Ticket to Temptation Read online

  Ticket to Temptation

  Lilith Darville

  Contents

  Preamble

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Afterword

  Acknowledgments

  Also by Lilith Darville

  About the Author

  She’s unfulfilled. His urges don’t play by the book.

  Can a mysterious manor help them break free from the ties that bind?

  Logan Archer is ready for a fresh start. After catching her hotshot lawyer husband screwing the secretary one too many times, the romance novelist takes a chance on an invitation to Blackstone Manor. She jumps at the opportunity to visit the mysterious haven of erotic exploration. But she never expected a freak storm to strand her there with her husband’s sexy business partner…

  Daniel Masterson buries himself in work to keep his mind off his unique sexual appetites. His last girlfriend couldn’t handle it, but his partner’s wife seems game. As long as they can explore their fantasies without getting too attached…

  As Blackstone Manor lowers their inhibitions, Logan and Daniel fight their budding emotions. But when they try to take things to the next level, how much are they willing to submit in the name of passion?

  Ticket to Temptation is a hot and heavy romantic suspense novel. If you like steamy sex scenes with a hint of BDSM, mystical settings with a paranormal flavor, and characters looking for a second chance at love, then you’ll swoon for Lilith Darville’s sensual story.

  TICKET TO TEMPTATION

  Copyright © August 2017 Lilith Darville

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  Ebook Design by MarksEbookFormatting.com

  Cover Art by Willsin Rowe

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No part of this literary work may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this story are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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  While I know it's hard for many of you to believe a romance writer doesn't necessarily personally and actively "research" every little erotic bit, I want you to ponder whether mystery and thriller authors actually go on a killing rampage before putting pen to paper. The opinions expressed and actions taken are those of the characters and should not be confused with the author’s.

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  First Edition: August 2017

  LilithDarville.com

  Chapter 1

  Logan

  “Logan, I can’t help you. You need to get yourself a good lawyer.”

  And that’s how the whole sordid mess began. You’d think one hundred percent of my attention should have been on the dilemma I found myself in; but no, that wee fantasy child was busy peeking through the keyhole making sure she wasn’t missing out on any fun. And in this instance, fun was embodied by the gorgeous frame of Daniel Masterson sitting right here in front of me.

  Daniel was my husband’s law partner, who just happened to be called God’s sexy gift to humanity by the women at the firm. Familiar warmth flared between my legs and spread upwards, an involuntary and all too familiar reaction to being this close to Daniel Masterson. And under the present circumstances, a complete and utter betrayal of my better senses. Here he was crushing my last hope while my libido kicked itself into overdrive. Me, about to be dragged kicking and screaming into middle age as my fortieth birthday loomed. Making Daniel too young for you. If I weren’t so furious, so emotionally overwhelmed, I’d laugh.

  Today, though, I was on a mission, so I had to ignore those golden locks and oh so appealing forearms. The expanse of those muscular shoulders sheathed in a fitted black sweater did absolutely nothing for me. Yeah right.

  Yes, I was mad as hell at him, but he sure did look good. No man should look that good. This man could be the model for any one of the heroes in my romance novels. He’s that perfect; I’d swear the devil sent him straight from hell just to torture the rest of humanity, or at least the female part of it. Yup, since I was acting like the heroine in one of my romance novels, I might as well sound like one.

  Firm in my resolve, I watch his tongue trace his full bottom lip and felt the first burst of heat between my legs. It had been so long since I’d been sexually excited, it took almost a full minute to recognize the warmth spreading through my abdomen. Focus, damn it.

  Irritation with just a pinch of attraction dusted over me as the pity in his magnetic blue eyes pierced straight through me. How could I have been so stupid?

  “Look, I need help, and I don’t know who else to ask. Help me find my money.” I sat up straight in the padded oak visitor’s chair and tried not to sound too bitchy. Daniel sighed and put his palms up in the air as if protecting himself from a rabid animal, cornered and frothing at the mouth. God only knows Greg had let me know I reminded him of one often enough.

  “Logan, you know I can’t give you any information without Greg’s authorization.”

  “So, in other words, you’re using attorney-client privilege as the rationale for helping Greg set me up—have I got that right?” I grabbed my cheeks trying to hide the wash of angry heat. I frantically curled a lock of hair around my finger, itching to rip it from my scalp.

  “I’m telling you no such thing. If you recall, I insisted you seek out independent legal counsel. Advice you chose to ignore.” Daniel abruptly pushed back from the desk and started pacing around the office. If there’d been a picture of me handy, he would have thrown darts at it.

  “What exactly is it about you Dicks? Every time I turn around you’re accusing me of some vile thing. You might want to think twice before you accuse a lawyer of committing a crime.”

