Method Acting: An opposites attract, found family romance (Center Stage Book 2) Adele Buck (e novels to read .TXT) 📖

She nodded, her mouth tightening. “Yeah.” Squaring her shoulders, she unlocked her phone, found her sister’s contact information and tapped it. While she waited for an answer, Colin took her hand and pulled her over to the sofa. Sitting next to her, he twined his fingers in hers, holding gently. She stiffened, her fingers gripping his almost painfully tight.

“Gracie?” her voice cracked. A pause while she listened. “Sorry…Grace. It’s Alicia. Your sister.” Another pause. “Yeah, she did. Where are you? Are you okay?”

Colin watched Alicia’s face as tense worry was slowly replaced by cautious optimism and outright pride as she listened to her sister, interjecting occasional questions and what he assumed were answers to questions Grace posed to her. After a much shorter time than he had counted on, she was ringing off, after promising to talk soon.

“Well?” he prompted.

Alicia turned to him with shining eyes. “She’s in Wisconsin. She’s about to start college. She got a full scholarship.”

“That’s quite something. Those are rarely granted anymore.”

“Aren’t they?” Her expression of wonder intensified. “She’s apparently really good at chemistry. She thinks she might want to be a doctor. My Gracie—Grace.” She corrected herself with a blink.

Colin smiled, squeezing her hand. “She objects to the childish nickname?”

Alicia nodded, her eyes serious. “She does.”

“How is she?”

“I think she might be okay, if that’s possible.” Alicia’s dark eyes flicked up to his face, then unfocused in the middle distance as she thought.

“You’re okay. You’re better than okay. I think it’s very possible.” Colin rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand.

“I wasn’t okay when I was her age and only just on my own,” she said.

“She’s a different person. She’s in a different situation. Hell, maybe even your family is different now.”

Alicia’s eyebrow arched, her expression disbelieving.

“Or maybe not. Don’t decide. Let it happen. Even better, invite her to visit before the school year gets started. I’ll see what I can do for her, see if some of my contacts can help her.”

“You’d do that? For Gracie?”

“I’d do it for you.”

Chapter 23

After dinner, Alicia let Colin persuade her to spend the night at his house. Not that I needed a lot of persuading, she mused as she waited for him to unlock the front door, admiring the set of his suit jacket across the breadth of his shoulders. The relief that coursed through her at being here, the need she felt for Colin’s presence, was almost frightening.

As if he could hear her thoughts, Colin reached back and took her hand, drawing her out of the muggy evening air into the cool stillness of the foyer.

“I’m so glad you’re here. So glad you said yes,” he whispered in her ear as he cradled the back of her head in his hands.

Taking a deep breath that hitched in her chest, Alicia nodded, running her palms under his suit jacket and around his waist, her hands skimming over the smooth cotton of his shirt, feeling the heat of his body under the fabric. “Me too.”

“Are you sure? You seem…fragile.” His voice rumbled in his chest and against her body.

“I am sure,” she said, surprised at how much she meant it. “It’s just been a long, eventful day.”

Colin drew back, stroking his hand across her hair, looking seriously at her eyes. “Do you just want to sleep?”

Alicia huffed a surprised laugh. “Hell no. You promised to ‘shag me silly,’ and I’m calling that debt due.”

A slow, sultry smile spread across Colin’s face, his full lips curving. “Consider it done.” Bending, he scooped her into his arms as she yelped and wrapped her arms around his neck. Taking the stairs without apparent effort, he charged into the bedroom and dropped her onto the bed. Laughing in helpless relief, Alicia slapped her hand over her eyes as Colin pulled her shoes off and threw them into the corner of the room, then inhaled sharply as he grasped her ankles and pulled her toward him, her skirt riding up around her thighs.

“How does this thing undo?” he grumbled, tugging at the waistband of her skirt. Smirking, she lowered the side zipper and then laughed outright as he tugged her panties off with it, flopping onto her back and lifting her hips to help. She heard the soft sound of her skirt hitting the floor, then gasped as Colin’s hands slid under her ass and tilted her hips toward him, licking and nuzzling. Her hands windmilled behind her, seeking purchase on something, anything to anchor her as her body responded to his erotic onslaught, rapidly torqueing with tension, only to release almost immediately, a wail ripping from her throat as she came apart, the sudden orgasm rippling through her with shocking force.

His tongue continued to caress her as aftershocks thrummed through her body, his hands skimming up the insides of her thighs, the slight roughness of his wool jacket cuff tickling.

Lifting her head, she took in the sight of Colin, rising from between her bare thighs, his office attire only lacking a tie, and collapsed back on the bed, her hand over her eyes again, laughing at the wonderful absurdity of it all.

Colin wiped his hand over his mouth as he stood, beginning to laugh, snared by Alicia’s hilarity. She removed her hand from her face and rose up on her elbows, glancing as she chuckled at her half-clad body, then at him, still fully clothed.

“You’re dressed a little formally for cunnilingus,” she observed.

“If I hadn’t left my tie at your place, I could have put it to good use,” he said with an expressive lift of his brows as he shrugged out of his jacket and began to unbutton his shirt.

“Let me,” she said, getting to her feet, her nimble fingers slipping buttons through their holes and pulling his shirttails free of his trousers. Taking advantage of his hands being free, Colin cupped her bare bottom and pulled her hips toward him, bending to capture her lips with his