Secrets of a One Night Stand
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Naima Simone
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HarlequinOne
Achilles Farrell had been called many things in his thirty years.
Dumb fuck.
Ex-con.
Bastard.
That last one behind his back since most people were leery of insulting a six-foot-four-inch-tall, 214-pound man to his face.
But never had he been called an heir.
Brother.
And in the space of one afternoon, he’d become both.
After a shock like that, he needed alcohol. Lots of alcohol.
Achilles stared at the neon red signs advertising the various beers on tap as well as framed posters declaring this pub the best and worst Beacon Hill, Massachusetts, had to offer. Hopefully, that ambiguity didn’t translate to its liquor quality.
It’d been a couple of hours, but he could still feel the judgmental gazes of “polite” Boston society on his skin like a thousand ants. The sensation deepened his thirst for the coffee-and-caramel flavor of a perfectly drawn Guinness, sharpened his anticipation for the burn of whiskey down his throat. Had him damn near demanding the bartender bring him another round when he hadn’t even requested his first drink yet.
“What can I get you?” The bartender leaned on the scarred bar top. Despite the colorful tattoos running the length of both arms, the young woman barely looked old enough to drink the alcohol she was serving.
“A shot of Jameson and a Guinness.”
She nodded. “Coming up.”
Only when she turned around to start building his drink did he exhale, some of the tension in his shoulders leaking out of him like a slowly released valve. Maybe once that Irish whiskey hit the back of his throat, the cold in his bones from that mockery of a funeral would finally dissipate.
To think, just three days ago, he’d been in his small cabin, alone except for his computers, just the way he liked it. That’s when he’d received a certified letter about the death of a man his mother had always refused to talk about although she’d given Achilles his last name. Achilles hadn’t given a damn then, just like he didn’t now, about a will or an inheritance. But morbid curiosity about the man who’d impregnated his mother had compelled him to accept the paid-for plane ticket and travel thousands of miles across the country.
As soon as he’d stepped off the plane and met the glacial expression of the chauffeur, Achilles had regretted his rash decision. He’d thought landing in prison had cured him of his hot, impulsive behavior. Apparently not. And now he was paying for his spur-of-the-moment decision to attend the funeral and the reading of the will for his so-called father.
A year.
He had to give up an entire year of his life, remain in Boston, with half brothers he didn’t know, and run a company he had no clue how to operate. A company he wanted no part of.
That was the price his father demanded Achilles remit.
Even from the grave, Barron Farrell was a selfish, narcissistic asshole.
When he was growing up, Achilles had begged his mother to tell him who his father was, to introduce Achilles to him. She’d always refused both requests. He’d resented her then. If she were alive, he’d thank her.
He propped his elbows on the bar top and ground his thumb and forefinger into his eyes. What he wouldn’t give to be back in Tacoma, Washington, in his cabin less than a mile from the Cascade Range. So far away from affluent Beacon Hill, Massachusetts. And not just in location.
Yeah, Tacoma had its wealthy, but as the son of a waitress, he didn’t have any use for them. In his experience, the rich either fucked you or fucked you over.
But as he’d stood in that mansion’s ridiculously huge library with its hardwood floor, leather furniture, fireplaces large enough for even him to stand in, spiral staircase and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, it hadn’t been just his black thermal shirt, faded jeans and battered brown boots that had differentiated him from the other men in the room.
Cain Farrell—his older brother, the heir, the son Barron Farrell had kept and acknowledged. Kenan Rhodes—the youngest son, biracial and the other bastard besides Achilles. But both men hailed from the same world. Boston’s elite. It was in the razor-sharp yet elegant cut of their suits. The cultured speech. The arrogant demeanor.
Achilles had encountered people like them. And had ended up despising every one of them.
Now he had to call them brother.
Life should really offer him a cigarette when it decided to fuck him.
Again.
“You starting a tab or paying for these now?” The bartender set a mug filled with dark, cold brew topped with a creamy head that spilled a little over the rim. Next to it sat a short, smooth glass of amber whiskey.
Perfect.
“A tab.” Because yeah, he was just getting started. The whole purpose of this trip entailed not thinking. And several rounds should accomplish his mission.
“I’ll be back, then.”
She cocked her head, running a dark blue gaze down his frame. He’d hit six foot his sophomore year of high school and had kept growing. He’d become used to that glint in a woman’s eyes. And he didn’t shy from it. The only thing better than losing himself in alcohol was hot, dirty, nameless sex.
