will you be helping Grace?”
“Not that Grace needs my help, but yes, I’m going to be an active part of the school community until the end of the year.”
“I’ll be happy to serve on a committee with both of you.”
Grace had absolutely no idea how this had happened. She didn’t work well in groups. There was no way she wanted both Adam and Sue-Ellen in her office on a regular basis.
“We can work out the details of our committee after the board meets this afternoon,” Adam replied.
“I’ll look forward to it,” Sue-Ellen said and walked away.
Grace glared after her, hating the fact that Sue-Ellen had bullied her way onto a committee that Grace wasn’t even sure she wanted to be a part of. If she was on a committee with Sue-Ellen, she’d have a hard time holding her tongue and being the nice little headmistress she was supposed to be. Of all the parents she dealt with, Sue-Ellen was the one who pushed her buttons.
Sue-Ellen glanced back over her shoulder with a smug half-smile. Grace had the feeling Sue-Ellen knew exactly what she did to her.
“Will you do something for me?” Adam asked.
“In return for your help at the school?” She didn’t want to say no since he was doing her a huge favor but she’d learned a long time ago not to agree to something without hearing all the details first.
“No. I’m going to help you without you being in my debt.”
He seemed a little offended that she’d thought she’d have to pay him for being nice to her. But he was a savvy businessman, and she knew he didn’t just donate his time to help anyone out. Even the school that was his family’s legacy.
“Then why?”
“Curiosity,” he said.
“What do you want me to do?” she asked after a few seconds.
“Have dinner with me,” he said.
Dinner with Adam Bowen … oh, my God. She wanted to say yes. She wanted to run and hide at the same time. Her resolution to change herself and not wait for her life to change around her was still so new that she had a moment’s thought that she’d just forget about it and sink back into her old life. After all, it was Monday night and she didn’t have TiVo. She’d miss her favorite television show.
This was it, she thought, glancing up at him.
“You’re staring at me,” he said.
She blinked and realized she had been. Just looking at that perfectly formed mouth. Wondering for the millionth time what it would feel like pressed to hers. “Am I?”
He quirked one eyebrow at her. She fought to keep her expression serene. To somehow keep him from guessing that he had any effect on her. But she knew that he was used to being around much more sophisticated women and a small-town girl from west Texas was going to be no match for him.
“Yes, you are,” he said.
“You’re a very attractive man.”
“I can’t believe you’re just noticing,” he said.
Startled she had to laugh. “You aren’t going to deny it?”
“Women seem to find the arrangement of my features pleasing.”
She shook her head. An innate charm imbued everything he did and said. She wondered if it stemmed from his childhood. She knew he was the pampered son of older parents. And her own childhood had been very different. Was that the key to adult success?
“I wish I had your confidence,” she said before she could stop the words. She’d gone to school this morning knowing she was going to have to fight to keep her career going, never imagining that she’d find herself in a different relationship with a man she’d fantasized about for a long time.
“Have dinner with me and I’ll teach you how to get it.”
She nodded, unable to say more. This was a fantasy come true. So why did she feel as if she were about to start something more potentially scandalous than the mess she was already in?
Three
Grace needed more of Adam. She wanted more. Her heart beat so swiftly and loudly she was sure he could hear it. She scraped her fingernails lightly down his upper body. He groaned, the sound rumbling up from his chest. He leaned back, bracing himself on his elbows. And let her explore. This was different than the hurried couplings she’d had with boyfriends in the past. Encounters that had happened in the dark and were over almost before they’d begun. “Last chance to stop before we go too far, Grace.”
Excerpt from “Adam’s Mistress” by Stephanie Grace
Adam paid the check and escorted Grace out of the restaurant. He wasn’t sure what had happened in there. Seduction for him was a well-thought-out game and caressing her in the middle of a restaurant had not been his intent.
He put his hand on the small of her back seemingly for the courtesy the gesture afforded, but he acknowledged to himself that he wanted to touch her. He wanted to pull her into his arms and feel her curves nestled against him.
He wanted to kiss her, He wanted to take all the time he wanted to explore her. To figure out the mysterious depths that he sensed were hidden inside her.
He didn’t want to go back to the school and drop her off. He didn’t want to spend the afternoon in meetings with Malcolm, who was out for revenge and wanted to close the school and then sell it. He didn’t want … to leave her.
He liked the quietness she brought to him. The way she really listened when he talked. And the shyness that he had been able to coax her into forgetting while they’d been eating. He also liked her honesty. She wasn’t pretending to be someone else or hiding from the mess the school was in.
Lies were something he simply couldn’t tolerate, even well-meaning ones, and with Grace he got the impression that she was as honest as the day was long. Though she didn’t see herself the same way he did.
He loved her hair and wanted to see it falling around her shoulders instead of clasped at the back of her neck. He seated her in his car, a black Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano, and walked around to the driver’s side.
She fussed with her hair as he started the car.
“What are you doing?”
She glanced over at him, her head tipped to one side. But her hands stayed at the back of her neck. “My hair is a little wild and not very professional.”
He could think of no woman who embodied professionalism more than Grace. He captured her wrist and pulled her hands free of her hair. The thick brown length of it spilled around her shoulders. She watched him with wide eyes, clearly waiting to see what he’d do next.
“It’s not the hair that makes you professional.” She had no idea how upstanding she seemed. He’d never even glanced
