Brazen & Burning

“You don’t have to stop,” Sydney said, pouting

Adam wished he hadn’t. His fingers had been almost there, working their way up her thighs, getting closer and closer to home. Then a cupboard had slammed in the kitchen, striking Adam with instant awareness of where he was—and what he’d been about to do. Yanking his hands from Sydney’s legs, he rocked back on his heels, his body thrumming, every inch of his flesh aroused. “My sister’s in the other room.”

“Then let’s go somewhere private.”

Sydney didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed that they’d almost made love, with Adam’s sister only a few steps away. Her expression reflected only desire—the hot, unadulterated need to feel his hands on her body, no matter what.

“I don’t know you,” Adam said.

She learned forward, grabbed his hands and pressed them to her rib cage. Her breathing wasn’t quite as steady as she let on, and the moisture seeping through her paper-thin blouse testified to a heat more intense than the ninety-degree temperatures outside. She was burning up from the inside out…and she wanted him to know it.

“You do know me, Adam. Better than any man ever has. You just don’t remember right now, that’s all.” She ran her finger over his lips, her voice a throaty purr. “But you will….”

Dear Reader,

Let’s clear one thing up right here and now. I am not Sydney Colburn. Or rather, she’s not me. Yes, she’s a romance writer…like I am. Yes, she has a smart mouth…like I do. But that’s where the similarities end, I swear. That’s the beauty of being a writer—indulging all sorts of fantasies, like wearing designer clothes, driving a candy-apple red Corvette convertible and executing a seduction of a man who looks particularly yummy in blue jeans and a tool belt.

This series—and the book—have been a ball to work on. Not only did I get to revisit several characters from other books (Cassie Michaels from What’s Your Pleasure? and Jillian Hennessy from Just Watch Me…) but I had the chance to work with talented authors Leslie Kelly and Tori Carrington! Our BAD GIRLS CLUB is open to new members, so make sure to stop by my Web site, www.julieleto.com, and sign up!

Enjoy,

Julie Elizabeth Leto

P.S. I’ve written a BAD GIRLS CLUB novella for the ultimate bad girl, rock-and-roll diva D’Arcy Wilde! Check it out at this month’s “Red-Hot Read” at www.eHarlequin.com.

Brazen & Burning

Julie Elizabeth Leto

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For Leslie Kelly, good friend, and Bad Girls Club head honcho…thanks for inviting me to join this series.

Right up our alleys, huh? When we’re bad, we’re better.

For Lori & Tony Karayianni, aka Tori Carrington…working with you never feels like work. Come up and see me sometime.

For Renée Perkie and her generous Ladies Lunch Group…your support means the world to me. Here’s to more good books, good food and good fun…though on second thought, goodness has nothing to do with it.

Contents

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

Epilogue

1

TO STOP THE INFERNAL KNOCKING, Sydney Colburn swung her front door open. Bright light sent her stumbling backward, but she managed to catch the doorknob for balance. Unable to form a curse harsh enough to express her ire, she opted to growl.

The person who had driven her to this indignity had the audacity to sound amused. “Are you always this cheery at twelve noon or are you just really happy to see me?”

Sydney squinted, fighting the blinding light—the noon hour explained the glare—to find out who had the frickin’ nerve to show up at her door sounding so incredibly buoyant when Sydney had a raging hangover. Her anger deflated when she met Cassie Michaels’s eyes—sapphire-blue and wide with nineteen-year-old innocence.

Sydney knew Cassie’s innocent act wasn’t entirely fake. With a petite body and naturally dark hair plaited in youthful braids that reminded Sydney of Gilligan’s Mary Ann, Cassie played the ingenue card for all it was worth. But Sydney had known Cassie too long to completely buy her sweet young thing act. Still, she let her inside the condo anyway. Cassie was, after all, the niece of Sydney’s very best friend in the world. The very best friend who was indirectly responsible for her drinking binge the night before. And Syd was pretty sure that Cassie had been the one to make sure she got home safely last night.

