Wicked Games

“I’m only here to get back my bikini bottoms.”

“How about we make a bet?” Doug backed her up against the credenza, stopping only when his body was pressed completely to hers. He moved one hand to her waist, slipping it beneath her crop top.

“What sort of bet?” Kinsey couldn’t think. His hand cupped her rib cage, sliding upward until the heel of his palm brushed the full curve of her breast.

“This weekend’s football game.” He wedged her legs apart with one knee. “The Texans win, I keep your bottoms. They lose, you model them for me.”

“How fair is any of that?” she asked, then gasped when he touched her.

“I like winning.” His hand made quick work with the hooks of her bra. “And getting my way.”

“So I can tell.”

Doug growled and ground his body against her until she whimpered. “Why the hell are you wearing pants?”

“I like pants.” She moaned.

“Learn to like dresses.”

Dear Reader,

A favorite story theme of mine is best friends who fall in love. We’ve all seen these couples in real life and in television, but reading about them in books gives us a deeper look into their thoughts as the magic happens.

What’s a girl to do when her decision to pursue a man comes too late—after he announces that he’s packing up and moving on? Why, she plays Wicked Games, of course! When Kinsey Gray and Doug Storey finally realize that the magic is greater than their determination to keep things simple, that’s when the fun begins. After all, personal complications and seemingly impossible odds are no match for love that is meant to be.

(And for those of you who’ve written to ask about the couple on the veranda in Bound To Happen? Here’s the book that reveals all!)

In January look for the final book in my gIRL-gEAR series—Indiscreet—in which outspoken Annabel “Poe” Lee meets her match in a hero who deserves every bit of grief she gives him!

Enjoy, and let the games begin!

Alison Kent

Wicked Games

Alison Kent

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Mauri Stott for stepping in at the last minute to rescue me from myself, to Tamara Collins for helping me bring Izzy and Baron to life, and to Jan Freed for making me see what I couldn’t.

Also, a belated thank-you to Rob for the technical assistance regarding Webcams and capture software. In fact, a big shout-out to the entire ninth floor for putting up with my writing flurries and my lack of participation in waffle making.

The gIRLS behind gIRL-gEAR

by Samantha Venus for Urban Attitude Magazine

Welcome back, loyal readers, to another deliciously dishy and voyeuristic peep into the world of gIRL-gEAR…a place where the women have brains and the men don’t stand a chance.

This month we catch up with two of our long-time bachelorettes whom we last saw on that luscious island vacation off the coast of Belize. And our number one bachelorette of the month is none other than that Scandinavian beauty, Kinsey Gray.

Those of you male readers who might like to get to know Kinsey better will have a chance later this month. Urban Attitude is pleased as punch to bring you the scoopage on the Halloween night bachelorette auction.

During said auction, Kinsey will be put on the block and made available to the man among you whose pockets run deepest. Get out those checkbooks! Don’t be cheap! The cause—and Miss Gray—are worth every penny.

Until next time, this is Samantha Venus for Urban Attitude Magazine. Ta-ta for now!

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

1

“DID YOU HEAR THAT Doug Storey is moving to Colorado?”

Holding a forkful of spring greens halfway between her plate and her mouth, Kinsey Gray stared across the gIRL-gEAR conference room table at one of her lunch dates and business partners, Lauren Neville.

Doug? Moving to Colorado? Impossible. Unbelievable. “Run that one by me again?”

Lauren nodded, cutting off a chunk of spinach-and-feta cheese pizza and stabbing it with her fork. “Anton told me last month. Doug got an offer from a firm in Denver. An offer so amazing that he’s considering selling his half of Neville and Storey.”

“Selling out to Anton?” A curious frown creasing her brow, Annabel “Poe” Lee, the newest gIRL-gEAR partner, squeezed a lemon wedge into her steaming cup of tea.

Lauren shook her head, took a sip of her soda before answering. “No. One of the junior execs wants to buy into the firm. Nothing’s been settled.”

Maybe not in the world of the architectural firm Doug owned along with Anton Neville, but one thing had certainly been unsettled—Kinsey’s stomach.

