If Only for Tonight
A night of love they’ll never forget…
Cydney Rayne likes living dangerously. But no thrill can compare to the passionate night she spends with a sexy stranger in Anguilla. The adventure-seeking event planner never expects to see her mystery lover with the sea-blue eyes again. Until he shows up in her Chicago hometown.
FBI agent Shawn Miles lives by his credo to honor, protect…and never get emotionally involved. Yet he can’t forget the sensual beauty who shared his midnight beach utopia—and changed his life forever. Rekindling their desire could blow his deep cover and expose her to the dangers surrounding him. But now that they’re back in each other’s arms, how can he ever let her go?
Cyd slowly backed up into a corner of the closet, attempting to put some distance between herself and Shawn.
Refusing to give her space, Shawn followed her into the corner and brushed a few fallen strands of hair out of her face. The heat surrounding them rose twenty degrees, and for the second time, she wished she hadn’t chosen a closet as her hiding place. He leaned in, indicating that he was going to kiss her. She could feel it, and even worse, she wanted it.
“What are you doing?” she asked, a little more breathless than she would have liked.
“If you have to ask, then I must be doing something wrong.”
No, he was definitely doing everything right. But she was trying to stall the passionate explosion that she knew would come from his kiss. His six-foot-three-inch frame towered over her five-foot-nine-inch body, and he’d successfully blocked her from any type of escape.
As his face grew closer to hers, she didn’t have the willpower to stop him.
“I’ve been waiting to do this for eight months,” he said as he dipped his head to hers.
SHERELLE GREEN
is a Chicago native with a dynamic imagination and a passion for reading and writing. As a young girl, she channeled her creativity and turned her thoughts into short stories and poems. Although she loves to read all genres, romance holds a special place in her heart. Her love for romance developed in high school after stumbling across a hot and steamy Harlequin novel. She instantly became an avid romance reader and decided to pursue an education in English and journalism. Nothing satisfies her more than writing stories filled with compelling love affairs, multifaceted characters and intriguing relationships. A true romantic, she believes in predestined romances, love at first sight and fairy-tale endings.
If Only for Tonight
Sherelle Green
www.millsandboon.co.uk
Dear Reader,
Introducing the spiciest owner of Elite Events Incorporated…Cydney Rayne!
I’ve always admired spontaneous women who aren’t afraid to be themselves and seize the moment. I wanted to challenge my fierce heroine by giving her a strong hero who would force her to analyze her views on Mr. Right.
Cyd embodies a sense of mystery and desirability that instantly attracts the devastatingly sexy Shawn Miles. Shawn has always been able to control his feelings and desires, but slowly Cyd begins to uncover the truth behind his facade. Soon, they both realize what may feel so wrong is actually so right!
I’m currently working on Lexus Turner’s story, the third installment in the Elite Events series. I love to hear from readers, so please feel free to contact me, and make sure you check out my website for my latest book updates.
Much love,
Sherelle
www.SherelleGreen.com
AuthorSherelleGreen@gmail.com
@SherelleGreen
To my parents, Carl and Mary, for their unwavering support and unconditional love. The words thank you can’t justify how grateful I am for all that you both have done for me. You raised me with strong family values and beliefs, always encouraging me to follow my dreams and approach life with confidence and determination. When faced with adversity or an obstacle, you both have overcome. When life throws you a curve ball, you both hit the ball as hard as possible, resulting in a home run. Throughout my life, I’ve watched you lean on each other for comfort and understanding, always proving that a beautiful relationship like yours—strong…solid…powerful—can withstand anything. After thirty years of marriage, you both are the epitome of true love and I’m so honored and blessed to be your daughter.
To my sister, Kelsey, for your support and motivation. When I was crafting the character of Cydney Rayne, I was inspired by your adventurous spirit, mysterious demeanor, intelligence and beauty. You never pass up on an opportunity to enhance yourself culturally and challenge yourself mentally. I greatly admire your drive to live life to its fullest and your ability to always be on the go and not be stagnant in life. As little girls, we shared a bond that could not be broken, and as adults, I’m so elated that our bond has only gotten stronger. You walk with such confidence and embody so many wonderful qualities. I’m so proud to have you as a little sister and I appreciate all the literary inspiration! Without you, Cydney Rayne wouldn’t exist. This one’s for you, sis!
Contents
Prologue
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
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Prologue
Cydney Rayne enclosed her arms around her body as she inhaled the unique scent of the ocean. On the southeastern coastline of Anguilla, sounds from the sea creatures mingled with those constrained to land as midnight approached.
“So peaceful,” Cydney whispered as she closed her eyes and listened to the sound of magnificent waves crashing against the rocky shore. Earlier that day, she’d soaked in the beauty of the bright sunset as it painted the sky a rusty reddish-orange. Now, as she opened her eyes, she admired the splashes of blue and gray that dusted the moon and the brilliant stars shining in the darkness.