His height, his build and his eyes—those were the only things his worthless sperm donor had passed down to him, and women seemed to eat that shit up. He picked up the shot of Jameson and knocked it back, never breaking visual contact with the pretty brunette. The corner of her lips lifted, desire flickering in her gaze as it dipped to his mouth.
“Let me know if you need to order food. Y’know, to balance all that alcohol. Can’t have you too wasted just in case you have later...plans.” She smirked before sauntering off to the other end of the bar.
“Hmm. That was subtle.”
Achilles stiffened.
That voice.
Like a fire beating back the coldest winter winds.
Like fingernails on a chalkboard.
As silken and sexy as skin sliding over bare, heated skin.
As jarring as crashing cymbals directly in the ear.
He longed to curl up against it, roll around in it.
He wanted to snarl at it, hurl himself away from it.
His heart smashed against his rib cage like a caged beast. His pulse, in sharp contrast, a sonorous warning at the base of his throat. Something primitive inside him warned that he should go find that bartender with the invitation in her eyes, pay for his drinks and get the hell out.
But the impulsive, destructive streak that had brought him to Massachusetts must have still been alive and kicking because he didn’t heed that warning. Instead, he slowly turned around on his barstool.
Jesus Christ.
That sense of self-preservation had been right.
This woman was everything he usually avoided.
Gorgeous. Pampered. Rich. He didn’t need to see the price tag on the purple pantsuit that conformed to her abundant, wicked curves to know it cost more than everything he’d packed in his suitcase back at the hotel. Including the luggage.
A Trojan horse.
That’s what she was.
Designed to appear like one thing—something innocuous—while inside was a virus waiting to strike, to infect...to destroy.
He dealt with those deadly viral strands during his job as a software developer. He’d suffered the poison of one after tangling with a woman like her.
Her dark gaze slid over him, and—in spite of knowing who she was, what she was—his breath snagged on the ragged resentment in his chest. Blood heated in his veins...pounded in his lengthening dick.
Apparently, his cock could give two damns what tax bracket she fell in.
She lifted a slim hand, hailing the bartender over to her. And in the magical way her kind had, the bartender abandoned the person she was talking to and headed their way.
Flicking a glance over Achilles, the brunette hiked her chin at the woman next to him. “What can I get you?”
“I’ll have...” She narrowed her eyes, tapping a pale pink–painted finger against her tad-too-full bottom lip. “I’ll have the bacon cheeseburger with a side of onion rings. Make that an extra-large order. And a Budweiser.”
Well...damn.
As if she’d heard the astonished words in his head, she arched a dark eyebrow.
“They have wonderful hamburgers here and the best onion rings in Boston.” She dipped her head in the direction of the bartender, who disappeared through a swinging door on the other side of the bar. “She was right, you know. You might want some food. I recommend one of the burgers or the fish ’n’ chips. Make sure you’re sober enough for—” the barest hint of a smirk whispered over a corner of her mouth “—later.”
Was she flirting? If so, teasing him about fueling up to fuck another woman had to be one of the weirdest come-ons...or the hottest. Possibly both.
His dick twitched as she flicked a tight, honey-brown curl away from her cheek.
Definitely both.
Disgust for himself trickled through him, and he picked up his Guinness, gulping the sweet and bitter ale until nearly half of it disappeared before he settled the glass mug back on the bar top. But the cold alcohol did nothing to douse the flickers of lust in his gut. Not when wisps of her scent—an earthy musk carrying hints of lavender, cedar and something more elusive—drifted to him, taunting him. Not when a glance down ensnared him in the dichotomy of a lush thigh and a delicate ankle. One invited his hungry teeth and the other his gentle fingers.
He had no business being tempted by either.
Women like her... They only wanted one thing from men like him. And while he didn’t mind a night of hot, no-strings sex, it was being looked at like trash afterward that didn’t work for him. Being someone’s dirty secret tainted the soul, and that kind of stain was hell washing out.
She sighed, and out of the corner of his eye, he caught her folding a napkin until it formed a tiny square.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be so flippant or rude.” She broke off as the bartender reappeared and set her beer in front of her, removing the cap.