“Shut the door before I show you how thrilled I really am,” Sydney threatened feebly, stumbling away from the threshold and cursing herself for mixing vodka and rum. Or was it tequila and gin? She didn’t remember. She didn’t need to remember. Whatever she’d drank the night before had been blended with something pink. Grenadine? Cranberry juice? When she opened her fridge searching for something to quench her thirst and caught sight of a jug of Ocean Spray, she gagged, thankful she had no breakfast in her stomach and, therefore, none on her floor.

Why hadn’t she eaten yet if it was noon? Oh, yeah. She’d just woken up. Why had she gotten out of bed again? Right. Loud knocking. Cassie.

The pint-size brunette strolled into her kitchen as if she’d been there a thousand times before. Which she probably had. “Have a good time last night?”

Sydney would have growled again, but she hated to be redundant. “Why are you here?” she asked instead.

“Aunt Devon wanted me to check on you.”

“Liar. Devon’s on her honeymoon.”

Cassie slid a chair out from under the kitchen table, filling Sydney’s head with a horrible screeching noise that obliterated the first couple of words of Cassie’s answer.

“…drank more than all the groomsmen put together. And I’m a little concerned that binge drinking may be your way of dealing with being the last single woman in your circle of friends.”

“Let me guess,” Sydney said, pulling out her own chair much more quietly, “the first class you’re taking at Tulane is Pop Psychology.” She had no intention of answering Cassie’s intrusive question. Besides, she didn’t have an answer. She didn’t want to accept that she’d drunk herself into oblivion last night all on account of a cliché.

Poor, unmarried me. No single friends left to hang with. No man in my life to make my world complete.

Blech.

“No, but I read Dr. Phil’s newest book on my plane ride home for the wedding,” Cassie answered. “Besides, I’m nineteen. That makes me a certifiable expert on everything, remember?”

Remember what? Nineteen? Sydney snorted. She couldn’t remember last night, much less something that had occurred over eleven years ago. Besides, she’d tried damned hard to suppress most memories from around ages ten to twenty. Those years were formative and filled with more mistakes, missteps and misery than she ever wanted to relive.

However, just around the time of her twenty-first birthday, Sydney had made a decision to buck the system of her New England upbringing and live without apologies. She did what she wanted, when she wanted. She spoke the truth, even when people didn’t want to listen. She played the stock market like a blackjack table—and won. She wrote widely popular, highly subversive historical romance novels where the women were strong and smart and could bring hulking knights and bloodthirsty warriors to their knees.

And whenever she could, she took lovers the way most men did—with emphasis on immediate physical payoff and avoiding commitment. For the past decade, Sydney’s carefree, unrepentant lifestyle had worked wonders. She’d graduated from college, made a successful career for herself as a novelist and collected a small but loyal group of friends who accepted her for who she really was. Not to mention that she had a love life that would make even the most sexually satisfied heroines in her books pea-green with envy.

And, yes, last night she’d become the last single woman in that loyal group of friends, excluding Cassie, who was too young to really count, though rumor had it her innocent young friend had recently met a college boy and was, officially, smitten. Who knew how long it would be before Sydney was throwing a wedding shower for a bride thirteen years her junior?

Oh, well. She’d throw one hell of a party. Sydney’d never planned to get married anyway. She hadn’t drank too much last night because she’d felt lonely or left out or any other weepy sentiment on the dark side of the emotional spectrum.

She’d drank too much last night because drinking too much was the only thing she could think to do since her life suddenly came to a stop. And not because of Devon’s wedding. She was genuinely happy for Devon. As Cassie’s legal guardian, Devon Michaels had spent most of her adult life caring for her niece at the expense of her own personal fulfillment. Sydney had toasted her friend and fellow writer with great gusto and premium poetic words. She liked to think she had a hand in the romance of her mystery novelist friend and Jake Tanner, the hunky former cop Devon had married. She’d encouraged their relationship from the start and had no regrets.

No, Sydney Colburn’s life had come to a stop at precisely five o’clock Wednesday afternoon—a full three days prior to the wedding—simply because she’d reached the pinnacle of her career. Her newest book, a hardcover historical set on the moors of Scotland, had debuted in the number one spot on the coveted New York Times bestseller list. She’d achieved her single most important dream, as evidenced by the newspaper Cassie had carried into the condo and was now spreading carefully over Sydney’s butcher-block tabletop.

