The Distraction

Book 2: The Body Work Trilogy

by Sierra Kincade

Genres: Women's Fiction; Contemporary Romance; Romantic Suspense

Synopsis

The seductive story that started in The Masseuse continues...

Anna Rossi knows that opening your heart only gets you hurt. But Alec Flynn is just too good to resist…

It’s been three long months since Anna’s seen Alec, since he saved her life and lit up her soul with unquenchable desire. Being without him has left her on edge, but his bravery has motivated her to change her life and go after what she’s always wanted—a job where she can help people. She can’t wait to show Alec the woman she’s become in his absence, or to prove how much she’s missed him…

Three months away has done nothing to slake Alec’s need for Anna. Unfortunately, it hasn’t made his life any less dangerous. The last thing he wants to do is hurt Anna, but if giving her up is the only way to save her, he’s not sure he can do that either. He’s determined to have her for as long as he can. Except his past is creeping up on him faster than he knows, and this time he may not be able to keep her from becoming collateral damage…

Release date: February 3, 2015

Publisher: Berkley

Print pages: 352

Sample

The Body Work Trilogy

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A huge thank-you to my agents Joanna MacKenzie, Danielle Egan Miller, and Abby Saul. I am doing what I love because of you and I am so proud to have you standing by my side. I am ever grateful for the kindness and support of Leis Pederson, editor extraordinaire, and Jessica Brock, my super-cool publicist. Go Team Masseuse! Cupcakes all around!

A special thank-you to my most excellent beta readers: Deanna, who nicely lets me know when she trips in plot holes so that I can fix them; Courtney, who gives Alec the best legal advice; and Katie, who is the master of backing up a “this doesn’t work” with a “but this does!” I love you guys.

And always, thank you to my husband, who knows me better than anyone and likes me anyway. I love you.

One

I closed my eyes, swaying my hips to the hard hit of the bass. The music flowed through me, a stimulant, urging my heart to keep time. My hips swung right, paused, and I reached down one sweat-slicked leg to drag my fingers seductively up my calf. Arching my back, my pelvis made one slow, tempting circle that defied the fast rhythm, and I placed both open hands on my stomach. I was already drenched, and the thin fabric dragged across my skin as I pulled it up.

“Slower,” commanded Jayne. Her voice was raspy, like a moan. Everything about that woman oozed sex. I did as she said because I wanted her approval. I wanted to be her.

My hips made a figure eight as I inched my shirt up to my bra line. My stomach was hard and flat, conditioned by weeks of workouts, but my legs were already trembling.

“Good,” she said. “One hand on the pole. Easy. Grab it like a cock.”

I bit my lower lip to stifle the giggle, but the way she said cock made my groin ache. It had been too long since I’d had what I wanted, what I needed. The hard, insistent pressure pushing into me, filling me, bringing me to the edge of my sanity with powerful thrusts.

I’d had to find another way to keep my desire under control.

Slowly, without opening my eyes, I felt for the erect pole and gripped it with just enough pressure, just as she’d taught me. It was slick, too wide for me to close my fingers around.

“Show me what you’re going to do to me,” Jayne said. She was farther away now, behind me, evaluating my every move.

I spread my legs wide and bent my knees. Holding on with only one hand, I dropped nearly to the floor, the pole sliding through my grasp. I rose then, feeling the cool metal brush high on my inside thighs.

“Make me want you,” said Jayne. “Make me so hot I can’t keep my hands off you.”

Dark eyes appeared behind my closed lids. A flash of broad, muscular shoulders. A drop of perspiration sliding down the ridges of hard, washboard abs. Desire pooled deep inside me, lapping against the surface of my womb with each swivel of my hips.

“Anna,” he whispered. “Come for me.” I could still hear his voice.

I hooked one knee around the pole, feeling a wave of self-consciousness as I pushed off with my opposite foot, spinning in a slow circle to my knees.

“There are some hot bitches in this room tonight!” shouted Jayne, suddenly enthusiastic.

