Keep Me Wanting

By Angela Addams

All I’ve ever tried to do is keep the people in my life safe. That’s gotten me into hot water more times than I can count. Hell, the last time got me four years behind bars.

So when my favorite barista tells her mom that I’m her boyfriend to stop the woman’s endless criticism, I can’t stop myself from helping her out. But she’s too innocent and I’m too damaged for this to ever be the real deal.

I can’t allow myself to touch her, not when making her mine will drag her into my world and drown her in my messed up life. What I really need to do is stay away.

Except every touch and every accidental kiss breaks my control. I want her.

Then I find out her dad is the detective who put me away...and he’s trying to take down my family.

I don’t blame him. The secrets I’m keeping are big enough to destroy everything.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Feb 10, 2020
• ISBN: 9781640638938

Angela Addams

Angela Addams is an author of many naughty things. She believes that the written word is an amazing tool for crafting the most erotic of scenarios and likes telling stories about normal people getting down and dirty and falling in love. Enthralled by the paranormal at an early age, Angela also spends a lot of her time thinking up new story ideas that involve supernatural creatures in everyday situations. She is an avid tattoo collector, a total book hoarder, and loves anything covered in chocolate…except for bugs. She lives in Ontario, Canada in an old, creaky house, with her husband, children and four moody cats.

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Dedicated to Linda Farnes-Copan: A true friend who has been with me through thick and thin.

Chapter One

Maggie

I bet I could bounce a quarter off that ass.

Yo, Maggie, close your mouth and quit drooling. Stella snaps a towel at my butt before turning to pull a cake from the display cabinet. I need a double shot vanilla iced latte. You on it or what?

Yeah, got it. I cough, feel the burn of embarrassment rising from my chest to my cheeks. I shift my hair so it hides the worst of the red and get to work.

I sneak a peek at him, the guy who has me drooling all over myself. He’s third in line and looking delicious as always. Liam of-no-last-name, who comes in for a coffee every morning—or at least every morning I’ve been working at the Coffee Hut—so that’s like four months now. He’s got these eyes, brown I think, dark and penetrating, a look so intense that I swear he’s undressing every woman he sees. Maybe not me—I could blend into most walls if I stood still enough—but a woman like Stella, vivacious and flirty? Yep, he totally imagined her naked.

Heck, I’ve imagined her naked.

One double shot vanilla iced latte, I say as I slide the coffee over to the waiting customer.

Stella serves the next person in line. I start pouring Liam’s drink. Black. Some mornings he likes a shot of butterscotch.

Maggie, can you help the next customer, please? I need to get some more napkins from the back. She doesn’t wait for me to respond. She just leaves.

I look over at Liam. He’s watching her walk away. Her ass sways naturally, like she was born knowing how to pull all eyes in her direction.

Thanks, Stella. She knows I’ve been fantasizing about Liam for months, lusting over his muscles, his face, that chiseled jaw, thinking about running my fingers over that stubble that’s sometimes there. Pressing against those pouty lips he has or licking along the scar on his cheek.

My face gets hotter if that’s possible. I keep my eyes down. No problem, I mumble. I wipe my hands on the towel and move to the cash. Is today a butterscotch day?

Excuse me? His voice is so gruff, like he’s gargled in liquid sex.

I snap my eyes up, suddenly panicked. Maybe he doesn’t get a shot some days. Am I remembering it wrong? I thought you liked your coffee black with a shot of butterscotch every once in a while.

Oh, sure, I do. He offers a smile. It’s not a big one, just a slight turn of his lips, but it’s there. That’d be great, thanks.

I try to smile back nonchalantly, but I can’t control what my mouth is doing. I go all crazy smile on him, like flash my teeth and set my burning red cheeks on full display. My eyes are probably sparklingly with unconfined lust.

His eyes flick to my chest, where I can feel my nipples harden. Wearing a cotton bra might be comfortable, but it does nothing to disguise the twins from jutting at the slightest breeze—or penetrating gaze.

And your muffins look great today.

