With or Without Him (48 page)

“Who’s your favorite composer?” Zak asked.

“Er…Beethoven?”

“You can leave,” Zak said.

The guy gave a short laugh and walked out.

“Zak!” his father barked in his ear.

“What?” He turned to face him. “They’re all okay or you wouldn’t have let them get this far. What am I supposed to fucking ask them? Why are you looking for a job? Did you cock-up and your last client died?” He turned to the second man who had to be older than his father. “Well, did he or she?”

“Still alive.”

“Have you ever killed anyone?”

He could hear his father grumbling behind him.

“No.”

“Would you?”

“Not unless it was absolutely necessary. Incapacitation is usually sufficient.”

“You can leave.”

“Jesus.” His father groaned.

The third person was a woman. A blonde in her thirties, dressed in a red trouser suit with a face like a bulldog. He definitely didn’t want her. She walked toward him with her hand out. Zak ignored it.

“You’ve got something stuck to your shoe,” he lied.

She glanced down and then looked back at him and glared. He smirked, lifted his hand and waved his fingers. The woman stomped out.

The next guy looked like he’d eaten an elephant for breakfast. He radiated menace. His arms and legs strained the seams of his suit and his chin disappeared into his neck. All Zak had to do was hide behind him and he’d be safe.

“What did you have for breakfast?” Zak asked.

“Sugar Puffs.”

He grinned. So he had a sense of humor. “What worries you most?”

“Letting a client down.”

He forced himself to look at the last guy.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Not a good idea to choose him, but when had he ever done something sensible? Number Five was taller than him, had hair just as dark, and a face that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a magazine advertising aftershave or boxer shorts. His suit looked expensive, but at least he wasn’t wearing a tie.

“How big’s your dick?” Zak blurted.

His father gave a roar of outrage.

“How good’s your dental plan?” asked Number Five.

Zak laughed.

“You can’t ask that,” his father snapped at his side.

“My favorite composer is Rachmaninov. My last client moved to New Zealand. There’s nothing stuck to my shoe. I had fruit for breakfast and I don’t waste my time worrying. I make sure there’s never anything to worry about.” He walked across the room and put his mouth close to Zak’s ear. “In answer to your last. How responsive’s your gag reflex?”

The guy walked out and left Zak gulping.

“I get the job?” asked the tank.

“No. He does.” Zak ran into the corridor. “Hey,” he shouted. The guy kept walking and his stomach clenched. “Number Five!”

The man stopped and turned.

“Would you like the job?”

He came back down the corridor and stopped a couple of yards away from where Zak stood. The other guy and his father came up either side of Zak.

Number Five stared Zak in the eyes. “Let me think. Do I really want to spend my time looking after a jumped-up, arrogant, ungrateful little shit the world would probably be better off without?”

His father stepped forward. “That’s quite—”

Zak put out his hand and stopped him. “He’s right. I don’t want either of you. Thank you so much for coming. Sorry you’ve wasted your time.”

Sinking his teeth into his cheeks, Zak walked to the elevator. No one called after him. He hadn’t expected them to. He disappointed everyone, he always had, always would. The elevator was empty and he was glad about that because it gave him chance to get himself back under control before he emerged at the base. He hadn’t had a cigarette in weeks but he wanted one now. Well, he actually wanted a drink or some more efficient mind-emptying substance, but he was trying to get himself back together.

He paused in the foyer, wondering where to go, what to do when he heard the ting of the other elevator descending. Fear of coming face-to-face with Number Five and the humiliation that would bring pushed him to the doors and he stepped outside. He had nothing to do, nowhere to go, no one to see. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten, but he wasn’t hungry.

Zak heard a cough right next to his ear and spun round, but there was no one there.
What the fuck?
Dust flew off the concrete step at his feet, he heard another weird cough and the next moment he was on the ground underneath someone.

“Jesus, get off me.” Zak struggled to get free. How much worse could things get? Now he was being mugged?

“Lie still.”

He registered it was Number Five sprawled over him and laughed. That had been easier than he’d thought.

“Someone’s trying to shoot you and you’re laughing?”

There was a squeal of brakes and an engine roared as a car raced away.

Someone’s just shot at me? What the hell’s going on?

The guy rolled off him and pulled him to his feet. There was dust all over his suit and Zak reached to brush it off, but curled his fingers into a fist and dropped his hand before he touched him.

“Why would someone want to shoot you?”

“I have no idea. You think I’m a waste of a bullet and you’re right.”

Dark eyes stared at him for a long minute. “We need to talk.” He glanced around and nodded toward a Caffé Nero across the road.

Zak followed. This guy was his Pied Piper and Zak suspected he’d follow him anywhere.

Stockbroker meets stock breaker. But who’s taming whom?

Cowboys Down

© 2012 Barbara Elsborg

London stockbroker Jasper Randolph flies to Jackson Hole with hopes as high as the Grand Tetons. Hope that the getaway will force him to let loose, get dirty, and overcome a deep-seated phobia about horseback riding.

He hadn’t counted on an attraction to the dude ranch owner’s son, a man with sun-tousled hair, eyes bluer than Wyoming skies…and a father who’d rather eat tofu than accept his only son’s sexuality.

The moment Calum lays eyes on the uptight, buttoned-down Brit, he’s lost. But with his own saddlebags full of emotional baggage, he knows he should be looking at anything but Jasper’s spotless riding boots and tight-fitting jodhpurs. Trouble is, Jasper makes his heart buck like a wild horse trying to break free.

Despite the differences that set them oceans apart, they fall hard and fast. Trouble isn’t far behind, and they’re in for a rocky romantic ride. Especially since there’s growing evidence that someone is willing to do anything—no matter how dangerous—to poison their love.