Cheers erupted around me. I opened my eyes, a huge grin spreading across my face as Jayne shut down the stereo. Beside me, a woman in her forties with some brand-new silicone laughed hysterically as her friend, easily twice her weight, tried to pull herself out of the splits. Near the front, two college girls pulled their tank tops back on over their sports bras. A woman who was easily sixty was still dancing around one of the ten poles that had been evenly spaced around the room.

Strip-aerobics had become my new Missing Alec Management Plan. It didn’t make me feel half as sexy as he could, but it worked to take some of the edge off.

I stood, and jolted upright as someone slapped my ass.

“Girl, you should seriously consider a dancing career.” Jayne planted her fist on one cocked hip and grinned. She looked like a stripper: fake eyelashes, heels that could have been murder weapons, and boobs the size of my head. It was impossible to tell how old she was under all that makeup. She was wearing a purple pleather bodysuit tonight, one of her many exciting wardrobe choices for the pole dancing class she taught twice a week at the gym.

My face lit up. I twisted my rib-length black hair into a wet knot at the back of my head with a band from around my wrist.

“You think?”

“Totally,” she said. “I can get you an audition if you’re interested.” Her brows wiggled.

I laughed. “Thanks, but that’s okay. I’m not sure my boyfriend would love the idea of other men watching me take off my clothes.”

My smile faltered. I still called Alec my boyfriend, but I hadn’t seen him in almost three months. Eleven weeks and four days to be exact. I’d written to him, but he hadn’t written back. He hadn’t called either. My dad’s friend on the Tampa Police Force had said this was because he couldn’t, that the FBI had locked down his communications with the outside until they could build a case against Maxim Stein. I hoped this was true. All that I had to hold on to was a promise I’d made the night before his arrest. That I’d wait for him, no matter what.

“Boyfriends.” Jayne rolled her eyes. “Dance with me, and you’d have a new lover every night.”

I giggled as she hiked a leg up my thigh and attempted to treat me like the pole I’d spent the last hour grinding against.

“Fine,” she pouted. “If you change your mind . . .”

“I know where to find you,” I said. “Thanks for the class, Jayne.”

A couple of ladies gave me high fives on our way out the door. I loved this class, one of the many perks the gym owner had offered me after I’d started offering massages here six weeks ago. I’d signed up after trying to burn off my sexual frustration on the elliptical trainer, and I hadn’t been sorry. Now I was toned, hot, and had moves. I hoped they were appreciated when Alec got out of jail.

“I still don’t see why they black out the windows.”

I smirked and turned toward the frustrated voice originating behind me. Trevor Marshall may have worked in advertising, but he was built like a runner, which is exactly what he’d spent the last hour doing in the main equipment room of the gym. He was tall and lean, with long pronounced muscles that I had the privilege of digging my thumbs into every other Wednesday, in the massage room at the gym. He ran a towel over his sweaty face, revealing a light smattering of freckles across his nose, and scrubbed at his blond hair that had turned dark with sweat. He was handsome, there was no denying it, and the attraction stirred inside of me as it always did when I saw him.

Attraction, but not lust.

“Because freaks like you would fall off their treadmills trying to watch,” I told him. “It’s a liability issue.”

“Seems more like a killer marketing strategy.” He smiled, and his gleaming green eyes dipped, just for a flash, to check out the damp tank top and shorts that clung to my curves. “And as an aside, I’m not sure you’re allowed to call paying customers freaks.”

“On the job,” I specified. “We’re not in session, so I’m allowed to call you whatever I want.”

His gaze narrowed. One of his hands slid down his sweat-soaked T-shirt, making it stick to his chest. It wasn’t all together a terrible sight.

“My mind is literally racing with possibilities,” he said.

I pushed him back with a snort. “Freak.”

We began walking toward the locker rooms on the gym’s lower level. The bottom floor was lined with weight machines, and the pop music piped in over the speakers was accented with the clank of metal. At the top of the staircase was a cart with a stack of towels, and he passed one to me.

“I had to move my session up to eleven this Wednesday,” he said. “If you’ve got a break after, we should grab lunch.”

