Wicked: Sweet Temptation [Wicked Series Book 4] Read Free Page A

picture on the front. She cringed and a pitiful moan eased past her throat.
    “You are so dead, Faith Weston. The Reverend is going to kill you.” She moaned again and stared down at the picture. The low cut blouse she was wearing in the photo was enough to make her daddy preach her ears off but the way she was straddling Mick, and the fact he had two handfuls of her ass and his face half buried in her breasts would cause him to send her straight to the nearest convent … and they weren’t even Catholic!
    What had she been thinking? You weren’t apparently. She frowned before sighing heavily. This is bad. This is beyond bad.
    The only thing she could hope for now was that no one at home ever saw the photo. Giving Mick a lap dance in a crowded hotel bar for every man and woman within viewing distance to see hadn’t seemed like a bad idea at the time but someone had photographed it! Sure the picture was in a local Vegas paper but she wasn’t stupid enough to believe that the photo wouldn’t eventually get sold to some magazine.
    And then her real troubles would begin.
    Everyone at home would know she’d spent her week in Vegas partying with a rock star. Mick Sheppard to be exact. The baddest of the bad. So much trash had been written about him, he made everyone else look like saints. It was all lies, according to Mick, but the people living in the small town she called home would believe every word they read.
    And this article painted her in a very disturbing light.
    And why shouldn’t it? she asked herself, sighing as she stared at the picture. She barely even remembered the night they’d spent partying in that bar, something she wished they hadn’t done now. Sneaking around to meet in private was one thing, going out in public was something completely different. She should have known better.
    Of course, it was hard to tell what she had been thinking at the time. She was experiencing a total blackout for most of the night. She remembered Mick calling her and asking her to meet him at the bar and she’d practically run the whole way. When she woke the next morning she had a hang over so bad she could barely see straight. She’d tried to wake Mick for half an hour to tell him she had to leave before giving one last look to him laid out naked on the sheets and left his room to sleep off her hangover.
    And here she was. A week of blurry memories later and photographic evidence that she hadn’t been the good girl her daddy thought she was.
    The seat belt sign came on moments before the pilot said they were approaching the airport. Her stomach tightened into knots thick enough to cause cramps and she swallowed the lump trying to choke her. Shaking her head, she crammed the paper into her bag and hoped no one she knew ever saw it. It wasn’t like Mick would tell. She’d never see him again and it took more energy than she wished to ignore the pain that thought caused.
    The plane landed with only a few bumps and the fight through the crowd in the airport didn’t help calm her nerves. By the time she’d reached the baggage claim, sweat was rolling down her back. When she saw the Reverend, she nearly choked on her tongue.
    “How’s my baby girl?”
    “I’m fine, daddy,” Faith said, forcing a smile onto her face when he hugged her.
    “You don’t look fine,” he said, pulling away from her and holding her at arms length. “You look a bit pale. Was the flight bumpy?”
    “Aren’t they always?” she said.
    He grinned. “Most of the time. Come on, we’ll find your luggage and get you home. Mabel has been at the house all morning cooking up a storm. No matter how hard I’ve tried, I can’t get that woman out of our kitchen.”
    “That’s cause she’s sweet on you,” Faith said, grinning as they walked toward the baggage carrousel.
    “Pftt. Now don’t go spreading that rumor around,” he said. “Half the congregation has been trying to get me to court her. I don’t have the time or inclination for