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Secret Pleasure
Taryn Leigh Taylor
She’s sweet as sin…and he’s twice as wicked!Bombshell burlesque performer Kaylee Whitfield has perfected the art of the tease—especially when deliciously gorgeous Aidan Beckett is watching. Of course Aidan has no idea that she’s his ex-bestie’s little sister, or that he broke Kaylee’s teenage heart. It was supposed to be one sexy—and secret—tryst. But Kaylee has a few things to learn about searingly hot temptation…and risking her heart.
She’s sweet as sin
...and he’s twice as wicked!
Bombshell burlesque performer Kaylee Whitfield has perfected the art of the tease—especially when deliciously gorgeous Aidan Beckett is watching. Of course Aidan has no idea that she’s his ex-bestie’s little sister, or that he broke Kaylee’s teenage heart. It was supposed to be one sexy—and secret—tryst. But Kaylee has a few things to learn about searingly hot temptation...and risking her heart.
TARYN LEIGH TAYLOR likes dinosaurs, bridges and space—both personal and the final frontier variety. She shamelessly indulges in clichés, most notably her Starbucks addiction—grande six-pump whole milk, no water chai-tea latte, aka: ‘the usual’, her shoe hoard (I can stop any time I… Ooh! These are pretty!) and her penchant for falling in lust with fictional men with great abs. She also really loves books, which was what sent her down the crazy path of writing in the first place. Want to be virtual friends? Check out tarynleightaylor.com (http://tarynleightaylor.com), Facebook.com/tarynltaylor1 (http://Facebook.com/tarynltaylor1) and Twitter, @tarynltaylor (https://twitter.com/tarynltaylor?lang=en).
Secret Pleasure
Taryn Leigh Taylor
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07151-2
SECRET PLEASURE
© 2018 Taryn Leigh Taylor
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.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For Tina—this book would not be without you.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
And for Crystal—alpha consultant, proof-reader,
sanity-restorer, best friend. I don’t know how you do
it all, but I sure am glad you do. I hope this one lives
up to pineapple-shorted expectations.
Contents
Cover (#u132a95b3-93c4-5ae5-b0f3-da72034c9ea2)
Back Cover Text (#ue727226f-263c-5874-bc48-e837ad188f91)
About the Author (#ua27859ef-99d9-5996-b8ac-4cbe2f9c4f22)
Title Page (#u71e93607-7389-5f77-a6ad-e3f902a70d80)
Copyright (#uc805b127-1a7d-5d5c-8c88-49aaf11ab879)
Dedication (#ud43a7185-a3e8-56a4-9689-3a16002cbf6e)
CHAPTER ONE (#u53854196-0ac9-5594-8933-56f70ef8896d)
CHAPTER TWO (#u98d6ce56-4da2-5795-ba0a-b1c88c5c12bb)
CHAPTER THREE (#ufc3690a7-8792-57af-9a03-d9a763f68d56)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u43d90534-f895-5411-a039-982dc04f96e1)
CHAPTER FIVE (#u75a90bef-81f1-581a-9f4e-20c4dd153778)
CHAPTER SIX (#u7f525010-3333-556c-9219-4645374b4a06)
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)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#udce100c3-b252-58fe-b0fd-5aebcd84969f)
“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, put your hands together for the one and only Lola Mariposa!”
The rush of that moment, the split second before anything happened, hit like a freight train. Nervousness, excitement, fear, anticipation, all toppling over one another, crowding her chest, grappling for dominance.
The curtains whooshed open. The spotlight beat down. She could feel their gazes on her.
It thrilled her to her core.
The music started, the old song sounding a little tinny and scratchy in the top-of-the-line speakers, and just like that, Kaylee Whitfield disappeared completely into her braver, sassier, sultrier alter ego.
The blond wig, blue contacts, and stage makeup helped, of course, but there was something magical that happened when she was out on the stage. Anonymous. Free.
She sat at the prop vanity set, her back to the club, pretending to brush her hair and apply blush. Then the incomparable Ella Fitzgerald launched into the first verse of “Bei Mir Bist du Schön” and Kaylee threw a coy glance over her shoulder, careful to keep her sight line just over their heads as she placed her index finger between her ruby-red lips. In a practiced move, she tugged her black satin glove off with her teeth before twirling it over her head and tossing it aside.
She never made eye contact while she was onstage. Because her performances weren’t for the crowd.
No, this moment in the spotlight was all about her.
She let the silk dressing gown slip off one shoulder before pulling it back up. Someone in the back gave a catcall, and Kaylee’s sultry grin grew more so.
Being onstage was a physical expression for the rebelliousness she’d been swallowing down since she was old enough to realize her mother’s terse rebukes of “You’re embarrassing yourself” actually meant Kaylee was embarrassing her mother, her family, and the esteemed Whitfield name, and that some Draconian punishment awaited her when they arrived home. As a result, Kaylee had learned early on how to blend in, to not cause a scene. She was a master at dousing her wants and desires under an impenetrable veneer of propriety and good manners.
But once a week, burlesque saved her, set her free.
She loved its costumes and pageantry.
