More Than A Vow: Vows of Revenge / After Their Vows / Vows Made in Secret

“I don’t,” she said huskily. “We’ve only met once. Twice.” Three times. “We’re not friends,” she assured him.

“Sure about that?” Trenton asked, giving her the kind of male once-over he’d started sending her way this trip. She had watched him flirt openly with more than one impressionable young supporter in his office, despite having a wife who kept the home fires burning. He hadn’t gone out of his way to hit on Melodie, though, preferring to bark orders for coffee and sandwiches in her direction. Being the only female traveling with the group seemed to have elevated her to a target, however.

“I’m sure,” she affirmed, recalling her last words to Roman, which had been most unfriendly. She tried to clear the catch from her throat as she added, “I should leave, or I might become a liability.”

“No,” he said with a thoughtful glance at the way Roman had joined a group near the bar, but had positioned himself so Melodie was in his line of sight. “Introduce us. Be as nice as you have to be to get him on my side. I want his support.”

We don’t always get what we want, Melodie wanted to say.

“He wasn’t on the list,” she reminded him. Mrs. Sadler had stayed home for this whirlwind junket. The rest of the team had stayed in their rooms and Melodie was standing in as Trenton’s date, something he seemed to think gave him the right to hands-on access. She’d been finding ways to sidestep, but she had her assignment when it came to ensuring the right connections were made. Roman Killian wasn’t one of the names in the room they had to touch base with, though.

In fact, if she’d known he’d be attending, she would have wormed her way out of this evening altogether. Mentally reviewing the guest list, she recalled a Swedish actress had been on it. Roman must be her plus one. Why his being involved with someone should cause a pinch near her heart, Melodie had no idea, but she didn’t want to get close enough to see how deep his involvement with the stacked blonde went.

Trenton didn’t care about her needs, though. “Introduce us,” he repeated firmly.

Paris, she thought.

“If you like.” She gathered her courage and found a stiff smile.

It took time to work through the crowded ballroom. They had to stop midway to listen to a speech about the refurbishment of this iconic hotel, one of New York’s first skyscrapers. Applause happened, balloons fell, dancing started.

Melodie tried to pretend she wasn’t in an intricate waltz with Roman, one in which she took two steps forward and sidestepped one. She was aware of his every shift and turn as he and his date worked the room. When he took the actress to the dance floor, Melodie told herself she only noticed because he was Trenton’s quarry. They were gaining on him.

He came off the dance floor feet away from where she stood with Trenton, practically an invitation to approach. The tray of champagne appeared to have been their goal. Roman took two and turned his back on Melodie as he handed a flute to the blonde, but the opportunity was at hand.

Melodie felt his nearness like the heat off a blaze. Anticipation began to buzz in her. She neutralized her nerves by setting a light touch on Trenton’s arm to break into his current conversation.

“I believe our opening has arrived,” she told him, smiling a goodbye at the navy general and his wife as Trenton covered her hand, insisting she maintain the contact while they crossed the small distance to where Roman and his girlfriend were sipping their drinks.

Roman looked at her, and it was the same sweep of her feet out from under her as ever. All the air seemed to leave her body under the impact of his cool, green gaze and she had to gather her composure just to speak.

“Mr. Killian. What a surprise to bump into you here. I don’t think you know Trenton Sadler—”

“I’ve seen the ads,” Roman said, flicking a cynical twitch of his lips at Trenton as they shook hands. “This is Greta Sorensen.”

“I’ve seen some of your films. I love romantic comedies,” Melodie said, sincere for the first time all evening.

“I’m filming one now. That’s why I’m here in New York,” Greta said in her prettily accented English.

“And she has to be at work very early tomorrow morning,” Roman said. “So we were just leaving. Good night.” It was quite a snub, one that made Greta’s eyes widen slightly before she turned it into a smoky look of anticipation aimed straight at Roman.

“I’ll assume that brush-off was meant for you, not me,” Trenton said tightly as Roman steered Greta toward the exit.