Cydney walked over to one of the few light posts on the boardwalk and took off her leather sandals, letting the pinkish sand slide between her toes. Her vacation with her girlfriends from college was finally coming to an end, but she hadn’t managed to track down the sexy guy she’d been running into all week. The ladies thought she’d made him up since they hadn’t been around to spot him. But she knew she couldn’t imagine the naughty conversations she’d had with the stranger or the sensations she felt in her body whenever he was around. She felt more intrigued by this man than any other man from her past. And she didn’t even know his name.
She glanced around the deserted beach, wishing she’d brought her iPhone with her to keep track of the time. “Come on, mystery man...where are you?”
Her friends would kill her if they knew she’d sneaked out of the resort at night to track down a man she didn’t know. But Cydney was known for being the daredevil of the group. The thrill of danger excited her, and even though her family disliked her adventurous ways sometimes, she couldn’t help but be anyone but herself.
Deciding it probably wasn’t the best idea to continue to walk around aimlessly in Anguilla, Cydney started to head back to the resort until she noticed she was near the beach house that she’d admired since her arrival. She knew she should keep walking since there weren’t any lights surrounding the house, but she slowed down her pace, anyway. All the lights inside the house were off, and according to a local she had queried, the house wasn’t occupied. But somehow she sensed someone was in the house, watching her from the front window.
She stood there for a few seconds before a porch light turned on and the front door opened. Out stepped a tall man who appeared to be shirtless. She could barely make out his face in the dim lighting. Her breath caught in her throat. The porch’s lighting was just enough for her to tell that he was looking straight at her. She told herself to leave and hurry back to the resort, away from possible danger. But something kept her bare, toenail-polished feet planted in the sand as her blue summer dress danced in the night wind.
He stepped off the porch and began taking slow, purposeful steps toward her. A closer look at the man made her heart beat even faster. As he drew nearer, she told herself to be prepared for anything that the night had in store. After all, that was what she’d ventured to the beach for. She’d wanted to find her sexy mystery man, and there he was...in the flesh.
“So we meet again,” he said in an alluring voice as he approached her.
“I guess so. You told me you’d be on the beach, but I didn’t expect to find you in a deserted beach house.”
The amused look on his face was undeniable.
“You didn’t think I’d come, did you?”
“Not really,” he said with a smile. “Beautiful women don’t often go out into the night to meet a stranger they haven’t even been formally introduced to.”
What he said was definitely true considering she’d questioned her own motives several times while walking along the beach.
“Well, I guess I’m not most beautiful women then, am I?”
He walked closer to her and she confirmed her observation. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, allowing her a nice view of his delectable six-pack.
“I guess not,” he answered, studying her, as well. “My name is Brandon. It’s nice to meet you,” he continued. He offered a handshake as he removed one hand from the pockets of his khaki shorts.
Cydney wondered if she should give him her real name but decided against it. “Nice to meet you, Brandon. My name is Jessica.”
She returned his handshake and felt an electric spark the minute their hands touched. She was totally caught off guard by the feeling and immediately dropped his hand. His eyes glinted with amusement.
“Very nice to meet you, too, Jessica. And might I add, I’ve enjoyed the conversations we’ve had this past week. Honestly, I can’t say I’ve ever been this captivated by a woman before.”
Cydney felt the same way but couldn’t explain why she’d felt compelled to exchange naughty dialogues with the stranger. In fact, she’d been the one to start the conversations. She’d first seen him at a food market where he’d been buying coconut cake, a local dessert extremely well-known on the island. She’d waited until he was leaving, and being the daring person she was, she’d told him she’d love to lick the dessert off his body and then walked away, leaving him with a stunned look on his face.
He’d returned the favor the next day by walking into a local clothing store while she was shopping and saying he’d love for her to purchase the swimsuit she had in her hands just so that he could strip it off her later. He’d taken it one step further and explained everything he would do to her naked body.
Their back-and-forth naughty banter had continued every time they’d seen each other until finally he’d told her to meet him on the beach her last night in Anguilla. That night had finally come, and she didn’t know if she was spontaneous or foolish for meeting with a man who had just learned her name, but probably remembered all the sexual positions she whispered in his ear for the past week.
“Brandon, I want you to know that I’ve never done anything like this before,” Cydney blurted out, although she wasn’t sure why she cared since she didn’t plan to ever see him again.
He grazed her cheek with the back of his hand. “I know. Believe it or not, I know what type of woman you are.”
The gesture was sweet, but Cydney didn’t believe him. What woman would believe a man in her position? She knew what he wanted, and it was fine with her because she wanted the same thing. She’d never had a one-night stand, but she didn’t think she could stop herself now, even if she tried. The man was definitely in shape and had the build of a basketball player. His skin was the color of cinnamon and she’d never seen eyes like his. They weren’t hazel or blue but more so a combination of the two. Sea-blue, she thought as she peered a little closer. He was hot....
