One Good Reason (A Boston Love Story Book 3) (4 page)

Three feet.

“I don’t want your money.”

“I could upgrade your computer system,” I offer, shuffling backward until my spine hits the tile wall.

He shakes his head, amused.

“Walk your dog?”

His eyes spark with humor. “Don’t have a dog, darling.”

“Water your plants when you’re out of town?”

“Do I look like the kind of guy who keeps a garden of delicate orchids?”

No. No, he does not.

He looks like the kind of guy who’d only ever see a flower if he decided to fuck you senseless in a field of wild daisies, just because he felt like it.

My mouth feels suddenly dry. When I speak, my words crack. “Then what do you want?”

His eyes flare with something dangerous. Something that makes my palms start to sweat and my legs press a little tighter together.

“I don’t think you want to know,” he whispers.

I agree. I definitely don’t want to know.

We’re silent for a long, heated moment, both waiting for the other to say something.

“Aren’t you going to ask me?” I blurt, unable to stop myself. I clamp my lips shut as soon as the words are out, instantly regretting my lapse of control.

“Ask you what?” The humor in his stare has heated into something else entirely. “About your little Jane Bond act, with the costume change?”

I swallow my words when he takes another step closer and give a small nod of affirmation.

Two feet left.

“No,” he murmurs. His eyes are fixed on my lips and suddenly my lungs feel too tight, like someone’s sucked all the air out of them. “I’m not going to ask when I know you won’t tell me.”

I don’t say anything, partly because he’s right but mostly because I don’t think I’m capable of coherent words, at the moment.

“You don’t know me. You don’t trust me.” He pauses and I see something in his eyes — the thrill of a challenge. I hear the echo of unspoken words humming in the air between us.

Not yet. But you will someday.

I push the strange thought away.

He takes that final step, until the space between us has all but disappeared. We’re not touching, but our faces are so close if I rise onto my tiptoes we’ll be kissing.

“What are you doing?” I breathe, pressing tight against the wall.

His eyes drag away from my mouth. Our stares clash like swords on a battlefield.

“I’m taking what I want.”

Before I can blink, his mouth claims mine.

I make a sound of surprise, but it’s lost as soon as our lips touch. He’s everywhere, all over me — invading my senses, stealing my breath. His hands pull me close, cup my face, slide into my hair, touching me in all the places he can reach as if his desperate fingers can’t decide where to linger. I’m stunned to find I’m just as ravenous – plastering my front to his, winding my arms around his neck, sliding my fingers through his thick, gorgeous, golden hair until it’s messy, like I wanted to the first time I saw him.

Some distant part of my brain is screaming this is crazy, reminding me I don’t even know this man, but I can’t hear it over the rush of desire flooding my veins. I can’t help myself.

Maybe I lived on the streets too long — learned the hard way that good things don’t come easy. Ever. If someone hands you a dollar bill, you grab it and don’t look back. You want something, you take it before it slips away.

And, for some inexplicable reason, what I want right now is him. This infuriating, entitled, egotistical playboy whose easy jokes don’t quite reach his eyes.

It’s just sex. Just lust,
I tell myself.
You want it.

So… take it.

I pull him closer, my leg slipping out the slit in my dress to wind around the back of his thighs as my hands grip his shoulders to get better leverage. Feeling my response, he makes a rough sound as his tongue seeks entrance to my mouth. I open for him without hesitation. Our mouths collide with such heat I forget to breathe, to think, to do anything except press closer to him.

There’s a terrifying edge of familiarity to this kiss — as though we’ve kissed a thousand times before, as though our mouths were made to fit together for only this purpose.

Not for speaking or eating or breathing.

Kissing
.

I’m filled with need, a devouring, deep-rooted desire that surpasses the fact that we’re strangers, that he doesn’t even know my name, that I’m relatively sure we don’t even like each other. Desire trumps it all, threading through me until I don’t care about any of the reasons I shouldn’t be making out with a stranger in a dingy bathroom.

The straps of my dress fall down my shoulders with a flick of his fingers. His hips pin me roughly against the wall, so hard I can’t move, and I’m shocked to find I like it, shocked to find I want more.

