Emily: Sex and Sensibility (The Wilde Sisters 1)

Sometimes, it was harmless.

Sometimes it wasn’t, especially if you were trying to make it on your own.

That had been her experience, anyway.

Coming East had meant a new start.

Here, she’d imagined that Wilde would just be a name. She wouldn’t be the youngest daughter of a general, the kid sister of three amazingly successful brothers. She wouldn’t be one of the three Wilde girls, certainly not the one who was having the most trouble following in those almost-impossible-to-fill footprints.

She wouldn’t be one of the wealthy Wildes—she’d simply be herself.

What a foolish dream!

Her very first interview had been for a fancy-sounding position at a private museum: Assistant to the Curator for Pre-Columbian Art. Once the interview began, she’d realized the job title should have been Gofer for the Pre-Columbian Art department but she’d been cool with that because you had to start a career somewhere.

Things had gone well until the curator took a second look at her résumé.

“You’re from Wilde’s Crossing? You’re one of those Wildes?” A big smile had spread over his face at her reluctant nod. “Small world, isn’t it? I worked at the Dallas Museum of Art a few years ago. I have some investments with your brother, Travis. Well, that makes me feel a lot better.”

At first, she hadn’t understood. Then he told her what her salary would be. She couldn’t have bought groceries with it, let alone pay for a roof over her head.

“I can’t live on that,” she’d said politely.

“That’s what I mean,” he’d said, chuckling as if they’d shared a grand joke. “You won’t have to. You’re a Wilde!”

Not two nights later, she’d gone to dinner with a nice enough guy who’d taken her out a couple of times before. That evening, out of the clear blue sky, he asked her where she was from.

Without thinking, she’d said she was from Wilde’s Crossing.

“Huh. The town’s named after your family?” he’d said.

She’d tried to recover fast, told him that it could be.

The next time he saw her, he called her Poor Little Rich Girl. He’d Googled Wilde’s Crossing, Googled her. Hell of a thing, he’d said, almost angrily, that a girl with all her advantages would play at being poor.

Lesson learned.

Emily wouldn’t play at being poor, she would be poor. That was when she’d dropped her last name. Just let it sail away, like a helium-filled balloon rising into the sky. Her middle name, Madison, gave her the anonymity she needed and it felt comfortable because it already belonged to her. She’d retyped her résumés and contacted her college, had them add a note to her files so that if anyone called to verify her transcript, she’d turn up as Emily Madison as well as Emily Wilde.

And that was it.

She wasn’t a Poor Little Rich Girl anymore; she was simply another girl scrambling to make it in New York.

That was how Marco saw her. Emily Madison, on the search for a good job and an interesting career, and if he wanted to believe he was introducing her to a lifestyle she’d never known before, how could she tell him she knew all about the way people with money and power lived and do it without telling him more about herself than he needed to know? He’d hired a Madison, not a Wilde, and that was the way things would remain.

Nothing personal. It had to do only with business.

So when he reassured her about the safety of private planes, she smiled politely.

“Thank you. That’s good to hear.”

What wasn’t reassuring was the way her breath caught at the feel of his hand on her waist, the hardness of his body as she brushed past him toward a soft leather chair.

“OK?” he said.

Emily nodded. “Fine.”

“Good.” He cleared his throat as he sat down in a chair angled toward hers. Charles had disappeared behind a door at the rear of the plane. “I know this is all very sudden. This job. This trip. You must have questions.”