Free Billionaire Novelist's Fiery Debutante by Nic Saint Page A

her with a baleful eye. “Did you sleep with him?”
    “Kiki! A lady doesn’t tell!”
    He gave her a sly smile. “But you’re not a lady.”
    “True, true. But still.” She couldn’t prevent a grin from creeping up her face.
    “You did, didn’t you?” He clapped his hands and expelled a loud laugh. “Good for you!” Then suddenly he turned serious and wagged a finger in her face. “If this Lee Child gives you any trouble, you call me, all right? I’ll set him straight. If he so much as frowns at you, I’ll break his neck, I swear.”
    “Thanks, Kiki. I guess.”
    The burly man gave a satisfied snort. “Now I will tell the others.”
    “Oh, don’t tell them, please,” she pleaded, sitting up. She just knew she wouldn’t have a moment’s peace if the others knew.
    Kiki hesitated, rubbing his chin. “Perhaps I won’t. But the moment I discover this man isn’t treating you right, I’m mobilizing the troops.”
    She flopped back onto her pillow. Just what she needed. A speaking choir commenting on her every move. Finding love was hard enough as it was, but when her friends started interfering, things were going to prove a whole lot tougher still.

CHAPTER 18

    Frankie Knox kicked the first thug in the gut. The goon went down with a pained grunt. The second thug came at him with a stiletto. Knox simply applied some of his practiced Aikido moves and moments later the Russian lay sprawled out on top of his buddy. The third heavy thought he was smart in using pure force to pummel Knox to the floor: he came charging at the dapper agent like a rhinoceros. Knox deftly stepped aside like a matador and tapped the charging hulk with the butt of his service weapon. Lights out.
    “Hands up, Mr. Knox,” an icy voice sounded in his rear. “And lose the fancy peashooter, will you?”
    Knox turned around to face his nemesis, the heavily scarred leader of the Russian crime syndicate intent on taking over his neighborhood. He narrowed his eyes as he raised his hands.
    “This is the end of the line for you, Mr. Knox,” rasped the villain. “No more wisecracks. No more puns. I’m just going to shoot you dead and be done with you.”
    “Why don’t you do it, Kharkov,” growled Knox. “Just get it over with.”
    “Oh, I will, Knox. I most definitely will,” wheezed the crime lord. “But not before I slice and dice your beloved partner Jacqueline Spark into bite-sized chunks.” The bag guy expelled a freakishly eerie laugh that cut to the bone.
    Josh lifted his hands from the keyboard and leaned back in his chair, asking himself that age-old question: how to go from here?
    He wasn’t referring to his manuscript, but to the kindling romance between himself and Chloe Thomson.
    In his thirty-eight years on this planet, he’d never felt for anyone what he felt for her, and he had to wonder if it was wise to throw himself head over heels into another romantic entanglement when the last one had cost him so much emotional effort to get out of.
    Furthermore, it seemed she was involved with this other guy. This Kiki. Oh, he didn’t blame her. It would have been a surprise if a woman of her caliber had come with no strings attached. Even though she hadn’t mentioned him, she was bound to have a boyfriend stashed away at home. Or, as it now turned out, several.
    What bothered him more, now that he’d had some time to think about it, was the fact that she hadn’t been honest about it. She could at least have mentioned the fact. Not that what they had going was serious. But still. It irked him.
    He laced his fingers behind his head and closed his eyes, Frankie Knox and his impending predicament pushed to the back of his mind now.
    When his phone rang, he instantly picked up, hoping it was Chloe. He was more than a little disappointed to find it was his mother instead.
    “Mom,” he intoned.
    “Honey! It’s your mother!”
    Mom was becoming a little hard of hearing lately, and had formed the habit of repeating