Drop Dead Gorgeous by Jennifer Skully Page B

on it.
    Poor T. Larry. He didn’t get it. She wasn’t right for him. She was flighty, which had never been a bad thing in her book. She said whatever came into her head, and she’d never do a single thing he told her to. T. Larry craved complacency. She’d die if she was nothing more than content. He’d try to mold her into something she could never be. She’d stifle with his routines.
    She’d have to slash her wrists. Of course, that wouldn’t be necessary when she had a stroke after her twenty-eighth birthday.
    Goodness, it was just a kiss, not a marriage proposal.
    She found herself in the small bathroom, in front of the mirror, touching her lips. She didn’t look merely kissed, but divinely kissed. There was only one way to view the situation.
    If T. Larry’s kiss took her breath away, Richard’s had to ring bells.
    Where was that brush? She opened the drawers and lifted the towels on the shelf above the toilet. In the front room, she looked in the side table drawer, then on the countertop that separated the kitchen. She searched everywhere, keeping her back to the window over the street, where she’d stood as T. Larry kissed her.
    A nice kiss. But just a kiss. Really nothing divine about it, even if she looked that way in the mirror.
    Back in the bedroom, she looked under the bed, finding nothing but a discarded bra—she’d been looking for that—and a few dust bunnies clinging to the carpet.
    Darn. Her hairbrush was nowhere to be found.

CHAPTER SIX
    W HAT HAD Laurence been thinking kissing Madison like that? He’d lost his mind. Some sort of mental fugue had overtaken him. He’d had an out-of-body experience.
    The truth was much less palatable. Laurence had simply given in to the intoxicating scent of her and his irritation over her desire to see him date a Barbie Doll.
    Still, his actions were unacceptable. He was supposed to protect her, not seduce her. However, if he didn’t seduce her, how would she come to believe he was The One? That was mere rationalization for bad behavior. He’d wanted her. He’d acted on it. Kissing her had nothing to do with helping her get over her unnatural notion that she was going to die.
    That kiss had disturbed Laurence’s sleep and troubled his mind from the moment he’d succumbed to it. It fogged his brain when he’d sat in front of his home computer on Sunday. It made him fifteen minutes late leaving Monday morning, which caused him an extra half hour in traffic. He’d forgotten his appointment with Amy Kermeth, hadn’t gotten his workout and had discovered the coffee machine was broken when he finally reached the office. The rest of the morning was no better. He couldn’t forget Madison’s filmy blouse draped across the coffee table or her panty hose and high heels on the carpet.
    The three times he’d called her into his office, his mind’s eye had stripped her naked, imagined the scent at the base of her throat, the color of her nipples…
    He hadn’t a clue what she was actually wearing.
    The worst part was that he hadn’t needed anything when he buzzed her, at least not anything work related. He’d gone insane. He’d lost control of his libido. He’d forgotten the Family Plan.
    This was bad, very bad. A boss should never, under any circumstances, notice such intimate details about his employee. Madison deserved far more respect.
    He’d unequivocally and irrevocably fallen in lust with Madison O’Donnell.
    So, what could a fourth visitation really hurt? He was already doomed as it was.
    He pushed his intercom button. “Madison, a minute, please.”
    He’d need her for a lot longer than that, considering everything he wanted to do to her. But this time, he’d note her attire, and he wouldn’t even think about the silky texture of her panty hose against his fingers.
    â€œDraft a letter to…” He couldn’t