Anyone but Alex (The English Brothers Book 3) by Katy Regnery Read Free Book Online

you.”
    Those eyes again. Those trusting eyes that looked into his face like she had some secret knowledge of his heart, like she had some guarantee that he wouldn’t hurt her.
    Well, she was right. He wouldn’t.
    He thought about Weston stalking away because his weekly nooners with Hope had ruined Wes’s chances with Constance. He thought of Cameron’s hard eyes as he warned Alex away from his sister. He couldn’t bear for Jessie to be the topic of rumors and speculation—for their mutual acquaintances, and her brothers, to assume she was just another conquest.
    “It would bother me . We’ll be discreet, or we can’t be friends.”
    She leaned back, a small smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “Okay.”
    “Shall I have a car pick you up at Cam’s or at Westerly on Tuesday?”
    “Westerly. I’m just in the city for tonight.”
    The music faded gently, and Alex heard his mother’s voice over the microphone, asking for people to take their seats before her presentation. She was about to make a speech about Save the Children of Philadelphia, and it was the perfect time for Alex to slip back inside unnoticed.
    He let go of Jessie regretfully , and she shrugged out of his jacket, holding it out to him. He put it back on quickly, savoring the warmth from her body, the faint smell of her perfume. Just before he turned away from her, he couldn’t resist taking her hand and raising it to his lips, resting them against the soft warmth of her skin for a single moment before slipping back inside.
    ***
    Jessie put her hand to her chest after he was gone. Her heart thumped wildly, and her mind was in riot as she tried to process what had just happened between her and Alex.
    She could tell—as she finished her list of qualities that she wanted in a man—that he’d taken himself out of the running, and she understood why. Cam had enlightened her earlier . “ He doesn’t do commitment, Jess. Never has, never will.” Carried away with his encouragement, she’d ended up describing someone quite different from Alex English. But as she watched him withdraw, something sharp and painful in the vicinity of her heart made her panic.
    It had been forward and impulsive to ask Alex to dance, but desperation had muddled her senses, making her cross a line. If he was going to walk away from her, if she wasn’t going to see him again while she was in Philly, she wanted one perfect moment in his arms before she lost him to a sea of eager women.
    As they danced, he’d changed his mind about a friendship.
    So had she.
    Despite the fact that she had agreed to be friends, it was a lie. It was utterly impossible for her to be his friend now. She wanted him like a heroine wants a hero, like a lover wants her beloved, like a woman wants a man—she wanted his heart and his soul and his body.
    She picked up her drink and finished it, mewling softly with longing as she felt the imprint of his warm lips brushing against her cold hand. Jessie clenched her eyes shut, unable to forget his warm breath against her ear, the strong muscles of his back under her fingers, the burn of his eyes as they looked into hers, the touch of his lips to the back of her hand. If they hadn’t danced, she could have just gone on imagining what it would be like to be with Alex, but now she had a taste, and that taste had unleashed a terrible hunger inside of her.
    She turned to enter the ballroom, but still deeply lost in thoughts of Alex, s he didn’t see Cameron waiting for her just inside. When his hand reached out for her wrist, she almost dropped her martini glass.
    “Cam!” she hissed, giving him a surprised look and grasping the thin glass stem in her fingers.
    Several people turned around and one person shushed them.
    “I think it’s time for us to go,” he growled softly.
    Jessie looked just beyond Cameron to Alex, who stood about ten feet away, his eyes focused with fury on Cam’s back. She was certain that Cam and Alex had just exchanged