Now, she was on Catalina Island with a free two-week stay in an exclusive resort, and it was the perfect time for her to learn how to be a consummate seductress. If she could convince this man to teach her, she could go back to her college and ask the guy of her dreams out to lunch — maybe even dinner, if she worked up enough courage.
Haley watched cautiously as Crew Storm checked every inch of his resort, not the slightest possible flaw invisible to his fastidious blue eyes. If there was something wrong, he would find it. The man’s strides were long and powerful, as if every step he took had a purpose, and there was no wasted energy in his movements.
He was tall — intimidatingly tall — standing a few inches over six feet, making her feel almost dwarflike at five foot six. Working on the island had obviously been good to him. His tan was a creamy golden color, making the blue of his eyes glow from beneath his thick, dark lashes.
Without a doubt, however, his hair was his best feature — just long enough for a woman to run her fingers through, then grab a handful and guide his mouth in the direction she most desired.
Although she hadn’t spoken the words aloud, Haley’s face flamed; she looked around, afraid someone nearby could actually hear her thoughts. What was wrong with her? She didn’t want to appreciate Crew Storm’s beauty; she wanted to hire him.
She could do this. When she’d found out she’d won the dream vacation, she’d hopped on her computer and researched all she could about the island and the resort. She’d found out the owner was an eligible bachelor and babe magnet. He had a new woman on his arm every week and was exactly the kind of man she needed to teach her how to be what she wanted to be.
“Do not chicken out!” she snarled under her breath before stepping from the shadows and making her way down the beautiful slate walkway. She’d parked around the corner, since the resort wasn’t open yet and management wasn’t allowing in cars, trying to prevent an early mob.
Though she should be trying to be a femme fatale at the moment, she was woefully underdressed in her loose linen blouse and jean capri pants. She’d been in school for the past three years, plus working part-time at a small stationary store and she never had the energy to dress up or worry about clothes. It had taken her five years of therapy to work up the courage to go to college in the first place, or she would have been finished with her education by now.
Though she’d received a large inheritance when she was nineteen, she hated using the money because her grandparents hadn’t wanted her to have it. They’d just never made a will, and because she was their only heir, the money had come to her. She was sure that if they’d taken the time to designate beneficiaries, they would have left it all to their precious birds rather than to her.
Still, there were times it was necessary for her to dip into her substantial funds. This was one of those times.
It was now or never.
“Are you lost?” Haley stopped the shiver fighting to travel down her spine from just the deep timbre of his voice. Oh yes, she had chosen well. This man could teach her all she wanted to know. He was sex personified.
“No. I’m looking for you, Mr. Storm.”
Nervous tension filled her as his gorgeous eyes gave her body the once-over. When they reached her face, she had the feeling that he’d checked her out and found her wanting.
Too bad!
She’d planned this down to the smallest detail, and she’d make him help her.
“And what can I do for you, miss?”
Oh, the promise in his tone was what women’s wet dreams were made of. She knew he spoke to every woman this way. She’d studied him, read about how effortlessly he flirted — how women fell at his feet. With one snap of his fingers, females young and old were panting, their salivary glands in overdrive.
“Haley Sutherland,” she said a little breathlessly as she stuck out her hand.
After a slight pause, he grasped her fingers and squeezed, then slowly lifted their entwined hands to his mouth and ran his lips across the top of her knuckles, his warm breath brushing over her skin.
“This!” Haley practically shouted as excitement filled her.
Crew’s normal cool seemed to be shaken; he stared at her in confusion. The expression on his face was almost comical as he stood frozen with his lips only a couple of inches from her skin.
“I want you to teach me how to seduce someone. I have been reading about you, studying the way you flirt, how you can have any woman you want. I want you to teach me how to get a man, how to make him want me so much that he can’t see straight, how to make him drop to his knees.”
“Ummm…are you drunk?” Crew asked after a long pause as he dropped her hand and took a retreating step. Haley had no doubt he thought she was crazy. Perhaps she was at the moment.
However, now that she was warmed up, she couldn’t hold back. She followed his steps, not realizing what she was doing until he bumped against the outside wall of his resort and her hand was pressed against his chest.
“I know this seems weird, and maybe I should have eased into it, but I am in love with a man who doesn’t know I’m alive and my psych professor suggested that I ask him out as a way of getting over my fears, but I get all tongue-tied around him, which just can’t happen. I want you to teach me how to make him want me — desire me — need me! I have money. Lots of it. I’ll pay you any amount you want if you will agree to be my teacher.”
Haley didn’t feel a trace of fear as she gazed into Crew’s eyes. All she felt was exhilaration. She knew he could do it — he could turn her from the wallflower she’d always been into a seductress who would get her man.
“Let me get this straight. You want to pay me to teach you how to seduce a man?”
“Yes!” she gasped, relieved he was starting to get it.
“I honestly don’t know what to say.” His tone of voice didn’t alert her at all to what he was thinking.
“Say yes.”
Chapter Four
Crew couldn’t remember a time in his life when he’d been rendered speechless, not even when his father had given him and his siblings that horrendous ultimatum a couple of years earlier.
This wisp of a woman, who looked a bit too much like a teenage girl, was asking him to teach her how to be a seductress. If it were dark out, he’d think he was dreaming. Was she a kid, and was he being punked? Or was she a crazy person who’d escaped from a mental hospital?
Whoever she was, she couldn’t be serious. Who walked up to a stranger and asked such a thing of them? Certainly not a rational person, someone with full brain functionality.
As he stalled to try to figure out how to make her go away, she pulled her hand back and leaned to her right, her other hand propping on her hip, giving him a glimpse of the curves beneath her baggy blouse. Her foot began to tap, and he noticed her slim ankles, and the smooth skin of her tanned shins.
Giving Ms. Haley Sutherland a bit more of a thorough evaluation, he decided she couldn’t possibly be a teenager. There was a woman’s body hiding behind all that fabric, and sparks were radiating in her misty eyes, such a pale color of green that they were almost translucent.
Her hair was tied back in a very sloppy bun, but tendrils of her long blond hair floated about her face. She was pretty, he decided, but obviously crazy, too, which could be a key reason this man she was in love with avoided her at all costs.