Slowly, she lowered her fork to her plate and twisted her fingers into the linen napkin on her lap.

The thought of parting with even a pittance of her stake in gIRL-gEAR, the fashion empire she and her five girlfriends from college had launched the year after graduation, was absolutely unfathomable. Equally unfathomable was the idea of Doug selling his half of the company he’d been a part of building from the ground up.

But the thing she had the most trouble understanding was how he could even think of leaving her when she was still undecided about her feelings for him.

What did that song say about not knowing what you’ve got till it’s gone? Something like that, anyway. She took a deep breath and looked back at Lauren. “When is he leaving?”

Lauren shrugged, sawing again at her pizza. “The date’s still up in the air. Nothing’s been finalized. I thought he might’ve already said something to you.”

“No, he hasn’t.” And why hadn’t he? Why hadn’t he? The dog! Friends shared the goings-on in their lives. Especially friends with the history she and Doug had. In fact, if their history wasn’t so…scandalous and her feelings for him so personal, she’d think of him as family. He was that much a part of her life.

Still, Kinsey was not going to panic yet. “And, anyway. If nothing’s been finalized, then you should’ve said that Doug might be moving to Colorado.”

“No,” Lauren answered, shaking her head. “He’s definitely going. The timing and whether or not he sells his share of the firm are the only things not yet decided.”

Now Kinsey was going to panic.

“He’s flying back from Denver today, in fact, and flies out again on Monday.” Lauren took another sip of soda, then transferred another slice of pizza from the raised serving pan in the center of the table to her now empty plate.

She dived right back in. “But I can guarantee you the man will be in the office all weekend long. One day his work habits will be part of a case study on burnout, I swear.”

Watching Lauren attack her food, gIRL-gEAR CEO Sydney Ford frowned. “Uh, Lauren? You’re not eating for two, are you?”

Lauren rolled her eyes, but barely looked up from her plate to do so. “Ha. No. I’m not pregnant. I’m starving. Anton and I argued over bedroom furniture until the store closed at ten. I wasn’t in any mood to eat when we got home, so I went straight to bed.”

“And this morning?” Sydney blotted her lips with her white linen napkin. “Don’t tell me you were still arguing at breakfast.”

“Actually, no. We were making up.” Lauren didn’t even stop eating to blush. “I hardly had time to get to work, much less eat.”

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Kinsey said. Her stomach rolled; her face felt clammy, as did the palms of her hands. This true love stuff was disgusting.

And now Doug was leaving Houston for parts unknown. Okay. For Denver.

Arching one dark brow, Poe studied Kinsey’s plate. “You don’t like your salad?”

“I don’t think it’s her salad.” Sydney ran a finger around the rim of her iced tea glass, a far too intuitive smile lighting up her face. “I think it’s Lauren’s news.”

“What?” Lauren finally stopped eating long enough to glower at her tablemates. “My fighting and making up with Anton is sickening?”

It was, but that was the least of Kinsey’s trouble.

She glanced from Lauren to Sydney to Poe, all the while feeling as if she’d left her body and was looking down at herself and the other three gIRL-gEAR partners. The four of them sat around one end of the conference room table.

The three remaining original partners—Poe having joined the firm only last year—had taken the afternoon off to spend a long Columbus Day weekend with their respective significant others.

Macy Webb and Leo Redding were busy moving the rest of her furniture out of the loft she’d once shared with Lauren in preparation for Poe to move in, while Chloe Zuniga and Eric Haydon were off for a weekend trip with Melanie Craine and Jacob Faulkner.

Kinsey almost needed a scorecard, so much had happened this last year: Sydney, Macy, Chloe and Mel finding their soul mates. Lauren finally marrying hers. Poe coming into the company as a full partner, taking over Chloe’s product lines, while she and Rennie Faulkner, Jacob’s sister and soon to be Melanie’s sister-in-law, launched the gUIDANCE gIRL mentoring program.

And what had Kinsey done? Waste the sixteen months since last year’s trip to an island paradise—a vacation during which she’d gotten to know Doug Storey intimately—twiddling her thumbs.

