He was pretty sure Jed wasn’t talking about tattooing or body piercing.

Patty flicked a glance at Ryan and went back to staring at something past his head. “Needlepoint, knitting…”

“Sweaters?” He took a sip of water. Sweaters? He was scraping absolute bottom. Times like this he needed a woman beside him, maybe someone like Christine, the woman who lived across the hall. That might sound sexist, but while he was sure there were men into needlework, he was just as sure he didn’t want to date any.

“Yes. And embroidery. Crewel tablecloths.” She glanced at him again and almost smiled, which was the closest thing to an expression he’d seen all evening.

Ryan put on his most impressed face. Whatever cruel tablecloths were, they clearly deserved a reaction. “Well. I’m in awe. Did you ever think of starting a business?”

She blinked in apparent alarm. “No.”

With that chatty and fascinating response, the waiter brought back the signed copy of the bill, thank God, and Ryan could end this misery. At the door to the restaurant, he kept a warm smile on while he shook hands, sure this was the last time he’d get that chance. Jed and Patty were old money, liberal, new to the city and in search of a place to leave their mark. Gilbert Capital’s newest fund fit their needs perfectly. But why would they give over large sums to someone they couldn’t connect with? Trust and compatibility were vital to the process, and Ryan was generally very good at eliciting both, even at first meetings. The Baxters had defeated him. Done in by bucking broncos and table linens.

“Well, it’s been a lovely evening.”

“It certainly has been.” Jed and Patty exchanged glances wearing polite smiles and made their escape, going east on 16 thStreet toward Union Square.

Ryan went west, turning back once to lift a hand in case the Baxters had the same impulse.

They didn’t.

He sighed and pushed impatiently at hair that insisted on ignoring careful combing, and diving over his forehead, aiming for his eyes. He needed to cut it, but he couldn’t bring himself to part with this last symbol of his rebellious youth. Maybe the Baxters liked short hair. Jed’s had been buzzed close to military-short. Maybe they liked bawdy humor instead of intelligent conversation, maybe they liked beer instead of wine, maybe they’d rather have gone to a deli for pastrami sandwiches. Jed was obviously devoted to his wife, and Ryan couldn’t find a single topic to draw her out, maybe that was it. If Patty made the decisions in the family, Ryan and his fund were definitely going nowhere.

A man bumped into him on Fifth Avenue and Ryan instinctively felt for his watch and wallet, then dodged another man aiming too close. New York, New York, a helluva town. He turned onto West 14 thStreet and a stiff breeze dislodged the rest of his attempt at a controlled hairstyle. Warm for mid-April. Nearly summerlike tonight.

At the Sixth Avenue subway stop, he paused, got a whiff of stale subterranean air and kept walking, straight and brisk, or as brisk as the crowd would allow. The thought of being underground, cooped up in a metal car, squashed among strangers’ bodies never appealed, but tonight it seemed unbearable.

Not for the first time, and more frequently in recent months, the country’s largest city felt too small, too tight. He’d never be a country boy, but he craved less crowded spaces, a more peaceful pace of life, a motorcycle between his legs, a pair of female arms wrapped around his middle and nowhere in particular to go.

Which would accomplish what?

He needed a change, but he needed to move forward, not back. His motorcycle days were over long ago, and with them, his reckless youth. Instead of high-speed alcohol consumption followed by high-speed driving, his social life consisted of low-key evenings with friends, work-related outings or charity events, an over-thirty soccer league and occasional dates. In short, he’d grown up.

When he left the city, he’d leave it for a commuting suburb, maybe in Connecticut, his home state, a big friendly house with a loving wife and a bunch of kids to play in the green backyard. That would be his next journey. And if his increasing restlessness in Manhattan was any indication, he was due to be starting it soon.

A taxi screeched to a halt near him, horns blared, people shouted.