Um…huh? I choke on the words, sputtering a little as I do. My-y-y muff—

He smirks, his eyes back on mine, raising a finger to point toward the display of blueberry muffins. Those muffins look delicious. I’ll have one of them, too.

Oh, right, of course. I whoosh out the words like I’ve been holding my breath and do a once over of his body while I’m punching his order into the computer. The top button of his dress shirt is undone, a hint of a tattoo poking just under the collar. I trail my eyes down his torso to his black slacks. Do you want your muffin heated?

I did not just say that, not like that with my eyes so obviously glued to his crotch.

He chuckles. Who doesn’t like a warm muffin?

I look back up at him and wonder if this is really happening. Sexual innuendo word play at nine a.m. with the sexiest man alive? With melted butter drizzling down the sides? I’ve cocked an eyebrow, like this is some kind of game I’m good at.

Now he really smiles, and it sends a jolt of heat through my eyes, down my spine, and straight to my belly. He opens his mouth, and I can’t help but wonder for the millionth time what it would feel like to have those lips skimming across my collarbone or what those thick fingers of his could do to my—

I got this. Stella shoos me to the side. That’ll be four-eighty, Mr. Liam. Stop drooling, she adds out of the corner of her mouth.

It snaps me out of my lusty brain freeze, but I stand there lost for a moment, like I can’t quite remember how to do anything but breathe, if I’m even doing that. He’s still smiling at me. I picture myself standing there, hands at my sides, mouth agape, staring.

Butter would be great. Thanks, Maggie.

Oh God, he knows my name. I abort any attempt to smile back, grab a muffin, and then turn away, keeping busy while my head nearly explodes. What just happened? I talked to him. He talks. He jokes. He…flirts? Was I reading that wrong?

My heart is thudding, my nerves zinging, and yeah, my hands are shaking. A guy like Liam, all tall, dark, and mysterious, doesn’t flirt with girls like me. I’m average everything. Nothing to draw the eye in my direction. I’ve got this hair that has a mind of its own; sometimes it’s blond, sometimes it’s brown, sometimes it’s curly, sometimes it’s not—the sun and time of year play havoc with it, and hair products literally laugh in distain when I attempt to wrangle it into place. I’m resigned to ponytails most days or, like today, a strategically placed headband. I could probably lose a few, twenty, pounds, but working at the coffee shop part time with a food discount doesn’t help the waistline much. I like to think of it as baby fat that’s just too comfortable to leave the curve of my hips and cheeks.

Baby fat, I snort. Yeah, right.

I graduated college five months ago with a degree in marketing, a head full of what ifs, and a debt the size of luxury car, minus the car. I’m working the Coffee Hut every morning and then head to one of two options on any given day: my second job at the mall information desk or an interview in my field. A field that I was so sure would get me working and up the ranks well ahead of my sisters, both uber-successful lawyers who stayed in school despite the mounting tuition bills, who both incurred the massive debt and then paid it off by the time they were thirty.

I had big plans when I started my post-secondary pathway. I’m a creative, determined to work my magic in marketing, a field that I find exceptionally intriguing, a field that hundreds if not thousands of other graduates also find exceptionally intriguing. Hundreds of graduates who I’m competing with at every interview I go to.

The marketing firms want interns, and while I understand the logic there, young energetic work at no pay, prove your worth and all that, I simply can’t afford it. I need a job that will pay me for my creative energy so that I can start to tackle this debt and get my life under control.

My family thinks I’m wasting my time. You’re smart, Maggie. Write your LSATs. Do something with your life. But I have a plan, or at least I thought I did. While I was doing my degree, I thought for sure I’d be snapped up by some hot as Hell promotions company doing big events or something before I even graduated.

When that didn’t happen, I became convinced that a dream job was just an interview away. A few months ago, I came to the bitter realization that what college really sells is a pipe dream. I’ve had to lower my expectations.

Now I’m just hoping to land a killer internship and somehow get by on the jobs I currently have.

