His Accidental Cure: The Runaway Contract Wife

The edges of her torn dress snagged on the elevator's brass handle. Jeanie Brooks stumbled in, her vision swimming, the world tilting on a sickening axis. The hallucinogen Denise had slipped into her champagne was a tidal wave, pulling her under.

Her finger jabbed at the 'door close' button, a frantic, repetitive motion. Through the narrowing gap, she saw the blurred figures of the Nash family's bodyguards rounding the corner.

The doors slid shut just as their hands reached for the opening. A soft chime echoed in the small space, a sound completely at odds with the frantic hammering of her own heart. The hotel's security system hadn't glitched on its own. Denise had paid a busboy handsomely to swipe a master keycard, intending to send Jeanie to the room of a sleazy, low-level executive on the fourth floor. But in his haste, the nervous busboy had swiped the card twice, activating the emergency override. The elevator bypassed all other floors, shooting her straight to the top-a level not open to the public.

Ding.

The doors opened to darkness. Jeanie lurched forward, her body a puppet with cut strings. Her foot caught on something large and ceramic, sending a towering vase crashing to the marble floor.

The explosive shatter ripped through the silence of the presidential suite, startling the man on the sofa. Devaughn Winters had been pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying to withstand the migraine that was the prelude to his PTSD episode.

He smelled a foreign perfume-something floral and sweet, a stark contrast to the sterile emptiness of his suite. A wave of nausea, visceral and immediate, rolled through his stomach.

"Get out," he rasped, his voice a low growl in the pitch-black room.

Jeanie's mind, ravaged by the drug, couldn't process the threat. The deep, resonant sound was a lifeline in a swirling vortex of panic. She scrambled towards it, a drowning woman reaching for driftwood.

Her hot, trembling body collided with his, landing squarely in his lap. Her hands, desperate for an anchor, fisted the collar of his expensive dress shirt.

Devaughn's entire body went rigid. Every muscle tensed, bracing for the inevitable, soul-crushing panic attack that any human touch triggered.

One second.

Two.

The expected suffocation, the feeling of his throat closing, didn't come. Instead, a strange, profound calm settled over his frayed nerves. It was like a switch being flipped in his brain.

"So hot," Jeanie mumbled, her voice a pained whisper. Her fingers, acting on pure instinct, fumbled with the knot of his tie, pulling it loose.

Devaughn was frozen in a state of shock. He was not only tolerating this woman's touch, he was... craving more. The migraine that had been splitting his skull in two was receding.

He tentatively lifted a hand, his fingers brushing against the back of her head. The heat radiating from her skin was a grounding force, the first real sensation he'd felt in five years that wasn't pain or revulsion. It felt like his soul, which had been floating untethered, had finally landed.

The cool touch of his palm against her feverish skin made Jeanie arch her back. She tilted her head up, her lips pressing blindly against the column of his throat.

That single, desperate act ignited a possessiveness Devaughn had suppressed for years. He shifted his weight, reversing their positions, pressing her down into the supple leather of the sofa.

In the darkness, their breaths mingled, hot and ragged. He pulled the band from her hair, letting it cascade around her face. He wanted to see her, to memorize the face of his cure, but the room was an impenetrable void.

A soft whimper escaped Jeanie's lips as she was lost to the overwhelming sensations. Her nails, sharp and short, dragged down his broad back, leaving thin red lines in their wake.

The night was a blur of tangled limbs and desperate need. As the first hint of dawn threatened the horizon, Jeanie's last ounce of strength gave out, and she fell into a dead sleep.

The first ray of sunlight pierced the gap in the heavy curtains, a sharp blade of light that lanced into Jeanie's eyes. A headache, vicious and throbbing, woke her with a jolt. She sat up, her mind a foggy mess.

Then, the horror set in. She was naked. And beside her, a man with a wide, muscular back lay sleeping, facing away from her.

Fragments of the night before-the heat, the desperation, the feeling of a stranger's hands on her skin-crashed into her mind. A gasp caught in her throat. She slapped a hand over her mouth, terrified. A man who could afford this suite could demand a price for this night that she could never, ever pay.

She scrambled off the bed, her movements frantic. She spotted her dress on the floor, a shredded piece of silk that was beyond useless.

Her eyes darted around the room, searching for anything. On the plush carpet lay a man's black dress shirt. Without a second thought, she snatched it, pulling the expensive fabric over her naked body. It hung on her like a tent, the hem falling to her mid-thighs.

Barefoot, she didn't dare stop for her shoes. She fled the suite like a thief in the night, pulling the heavy door closed behind her.

The soft click of the latch was the only sound in the quiet room.

On the bed, Devaughn Winters slowly opened his eyes.

He instinctively reached for the space beside him, his hand meeting only the residual warmth on the sheets. His brow furrowed.

He sat up, a feeling of clarity and vigor washing over him, a sensation he hadn't experienced in five long years. Last night wasn't a dream.

He threw back the covers. His eyes caught on a small, crimson stain on the pristine white sheets. His gaze darkened, becoming impossibly deep.

Devaughn picked up the intercom from the nightstand, his voice calm but laced with an unshakeable authority.

"Tate. My room. Now."

Less than a minute later, his chief assistant, Tate Shaw, burst into the room. He saw his boss, bare-chested, with angry red scratches marring his back. Tate's eyes widened in disbelief.

Devaughn's order was cold and absolute. "Lock down the hotel. Every exit. Find the woman who was in my room last night. Find her now."