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Forbidden: A free sexy read from the author of Off Limits. For fans of Fifty shades Freed
Clare Connelly
Mills & Boon M&B
One night wasn’t enough…
Will two be too much?
Violinist Astra James has never forgotten her x-rated night with billionaire Manning Brown-Hadden – or how he walked away the morning after. He’s her step-brother, so he couldn’t be more off-limits…but his every sinful touch is branded on her memory for life! So this time, she’s going to make him beg for her! It’s her game, so she’s playing by her rules, one hot moment at a time…
One night wasn’t enough…
Will two be too much?
Violinist Astra James has never forgotten her x-rated night with billionaire Manning Brown-Hadden – or how he walked away the morning after. He’s her step-brother, so he couldn’t be more off-limits…but his every sinful touch is branded on her memory for life! So this time, she’s going to make him beg for her! It’s her game, so she’s playing by her rules, one hot moment at a time…
Also by Clare Connelly
Off Limits
Bought for the Billionaire’s Revenge
Innocent in the Billionaire’s Bed
Coming Soon
Burn Me Once
Her Wedding Night Surrender
CLARE CONNELLY was raised in small-town Australia amongst a family of avid readers. She spent much of her childhood up a tree, Mills & Boon book in hand. Clare is married to her own real-life hero and they live in a bungalow near the sea with their two children. She is frequently found staring into space—a sure-fire sign that she’s in the world of her characters. She has a penchant for French food and ice-cold champagne, and Mills & Boons continue to be her favourite ever books. Writing for Mills & Boon is a long-held dream. Clare can be contacted via clareconnelly.com (http://www.clareconnelly.com) or her Facebook page.
Forbidden
Clare Connelly
COPYRIGHT PAGE (#ulink_31932aed-bfd7-54e6-aa83-5f0eb4f10ec9)
ISBN: 9781474085052
Forbidden © 2018 Clare Connelly
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a "Licensed Device") and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Version: 2018-09-27
Contents
Cover (#uc9b0442d-edd0-5c36-bc04-2afd14f78b25)
Blurb (#ub9b44ca1-f3b9-5e4b-b468-fd05dceb9b36)
Author Bio (#uca24da7b-4aff-5fbd-b62e-43181f9e5b04)
Title Page (#u7f534172-b3b5-58ce-ad83-fdcb135dfc48)
Copyright (#ulink_0ce19a8a-6311-5d87-82a5-df851aa6d2a6)
Chapter One (#ulink_f803dd65-2295-5953-9fea-ec7aa8bec87e)
Chapter Two (#ulink_c4d3ed73-d846-52f3-bcdc-6259e47aa141)
Chapter Three (#ulink_7da00c84-1628-5645-81e1-490a87f4494e)
Chapter Four (#ulink_5a9a8506-9b5f-522c-abea-c41e0e96eb83)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Excerpt (#litres_trial_promo)
Endpages (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_e8320ced-8799-5e0e-90b5-7d241b4dc113)
I’M HIGH FROM THE applause. As always, the sound of an audience’s appreciation for what I do, for the music I create, the songs I play, fills me with pleasure.
But that’s not why my heart is rabbiting about in my chest, beating against my ribs in a frantic tattoo.
It’s because of him.
Manning Brown-Hadden. Or, as I like to think of him, my first lover. My only lover.
A frisson of anticipation runs down my spine. Flashes of memory lance me, memories of our night together that are crystal clear despite the passage of time. The way his fingers, tentative at first, lifted my dress, tracing the flesh of my thighs with such reverence, as though I were his precious objet d’art and he my owner.
I stifle a groan as the recollections sear me with their intensity.
Manning is not just my lover. He is not just the only man ever to touch and kiss me.
He is also my stepbrother.
It’s been almost a year since that night in New York. The night we slept together. The night I seduced him. The night I brought him to my bed, knowing he had no knowledge of my innocence, knowing he would never have slept with me if he had, knowing and not caring.
Because nothing mattered more to me than being with Manning. I’d lusted after him since the first moment we’d met: me eleven years old, unprepared for the sledgehammer of desire that would grip me from that night on. Him sixteen, but already built like a man, strong and muscled and so handsome he hurt me in my dreams.
