Getting Naughty Read online

  What’s the answer to a slow burn?

  A superhot fling!

  High-flying US lawyer Teague Hamilton has always been way out of free-spirited Frankie’s league, but she’s never hidden her desire to break down all blue-blooded Teague’s barriers and corrupt him entirely! When he accepts her proposal of a naughty-but-nice fling, she’s as surprised as he is. But will their hot two weeks be enough to quench a desire that’s been burning for ten long years?

  Avril Tremayne is an award-winning author of sexy modern urban romances, featuring heroes strong enough to make any woman swoon and stronger heroines who nevertheless refuse to do so. She took a circuitous route to becoming a writer, via careers in nursing, teaching, public relations and corporate affairs—most recently in global aviation, which gave her a voracious appetite for travel. She currently lives in Sydney, Australia, but is feverishly plotting to move her family to Italy for half of every year. When she’s not reading or writing, Avril can be found dining to excess, drinking lots of wine and obsessing over shoes. Find her at avriltremayne.com, on Facebook at avril.tremayne, on Twitter, @avriltremayne, or on Instagram, @avril_tremayne.

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  If you liked Getting Naughty, why not try

  Her Guilty Secret by Clare Connelly

  Stripped by Nicola Marsh

  Sweet as Sin by J. Margot Critch

  Also by Avril Tremayne

  Reunions

  Getting Lucky

  Getting Even

  Discover more at Harlequin.com.

  GETTING NAUGHTY

  Avril Tremayne

  This one’s for my mother—who may require a strong drink to read past this page!

  Acknowledgments

  Getting Naughty emerged from my great desire to include the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race somehow, somewhere, in a story. I’m so lucky Alex Lomakin was on hand to share his firsthand experience of the race with me. Thanks, Alex!

  I’d also like to thank my fabulous, superpatient editor, Bryony Green, for taking all three of my precious DARE gems and polishing them to a fine sparkle.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Excerpt from Her Guilty Secret by Clare Connelly

  CHAPTER ONE

  TEAGUE STRETCHED HIS arms over his head and sucked in a lungful of summer air as he peered at Frankie’s doll-sized cottage, which was situated at the end of a long driveway that ran alongside a squat redbrick apartment building.

  It was so small he’d probably have to duck to fit under the lintel.

  If she invited him in.

  If she even heard him knock, given it was barely eight o’clock on a Sunday morning.

  His memory of Frankie’s Saturday nights was that they were big and wild, so unless she’d changed drastically in the ten years since he’d last seen her, chances were that at this precise moment she’d be either comatose or contemplating the walk of shame from wherever she’d ended up after work last night.

  And it was too bad he chose now to remember that instead of thirty minutes ago, when he’d gotten into the taxi at Sydney Airport. At that point, he could have done as his best friend Matt had suggested during those chaotic last moments at Heathrow: gone to his hotel, gotten some sleep, and called Frankie at a civilized hour to arrange a time to meet for the handover.

  Handover! Like he was doing some illicit drug deal.

  Not that dealers dragged their supplies around with them in wheeled suitcases. Or maybe they did. What did he know? He was a corporate lawyer, not a criminal one.

  Whatever. It was too late to change his mind because he’d let the taxi go and stranded himself.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake, get it over with,” he ordered himself, and trudged up the path, stopping at a ratty-looking welcome mat that announced, You Have Arrived at Your Destination.

  “I don’t think so, Frankie Lee,” he scoffed, stepping up to the door.

  He tugged at the collar of his shirt to make sure it was sitting straight, ran a hand over his hair, dragged in another lungful of air and knocked.

  Unsurprisingly, there was no answer.

  He knocked again, just so he could say he’d really tried.

  Waited for proof of life.

  Nothing.

  Okay, three strikes and you’re out a-a-and knock.

  Silence.

  He looked back down the driveway, picturing Frankie in one of her vintage dresses, black hair disheveled, makeup smeared, humming a satisfied tune and swinging her shoes from one hand as she meandered up the path as though she owned the world and all its contents.

  Ha! Walk of shame? Not likely. Swagger of pride was more her style.

  But, of course, there’d be no sign of her yet. At eight o’clock she’d still be in bed with...well, whomever she’d gone to bed with.

  Teague tried to picture a likely “whomever” but that wasn’t so easy to visualize. For all Frankie’s brazen sex appeal, Teague could only recall one identifiable boyfriend from that year she’d spent in Washington, DC. Kyle. Big, burly, covered in tattoos. Kyle hadn’t been around long enough for Teague to get more of a handle on him than that; Frankie had dumped him within a month of their arrival together in DC, after he’d pitched a fit over her taking a second job.

  That second job was as a dancer in a gentlemen’s club, so Teague had some sympathy for the guy. Or he would have had, if Kyle hadn’t already worked himself into a lather over Frankie working as a server at Flick’s, which marked the guy as more proprietary asshole than concerned boyfriend. Because come on, Flick’s? Seriously?