She and Doug had dated off and on. Nothing serious. Dinners and movies and ball games and concerts. Neville and Storey functions; gIRL-gEAR soirees. She’d thought he would always be around. She’d never imagined he’d move out of town.

Or leave her.

Now what was she supposed to do?

Poe offered her clearly expert opinion on Kinsey’s sudden illness. “No, Lauren. Not the fighting-and-making-up news. The news of Doug’s abandonment. Kinsey just realized she’s about to lose a friend with convenient and sizable options.”

“Pfft. Doug and I are friends, yes,” Kinsey said. “But I don’t know a thing about the size of his, uh, options.”

Poe returned her teacup to her saucer and laced her fingers together along the table’s edge. “Wait a minute. You’re saying you haven’t slept with him?”

“Not that it’s any of your business, but no. I have not slept with him.” Emphasizing the word slept saved her from telling a lie.

“Even last year on Coconut Caye?” Sydney asked. “Like maybe late one night on the first-floor veranda?”

Kinsey shook her head. She wouldn’t call what she and Doug had done on the veranda that night sleeping. No bed had been involved. No postcoital cuddling. Besides, they’d been drunk and that meant it didn’t count.

Or so she’d been telling herself for sixteen months.

Neither of them had spoken of the incident again. And as much as she enjoyed her girlfriends’ kiss-and-tell bonding, she couldn’t bring herself to reveal the things that had happened that night.

Or how she felt about Doug.

Especially since she wasn’t quite sure what that was. “Doug and I are friends. That’s all. I haven’t even kissed him but once or twice since last summer.”

Three women turned their full attention on Kinsey. Two sets of blue eyes and one of brown prodded and probed and drilled. Brows up, brows down, brows level.

“What? What? What do you expect me to do? I’m not a first-move kinda girl. Besides, he’s always got work on the brain.” Kinsey was not going to put in any serious pursuit time only to end up an after-thought—after work, after business, after meetings, after deals.

No sirree bub. Once she settled down, it was home and hearth all the way. Dinner on the table at six. Kids’ homework done by seven. Bedtime no later than eight. Cuddled up to the hubby by ten. Hmm. Okay. She was getting a bit ahead of herself here.

“So, give him something else to think about.” Lauren waved her fork, then stabbed again at her pizza.

“Yes,” Poe added. “Change his mind.”

“About moving? How am I supposed to do that?” And did she even want to do that?

“Tell him how you feel.” This advice from Sydney.

Good advice if Kinsey had a clue as to how she did feel—besides panicked and sick.

“No.” With a vigorous shake of her head, Lauren shared a kernel of her wisdom. “Show him how you feel.”

Kinsey moved her gaze from one woman to the other to the next. “You’re talking about sex.”

Poe folded her used napkin into a precise square and placed it in the center of her plate. “Aren’t we always talking about sex?”

Feeling suddenly bullied, Kinsey crossed her arms. “You’re only talking about it because you’re not getting any.”

“Is that so?” Poe replied, her dark eyes giving nothing away.

Calm. Calm and collected. Deep breath. In and out. Ohhmmm. Kinsey slumped back in her chair. Her usual ability to relax and blow off stress wasn’t working. She had a feeling nothing was going to work this time.

She hadn’t been looking where she was going and had stepped off into a big pile of emotional poo. Ask her a month ago, and she’d never have believed it possible that what she’d thought was friendship was actually more.

But with the specter of Doug’s departure hanging over her head…

She blew out a frustrated breath. “So, what do I do?”

Sydney looked to Lauren, Lauren to Poe, Poe back to Sydney, then all three turned their attention on Kinsey. Sydney was the one who finally spoke. “I think we need to put a few of the Web site’s gIRL gUIDE tips into play.”

Kinsey closed her eyes, shook her head. This was exactly the reason she kept her private life private. Glancing around at her girlfriends, she said, “I’d really rather not become a gIRL-gEAR project.”

Puffing up her cheeks so she looked like Dizzy Gillespie, Lauren pushed away her plate and scooted her chair back from the table. “Get over it, Kinsey. The rest of us have had to put in time as test cases. It’s what keeps us honest and makes the site’s advice columns such a success. We know of what we speak.”