I dreamed about how it would feel to be kissed by him, touched by him, held by him, but nothing could have prepared me for the reality. The way he’d been rock-hard through his clothes, his body cleaved to mine so that I could feel his cock pressed to my belly. I groaned with the strength of my wanting him. The way he spread my legs apart, hovered over me for a second, his breath snagged, just like mine, as though we both knew we were on the precipice of something world-changing. Our eyes locked, all our promises and our pasts passing from one to the other, and then he drove into me, his cock so hard, so big, that even the instant flash of pain didn’t last longer than a millisecond before extreme pleasure usurped it, spreading within me like wildfire through a forest in summer.
His eyes flared with surprise—betrayal, even—at that moment when he realised that I was untouched, that he was my first. But then he was as lost to pleasure as I, swallowed by the flames of a desire finally being fulfilled.
I had wanted him forever.
I’m not that girl any more—don’t get me wrong. Waking up the morning after we’d slept together, with a smile on my face and certainty deep in my heart that he would finally see what we were—see what we could be—I was quashed beyond repair when I discovered him gone.
Nowhere to be seen.
He’d left a note—because Manning Brown-Hadden is nothing if not appropriate.
A – it shouldn’t have happened. I’m so sorry.
MBH.
For fuck’s sake! I was livid. Furious. And then I was resilient. Strong. Determined. Determined to forget him and move on. To push him from my mind. Because finally I realised he didn’t belong there.
He slept with me and walked away. He took my virginity and left as though it were nothing. He dodged my calls and avoided family functions.
As if I meant nothing to him.
As if I didn’t matter—we didn’t matter.
But I remember the way he touched me. The way his body was so hard for me. The way he was so consumed by our desire, the way he swore as he kissed my neck, his teeth sharp against my collarbone, his fingertips digging into my thighs.
Still, he left. Still, he left me—as though I was a meaningless hook-up rather than the woman who knows him best in the world
Well, maybe he was right. Maybe this isn’t important. But to me his complete desertion has been the breaking of my world.
I’m no longer in love with him. But I sure as hell still want him. And now that I’m in Paris, where he’s living, I’m determined to show him that he still wants me. I’m going to make him want me. Make him beg for me. And then I’m going to walk out the door without a backward glance, letting him have a taste of his own medicine.
One night wasn’t enough for me, but two ought to do it…
I haven’t come straight to his luxurious penthouse from the performance. I don’t want him to see me as Astra James, prodigy. I want him to see me as a woman who is intent on one thing and one thing only.
So I’ve ditched my black couture dress and the heavy concert make-up, replaced the former with silky underwear and a sheath-like dress and the latter with bright red lips alone. My dark hair I’ve brushed loose around my face, the way I know he likes it.
I’m ready for this—ready for him.
Manning Brown-Hadden isn’t going to want to let me go this time. But that’s too bad: he’s not going to have a say in the matter. This is my show, my rules, my game. And I’m playing to win back my pride.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_7ceb58b4-3fb4-5039-8cc3-079aafaecd1d)
THE CONCERT WILL BE over by now. I imagine Astra in her beautiful dress, chatting to the other musicians backstage, and my gut clenches. I stare out of the window towards the Maison de la Radio, straining to see what I can.
There is a thick fog, the distant passage of headlights and the glowing Tour Eiffel.
Where is she staying tonight? In what bed and with whom?
One year. Almost, not quite. But it might as well be ten.
Fucking my stepsister was a dick move—but not just because she’s younger than me and I’ve known her since she was eleven.
My father would kill me. Kill her. He’d be beyond livid. Yet, his anger I can wear. I don’t like to upset him, but I would. For Astra I’d do just about anything. It’s not his anger I seek to avoid but his distress. He’d be devastated. He’d feel betrayed—by me. And, having seen Carter weather two bad heart attacks in the last three years, no way am I going to risk inflaming him further.
‘I’ve adopted her, Manning. She’s part of the family now. Not a stepdaughter, not your stepsister. She’s my daughter. Your sister. She’s ours. Your job is to look after her, you hear me?’
I looked after her, all right. I made her come again and again. My ‘sister’.
I remember Astra the way she was that night, tangled in bedsheets, her long, tanned legs with those brightly painted toes making me ache for her anew. I dressed silently, watching her the whole time, half willing her to wake up, wanting her to see me, wanting her to ask me why I was leaving. Wanting her to look at me with those huge caramel eyes of hers, to smile at me, to tell me she understood.
She didn’t wake. Why would she?
She was exhausted.
Despite her innocence and inexperience I’d taken her again and again, pleasuring her until she was shaking and moaning, her face pink, her breath rushed. I’d taken her in the kitchen, in the lounge, on my bed. Her eyes had grown heavy at some point and I’d watched her fall asleep.
I’d still wanted her.
