Secret Passions Read Free

Then a face popped into her mind. Sea-green eyes full of concern, sandy blond hair that looked soft and inviting, a chin chiseled out of stone with a cute little cleft in it.
     
    With her mind on the man of her dreams, she would have walked right up to her building if it hadn’t been for the kid on a skateboard. She wasn’t focusing on her surroundings until the young boy zipped by, almost knocking her down. Then her eyes focused, and one of the first things she noticed was the dark sedan parked across from her building in the loading zone. Her steps faltered and she quickly rushed to the corner and peeked out from behind the newsstand that sat there.
     
    She watched as two men got out of the car and her heart sank. She knew the penalty for what she’d done five years ago was death. Her mind raced. How had they found her? What was she going to do now? She knew one thing for sure; there was no way she could ever go home again. Her life would have to start over, again.
     

    Mitchell Kovich took another breath and pulled himself up for the last time. Slowly releasing his breath, he swung back down. Once his feet were back on the ground, he let his arms fall and felt himself sway with fatigue. He was getting too old for this shit. Okay, maybe not too old; he was only a few months shy of his thirty-second birthday. But he started thinking of cutting back to one-hundred pull-ups a day instead of one-fifty.
     
    His arms screamed, his back screamed, and the rest of him, well.... He closed his eyes and rolled his shoulders. Having a home gym had always been a blessing. This way no one could tell if you cut back a little. But he hadn’t counted on the guilty feeling he got when he didn’t do his full sets. Besides, he always felt better after he showered and rested.
     
    Draping his towel over his shoulders, he made his way upstairs to shower. The place felt empty since Suzanne had moved out three months ago. He didn’t mind it, though, considering she was now snuggled up with some other woman. Yeah, it had been a blow, walking in and seeing the two women locked together. His first thought had been excitement; after all, he was a man. But when the two of them had jumped apart and quickly covered themselves, he had known it wasn’t an early birthday present as he’d first thought.
     
    Later that evening, she had mumbled through an apology and tried to explain how she felt before packing her things and leaving for good. It was just so hard to be mad at the other person when you felt inadequate yourself. He’d spent the first month wondering what he’d done wrong. Then he’d graduated to anger. How had he not seen this coming? Suzanne was always more comfortable around women, she was always very hands on with them and had, in the last year of their relationship, pulled farther away from him. Hell, he and Suzanne hadn’t even had sex for almost three months before he’d walked in on the two women. Which got him thinking about how horny he was now. He wanted a woman. No, he needed a woman. But he didn’t want to put himself out there again. Not like he’d done with Suzanne. He’d spent almost two years building their friendship and relationship to what it was before she’d cheated. When he first met her, they’d had to work on the physical part, which should have been the first clue to him to stop then. It had seemed like she’d kept putting on the brakes when they’d dated. Then, when they’d finally had sex, it had been ... well, awkward was the best word. He’d never had issues like that before. But he’d fallen for her, and he’d tried very hard to make their relationship work. And it had seemed to work for a while.
     
    He was at a point in his life now when even his buddies were trying to hook him up. Carter, his business partner of seven years and best friend since grade school, was always pointing out women to him. They had started the Kovich & Edward Agency together and the agency had grown to new