  Flick’s was a grungy, student-hangout bar/restaurant. None of its patrons had ever stood a chance with Frankie. Hell, most of them were underage, and Frankie might have only been nineteen, but the rolling confidence of her walk flashed a warning that she’d already seen—and enjoyed—everything life had to offer, so they shouldn’t bother approaching her unless they were packing something more interesting than a fake ID. Teague had been under no illusions that he was in the running, despite being two years older than her and probably the only legal drinker in the place. She could fluster him by doing nothing more than breathing in his general direction. The only guy she hadn’t flustered had been Matt—but then, those two were like spirit animals.

  So, okay, maybe it wasn’t so hard to envisage the guy whose bed Frankie was in. Someone like Matt.

  Teague sighed. He loved Matt like a brother, but sometimes it sucked playing running back to Matt’s star quarterback. And after a twenty-three-hour flight Teague decided he was too tired to receive yet another handoff. So enough! The end! There’d be no call to arrange a time with Frankie. Teague would slip the damn thing under her door, then delete the number M att had punched into his phone and go have his vacation.

  He bent low, assessing the size of the gap...heard a faint rustle. What the—? Uh-oh.

  Shit!

  The door opened before he could move. He heard his name—“Teague?”—and closed his eyes. Fuck. Just fucking brilliant, to be caught with his head level with Frankie’s crotch.

  “Are you coming up anytime soon?” she asked in her sleepily amused Australian drawl, as though a guy bowing down for her on her doorstep was par for the course. Which it probably was.

  Slowly he unbent, eyes traveling up the length of a silky cream-colored robe covered in bold red flowers. An outfit deserving of a smokily sinful bordello.

  And then his eyes reached her face, and she smiled at him in that how-about-it? way she had, and it killed him that despite the fact he was now thirty-two years old, with a megasuccessful career, property in three countries and billions in the bank, she still had the power to make him feel like a schoolboy with a crush on his teacher. And he didn’t even have a crush on her. He’d never let himself have one, because she was too—too much for him, too dangerous. Hadn’t that been the whole damn point of keeping his distance all those years ago?

  “Hello, Frankie,” he said, blinking a little at her hair, which was hacked off halfway between her ears and her shoulders, the depthless black of it livened up with an inch-wide band of electric blue across the blunt ends. Everything else about her was as he remembered. The gold-tinged skin, the swollen-looking lips that seemed permanently stained a shade of almost red, the pale gray eyes—the left one turned in very slightly, an imperfection that was mystifyingly, profoundly, vulnerably alluring. The haughty black eyebrows that started low over the inner corners of her eyes and ended in a late arch, and heavy black lashes so thick they framed her eyes like eyeliner. She wasn’t beautiful but she was so vibrantly alive it had always been an effort not to stare and stare and stare at her.

  “Come on in,” she said and stepped back.

  “My suitcase...”

  “A suitcase?” She laughed—a suggestively throaty chuckle. “Does that mean you want to stay with me?”

  “No!” Jesus! “No, no. No.”

  “So that’s a no, then, is it?” She smiled again as she hitched up her slipping robe at one shoulder. “Pity.” One beat, two, as she pursed her lips, assessing him like he was a side of meat hanging at the butcher. As she turned away, she added, “Ah, well, bring it in anyway.”

  By the time Teague stepped over the threshold, she was disappearing through an archway at the end of the room.

  He closed the door, then just stood there as a riot of color dueled with his eyes. Red couch, big enough for two people to sit on—or it would have been, if not for a basket taking up one half. The basket was overflowing with wool in too many shades to count and had at least six sets of knitting needles sticking out of it, and it boggled his mind because...Frankie? Knitting? There was an exotic rug in reds, browns and indigos taking up most of the wall behind the couch, and the floorboards were covered by a similarly styled rug in variegated creams, ochres and olives. A low coffee table in dark green sat on the rug in front of the couch, and a table at one end of the couch served as a display plinth for a small sculpture—an abstract twist of glass.

  There was a doorway at the end of the room, to the right of the arch through which Frankie had disappeared. The door was ajar, so he could see into the room beyond. Rose-pink walls, a section of bed—rumpled white sheets, no coverlet. He pictured Frankie on those sheets—gold, crimson, gray, black, electric blue—and his heart started to thump uncomfortably.

  “Teague?” she called. “You like whiskey when you’re straight off a flight, don’t you? So this is me, offering whiskey if you’ll come on through!”

  He took a jolting step toward the archway, toward her voice, and then she added, “Or whatever else you want...” and he stopped, waiting, because he knew it was a pause, not an end. “Because all you need to do is name it and it’s yours!”

  Name it. Name it?

  And it was there—the answer. You, I want you.

  His pulse zoomed up so fast, he thought the top of his head was going to fly off. He didn’t want her. And even if he did—okay, okay he did, he always had, but so what, every guy did—it made no difference. She didn’t mean he could have her, that was just—just the way she talked. She’d never meant any of those things she used to say, those things he hadn’t had the knack for laughing off because he didn’t flirt. Ever.