“So what do you say, Jessica?” he said, breaking into her thoughts. “Will you come inside the beach house and spend the night with me?”
Cydney looked him up and down, her eyes lingering on his six-pack. How can I say no to a man this fine? She didn’t live with regrets and after one more glance over his body, she knew she’d regret not taking him up on his offer.
“I accept,” Cydney said, relishing in the desire reflected in his eyes. “But only on one condition.”
“What’s that?” Brandon said, his voice even sexier than before.
Cydney tilted her head to the side as she observed Brandon a little more closely. She was one day shy of twenty-seven and definitely not a stranger to the bedroom. But there were still certain things that she’d always wanted to try yet never entertained with other men. If only for tonight, she wanted to live out one of her fantasies. She glanced at the beach, and then back at Brandon.
“I want to have sex in the ocean,” Cydney finally replied.
Brandon smiled at her and nodded his head in agreement. “That seems simple enough.”
“But not just that,” Cydney continued. “I want us to continue our naughty conversations by talking dirty while we explain every single thing we want to do to each other...while having sex in the ocean. No inhibitions....”
Cydney watched the fire build up in his eyes right before he stepped closer to her. His hands gently grazed her face again, only this time they didn’t stop there. He took one finger and dragged it in between her cleavage before dropping his head to the side of her neck. There, he placed soft kisses along her neckline, paying close attention to the parts right above her breasts. Cydney dropped her head back and enjoyed the way his lips felt on her skin. She couldn’t help the moans that escaped her mouth with every seductive kiss he placed on her upper body.
When he neared her mouth, she stopped him before their lips could touch. Outlining his jawline with her finger, she used her free hand to gently push him away from her. She took that moment to provocatively lift her dress over her head, revealing her spicy two-piece bathing suit.
Her eyes were pinned to his lips as he licked them in anticipation and slowly unzipped his pants before pushing them completely off. Cydney gasped at the sight that was before her. Brandon hadn’t worn anything underneath, displaying his enlarged sex. Her mouth watered as she took in the complete sight of his sexy nakedness. His arms and abs were so muscular that it made her want to lick every crevice of his body like it was a chocolate-ice-cream sundae.
He walked toward her, one mission clearly evident in his mind. Instead of getting nervous, Cydney flirtatiously smiled and met him halfway.
“I see you brought the swimsuit you were looking at in the store,” Brandon said as he played with the string on the side of her bikini.
“I always keep my promises,” Cydney replied, her voice catching as his eyes grew even deeper with desire.
“Come with me,” he told her seductively while grabbing her hand and leading her to the ocean. Her inner voice warned her that a man this sexy could be dangerous for a woman’s psyche. Men this fine were hard to forget and even harder to duplicate. But that inner voice was no longer present the minute their bodies hit the water. The only thought on Cydney’s mind was making sure she remembered every moment she spent with her sexy island lover.
Chapter 1
Eight months later...
“Cydney Rayne.”
She glanced up at the man who had whispered her name and prayed her eyes were deceiving her. They’d been formally introduced an hour before her sister Imani’s wedding, and her body temperature still hadn’t returned to normal. It had taken all her strength to stand up as maid of honor and not steal glances at the sexy man whose eyes had been glued to her the entire ceremony.
Imani and Daman Barker’s backyard wedding reception was in full swing, and she didn’t dare regard the man while being surrounded by her family and friends.
“Please follow me,” she said quickly before leaving the reception and retreating to a nearby walk-in closet inside her grandfather’s large house. As soon as she shut the closet door, she wondered why she hadn’t found a less confined hiding spot.
As they stood there observing one another, she wondered who would be the first to speak. Goodness, the man looked devastatingly sexy. He looked even better than she remembered. His black suit looked tailor-made and now the foremost thought in her mind was how good he’d look out of it.
He licked his lips as his eyes practically burned a hole through her lavender maid-of-honor dress. He was obviously having the same thoughts she was. She wanted to kiss him badly, and seeing the fire in his eyes, she knew that he wanted to kiss her, too. But Cydney refused to start something with a man like him—the kind of man who oozed sex appeal and looked like he just walked off the cover of GQ magazine. She could lose her damn mind with a man like him, and losing her sanity over a man, no matter how good he looked, was not an option.
A month ago, when she’d gone to help her new brother-in-law move out of his Detroit condo, she had seen a picture of Daman with a man she couldn’t quite make out. She could only see his profile in the picture, but she instantly knew that she had met the man previously. Refusing to believe her eyes, she put the photo out of her mind, hoping it was just a weird coincidence that he resembled that man she’d tried to forget about. Now, staring back into a pair of amused sea-blue eyes, she reminded herself that she never did believe in coincidences.
