Shameless Playboy by Caitlin Crews Page A

imagined
when he was covered in more than just a soft bit of linen. She shifted farther,
trying to pull herself as far toward the opposite side of the car as possible
without looking as if that was what she was doing.
                 “Tell
me about Wolfe Manor,” she said, dropping her PDA into her lap and facing
head-on the dragon in its lair. An apt comparison for this man, who was all
fire and heat and that coiled danger that no one ever seemed to mention, but
which Grace found mesmerizing. And alarming.
                 His
green eyes gleamed and his fine mouth crooked into a half smile as he
considered her for a moment.
                 “If
we are to pull off a huge party there in a very short period of time,” she said
mildly, reminding them both why they were there, together, “I really should
know everything there is to know about the place.”
                 “I
can tell you that it has never flooded,” Lucas said in that silken voice, a
dark eyebrow arching high. Grace was forced to consider—and not for the first
time—the unnerving possibility that he was much quicker and significantly
wittier than any pathetic international playboy had a right to be. She did not
know why that thought should unsettle her. Why it should make her arms break
out in goose bumps.
                 “Touché,”
she said, but still gazed at him expectantly.
                 “What
is there to tell?” he asked then, with a careless sort of shrug. “It is a manor
house like any other. The country is infested with them. It is the ancestral
encumbrance, passed down through generations, a monument to aristocratic greed.
I thank the gods every morning for the great gift of primogeniture, which, as I
am not the firstborn son, ensures I need never set foot there again unless I
wish it.”
                 A
moment passed, and then another. The tires swished along the wet roadway, the
rain drummed against the roof, and still, Grace was too aware of the way his
eyes met hers, bold and demanding, daring her to look away. To ignore him. To
pretend he was not getting to her.
                 “Thank
you,” Grace managed to say in her driest tone. “I’m sure that will be very
useful information as we prepare to throw a gala there. No thoughts on an
appropriate place to pitch the tent? Where to set up the catering? How to craft
the perfect delivery system to ensure the guests are properly wowed as they
enter the event?”
                 Lucas
only continued to watch her, that wolfish smile and a silvery light in his eyes
that made her feel as if she was made of sand, something insubstantial that
would blow away at his next breath. Grace felt almost dizzy, and hated it.
Hated him , she told herself fiercely,
that he should be the reason she felt so wildly out of her depth when she was
working—the one place Grace had always exerted complete control.
                 He
was a devil, clearly. He was used to this, to using his incredible sexual
magnetism to bend all he encountered to his whim. Simply because he could. But
he was not the first devil she’d met, and she refused to be seduced. She refused .
                 “I
imagined my role was to be rather more decorative than administrative,” he
said, his eyes laughing at her.
                 “My
mistake,” she said, redirecting her attention to her PDA as if dismissing him. “I
thought for a moment in yesterday’s meeting that you were a creature of
substance as well as style.” She smiled, to soften her words—to pretend she was
still being professional, when she felt so edgy, so raw and unwieldy within. “But
you can rest assured, Mr. Wolfe, that your face alone is of great use to
Hartington’s, however else you choose to help. Or not.”
                 “I
know,” he agreed, not appearing in the least chastened by her words. Or even
particularly offended