Chapter One: Hunted
“Lovely work, Miss Richardson.”
Russell Tennyson was dark, mysterious, and the object of her unceasing lust from the moment Tabitha laid eyes on him, and until he spoke, she had been convinced that he had not even noticed her presence in the room.
“I’m not quite finished yet,” she said, hearing her voice echo in the large, empty room, and gestured toward the ceiling-to-floor windows on the wall opposite her, the only spot in the room that wasn’t decorated. Russell glanced at the windows, then back at her and smiled.
This job made her edgy, but he, and her immediate and inappropriate internal response to him, downright frightened her. After all, she was standing in the ballroom of his home—his private residence, Tabitha reminded herself for the umpteenth time—and her event-planning company, Magical Moments, was being paid a very intimidating six-figure sum of money to see that the night was immaculately presented for himself and his guests. She didn’t have time to contemplate the tug of arousal at the sight of him; there was too much work to be done.
“You seem to have read my mind,” he said, stalling her as she reached to adjust a glass bowl on one of the perimeter tables. “This is perfect.” It was quiet, they were alone, and he was on the other side of the room, but the acoustics brought the sound to her like he was standing behind her. His voice flowed over her like silk, low and intimate, with a warm timbre that promised wicked things. She shivered and turned to face him, only to find herself held captive by a pair of intelligent, ice-chip eyes that stole the very breath from her lungs.
The way he had emphasized the “miss” before her name had sent shivers down her spine, punctuating his appeal with a stab of desire straight to the heart of her sex. Any idiot could see by the lack of a ring on her finger that she was not attached to anyone, but the way he pointed out that lack of attachment sent her mind twirling toward the obscene.
So not good, Tab.
It took her a moment to rip herself out of her little fantasy world in which he was the naked and very competent star and process the fact that he had spoken to her. And that he might be expecting a reply.
“T-thank you,” she muttered, and chewed back a wince. Right now she sounded like a complete idiot, and it was all his fault. She couldn’t think about all the work she had left to do when she was too busy focusing on the fact that her belly was on fire and her knees were one degree away from jelly.
He appeared nothing at all like the entrepreneurial multibillionaire of Fortune 500 legend, or the fashionable playboy the media swore him to be. For someone so outstanding, he looked like a run-of-the-mill, insanely good-looking man who made her wish she’d included a pair of dry panties with her uniform for tonight. He had dark, shaggy hair with just the right amount of curl, broad, mouthwatering shoulders and narrow hips that tapered into strong legs. His cheeks and chin were shadowed with a day’s worth of stubble, but it only added to the air of power, mystery, and danger surrounding him. He did not look like he had just come from an important business meeting… He looked more like he had just crawled out of the jungle.
He was tall, and for someone who was supposed to be in his mid-forties, he appeared very, very young. His clothes were made of smooth, pressed linen, the only nod to his true wealth she could find on his person. He wore no jewelry, and when he moved he moved like a man comfortable in his own skin. There was no stiffness to his posture, nothing that would signal the need to be seen as something more. Russell was quite possibly the most charismatic man she had ever met, and he moved with animal grace and inherent self-confidence, inspecting her handiwork, interspersing his murmurs and sighs of appreciation with backward glances toward her that
“Lovely work, Miss Richardson.”
Russell Tennyson was dark, mysterious, and the object of her unceasing lust from the moment Tabitha laid eyes on him, and until he spoke, she had been convinced that he had not even noticed her presence in the room.
“I’m not quite finished yet,” she said, hearing her voice echo in the large, empty room, and gestured toward the ceiling-to-floor windows on the wall opposite her, the only spot in the room that wasn’t decorated. Russell glanced at the windows, then back at her and smiled.
This job made her edgy, but he, and her immediate and inappropriate internal response to him, downright frightened her. After all, she was standing in the ballroom of his home—his private residence, Tabitha reminded herself for the umpteenth time—and her event-planning company, Magical Moments, was being paid a very intimidating six-figure sum of money to see that the night was immaculately presented for himself and his guests. She didn’t have time to contemplate the tug of arousal at the sight of him; there was too much work to be done.
“You seem to have read my mind,” he said, stalling her as she reached to adjust a glass bowl on one of the perimeter tables. “This is perfect.” It was quiet, they were alone, and he was on the other side of the room, but the acoustics brought the sound to her like he was standing behind her. His voice flowed over her like silk, low and intimate, with a warm timbre that promised wicked things. She shivered and turned to face him, only to find herself held captive by a pair of intelligent, ice-chip eyes that stole the very breath from her lungs.
The way he had emphasized the “miss” before her name had sent shivers down her spine, punctuating his appeal with a stab of desire straight to the heart of her sex. Any idiot could see by the lack of a ring on her finger that she was not attached to anyone, but the way he pointed out that lack of attachment sent her mind twirling toward the obscene.
So not good, Tab.
It took her a moment to rip herself out of her little fantasy world in which he was the naked and very competent star and process the fact that he had spoken to her. And that he might be expecting a reply.
“T-thank you,” she muttered, and chewed back a wince. Right now she sounded like a complete idiot, and it was all his fault. She couldn’t think about all the work she had left to do when she was too busy focusing on the fact that her belly was on fire and her knees were one degree away from jelly.
He appeared nothing at all like the entrepreneurial multibillionaire of Fortune 500 legend, or the fashionable playboy the media swore him to be. For someone so outstanding, he looked like a run-of-the-mill, insanely good-looking man who made her wish she’d included a pair of dry panties with her uniform for tonight. He had dark, shaggy hair with just the right amount of curl, broad, mouthwatering shoulders and narrow hips that tapered into strong legs. His cheeks and chin were shadowed with a day’s worth of stubble, but it only added to the air of power, mystery, and danger surrounding him. He did not look like he had just come from an important business meeting… He looked more like he had just crawled out of the jungle.
He was tall, and for someone who was supposed to be in his mid-forties, he appeared very, very young. His clothes were made of smooth, pressed linen, the only nod to his true wealth she could find on his person. He wore no jewelry, and when he moved he moved like a man comfortable in his own skin. There was no stiffness to his posture, nothing that would signal the need to be seen as something more. Russell was quite possibly the most charismatic man she had ever met, and he moved with animal grace and inherent self-confidence, inspecting her handiwork, interspersing his murmurs and sighs of appreciation with backward glances toward her that
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