“So, Cydney Rayne, would you like me to call you Jessica, Cydney or do you prefer Cyd, the name everyone else has been calling you all day?”
She wished she could wipe that smirk off his handsome face. She wasn’t the only one who’d made up a fake name. “Well, that depends. Do you want me to call you Shawn Miles or would you rather I call you Brandon?”
His eyes squinted together. “Although I loved the way you screamed my name that night in the ocean, I’d wished you were screaming Shawn rather than Brandon. Now that you know my real name, maybe we can make that happen.”
Throwing her head back in an exaggerated laugh, she refused to let his arrogance get to her. “I’m sure your ears were playing tricks on you, but if that’s the name your mother gave you, then Shawn it is. You can call me Cyd or Cydney, but if you think for one minute that we’ll be sleeping together, think again.”
He was still smiling and checking her out. She tried to keep a calm demeanor, but she was anything but relaxed. She couldn’t even remember how Shawn knew Daman since she hadn’t really listened to the introductions past learning his real name. The moment she’d seen his face before the wedding, she’d wanted to crawl into a deep, dark hole. However, Shawn had looked more amused than surprised. She’d barely returned his handshake when the enormity of the situation had hit her full force. Most people never saw their one-night stands again. Unfortunately for Cyd, her one-night stand came strolling through her grandfather’s backyard for her sister’s wedding. Seriously?
“How do you know Daman, anyway?”
He looked at her from head to toe one more time before responding. “I met Daman through Malik Madden, a mutual friend.”
Cyd wondered if Shawn had known her true identity when they’d first met on the island.
“No, I didn’t know we shared a mutual friend. Imani and Daman hadn’t started working on the gala they planned yet,” Shawn said, interjecting her thoughts.
Cyd squinted her eyes together, soaking in his accurate assessment. “I didn’t even ask you anything,” she snapped. Even if he didn’t know her then, she was sure he’d known about her before he got to the wedding because he hadn’t appeared surprised when he saw her.
“You’re right. I knew who you were before I got here today. After meeting with Daman and Malik one day, I used Google to search Imani when I heard she was marrying Daman. That’s when I spotted a picture of you and your business partners.”
Cyd rolled her eyes and shook her head when he read her thoughts once more. Clearly Shawn had done his research. Cyd, along with her sister Imani Rayne-Barker, cousin Lexus Turner and friend Mya Winters were proud founders of Elite Events, Incorporated in Chicago. The women were well-known for planning elaborate events that left lasting impressions with all who had the pleasure of attending.
“How do you know that’s what I’m thinking? I could have been thinking anything.” Cyd didn’t like when people assumed they knew what was on her mind because usually they were wrong in their assumptions. But Shawn had correctly assessed her thoughts, and that didn’t sit well with her.
Shawn pushed aside a coat that was partially blocking his view of Cyd. “That’s true, but you weren’t just thinking anything. And trust me, Cyd, I wanted to track you down the minute I found the information.”
He was really starting to irritate her. He spoke to her as if they’d known each other forever instead of just being sex partners for one night. “Listen, you don’t know me, Shawn Miles, or whatever your name is. So do us both a favor and stop acting like you do.”
He leaned in closer, and she inhaled his enticing masculine scent. Being around him was a threat to her sanity, and her body was a ball of nerves. Her heart beat even faster as her eyes followed his hand that reached for her face. She couldn’t help but lean into him a little more.
“I know you better than you think, Cydney Rayne or Jessica or whatever your name is. And I also noticed your hair. It’s different than I remember. This color makes you look even sexier than you did the week we met.”
His voice was so seductive that she squeezed her thighs tighter to try to ease the ache that was starting to develop. When she’d met Shawn, her hair had been light brown and styled in natural waves since she’d wanted a look suited for the island. Now her hair was jet-black and cut in soft layers that flowed around her shoulders. The dark color looked dramatic on her light butter-toffee complexion, and she’d definitely gotten a lot more attention since she’d dyed it.
Cyd slowly backed up into a corner of the closet, attempting to put some distance between them. Refusing to give her space, Shawn followed her into the corner and brushed a few fallen strands of hair out of her face with the back of his hand. The heat in the closet rose twenty degrees, and for the second time, she wished she hadn’t chosen a closet as their hiding place. He leaned in, indicating that he was going to kiss her. She could feel it and even worse, she wanted it.
“What are you doing?” she asked, a little more breathless than she would have liked.
“If you have to ask, then I must be doing something wrong.”
No, he was definitely doing everything right. But she was trying to stall the passionate explosion that she knew would come from his kiss. His six-foot-three-inch frame towered over her five-foot-nine-inch body. He’d successfully blocked her from any route of escape.
As his face grew closer to hers, she didn’t have the willpower to stop him.