Read Online Hold On to Me by Victoria Purman - Free Book Online Page B

Stable. He wore a suit to work. Sensible. Clean living. Of course, that was why she’d slept with him. She needed to find someone who was the polar opposite of Sully Brown in every way. If Sully was Adam Levine, Duncan was Michael Bublé. It should have worked. She loved Bublé. She adored the Great American Songbook.
    But there was simply nothing about Duncan that zinged.
    â€˜He is a nice guy who does absolutely nothing for me, Summer.’
    â€˜Poor Duncan.’ Summer patted her back. ‘Turn around and I’ll do your toes.’
    Stella flipped over. She liked this position better because she got to look at her friend’s face while they chatted. Summer’s long, sun-blonde hair was pulled up in a high ponytail, and her bright blue eyes glowed with vitality. She looked exactly like the season she was named after.
    â€˜So are you going to hire the hot Luca, then? Think you can keep your dirty-old-lady hands off him?’
    Stella laughed. ‘Oh, I can look—and I will—but that doesn’t mean I have to touch. Flirting and fantasising are completely safe, right? It’s so much safer than dealing with the real thing.’
    â€˜Yeah …’ Summer sighed. ‘At least you’ve got the flirting. All I’ve got is fantasising.’
    Stella let out a belly laugh that echoed around the room, drowning out the tinkling new-age music. ‘I hear Duncan is still free.’

CHAPTER
7
    When Stella finally made it home at the end of an exhausting and confusing day, the first thing she did was check her inbox for messages from her suppliers, her insurance company and customers. Among the fifty new emails, one in particular caught her eye. She pulled her chair closer to the desk in her home office, straightened her back, and clicked on it.
    Stella,
    Please find attached the references you were after. I hope I meet with your satisfaction.
    Luca
    What the? She read it again.
    Please find attached the references you were after. I hope they meet with your satisfaction.
    Right. That made much more sense.
    She thought back over her encounter with Luca. She felt as though she hadn’t looked at a man—or really noticed one—in years. And there had been flirting. Oh yes, that’s what had happened today. No one had flirted with her in forever. She’d heard it in Luca’s words, had seen it in his smile. In the intense way he’d watched her when she was swigging water from her bottle. And when they’d shaken hands, there was a certain heat and pressure from his fingers. God, she missed flirting. That was the downside of working in an environment that was all about women.
    Stella had intentionally created a man-free zone out of her business and, really, her life since returning to South Australia. Her accountant was a woman. So were her bank manager and her insurance agent. The only men she saw regularly were her friends’ partners, and she wasn’t especially close to any of them. There was a reason she’d run from Sydney and men at exactly the same time. She tried not to think about Sully. It had been five years since he’d snorted away almost all her money. Five years without a word—or a dollar—from the man who’d almost ruined her life. And ruined her.
    She read Luca’s email again and let herself think about what it would be like to work with him. And then she let herself fantasise for a moment about all the things she wouldn’t mind doing with Luca Morelli. In an alternative universe, that is. Because Stella didn’t let anyone in any more.
    So fantasy was what she did now. It was safe. As well as incredibly unfulfilling, but that was her lot and she would live with her choice. Her eyes returned to Luca’s email. ‘I hope they meet with your satisfaction,’ she murmured. Then she clicked on the attachments. She closely read two glowing references from people who didn’t share the Morelli name