Raising Hell by Julie Kenner Read Free Book Online Page A

fastened with a simple clasp in front.
    Nick couldn’t help himself. He reached out and traced his finger down between her breasts, noting with interest the way her nipples hardened against the lace. He stroked his thumb over her nipple, his breath catching in his throat, mesmerized by the way she closed her eyes and arched her head back.
    Her movements were slow and subtle, but she tilted her breasts up in a silent invitation. Greedily, he cupped her breasts, feeling them swell against his palms.
    Glorious Hades! How he wanted this woman. A woman like none he’d ever had before, with a purity that seemed to reach out, begging for him to take and make his own.
    “Delilah,” he whispered.
    That, though, was a mistake. Her eyes flicked open, and she reached for the lapels of her shirt, tugging it modestly closed even as she slid to the far side of the bed. “Sorry,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”
    “I’m not,” he said, hoping for a smile but receiving nothing in return.
    She stopped by the window, then reached her hand up to stroke her fingers along the glass. Outside, the setting sun burned orange in the sky, painting her body with an ethereal glow and setting her hair on fire.
    Her shirt, though more modest now, was still unbuttoned, revealing only a hint of her bra.
    Magic seemed to wash over her, as if the firmaments had both consumed and released her, leaving her trapped between Heaven and Hell, earth and sky.
    This, Nick realized, was the image he’d been waiting for.
    She started to turn toward him, but he held out a hand and cried, “No! Don’t move.”
    She froze, one eyebrow lifting. “Nick?”
    “Say nothing,” he said. “Just stay stay there. Stay, and let me capture this moment.”
    Lila stood completely still, her palm pressed against the window, the cool of the glass a counterpoint to the heat that filled her body. So intense, actually, that it was a wonder steam didn’t rise from beneath her fingers.
    She smiled at the thought, pleased to have something silly enter her head after all the decadent images that had filled and distracted her.
    He’d touched her.
    Even now, it was all she could do not to trace her fingers down her throat and cup her own breasts, remembering the feel of his hands against her. So heady, so wonderful, so very erotic.
    And so very terrifying.
    She’d felt the quickening in her thighs, the liquid heat in her panties, and she’d bolted, startling him and embarrassing her. But what choice did she have? She’d come here to be a model, not to fall victim to Nicholas Velnias’s famous charm. No matter how real that charm might be.
    The man had a reputation, after all. And she didn’t want to be one of his many publicized conquests. Didn’t want to be one of a line of women. More, she didn’t want to turn into the very woman her father had predicted she’d become if she moved from home to the dark hell of New York City. A wild woman, unconcerned about whose bed she ended up in, more interested in pleasure than love or morality or simple kindness.
    No, Lila didn’t want to be that woman.
    But she did want to sleep with him. Like it or not—foolish or not—the desire coursed through her, filling her. And, ultimately, driving her.
    Her eyes welled, and she fought back tears as she thought of her father’s harsh words when she’d told him that she was doing it—that she was going to New York. He’d been cruel, accusatory.
    But he’d also been wrong. Because she wasn’t that woman. She had her head on straight and she wasn’t going to sleep around.
    But did that mean she couldn’t be just a little wicked with a man she was desperately attracted to? Because right now, she wanted to be. Oh, how she wanted to be.
    Nick was fully focused on her, and the sensation of being at the very center of his attention turned her on, filling her body with heat. Something about him—about this place—seemed to open her senses. The pungent scent of oil and turpentine. The