  I froze, glaring right back at him. He knew how much I hated Greg’s name. “And you can’t be more forthcoming now because…?”

  “You’ve been married to a lawyer long enough to know better than that. What I know about Greg’s business dealings falls under client confidentiality. Breaking that could get me disbarred.”

  Selfish bastard. Similar venomous thoughts pinged around in my skull, but otherwise, they stayed put. I was a polite Canadian girl, and thinking a mean thought was one thing, voicing it, entirely another. Even this level of confrontation was unusual for me. I didn’t know what got into me, but it was like I’d reached my breaking point, veering too close to the edge of the cliff.

  “I’ve always thought you were a good guy, but now I’m not so sure. Well, you can tell your partner I’m not letting this go.”

  “That ‘partner’ happens to be your husband. You’re an articulate and gifted woman. Tell him yourself.” He gave me a tight smile.

  Sparks flew from those gorgeous blue eyes making them seem like they were on fire. Stop that, Logan, you’re a married woman. For now. I’d lived in a loveless marriage of
convenience long enough. Not that I deserved any better.

  It was at times like this that I wished I used foul language. I rarely exploded; in fact, I prided myself on my control. I didn’t know what it was about Daniel, but something just got under my skin. Maybe it wasn’t him at all; maybe it was the situation. One minute I was an independent woman with options—or so I thought—and the next a penniless leftover.

  Lots for me to consider at another time and another place. Right now, I needed to get the hell out of Daniel’s office before I totally lost it. I gathered my purse along with my dignity and headed for the door.

  “You keep telling yourself that, Danny boy. Don’t break your arm patting yourself on the back for that piece of advice.” Asshole. Oh yes, I could think a pretty mean thought all right.

  I gave him one last cold stare. “It’s never about people, is it? It isn’t even about what’s right or wrong as long as you can hide behind your world of legal superiority.”

  Daniel leaned forward and clasped elegant, long-fingered hands on the desk. Groomed nails, but not manicured. Hmmm. I almost swooned. Every movement was precise, almost cat like. He wore an Eidos Napoli sweater with the sleeves pushed up like a second skin. Everything about him screamed lean and muscular. My gaze fixed on those forearms, those firm and well-formed muscles, with fine light brown, almost golden hairs sprinkled across them. I wanted to run my fingers through them and his longish blond hair.

  “Look, I hope you get what you need from Greg.”

  Back to reality. I could see the pity radiating from Daniel’s eyes. Without warning, my eyes shimmered with tears. I blinked them back. I was made of sterner stuff than this. I clutched my bag and took a step closer to the door, almost knocking over the chair. I had to get out of there. Be cool.

  “Hope springs eternal as they say.”

  I managed to make it out the door, down the elevator, through the lobby, and into the hustle and bustle of a hot New York workday without shedding one tear. Without a clue where I was going, I stumbled through the flood of pedestrian traffic, letting the crowd move me along. Four or five blocks later, I gratefully sank onto a park bench—the old-fashioned kind with wood slats and stone ends—below a large oak tree. I looked around and got my bearings. Columbus Park.

  And that’s how I came to the tipping point. It wasn’t Daniel’s fault, and I had no idea why I’d picked on the poor guy. Truth be told, he was a decent man, absolutely gorgeous, and under different circumstances, we might even have become friends. Yeah, right. No, the fault lay with my husband, whose last name was appropriately “Dick.” And people wondered why I hadn’t taken his surname.

  I could no longer ignore the reality of my life. Time to call Judy. I pulled my iPhone out of the cavernous bag that made up part of my armor and dialed.

  “Hey girl, what’s up?”

  I loved my best friend, Judy James. She was everything I wasn’t. She was the only spark in an otherwise uninspired existence; that and my romance novels. Judy had divorced the “excess baggage” she married and became a fireball who embraced life for all it was worth. Now she had no one to answer to but herself. She believed if you weren’t happy, you did something about it. Easier said than done as the saying goes.

  “Jude. Hi—”

  “Don’t Jude hi me. Spill.”

  “Is it that obvious?”

  “Ah, yeah.” I could imagine Judy’s signature pigtails dancing around as she nodded vigorously.

  “I’m broke.” I took a deep breath. “I know, that sounds a bit dramatic, but it’s true. I don’t have access to any of our money…my money unless I go through Greg. So in essence, I. Am. Broke.”

  “What the fuck?”

  I could almost see her now, standing before me, fire in her eyes and hands on hips.

  “I told you, you needed to dump that son of a bitch. How long ago did I tell you to get legal advice?”

  “I know, I know. But Greg—”

  “Don’t even say that asshat’s name in front of me. I’d like to kill the fucker for what he’s done to you.”

  “I don’t know what to do.” My pity-party was in full swing.

