Keep (Command #2) Read Free Page A

she was in Munich.
    She would be wrong. If she got into his car, she would unknowingly give him permission to continue his pursuit of her. His brother had loved chasing fugitives, but for Shawn it had always been women.
    Somehow, she must have sensed it because she shook her head adamantly. “No, thank you.”
    “Suit yourself,” he said. The disappointment that ran through him was surprising. “ Auf Wiedersehen .”
    He and his umbrella left her at the cab stand, the rain pouring down on her. When he opened the limo door, he glanced back over to see her, glaring at him like the bastard he knew he was.

-2-
    Crap, Kara thought as the cold rain drenched her. This was ruining her shoes. He’d left her with no umbrella and absolutely no choice.
    When she slid into the dry backseat beside him, he didn’t bother to look up from his phone. She set her laptop bag between them as a buffer, but doubted it would stop a man like Shawn. It wouldn’t even slow him down.
    “You’re kind of a jerk,” she said.
    “Didn’t your sister warn you?”
    Yes, she had. He put his phone away, leaned forward, and told the driver they were ready. God, ready for what?
    “Where are we going?” she asked, her voice even and detached when the car was in motion.
    “Lunch.”
    Oh, that was all she agreed to. She relaxed into the soft leather of the seat and wiped the rain from her forehead. Yet an evil half-smile crept across his face that filled her with unease and unwanted excitement.
    “That isn’t the strings attached, is it?”
    “No,” he said. “It isn’t.”
    Whatever it was, she suspected she wasn’t going to like it, and she’d spent too much time already putting up with things she didn’t like. “Stop looking at me like that.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like you want me.”
    She didn’t regret putting it out there until his evil smile widened into a full ear-to-ear grin. “I do want you.”
    She couldn’t breathe. All of the air in the car vanished. Why was he like this? He had his pick of women and, from what Laurel had told her, he tried them all. The last thing Kara wanted to be was Shawn Dunn’s plaything . . . even though the idea filled her with unexpected warmth.
    He was a cocky, arrogant piece of work, a god’s-gift-to-women type. He was sure to be selfish and controlling too — at least, that was her experience with a man like him, a man in power. And beneath it all, that was what she most disliked about Shawn: His personality was like Paul’s.
    Only on steroids.
    She recalled the awkwardness when Paul appeared in her office doorway. He was only an elevator ride away, but Shawn on the other side of town had beaten Paul to check on her. Only because Shawn wants something from you . Paul didn’t come running because she wasn’t capable of giving him what he wanted. Maybe it had been petty to make Paul jealous, but she didn’t care.
    “Lunch,” she said, “There’s a drive-thru a few blocks over.”
    He laughed. “How totally American.”
    “Didn’t you grow up here? Aren’t you American?”
    “I have dual citizenship because my father was American,” he said. “ Ich bin Deutsch .” Then he said something else in German, a long sentence that sounded threatening.
    “Did you just order my death?”
    “What? No.”
    “German always sounds angry to me.”
    More German rolled from his lips and the warm look of desire in his eyes left little doubt that what was said was sexual in meaning. She treated him to a blank stare. And for the first time, she saw it. A momentary weakness in his armor. Words were weapons of seduction to him, and she’d just disarmed what she assumed was his biggest gun. So he reloaded in English.
    “I said that I happen to prefer American women, like the gorgeous one sitting beside me.”
    She ripped her gaze away from him, annoyed. It was just a line. So why, deep down, was she somewhat flattered? There was no way around it — he was undeniably attractive. There was also