“Besides,” Sydney said, a teasing smile blossoming as she glanced from Kinsey to Poe. “It’s time for you two holdouts to take the relationship plunge so those of us who have can return the grief you’ve given us now for months.”

“That’s what I’m talking about. I don’t need six hovering fairy godmothers when Doug comes running should I decide to crook my finger.” Now if only her bite lived up to her bark, Kinsey ruefully mused.

Sydney laughed. “C’mon, Kinsey. You know I’m kidding.”

Lauren butted in promptly. “Ha! You’d better be only partially kidding, because I am quite in the mood to return the relationship harassment Kinsey has been so generous in doling out.”

“And what about Poe?” Kinsey was not going to suffer the payback alone. “Ms. Cool-As-An-Asian-Cucumber over there is hardly the picture of innocence.”

Poe’s chin and nose went up. “I certainly hope not. I work hard at my cosmopolitan image.”

“You just wait.” Lauren pointed a finger. “Some guy is going to come along and take you down so hard and fast you won’t have a clue what happened.”

“I welcome the challenge,” Poe said, keeping a straight face as she added, “Many have tried. All have failed. Most have begged for another chance.” Even the hand holding the china cup remained steady, as if serenity were the woman’s middle name.

Kinsey, on the other hand, sputtered the tea she’d been drinking. “Poe, you crack me up. Truly. And manage to make me envious at the same time.” She pressed her lips together in a grimace of sorts. “If I had even a smidge of your confidence, I’d go after Doug in a heartbeat.”

“It’s not about confidence,” Poe said, her fingers now drumming thoughtfully on the arms of her chair. “It’s all about the game. You have to know your opponent’s weaknesses. And then you dig in.”

Pondering that, Kinsey shook her head. “I’m not sure Doug has any weaknesses. But I’ve never thought of him as an opponent.”

“Then you need to change your way of thinking. If he’s standing in the way of something you want, then he’s an adversary. And you have a decision to make.” Poe waited. One heartbeat, two. “How badly do you want it?”

“That’s the thing. I don’t know if a relationship with Doug is what I want.” Kinsey gave a slight shrug. “Maybe I’m overreacting, and once the shock of his moving wears off I’ll be first in line to throw him a bon voyage bash.”

Lauren leaned forward. “Do you want to find out?”

That seemed to be the question of the day, didn’t it? No matter the denial that leaped to the tip of Kinsey’s tongue, her first flustered response to the news of Doug’s move had been too strong to discount as meaningless.

What would it hurt to explore the chemistry they’d largely ignored this past year? As long as she kept her eyes wide open and did nothing as stupid as putting her heart on the line, no harm, no foul, right?

It wasn’t as though she was going to set a trap, then watch him gnaw off his leg trying to escape. If he decided to stay, she didn’t want it to be because she’d crippled him.

“I don’t know. I just don’t know. I like him a lot.” She toyed with the cherry tomato on her plate, stabbing at it with the tines of her fork. “We have loads of fun, and I don’t want to screw that up. I don’t want to lose a good friend because I was desperate and stupid.”

“Then don’t be desperate and stupid,” Lauren said with a shrug, reaching for her diet soda. “Promise yourself you won’t do anything you’ll regret.”

“That sounds all well and good in theory, but in practice?” Kinsey shook her head. “It’s more like I’ll seduce Doug, we’ll get married and have three children, then we’ll turn forty or so and realize we have nothing in common. That’s when the regrets will set in. And divorce and child support. I just can’t deal with it all,” she said, and with one last stab, her tomato went flying.

While Poe rolled her eyes and poured herself another cup of tea from the white ceramic pot she kept at the office, Sydney took the fork out of Kinsey’s hand. “Kinsey? While you’re not being desperate or stupid, why don’t you try not borrowing trouble? You have no idea where you’ll be five years from now, much less fifteen.”

“Where she won’t be is running a five-star kitchen,” Poe said, eyeing the tomato on the floor.

