Wish List - Sylvia Day Page 0,1

And even though he knew it was never going to happen, Nick couldn’t stop dreaming about it.

Steph was gorgeous, beautifully built, confident and intelligent. She knew her assets and showed them off. She also knew her worth and wanted a man who did.

What had she said to him once?

But he wasn’t a fly-by-night kind of boyfriend. He took damn good care of the women he dated. He paid attention to what they liked and didn’t like. It wasn’t so hard.

It just took a little effort, and Nick enjoyed making that effort. Enjoyed watching their surprise when he remembered their favorite author, favorite song, favorite places to be touched and caressed. Because of this, most of his exes were still his friends.

“You’re staring,” teased a soft voice beside him.

He tore his gaze away from Steph’s wide eyes to look at the woman next to him.

“Looks like she liked your gift,” Amanda said with a fond smile. “Why didn’t I ever get naked pics of you when we were dating?”

“You never asked.”

Stephanie hadn’t either, at least not in the verbal sense. He’d been staying late one night working on his billable hours. The goal was twofold—to get a decent cushion for the holiday time off work and also to forget about how he couldn’t find a damn thing to give Steph that would get his foot in her door. The ploy wasn’t working, so he’d stood and began to pace the hall that formed a ring around the center receptionist’s desk and elevators.

That was when it caught his eye. The small, crumpled ball of paper missed or dropped by the nighttime cleaning crew. It was wedged next to the polished wood leg of their waiting room sofa. He’d picked it up with the intention of tossing it when a bit of red and green caught his eye. Steph had been using a cute little stocking-shaped notepad ever since the first of the month. Christmas was obviously one of her favorite holidays, if the tiny decorated tree on her desk was any indication. He knew instantly the festive bit of trash had once belonged to her, and it took on new meaning just because of that.

So feeling a bit guilty but unable to help himself, Nick opened the bit of trash…

And he’d been thanking his lucky stars ever since.

At the top of the striped paper were the words Wish List printed in a font designed to resemble a child’s scrawl. Below that were the beautifully formed letters he recognized as Steph’s handwriting.

And then she’d run a slash through that list and begun a new one.

The shock of that list had hit him so hard he’d stumbled into the nearby couch.

He’d understood then that Stephanie had been fooling him the whole time, just like she would a jury. Acting unaffected when she was really as hot for him as he was for her.

No woman had such detailed sexual thoughts about a guy she wasn’t totally into. She’d obviously been thinking about him for awhile.

Images inspired by her words filled his mind. His c**k swelled and he wondered how he’d make it back to his office, let alone the parking garage eighteen floors below.

He needn’t have worried. Her next shakily written line took all the heat out of him and left him cold.

In that moment he’d discovered two things. One—no matter how much she wanted his body, she still didn’t want anything to do with him. To the point where she was considering transferring to their firm’s other office across town.

Two—the thought of not seeing her nearly every day struck him like a physical blow. Too painful for his interest to be merely casual. He’d realized then what the tight knot in his gut was trying to tell him.

Somewhere along the way, the purely sexual desire he had for her had become something more. Maybe it’d happened when they’d worked that last case together and she kept blowing his mind with her brains. Or maybe it was when she’d cried over a verdict and hadn’t tried to hide it from him. Whatever it was, he’d be damned if his past got in the way of what they both wanted.

This Christmas, not so saintly Nick was making sure all of Stephanie Martin’s wishes came true.

Chapter Two

Steph left the conference room party the moment Nick’s attention was drawn away.

She had the next two weeks off. If she could just slip out of the office, she could get out of this mortifying situation.

She’d had a feeling when she