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penguin books BARED TO YOU ‘B ared to You has an emotional feel similar to F ifty Shades of Grey . In fact, if I were to recommend any book today to readers who enjoyed Fifty Shades of Grey and were looking for another book like it, this would be the fi rst one I would off er . . . It is full of emotional angst, scorching love scenes, and a compelling storyline’ Dear Author ‘While it is true that Bared to You has much in common with Fifty Shades of Grey , Bared to You is a more complete story, one that is better written. Th e characters are better developed and the story is far sexier. Th is is an erotic romance that should not be missed. It will make the readers fall in love’ Romance Novel News ‘Th e secondary characters are just as fl awed as Eva and Gideon, which makes Bared to You richer and more real to me than many of the contemporary books I’ve read in a while’ R omance Junkies ‘Th is is a sophisticated, provocative, titillating, highly erotic, sexually driven read and is extremely well done. I enjoyed Fifty Shades of Grey , but I loved Bared to You ’ Swept Away by Romance ‘Th is book was just incredible. I couldn’t put it down! Th e sex was so hot and the relationship was so juicy that I just had to know what was coming next!’ Read Our Lips! ‘I’m forewarning you, once you get wrapped up in these two, you’ll only want more . . . If you are looking for a hot and steamy romance that isn’t always bubbles and fl owers but has rocky paths and mountains to climb, then B ared to You is very much recommended. I think the rocky paths and mountains make the scenery that much more awe-inspiring to look at anyway’ Sizzling Hot Book Reviews ‘Bared to You was a fantastic read and I pleasantly found myself not wanting to put it down. From chapter one I was ensnared in this tale of passion and intense vulnerability that Ms Day so expertly weaved. Oh, and did I mention the sex is hot? Page-meltingly hot’ Darhk Portal 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 1 09/06/12 3:49 PM ‘B ared to You obliterates the competition with its real, emotionally intense characters that deal with pain and pleasure with honesty. I felt these characters bare their hearts and souls in this story. Sometimes it was so intense it was painful to watch as they hurt themselves and each other with actions or words. Yet this is what makes the story unique and unforgettable’ J oyfully Reviewed ‘It literally blew my mind, and after fi nishing it, I wasn’t able to stop thinking about it! . . . Bared to You is an intense novel full of hardships, heartbreak, overcoming obstacles, trust and most of all . . . trying to fi nd love in a relationship that may seem hopeless. I truly and wholeheartedly was amazed by this book’ Happy Every After about the author Sylvia Day is the New York Times and U SA Today bestselling author of more than a dozen novels. Her résumé includes a variety of odd jobs ranging from amusement park employee to Russian linguist/interrogator for US Army military intelligence. She’s presently a full-time writer. Sylvia’s work has been called an ‘exhilarating adventure’ by Publishers Weekly and ‘wickedly enter- taining’ by Booklist . Her stories have been translated into several languages. She’s been h onoured with the R T Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Best Book Award, the E PPIE Award, the National Readers’ Choice Award, the Readers’ Crown and multiple fi nalist nominations for Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA Award of Excellence. She’s now hard at work on Deeper in You , the sequel to Bared to You , but would love for you to visit her on her website, w ww.sylviaday.com , on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ authorsylviaday , or on Twitter at w ww.twitter.com/SylDay . 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 2 09/06/12 3:49 PM • Bar ed to You • Sylvia Day PENGUIN BOOKS 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 3 09/06/12 3:49 PM PENGUIN BOOKS Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC 2 R 0 RL , England Penguin Group ( USA ) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014 , USA Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700 , Toronto, Ontario, Canada M 4 P 2 Y 3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2 , Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124 , Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017 , India Penguin Group ( NZ ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632 , New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, Block D, Rosebank Offi ce Park, 181 Jan Smuts Avenue, Parktown North, Gauteng 2193 , South Africa Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offi ces: 80 Strand, London WC 2 R 0 RL , England www.penguin.com First published in the United States of America by The Berkley Publishing Group 2012 First published in Great Britain in Penguin Books 2012 001 Copyright © Sylvia Day, 2012 All rights reserved The moral right of the author has been asserted Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser ISBN : 978 – 1 – 405 – 91023 – 1 www.greenpenguin.co.uk Penguin Books is committed to a sustainable future for our business, our readers and our planet. This book is made from Forest Stewardship CouncilTM certified paper. 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 4 09/06/12 3:49 PM Th is one is for Dr. David Allen Goodwin. My love and gratitude are boundless. Th ank you, Dave. You saved my life. 