Trevor had started signing up for massages here about a month after Alec had gone to jail for his association with Maxim Stein’s white-collar crimes—crimes he had tried to make right by reporting to the FBI. We’d hit it off immediately. He’d come right when I needed a friend, someone who didn’t know that Maxim Stein’s nephew Bobby had tried to kill me, or about Charlotte MacAfee’s death, or about how hard it was without Alec, the only person who I could really talk to about any of it. Trevor was fun and interesting, and a perfectly good distraction from the chaos that had become my life.

“Can’t,” I said. “I’m busy Wednesday.” The nerves jolted to life in my belly, and I grabbed the handrail so I didn’t accidently backflip down the stairs.

“Oh,” said Trevor knowingly. “Loverboy comes home this week, I forgot.”

I hadn’t. I couldn’t. The countdown to Alec’s return had been permanently seared in my memory. I practically had a clock ticking down the seconds transposed over my vision. A month ago the Department of Corrections had sent a letter to Alec’s father informing him of his son’s release date. Alec hadn’t confirmed his arrival, but I was going to be prepared nonetheless.

“Three days,” I said, my throat suddenly dry. “Two, if you consider that today is practically over. Well, the workday anyway. If you work a nine-to-five . . .” I trailed off.

Trevor refrained from rolling his eyes, but I could tell this was difficult.

“Where was he again?” he asked, scratching his chin to hide the frown. “Seattle?”

My eyes flicked to the floor. “Yeah. Seattle.”

“He left you alone a long time.” He threw his towel into a laundry basket. “I guess you gotta go where the work is.”

“Right,” I agreed. It wasn’t that I was embarrassed Alec was in jail, but it really wasn’t anyone’s business.

“What’s he do again?”

“Security,” I said, quickly changing the subject. “I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got some stuff to get ready before he comes home.”

“Sure,” said Trevor, looking a little dejected. “I’ll see you Wednesday.”

I smiled, and made my way to the locker room. After changing, I saw that I’d missed a call from Amy. The gym was downtown, just a few blocks away from Alec’s high-rise apartment, and after stepping into the warm June evening, I called her back.

“I am giving up men,” Amy announced. “For real this time. It’s all women, all the time.”

“That sounds great,” I said.

“It is. It’s awesome. You know why? Because women aren’t dicks.”

“I feel like there’s a joke somewhere in there . . .”

“A fruit arrangement, Anna,” Amy said. “I told David about Paisley and he sent me a we’re-not-working-out note on a fruit arrangement. One of those stupid fucking cantaloupe and strawberry flower things.”

I cringed, inside and out. Amy was constantly dating men that rejected her, and there had been a string of them lately that had checked out when she’d told them she had a daughter who’d just turned six. Because of that, she stopped introducing Paisley to anyone who hadn’t passed the three-date mark.

No one had passed the three-date mark in two years.

“Did you eat the flowers?” I asked tentatively, waiting until the pedestrian sign lit up so I could look both ways and cross the street.

“Of course I did, but that’s not the point. Who breaks up with someone with a fruit arrangement? It’s like the tackiest thing in the world.”

“Agreed,” I said. “I’m so sorry. You’ll find someone better, I promise.”

She groaned. Then sighed. “I’m ruining your birthday.”

I paused outside the French bakery that stood between the gym and Alec’s place. Pink and white cakes were showcased in the neatly framed window, and they pulled me closer like they were made of magnets. Damn this place for still being open. It was clearly out to sabotage my life.

I went inside. Instantly, my mouth was watering. Croissants, French bread, and cupcakes. Enough cupcakes to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool. Or at least a moderately sized hot tub.

My gaze honed in on the red velvet with cream cheese frosting. It was the sexiest of all the cupcakes. And it was calling to me in its little cupcake voice.

“You’re not ruining anything,” I told Amy. “I had a fabulous weekend with you, Dad, and Paisley. Today’s just another day.”

It wasn’t really. It was the day before the day before Alec came home. I’d spent most of the weekend with my father, assuring him that everything was going great and downplaying how nervous I was for Alec’s return. I’d taken him to the airport this morning before going in to the salon, and since then, I’d been all jitters.

Thank goodness for pole dancing.

“Well, if Pais and I didn’t have this stargazing thing for her school tonight, we’d totally subject you to more cake.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, pointing out the cupcake to the skinny emo kid behind the counter. “I’ve got it covered.”

