A Scandalous Melody Read Online Free PDF

keep trying, for Maddie’s sake. “I beg you, Chase. Please just consider it.” She looked down between them, away from his demanding gaze. But one look made it clear that her aching breasts were peaked and pushing against her cotton blouse, begging for his touch.
    Chase saw it as well and leered down at her. “Ah, yes, bébé, I can feel the heat between us, too. Odd isn’t it, that an ice princess could flare so easily for a ghost?”
    He didn’t know? He couldn’t just look at her and see that her heart still longed for him and that her body still responded to his with no provocation at all?
    Her heart pounded in her chest, but she pushed away from him. “Dammit. Tell me what I can do to make you change your mind and let Shelby and the baby stay.”
    â€œDo?” he asked thoughtfully after a minute. “Ante up, Kate. It’s time to put in or fold. I want you.”
    â€œMe?” Her knees were wobbling now and she was becoming light-headed. “You mean to be your maîtresse? ”
    He chuckled at her use of the old-fashioned word. “A mistress? Now wouldn’t that be an amusing form of revenge.”
    She scowled and clutched his arm. “You can’t mean that. You don’t even know who I am anymore.”
    Kate clearly understood that Chase was her biggest weakness. She wanted him to want her. But she would never give up independence—not even for him. If he asked for her body, fine. She would be all for it.
    He would never take her soul.
    â€œNo?” Chase said with a chuckle. “Well, let’s start with dinner, then. Tomorrow night. And wear something sexy. I think I’ll be needing a lot of persuasion.”

Three
    C hase knelt beside Kate under the low-hanging branches of a willow tree that was all decked out in its June finest. Silvery light from the full moon shone through the leaves in platinum streaks and illuminated Kate’s sweet, smiling face. Taking his time, he unbuttoned her blouse and ran a finger over the rise of her creamy breasts, peeking out from under the soft, white bra.
    Kate, his wonderful darling. Tonight wouldn’t be the first time that they’d made love, but this time he would go slow. He would manage to ignore the hard, burning heat in his groin long enough to make it good for her, too. Tonight he would show her…tell her with both his touch and his words how much a part of him she had become.
    â€œI love you, Kate,” he whispered as he bent to place a kiss against her tender neck. “You are my everything.”
    â€œChase,” she groaned. “That feels so good. But I have something important to tell you.”
    â€œTell me, chère,” he mumbled against her lips. “Tell me how you feel.”
    She opened her mouth to speak, and he held his breath, expecting to hear words of love for the very first time in his whole nineteen years of life.
    â€œWhoohoo. Just looky what we’ve got here.”
    The sudden deep catcall from behind his back shot a spear of fear straight to his gut. But before he could cover Kate and turn around, rough hands grabbed them both and pulled them out from under their shelter.
    Chase shot up out of bed with a start. His hands were fisted, the sweat poured off his forehead and the sheets lay on the floor in a tangled knot.
    Dammit. He hadn’t had that dream in years.
    Looking around the bedroom of his suite at the B&B, he tried to get his bearings—tried to remember how to breathe. He grabbed his slacks off the back of a chair, pulled them on and opened the French doors out to his private balcony.
    In three long strides he was outside, holding on to the railing with a deadly grip. He stared unseeing out at the pearly gray predawn that was casting quiet shadows over the southern Louisiana swamp.
    He took a deep breath and blew it out. It hadn’t occurred to him that coming back here and facing his past would bring back