Driving Force Read Online Free PDF Page B

suggested she come along to the party, she hadn’t even thought that Ian Raeder might be here. And of course she should have. He was a party animal, wasn’t he? She felt like kicking herself.
    “There goes my night,” she muttered.
    “That’s one hell of an outfit, Mouse.”
    His face was alight with that vivid mocking laughter that she hated because it always meant he was in the mood for what he called playing and she called cutting her up.
    “Thanks,” she said defiantly. “So glad you approve.”
    “Pink. I like pink on you.”
    “I’ll have to remember never to wear it again.”
    The pointed corners of his lips indented in amusement. “And here I’m trying to be friendly.”
    “Friendly. Yeah, right.”
    “I was trying to pay you a compliment, Mouse. No hidden agenda. Is that so hard to believe? Nothing to come back and bite you in the ass later. Well, except me,” he added and grinned, long creases slashing down the flat planes of his cheeks. “Just saying I like the way you look.”
    And she liked the way he looked in his usual black tee and black jeans, which contrasted so effectively with his pale gold hair. So sexy, dammit. And she wasn’t going to think about that anymore.
    “Well, thanks,” she said stiffly.
    He was too close and the crush surrounding them kept her from stepping away. She could feel the warmth of his body, smell his clean scent, see the pulse beating in the hollow of his throat and a muscle ticking oddly at the corner of his jaw.
    “Arizona taught you a lot. How to dress, how to dance…” His voice dropped into a lazy, raspy purr that she felt right down in her womb. “How to be a woman.”
    Her insides melted. God! Was she easy or what? Instinctively she recoiled, her walls coming up.
    “How not to be the geek that I was,” she snapped. “Yeah, I’ve changed. Pity I can’t say the same about you.”
    “No, I don’t change. But you haven’t changed either, Mouse. Not really. You’ve just let what was already there inside come out.”
    She frowned at him, bewildered. “What?”
    “The outside matches the inside now, Mouse. You were hot at eighteen, didn’t you know? I saw it when you went to your prom. But then you pulled back and never let it come out again.”
    Had she done that? She had felt beautiful on the night of the prom. But she had never really believed it was for more than just that one night and so, yes, she had pulled back. Peter had preferred it that way. Peter had wanted an adoring disciple, not an equal, not a competitor who might outshine him.
    She had learned to be herself in Arizona, had spread her wings. And now here was Ian Raeder saying…
    Wait. Was he saying he found her hot?
    She caught her breath. But this was Ian Raeder and she didn’t trust him an inch.
    He was looking down at her, his eyes dark and smoldering. It sent shivers down her spine, made her acutely uneasy, that intense, focused stare.
    “I’m sorry for what I said in the car.”
    She flushed, remembering what he had said. “Sure you are.”
    “I had no call to say it.”
    “When has that ever stopped you?” she snapped and turned to push her way free of the crowd. Then she was jerked up short as he hooked a finger through the waistband of her leggings and pulled her back.
    “Sierra, wait.”
    She struck out behind her at his hand. “Let go!”
    He released her hastily. “Look, I’m trying to apologize here!”
    “No, you’re not. You’re just setting me up for something.”
    “No! Stop. Just stop, okay?”
    Sierra found herself hesitating. She scowled at him. “Why?”
    “I know things have been lousy between us and it’s mostly my fault. Can’t we start over? Start fresh?”
    The worst thing was that she wanted to. Wanted it desperately. But she couldn’t trust him not to pull the rug out from under her.
    “Dance with me,” he said.
    Oh, no, no. They were playing a slow dance. It was far too much of a risk. God, she had always wondered what it would