You think you can handle taking it to him, Maggie, or will your panties catch fire if you get too close? Stella is standing at my side watching me butter up Liam’s warm muffin.

I nudge her with my elbow. Shut up, I hiss, glancing over my shoulder at Liam. He’s sitting at his usual table, looking hot, oblivious to my raging hormones and the fact that I undress him with my eyes every time I look at him.

Hey, maybe you should ask him.

No.

You’re running out of time, girl. And really, what’s there to lose at this point? Carpe the fuck out of that diem is what I say.

I look at him again. Absolutely not. I pick up the plate and his coffee cup and leave the counter before she can say anything more.

Ask him. What exactly? Well, it’s nine a.m. on the Friday before the biggest, five-years-in-the-making family reunion that my mom and her side of the family have been planning. She’s due to arrive here in a matter of minutes, expecting me to produce a boyfriend who might just happen to look a lot like Liam but who doesn’t actually exist, not in the context that I’ve created, anyway.

My mom is seriously going to kill me if she finds out I’ve been lying to her. Worse than that, she’s going to blame me for ruining her dream family reunion by insisting on being unsuccessful and unattached, like it’s some personal dig against her that keeps me from landing the perfect job and the perfect man.

I was a total oops baby. Not unloved or unwanted, just unplanned. And so, given the huge age gap between me and my sisters, I’m also pretty independent…which means I like to do things my way. I have failed in so many ways to fill the space that my family has carved out for me, and I continually miss the mark trying to fulfill the image of perfection my mom likes us to present to the world. It’s not that I don’t want the perfect job. I just want it to be my perfect job.

Here you go, I manage to mumble as I set Liam’s stuff down.

He glances up from his paper and smiles again. Thanks, Maggie.

The way he says my name, like the butter that’s melting on his muffin, makes me feel bold, as if I could actually ask him if he wouldn’t mind playing along.

What are you reading? I blurt. The newspaper, you idiot.

He glances down at the paper. Just the business news. He pulls the muffin plate toward him, and when I don’t leave, he quirks an eyebrow.

I look up at the clock. Mom is on her way for sure. She’ll be here any moment, expecting to find a successful, fully functioning adult male by my side. One who has a real job and a bank account and who looks like a sex god, er, model with all those muscles and brooding expressions.

I suck in a deep breath. Let it out slowly. Carpe Diem?

Yeah, right.

So, I was wondering if you’d be willing to do me a favor?

A favor? He curls his fingers around the handle of his mug but doesn’t lift it.

Uh, yeah, because I did this thing. I mean, I have this problem.

I let out another breath and then collapse in the chair opposite him. I can feel Stella’s eyes on me. I know she’s judging. I sit up and straighten my back in a vain effort to push my boobs out more, somehow thinking that that’s going to help. My mom, she’s always on my case to bring a boyfriend to our family things, and we’ve got this reunion, and I kinda, maybe, let her believe that a guy, named Liam, who looks strikingly similar to you, has been my boyfriend for the last few months.

I rush my story, speaking so fast I’m not sure he’s actually following. His eyes widen then narrow. I’m not asking you to come. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t inflict my family on you. I let out a nervous laugh. It’s just that, my mom, she was planning this with my granddad and, well, he passed, so I was trying to avoid upsetting her.

I suck in a deep breath, tears burn my eyes, and my heart clenches. He died five years ago, but he was the anchor of our family, and his death still feels like a gaping hole. It’s a huge deal for her, you know, because life is so short, and my granddad, he really wanted this to happen, all these family members are coming that we’ve never met before. I mean, it’s a big deal to everyone in my family but especially Mom.

I attempt a smile and shove the sappy stuff way down in my gut. I cannot go all teary on this poor man. So Mom is super stressed, and when she gets this stressed, sheesh, look out. She channels it directly at me and my less-than-perfect life.

I flop back into my chair again and blow air up my face so that my straggling curls that have escaped the headband puff away from my eyes. Anyway, what I’m trying to say but butchering horribly is that my mom is expecting me to bring someone, and I was wondering if you’d play along for, like, five minutes. Just long enough to make her believe that you’re my boyfriend so that I get her out of here before she makes a scene. I’ll deal with not having an actual date later.