More pressure, more weight, more
Parker
.

I’ve never liked to lose control. Never been the meek little girl in missionary position.

Oh, yes, let me lie here subdued while you fuck me
.

Sex, like life, is about power. I don’t relinquish mine in either the business world or the bedroom. My previous partners have learned quickly — try to domineer me and you’ll find yourself blue-balled so hard, you’ll look like an extra in
Avatar
.

But this is different. There’s something about him that breaks every single one of my rules.

Maybe it’s the knowledge that he doesn’t know me, that he’ll never see me after this moment… or maybe it’s just
him
.

I don’t care.

All I know is, he could have me any way he wanted and I’d like it. Up against a wall, flat on my back, driving in from behind. It’s an addictive feeling. An adrenaline rush.

I pull him closer, until his frame dwarfs me completely, and abruptly find myself kissing empty air as he tears his lips from mine and moves them to my neck.

“I don’t even know your name,” he mutters against my skin as his hands move inside the bodice of my dress, beneath my bra.

Dear god, I’m going to come undone and he’s barely touched me.

“Does it matter?” I ask, craning to give him better access.

Something about that question touches a nerve. He goes still and lifts his head so our eyes meet. I don’t know him well enough to put a name on the emotion in their hazel depths. I feel dazed, my lips still tingling from his kisses as I stare up at him. His thumb moves to brush my bottom lip, as if he can’t quite help himself.

“It matters,” he says quietly. “I’m not fucking you for the first time in a bathroom stall. In fact, I’m not fucking you anywhere except my bed for the foreseeable future.”

The way he says that — with such certainty, like there’s no doubt in his mind we’ll be doing this again — sends alarm bells ringing inside my head.

Common sense returns in a flash.

What the hell are you doing?
my brain is screaming at me.
You aren’t the kind of girl who gets carried away because of… what? Lust? The promise of a good fuck? You’re here on a job. Get your head out from between your legs and get the hell out of here.

“I have to go,” I say, pushing against his chest and sliding past him before he has a chance to corner me again. By the time he’s turned around, I’ve already crouched to retrieve my backpack and pulled it from the cabinet beneath the sink.

“Go?” His voice is full of disbelief. “I just had you pinned to a wall, with your hands in my hair and your tongue in my mouth. Darling, where exactly do you think you’re going? If the answer isn’t my place, you need to rethink it.”

“Listen, this was…” I trail off, fighting a blush as I slide the strap of my backpack up over one shoulder and edge toward the exit door. “This was…”

“Hot as hell?” Parker supplies.

I shake my head.

“Not nearly enough?” he suggests.

Another head shake. God, I’m actually
blushing
. Like a virginal little schoolgirl.

What the hell is this guy doing to me?

I swallow. “I don’t know what this was.” I rise to full height, avoiding his eyes at all costs. “But I have to leave now. So… thanks for…for…”

“Saving you?” He’s watching me carefully. “Or for the second part that happened just now, the part that’s got you so turned on you can’t even look at me?”

My defiant eyes fly to his. “I’m not turned on.”

“Red cheeks? Swollen lips? Wild hair?” He smirks. “You look pretty turned on, darling.”

“Well, I’m not,” I snap.

He steps closer.

I step back.

“I’m leaving now.”

“So you said,” he murmurs, still watching me.

“Don’t follow me.”

“I wasn’t planning to.” He takes another step.

I hold out a hand to stop his advance. “And don’t even think about kissing me again.”

He grins. “Seems like you’re the one thinking about it,
snookums
.”

“Ugh!” I whirl around to the exit door and put my hand on the knob. Before I can turn it, he’s there at my back, pressing into me — a wall of heat and need. Damn if it doesn’t feel good.

“This isn’t over,” he whispers, his lips brushing the bare skin of my shoulder in the hint of a kiss, his hand tracing the sensitive skin of my spine. It takes all my strength not to lean back into his touch.

“You’re right,” I say, wishing my voice didn’t sound so rough. “Something can’t be over if it never even started.”

Twisting hard on the knob, I yank open the door and slip out into the hallway.

