It’s In His Kiss. Eve Devon

the Cheese Grater building stuck on top of it, Sephy’s heart was skipping, dipping and nose-diving quite enough, thank you very much.

      Lord, could this go more spectacularly wrong? She should never have attempted to ask him without first practising. She already found his rock-solid approach to their friendship way hotter than she should, without introducing words like ‘sex’ to their banter.

      She flicked a look to Luke and saw that her friend had gone from slouching in one of the two hundred gilt-framed chairs surrounding the catwalk, to sitting up a little more straight and a lot more alert.

      Damn. There was now no way to retract her garbled plea.

      Sephy tried to remind herself that she was good at thinking on her feet. That she excelled at rolling with the punches. But this was Luke she had just made a fool of herself in front of and embarrassment was brought to her on a whiff of defeat that had her shoulders dipping a little.

      Clearing her throat she went with a lame, ‘It’s not that I want you to sell,’ she paused and flapped a hand about, creating a new and interesting gesture to indicate the word ‘sex’, ‘specifically – it’s more, the idea of it.’

      ‘The idea of it?’ Luke’s eyebrows remained in the region of his hairline. ‘I thought you asked me over here to check out how well it was all coming together before getting around to asking me to hand out a few catalogues on the night?’

      ‘Actually, I have someone for that. What I’m asking for involves a more,’ she licked her lips and searched her head for a tactful phrase, ‘hands-on approach.’

      ‘Hands-on?’

      ‘Uh-huh.’

      ‘Okay. So, then, you’re going to have to be more explicit about the sex thing.’

      Sephy blinked as Luke relaxed back against the chair he was sitting on, his arms stretching out to rest against the backs of the chairs either side of him in a pose that practically shouted, ‘and Honey, I’m all ears.’

      She forbade herself to drop her gaze to where his olive-green tee now stretched across his impressively honed chest. Friends weren’t supposed to notice things like that and it was bad enough that the tips of her ears had grown hot at hearing the words ‘explicit’ and ‘sex’ coming out of his mouth. No way did she need her eyes getting in on his act.

      And it had to be an act, didn’t it? How could Luke not be as mortified as she to be having this conversation? But as her eyes disobeyed her, and tracked back from their circuit around the vaulted-ceilinged room to land on his face, she caught the unmistakable edge of a grin creeping on to his expression.

      Double-triple-quadruple damn.

      This had to mean the dimples were about to make an appearance.

      Sephy steeled herself for their impact.

      Mortification wasn’t even on his radar, was it?

      Figured.

      Okay, so she was going to have to pull on her big-girl panties and get explicit.

      She could do that, right?

      She’d already had to employ her most fierce expression while using words of one syllable to get the printer to correct all the signage she wanted for the launch party. Then, in order to get the contractor to finish the catwalk ahead of schedule so that she could see how it all looked and make any changes to the layout in good time, she’d had to go from a winning smile and cajoling tone to being downright expletively explicit.

      Neither experience had made Sephy feel great. She didn’t usually have to operate by getting all up in a person’s face. Usually all she had to do was smile. She tried one out for Luke, now.

      Just ask him, her sister Nora had calmly advised her when Sephy had told her that she had figured out what would absolutely fix the problem she had with her advertising campaign.

      Sephy wanted to roll her eyes as she remembered exactly how many times Nora had thought her sage ‘just ask him’ advice bore repeating. It was at least once every time Sephy tried to think what else she could do to get around the fact that the problem with her marketing campaign was now perfectly encapsulated in the sleek banners that draped down from the ceiling either side of the catwalk and against the walls of the room.

      She glanced at the banners now, hoping against hope that what she’d see would somehow have changed.

      But no. The models on them, while looking gorgeously every-woman, like she had insisted upon, all made her lingerie look…okay.

      Just – okay.

      Sephy’s head dropped to her chest.

      She wanted – needed the artwork to scream ‘Crave Me’.

      Because although she believed in her designs, what she really needed, above everything, was to sell her designs.

      In two weeks’ time she needed to be able to look herself in the eye and know that she had given her absolute all to secure the best-possible start for her business and Nora’s whole grinning-like-a-Cheshire-cat thing that had accompanied every one of her ‘just ask hims’ had made Sephy want to sock her in both eyes.

      Like it was that easy to ask someone to do some modelling for you.

      Like it was that easy to ask Luke.

      What she should have done was phone her brother Jared for another business opinion. He could probably have convinced her that all the doubts plaguing her over how non-effective the advertising campaign she’d signed off on was, were all simply down to nerves.

      Jared, though, was weeks away from marrying his fiancée Amanda and displaying all the signs of being so in love she wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d just grinned like a buffoon and offered up the same unhelpful advice as Nora.

      Huh.

      Now she came to think of it, Nora’s grinning was probably down to the fact that she had recently got engaged to Ethan Love.

      Marriage.

      Nuptials.

      Weddings.

      Sephy shuddered.

      It was like some giant conspiracy.

      She didn’t begrudge Jared and Nora finding their soul-mates, but she much preferred it when her brother and sister had been completely focused on their businesses. What she wouldn’t do now to go back and spend halcyon days soaking up their knowledge.

      Not that she’d had the slightest interest in running a business then. She’d had other priorities. Namely: raising her daughter, Daisy.

      Sephy felt a cramp forming in her shoulders and as her hands came up to knead the tight muscle and encourage them to decamp from the vicinity of her ears, she sighed.

      Could she really do this?

      Could she still devote the time and attention her precocious five-year-old needed, and make Seraphic a success?

      Of course she could, she repeated to herself. She’d had clients come to her for couture lingerie for the past six months and she’d managed. She could step it up and expand.

      She could.

      She had to.

      ‘Hey, not to pressure you,’ Luke chimed in helpfully, ‘but how much longer are you planning on stalling explaining how I fit into this sex-plan thing of yours, because don’t you need to go pick Daisy up in an hour or so?’

      ‘It would only be your hands,’ Sephy blurted out.

      Luke lifted his hands for inspection and as he held them up, Sephy sucked on her bottom lip.

      Last night, in a mind-blowing turn of events, Sephy had learned that Luke Jackson had the most amazing, incredible, beautiful hands.

      The discovery had taken place in her living room. A room she’d walked into every