Bourbon & Branch Water by Patricia Green Read Free Book Online Page A

getting any sleep.”
    Fact was she didn’t plan on sleep. She
hoped for erotic hours with Jeff. This was her fling and she wanted to make it
count. Tanya’s advice to keep her heart out of it was good advice, so she’d
enjoy these moments and not expect more.
    Jeff gave her one more smack on her
stinging butt and pressed her forward until she crawled into the middle of the
bed. He joined her there and snuggled her into his side and sighed. “This is
good, hmm?”
    She nodded.
    He chuckled. “You may not say much,
but your body tells the tale.”
    Stormy snuggled closer, her hand on
his chest feeling the beat of his heart. Yes, every moment was something to be
savored.
    * * *
    They did it twice more through the
night, completely ignoring the whole idea of dinner and the jazz show. Finally,
exhausted, they slept.
    When Jeff woke, it was to an empty
bed. He didn’t know what to think. She’d been so skittish after their first
encounter; maybe she was running away again. So many things about her screamed
inexperience, but this hurrying away seemed to deny it. It was as though she
was in it for the sex and nothing else. He tried to figure out what he’d done
to make her think they were incompatible for more than that, and he couldn’t
think of a thing. They had things in common, they enjoyed each other’s
company—well, he admitted to himself, they did
focus on one aspect of that togetherness rather a lot.
    He sat up in bed and paused on the
edge of his mattress, leaning forward on his knees as he ruffled his bedhead.
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted one of Stormy’s white, high-heeled pumps. That was quickly followed by a thump in his living
room. What the hell was that? Was she still here?
    Jeff pulled on his pajama bottoms
and tiptoed into the hallway, peering into the living room cautiously. It was a
secure building, but caution was never a bad plan. Stormy was there, fully
dressed except for her shoes and bent over his roll-top desk, pawing through
the papers there.
    His brief! She was looking for the
legal brief for the Randolph/ Porterman case. Why that
little tramp! She had had him completely fooled. Here he thought she was a
guileless, honest woman, maybe a little extra-randy, and yet he finds her
searching his personal papers for information. Talk about a ruthless competitor.
That she would use him like this, sleep with him in order to get access to the
files soured him. Fortunately, all the papers for the case were in his locked
briefcase.
    He stepped into the room and leaned
on the wall. “Find what you’re looking for?”
    She straightened as though shot and
turned around quickly. “I was…I was looking for a piece of paper and a pen.”
    “What for?”
    “I was going to leave you a note, a
good-bye note.” Her cheeks were flushed and she wouldn’t meet his gaze. Either
she was extremely innocent and shy or she’d missed her calling as an actress.
    “Oh, I see. You were just going to
leave without waking me. Run off like our time together didn’t matter. And,” he
stalked closer to her. “You’d have accidentally stuffed the Randolph/ Porterman file in your purse.”
    “File?” she squeaked.
    His frown was immediate. “Don’t
play that game with me, Stormy. You’re here for privileged information. You’re
so desperate to win this case that you’ll stoop to anything to do it.” Bitterness
seeped into his tone. “You’d sleep with me to get it. How low is that?”
    She gasped. “I didn’t! I wouldn’t!
That’s not true!”
    “Come on, Stormy. The evidence is
clear.”
    She stepped toward him, hands
imploring. “But, Jeff, you’ve got to believe me. I was looking for paper and a
pen. I wasn’t looking for the brief. We’re not even supposed to talk about the
case, let alone share information.”
    Jeff grunted his disbelief. “Yeah,
right. So, were your orgasms real?” He stepped closer, unable to resist the
warm, sexy smell of her. “Did you fool me with those,