My One And Only by MacKenzie Taylor Read Free Book Online Page B

dare take the time to analyze the intensity of his desire. For the space of a few hea rt beats, he let restraint war heavily with it. Hunger was beginning to surge through the vault. Anger he was used to. Exhilaration, passion, even desire had occasionally gotten the better of him, but this gnawing hunger was new. And if he took the time to think about it, it would scare the hell out of him. He was tired, he told himself, and Abby represented something he'd left behind when he'd walked away from Harrison Montgomery. Naturally, he found her intriguing. This explanation satisfied him. He thrust the anxious feeling aside with the determination and skilled precision of a knight dropping his visor into place as he prepared to charge into battle. "You're nervous," he said softly, "aren't you?"
    "Wouldn't you be?"
    Did he mistake the slight intake of breath? "Depends."
    "Six thousand people are about to lose their jobs. If I can't convince you to help—" She was clutching her fingers in her lap now. "It's a lot of pressure. "
    "I'm not talking about Harrison or his company. I think you know that."
    "I don't—"
    "Do I make you nervous, Abby?" he asked quietly.
    "No."
    No hesitation there, he saw. He raised an eyebrow. She shook her head. "You look like you don't believe me," she told him. "You don't make me nervous."
    "That's a very good thing."
    "I'd say the feeling I have is more like the slowest and fattest gazelle in the herd who knows the panther just woke up and realized he was hungry."
    His lips twitched. "I'm not sure I'd have used 'fattest' and 'slowest'… "
    "So you're more diplomatic than I am. How am I supposed to respond to statements like ' I'm do ing this for you?' "
    She hadn't forgotten. He put that piece of information in the Positive column of his growing balan c e sheet of this conversation. "You didn't actually think I'd do it for Harrison?"
    "I don't know what I thought."
    "You're probably the only person alive who could stand the man for as long as you have," he told her. "I'll admit that I'd kind of like to know what the attraction is."
    She didn't flinch. He'd spent the two-hour flight to Chicago mentally ticking off all the reasons that he shouldn't do this. Those reasons had started to crumble the moment she'd opened the door and let him into this warm haven of her life. They now lay in ruin around his Italian leather shoes.
    Abby shifted on the couch so she could tuck her bare feet beneath her jeans-clad legs. She slipped one of those honey-blond curls behind her ear. Every time she did that, it made him jealous. He'd been wanting to get his hands into her hair since he'd seen it conf ined by a pencil with a chewed- off eraser.
    "It's not like I don't know the man has his flaws, you know."
    "I don't think you're that naive."
    "But it's like Rachel told you tonight. After Mother and Dad were killed, it took months for the insurance to pay out. If Harrison hadn't hired me, social services would have sent Rachel away to foster care."
    "How did you make your way from the mail room to running the Montgomery Foundation? "
    A slight flush stained her cheeks, but the angry glint in her eyes told him fury had caused it, not embarrassment. "I worked hard. I did everything anyone asked me to, and more. I spent as much time as I could learning what MDS does, who we do it with, and how we do it. I studied, I did a lot of jobs nobody else wanted to do, and my managers appreciated it."
    "No doubt."
    "By the time Harrison moved me upstairs, I had already held manag erial positions in three depart ments. When he started the Montgomery Foundation, I was naturally excited by the project."
    The foundation, Ethan knew, supported a number of different charitable ventures, the most notable of which provided financial support, health care, and a variety of social services for Chicago's veterans. Abby's father, Ethan's research had told him, was a veteran of the Vietnam War. Before his death, he'd owned and operated a well-loved