The woman smiled at her in thanks, and Achilles glanced away as another bolt of lust speared him in the chest. And lower. A dimple. Of fucking course. Because cheekbones as sharp as broken glass, eyes the color of melted dark chocolate, a mouth a shade too wide and a sinner’s prayer past too full weren’t enough. Because tight, springy curls the shade of sun-warmed honey wasn’t overkill. She needed dimples.
“I’m usually not so forward. I’m blaming it on jet lag.” She shook her head, picking up her beer and raising it to her lips.
And by all that was holy, he should’ve looked away. Shouldn’t have stared so openly, so...so eagerly at how that beautiful mouth pursed around the opening. Or how her delicate throat worked as she swallowed. His fingers tightened around the handle of his mug. Either that or do something that would get him booted out of the bar and possibly arrested. Like lean forward and wrap his hand around that elegant throat so he could feel every swallow against his palm. Feel the vibration of that husky contralto when she spoke.
He fixed his gaze on the rest of the ale in his glass. “Jet-lagged from where?”
He didn’t glimpse her surprise, but it crackled over him just the same. As did her soft delight when she said, “London. I was there on business, and you’d think after being away from home for a week the first thing I’d want to see is my own bed, but I can’t go—” She broke off, and Achilles glanced at her. But she didn’t continue the sentence, instead taking another sip, then setting the bottle on the bar, studying the dark brown glass with a small frown. But her expression cleared as she looked at him. “Anyway, I found myself craving a greasy burger and a beer from my favorite bar.”
As someone who’d learned early in life that detecting a lie could save him from being backhanded by whomever his mom happened to be dating, he could sense an untruth when he heard it.
“You sat down by me,” he said.
She nodded. “I did.”
“You started talking to me.”
The corner of her mouth twitched because the “uninvited” went unspoken but might as well as have been shouted to the ceiling. “True.”
“And you’re never going to see me again after tonight.”
“Also true.”
“So you don’t have to bother with bullshit. Either you tell me the truth or tell me you don’t want to get into it. But don’t lie.”
She stared at him, pretty lips parted. She wasn’t the only one surprised. He lived and worked alone for a reason: he didn’t really care for people. Liked talking to them even less. Developing computer software encompassed designing algorithms, producing code, testing applications and troubleshooting existing systems. Challenging, but it came down to numbers, to science.
Not emotions. Not baggage. Not history. Not on which side of the tracks a person resided.
People were messy as fuck and he wanted no part of them.
Which didn’t explain why he’d decided to engage Ms. Beacon Hill in conversation.
That dimple flashed again as her lips slowly curved into a smile that had his chest seizing and his dick hardening.
“You’re right. There’s something to be said for the gift of having only the ‘right now,’ isn’t there? It’s temporary, which somehow makes it more special, exciting.” She extended her hand toward him. “Mycah.”
After a brief hesitation, Achilles accepted that slim, smaller hand in his own. And exhaled a low, long breath when his completely encompassed hers. “Achilles.”
“Achilles,” she repeated, and he clenched his jaw when she emitted a little hum afterward, as if savoring his name on her tongue and finding it satisfying. “I like that name. Well, Achilles.” She picked up her beer bottle once more and tipped it toward him in a toast. “Here’s to strangers meeting for a night.”
He lifted his mug, tapping it to her beer. And he couldn’t prevent his rebellious gaze from traveling down the graceful column of her neck, past her slim shoulders to a pair of beautiful breasts that might not fill his hands but would damn sure make their presence known. Her open suit jacket offered him an unhindered view of high-waisted pants and a slightly rounded belly that he found sexy as hell. A woman who ordered the kind of meal she had, who didn’t starve herself...
He shifted his scrutiny to her face of contrasting angles and curves and narrowed his eyes, studying her anew. Her clothes, those shoes with their red bottoms that even a fashion idiot like him recognized, her flawless makeup and smooth, pampered, almond-brown skin—all of that shouted wealth.
But the decadence of her food order, the roundness of her stomach, the gorgeous lushness of curves that society dictated she diet away, even her laid-back choice in beer and bar... Those all pointed to a woman who indulged herself. A woman who knew restraint but also understood that abandon wasn’t always the opposite of losing control.
What would it be like to have this woman lose control all over him?
“To strangers and one night.”
As they sipped their respective drinks, and the Guinness flowed over his tongue and down his throat, he couldn’t shake the sense that his words had never been more prophetic.
Good thing he didn’t believe in that shit.
