31

 

 

Emma

 

 

His face clenches and his jaw tightens. There's a tension there that is hard to explain, but I can tell that he wants me still just as much as I want him.

“Invite me inside,” I say. “I want to see your bedroom.”

He hesitates.

My heart sinks.

Is this happening again? Did I just put myself out there just to get crushed once again?

Pulling his hands out of my panties, he withdraws into himself and buckles his jeans.

I adjust my clothing and take a deep breath to try to calm my nerves. I can't believe that he's doing this to me.

Rejecting me like this.

I know that he wants me, so why are we playing these games?

“You want something from me,” Liam says, with his dark hair falling into his eyes. “I want something from you.”

“I have no idea what you're talking about,” I say.

“You want me to agree to that article about D. B. Carter. You want me to expose who I really am and the only way that I'll do it is if you agree to spend a week with me here.”

I shake my head and cross my arms. I try to walk away from him, but he grabs my hand.

“I'm not going to sleep with you for a story,” I snap at him. “I was going to sleep with you now, but I'm not going to do it like that. Not as a deal.”

“I'm sorry. I don't mean to offend you. I know that you’re a journalist and that you have high standards. I just want to spend time with you. I don't want you to leave, not quite yet and not for good. So, if you come here for a week, you can see how I work, we can spend time together, and anything else that happens is entirely up to you.”

Now it's my turn to swallow hard, but I mutter out, “Why do you want this?”

“I want you.”

“So, why did we stop?”

“I want to make you wait,” he says after a very long pause.

His eyes twinkle in the sunlight and his words hit me so hard they practically blow me back.

Did I just hear him say what I think he said?

“Are you teasing me?”

“More than that. I know that you want me,” he says, focusing his eyes arrogantly on mine.

“You want me, too,” I say.

“There's no denying that,” he says, shaking his head. “As I said earlier, I want you more than I ever wanted anyone, but that's what scares me.”

“What?”

“You walked into my life and suddenly I feel upside down. Everything that used to make sense doesn't. What scares me most now is the fact that you will walk out of it just as suddenly as you came into it. That's why I want to make this deal.”

I swallow hard.

“You spend one week here and I will let you write an article about me. You can call it research or you can call it whatever you want.”

I look him up and down as he towers over me like a marble statue of a Greek God. Dark and lean with the slim build of a cowboy or distance runner, his face is only now getting some lines in his forehead and around his eyes. He tilts his head to one side, popping his chin out, confidently waiting for my answer.

I hate the cockiness. I hate that he’s trying to make me make a decision when I don’t have a choice.

Doesn't he know that my life is on the line for this?

Doesn't he know that if I don't bring the story back to my boss then everything that I have worked for is going to be taken from me?

“I don't like games.”

“This isn’t a game.”

“Yes, it is. You’re putting me into a terrible position. You're trying to pressure me. That's not what people who want to spend time with someone do. If you wanted me to spend the night, you could've just asked me. If you wanted me to spend a week with you and for us to get to know each other more, you could've asked.”

“I’m asking now.”

“No, you’re not.”

“You would've said no.”

“Perhaps, but now we will never know.”

Liam crosses his arms with a satisfied grin on his face. For some reason, he seems unfazed and that makes me feel even more out of control and angrier at him.

Why did he have to take this beautiful moment that we just had and turn it into something else?

We could have had some glorious sex on the hood of my car and that could've been it.

Then it occurs to me.

He wants more than that.

He wants more than a one-night stand.

“Is that what's really going on here?” I ask. “You want more than just some meaningless sex?”

“I don't want any meaningless sex,” he says quietly. “Not with you. I want you more than anything, right now, on the roof of that car. I want to rip off your clothes, spread your legs, and push myself deep inside of you. I want to do it over and over again until you scream my name so loud that the crows on those cacti five acres away get scared and fly away. I also want more than that. I want you. All of you. For a week. In return, I will give you what you want, anything you want.”

 

 

Thank you so much for reading ALL THE LIES!

I hope you are enjoying Emma and Liam’s story. Can’t wait to find out what happens next? Their story continues in the next book.

Read ALL THE SECRETS now!

 

 

The only way he’ll agree to the story about the great and reclusive writer, D. B. Carter is if I agree to spend the week with him.

He thinks that the reason that I left is that I don’t want him. Nothing could be from the truth.

He thinks I was insulted. He’s wrong.

I have a fire in my body that burns just for him.

Still, I leave.

He shouldn’t have asked for something like that. All that it did was push me away.

But I have to write this story to save my job.

It won’t be published for a while and I’ll have time to convince him to go on the record.

At least, that’s what I think.

But then the article comes out and he shows up at my house.

He’s angry.

I’m mad.

What happens when that fire between us starts to ignite?

What happens when he pulls me close and doesn’t let go?

Read ALL THE SECRETS now!

 

 

Can’t wait and want to dive into another EPIC romance right away?

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When he burst into my life, he set everything on fire.

He is a multi-millionaire, escaped inmate serving life in prison for a double murder he didn’t commit.

He was once my only friend and my first crush.

He doesn’t ask for help and I don’t offer.

His hair falls into his face and a strand brushes along his chiseled jaw. His vulnerability is disarming.

We both know that he shouldn’t be here, but when I stare into his piercing, intense eyes, I can’t look away.

I want to tell him to leave, but then he leans over and runs his finger over my lower lip.

When our mouths touch, I know that I won’t be able to stop.

What happens when one night isn’t enough?