She loved its tongue-in-cheek showmanship.
And most of all she loved how in control it made her feel.
There was power in the art of the tease, in bringing people to the brink before retreating, only to do it again. She drew power from leaving them wanting more.
She tugged off the other glove in the same fashion before pretending to do a final check of her makeup in the vanity mirror and standing up.
As planned, she twirled one end of the sash holding the dressing gown closed and did her slinkiest walk toward the front of the stage. What was completely unplanned, though, was when her coquettish sweep of the crowd—carefully aimed just above their heads, of course—collided with a pair of green eyes that stopped her dead.
Not that she could see their color from the stage. But despite the distance and the dim light of the club, she knew they were rich jade, darker around the edges, and unlike any eyes she’d seen before...or since. That they squinted when he concentrated. That they sparkled when he teased. That they cut when he was angry.
Aidan.
It had been ten years since she’d last seen him. Five since he and her brother had unceremoniously ended all contact. Still, she’d know Aidan Beckett anywhere.
Something suspiciously like desire bloomed in her abdomen, reminding her of hormone-addled summers spent pretending to read books by the pool so she could furtively admire Aidan’s sun-kissed chest and the way rivulets of water clung to his back muscles as he and her brother, Max, showed off for the omnipresent bevy of interchangeable, age-appropriate, bikini-clad girls giggling and preening nearby.
If he’d been sitting like everyone else watching the show, she never would have seen him. But instead, he was leaning against the wooden pillar at the edge of the seating area, with a bottle of beer in his hand, looking bigger and broader and more delicious than he had when he’d visited during college breaks. Manlier. Like he knew what he was doing.
In fact, he was so devastatingly gorgeous in jeans, a black T-shirt, and a black motorcycle jacket that she couldn’t look away.
With a deep breath and a swivel of her hips, she reminded herself that in addition to being a decade older, she was wearing a damn good disguise. And even if she weren’t, there was no way he’d ever associate the sexy, sensual Lola Mariposa with the awkward teenage incarnation of Kaylee Whitfield.
Then Aidan shifted and his tongue darted out to moisten his lips, the way it had all those years ago, right before he’d leaned in and kissed Natasha Campbell, unaware that a young, puberty-addled Kaylee had been jealously spying on the two of them from behind her mother’s prized rosebushes.
And just like that, lust and vindication shoved fear of discovery out of the way.
Because if he’d recognized the woman onstage as Max’s shy little sister for even a second, there was no way he’d be staring at her with such undisguised hunger.
And Kaylee intended to do everything in her power to make sure he stayed hungry.
She shed the dressing gown with no fanfare, catching her routine up to the beats of music she’d let slip by, reveling in Aidan’s undivided interest.
His attention crackled across her skin like an electrical current. A rash of goose bumps followed the same path as she expertly controlled his gaze—rolled a bare shoulder, swept her fingers along the sweetheart neckline of her black satin-and-lace corset, cocked a hip before tracing the edge of her matching panties. She shot him a mischievous smile before bending at the waist as she ran her hands the length of the leg closest to him, from the top of her garter belt down her black thigh-high it held in place. She paused at the bottom so she could undo the strap of one three-inch metallic-edged black T-strap heel, and then the other one.
Free of her shoes, she settled into the rest of her routine, letting her body dip and sway with the music, daring him not to want her.
Even her favorite part of the routine, when she put all the hours of ballet class her mother had forced on her to taboo use and used her perfect développé as an opportunity to unhook her garter belt before perching her toes on the stool and tugging the seamed stocking down and all the way off, was dedicated to Aidan tonight.
She spun so she was sitting on the stool and extended the other leg so she could remove that stocking, too, being sure to aim her flirtatious looks in his direction.
Her routine was all vintage bump and grind, from the music to the victory rolls in her faux blond hair, but there was nothing old-fashioned about the way her body was responding to having his eyes on her. She loved being onstage, but it had never turned her on like this before.
Kaylee put her back to the audience so they could watch her loosen the laces of her corset, every cell in her body acutely attuned to Aidan.
When she turned to face front, her body subconsciously angled toward him as she began undoing the hook-and-eye closures that ran the length of the bustier. After unfastening all of them under his careful watch, she held the stiff garment to her body, drawing out the big reveal, and her nipples tightened almost painfully as she imagined how differently her evening might have ended if, instead of a club full of people, this had been a private show for Aidan. Heat pooled at the apex of her thighs, and she bit her lip against the erotic thought of their bodies pressed together.
When her corset hit the floor, Kaylee was clad in nothing but sequined pasties and ruffled panties, but in all her performances, she’d never once felt so deliciously naked or so desperately wanted. She barely heard the applause and whistles. There was only her and Aidan and his stark look of desire as she executed an impressive shoulder shimmy and struck her final pose as the music ended.
She was breathing faster than normal, not from exertion but from the sensual thrill of stripping for the beautiful boy she’d wanted with her whole heart back then and the sexy man she wanted with her whole body now.
He lifted his chin and raised his beer bottle in tribute, and the intimacy of the moment in a club full of people stole her breath altogether.
Then the curtain rushed closed and swallowed him from sight.
