Raising Hell Read Online Free PDF Page A

awkward.
    “Don’t be sorry. Just tell me what’s on your mind.”
    She licked her lips. “Maybe I’m just not quite able to believe my good fortune. I mean, this is the kind of thing a girl like me daydreams about. You know, rejected by all the modeling agencies, then in walks the handsome stranger to—” She stopped mid-sentence, mortified. “I can’t believe I said that.”
    “What? That I’m handsome?” The dimples made a quick appearance again. “I promise you’re not the first woman who’s told me that.”
    “That, I believe. But, no. I meant the rejection part. Not exactly doing a good job of selling myself, am I?”
    He took her hand, his firm and slightly calloused. This was a man who worked with his hands, wielding a brush, stretching canvas. How sweet would the rough pad of his thumb feel stroking her lips? Her nipple? Her… there?
    Alarmed, she jerked her hand free, her whole body burning from a mixture of desire and embarrassment.
    “Something wrong?” he said, and though his tone was innocent, his expression suggested that he knew exactly what she’d been thinking. And that he very much liked her thoughts.
    She closed her eyes and counted to five. “I’m fine, thanks.” Another deep breath. “I just meant that I shouldn’t have told you I was a reject.”
    “And I just meant,” he said, brushing his thumb down her arm, “that I don’t give a damn what anyone else thinks. You’re perfect, Delilah. You’re perfect for me.”
    Lila sighed, then took a sip of her wine. The truth was, she did feel perfect. She didn’t know what it was about Nicholas Velnias, but he made her feel both special and daring. It was a heady combination, and she tried not to lose herself in it. “But how did you find me?”
    “You know who I am, right?”
    “Of course,” she said, sitting up straighten “You’re… well, you’re Nicholas Velnias. You’re huge. You’re amazing. You’re—”
    “Getting a swelled head,” he said with a smile, and right then she liked him even more.
    “But it’s true.”
    “Maybe,” he said. “All I meant was that I’m in a position to have access to the headshots that modeling agencies receive. I saw yours and, well, here we are.”
    “Here we are,” she agreed. Wherever that might be.
    “But now I need to know what your intentions are.” He picked up her hand before she could respond, then pressed it against his chest. “Are you going to lead me on? Tease me? Play hard to get? Or are you going to be mine?”
    “Yours,” she repeated, looking at their intertwined fingers. “That sounds intense.”
    “And it will be,” he said, disentangling their hands and leaning back in his seat. “I expect full access to a model. I don’t pretend to keep banking hours, and I don’t intend to make the muse wait simply because my model is across town or at work or going shopping with friends. You’ll move into my guest quarters. And you’ll keep my schedule.”
    She shook her head, startled as much by his words as by his sudden shift to a businesslike tone. “That’s not possible. I mean, Mr. Velnias, my job—”
    “Can be performed by a nineteen-year-old college student. You’ll quit, and I will more than compensate you for your time.” He named off a figure that not only had her gasping, but was also almost double her annual salary at Kelley-Hart. “And call me Nick.”
    “But… but… you can’t really mean you’ll pay me that much. How long will the job take? I can’t just up and move in with you for a year.”
    He chuckled. “Am I really that unappealing?”
    “No!” Quite the opposite, actually. Dangerous, maybe. Tempting, definitely. The kind of man a girl could get lost in—and the thought made her blush burn hotter.
    “I’m teasing you,” he said, brushing his fingertip over her lips and sending sparks shooting through her body. “I don’t expect I’ll need you in the studio more than a week or so. Once I’ve captured your essence