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Pillow Talk
Kathleen O'Reilly
Jessica Barnes has a one-way ticket to the career of her dreams as a corporate VP when Adam Taylor, the sexy consultant and chief hatchet man, arrives on the scene. Suddenly Jessica's not sure whether her job will get axed if a merger with a rogue company goes through.She wants to ignore the man who's turning her world upside down, but instead he's turning her on….Adam Taylor never expected to find his dream woman. And he certainly never expected her to be the fireball in the power suit, who's making him want her in as many positions as possible. But when they make a bet to keep their hands to themselves for ten whole days, Adam's not sure he can keep up his side of the bargain! Besides, what's one kiss? Unless it leads to a whole lot more…
“So no dinner for guys in black hats, huh?”
“Nope.” Jessica rocked back on her heels, looking rather proud of herself.
Adam studied her for a long time, wondering about all that pent-up energy, and then finally shook his head. “Now you’ve done it. You’re an insurmountable challenge, Barnes.”
For a heartbeat their gazes were locked. He could see it in her eyes: the challenge, the excitement. She loved the game just as much as he did.
“Just don’t get any ideas about surmounting, if you get my drift, Taylor.”
“Hey, you get your mind out of those dark, sexy places you don’t want to go to, and I’ll do the same.”
She stared him down, the glasses tapping against her thigh. “You’re no threat to my peace of mind…only to my career ambitions.”
He laughed softly. “I’m going to go have dinner, Barnes. You’re welcome to join me.”
She turned and walked away, a cocky swing in her hips. “In your dreams, Taylor.” She tossed the words over her shoulder.
“There, too, Barnes. There, too.”
Dear Reader,
All through my life I’ve been lucky enough to count among my friends some of the most extraordinary women in the entire universe. Some of the friendships have lasted forever, while others are more recent, but in the truest sort of friendships, years are simply relative and most often just get in the way. There is no stronger bond than the friendship between women. It is forged through the hot steel of shared suffering and stupid mistakes, and then cooled over time until only the bond remains. The years pass, marriages and children struggle and pull at the friendship, but it never breaks. Like the indomitable will of women, it will endure. Always.
Kathleen
P.S. I love to hear from readers. If you’d like to write, my address is P.O. Box 312, Nyack, NY 10960, or visit my Web site: www.kathleenoreilly.com.
Books by Kathleen O’Reilly
HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION
889—JUST KISS ME
927—ONCE UPON A MATTRESS
HARLEQUIN DUETS
66—A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Pillow Talk
Kathleen O’Reilly
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Jill, Lynn, Stacy, Sara, Nedra, Marian, Tanja, Meyerer, Martha, Suzanne, Marsha, Julia, Dee and Sherry.
Contents
Chapter 1 (#uaa937502-839e-5f0e-92a8-8784be2eedb7)
Chapter 2 (#u142d3b4c-2bdf-5352-871d-5905e33fd0e8)
Chapter 3 (#u4bbb920f-0a03-5f42-928a-ef2e57d99d79)
Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
1
JESSICA BARNES studied the bride critically. Perfect. The warm, sparkling, spring afternoon was a rare thing in Chicago. White flowers covered the arbor, not one dead blossom in sight. The musicians hadn’t missed a note. The slim branches from the weeping willow trees danced in the gentle breeze. Absolutely perfect.
Yup, there was nothing like seeing fairy-tale happiness to make you feel like crap. “Do you think she’s put on weight since college?”
Safe on the far side of the garden, far away from the white, flower-strewn tent, the four friends shook their heads. It was a sad day for them all.
Mickey was the most practical. “It’s the dress. All those ruffles. I don’t know why women don’t understand the illusion of substance that ruffles project.” She shook her head and made a note in her PalmPilot.
Jessica considered her own well-stocked closet, completely ruffle-free. She didn’t have the fashion sense of Dior, but she managed.
Beth sighed, her eyes still locked on the groom. A long, wistful sigh that she did so well. “He looks pretty good. Kenny never looked that good.” Kenny was Beth’s ex. An ex they’d never liked, but that was the sort of thing you didn’t tell your friends. Subtle hints, yes. Life-damaging proclamations, no.
Cassandra, never one to confess weakness, studied her nails. Ten perfect ovals trimmed in Scarlet Nights. “He asked me out once, but I said ‘no.’ I was in my medical-students-only stage.”
“Kenny asked you out?” Beth’s wide blue eyes looked horrified.
Cassandra exhaled, her white sheath lifting gracefully. “No. Charles, the groom.”
“She looks happy,” Mickey put in, veering the subject away from No-Account Kenny.
Beth swallowed one bite of the wedding cake before licking the crumbs from her lip. “She’s glowing.”
That met with a long, jealous silence. They might as well just brand the lot of them with a scarlet L.
“Who needs love?” Cassandra asked, and then took a healthy drink of champagne.
Beth never took her eyes off the happy couple. “I do.”
With a bit more violence than finesse, Jessica speared the olive in her drink. This was an argument they’d had many times. “No, Beth, you don’t. You’re a single woman with your independence, you can stay up as late as you want, let the laundry stack up, go to happy hour whenever you choose. What’s not to love?” Just to prove her point, she swallowed the olive whole, a gesture her freshman-year fiancé had abhorred. They had broken up soon after.
Beth defended herself. “Sometimes it’s lonely.”
“Get a cat,” Mickey said.
Was a cat everyone’s answer to life? Jessica just shook her head. “Oh, please, no. Aunt Charisse had ten cats when she died. They could not get the smell out of the carpet. Ever. Finally replaced the carpet, the padding, even deodorized the slab, and still they had to take ten K off the price.”
