LEAD ME ON Julie Ortolon (mind reading books .TXT) 📖

that would get a man excited. Like phone sex, where a woman can get a man so aroused just with words that he ...” Color stained her cheeks.

“Is satisfied?”

“Tactfully put.” She sighed a bit in relief, but the determined glint in her eyes had him on full alert. “That seems like a useful skill, as useful as knowing how to touch a man in ways that make his blood rush and his body ... quiver.”

Her voice dropped in pitch on the last word, making him want to do exactly what she said. Quiver. He cleared his throat. “Yes, words are powerful, but then, I suspect you know that.”

“Actually, I never thought about it before, but they really are, aren’t they?” The newfound power sparkled in her eyes, an irresistible combination with her flushed cheeks and the sunlight glowing in her hair—and through her skirt. “When you hear something described, you can almost feel it physically. For instance, if I said something like, ‘I want to taste your skin against my tongue and feel the heat of your body covering mine,’ would that get a man aroused?”

He groin went so hard he grimaced. “Yeah, I’d say that would pretty much do it.”

She moved closer, graceful and seductive. He leaned back, bracing his hands against the desk. “But surely that’s only the beginning. I wonder how one learns to talk provocatively enough to send a lover... over the edge.”

“Somehow I don’t think you need lessons.”

“So you think I could excite a man, get him hot and hard, with words alone?”

“I think it’s possible, yes.”

“Hmm.” She purred, stroking her throat with her fingertips, making him long to kiss her there and feel her pulse pound against his lips as he breathed in her mind-numbing scent. “That gives me something to think about.” A smile as mysterious as Mona Lisa’s curved her lips. “Thanks for taking the time to answer. I’ll, um, let you get back to work. Since I know how very ‘busy’ you are.”

She gathered the dirty sheets and the bucket of cleaning supplies and left.

He dropped his face into his hands. Help.

A memory flashed in his mind from the day he’d arrived, when he’d asked Marguerite to make Allison a little less of a nice girl. Lifting his head, he looked about the room. “Is it too late to change my mind?”

Allison’s campaign to get back at Scott worked so well that by Saturday, she was practically singing, and would have been except she’d discovered she was wielding a double-edged sword. True, he looked more flustered each time she questioned him about the finer points of “verbal sex,” but each encounter left her itchy all day and restless at night.

It was worth it, though. Especially since now he’d started to sweat the minute she entered his room, before she even said a word.

A feline smile curved her lips as she topped bowls of crisp lettuce with chilled shrimp. Scott was on the verge of begging her to sleep with him and she was going to have the supreme pleasure of telling him she was “too busy.”

“What next?” Chloe asked. The girl had become a regular little helper around the inn, offering to do odd jobs to keep from being bored. And—Alli suspected—to get Adrian’s attention. Ah, the agony of a first crush. At twelve, it was still innocent enough to be sweet.

“Let’s see.” She pulled her mind away from Scott to concentrate on making shrimp Caesar salad for the crowd that had just descended upon them. Each Saturday they served lunch on the veranda as part of Captain Bob’s Big Bay Boat Tours. “Parmesan cheese. You should find a block of it in the fridge.”

Chloe crossed to the refrigerator just as Paige entered the kitchen—petite and blonde and graceful as always. She might help her husband run the tour boat, but she still looked like she should be lounging at the country club. She even made the tour-guide uniform of white shirt and navy-blue shorts look like the latest designer fashion, complete with diamonds at the ears and a tennis bracelet that could blind a person in strong sunlight.

“Good morning,” Paige said brightly.

“Good morning to you,” Allison answered with a smile.

“Well, you’re in a good mood,” Paige noted. “And here I thought to rescue you by offering to help.”

“On a Saturday, I’ll always take help,” Allison laughed.

Chloe pulled her head out of the refrigerator to hold up a block of hard white cheese. “Is this what I’m looking for?”

“That’s it.” Allison nodded toward a drawer. “The grater’s in there.”

Paige raised a brow as she joined Allison at the center island that functioned as a workstation. “I didn’t know you’d hired help.”

“Well, sort of.” Allison transferred salad bowls to a large serving tray. “Chloe’s actually a guest, but she enjoys helping out. Chloe, meet Paige.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Paige said as she fell easily into the rhythm of assembling salads. “I noticed Aurora working in the gift shop. That’s a switch.” Normally Allison worked the shop on Saturdays, dressed in her Southern belle costume, while Adrian and Chance waited tables in their pirate costumes. Rory had been working the kitchen the last few months, since she couldn’t fit her stomach into her own costume.

“Her ankles are so swollen lately, she has trouble standing for long periods,” Allison explained. “We all thought the gift shop would be less taxing for her right now.”

“I guess she’s getting pretty close to her due date? How’s she feeling?”

“Fine, she says.” Allison’s happy mood dimmed as she fought the growing urge to turn and run every time the subject of the baby came up. When she thought of Rory in labor, of all the possible complications to both the mother and child, fear slid beneath her skin like ice.

“Hey there, Paige.” Chance came striding in wearing a big-sleeved white shirt, wide leather belt, and tight pants tucked into black boots. He set a tray on the counter and started filling the sink with dirty soup