Welcome to the Hush hotel! Check out Room 1217â¦
A gentle knock sounded. Beck fought down the rush of excitement and opened the door calmly. âHello, May.â
She looked beautifulâwhen did she not?âand walked past him into the room. She wore a sexy black off-shoulder top that left her firm midriff bare, and a fire-engine-red clingy short skirt that hugged her hips adoringly.
Heâd invited her in for research. Right.
âThanks for coming.â
âI havenât yet, but youâre welcome.â Smiling, May faced him, and whatever uncertainty had been plaguing her before was gone. She was on fire, eyes bright and sure.
âUh, would you like a drink firstââ
She held up a hand to stop him. âLetâs just do it, Beck.â
Her soft words had the opposite effect on his arousal. He needed to focus on the scene playing out before him, focus on his book. He grabbed his laptop. âMind if I take notes?â
âKnock yourself out.â
She stood still for a second. Putting her hands on the hem of the shirt, she lifted it slowly, exposing full round breasts capturedâbarely, it seemedâin a few inches of sheer black lace, nipples clearly visible under the sheer fabric.
Beckâs hands froze on the keyboard. Oh, my.
Dear Reader,
Who wouldnât want to be treated to a week in a luxury boutique hotel in Manhattan? Especially a âdiscreetâ hotel like Hush, where anything goes and the staff is trained to lift no eyebrows and refuse no request.
My heroine, small-town girl May Ellison, rebounding from the only relationship sheâs ever had, thinks this is not a bad idea either, especially once she meets sexy celebrity author Beck Desmond. During her week at Hush, May gets to indulge herself at the spa, pool, library, restaurant and a certain unusually titillating barâ¦.
Welcome to the fabulous miniseries, DO NOT DISTURB, brought to you by yours truly and some of my favorite Harlequin Blaze authors. We worked closely together to create this fabulous fantasy place. Want a virtual visit? Go to www.hushhotel.com and check yourself in. Canât get enough? Spend time at www.eHarlequin.com as the seriesâ books come out, and look for each authorâs bonus short story, set in one of Hushâs rooms. You can also chat with the authors on the site and ask us questions!
Finally, donât miss the excerpt from the next DO NOT DISTURB story, Kiss & Makeup by Alison Kent, at the end of this book.
Hope you enjoy May and Beckâs adventure and the miniseries! Let me know. You can e-mail me through my Web site, www.IsabelSharpe.com.
Cheers,
Isabel Sharpe
To Tracy Miller,
who has brought so much happiness to those I love best
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
MEMORANDUM
To: Staff
From: Janice Foster, General Manager, HUSH Hotel
Date: Sunday, July 6
Re: Trevor Little
Mr. Trevor Little will be bringing another guest this week. We will be following the usual pattern of gifts: flowers Monday, spa visit Tuesday, bracelet Wednesday, negligee Thursday and the molded chocolate sculpture Friday. Reminder: please treat his guest with absolute courtesy and do not act as if youâve seen him here before. As usual, calls to his room should be forwarded to his voice mail and anyone asking for him should be told he is not registered here.
Note on housekeeping board:
Someone else gets to clean Trevor Littleâs room. I got it last time. Yick!
IF SHE THOUGHT of the Midwest Airlines airplane as a womb, and the jetway into Newark airport as a birth canal, then May Hope Ellison figured she was about to be reborn. Her first symbolic breaths of new life were only yards away in the hallowed area outside gate B40.
Okay, so maybe that was pushing it.
Sheâd been planning to fly into LaGuardia since Manhattan was her destination, but Trevor had insisted she fly into Newark. To save her the traffic and hassle of LaGuardia, heâd said. And with luck, heâd get out of his meeting in New Jersey early and be able to meet her on the eleven-thirty-five train to Penn Station.
Mayâs mother, born and bred in Wisconsin, but lived in the Big Apple for a couple of years before she married, had shrugged and said sheâd never had any trouble at LaGuardia.
Of course May hadnât told her mother about Trevor. Mom thought May was exploring New York with her high school friend Ginny. Mothers didnât generally get very excited about daughters flying halfway across the country to spend a week of wild passion in a luxury boutique hotel with a man they barely knew.
Well, maybe they did get excited. But not in a good way.
One more step, around the corner, and there was her first sight of her new temporary life andâ Wow. Lots of gates. Lots of noise. Lots and lots of people. This was not Milwaukee. And it certainly wasnât Oshkosh.
She wasnât aware sheâd stopped dead until someone bumped into her and muttered something not terribly flattering or polite.
Forward, then, going with the flow, heading out of the gate-studded cul-de-sac, up a long corridor, then around another corner into the main terminal. Even more people. Security lines many many yards long, three of them, two and three people deep. She clutched the directions Trevor had e-mailed her and followed signs for the shuttle to the N.J. Transit train that would take her into the city.