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BLURB
The fourth story in the new adult series that began with the New York Times bestseller Real, featuring Brooke's best friend, Melanie, and the ROGUE she can't resist.
Greyson King...
My boyfriend. My friend. My protector. He's the reason I wake up every morning with a smile on my face, and the reason I fall asleep limp, worn out, and aching for his warm arms around me. When we make love, he says my name like it means something. Like I mean something.
He
Lied.
His name is Greyson King, but his alias is Zero.
There's zero trace of him, he has zero past, and now I know that with him, I will have zero future.
He may leave no trace of him anywhere, but his imprint is in me, in my very soul--and I hate that a mere look at him commands the beat of my heart. The temperature of my body.
I've looked for love my entire life. I've waited for the butterflies, the rainbows...
Instead I'm in a free fall of emotions and there's no one to catch me but the one man I should be running away from. The one man I thought was my prince charming.
Except this prince charming went rogue.
Greyson will stop at nothing to make me be with him. He'll let no one stand in our way, will allow no one to threaten me, and maybe this is what scares me most of all...
What will my rogue do to keep me?
My boyfriend. My friend. My protector. He's the reason I wake up every morning with a smile on my face, and the reason I fall asleep limp, worn out, and aching for his warm arms around me. When we make love, he says my name like it means something. Like I mean something.
He
Lied.
His name is Greyson King, but his alias is Zero.
There's zero trace of him, he has zero past, and now I know that with him, I will have zero future.
He may leave no trace of him anywhere, but his imprint is in me, in my very soul--and I hate that a mere look at him commands the beat of my heart. The temperature of my body.
I've looked for love my entire life. I've waited for the butterflies, the rainbows...
Instead I'm in a free fall of emotions and there's no one to catch me but the one man I should be running away from. The one man I thought was my prince charming.
Except this prince charming went rogue.
Greyson will stop at nothing to make me be with him. He'll let no one stand in our way, will allow no one to threaten me, and maybe this is what scares me most of all...
What will my rogue do to keep me?
ROGUE
– snippet
“Bastard,” I mumble. “You ruined my whole week, you
fucking bastard. I bet you’re fucking some triple-D blonde right now and her
triplets all at the same time, aren’t you? You’re not even a two-timer, you’re
like a three-timer, liar, feeding me an I’ll-take-you-to-the-movies fucking
line. I swear I was fine until you came back like you “got” me, like you “got”
me even if I looked like a hungover mess. God, I can’t believe myself!”
I
kick the tub as if it’s the tub’s fault, then yell, “OUCH!”
Scowling,
I walk into the bedroom, grab my sleep clothes, pad outside to my living
room/kitchen combo to grab some ice cream, slide on my Princess Bride DVD and turn on the TV. A couple of pounds of fat,
here we go. I plop down and a vibration buzzes across the couch. I scowl and
feel around for my phone. I find it way in between the two couch cushions, pull
it out, and set it aside for a scoop of ice cream. I almost choke on it when I
see a text I hadn’t noticed before.
Be home
tonight.
What?
My stomach vaults. I read who the text is from and suddenly I want to throw my
phone into a WALL. Greyson. I scowl
at it and throw it down to the couch and start pacing. I’m not going to answer
him. Why would I? He seemed in no hurry to talk to me before, and now he orders
me? Like an all mighty king? No
thanks. I’ll pass on our second date, thank you.
But I
check and notice the text was sent hours ago. I tell myself I am not going to
respond, I will wait a gazillion days like he did. I set the phone aside and
put a big spoonful of ice cream in my mouth, letting it melt on my tongue, but
my stomach is squirming and now I can’t watch the TV, I can only stare at my
phone and suck on the spoon. Then I bury the spoon in the tub and grab my
phone, squeeze my eyes shut and type.
I’m
home but that doesn’t mean I’m staying home. Just depends . . .
On?comes the reply, and quickly.
Whoa,
was he waiting, with phone in hand, to answer? It seems like he was.
I
wait one full minute. Trembling. Type: On
who’s visiting
I
don’t mean that as an invite. I mean it as in: I’d hightail it out of here if
he set foot in my building. But his answer is lightning fast and my heart
starts pounding as it keeps staring back at me.
Me.
Crap!
I have to leave. I have to leave; I can’t see him! I can’t be this easy! A line
must be drawn. He’s already shown what our night together meant to him, and I
won’t let myself be devalued by him or any other moron again.
I
should leave before he arrives, or when he does, yell through the door, without
opening it even an inch, and tell him that I’m NOT INTERESTED! You stood me up, you didn’t get in touch
soon enough, I am not your booty call, have a good life!
Yeah.
That sounds right.
Determined,
I head over to close the living room blinds. When I glance out the window and
reach for the string I see a dark sports car pull over and a man in black step
out of the driver’s seat. He looks up toward my window and all my systems stop
when our eyes lock, hold, recognize.