This time, he doesn’t follow me… but his voice carries softy at my back and I can’t tune out his final words no matter how hard I try.

“I wouldn’t count on that, darling.”

M
y Uber driver
shoots me a strange look as I clamor into his backseat and I can’t exactly blame him— kiss-bitten lips, sex hair, and an ensemble featuring a white button down layered over an evening gown doesn’t exactly scream
stable
. Thankfully, he chooses not to comment as he drives me across town to my loft in the Leather District. I wouldn’t be able to keep up a conversation if he tried. My body’s in the car but my mind is back in that bathroom — remembering the way Parker West’s mouth felt against mine.

I’ve never been kissed like that in my life — kissed until I lost myself, kissed until I ceded control over my every autonomous instinct, kissed until I felt possessed, owned, kept like a bargain I didn’t remember making. His mouth hit mine and suddenly I
belonged
to him. Worse, I
liked
it. His lips are the only shackles I’ve ever allowed to hold me; it’s more than a little disquieting to realize I enjoyed the sensation of their weight against my skin.

My driver pulls up outside the towering brick warehouse. The faded white paint that stretches across the side in bold letters is visible even in the dark.

EDISON PIANO FACTORY, EST. 1922

I punch in the building code, shuffle down the hallway, and shove my finger into the small illuminated panel to call the freight elevator. I hear it coming long before it arrives — rattling and groaning as it descends slowly down the shaft. The clanging, ancient brute of a machine is a relic from the original factory, built to haul thousand-pound pianos between floors. It refuses to fall apart no matter how many decades pass. With its iron bars and odd shape, it looks more like a birdcage than a viable mode of transportation. Hell, it almost makes the prospect of walking up six flights of stairs sound appealing.

Almost.

I’ve aged several years by the time it finally arrives. Sliding open the wooden hoistway gate, I wait for the inner metal doors to spring apart, step inside, insert my key into the panel, and breathe a sigh of relief as I feel the box jolt into motion.

I’m home.

Parker West will soon be a distant memory.

And, most importantly, I’m pretty sure I got the intel Luca needed.

A smile drifts across my face as the elevator rattles to a stop on the top floor and I step into my dark loft. Sure, the whole
Parker-saving-me
thing wasn’t ideal, but that doesn’t matter, now.
He
doesn’t matter, now. All that matters is the Lancaster financial data, proving their CEO is a lying sack of dog shit.

My grin widens as I reach into my bodice, searching for the flash drive…

…and morphs into a grimace of shock when my fingers find nothing but flesh and fabric. I go completely still, panic overriding my every sense as I realize the USB is missing.

No
.

No way in hell did I drop it. It was so tight against my skin, nothing save a full body search could’ve shaken it loose.

Then again
, a quiet voice at the back of my mind whispers.
You do know
someone
who recently attempted a full search of your body… Someone with burnished blond hair and broad shoulders, who kissed like a vow and touched without hesitation… Someone who could’ve easily taken that flash drive from your cleavage without you noticing, so distracted by his touch you weren’t even aware it was gone until now…

My hands curl into fists as I realize exactly what happened to my flash drive. Or, should I say, exactly
who
happened to my flash drive. I hear a husky voice, still fresh in my memory, making me a promise.

This isn’t over.

Parker. Fucking. West.

I admit, I’m shocked he found it while feeling me up. I’m even more stunned he was clever enough to pocket it. I underestimated him — dismissed him as nothing but a stacked wallet, high cheekbones, and unadulterated sex appeal. And yet, he’s backed me neatly into a corner without my even realizing it.

Now, I’ll be forced to seek him out. See him again.

Kiss him again
.

No! No.

There will be no more kissing.

With a groan, I flip on an overhead chandelier, basking the industrial space in soft, feminine light. The loft is my sanctuary, my safe haven, though I’m probably the only person in a ten-mile radius who’d use those words to describe it. Even disregarding the ancient elevator, it’s not in the greatest of neighborhoods. I don’t participate in a weekly potluck with my neighbors or know their first names. It’s frigidly cold in the winter months — the polished concrete floors are icy against my feet, the exposed brick walls essentially act as a meat locker. Most mornings, I can see my breath when I roll out of bed.

