Free A SEAL's Pleasure by Tawny Weber Page A

feat considering the erection Tessa had left him with. Rocking back on his heels in the sand, he mused that this was the first time in his life that he’d bet against his own talents.
    It’d be interesting over the next few weeks to see how many times he’d have to put those talents to the test before being declared the winner.
    That he’d win was a sure thing.
    Gabriel Thorne never lost.
    Especially when it came to the games between the sexes.

5
    â€œI T ’ S A GAME . It has to be. I mean, what kind of idiot says no to great sex because they’re holding out for romance?” Tessa asked, spitting the last word out as if it tasted nasty.
    â€œMe.” The response was accompanied by a heavily ringed hand waving absently over a frizz of orange hair, which was all that could be seen of the speaker.
    â€œYou actually believe in romance?” Tessa asked, her surprise not slowing her stomp from one end of the office that housed the heart and soul of
Flirtatious
to the other. “Given everything we write about? The relationship statistics? The long-shot odds? Heck, the men you’ve dated? With all of that data, you’re holding out for moonlit lies and sand-castle dreams?”
    â€œIt only takes one Mr. Right to beat the odds,” Maeve Bannion said absently, her attention still zeroed in on her computer screen. “And I don’t put out if he don’t put out.”
    Tessa snorted.
    â€œSo you’re saying you think guys pay for sex with romance?”
    â€œNo more than I think women pay for candlelight dinners, expensive flowers or dancing under the stars with sex.”
    Tessa frowned, her laughter fading as she thought of the many, many men who figured she’d show her appreciation sexually for being taken to a fancy restaurant or sent lavish gifts. It always seemed so fake to her. She couldn’t remember the last romantic date she’d had that wasn’t a sad, sad cliché.
    She’d written articles on that very theme. Romance by the Numbers: Ten Steps That Work On Every Woman. Or her series called Developing a Signature Style, based on tried and true textbook romantic gestures.
    It all came down to bullshit. To spinning the pitch just the right way to achieve the goal. For most men, that was sex. Which brought her back to the question of why waste time with romance?
    Tessa’s shoulders drooped, her body suddenly feeling as if it weighed a ton.
    God, she was jaded. Was that why she shunned romance?
    Because she didn’t like being disappointed? Because no man had ever moved beyond the textbook steps?
    Well, there ya go.
    One more thing she didn’t want to know about herself.
    Tessa sighed, then resumed pacing the room.
    She’d spent the entire weekend, ever since Saturday night’s engagement party, fuming. She’d tried to work her sexual frustrations off at the gym, and then to bury them in a double-caramel-fudge sundae delight.
    Nothing had helped.
    She couldn’t rant to Livi. Under normal circumstances, her best friend would have been gratifyingly sympathetic, appropriately outraged and completely supportive. But where Romeo was concerned, nothing was normal.
    So Tessa had done the next best thing.
    She’d hit the office first thing this morning, knowing that her partner would be holed up here obsessing over the specs for the next issue’s publication.
    â€œThere, in the middle of hot and heavy, the guy turned me down,” Tessa grumbled, as irritated at the fact that she, with her excellent verbal skills, had now repeated that same sentence at least nine times as she was with the sentence itself. “Can you believe the arrogant ass?”
    â€œWhy?” was all that Maeve muttered, her lanky body hunched over her computer like a gnome over its treasure. A brilliant tech, she’d been wooed by Silicon Valley numerous times. Tessa knew she stayed as much out of loyalty to the company the two women had