Ian's Way Read Online Free

yes and then he would show her—
    Jeezus , talk about fantasies. It was all she could do to keep from making a mad dash to Ian’s suite right now. Some nerve he had, getting her all worked up like this, with no chance to sort through her feelings and her memories.
    So long ago…and yet so fresh.
    Nikky tried to tune back into the conversation. They were still talking about Ian.
    “Is he rich?” Gretchen asked. “I bet he invented something. He was always doing weird experiments.”
    “I have no idea,” Nikky said. “We didn’t talk about money.”
    “Did he ask you out?” Gretchen pressed.
    “He has a suite upstairs,” Kaity volunteered, her mouth working faster than her brain, as usual. “He invited Nikky to stay with him for the night.”
    Nikky glared.
    “Oh my gosh ,” exclaimed Kaity looking like the proverbial deer in headlights. “I wasn’t supposed to tell.”
    “You know,” Nikky fumed, furious over the broken confidence. “Ian said I deserve better lovers and maybe I deserve better friends too.”
    Kaity’s eyes went wide with hurt.
    Nikky wished she take the words back.
    Ian was the one she was really upset with, on account of his coming back into her life and turning everything upside down. From platonic friend to enticing would-be lover—zero to sixty, no context, no nothing.
    After a decade of giving her the cold shoulder.
    It didn’t add up. Here he was all pumped up for one night but he was making it clear the sex wouldn’t lead to anything else. Ian was a lot of things but superficial wasn’t one of them.
    No, there was something off here, a flaw in Ian’s usually impeccable logic, and she meant to find it.

Chapter Two
     
    Ian had passed the point of hope when he finally heard the knock on the door.
    He was naked except for a pair of silk boxers, having changed into them for his nightly meditational exercises.
    “Hello Nikky ,” he said, his voice even, his breathing perfectly centered.
    She stood in the doorway, momentarily taken aback. There was no mistaking the way her eyes travelled down his body, lingering just a little too long on his crotch.
    The action was healthy and normal on her part but it seemed to embarrass Nikky that she had been caught.
    “I am not here for sex,” she informed him quickly. “So you can wipe that idea right out of your mind.”
    “I don’t have anything in mind, Nikky . I told you, it is your call.”
    Her gaze narrowed. He had touched a nerve. She pointed a single, pink-nailed finger at him. “No Ian, I’m not letting you pawn off all this on me. This so-called offer of yours is a joke. It seems so noble and I’m supposed to just give in, right? Sex with no strings attached or else I look like the bad guy, turning you away after you’ve had all these fantasies?”
    He was ready with a response but she was just getting wound up. “The thing is,” she said, barely pausing for breath. “Sex always comes with strings attached, at least for people like us. Or are you telling me this is going to be something our bodies do, no feelings, in which case you might as well pay a hooker. But you don’t want a hooker, you want to live out this illusion—the perfect cheerleader girl you didn’t get to fuck in high school and now you can get her to come to you because she is so hard up.
    “What’s the deal, Ian? You got friends you are going to brag to about this tomorrow? I have Kaity and she will talk about this to everyone. She won’t be able to not talk about it just as I won’t be able to keep from telling her all about it tomorrow morning after you and I go our separate ways. And what happens after that? Am I going to be a notch in your belt? That doesn’t fit with the Ian I knew if I can say I ever knew you.”
    Ian arched a brow. “Wow, now why don’t you tell me what you really think.”
    Nikky tried not to laugh. This shouldn’t be funny, not by a long shot.
    “I think I need a drink,” she decided.
    Ian let her in. “I took