After another rendition of the Birthday song, I hung up with Amy and, fancy cupcake box in hand, made the trek across the street to Alec’s place. I kept a small apartment on the south side of town now—that was where I stayed when my father was visiting—but I spent a lot more time here. It made me feel closer to Alec, even when we couldn’t talk.

As I entered the main foyer, impressive with its gray-green marble floors and black leather couches, an athletic man wearing a white dress shirt and slacks greeted me with a smile. His skin was the color of milk chocolate, and his eyes were bright amber—gorgeous, and impossible not to notice.

“Hey sweet girl,” he said. “How many days we got left?”

“Two and a half,” I answered. “How are you, Mike?”

“Better now,” he said, reaching to pull me into a suffocating embrace. “Tell Alec to stay where he is so I can keep you for myself.”

I laughed. Mike and Alec had been friends in high school. When Maxim Stein bought the building, Alec had hired Mike as the head of security. A blush crept up my neck as I considered some of the things Mike may have seen on the building’s security cameras.

“I’ll tell him, but I don’t know if he’s going to go for it.” I hoped he couldn’t see how thin my confidence was.

“He will when he sees these,” Mike quipped, rolling up his sleeve to reveal a massive flexing biceps.

I fanned myself, moving toward the elevator. “Is it hot in here or is it just me?”

Mike laughed as I stepped into an open car, and pressed the button for the thirty-fifth floor. When I was hidden I sighed, and rubbed the heel of my hand over my eyebrows. Things were going to be fine with Alec. What we had was real, unbreakable. A few months apart couldn’t change that.

When I’d reached his floor, I made my way down to his apartment and used the key to get inside. Familiar sights greeted me; a few pictures on the wall of the beach, a cherry dining room set up ahead, a hook where I hung my keys. Things I’d put out over the last couple of months—things Alec wouldn’t recognize because he’d been gone. He’d asked me to make the place a little homier. I hoped I hadn’t gone too far when I bought a spice rack and a toilet seat cover.

This place was only temporary anyway, I reminded myself. Once Maxim went to jail for the rest of eternity—something I hoped would happen once Alec testified—the building would be sold, and Alec would probably have to find another place. One that was unfortunately not quite so rent-free.

I turned into the kitchen, and put down my bag and cupcake box on the counter beside the knife block. I toed off my shoes and left them on the beige tile, then opened the refrigerator. It had the basics now, but I definitely needed to restock before Alec got home. There wasn’t anything good to eat for dinner, and the freezer was too packed with ice cream to fit any frozen meals.

“Pizza it is,” I said aloud, then made the call for delivery to a place in South Tampa famous for their thin crust. It probably would have been a good idea to pick something up while I’d been out, but I’d been too focused on my beautiful red velvet friend.

I opened the lid of the box and removed the pretty cupcake, feeling a surge of loneliness. I’d only known Alec a few weeks before he’d gone to jail, but sometimes I missed him so badly it hurt.

“Happy Birthday to me,” I said quietly, peeling back the dainty wrapper and taking a bite. Twenty-eight years old, and in a serious, committed relationship with a man I hadn’t spoken to in eleven weeks and four days. Living in an apartment still owned by an imprisoned billionaire mogul who’d sent his nephew to kill me. And spending my birthday alone. The cream cheese icing only took a little of the sting away.

I still had an hour before the pizza was delivered, so I hauled my bag into the bedroom, now adorned with a nightstand lamp and a drawer full of my clothes, and left the cupcake on the dresser so I could shower. When I was clean, I towel-dried my long, wet hair, and laid out two outfits side by side on the bed.

One was a black teddy with thigh-highs. The other a red lace bra and panty set with a frilly little skirt. Just looking at them gave me a little thrill. For Alec’s first night back I wanted to wear something special. And then I wanted to make him act out every fantasy my overactive imagination had come up with in his absence.

“Red or black?” I took another bite of the cupcake. He’d liked me in red. He’d liked me in black, too. I giggled a little. He wasn’t really all that hard to please.

At least, he hadn’t been.