  “Snap out of it. You’re going to get your ass over here, and we’ll figure this out together. You’re adorable, and all men want to do you. Don’t waste another minute on that asshole.”

  I had no delusions about my looks. On a good day, I thought I was kind of cute. Judy, bless her heart, was dead wrong. Men didn’t go for fleshy women like me. Flat stomachs, big breasts, which I had in spades, and an air head is what they looked for. I dashed away the tear escaping the corner of my eye. “I’ve got to go home first. I’ve got to give him a chance to explain.”

  “Logan.” Her roar was enough. I didn’t need to hear what was coming next. “Don’t you dare—”

  I clicked off.

  I headed home on the ferry, alone for the next hour with the whirling dervish going on in my head. When I was around Judy, I felt like anything was possible. If it weren’t for her, I might have bought into the notion of marriage becoming a life of complacent mediocrity. I listened with shock and amazement as Judy entertained me with stories of her sexual adventures. I enjoyed having a friend I affectionately thought of as a fairy in constant motion.

  After a while, I tried to imagine what life would be like if I were more like Judy. The sweet romances I usually wrote morphed into steamy bodice rippers. Bodice rippers—what a great old-fashioned word. Then I’d begin pleasuring myself, reliving Judy’s torrid sex life as if it was my own. My novels got even steamier. I started to look forward to that secret escape each day when I took off all my clothes, lay on my bed, touching myself until I lost myself in my need—a temporary respite knowing I was avoiding my life, longing to be someone else. And my fantasy hero looked like Daniel, no matter how hard I tried to replace him with someone else.

  With each and every one of those escapes I changed, just a little bit. At first, it wasn’t noticeable, but gradually I realized I was thinking of myself as a sexual being despite Greg’s best efforts to prove otherwise. In fact, when I looked at myself naked in front of the mirror, I was pleased with what I saw. Yes, I had put on a little weight, but…

  I gave my head a shake. None of that mattered now. It was time to get focused on important matters. I needed legal advice, but to get it I needed money without Greg finding out. Now I’d discovered he’d taken my hard-earned cash and did who knew what with it. But the biggest revelation of all was that I didn’t care one iota. Don’t get me wrong. The lost money was necessary but paled when compared to the realization that I didn’t love him…and maybe never had.

  I pulled over, went on another fishing expedition for my iPhone, retrieved it and dialed Greg’s office. When it rang out to voicemail, I hung up and dialed his cell. He answered after three clipped rings.

  “Logan. Look, I’m busy. I’ll call you back.”

  “Whatever it is, it can wait. This can’t.” God, he’d only just picked up the phone, and already it was like talking to a toddler.

  One… Two… Ah, there it was, the exasperated sigh.

  “What is it?”

  “Where is my advance?”

  “Advance? What are you talking about? Look, I don’t have time for this.”

  “The twenty-five thousand dollars my publisher wired to my account. Where is it?”

  “Oh, that. Well, I invested it, of course.” Greg sounded distracted. “Why?”

  “Because I want it. I made it, and I want it.”

  “Honey. I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but if you need money, there should be plenty in the joint account. If you need more, all you have to do is ask, you know that. That’s how we do things.”

  That’s how we did things.

  “Greg, sweetie, I’m waiting.” A distinctly female voice echoed in the background.

  “Another one of your little distractions?” My voice dripped with sarcasm.

  “Look, Logan, I gotta go. We’ll talk about
this later. You’ll see there’s nothing to worry your pretty little head about. Now be a good girl and stop fussing. I’ll bring supper.”

  Oh, now it’s my pretty little head again instead of my fat ass.

  I stared at the phone listening to the beeping noise made by the disconnected call. The ringing note of Greg’s betrayal drove the final nail in his coffin and this farce of a marriage.

  I leaned back on the park bench. “Never let them see you bleed.” My favorite quote came from my number one role model, Q in the James Bond movies. She was the epitome of the stiff upper lip, and I adored her. Bond movies brought the only excitement I’d had in my life for years, and I watched them avidly while hiding a secret passion for James. I knew it was make-believe, but you just knew he’d be the best in bed. Sadly, the term good lover was an oxymoron in real life. Oh, men made a paltry attempt at wanting you to enjoy sex if they wanted something from you, but once they thought they had you, it was wham, bam, thank you, ma’am. If you were lucky enough to get even the thank you, that is. The truth was it was all about them.

  Time to go home.

  I wasn’t thrilled with the long commute, but it gave me time to think. Maybe it was my fault. Obviously, there was some need of Greg’s I wasn’t able to fulfill. I had no idea what that might be, and I’d agonized over it time and time again. Maybe if I hadn’t overlooked it when I suspected he was fooling around the first time or the second—and certainly not the third…