Cat Schield - A Taste of Temptation

Is lasting love on the menu?

Hotelier Harper Fontaine only wants one thing in life: to take over her family’s business empire. And she won’t let celebrity chef Ashton Croft screw up the new restaurant in her Vegas showcase. Getting the adventurer to meet deadlines is hard enough, but turning down the flame on their uncontrollable chemistry soon proves impossible!

Ashton has traveled the world but has never encountered a delicacy as delicious as Harper. Sure, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, but will Ashton stay for Harper…especially when the chips are down and she suddenly stands to lose it all?

“From the minute I showed up here I’ve rubbed you the wrong way.”

Harper stared at him in helpless fascination. This was the Ashton Croft she’d been dying to get to know. The dashing adventurer who’d gamely hiked into dangerous surroundings to share a meal with locals and educate his viewers about what was unique to the area. It was always fascinating and often stuck with her long after the credits rolled.

“If you knew that, why didn’t you try rubbing me the right way?” Harper regretted the words the instant they left her lips. They sounded like flirtatious banter. “What I meant was…”

Ashton shook his head, stopping her flow of words. A low chuckle vibrated in his chest. “Please don’t try to explain it,” he said. “I think it’s the first honest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

* * *

A Taste of Temptation is part of the Las Vegas Nights trilogy: Where love is the biggest gamble of all!

Dear Reader,

Being a huge fan of cooking shows, it was only a matter of time before I had a chef as a hero. A man who knows his way around a kitchen is oh-so-sexy. And when he’s also an adventure-loving world traveler, I’m hooked.

Researching new places to visit is a favorite pastime of mine. I’d never considered South Africa a must-see destination until I started researching the perfect safari camp for Harper and Ashton to fall in love. As I wrote, I listened to sounds of the bush, and by the time I finished the story I felt as if I’d actually traveled there. The area’s culture and history intrigue me, and I’ve added South Africa to my growing list of places I’d like to experience.

I hope you enjoy this third installment of my Las Vegas Nights series featuring the Fontaine sisters. I certainly had a blast writing their stories. I always enjoy hearing from my readers. You can contact me at cat.schield@yahoo.com.

All the best,

Cat Schield

A Taste of Temptation

Cat Schield

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CAT SCHIELD has been reading and writing romance since high school. Although she graduated from college with a BA in business, her idea of a perfect career was writing books for Mils & Boon. And now, after winning the Romance Writers of America 2010 Golden Heart Award for series contemporary romance, that dream has come true. Cat lives in Minnesota with her daughter, Emily, and their Burmese cat. When she’s not writing sexy, romantic stories for Mills & Boon® Desire TM, she can be found sailing with friends on the St. Croix River, or in more exotic locales, like the Caribbean and Europe. She loves to hear from readers. Find her at www.catschield.com. Follow her on Twitter, @catschield.

To my MFW-BIAW Golden Girls: Nan Dixon, Lizbeth Selvig and Nancy Holland.

Thanks for keeping me motivated and inspired. You ladies rock.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Extract

One

As soon as Harper Fontaine stepped from her lively casino into her stylish new restaurant, she checked near the door for a rolling black leather duffel. Ashton Croft’s go bag. She loathed the thing. It represented everything that drove her crazy about the celebrity chef. His tendency to show up without warning. The way he thrived on excitement, and when none could be found, his knack for either stirring it up or heading out of town on some adventure or another.

But she needed the bag to be there because it would mean that Ashton had shown up for today’s head chef interview. Batouri’s grand opening was two weeks away. When the original deadline for the opening of the restaurant had come and gone without it being ready, Harper had questioned the wisdom of asking an unreliable television personality to start a restaurant in her hotel.

True, the buzz about the grand opening had drawn all eyes and scads of publicity to her hotel, Fontaine Ciel, but was the attention worth the stress Ashton had heaped on those in charge of making the restaurant a success? Carlo Perrault, the restaurant’s manager, wasn’t sleeping and had grown irritable these past two months. Harper was grinding her teeth at night. The headaches induced by this behavior had forced to her seek medical help. She now wore a mouth guard when she went to bed. Slipping the awkward plastic device into her mouth, she would lie on the mattress and wish she had some idea what happened to Ashton’s initial enthusiasm about the restaurant.

The longer the filming of The Culinary Wanderer had gone in Indonesia, the more difficult she’d found working with him to be. They’d had to postpone Batouri’s launch date twice because of scheduling conflicts with his travels for his wildly popular television series.

Which was why Harper refused to delay again. The restaurant’s black floors were polished. The chandeliers had been hung from the high cove ceiling. Their light illuminated the white napkins and crystal wine goblets on the black tables. Ten days earlier the painters had completed the metallic gold treatment on the three wide pillars down the center of the room. Near the fully stocked bar, the assistant manager was putting the waitstaff through their paces.

But for two things, Batouri was ready to open. Two key things. It lacked a head chef and a menu.

And seeing that Ashton’s go bag wasn’t in its usual place, it looked as if that menu was going to have to wait. Harper glanced at her watch. It was exactly four in the afternoon. She’d told Ashton the interview would happen at three to make certain he arrived on time. Playing these sorts of games wasn’t in her nature, but she was at her wits’ end in dealing with the celebrity chef.

She dialed her assistant. Mary picked up on the second ring.

Harper got straight to business. “Did Ashton Croft call to say he’d be delayed?”

“No.”

“And his plane was supposed to land in Las Vegas at one?”

“Yes, I confirmed his itinerary this morning.”

Damn the man. Two weeks ago Ashton had promised Harper his full attention starting today. She should have known better. “Thank you, Mary. Let me know if you hear from him.”

“Sure thing.” Harper was on the verge of disconnecting the call when something Mary said caught her attention. “...in your office.”

Carlo Perrault emerged from the kitchen, a scowl on his handsome face. The forty-six-year-old restaurant manager was known for his composure, but even he was showing signs of stress at all the things that still needed to be done. “We have a problem.”

“I’m sorry, Mary. Who did you say was in my office?”

“Your mother.”

“My mother?” Surprise kept her from guarding her tone. Aware of Carlo’s scrutiny, Harper turned her back on him and stepped away to give herself some semblance of privacy. “Did she say what she was doing in Vegas?”

“No, but she seems upset.”

“Just upset?” Harper mused.

Penelope Fontaine wouldn’t have left her elegant condo in Boca Raton to fly two thousand miles to visit Harper unless something was seriously wrong. And if it was, why had Penelope come to Harper? Usually Penelope took her problems to her father-in-law, Henry Fontaine.