Feel the Heat Read Online Free PDF Page A

her. “Let it ring.”
    “He’ll just keep calling,” Lauren protested. “Eventually he’ll get tired of it and stop. At least for today. I’ll just take the receiver off like I did earlier.”
    Sure enough, the phone rang a third time.
    Troy held up a hand to her as he reached for the instrument. “Let me.”
     
    Troy didn’t know what he expected when he lifted the phone, but it wasn’t the stream of vitriol that spewed over the connection. He didn’t even need to utter a greeting before it began.
    “Don’t ever hang up on me, you mutant. You bitch. You’d better answer my calls, or I might have to step up my efforts to rid society of you. Before you actually kill someone with your mumbo jumbo.”
    Troy didn’t say a word, just let the man rant for another minute or two, growing angrier by the minute. What he heard disturbed him greatly, and he had to grit his teeth to keep his control in place. He had dealt with people like this before, and the end result was never good. The man was obviously disturbed and obsessed with destroying Lauren, and it might not be too much longer before he moved from phone calls to a personal appearance. All of Troy’s experience told him this man was perched on the edge of a ledge and about to fall over into escalated violence.
    Finally, he disconnected the call in mid-rant and turned back to Lauren. She was watching him, eyes wide. Her face was pale and her body taut with anxiety. He needed to be sharp here, not just to analyze the situation and develop solutions but to assure Lauren that he had things well in hand.
    He was, however, having a hard time focusing. The Hallorans hadn’t warned him that Lauren Cahill had the kind of earthy beauty that punched you in the gut and stunned your body. It was all the more shocking because she was so unaware of her natural sexiness. And he totally hadn’t expected to be blindsided by the electricity that crackled between them from the first casual brush of hands. Not that he ever lacked for women. He had a healthy sexual appetite and wasn’t shy about feeding it. But no woman had ever affected him like this one. His fingers itched to sift through the silk of her thick brown hair and his mouth badly wanted to taste hers. And her body!
    Holy shit!
    He had to forcibly rein in his libido, reminding himself he was here on business. What now appeared to be really serious business. And he couldn’t let himself be distracted by a woman whose very presence set his blood to heating and his cock hardening to the point he could pound nails with it. Shit. He had more control than that.
    Didn’t he?
    He damn well better have.
    “You have an answering machine, right?” he asked her. Who didn’t in this day and age?
    She nodded. “In the room I use as my office.”
    “Show me.”
    She led him into the cozy room where bookshelves lined two walls. A large window looking over the backyard let in plenty of light and sunshine and made it a pleasant work environment. Here, she’d set up the computers and printers she used for her web design and graphics business, a large corkboard on one wall displaying printouts of projects in various stages of design.
    “I fell in love with this house the minute I saw it,” she told him. “My family tried their best to talk me out of it.”
    “Why?”
    She shrugged. “Different reasons. Too big. Too much space. Too much to take care of. What was I doing with something this size?”
    He couldn’t help smiling. “But you bought it anyway.”
    “Of course. I had the money and I needed to get away from my mother’s constant disapproval and my father’s worry. I was too old to be living with my parents anyway.”
    “When did you buy it?”
    “About eight years ago. And I’ve never been sorry.”
    Troy took a moment to admire the room before turning toward the desk. Lauren was scant inches away from him and again that charge of electricity crackled between them. Holy shit! This woman was in danger, and his