“See?” Kinsey slumped in her chair. “I can’t even manage something as simple as testing the theory that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

“Let me tell you a little secret.” Lauren pulled her chair back up to the table, braced her elbows on the edge and leaned forward. “A man has only one organ he wants taken care of. And it’s neither his heart nor his stomach.”

Sydney nodded. “For the most part, Lauren’s right.”

“I never had any doubt,” Poe added sagely.

“So?” Lauren asked. “Yes or no? Do you want to explore the untapped possibilities between you and Doug?”

With an enthusiasm that continued to grow the longer she considered the question, Kinsey glanced from one woman’s inquiring gaze to the next. “Yeah, I think I do.”

Lauren rubbed her hands together gleefully. “I love the chance to put a plan in motion.”

COLLAPSING ONTO the leather sofa in Anton Neville’s office, Doug Storey stretched out his legs, laced his hands behind his head and gave in to exhaustion.

Who knew flying between Houston and Denver three times in one week could take so much out of a guy?

Either he was getting old or he needed to find more time to work out. Sleep wouldn’t hurt. Whatever. Something had to give before he collapsed like a bad knee.

He had decisions and deals stacked one on top of the next, and needed a working body and a fully functional mind. Right now he felt as if the only thing working was his ability to sit still and not move.

Anton finished his phone call and cradled the receiver, his hand lingering on the phone, his eyes lingering on Doug as if something vital hovered on the tip of his tongue.

Finally, with a shake of his head, Anton walked around to the front of his desk. He dropped into one of the office’s visitor chairs and waited—the way he always waited, sitting and thinking and driving Doug crazy.

Doug had to be on the go all the time, which he was rapidly coming to learn was not as easy to manage when his going was spread from the Gulf Coast to the Rocky Mountains several times a week. He’d be glad to get settled in Denver at last.

“Man, I can’t take much more of this,” he said, shaking his head and stifling another yawn. “If this is what it feels like to be eighty, I’d rather go out in a blaze of glory at thirty-one.”

Anton snorted. “If you’re what blazing looks like, remind me not to light a match.”

Doug rolled his eyes. “What? You’d rather sit behind your desk than burn up the street?”

“No, dude.” Anton leaned back and squared an ankle over the opposite knee. “I’d rather get out of here by seven and take my butt home to Lauren.”

Dragging both hands down his face, Doug grunted. “Damn marital bliss. I remember when I wasn’t the only one around here ordering in pizza and chicken teriyaki. We got a hell of a lot of work done after-hours back then.”

“I still do. It’s just business I don’t want to be taking care of up here. Especially with you for an audience.”

“Your discretion is much appreciated.” Ah, but it felt good to be able to smirk. “I don’t think I could take it, seeing you snowed under by a honey-do list.”

“Oh, yeah. Funny,” Anton said, flipping him off.

“Hey,” Doug said with a slow-rolling shrug and a grin. “I just call ’em like I see ’em.”

“Then you need to clean the dollar signs out of your eyes, because work is making you blind.”

“And here I thought it was all that stroking I’ve been doing on the road.”

“Man, you need help. Hell, you need a woman, at the very least.”

Doug scooted forward to sit on the sofa’s edge, knees spread wide, elbows braced on his thighs. “No woman. Women. Plural. One woman means complications, expectations. And honey-do lists.”

This time it was Anton who smirked. “One woman also makes for a much warmer bed.”

“Except when you’re sleeping on the couch.”

“Whoever’s giving you advice about women is charging way too much.” Anton grunted. “You don’t know jack about what you’re saying.”

“Maybe not. But I know more than jack about what I’m seeing. Especially on the soccer field. You guys who’ve shacked up or gotten your butts married? You suck. Leo can’t defend a goal worth a crap anymore.” Doug liked his life fine just the way it was. He had no plans to put his nuts on the line to be snipped.

Anton didn’t even bother with a comeback. “Speaking of soccer, are you planning to make the scrimmage Sunday night? What with you being eighty and all?”

“Nah. I’m having dinner with Kinsey.” Slumping into the cushions again, Doug grinned and waggled both brows. “She’s cooking.”

Anton did that waiting thing again. Then that smirking thing. “You know Lauren will kick your butt back to the Rockies if you hurt that girl.”