Author: Bella Andre

“You’re the one who’s saying I leave you cold.” He hadn’t taken his eyes from hers, and in the span of a handful of words, they’d grown darker, more intense. “One kiss, Mia. Surely you can walk away from that.”

What had she done to deserve his return into her life? She’d packed up every beautiful moment, every sweet and sinful memory of being with Ford, and had buried them all in the deepest, darkest part of her heart. She’d worked so hard to put the past to rest. She’d been over him.

He couldn’t just come back like this, couldn’t make her want him like this, couldn’t send her emotions into turmoil with nothing but a dark look and a few tossed-off words in his deep, mesmerizing voice. Heck, she had a date tonight with a really great guy who could very well end up being the one.

But now, after less than an hour alone with Ford, she was grappling with all of her old demons.

She needed to take a step away from him, and then another and another until she was far enough that she couldn’t see him anymore, couldn’t smell him, couldn’t reach out to find out if his skin was still as hot to the touch as it had once been.

Pride be damned, she was going to have to let him win this round by running from him...if only to make sure he didn’t win back the one thing that really mattered.

Her heart.

Or worse, her soul.

But her feet still weren’t listening, because instead of taking her further from him, they were moving her closer, then closer still, until he was right there within kissing distance.

“One kiss,” she found herself agreeing though she knew better. “And when you realize that it, and you, mean absolutely nothing to me—” She shouldn’t need to pause, shouldn’t feel even the slightest hesitation in stating what she knew needed to happen. “—you’ll promise never to come near me again.”

He didn’t so much as blink before agreeing with a husky, “You have my word.”

And then he cupped her face in his hands and lowered his head to hers...

Chapter Five

Ford had never been much of a planner, had always chosen to follow passion, instead. Then again, this much had never been on the line before. One kiss to decide if Mia would remain in his life...or if he’d have to give her up forever.

Only, even if he’d thought to plan the kiss carefully by playing off all her sensual trigger points, Ford wouldn’t have had a chance of following that plan. Because the instant she agreed to the kiss, the desperation to touch her again ripped through every other thought, every other sense, every other need.

Just being near her tore his control to shreds.

The entire world thought Ford Vincent was the ultimate ladies’ man, and that there wasn’t a woman alive who had the power to bring him to his knees. But the world was wrong. Dead wrong.

Mia was the only woman who had ever truly marked him. Not just his body, but his heart...and down deeper than that, even. He’d never felt passion like this for anyone else.

He felt her breath hitch in her chest as his thumbs brushed gently over her cheekbones, his fingertips lightly caressing her jaw and the very tips of her earlobes. Earlobes he knew to be extremely sensitive. All he’d had to do when they were together before was score one of her lobes with the edge of his teeth and she would start begging him to take her.

She’d had on a fresh coat of lipstick when she first walked into the tower, and though it was mostly gone now, a faint stain of red pigment remained. Her eyes were still open, but her lashes were fluttering in her fight to keep them from closing.

The breath from her lips was warm, and so damned seductive against his as he tried to prolong the moment. But Ford just didn’t have it in him to draw out the anticipation any longer, not when he was dying to taste her again.

Finally, with her name on his lips, he closed the final distance between them.

There was no way he could have held back his groan of pleasure at how good the simple touch of Mia’s lips was against his. He felt almost drunk from the press of her curves, though she was trying to remain stiff and unyielding against him.

Shifting his hands up into her hair, Ford slicked his tongue in a slow path along her lower lip. For all his memories of how good kissing her had been, memories had never tasted this good, nor made his heart race nearly out of his chest.

Her hands had come up to press against his chest, as if to push him away. But as his tongue made a second trip over her upper lip, ducking into the bow in the middle before tracking a damp path to the sensitive corner, he could feel her warring with herself. Staying cold and unmoved by his kiss had been her intention upon rising to his challenge. And she’d clearly believed she could pull it off.

But when her fingers began to clench on his shirt, and all it would have taken was one slight shift to push him away and end the kiss before it really even got a chance to begin, she grabbed the cotton, instead, to drag him even closer.

Thank God.

* * *

Mia had mentally braced herself for pleasure. She had physically prepared herself for heat.

But it wasn’t until Ford actually touched her skin with calloused fingertips, then waited for her to have no choice but to respond to his sinfully sweet caresses before finally dropping his mouth to hers, that she remembered just how enormous his powers of seduction were.

Worse still, as if the mere press of his lips over hers wasn’t already enough to start melting her from the core outward, he’d dragged his tongue over her lips. And that was when her memories became even clearer.

Because Ford had never simply seduced her. He had demanded her passion, instead. Right from that first moment when he’d been on stage and she’d been in the audience, he’d forced her to face what was already between them. It hadn’t mattered that they were two complete strangers, because with nothing more than a look, and a song, she’d been his. Just as he was making her his again with this kiss, even as she tried to remind herself that she should be keeping him from touching any part of her, body or soul.