My little icebox.

But that’s just it… it’s
mine
.

When I turned eighteen, I finally gained access to the financial trust my parents left behind for me when they died. It’s not much – certainly not enough to carry me forever – but it pays my meager rent each month and keeps me fully stocked in as many chocolate peanut butter cups as I can eat. So long as I take on a few freelance programming or graphic design jobs on the side every now and then, I’m able to live and work quite comfortably.

To soften its harsh industrial lines, I decorated in lush white fabrics and delicate glasswork. Colorful art prints span the interior walls; massive floor to ceiling windows look out over the city skyline to the north. A cluster of couches flank my black wood stove. A granite-topped breakfast bar divides the range from the rest of the space. My queen-sized platform bed dominates the far side, smothered in piles of down blankets and white faux-fur pillows. And in the corner, my most cherished possession — a bank of computer monitors on a massive black desk.

I peel off my flats, toss the backpack by the door, and shimmy out of my dress. Crossing to my dresser, I pull a loose-fitting white sweater from the bottom drawer and tug it on over my underwear. It drapes to mid-thigh, stretched out after a zillion washes. I shove the sleeves up above my elbows and feed a few fire-starters into the wood stove along with some kindling before I plop down in front of my computer.

I need that flash drive back, otherwise Luca will kill me and thousands of people will continue being screwed out of their hard-earned retirement accounts. Which means… Parker West just found his way onto my hit list.

Time to dig up some dirt.

As my fingers hover over the keys, I consider what I already know about the man, besides the fact that he kisses so well it should be illegal.

Not much
.

My one and only interaction with the West family happened last spring, when Parker’s younger sister Phoebe stumbled into trouble with Keegan MacDonough — head of Boston’s most notorious Irish mob family. The MacDonoughs are a nasty lot, prone to brute force, bribery, and extortion. Taking Phoebe was just another one of their schemes to manipulate her sleazy father, Milo West, and tip the many, many millions controlled by the WestTech telecommunications company in their favor.

Twenty-five years ago, MacDonough bullied his way to the top the criminal food chain and never relinquished an ounce of his control, even with the DA breathing down his neck and the FBI searching his many properties for proof of illegal activities. He was a cancer, slowly eating away at everything that makes Boston beautiful. So, when I heard through the backchannels that he was holding the West heiress in a slum-house in Charlestown last April… Luca and I couldn’t resist an opportunity to fuck with his carefully-constructed house of cards.

Now, I’m happy to report he’s rotting in jail.

Plus, watching the Louboutin-wearing princess die at the hands of ugly thugs without lifting a finger to intervene isn’t something that sits well on one’s conscience — even a morally-hazy conscience like mine.

I may live in the gray area, but I’m not fond of watching innocents die.

And Phoebe is innocent.
Annoying
, but innocent — the girl talks a mile-a-minute, wears exclusively designer labels, and has never, not for a single moment in her privileged life, known what it feels like to go without food or heat or a safe place to lay her head.

We never spoke again, after that night. She doesn’t even know my name — she never will.

Still, against my better judgment, I sort of… liked her, when we met.

Her brother is another story.

With their father facing prison-time for his collusion with MacDonough, Parker moved to the city a few months back and took over WestTech as interim CEO. I’m not sure what exactly makes a party-loving playboy qualified to run a Fortune 500 company, but no one asked my opinion on the matter.

My eyes narrow as his gorgeous face flashes in my mind. I still can’t believe the jerk stole my flash drive. But, more so, I really can’t believe he kissed me. I mean… the
nerve
of it all.

Who the hell does he think he is?

Only the most attractive man you’ve ever been pressed against, full-frontal...

I ignore the squirmy feeling in my stomach and focus on my anger. That’s the only emotion I’m equipped to process, at the moment.

Cracking my knuckles, I turn my attention back to my computer screen and dive in.