My face is on fire. I can feel the flames on my cheeks. My head might explode. I glance down, daring a look at him through my eyelashes. I’ll totally buy your coffee for the next two months. I add the last part out of sheer desperation because the look on his face is a little hard to read, but it definitely doesn’t seem enthusiastic.

The silence hangs. I clamp my mouth shut. Stella clangs something at the counter then curses quietly. I gulp. Sweat trickles down my back. Fuuuuuck, this is awkward.

He lifts his fingers from the mug, rubs the corners of his mouth, studies me with those eyes, like he’s trying to figure out what in the hell is wrong with the girl who serves him coffee every morning. Then he clears his throat, pushes his chair back, gets up, and leaves.

Oh. My. God. I want to die. All of my insides are pooling in my feet. I can’t believe I did that. Of course he just left. He probably thinks I’m a fucking lunatic.

Stella is at my side. She grabs my shirt and tugs me to my marshmallow feet. I can’t feel my lower body. It’s like I’m detached from myself.

Please tell me I didn’t just— I choke. Oh fuck.

No time for this, Mags. Heads up, your mom is coming in.

I turn toward the door. My mom is there with her beaming smile, her hair piled high on her head, face done up, nails manicured, wearing a sundress that looks fresh and breezy and heels that are way too high for any sane human but that she rocks as usual.

Margaret, sweetie, is it break time already? She glances at Liam’s uneaten muffin sitting abandoned on the table in front of me. No wonder you’ve put on so much weight if that’s what you’re eating everyday!

Chapter Two

Liam

Of all the things I thought might come out of the sexy-as-sin woman’s pretty little mouth, a fake boyfriend proposition was not one of them. Girls I know—knew, actually, since I haven’t known many girls in the last four years—don’t ask things like that. They want some cash, or the connection, or to get to my brother so they can be on the arm of a real badass.

But Maggie, the sweet coffee girl I see every day…she doesn’t even know who I am, and yet she asks me to, what, pretend I’m the boyfriend who’s supposed to be her date to some family thing? Like I’m some upstanding citizen that she’d want to show off to her folks?

Unreal.

I’m not an upstanding citizen. Not anymore. Not now that I’ve got a criminal record and a hardened heart to go with it.

My brother made sure of that.

It wasn’t supposed to be that way. I had dreams. Plans. I wanted to open my own business, like a legit one, maybe a bar or a restaurant. A chain of them somewhere far away from what my family is becoming. Use the capital I’ve built to really do something that will last, something I could pass along to my own kids one day.

When Dad got sick, things really fell apart. The stroke nearly killed him, and for eight years, I think I’ve been holding out hope that somehow he’ll come back to us and be the man he once was. But each year that goes by, his medical needs get more pronounced, and I’ve realized that my dad as I knew him is gone. He can’t speak, and he can’t move on his own.

And he sure as hell can’t stop his eldest son, my brother Shawn, from taking the Doyle family name and turning it into something dark and dangerous.

Shawn and I, we used to be super fucking tight. All of us brothers were. But when Dad got sick, some kind of switch flipped in Shawn, and he became this guy who would do anything. At first, he’d do anything to protect us, to keep us from losing the house because Dad couldn’t anymore, but then Shawn turned into the guy who would do anything to get ahead, to get rich. Including betray me.

Dad has no idea that I’d been set up so I was arrested and did the time Shawn should’ve served. With the way Dad is now, I don’t even know if he realizes that I’m back—or that I was even gone for four fucking years.

Now I’m trying my best to keep my brothers, Cormac and Ronan, from following Shawn down the same dark path. But I’m not my dad, and I don’t think I can stop the train wreck that’s coming. Shawn cares about no one but himself, and I am constantly worried that my brothers are going to end up doing time or, worse, dead because of him.

