“Come on, Danny. Aren’t you going to tell me how beautiful I look?”
Abby took a step back, waiting while he drank in the whole delectable picture.
He deserved this. The torture of dragging his gaze up her long, tanned legs cut at his core. Her curved hips, trim waist and slim belly taunted him so that he nearly squeezed his eyes shut once before he reached her sweet, round breasts. But as much as he wanted to look away, he couldn’t.
The flavor of her skin was one he’d never forget. The sound of her pleasured moans echoed through his dreams. The feel of her lips lingering on every intimate part of him was like a chained ghost, haunting him with the sins of his past.
The irony that Abigail Albertini would show up in New Orleans tonight couldn’t be denied. He glanced at the stupid ring his brother had shoved onto his finger. Michael had spouted some nonsense about how the two-hundred-year-old heirloom would change his life, but Danny hadn’t believed it.
Now, he wasn’t so sure.
Abby sidled closer, dancing the tips of her fingers up his shirt, from his waistband to his collar. “I have a job for you. And I’m counting on you being the same low-life thief you used to be.”
Karma could really be a bitch sometimes….
Dear Reader,
I remember the first time I fell in love with a scoundrel. I was eleven years old. His name was Han Solo. I liked the way Princess Leia pushed him around, but he pushed back. I liked the way he shot first and made no apologies later. I loved how in the end, everyone thought he’d abandon them, but instead, he came back in the nick of time and saved the day.
The scoundrel is a wily hero. He’s hard to justify, but even harder to resist. He’s charming and clever and when he’s bad, he’s oh-so-bad. He’s Rhett Butler. He’s Danny Ocean. Or even better, he’s Danny Burnett, the hero of this book and the third brother in my Legendary Lovers series.
Danny isn’t your typical good guy. He doesn’t have an implacable moral code, and the only time he deals with law enforcement is when they’re after him. Now he’s inherited the infamous Murrieta ring—which means his life is about to undergo a serious change.
And, of course, that means a woman!
I hope you enjoy the story, especially the sweet antics of Black Jack and Lady, two real cats who are looking for their forever home (check out the Blaze Authors’ Pet Project at www.blazeauthors.com for details). As the owner of a rescued cat, I know the joy animals can bring. Please stop by and see me on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/readjulieleto) or Twitter (@JulieLeto) and, as always, at www.plotmonkeys.com.
Enjoy!
Julie Leto
Too Wicked to Keep
Julie Leto
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Over the course of her career, New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Julie Leto has published more than forty books—all of them sexy and all of them romances at heart. She shares a popular blog—www.plotmonkeys.com—with her best friends Carly Phillips, Janelle Denison and Leslie Kelly and would love for you to follow her on Twitter, where she goes by @JulieLeto. She’s a born and bred Floridian homeschooling mom with a love for her family, her friends, her dachshund, her lynx-point Siamese and supersexy stories with a guaranteed happy ending.
To all the families who adopt pets…
either from roadsides or shelters like
Furry Friends in Barrie, Ontario. Animals bring
pure joy and light into the lives of so many.
Contents
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
1
Five Years Earlier…
REACHING BEHIND HER, Abigail Albertini tried to snag the tiny crystal dangling from the zipper of her white silk cocktail dress. Her shoulders ached. Her neck twinged, and her artfully arranged hair lay heavy at her nape. The day had been so long. Appointments at the salon. Lunch with her bridesmaids. A last-minute meeting with the wedding planner before a pre-rehearsal cocktail hour, a trek to the church and several run-throughs with her family and friends. Then the wedding party had endured a five-course meal at Charlie Trotter’s and a final round of champagne and aperitifs at her father’s Lake Shore mansion, where she was now shedding the last vestiges of her life as a single woman in the room she’d slept in as a child. No wonder people wanted to only get married once. It was hard work.
She bent her arm back farther, trying not to snag her newly polished nails on the metal clasp, when she heard the deep male voice from behind her.
“Need help?”
She spun, her heart hammering.
“David!”
He emerged from the shadows beside her window looking more delicious and debonair than any man had a right to. Dressed in a tuxedo with a loosened collar and tie, he would have fit right in with the guests at tonight’s pre-wedding soiree. Had he been there, blended with the crowd of out-of-town guests, family friends and Chicago elite? Her father had given the security team strict instructions to detain him if he got within two-hundred yards of her, but what chance did former military police have against a man like him?
She’d learned the hard way that what David Brandon wanted, David Brandon got—no matter the danger. No matter the cost.
As he swaggered closer and closer, she thought about screaming or running for the door. Thought, but didn’t act. In that instant of indecision, his nearness ensnared her. Her exhausted nerve endings exploded with keen awareness of his body, of his hands encased in soft kid leather. Of his skin, devoid of cologne, yet rich with an intoxicating scent that was his and his alone.
David Brandon was an expert at getting into places he shouldn’t. He’d breached Abby’s heart that way—what was one Gold Coast bedroom to a thief like him?
“You have to go.”
“Not without you,” he whispered.
She stumbled backward, forcing herself out of the fog his body heat injected into her brain. “Have you lost your mind? You betrayed me, David. You took advantage of me and used me to get your hands on my grandmother’s painting. You used me.”
“I know. I’m sorry. And trust me, I’m never sorry.”
It wasn’t his confession that stopped her retreat, but the pleading in his voice. She shook her head, knowing she must have heard wrong. Why would he beg? Why would he care? He’d taken what he wanted. She had nothing more to give.
“Then don’t