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 5 09/06/12 3:49 PM 9781405910231_BaredToYou_PRE.pdf 6 09/06/12 3:49 PM •1 “W e should head to a bar and celebrate.” I wasn’t surprised by my roommate’s emphatic pro- nouncement. Cary Taylor found excuses to celebrate, no matter how small and inconsequential. I’d always considered it part of his charm. “I’m sure drinking the night before starting a new job is a bad idea.” “Come on, Eva.” Cary sat on our new living room fl oor amid half a dozen moving boxes and fl ashed his winning smile. We’d been un- packing for days, yet he still looked amazing. Leanly built, dark- haired, and green-eyed, Cary was a man who rarely looked anything less than absolutely gorgeous on any day of his life. I might have re- sented that if he hadn’t been the dearest person on earth to me. “I’m not talking about a bender,” he insisted. “Just a glass of wine or two. We can hit a happy hour and be in by eight.” “I don’t know if I’ll make it back in time.” I gestured at my yoga 9781405910231_BaredToYou_TXT.pdf 1 09/06/12 3:51 PM 2 · Sylvia Day pants and fi tted workout tank. “After I time the walk to work, I’m going to hit the gym.” “Walk fast, work out faster.” Cary’s perfectly executed arched brow made me laugh. I fully expected his million-dollar face to appear on billboards and fashion magazines all over the world one day. No matter his expression, he was a knockout. “How about tomorrow after work?” I off ered as a substitute. “If I make it through the day, that’ll be worth celebrating.” “Deal. I’m breaking in the new kitchen for dinner.” “Uh . . .” Cooking was one of Cary’s joys, but it wasn’t one of his talents. “Great.” Blowing a wayward strand of hair off his face, he grinned at me. “We’ve got a kitchen most restaurants would kill for. Th ere’s no way to screw up a meal in there.” Dubious, I headed out with a wave, choosing to avoid a conversa- tion about cooking. Taking the elevator down to the fi rst fl oor, I smiled at the doorman when he let me out to the street with a fl ourish. Th e moment I stepped outside, the smells and sounds of Manhat- tan embraced me and invited me to explore. I was not merely across the country from my former home in San Diego, but seemingly worlds away. Two major metropolises—one endlessly temperate and sensually lazy, the other teeming with life and frenetic energy. In my dreams, I’d imagined living in a walkup in Brooklyn, but being a dutiful daughter, I found myself on the Upper West Side instead. If not for Cary living with me, I would’ve been miserably lonely in the sprawling apartment that cost more per month than most people made in a year. Th e doorman tipped his hat to me. “Good evening, Miss Tramell. Will you need a cab this evening?” “No thanks, Paul.” I rocked onto the rounded heels of my fi tness shoes. “I’ll be walking.” He smiled. “It’s cooled down from this afternoon. Should be nice.” 9781405910231_BaredToYou_TXT.pdf 2 09/06/12 3:51 PM Bared to You · 3 “I’ve been told I should enjoy the June weather before it gets wicked hot.” “Very good advice, Miss Tramell.” Stepping out from under the modern glass entrance overhang that somehow meshed with the age of the building and its neighbors, I enjoyed the relative quiet of my tree-lined street before I reached the bustle and fl ow of traffi c on Broadway. One day soon, I hoped to blend right in, but for now I still felt like a fraudulent New Yorker. I had the address and the job, but I was still wary of the subway and had trouble hailing cabs. I tried not to walk around wide-eyed and distracted, but it was hard. Th ere was just so much to see and experience. Th e sensory input was astonishing—the smell of vehicle exhaust mixed with food from vendor carts, the shouts of hawkers blended with music from street entertainers, the awe-inspiring range of faces and styles and accents, the gorgeous architectural wonders . . . And the cars. Jesus Christ. Th e frenetic fl ow of tightly packed cars was un- like anything I’d ever seen anywhere. Th ere was always an ambulance, patrol car, or fi re engine trying to part the fl ood of yellow taxis with the electronic wail of earsplitting sirens. I was in awe of the lumbering garbage trucks that navigated tiny one-way streets and the package delivery drivers who braved the bumper-to-bumper traffi c while facing rigid deadlines. Real New Yorkers cruised right through it all, their love for the city as comfortable and familiar as a favorite pair of shoes. Th ey didn’t view the steam billowing from potholes and vents in the sidewalks with romantic delight, and they didn’t blink an eye when the ground vi- brated beneath their feet as the subway roared by below, while I grinned like an idiot and fl exed my toes. New York was a brand-new love aff air for me. I was starry-eyed and it showed. So I had to really work at playing it cool as I made my way over to the building where I would be working. As far as my job went, at least, 9781405910231_BaredToYou_TXT.pdf 3 09/06/12 3:51 PM 4 · Sylvia Day I’d gotten my way. I wanted to make a living based on my own merits, and that meant an entry-level position. Starting the next morning, I would be the assistant to Mark Garrity at Waters Field & Leaman, one of the preeminent advertising agencies in the United States. My stepfather, megafi nancier Richard Stanton, had been annoyed when I took the job, pointing out that if I’d been less prideful I could’ve worked for a friend of his instead and reaped the benefi ts of that connection. “You’re as stubborn as your father,” he’d said. “It’ll take him forever to pay off your student loans on a cop’s salary.” Th at had been a major fi ght, with my dad unwilling to back down. “Hell if another man’s gonna pay for my daughter’s education,” Victor Reyes had said when Stanton made the off er. I respected that. I suspected Stanton did, too, although he would never admit it. I un- derstood both men’s sides, because I’d fought to pay off the loans myself . . . and lost. It was a point of pride for my father. My mother had refused to marry him, but he’d never wavered from his determina- tion to be my dad in every way possible. Knowing it was pointless to get riled up over old frustrations, I focused on getting to work as quickly as possible. I’d deliberately cho- sen to clock the short trip during a busy time on a Monday, so I was pleased when I reached the Crossfi re Building, which housed Waters Field & Leaman, in less than thirty minutes. I tipped my head back and followed the line of the building all the way up to the slender ribbon of sky. Th e Crossfi re was seriously im- pressive, a sleek spire of gleaming sapphire that pierced the clouds. I knew from my previous interviews that the interior on the other side of the ornate copper-framed revolving doors was just as awe-inspiring, with golden-veined marble fl oors and walls and brushed-aluminum security desk and turnstiles. I pulled my new ID card out of the inner pocket of my pants and held it up for the two guards in black business suits at the desk. Th ey 9781405910231_BaredToYou_TXT.pdf 4 09/06/12 3:51 PM