Mickey raised her sunglasses and studied the bride once more. They’d all gone to college with Annie Summers, and now, six years after graduation, Annie was the first to get married. Second if you counted Beth’s two-week marriage, but they usually didn’t count Kenny. “I think white just isn’t her color. She should have done something with a rose tone for her complexion, don’t you think?”
“I heard they’re going to the Caribbean for the honeymoon.” Beth studied the hors d’oeuvre on the side table, finally settling for the curried shrimp.
“That’s so cliché.”
“I want to go to the Canadian Rockies on my honeymoon.” Beth sounded as though she was reciting a Christmas list. Jessica wanted to shake her sometimes, tell her the world wasn’t one big Disney movie, but she never did. Instead, they did their best to protect Beth from ever learning that Disney owned Miramax, too.
“Why don’t you go by yourself?” Cassandra asked.
Beth froze, her blue eyes wide. “I could, couldn’t I?”
Mickey shrugged. “Sure.”
“I don’t know. If I went now, where would I go on my honeymoon?” Beth sounded so certain. As if honeymoons were part of life’s guarantees. Jessica was much more realistic. There were no guarantees, unless you did it yourself.
“What if you don’t ever get married again?” Always the troublemaker, Cassandra wouldn’t let it drop.
“Cassandra, don’t scare the girl,” Jessica said, working to avoid a scene.
“She doesn’t need a man,” Cassandra insisted.
Jessica just rolled her eyes at that. “Big words from a woman who always has a date on Saturday night.”
After one regal sniff, Cassandra went on. “No, I’m serious. I could remain single for the rest of my life and be happy.”
Mickey raised a hand, sans ring. “I could, too.”
Beth stood firm. “Not me. I want to get married.”
Jessica raised her glass. “To the solo state of mind. Junk food and chick flicks forever. A bachelorette pact, single forever.”
Mickey and Cassandra clinked glasses. “Hear, hear.”
By the look on her face, Beth knew she was defeated. After a long moment of silence, she joined in. “Screw ’em all.”
Cassandra laughed, that throaty laugh she had perfected over the years. “Honey, life isn’t long enough.”
Sometimes marriage was overrated, but Jessica knew the truth. They had been single for so long that it was now easier to attack the institution of marriage than to face failure. Jessica hated failure.
“Marriage is nothing more than a woman’s subjugation to a man’s need for dominance. Ha. They try and dominate me, I’ll pin the laser on them.” Mickey worked at a research lab and had never yet met a man, or anyone for that matter, with a higher IQ.
Jessica speared another olive. “You know, there are some advantages to marriage. Actually, ever since the government tinkered with the tax structure, it doesn’t cost as much as it used to. For instance, I would probably jump into the next tax bracket, assuming he’s a white-collar professional; however, I’d get a credit of almost eight thousand. Not a great investment, but I suppose if he’s willing to cook every now and then, it could be worth it.” Jessica hated to cook.
“Or you could take all that money you’d put in extra taxes and buy your Porsche.”
That earned a smile. Only 2.1 more years and then the Porsche would be hers. Unless she got the promotion to vice president at Hard-Wire Networks, a computer networking equipment manufacturer. Not likely, but possible. The raise would put her in Porsche-attainment status within nine months.
“Now you’ve done it,” Mickey said with a sigh. “She’s going to have an orgasm, right here.”
Of course, if Adam Taylor had his evil way, she wouldn’t be polishing a Porsche, she’d be polishing her résumé. The impending buyout made her nervous, made her cranky and worst of all, made her sneeze. First her nose tickled, then twitched, and finally she began to wheeze.
Mickey started to laugh.
Jessica blew her nose and sniffed—for effect not necessity. “Orgasm? Not all of us have Cassandra’s talents.”
Cassandra’s smile spoke volumes. “All you have to do is exercise.”
Mickey waved a languid hand and assumed a Southern drawl. “I abhor exercise. I need my cabana-boy to do it for me.”
“He could be my cabana-boy,” Cassandra said with a nod to the other side of the garden.
Yes indeed, when it came down to men, they were all such frauds. Jessica, Mickey and Beth turned to look. Mickey and Beth got that gooey look. Jessica simply wanted to hit something.
He was here. Adam Taylor.
And didn’t that just put a cherry on top of the day? Tall, impossibly handsome in a dark suit, and worst of all—intelligent, witty, sharp. That brought her thoughts to a halt. Sharp like an executioner’s ax.
She shouldn’t have been surprised; the groom worked at Adam’s firm, after all.
Life really wasn’t fair. Work had been hell for her since he arrived, a consultant brought in by JCN, the international computer conglomerate, to prepare a report on Hard-Wire’s buyout potential. An “operational efficiency expert.”
Yeah, you could call ’em all the pretty terms you wanted, but you still couldn’t disguise that chainsaw. She picked up an olive and popped it in her mouth.
He turned and saw her, favoring her with a cool, appraising gray-green stare. Jessica was grateful for her sunglasses. She could look as if she was calm and in control. But then her nose began to twitch and she sneezed. Twice. She searched her pockets for a tissue, but came up empty. Great.
When she looked up, Mickey was still eyeing Adam with appreciation. Jessica felt inclined to enlighten them all. “He’s okay, if you like the rich, strong, arrogant jerks.”
“You know him?” Mickey asked smoothly.
Jessica bit into her last olive. “Adam Taylor,” she mumbled between bites.
They had all listened to Jessica’s horror stories of Mr. Adam “The Ax-Man” Taylor, but she’d never described him physically. It seemed a betrayal to her lifelong ambition of job security and Porsche ownership. Adam was the enemy.