“Congratulations. I hear you kicked some literary ass last week,” Cassie said, attempting to couch her understated tone with a wry grin.

“Apparently,” Sydney grumbled.

Sydney had dreamed about this day since she first learned there ever was such a thing as a bestseller list. These novels were in such demand by booksellers and readers across the country that the titles and authors’ names were printed in the country’s most prestigious newspaper.

“Aunt Dev said you’ve wanted this all your life.”

“Well, I don’t think I wanted it when I was four,” Sydney quipped. “My main ambition then would have been a Malibu Barbie with a cool Corvette convertible.”

“You drive a Corvette convertible,” Cassie pointed out. “There may be a connection.”

Sydney raised her eyebrows, wincing as the simple movement made her head throb all the more. “You think?”

Cassie sighed in the way only someone younger than twenty could. Sydney glanced at the refrigerator again, wondering if that “hair of the dog that bit you” saying was true. She owned at least one bottle of vodka or gin or rum or tequila. She vaguely remembered a fully stocked wet bar somewhere in the living room. She didn’t drink much, but when she did, she made it count. Only, she didn’t really want more alcohol. She wanted to get rid of the kid, so she could go back to wallowing in peace.

“When you set a goal, you set a goal,” Cassie continued, obviously intent on having this deep psychological conversation even if Sydney didn’t want to. Oh, well. Why fight it? She didn’t have anyone else to hash this out with.

Devon was on her honeymoon, and while the others in her circle were good for shopping excursions and beachside lunches, none of them were writers. They supported her career by buying her books and talking them up to anyone willing to listen to their pitch, but none of them would really understand the downside of her reaching her ultimate goal. Even though they knew her profession held little of the glamor the media hyped and they respected her hard work, they could see no negatives to her job. She made up stories for a living. She’d just reached a major accomplishment in popular fiction—her name above Clancy, Grisham and Roberts, for this week at least. So while she’d tried to talk to them about how lost she felt, they couldn’t get beyond excited congratulations.

She loved them for the support—she really did. But support or not, she still felt like a drifting boat on a wind-tossed sea.

She wasn’t even sure that Cassie, who’d grown up in Devon’s care and knew more about the publishing business than most literary agents, would truly understand. How could she when Sydney didn’t? She’d accomplished her dream years before she expected to, and still she wasn’t happy. Why wasn’t she flying off to New York to celebrate with her editor? Why wasn’t she searching out a ladder so she could shout her accomplishment from the top of her three-story condominium building?

God, her head hurt.

“I don’t want to talk about this, Cassie.”

“You sound like my mother.”

Sydney’s shoulders drooped. “Did you come here to help or to insult me?”

Cassie’s mother was the Grammy-award-winning rock ’n’ roll phenomenon, D’Arcy Wilde. Of all the sexy acts out there giving music lovers their MTV, only Darcy could make Madonna look like June Cleaver in a push-up bra. Madonna at least raised her own children. Darcy had pawned Cassie off on her sister Devon, and she continued to lead a wild life, trotting from one gig to the next, building a personal empire on a foundation of provocative videos and sold-out concert tours. Though Sydney and Darcy had been compared to each other many times because of their open attitudes toward sex and men, neither of them took the association as a compliment.

In short, they despised one another.

“You know, my mother likes you,” Cassie claimed.

“She also likes tearing strategic holes in her T-shirts and playing peek-a-boo with her nipples on stage. I should be flattered?”

Cassie laughed. “Darcy likes to shock people. So do you.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. In order to like shocking people, you actually have to care about what people think about you. I don’t give a damn.”

Clearing her throat, Cassie nodded. “But you gave a damn about making the Times list. So what’s next?”

“Sex on the beach,” Sydney concluded.

“Oh, yeah. Drinking more is the solution.”

“I wasn’t talking about the drink. I’m going to the beach to pick up some glistening hunk, and then I’m going to have sex.”