But as his tongue stroked against hers once, then twice, then three gorgeous times, sending shivers through her, head to toe, and her hands involuntarily clutched the fabric of his shirt even harder, their kiss deepened the way it always had. From nothing to everything in the span of one heartbeat, one breath.

And now that his heat, his strength, were beneath her hands and pressed hard against the length of her body, Mia couldn’t help but give in to the need that she hadn’t wanted to admit had been bubbling away inside of her for the past five years.

As the years fell away and her memories were replaced with shockingly potent and dizzying real-life pleasure, Mia also couldn’t possibly deny that this kiss trumped every one of their previous kisses. Not just because they’d both obviously been waiting five long and painful years for another one, but because everything was different now.

She’d been a girl then, caught up in dreams and fairy tales, and though she still looked much the same on the outside, their breakup had changed something inside her forever. Ford had barely been more than a boy himself when he’d broken her heart. Now he was not only a man, but also a superstar who had the entire world at his feet. Mia had always believed she was a strong woman, but even so, she’d wanted Ford so badly at twenty-three that she’d nearly given up her entire life for him.

If he’d nearly been able to take everything from her then, what would he take now if she were stupid enough to let him?

“Jesus,” he said in wonder against her lips, “even in my wildest memories, I never remembered anything this hot.”

Though his shirt was still in her hands and her body was urging her to yank him closer, she suddenly realized that if she didn’t put every wall back up, and make every last effort at resistance, then Ford might have the power to actually break her this time, rather than just bruise her.

Gathering up every possible ounce of determination she possessed, she pushed him away, hard enough that her fingers had no choice but to break free of their hold on him. Her move was so sudden that one of his hands tangled in her hair and left her scalp stinging as they finally came all the way apart.

She couldn’t do this, had known better than to step up to his carelessly thrown-out dare. No one but Ford had ever made her want like this, so effortlessly, so deeply, so passionately...so foolishly.

All these years she’d told herself that she would never be stupid enough to be susceptible to him again. But now she knew with one hundred percent certainty that it wouldn’t matter how many years passed.

She’d still be held in his thrall.

Both of them were breathing hard, and the way his chest rose against the thin fabric of his short-sleeved cotton shirt outlined his well-developed muscles against the fabric in a horribly distracting way. Denying their physical connection would just prove her to be an even bigger fool, so she didn’t bother to try.

“You’re right,” she agreed. “It was hot.” She made sure to pause a beat so that he wouldn’t miss her next words. “But you still mean nothing to me.”

“We both know that’s a lie.” He looked arrogant and beautiful as he told her, flat-out, “You’ve never been able to forget me any more than I’ve been able to forget you.”

“Stop it.” She backed up, but her path was blocked by a thick shrub before she could get any farther from him and the words she knew he intended to use in exactly the same way he’d used his kiss. Not to seduce, but to demand. “Don’t you dare look at me like that, like that kiss was special, like it mattered to you. Not when we both know it didn’t.”

For the first time since she’d seen him standing in the tower, anger flared in his eyes. “How the hell can you say that to me after that kiss? How can you act like you aren’t special to me, or that you don’t matter—when no one has ever mattered as much as you do? If I thought you’d listen to reason, if I thought you’d listen to my apologies, I would have started with those, but you’re so damned stubborn that I had to lead with the kiss just to get you to admit you feel anything at all.”

Hating the way her lips still tingled, how good the taste of him was even now, and worse, how desperately she suddenly wanted to hear his apologies, she gave up any final attempt at composure.

“You didn’t try to contact me for five years!” She was flat-out yelling now, but didn’t care anymore what he thought of her. “And then when you did, you tricked me with a call from a lawyer so I wouldn’t know it was you lying in wait for me in the tower. You are just as much of an egocentric jerk as you always were, because, clearly, it’s still all about what you want, and no one else’s life—or wishes—matter. So don’t you dare stand here and try to convince me I’m special or that you’re finally ready to give me some apologies that are going to make everything all better. We were good in bed together. That’s all there is, or ever was, between us. But do you know what the worst part of it is? I was almost stupid enough let you buy your way back into my life.

She reached into her jacket pocket, pulled out the check she hadn’t yet taken to the bank and ripped it in half. The two pieces of paper fluttered to the ground as she said, “Five years ago, you were the one who told me goodbye. Now, I’m saying it to you.” Head held high, she turned and walked away.

Chapter Six

The last thing Ford had time for right now was a house-hunting trip to Seattle. His touring crew and management team were in Los Angeles preparing for his Sunday night show at The Staples Center. He’d had half a dozen major interviews scheduled for today, but when his lawyer had confirmed that Mia was available, he’d had his PR team reschedule everything. Despite his fame, he’d never been a particularly high-maintenance client, so they’d been happy to take care of it because they figured something important must have come up. Tonight and Saturday were going to be pretty rough without any breathing room between the extra interviews they’d had to cram in.