Free A Taste of Heaven (Billionaires' Secrets Book 3) by Jennifer Lewis Page A

resting delicately above the dark purple horizon. “Maybe I’m getting older or something.” He looked at her, humor shining in his eyes. “Who am I kidding? Of course I’m getting older. But lately, I find I need to step off the carousel and reconnect with nature. With myself.”
    He frowned, as if embarrassed by his confession. “And I thought you might like to do that, too.”
    A very strange sensation rose inside Sam. She absolutely believed him. He’d chosen her, out of all the women in the world—a good percentage of whom would no doubt be willingly at his disposal—to share his special place with.
    Without the promise of even a touch, let alone a kiss.
    That touched her somewhere far more powerful and vulnerable than her skin.
    She covered her confusion with a sip of her drink. She wondered if she should say something, but Louis didn’t seem to expect her to. He’d brought in the picnic basket and he opened it and unloaded some supplies into the small fridge. “We have fruit and cheese if you’re hungry, and there’s plenty of bread left. If you like, we could catch some shrimp. There’s a grill out on the deck.”
    Sam laughed. ‘That’s self-sufficient! Let’s leave the shrimp alone, though. They deserve some peace and quiet, too. How did you come to build way out here?”
    “My granddad owned the land.” Louis popped the cap off a second bottle of soda water. She watched his powerful neck swell as he took a swig. “Or at least it used to be land.” He smiled ruefully. “It’s been underwater for as long as I can remember, but he said it used to be dry and that you could walk out here from the road.”
    “That’s hard to imagine.”
    “I like it better like this. Somehow a destination seems more worthwhile if there’s a bit of a journey to get there.”
    “I guess you’d have to have that perspective if you have restaurants all over the world and travel a lot.”
    “I grew up traveling. My mom’s a musician, so I went with her on tour every summer.”
    “That must have been fun.”
    “Fun, exhausting, confusing, exciting. A little bit of everything. Made me who I am, though. I make friends easily and I can settle in pretty much anywhere at a moment’s notice. One of my friends teases me that the whole reason I opened my restaurants is so I can have a roomful of friends to drop in on in any city I visit.”
    “That’s a nice idea.”
    Louis chuckled. “I think she might just be right.”
    Sam’s smile faltered at the mention of a “she.” Which was ridiculous. How on earth could she be jealous of some woman she’d never even heard of who probably really was only a friend?
    Especially when she had no real personal relationship with him at all.
    Other than being the first woman invited to his special place.
    And having spent one night in his bed.
    The memory of his strong arms around her assaulted her like an anxiety attack. He’d rolled up his sleeves and she could see his powerful forearms clearly, even in the dusky gloom. The exertion of their journey had rendered him rather rumpled and he looked more boyish and innocent than he had yesterday.
    She probably looked pretty rumpled, too, though she managed to resist peeking down at her clothes to check. Lord knew what this humidity was doing to her hair.
    Then again, maybe she also looked cute and girlish.
    She tried not to giggle. Suddenly she felt like a teenager.
    For the first time in her life, she was alone, in a sexually charged situation—let’s face it, the sexual tension was so thick in the air she could smell it even over all the cedar—with a man her own age.

 
    Chapter Eleven
     
    “I bet you’re a painter.” Louis’s low voice jarred her out of her contemplation.
    “You mean, painting pictures?”
    He nodded. “When you look at things you seem to linger and take in all the elements of the image in front of your eyes.”
    Sam blinked. Her heart started pounding. “I, uh, used to paint...a