I put the outfits back into the bag and stuffed it into the drawer. The big decisions could come later. I still had to clean and figure out what I needed to pick up at the supermarket tomorrow.

Because the next day Alec would be home.

I closed my eyes, and rubbed one hand over my breasts, remembering the way he caressed them. The way his fingers felt dipping beneath my panties. How my body became charged and ready, just from a look.

The memories were enough to make my blood heat.

If he didn’t want me anymore, I didn’t know what I was going to do.

I ate another bite of the cupcake.

A moment later, a knock came at the door. I checked the time, surprised to see that the pizza guy was still twenty minutes early. Throwing on some pink pajama pants and one of Alec’s T-shirts, I hurried back toward the kitchen to get my purse.

“Just a second,” I called. “I’ll be right there.”

Wallet in hand, I glanced at the baseball bat I left leaning against the wall—a safety precaution I’d added since Bobby had abducted me—and opened the front door. I looked up, and then up higher, into the stormy blue eyes of the man who stood in the hallway.

My heart stopped in my chest.

“Hey.” Alec’s gaze lowered slowly down my body. “Nice shirt.”

Two

For a second I thought I was dreaming. Before me was Alec, at least, a man who looked like Alec. The careless waves I’d run my fingers through were gone, his hair cut short. His chest seemed broader, and his arms hung loosely at his sides—arms defined by hard muscle that stretched the sleeves of his white T-shirt. But that was where the differences ceased. His eyes, piercing and blue as the deepest part of the bay, locked me in place as his trademark smirk lifted the corners of his mouth.

He was hot enough to melt the polar ice caps. Even more gorgeous than I remembered, which seemed impossible. He had a mouth made for kissing and a body made for fucking, and as he sized me up I was battered by images of both. The space between us turned electric. I could practically hear it hiss like a drop of water on a live wire. My purse fell from my hand and I grabbed the door handle just to keep my legs from buckling.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” I managed.

He was early. Two and a half days early. I hadn’t cleaned up; my stuff was everywhere. There wasn’t any food. I wasn’t wearing any makeup, my hair wasn’t combed, and my underwear wasn’t even remotely sexy. This wasn’t what was supposed to happen. I was supposed to pick him up at the police station. We were supposed to have sex in the car twice. Maybe three times. Then we’d come back here so I could make him a huge homecoming dinner wearing dirty lingerie, only to have to warm it up later because he’d been unable to keep his hands off of me.

I couldn’t move.

His head tilted to the side. “I live here. At least I used to.”

I pulled the shirt away from my chest, hiding my body’s immediate reaction to him. Was it weird that I was wearing his clothes? I hoped it didn’t freak him out.

He still stood in the hallway, as if waiting for me to invite him in. It hit me all in a rush how rude I was being, and I quickly stepped back and pulled open the door.

“Sorry, I . . . Hi.” I stepped forward and rose on my tiptoes to give him a hug. “Welcome home.”

Touching him was like brushing against open flames. Scalding, terrifying, but also fiercely addicting. His arms surrounded me, drew me closer, until my feet were barely touching the ground. My breasts, bare beneath the soft cotton, grew tender and heavy, and my fingers grasped his broad shoulders too tightly. I inhaled, dizzy from that familiar masculine scent that I’d missed so much these last few months, and then shuddered, like I hadn’t really breathed since he’d left. He had to feel my heart pounding against his hard chest.

His head turned, and his mouth found my neck. He whispered something against it that I couldn’t hear, and my whole body quivered as his breath warmed my skin. The desire was still there, stronger than before. The intensity of it frightened me; I was almost afraid to set it loose. We would burn each other to the ground.

Then he was pulling back slightly, his mouth seeking mine.

And for some absolutely insane reason, I turned away.

“Chocolate,” I said, too loudly. He set me down, his hands lingering on my waist. “I just ate a cupcake, I have chocolate breath.”

No, I did not just say that.

He didn’t move for a moment, as if waiting for me to tell him this was a joke. Then he scowled, and withdrew his hands from my sides. One thumb tapped his lower lip. “All right.”

“It’s my birthday, that’s why I had the cupcake.” Shut. Up. Anna.

