If the Shoe Fits Read Online Free Page A

tried, almost desperately, to get tipsy, buzzed, or even flat-out drunk—anything to take the edge off the overarching awkwardness that plagued her. Her mother and father had always babied her and told her how pretty and kind and lovely she was, but Sarah knew better. Her skin was nearly blue, it was so pale. Her fleshy middle and thighs were impervious to jogging and sit-ups.
    And then the boobs.
    Well, suffice to say, her chest was ample.
    When Elizabeth James died soon after Sarah’s twelfth birthday, Sarah said good-bye to her mother and, unwittingly, to her childhood. In the midst of her mourning and depression and isolation and futile attempts to love her father out of his own misery, Sarah took no notice of her body’s transformation from pudgy preteen to voluptuous Lolita. By the time she was fourteen, her father was still bringing home old-fashioned smocked dresses when her body was better suited to a Maxim cover shoot. Just like everything else in her life, as far as Sarah was concerned, her body had been all wrong .
    Somehow sex just never made it to the top of her to-do list. And now that she was a successful twenty-five-year-old businesswoman, it would have seemed patently absurd to tell anyone that she was still a virgin. Bronte Talbott, of all people, who had single-handedly crafted the advertising and PR campaign that depicted Sarah James as the quintessential voluptuary, would never have believed her.
    But something about the way Devon touched her made her feel like her too-big, too-soft body might be quite fine as far as he was concerned. Maybe even better than fine. A permanently smiling Devon Heyworth draping his hand over her shoulder and tracing his index finger along the arch of her left breast made her feel like the whole world was better than fine.
    “You do realize you are touching my breast, right?” Sarah blurted.
    Devon looked at her, continued to smile, continued to touch. “Are you going to narrate the entire evening?”
    Sarah blushed. Not just rosy cheeks, but hot, ferocious waves of heat up her chest and neck. Luckily, the back of the car was dimly lit.
    “Are you blushing?” Devon looked at her closely, his hot, boozy breath against her cheek, then looked out the car window, still touching her breast absently. “Hmm. I was under the impression that American women no longer blushed. I will have to report back to the Royal International Seduction Society at their quarterly meeting next month.”
    She smiled, mostly relieved that her narration faux pas hadn’t given her away. In that split second of contemplation at the dinner table, after which she had nonchalantly informed Devon that she was a sure thing, Sarah was all of a sudden 100 percent committed to getting rid of her virginity once and for all. It was just hanging out there in the ether. Undone. And she wanted it done.
    But she didn’t want to go through some long, tedious relationship that would require doting phone calls, feigned intimacy, and the dreaded nicknames and baby talk. Devon was undoubtedly the man for the job. Just look at him , her alter ego cried. Could he have been any better looking? Sarah thought not. And she had been around her share of photo shoots with hot Italian male models. Not to mention that he arrived prevetted, being the younger brother of her best friend’s ducal husband-to-be. Devon Heyworth was royal and witty and… fondling her breast… and…
    Sarah shook herself slightly to clear her head.
    It also helped that he was buzzed enough that he wouldn’t even know it was her first time. As long as she kept her mouth shut. Because she had to confess she did tend to err on the side of narration, especially when she was a little nervous. One more reason she probably excelled in business, because instead of cowering in the face of questions or criticism from potential buyers and investors, she simply launched into lengthy downloads of information that she had committed to memory for just such