Some Like It Hot by Louisa Edwards Read Free Book Online Page B

wasn’t the kiss that turned you on,” she murmured. “It was the naughtiness of it. The fact that you broke your own rules and played by mine, even for a few seconds, got you hotter than you’ve ever been in your whole life. And there’s more where that came from.”

    Danny’s lungs locked up tight. He couldn’t move, could only stare as the doors slid open and Eva walked past him and out into the golden light of the hallway.

    “You coming?” She tossed it over her shoulder as if she didn’t even care, but even in his moment of shocked paralysis, Danny registered the slight stiffness of her slim, elegant form.

    Somehow, the knowledge that she wasn’t quite so nonchalant as she wanted him to think made it easy to breathe again, and to stride down the hall at her side.

    He let them get to the huge double doors that marked the entrance to the hotel kitchen before he stopped and said, “I’m a pastry chef. I’m good at rules—good at figuring them out, and figuring out ways around them, ways to bend them, ways to break them.”

    She hesitated, one hand on the door, and for the first time a note of uncertainty crept into her confident gaze.

    “Just a friendly warning,” Danny said, reaching past her to push the door open. “In case you thought you were the one setting up the game. I’m here to win, sweetheart. And I don’t mess around.”

Chapter 5

    It was only October. How was Chicago already a bleak frozen wasteland ripped by icy winds? Kane Slater zipped his black hoodie up all the way to his chin and wished he’d been smart enough to bring a real coat.

    But damn, it never got this ball-shriveling cold back home in Austin, not even in the dead of winter. And in fucking LA, where he lived now, people wigged out and started wearing those ugly-ass furry boots if it dropped below seventy-two.

    Still. He should’ve known it would be chilly up here. He hummed a snatch of the new, half-formed melody he couldn’t get out of his head and huddled down into the worn fleece of his sweatshirt, making sure his thick black sunglasses were perched firmly on his nose, hiding his distinctive blue eyes. His hood was up and pulled tight, too, and he’d pretty much found that if people couldn’t see his blond hair and blue eyes, they didn’t know who he was.

    At the very least, no one on the streets of Chicago seemed to recognize him, and Kane sent up a hymn of thanks to whatever gods looked out for rock stars who’d slipped the leashes of their handlers for an afternoon.

    It was stupid, maybe, but after the rocket-ship launch of his last two years of Grammys and music video awards and world tours and screaming girls throwing their panties onto the stage, Kane needed a break every now and then. He accepted the restrictions, the bodyguards, the eyes watching his every move as part of the whole fame package, and usually it was a decent trade-off. He knew he’d make the same deal with the devil a thousand times over if it meant he got to live and breathe music every day.

    But the huge, smothering, never-receding wave of attention made it hard to get a minute alone to think.

    And Kane had some shit to work through.

    Okay, he told himself as his rubber-soled Converse All Stars pounded the sidewalk, the thin canvas doing nothing to block the slushy leftovers of last week’s snow. Man up. You made a commitment to the RSC, to Eva, and to yourself. Don’t let the fact that you’re all whipped and mopey over a fellow judge stop you from doing your job.

    Also, he decided as a gust of frigid air whipped down the canyon formed by the tall buildings and neatly sheared off the top layer of Kane’s skin, maybe don’t be such an emo loser that you stalk around in the ice cold contracting pneumonia or something .

    Conceding his defeat to Chicago’s famous blustery weather, Kane wrapped his arms around his torso and shouldered his way into the first coffee shop he saw.

    Warmth hit him like a feather pillow to the