My family isn’t the kind to brag about, and the fact that Maggie even asked me to pretend to be the kind of guy who deserves to hold her hand… Shit, it was more than I could handle.

She was looking at me with these big green eyes of hers, her cheeks a pretty shade of pink, her ample chest heaving, and what did I do? I got up and walked out. Because how was I supposed to respond to something like that? She wouldn’t want to get involved with a guy like me, not even for five minutes. Not if she knew what kind of guy I am.

Now I’ve got my eyes on my car, ready to get the hell out of here, when I see that there’s one bundle of roses left for sale among a pile of carnations in a plastic bin filled with water at the corner store.

I stop walking.

She’d never have to know my family history or who I am. There’s no way she’d be dragged into my Hellish world in the span of five minutes. Right?

I pick up the roses, the water dripping from the unevenly cut stems onto my shoes.

Maggie needs my help, and I have to admit, it took a lot of balls to ask me for such a wild favor in the first place. And it’s not like I haven’t fantasized a million fucking times what it would be like to be with a girl like Maggie.

I can never have a girl like her. Not with who I am now.

But would it hurt to pretend?

Am I seriously talking myself into this?

I buy the roses. I even ask them to cut the thorns off.

Maggie doesn’t see me walk in at first because she’s too busy answering her mother’s rapid-fire questions. She’s got her hands up like her mom’s got a gun on her, taking one step backward at a time, trying to get distance, but her mother is following her.

This is the uniform they make you wear? Her mother tsks in that disapproving way some mothers have. Don’t they have a bigger size? It’s really too tight. She leans forward and pretends to whisper. For goodness sake, your boobs are practically falling out.

I stifle a growl. I like that tight shirt. It highlights the curve of her tits in the hottest way, like they’re just gonna burst free at any moment. Fantasy fodder when I’m rubbing one out.

You’re not going to your interview later dressed like that, are you, dear?

I have a change of clothes in the back, Maggie mumbles.

Interview? She’s looking for a job?

Maybe it’s the clothes you’re wearing to these interviews that’s preventing you from getting a job. Go get your change of clothes. Let me look at them.

Mother, I told you, I’m not getting any jobs because it’s me against, like, a hundred people, every time.

Well, you could choose a different field, you know. Your sisters—

Marketing is my field. I like my field. It’s just tough out there right now. I’ll find something, maybe today. My interview is at two.

You know how I feel about all this. Her mother waves her hand around. Wasted time.

The other coffee girl, the one with the purple hair and fuck-me eyes, tries her best to get Maggie’s mom to shift directions. Ms. Chandler, can I get you a coffee?

I feel the blood drain from my face. Chandler?

Maggie’s mother turns her head so I can see her face as she looks over the coffee menu. I take out my phone and scroll through the files my brother Ronan sent me. I pull up a series of pictures. Rebecca Chandler. Pieces I really don’t want to connect start coming together.

Ohhhhhhh fuck.

So where’s this boyfriend of yours, Liam something or other? She isn’t looking at Maggie, but Maggie is sure as shit looking at her. Come on, Margaret, you’ve talked about this man like he’s God’s gift. Where is he?

Maggie’s face has gone red. Her mouth is open, and I can see her thoughts are spinning. Well, um, he’s busy with work, so he might not be able to make it…?

I’m standing there with flowers in my hand, hiding behind a shelf filled with decorative mugs and potted plants, wondering if I can get out the door without being seen while at the same time knowing that there’s no way in Hell I can let Maggie suffer, not when her mother is expecting her to produce this boyfriend and I’m the perfect guy for the job.

Despite having a firm grip on common sense, I know I can’t let her handle this alone even though I now know she’s Maggie Chandler, daughter of Detective Fredrick Chandler, the very man who has been gunning for my family for years now, the man who put me away, and the man who probably would give his left nut to put my brother behind bars for good.

Oh, Margaret, don’t tell me you broke up with him?

Mom, I-I-I… She’s sinking with panic in her eyes.

I suck in a deep breath then let it slide out of me, shaking my head the whole time. I just can’t walk away when someone is floundering that