It had been a long time since Sydney had indulged in an anonymous affair. Too long. She searched her mind for a face—names were usually optional—and she couldn’t place one. Hmm. In fact, the first face that came to mind—rugged, handsome and highlighted by the most unusual almond-tinted eyes she’d ever seen—belonged to Adam Brody. God. Adam Brody. He’d literally disappeared out of her life over a year ago, though he still he managed to creep into her thoughts every so often. At weak moments.

“I shouldn’t be telling you about my love life,” Sydney said.

“You’re not ashamed of your free-love lifestyle, are you?” Cassie asked, her tone a tad too suspicious for Sydney’s liking.

“The fact that Sydney and shame start with the same letter is the only connection between me and that emotion,” she assured her. “On the other hand, I don’t want to corrupt you. My lifestyle is just that—my lifestyle. My choices aren’t for everyone.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Cassie concluded. She scraped her chair back and headed toward the fridge, which Sydney noticed she’d left open.

As she watched Cassie rise on her tippy-toes to peer behind the carton of week-old skim milk, Sydney realized something.

The kid was wearing makeup.

In all the years she’d known her, from way back when Cassie’s main concern in life revolved around Beanie Babies, throughout childhood and her teen years, Cassie chose her clothes for comfort and brushed her hair only after her aunt threatened to withhold her allowance. She eschewed high school homecoming dances and proms in favor of opera night or a hockey game. So why did the levelheaded, giggle-free Cassie suddenly look like an ideal candidate for Temptation Island?

That rumor she’d heard about Cassie and a boyfriend must have been true. No wonder she was suddenly so concerned with the state of Sydney’s life. No one could be more meddling than a young woman in love.

Cassie retrieved a jug of orange juice and shut the door. “You can have your choices, Sydney. Thanks to you and my mother, I have lived a vicarious wild life I won’t ever need to experience for myself.”

Sydney raised an eyebrow, watching through bleary eyes as Cassie retrieved two glasses, filled them, and replaced the jug. She’d always known the kid was mature beyond her years and had had amazing insights since she was old enough to speak in sentences, but sometimes she still surprised Sydney. Mainly because Sydney constantly underestimated her young friend.

“You’re sure?” Sydney asked. “Most kids your age are just clamoring to live life on the edge.”

Cassie visibly shivered. “Most kids today aren’t raised on the edge.”

“Devon made sure your life was normal,” Syd reminded her.

“Thank God. But I eavesdropped on your little tête-à-têtes with my aunt during Tuesday-night poker. And I watched Entertainment Tonight at least once a week to find out which boy toy my mother had most recently dumped.”

Cassie placed one OJ in front of Sydney, then shook out two aspirin from the bottle she found in the cabinet over the sink. Sydney downed them greedily.

“It’s safe to say I’m immune from wanting to be like you or my mother,” Cassie concluded.

Sydney sighed in relief, pressing her hand to her throbbing brow. “I’m glad to hear it.”

Cassie slid back into the chair across from hers. “You look horrible—you know that, right?”

“Doesn’t come as a big surprise.”

“Picking up some nameless hunk might not be an easy feat.”

Sydney chuckled. “Maybe that wasn’t the best idea I’ve had.”

Cassie leaned back, then kicked her feet onto the chair beside hers. “Mom bought me a spa package over at Safety Harbor for graduation that I still haven’t used. I’d bet they’d fit us in on short notice—you being a New York Times bestselling author and all.”

“Oh, and the fact that your mother is D’Arcy Wilde would have nothing to do with it?”

“Couldn’t hurt…”

The idea sounded tempting, even to Sydney in her foggy condition. But after spending the day being salted, exfoliated, massaged and pampered, what then? She’d still have the same problem that she’d had for the past four days. She had no idea what she was going to do next with her life or career.

She’d made the New York Times list before, and had reaped the benefits. Her bulldog of an agent had manipulated her repeated appearances in the top fifteen of the bestseller list into a multimillion dollar contract—a contract Sydney had just fulfilled by turning in the last book. Making the list the first few times had been a rush—so much so that she had set debuting at number one as a goal to work toward for the rest of her career.

