One Night to Risk It All Read Free

Alex?” she asked.
    He lifted a shoulder, the muscles in his chest shifting with the motion. “Why not?”
    Why not, indeed? It wasn’t as though there was any reason for him to be anything else. Who cared what his last name was? She’d never have occasion to use it. She’d never introduce him at a party, or need to refer to him in conversation. She’d never see him after today.
    “Good point. So, a drink? Or...would your boss get mad?”
    “My boss?”
    “The owner of the yacht.”
    He frowned and looked behind him, then back at her. “Oh. No, he’s gone up to Athens for a few days. I’m just supposed to check in on things now and again. No need to stay tied to the dock.”
    “I suppose not. You won’t float away.” She laughed, then felt immediately stupid. Like she’d regressed to being an eighteen-year-old girl rather than a twenty-eight-year-old woman. Of course, she hadn’t been giggly or ridiculous over men at eighteen. She’d learned better by then.
    Apparently all good sense and life lessons were out the window now.
    He wrinkled his nose and squinted against the sun, an oddly boyish gesture. It made her feel even warmer. “I don’t suppose. Though I have in the past.”
    “Have you?”
    “Sure. That’s how I ended up here. I spend a lot of my life floating.”
    She felt the layered meaning in his words. And in a strange way, felt like she’d heard more honest words from this stranger, this man she’d known all of five minutes, than she’d ever heard out of the man she was planning to marry.
    “So,” he said, “drink?”
    “Of course.”
    “Let me just get a shirt.” He tossed her a smile and climbed back up onto the boat. It took all of her willpower not to say “oh, no, please leave your chest bare.” She figured that would be pushing it. Especially since, no matter how much she might want him, she knew she’d never do anything about it.
    A drink was all it would ever be.
    They’d gone to the bar next and ordered a couple of sodas. She’d texted Alana to let her know everything was fine and that she wasn’t axe-murdered. But she didn’t send a text when she and Alex walked around town for hours, or when they ended up having dinner on the pier, laughing and talking over seafood and pasta. She didn’t text Alana about how he lifted his fork to her lips and let her taste his entrée, about the way their eyes had met in that moment and it had sent a snap of heat through her.
    Or when he took her to a club later that night.
    She hadn’t been to a club since she’d had to sneak in with a fake ID. Clubs like this were a hotbed of scandal and sex, and all sorts of things her father and Ajax would never have approved of. The sort of place the press would crucify her for going to.
    Alcohol, loud thumping music, sticky dance floors filled with bodies. There had been a time when she’d loved it. But not after she’d become aware of what she was inviting. Not since she realized the sort of trouble she could get herself into. Since she realized she’d been walking down a path that only had one ending, and it wasn’t a happy one.
    But just for now, she was going to put good behavior on hold. She felt secluded here, insulated by whatever magic spell Alex had cast on her the first moment she’d seen him. No one around was looking at her, expecting her to behave in a certain way. She didn’t think she was in any danger of exposing herself the way she’d done in the past.
    Somehow, with Alex, it felt exciting. It felt dangerous—a hit of adrenaline she used to crave. One she’d denied herself for far too long.
    It all did. The whole day. It was like being on a vacation from herself, and she loved it. Or maybe it was a vacation to herself, but that was a step further into the philosophical than she wanted to get.
    “This is so fun!” she shouted, trying to make her voice heard over the thumping bass.
    “You are enjoying yourself?” he asked.
    “Very.”
    He took her left hand and