B
y midnight
, I’ve scoured the internet for all traces of Parker West… and, frustratingly, come up rather short. I sit back in my computer chair and exhale a heavy sigh. Besides the slew of Instagram pictures of him posing with half-naked Victoria’s Secret models, there’s really not a lot to go on. No criminal history, with the exception of a few teenage disorderly conduct charges his father’s lawyers buried before they ever made it onto his permanent record. No marriage licenses; not even a trace of any long-term relationships, if his Facebook profile is anything to go by. No property listed in his name. In fact, I couldn’t even find an address for him listed in the Registry of Deeds, which means he’s either crashing with friends, staying with his sister, or booked at a hotel.

Or, more likely, he’s shacking up with one of his many bimbos on the Eastern Seaboard.

Disquieted by the ridiculous thread of jealousy in my thoughts, I rise and head for the kitchen. I have to hop up onto the counter to reach the top cabinet where I keep my stash of candy — an intentional hurdle, since I figure if I have to climb to get my fix, there’s a chance I’ll eat less of it.

Fat chance. Emphasis on
fat
, because one of these days my metabolism is going to slow down and I’ll actually have to work out to burn off the zillion calories contained in Reese’s peanut butter cups.

…An eventuality I plan to ignore until the moment it happens.

I pop the chocolate into my mouth and let it melt on my tongue as my mind spins in indecisive circles. Since I can’t track down where Parker’s staying, I have no choice but to confront him somewhere I know he’ll show up.

The WestTech offices.

I feel my lips tug up at one side as the beginnings of a plan take shape in my mind.

He told me this thing between us wasn’t over — he was right.

It’s just begun.

“
D
id
you get the intel on Lancaster’s finances?”

I squirm against the hard plastic subway seat and adjust my grip on the phone. “Yes. No. Kind of.”

“What the hell does that mean, babe?” Luca sounds impatient. “You either got the intel or you didn’t.”

“I got it,” I murmur, wincing. “And then… I kind of… lost it.”

Silence blasts over the line. “Care to explain?”

“Listen, Luke, it’s complicated.”

“Uncomplicate it for me.”

“I have the files on a flash drive.”

“Okay, so what’s the problem?”

“The flash drive may or may not be… misplaced at the moment.” I wince again. “But I’m going to get it back. In fact, I’m on my way to get it back at this precise moment.”

More silence.

“Don’t freeze me out,” I snap, making sure my voice is too low for the other passengers to overhear. “You should be thanking me for going on this crazy mission of yours at all. I almost got caught. Some…” I pause, searching for the right word to describe Parker. “…some stranger had to save my ass.”

“Uh huh. Would this
stranger
have anything to do with your missing intel?”

My jaw clenches. He knows me too well.

“Guess the silent treatment is okay as long as you’re the one using it, huh, babe?” he teases.

“Shut up.”

“For real… you okay?” he asks, voice suddenly serious. “Don’t like hearing you were almost caught. I shouldn’t have asked you to put yourself at risk. I should’ve been there to help you.”

“I’m fine.” I sigh. “Parker — the guy who helped me — was there. He covered for me. I don’t know why, but he did.”

“I know why,” Luca mutters. “I’ve seen that black dress.”

I blink. “What?”

“Never mind.” He clears his throat. “Just let me know how it goes.”

“Aye, aye, captain.”

He clicks off, leaving me listening to dead air.

I hate when he does that.

Ten minutes later I’m out of the dark subway tunnels, squinting as afternoon sunshine glares off the towering glass skyscrapers of the Financial District. This part of the city feels foreign to me — too new, too tall, to modern for Boston, a place steeped more strongly in history than the tea we once dumped into our harbors to piss off the British. These towers all look the same, totally devoid of charm and character. I head for the one with the WestTech logo on the side and step through the glass rotating doors, keeping my head held high and my strides confident.

The first rule of blending in anywhere: act like you belong and people will assume you do.

Luca’s been saying it since we were kids.
Fake it till you make it, babe
.

The lobby is jammed with people returning from their lunch breaks, just as I’d hoped. Amid the chaos, I note the entire space is decked out in holiday decorations, complete with a fifteen foot Fraser fir and massive ornaments suspended from the ceiling, like model airplanes at a museum.