Free The Bad Boy Billionaire: What a Girl Wants by Maya Rodale Page A

couch gazing shamelessly at Duke. He stood, hands in his pockets, staring out the window.
    “Another romantic night in,” Duke said, turning to me.
    “Is it wrong if I say that I’m tired of romantic nights in?” I replied, shutting my notebook and shaking out my hands. Seriously: how did people handwrite so much?
    Duke took my hands in his and started to massage them, rubbing out all of the tension. I sighed. Bliss.
    “What do you want to do tonight?” he asked.
    “Take a shower. A long, hot shower.” It was the truth. It was also impossible. There was no running water this high up without the electric pump working.
    “And your second choice?” Duke asked with a wry smile.
    “I want my own clothes. And a proper meal. And real light. And toilets that flush.”
    “Not loving your taste of Regency living?”
    “I love how flattering candlelight is,” I conceded. Everything little thing was so soft and lovely when lit by candles instead of overhead fluorescents. “But I confess: I want my modern conveniences back.”
    “I could boil water on the stove and make you a bath.”
    “We don’t have water,” I grumbled. Buildings this tall required electricity to pump water to the higher floors. Running water wasn’t an option. God, I missed it.
    “We’re really screwed aren’t we?” Duke said, grinning, even though there was nothing amusing about his. Still, his amusement was kind of infectious and I couldn’t help but smile and sigh and lament my tragic fate of having my hands massaged by my hot, devoted boyfriend after a day of writing what felt like a truly great book.
    “I told you. I had the worst luck lately.” But maybe I was kind of lucky. Because I had found a man I loved and work I loved.
    “And I told you I’m lucky.”
    He pressed a kiss on my lips. Just a quick little press of his lips against mine. I wanted more. I didn’t want to feel Sam on me anymore. I wanted new feelings to wash away the old ones.
    “Since we’re living it up Regency style,” Duke began, “why don’t we play cards, drink brandy and make ridiculous wagers?”
    “How do you know all that?”
    “I read your books, Janine,” he said, calling me a wrong version of my name, as he did to be cute sometimes.
    Not being a Regency gentleman, Duke did not have brandy stashed in his apartment. Unfortunately, he didn’t have cards, either. He did have a bottle of really good whiskey.
    “Now what do we do,” I asked after we settled on barstools at the kitchen counter with our drinks. A mass of candles were scattered around, illuminating this little corner of the world.
    Before he answered, Duke checked his iPhone. Of course it was off, and he was having a phantom phone moment. “Damn it. Habit,” he said. “What did people do before the Internet and Twitter?”
    “I once read about an eighteenth century house party in which all the guests would write and exchange little notes to each other after supper. It was like instant messenger before the Internet.”
    “Are you trying to get me to write you love notes?”
    “Maybe. Or perhaps I have another ulterior motive,” I said. Without waiting for his response, I ripped out a sheet of paper from my notebook and wrote something across the top. Then I folded the paper and slipped it across the counter to him.
    How did you meet Felicity?
    “It’s been on my mind,” I confessed.
    He scrawled a quick response and pushed the paper back to me: I knew you were going to ask me about her.
    I pursed my lips, annoyed. That wasn’t an answer. I gazed at him for a second and then wrote: Is anything in her book true?
    Duke grinned and wrote quickly: She does mention that I’m the greatest lover she’s ever had.
    Finding that it’s easier for me to write how I feel, rather than say it out loud, I wrote:
    I don’t want to hear about you with other lovers.
    “Me neither,” Duke said softly. We gazed each other. The candles flickered. No one spoke, no one wrote. But something was