Pleasure Island Read Online Free Page A

had decimated her, not least because it had been so unexpected.
    Well, she had certainly had a lesson in humility, make no goddamn mistake about that. That treacherous bastard had been her life, and moreover he was one of the only people who knew her past. Her real past .
    Bailey cleared his throat and wondered if it might be too early for a nip of Cognac. A meeting with Mia practically demanded it.
    â€˜How’s Josh?’ he asked. ‘Still busy battling it out on the pub circuit with his little pals, turning it all the way up to eleven?’ Joshua was Mia’s latest in a long line of revenge fucks, the prerequisite being the younger the better. Still, he regretted the words as soon as he’d spoken them. He needed her on side today, especially after what he was about to put to her. His fat ass depended on it.
    Mia’s arched brow twitched. ‘You may mock, Bailey –’ she crossed her legs, a defiant swing of tanned skin ‘– but actually Josh -ua has had a recent breakthrough career-wise.’
    She sounded smug. She was. After all, what woman wouldn’t be? Joshua Jones, or JJ as his adoring legion of young female fans called him, had just signed a rather lucrative record deal, or rather his band, The Dopamines , had. He was young and talented with the face of an angel and the kind of body that had made women want to drop to their knees, even at her age. Two can play at that game, Dickie darling.
    â€˜Sony has given him a two-album deal.’ She flashed him an sickly smile. ‘He’ll be a star in no time, mark my words.’
    â€˜Good for him.’ Bailey was unable to fully disguise the surprise in his voice. From what he’d seen of Josh -ua , that useless layabout would be lucky to get a kite off the ground in gale force winds.
    â€˜Isn’t it?’ came her rhetorical response. Joshua Jones was just another walking dick as far as Mia was concerned, another way of trying to fill the bottomless black void inside her. Still, as far as revenge fucks went he was certainly above average: terribly young, terribly energetic, and terribly eager to please.
    Her mind flashed back to that morning as she had looked down at him between her open thighs, his curtain of soft, wavy, blond hair – so very rock star – gently brushing against her pelvis ...
    â€˜You’ve done this before,’ she’d smiled between gasps, his breath warm against her delicate skin, ‘many times.’ He’d glanced up at her and grinned, wet lips glistening. So what if he was young enough for her to have given birth to him (and brought him up), she was Mia Manhattan, for fuck’s sake, and he was an aspiring rock star who she could introduce to people. It was a mutually advantageous arrangement, for now at least.
    Bailey flashed a warm smile that belied his true feelings. Silly old bint, flashing her clout to men young enough to be her second son, she was making a fool of herself with this conveyor belt of virtual teenagers keeping her four-poster-bed warm, the latest being the most wet behind the ears, and the most cerebrally challenged. When the lad spoke, the word lobotomy sprang to mind.
    Mia looked past Bailey and out onto the spectacular midtown-Manhattan skyline displayed like a postcard behind him in the floor-to-ceiling office window. The Empire State, Chrysler and Rockefeller buildings in all their art-deco inspired splendour, spires standing erect and proud in a one-fingered salute to the world. God, she loved New York. New York, New York, so damned good they named it twice. She’d never tired of it in the decades she’d been coming here. What was it Liberace once said ... ‘too much of a good thing is ... wonderful.’
    â€˜This is the thing, sugar.’ Bailey had no choice but to give it to her straight. She was too long in the bloody tooth to bullshit; besides, he needed to play this one very cool indeed. A lot was riding on it,