Excerpt of Private Party by Amanda McIntyre

Damn, I have shoes older than him

I watched the new guy, Ryan—whom I’d hired for the advertising department—from the corner of my eye as he tapped a stack of papers on the copy machine. He had great hands, though I would never tell anyone my little fetish about a guy’s hands. Some women notice a man’s ass (granted Ryan’s wasn’t bad) or the size of his shoes (unfortunately, my Frank killed that theory the first time I saw him naked). But guys’ hands show the character of the man, in my opinion. And Ryan, aside from his other stellar attributes, had the kind of hands you can imagine gliding over your skin. Hands that exuded strength and looked as if they weren’t afraid of a little hard work, but at the same time could knock you off the bed with their expertise.

Of course, it was just a theory.

As

Passions executive editor, it was my duty to notice the little things. That’s why for a week I’d been carefully scrutinizing his facial expressions, the way his dress slacks, neatly creased in all the right places, hung perfectly from his narrow waist. He had an array of freshly starched button-down dress shirts that fit across the impressive breadth of his shoulders. I hadn’t seen one that looked like it hadn’t been to Murphy’s Dry Cleaning next door.

That alone made me curious as to how close by Mr. Perfect lived. Yes, Mr. Perfect. He always wore a tie, always had that shirt tucked neat and his hair cropped short at the neck and above his ears, leaving a mop of coal-black curls atop his head. It was the only unruly thing about him, that and his wicked smile. Which— I’d overheard one day in the women’s restroom— could make you wet in ten seconds flat.

Damn, I wish I could remember what that felt like.