My insides go into chaos mode. A strange excitement makes my knees knock.
Fuck
me, it’s really him.
What
is he doing here? What does he want?
He
heads into the building and I turn to face my closed door, panicking because I
haven’t changed, I didn’t change. I’m
in my pj’s, if hardly that.
Noticing
the pint of ice cream still grasped in my hand, I run to shove it back into the
freezer, spoon and all. I start pacing around in circles, trying to come up
with a new plan, but unable to think for shit. I consider telling my building
guard not to let him in, but I hear the ring of the elevator and realize the
guard must have recognized the motherfucker from when he brought me home last
week.
Deciding
not to delay the inevitable, I swing the door open as he steps out of the
elevator. He looks straight at me and his gaze drills into me, making a hole
straight in my thoughts. One of my neighbors and her husband pass along the
hall toward their door.
“Well,
hello there, Melanie. A little chilly out.” She gestures to the white silk
shorts and near-transparent camisole I’m wearing in complete disapproval and
continues on.
Greyson
follows behind her and fills up the space one foot away from my threshold with
muscle and beauty and testosterone and, I swear, god, I swear, he’s as lethal
as a nuclear bomb. My knees, oh, my knees. My heart. My eyes. My body feels
both light as a feather and heavy as a tank. How can this be? He’s so stunning
I can’t even move. Or blink, or
hardly stand; I’m leaning on the door frame.
I’m
fully sober. Something I might regret. He’s no longer blurred by the rain, by
vodka, or by my stupid illusions of prince charming.
The
man standing at my door is very real, very big, very tan, and his smile is
very, very charming. There is no word for the way he stands there, his eyes
dark and glimmering, his cheekbones hard and his jaw smoothly shaven, his mouth
so beautiful, tipped up mischievously at the corners. His suit is perfect,
playboy perfect, and his tousled hair run with wayward streaks of copper that
makes me want to rake my fingers straight through. And he’s here, looking at me
as if waiting for me to let him in. A memory of the morning he brought me home
flashes through me. Where I felt sore because of the way he’d loved me all
night. The little mark behind my ear that I found the next morning.
Hanging
on to my every instinct of self-preservation, I hold the door only halfway open
when he catches it in one big powerful hand.
“Invite
me in,” he says softly, holding the door in his firm grip.
“My car doesn’t need a tune-up, it’s fine, but thanks for
checking in on it,” I say, pushing it closed with more effort.
He shoves the door open and strides inside, and I’m
frustrated over my inability to keep him out. Now he’s inside and he shuts the
door like he owns my place, then he studies it with a sweep of narrowed eyes.
“This building has a laundry chute?”
“That’s your
line?”
He crosses the room and pulls the rest of the blinds
shut, then he performs an insanely quick check of my place with a sweep of his
gaze that makes my insides turn over.
It’s almost like he’s making sure there is no other man
here.
He can’t possibly be jealous, can he?
And now . . . now that he seems assured no one is here
but me, he starts walking over to me and looking at my mouth, and I’m walking
away because every instinct of self-preservation in me tells me to walk away.
“You’re here. Why are you here all of a sudden? Some
other date canceled on you last minute?” I demand.
“I have a date I’d like to schedule with you.” His
eyebrows pull low over those brilliant hawklike eyes. “You’re not nearly as
excited to see me as I’d hoped.”
“Maybe I thought you were a drunken hallucination. Maybe
I hoped you were.”
I hit the back of my kitchen island and he locks me in
with his arms, his eyes almost desperate and hungry. Then he cups my face and
sets his mouth to mine, like he thinks—mistakenly—I belong to him.
“I’m not,” he says, softly, then he kisses me again, so
deeply I lose my train of thought until he speaks against my mouth again. “A
hallucination. And if you need me to, I’ll spend all night reminding you of
what it feels like to have my tongue and my cock buried deep in you and how
much you liked it.”
He leans over as if to kiss me again. My voice trembles
as I turn my head. “Don’t, Greyson.”
“I don’t like that word, ‘don’t,’” he rasps against my
cheek. “But I do like you saying Greyson.”
He tips my head around with the tip of one finger and
stares at me like he loves the look of me. I lift one of his arms and he lets
me, and I start easing away again, free of him, but not free of his stare. The
first night he just kept staring at my eyes like he couldn’t tear his gaze
free, but now, now he’s seeing all of me. I’m wearing shorts and a camisole yet
my body starts heating as his eyes rake me up and down.
“I gave you a chance and you blew it,” I breathe.
“I want another one.”
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Bio
My Life in 8 Words: “Hectic, wonderful, complete; everything I ever wanted.”
Katy Evans grew up with books and book-boyfriends until she found a real sexy boyfriend to love. They married and are now hard at work on their own happily ever after. Katy loves her family and friends, and she also loves reading, walking, baking, and being consumed by her characters until she reaches “The End.” Which is, hopefully, only the beginning…
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