Warning: Mix one sun-bronzed cowboy with a yummy Brit who’d give Darcy in his wet shirt a run for his money. Mix gently. Try not to drool.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Cowboys Down:

“You have to be in control of everything?” Calum asked in a quiet voice.

“Not everything.” Jasper’s cock uncurled like a sprouting plant.

“Because I’m a sort of controlling guy too.”

Shit, shit, shit.

Calum brushed a smear of dust from the knee of Jasper’s pants. The slightest touch and Jasper’s breathing hitched. Every muscle tensed.

“You resisted wiping that off,” Calum said with a mouth-watering grin.

Maybe I was hoping you’d do it for me.
Jasper averted his gaze and stared at a tree. Of course the words stayed in his head. Ultra-decisive in his professional life, he was a different person in his private. The chances of Jasper making a move were zero.

Calum lifted Jasper’s sunglasses off his face and set them aside.
Oh fuck.
Now Jasper had to look at him.

“The getting dirty thing could be because you grew up too fast.” Calum stared straight at him. “No time to be a kid. Probably had something to do with what happened to your brother. You stayed under the radar by being a good boy.”

Clever guy.
Except how could Jasper begrudge the time his parents had spent with Ben and not with him? Jasper had to behave, stay in his room, keep out of trouble, not make a nuisance of himself. How could he have fun and laugh when his brother was able to do little more than blink? How could he be happy when everyone in the house was steeped in misery, when every conversation was about Ben and never about him?

“The control thing,” Calum said, “I understand that. When I’m breaking in a horse, I can’t let my concentration slip for a second. I have to show the animal I’m in charge, and that I understand what he needs. But work is work and pleasure’s pleasure.”

Calum’s hand lay flat on the rock between them. Jasper’s hand mirrored it, their fingers inches apart. A small gap the size of the Grand Canyon. Jasper imagined his hand sliding over to touch Calum’s fingers.

So easy.

So damn difficult.

Jasper’s heart thumped so hard it hurt.

“You know the first thing I noticed about you?” Calum asked and swung round so he was sitting the same way as Jasper.

“You thought I had pink luggage?”

He laughed. “No, the purple.”

Jasper couldn’t dislodge the lump in his throat.

“Your huge brown eyes,” Calum whispered.

Oh God.
Jasper’s cock made a determined attempt to get through his zipper and his grip tightened around the water bottle held at his groin as if he could push the thing back down.

“I have a thing for sparkling blue eyes,” Jasper blurted. Like a pool he wanted to dive into and then never climb out.

“Is that right?”

“And tanned skin that looks as though it’s always warm.”
Shit.
Where did that come from?

“Not in the winter. I get so cold I feel like my skin’s freezing.” Calum’s voice was hoarse. “I like soft hands.”

Oh God, he’s flirting with me. And I’m flirting back.

“For me, there’s something about a rough touch,” Jasper choked out.

Calum barked out a laugh.

Jasper sighed. “I wasn’t sure about you.”

“Nor me about you.”

But I am now.

Jasper swallowed to bring moisture to his mouth. “Which makes you just about perfect.”

“Hell, I’m a long way from perfect.”

Not me for, you’re not.

“So,” Calum said. “We going to ignore this?”

Jasper tightened his mouth. Calum wanted to slam the lid back on the box already?

“Or do something about it?” Calum asked. “Only I’ve just ridden seven miles with a cock so stiff it hurts.” He gave a wry grin.

“Me too.”

“I know we
should
ignore it,” Calum said. “The wranglers aren’t allowed to fuck the guests. It causes complications and that rule applies to me too even though I’m the boss’s son. Especially to me since I’m supposed to be setting an example. My father will just about kill me if he finds out, but you’re distracting me beyond reason. I came so hard after I left you last night, I thought my heart would stop.”

The effect on Jasper’s cock was as effective as if Calum had stroked it. Jasper glanced down to check it hadn’t burst his zipper and wasn’t out scenting the air.

“I sort of understand how Eve felt when she was tempted with that apple.” Calum grinned. “So bad, so good.”

How many before me? Does it matter?

Jasper stared at their hands, fingers inching closer and closer until the tips touched. The jolt that went through him could have been a lightning strike for the impact it had. Jasper burned head to toe. His throat dried so fast he couldn’t speak. His cock strained against his zipper and made the water bottle jump. Then their fingers linked, and their hands clasped and tightened.

“Oh fuck,” Calum whispered.

It was as if they’d been welded together, and while their entwined hands didn’t shift, to Jasper’s astonishment, his other hand let go of the bottle and rose to slide up Calum’s forearm. It was Jasper’s hand that crept to the damp hair at the nape of Calum’s neck, Jasper’s hand that tugged Calum nearer. Their faces were so close they breathed each other’s air. Calum brought his free hand to the back of Jasper’s neck, and when Jasper slid his fingers into Calum’s hair to press into his scalp, Calum did the same to him.

Their other hands unlinked as if by mutual consent, and as Calum lifted his fingers to Jasper’s face and stroked his chin with his thumb, Jasper’s palm settled over Calum’s chest. Then their lips were together and Jasper wasn’t sure who’d moved first, nor did he care. Their kiss was wet and open, tongues tangling as the sound of their ragged groans filled the air. Calum’s tongue teased his while his fingers twisted harder in Jasper’s hair, urging him closer.

The first deep thrust of Calum’s tongue surprised him.

Calum pulled away, muttered, “Oh God, you taste good,” and then he kissed him again.

Jasper curled his tongue under Calum’s, exploring his mouth, but a gentle kiss grew rougher by the second. Deeper and harder lunges as they dueled, each fighting for control and then they were on their feet, bodies plastered together, hands on backs, on butts, on necks as they staggered around and writhed and humped and fucked each other’s mouths until they couldn’t breathe.