Priceless Treasure(15)

“Ashton, stop.”

Was that her voice? It didn’t sound like her, not at all. It was husky, and breathy, and the moan that followed certainly didn’t sound like something from a woman who was really saying no.#p#分页标题#e#

“Why?” he groaned before his hand slipped below her shirt.

She pulled back. He let her. Much to her … hell, her disappointment. Maybe she wanted him to take this decision — not that it was anything rational now — out of her hands. No. She didn’t want that. Maybe she thought she did for the moment, but she’d hate herself in the morning.

And finally she managed to speak. “Because you aren’t mine.”

With that, she turned and walked away. He let her. Savvy didn’t sleep well that night, not well at all. The little sleep she did manage to get was filled with dreams of Ashton.





Chapter Seven


What in the freaking universe had he been thinking?

He was engaged to another woman. He wouldn’t be a cheater. He’d never cheated before. Sure, he hadn’t been in a committed relationship before, so he’d never really been tested, but that was beside the point.

The point was that Kalli was the perfect wife. She was blue blood at its finest. She was literate, funny — at times, anyway — conservative, and the perfect choice to produce children who would make his father and his uncles proud.

Ashton had spent enough years being the bartending playboy. It was his duty now to grow up and act like a Storm. And he had the added responsibility of knowing he wasn’t only a Storm but also an Anderson. Damn, that was a lot of weight on a regular guy’s shoulders.

So he couldn’t mess this thing up with Kalli. He wouldn’t do yet another thing that would prove his father right. The old man had pulled him and his brothers and his sister into a room and threatened to take everything away from them. He’d said that they were all spoiled, and that they all needed a purpose in life. And after the initial shock, Ashton had done his damnedest to demonstrate that a man could change. He’d done that.

But he was now playing with fire, whatever that meant nowadays, and that wasn’t acceptable.

He didn’t want to be a man people couldn’t trust. To “party on” and to live life to the fullest was one thing. Or two things. Who was counting? To have no morals at all was completely different. So he had two options. He needed to get rid of the temptation — which was one Savannah Mills — or he needed to learn some self-control and do what he knew was right.

Getting rid of Savvy would be much easier. Dammit. His life had become complicated the moment she’d stumbled onto his docks, and he didn’t like “complicated.” He liked smooth sailing — on and off the water. But when had he ever taken the easier way when it wasn’t a way he wanted to travel? Never that he could think of.

Well, it was too late to do anything more about it tonight, so it wouldn’t do him any good to waste time dwelling on the subject. But as he lay in bed, Ashton began getting annoyed. Who in the blazes was this Savannah person to come in and mess up his perfectly laid-out plans for the future? He’d been happy with Kalli. No, not ecstatic. He wasn’t deeply in love with her, but he’d been comfortable. He’d never wanted love, really, never wanted someone to hold him down. He’d seen where that could lead. And the end of the road wasn’t pretty.

Love brought with it a deep responsibility. You had to make sure that someone else’s life was better with you in it than it had been without you. He didn’t want to be responsible for anyone else, didn’t want that pressure.

And he’d been perfectly content to marry Kalli. She didn’t make him uncomfortable, with the exception of that shoe thing, and he’d had decent sex with her. She wasn’t someone he got all giddy about inside, but that wasn’t what he wanted.#p#分页标题#e#

And now, in less than two weeks, Savvy had come along and turned his life into tatters. Who did she freaking think she was? He had half a mind to storm over to her boat — no, not her boat, his boat — and give her a piece of his mind. Or a piece of something.

No, not in his best interest. Obviously. But he wasn’t exactly sure what was in his best interest. He had a clue, though, that the first step in being a hell of a lot healthier was to avoid his newest employee.

He could do that. He was certain of it.

Closing his eyes, Ashton spent the rest of the night tossing and turning. When the sun began rising and he wandered out onto his deck just in time to find Savvy sauntering along the dock and showing off that amazing derrière of hers, he sent a withering look her way. What in the world was she doing dressing the way she dressed?