He froze, gave me a look that bordered on horrified.

“I didn’t . . .”

“Oh, I know.” I waved my hand as if I wasn’t disappointed. “I don’t even know why I said that.”

He didn’t know it was my birthday. I knew he didn’t, but it still struck me how little time we’d actually been together.

He was frowning.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Really.”

I had clearly lost my mind. Or my nerve. Or both. Whatever the case, my sex drive was running full steam, but my brain was running interference. This wasn’t supposed to be awkward, but since I’d acted so strangely, he was pulling back as well. It was as if there were a barrier between us, a wall of glass that neither of us could break.

Now inside, he took a slow look around, gaze lingering on the bat for a moment before I hurried around him to close the door. The bolt sliding home clicked loudly enough it might as well have been a prison cell.

He stepped into the kitchen, getting his bearings. Goddammit. The plates were one thing, but I’d totally overdone it with the spice rack. I knew it.

He picked up a mug beside the sink, then ran his index finger over the lipstick mark I’d left there. I bit my bottom lip, wishing he’d touch my mouth in the same way.

And now I was jealous of a ceramic cup.

“If it’s too much, I can get rid of some of this stuff,” I said.

Please say something, I willed him. The silence was unnerving. I tried to keep all my fears at bay, but they were pushing hard at the forefront of my mind. Things had changed. We had changed. I didn’t belong here. I’d made myself too at home in his absence.

He had continued on to the dining room, and in the narrow computer nook between the two rooms he paused, brows lifting. While he’d been gone, I’d gotten his college degree certificate from his father, framed it, and put it up. At the time it had seemed like a nice thing to do, but as I watched his hand slide down his throat, I wasn’t so sure.

“Look,” I said quietly, unable to stand it any longer. “You probably want some time to relax. I should go home. You can call me later if you feel up to it.” I didn’t even know if he had the same phone number that he did before he left.

His head snapped toward me.

“You still live in the studio?”

I shook my head. “No. Didn’t seem like the safest place after the whole stalker/abduction thing, you know?” I tried to laugh, but there wasn’t much breath behind it. “I got a little apartment in South Tampa. I didn’t want to suffocate you.”

He pushed his hands into the pockets of his jeans and leaned against the wall, looking disappointed. Hope lifted my spirits, but they crashed again as the seconds wound on.

“There’s a little food in the refrigerator,” I said. “I meant to stock up before you came home, but I thought you would still be a couple days.” I wiped my damp palms on my sweatpants. “I did get you ice cream.”

I turned to the freezer and opened the slender silver door. Inside were eight different cardboard cartons—exactly seven too many, I realized now. I closed my eyes, waiting for the cold air to cool me off.

“That’s a lot of ice cream,” he said, a trace of humor in his voice.

I winced. “You told me once you liked vanilla. I didn’t know which kind—French vanilla, or vanilla bean, or plain—so I got them all.”

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

“I don’t want you to leave, Anna.” The quiet way he said my name made my heart hurt, and I turned around to face him. His back was against the counter, hands still fisted in his pockets. His arms were definitely bigger than before. Both of my hands together wouldn’t fit around his biceps, and that realization gave me another thrill. I couldn’t help but wonder what he looked like without his shirt on. If his pecs, his abs, that thin, sexy line of hair that disappeared beneath his waistband, were still the same.

“Anna,” he said again, and I shook my head, refocusing on his face. “What are you thinking?”

“Why didn’t you call?” I sagged back against the cool doors of the refrigerator. There was only five feet at most between us, but it might as well have been five hundred.

He looked down at the floor, where I’d left my shoes earlier. “I wanted to. The FBI kept me pretty tied up.” He hesitated. “I got your letters.”

The air left my lungs in a whoosh. Terry Benitez had told me he wouldn’t be able to talk to me, but I’d needed to hear Alec say it.

Alec reached in his back pocket and pulled out an envelope. It was a little wrinkled, but otherwise in good shape. Carefully, he opened it, revealing a stack of notes I’d sent him. As he flipped through them I could see that the paper was worn, the creases nearly torn. He’d read them. A lot. Another shimmer of hope made me stand a lit