With: Ainslie Paton
Fool Me Forever
features Lenore Bradshaw, whose father went to jail for running a fraudulent
investment scheme (think Bernie Madoff).
Lenny is desperate to repair her family name and keep her not-for-profit
alive and then along comes Halsey Sherwood who is from a long line of Robin
Hooding con artists and runs a fraudulent investment scheme that funds social
justice projects.
Lenny wouldn't
put Halsey out if he was on fire. He's getting away with the same crime that
destroyed her family, except that a charity has misused her donation money and
Halsey knows how to get it back.
All she has to do
is play PowerPoint Girl to his Excel Boy and they can expose a criminal and help
bring down a despotic government. (Think government lead by a lying, cheating
narcissistic prime minister of a post-Soviet state).
There is
absolutely no way they can be anything more than partners in grand bait and
switch.
Here is Lenny and
Halsey about to share their first kiss.
Halsey was on
time, of course. Lenny opened the door to him, a tightness in her chest because
of all the winged sprites that’d taken up residence there. Why was it this man,
whose secrets she knew, whose profession she despised, who could inexplicably
make her heart speed, her breath catch, and her insides flutter?
She opened her
mouth to say hi and swallowed the word when he put his hand to her waist. “Am I
going to ruin your makeup if I kiss you?” he asked in a husky tone that melted
critical faculties in her brain.
He took the
slightest movement of her head as his answer and cupped her face, tilting it
up, and bringing their lips together, giving her plenty of time to change her
mind. He locked his eyes with hers until the hand on her waist became an arm at
her back, and the sprites in her chest went still momentarily and then lifted
into flight in one swooping motion, making her lean into Halsey and clutch at
his suit coat.
He had control of
the kiss and made it a full-scale production that could play for years on
Broadway. The soft, mysterious meeting of lips that opened out into something
fuller and warmer and became a tangled greedy demanding force before a third
suspenseful act where it nipped and teased and backed away to a cliffhanger,
promising more.
“Hi,” he said,
seemingly unaffected, when he drew back. “I don’t think I messed you up.”
But he had. He
made her heart swell and her senses swirl. She didn’t want to let go of his
coat or move to draw him properly inside the apartment, and the words in her
head weren’t the right ones to say aloud. Again.
More. Now.
“Lenny, are you okay?”
What happened to
the Halsey Sherwood who couldn’t even say, “You look nice” while avoiding her
eyes? “I wondered how we’d be after you had a chance to think.”
“I only thought
about two things all week. What needs to happen with Cookie Jar tonight and
kissing you. Did I do all right?”
It wouldn’t do to
give a confidence man a swollen head. She pulled out of his arms. “It’s an
improvement. Gold star for effort.”
She left him in
the doorway and went to pick up her purse. From across the room, she snuck a
look at him: black suit, rose-pink tie and pocket silk, white shirt, silver at
his cuffs. The details were ordinary; the combined effect was like she’d
shot-gunned half a bottle of whisky. He made her feel deliciously woozy.
He wasn’t
avoiding her anymore. He gave her the same rude appraisal she was covertly
giving him, except his was no undercover exercise—he wanted her to know he was
looking and that he liked what he saw.
“You’re stunning,
Lenore Bradshaw. And I’m not finished kissing you. I’m more in awe of what’s
inside you, what drives you, than how you fill out that dress. Since I’m trying
to be a better fake boyfriend, let me just say you’re incredibly sexy, and I’m
not exactly myself when I’m around you.”
As compliments
went, that one was in a class of its own when she’d have sighed for a tossed
off “you look beautiful.”
“I’m pretty sure
I don’t know who Halsey Sherwood is. Oh, I know the broad strokes.” Did his
lips quirk on the word “stroke”? Oh, yes,
they did. Damn, that was surprisingly cocky. “Crook, collector, cup
wrangler, calculator of sums in cells, corruptor of small children.”
She tossed her
house keys at him, and he caught them.
“Good catch.
Equally good at ducking, talks a tall story about tattoos, but sucks at chit
chat if there are more than three people in the room.” She checked her makeup
in the hall mirror, moved across to him, and let him close and lock the door
behind them. It wouldn’t do to have him think she was going to be easy. She was
going to be easy, though not without some pretense of a chase. “Under all those
labels and the sharp dressing, you’re a ghost.”
“What do you want
to know about me?”
A dangerous line
of inquiry. “Nothing.” She didn’t want the responsibility of really knowing
him. If she imagined him all gloss and no substance, it would be a no-brainer
to walk away.
He adjusted his
tie needlessly, and that made her feel shivery. She still made him edgy, and
she liked it.
“I want to know
all about what’s inside you, Lenny.” He pushed a folded knuckle against the
elevator call button.
Inside.
That made her eyes flutter. She imagined how good that knuckle on his big hand
would feel pressed against her call button. Unf.
“I want to know
what your favorite food is, what you like to do when you’re not working, what
you watch and read and dream about. I want to know how you hold your family
together and what you want your future to be.”
Unbelievable.
He should stop talking. It was easier to deal with him when he was only
semi-articulate. The elevator car arrived, and she stepped inside. He moved in
beside her and reached for her hand. Giving it to him made her five kinds of
foolish, because she wanted it like she always wanted Li-Lac
chocolates—greedily, voraciously—and it was just two hands pressed together.
She’d held his
hand before, but it felt different now because she’d told him exactly where
handholding was going to lead, and he’d had the chance to renegotiate the deal
and let it slide.
They made
acceptable “how was your week, what about those Yankees, Giants, Rangers,
Knicks” conversation, laughing at each other. It was clear Halsey wasn’t a
sports fan, didn’t know his touchdowns from his home runs. By the time they
arrived at Pier Sixty, they didn’t sound so much like a couple who should never
have swiped right.
Author bio
Ainslie
Paton always wanted to write stories to make people smile, but the need to eat,
accumulate books, and have bedclothes to read under was ever present. She sold
out, and worked as a flack, a suit, and a creative, ghosting for business
leaders, rabble-rousers and politicians, and making words happen for companies,
governments, causes, conditions, high-profile CEOs, low-profile celebs, and the
occasional misguided royal. She still does that. She also writes for love, and
so she can buy shoes, and the good cat food.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AinsliePaton
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ainsliepaton/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/AinsliePaton
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