  A hot flash of memory—the first time he’d seen her in Flick’s. She’d smiled at Matt, whom she obviously already knew, from across the room, then zeroed in on him—probably having felt his awestruck eyes on her. She’d headed toward them, carrying an overstacked tray of empty beer glasses and conducting an effortless flirtation with at least three separate groups of guys en route. She’d asked him if he liked what he saw. He’d said no, causing her to look at him like he was an alien life-form, and he’d stumbled out something about her being too young—like what the fuck? He’d meant she was too young to be working at Flick’s, because of course she wasn’t. He was simply trying to impress her with his intelligence and legalese seemed the quickest way—a launching pad to talk to her, since her accent told him she was Australian and he knew licensing laws were different in Australia. And she’d chosen a different interpretation of “too young” and told him she was three years over the age of consent, and if he was interested, to ask Matt for her number.

  And the pattern had been set. Frankie giving him the come-on every time she saw him, him fucking up the responses.

  How good does a girl have to be to score a date with you, Mr. Perfect? Um, er, huh?

  I’d ask you to get the eyelash out of my eye for me, Mr. Perfect, if putting your hands on me wouldn’t give you a heart attack—not that I wouldn’t enjoy giving you mouth-to-mouth. I, um, huh?

  If you decide to get naughty and come watch me dance at Club DeeCee, Mr. Perfect, I’ll give you a free lap dance. Er, um, no, no! Followed by an actual recoil, during which he’d spilled his beer. He’d rushed on to say it wasn’t that he disapproved, at which point Matt had stepped in, calmly suggesting Teague leave things there because Frankie didn’t need anyone’s approval, she needed money or she’d have to fly home. So Teague, smooth operator, had reached for his wallet—like, fuck!—and she’d kind of frozen as she’d looked at the wallet in his hand and he’d found himself holding his breath. And then she’d said if she’d wanted to turn tricks, she would have stayed in Sydney, and the next second she was gone.

  The invitation to Club DeeCee had not been repeated.

  “Hey!” she called out from beyond the arch, bringing him back to the present. “Come on in, Mr. Perfect! I promise not to bite—unless you ask me nicely.”

  And he felt something snap. Mr. Perfect. He was fucking tired of being Mr. Fucking Perfect.

  Mr. Perfect Boyfriend to Romy—sure, Romy, we’ll go as slow as you like. Mr. Perfect Friend to Matt—sure, Matt, take the girl I love. Mr. Perfect Son for his parents—sure, Mom and Dad, I’ll be careful, I won’t do that, won’t go there, won’t take any more risks.

  He wanted to not go slow. Wanted to win the girl. Wanted to take a risk again.

  Wanted to tell Frankie, Sure, bring it! A pity he wasn’t staying with her? Then okay, he’d stay, as long as it was in her bed. Wanted to throw her down on those white sheets and lick every inch of her until she screamed for him. Tell her to go ahead and bite him, bite him anywhere she wanted, put her mouth all over him, do whatever she wanted to him. He’d take the damn dare, and not think about the consequences for once, and—and know, dammit. Know what it was like to be the man she wanted and not some fucking cautious, stuck-up, Victorian-era prig doing things the right way and giving everyone what they wanted except himself.

  He took a step—he was so ready for this!—and then “I was joking!” floated out to him. “It’s just whiskey waiting in here, I’m not going to molest you!”

  And he stopped again.

  Just joking. Just whiskey.

  He wasn’t here for Frankie Lee. He was here for Matt—to hand over whatever the fuck was in the velvet pouch Matt had shoved at him like a guilty secret. And then he’d do what he did every December on his annual three-week vacation: patch up his facade in advance of facing another year of being everyone’s Mr. Perfect.

  He took a slow breath and forced himself to move through the arch into what seemed to be a kitchen/dining-room combo at the front, with what looked to be a laundry at the back, stretching around to the right, out of sight. The kitchen was the most basic he’d ever seen. A bench against the wall inset with an oven and cooktop, a row of cupboards hanging high above the countertop and a short return from the wall that housed a mini fridge and a set of pantry shelves. There was no island separating the kitchen from a small table that had one low stool shoved underneath it. No other seating area—unless you counted the wrought-iron table with two mismatched chairs outside. The door leading out there was open, so he didn’t know if Frankie expected him to go outside, stay indoors, sit or stand—all he could do was hover.

  She was facing away from him, doing something at the counter, but the moment she turned the two of them would be close enough to share breaths. And goddammit, that robe had decided to slip off her shoulder after all—far enough this time that he could see her shoulder was bare, and he did not need to see that!

  “Don’t tell me you had a problem finding your way!” she teased, without turning around.

  “No,” he said.

  He wished he could add something witty, but he couldn’t think past her naked shoulder.

  Then again, he’d never been garrulous in Frankie’s company. It was just more noticeable today because for the first time ever it was only the two of them. No Matt, Romy, Veronica, Rafael or Artie—none of the old DC gang—to act as buffer and make his taciturnity unremarkable.