“I told you we weren’t friends.” Melodie reeled from the rebuff, her entire body stinging as though she’d been lashed front and back. Something in her ought to have been worried about how this would impact her job, but all she could think was that the encounter had made her incredibly sad. Especially if he was in a rush to make love to his date before she got her unnecessary beauty sleep. Lucky Greta.

“You didn’t exactly try to kiss and make up, did you?” Trenton charged.

Ah, the temperament of the politically hungry. Melodie ignored his tone, swallowed back a disturbing thickness in her throat and adopted her own implacable smile as she nudged Trenton toward a paunchy older gentleman. Work. Paris. She would not speculate on what Roman was doing with that Swedish sex kitten.

Nor would she wonder what her life would look like right now if she’d allowed Roman to take her back to his hotel room that day four months ago. Had she been tempted? On a physical level, absolutely. Even now, she regularly woke up damp with perspiration, deeply aroused, remnants of sexually explicit dreams lingering behind her clenched eyes.

Why did he have to torture her this way?

A man who could set aside revulsion toward a woman and bed her anyway was obviously incapable of the sort of love and respect she had always wanted. He’d battered her heart so thoroughly she doubted she’d ever recover.

Which made her furious with him all over again.

Firm hands descended on her waist from behind.

She gasped under a jolt of electricity, nerve endings flaring hotly, immediately aware who was touching her. She covered his hands, trying to remove them, but he only held on more possessively.

Trenton broke off midspiel and glanced at her, brows going up as he recognized who stood behind her. “I thought you were taking your date home?” he said.

“She’s staying on the eleventh floor. Dance with me, Melodie.”

No. She couldn’t breathe to speak.

“Good idea,” Trenton said, piercing her with a significant “be nice” look.

Numbly she let Roman guide her onto the dance floor. Actually, she wasn’t numb. She was so sensitive every touch and smell and sound overwhelmed her. She couldn’t pick out the beat in the music or tell whether his hands were hot or her skin was flushing in reaction to his hold on her. Her throat hurt where her pulse thrummed. Her limbs felt clumsy as she set one hand on his shoulder and the other hand in his.

“Why—?” she tried, but her voice didn’t want to work. She wasn’t sure what she was asking anyway. So many questions crowded up from the hollow space between her knotted stomach and her tight lungs she couldn’t make sense of a single one.

“Are you sleeping with him?” he asked with seeming disinterest. “He’s married, you know.”

She snorted, disdainful words choking past the locked gate of her collarbone. “I’m aware, and no. He’s my boss. What happened to Greta? Turn you down?”

“I don’t sleep with clients, but she wanted to make an appearance.” His touch on her changed, fingers closing more firmly over hers. His hand weighed more heavily at her waist. A hint of dry humor glinted in his eye. “Now that we’ve got that out of the way...”

“I don’t care,” she tried, but came up against her own dishonesty as quickly as his smirk flashed and disappeared.

“No. Of course not. You hate me. Why are you dancing with me, then?”

“I was told to be nice to you.” Offering a lethal mimic of Greta’s smoky look, she warned, “Do not get me fired, Roman. I will kill you.”

“He’s a sycophant.”

“So am I,” she retorted, squirming inwardly at being caught out as one of Trenton’s minions. “It pays the bills.”

Roman’s mouth tightened briefly before he allowed, “You’re good at working a room. I’ve been watching you.”

Melodie tingled with awareness at the idea of his watching her, covering her reaction with a blasé “Mom always needed a wing woman at these sorts of things. When it was her turn to host, I made all the arrangements. Ingrid’s wedding really would have come off beautifully under my hand, you know. How are the arrangements coming along?”

“I have no idea. She’s training her replacement and that’s enough comedy for my tastes.”

“Because weddings are a joke? Falling in love is for the weak and pathetic? I’m beginning to agree with you, Roman. Which makes me hate you all the more,” she added with a quiet burst of ferocity.

He spun her off the dance floor and behind a mirrored column.