Who’d have known she’d succeed so quickly?

She felt like a fraud. A directionless, ungrateful fraud.

“I have no right to feel depressed, you know,” Sydney admitted.

“If the constitution had been written by the Founding Mothers rather than the Fathers, the right to be depressed in the face of good fortune would have been second on the list.”

Sydney grinned, even though the action made her cheeks ache. “I should be shouting from the rooftops! Please tell me I’m insane. I’d hate to think a sane person would feel so lost when they’d just achieved the one thing they wanted more than anything in the world.”

“Maybe if you had someone to share your victory with…”

“I’ve shared, sweetheart. With Devon—”

“—who was mostly too wrapped up in her wedding to really celebrate with you.”

“I called my mother.”

“And?”

“She called all her friends at the country club. They want me to speak to their ladies’ lunch group next month.”

“You haven’t spoken to them before?”

“They kept telling me I couldn’t mention sex.”

“Now you can?”

“I debuted at number one on the New York Times. I could talk about belching and farting in the fifteenth century and they’d think I was just charming. Oh, God. Please don’t tell me I just earned the right to be eccentric.”

“You’ve been eccentric since I met you. But when you’re under sixty-five, it’s called something else.”

“Don’t tell me what.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

“Value your life, do you?”

“As much as you value your Barbie Corvette.”

“Okay, so I shared with the people I care about most. So now what?”

“Pick a new goal?”

Sydney shook her head. What else was there? She already had the best job in the entire world. She spent long hours every day in her fantasy world, making up stories about hot sex and deep love, and someone paid her money to do it. Not that she needed the money. With her handy-dandy trust fund, she would have been set for life if she’d never typed a word. But when she’d received the first third of her legacy at eighteen, she’d started her foray into the world of stocks and investments. By the time she’d received the second third, not only was she earning a living as a writer, but she’d also doubled the investments she’d made the first time around. Sydney learned she had a head for three things—history, sex and money.

And as a successful historical romance novelist, she’d worked those strengths into a damned great career. She even enjoyed an ideal celebrity status, appearing at crowded book signings and on television and radio interviews, yet she could still go to the grocery store or the mall without being accosted.

To top it all, she served on the board of a foundation that provided literacy training in poor neighborhoods. Hell, she volunteered her time twice a month.

“What’s left, Cassie? God! I must be the most shallow woman on earth to have accomplished everything she wanted to do by the time she was thirty-two.”

Cassie shook her head. “Not shallow. Not really.”

Sydney cocked her eyebrow. She’d heard a “but” in there somewhere.

“What do you mean, ‘not really’?”

Anyone with more sense would have shrugged and begged off pointing out Sydney’s shortcomings, but Cassie, in her youthful confidence and ignorance, settled into her chair. “On the surface, you have an ideal life. Money, friends, a great career.”

“The foundation. Don’t forget the foundation.”

Cassie grinned. “Yes, you even do charitable work. You’ve been very careful and calculating, organizing your life with precision.”

“Hey, let’s not get insulting. I don’t organize. I fly by the seat of my pants.”

At this, Cassie frowned. “You like to think so.”

“Think so? I’m famous for my haphazardness. Ask your aunt. She rags me all the time for being such a mess.”

“That’s because Aunt Devon has elevated organization and planning to a religion. Compared to her, you are a mess. But compared to the normal population of the world, you’ve mapped out your entire life, ending with debuting your novel at number one on the New York Times bestseller list. Am I right here?”

Sydney couldn’t argue, not only because of her pounding headache, but because the kid made sense.

“But you don’t have someone to love.”

With a groan, Sydney folded her arms on the table and laid her forehead down. Gently. This verified her earlier suspicion. Young Cassie was in love and wanted to share her joy.

Great. Just great.

“God, please save me from being the clichéd heroine of a romance novel!” Sydney wailed dramatically before skewering her inexperienced friend with a powerful glare. “You know, that line in Jerry Maguire was written by a man. I do not—I repeat—I do not need a man to complete me. If you really subscribe to such thinking, you’ve set feminism back to the days of Susan B. Anthony.”