I reach Sunset Cove in record time, just managing to get through the start of the rush hour traffic.
I make my way to Aurora’s office. There I find my beautiful wife-to-be sitting behind her desk in the corner of the room.
The sun is beaming down on her, making her white hair glow with angelic radiance. It feels like another attempt to mock me, like a spotlight shining down on the thing I mustn’t touch, mustn’t think about, mustn’t want.
I stop by the doorframe, an instinctive response to observe her beauty from a safe distance and school my thoughts.
Being away from her for the last five weeks has done fuck all for me.
I could literally be standing exactly where I was weeks ago.
Everything is the same.
The only difference is the time and setting.
Unaware of my presence, she’s tapping away at her keyboard with her eyes glued to her computer screen.
I scan over her clothes, instantly feeling annoyed. She’s wearing a nude-colored camisole top that makes her look like she’s naked. The little strap has slid down her left shoulder, an invitation to ogle the soft swell of her breast peeking over her strapless bra.
The mini chocolate-brown skirt she’s wearing is hardly any better. I’m seeing way too much skin for my liking. Why the hell is she dressed like that with all the contractors milling around? No wonder they don’t mind working late, and they’re not quick to take breaks either.
Aurora is sex on legs with a messy fuck-me-librarian bun rolled up at the back of her head.
I don’t even know why she needs to be here—working.
I’ve wondered on several occasions why she hangs on to this job so much. I understand that it was her mother’s and maybe holding on to it is like keeping her mother close to her heart. But I don’t get her.
In one breath she’s telling me her dreams for writing, and in another she’s here doing administrative work.
She’s an amazing author who could write whatever she wants. Many would kill to have the kind of platform and success she has. Not to mention her other writing experience. Her resume is beyond impressive, so why the hell isn’t she working for some lifestyle mag like she wants to?
And why the fuck did the last place turn her down when she’d worked for them for years?
I looked into all her records, so I know the level of expertise under her name and the work she put in to harness it.
The bottom line is she shouldn’t be here for a number of reasons.
One of them is me.
I take a step forward. The sound of my footstep turns her head toward me.
Her hands still on the keyboard, mid-typing. Aurora stares at me, her expression changing like the colors on a chameleon. They drift from uncertainty to anger and pause on rage. All look sexy on her.
The uncertainty is because she didn’t think I’d come. Everything else on her face are whispers of the woman scorned.
I stop a few paces away, my gaze unwavering, masking the wave of arousal crawling up my insides like a nest of fire ants on a hunt.
“Working on Javier’s quivering dick again, mon cherie?” My gaze flicks from her to the computer screen. I can’t actually see anything from the angle it’s facing, but I like the rattled look on her face.
“What are you doing here?” Indignation flows through her words like a river in a storm.
“Well, hello to you, too, Goddess. I was about to ask you the same thing.” I’m drawn to her bare shoulders when she adjusts the strap of her top. She straightens then stands holding some files, ignoring my comment. “You know we have a fundraiser to attend.”
“I’m not going. I already told your henchmen.”
“Yes, I got the message. That’s why I’m here to get you myself, so come, we’re going.”
“Take Chelle with you.” Her eyes harden and fill with something I’ve never seen on her—envy. It looks misplaced on her beautiful face. Women like her have no reason to be jealous of anybody, yet here she is. “She already has an outfit picked out for the evening. Something low and sexy, just the way you like her.”
Those sound like Chelle’s words.
“Chelle is my assistant.”
She gives me the kind of ill-fated laugh you’d hear from a psychotic prisoner on death row. “Please don’t take me for some kind of idiot. Nobody would be that stupid to believe you. We both know she’s not simply just your assistant.”
“She is.” Even though I try to emphasize the truthfulness in my words, there’s an undercut of hidden silence revealing the things I’m not saying.
“You have dinner late at night with your assistant? Or invite her to the Four Seasons to spend the night with you in the presidential suite? Or make sure she knows where you are twenty-four seven so she can tend to your needs?”
Well, damn. She is jealous.
And fuck. Thanks, Chelle, thank you so damn much for spinning everything into shit.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve had to sleep at various hotels for conference calls to my clients in Hong Kong. It was my grandfather who was with me. Not Chelle. She just made the bookings and arrangements. There was one instance when she joined us for dinner, but that was to take notes while we brainstormed.
“I can assure you I was working.”
“Be that as it may, you can’t tell me that you two don’t have a past.” Aurora wrinkles her nose and looks me up and down as if she’s sizing me up. “A past she’s clearly still hung up on, but I can completely understand why she would be. Your workshop is covered in sculptures of her.”
Her words pierce the rigid control I usually have on my emotions.
I guess she did look through my sketch book. The photo album, too.
That’s why she thinks Chelle is Giselle. I see why she would. Their names are similar and easily mistaken for a nickname or an abbreviation.
The similarity in appearance was what screwed with me when I thought it was a good idea to hook up with Chelle. Again, not my finest moment.
“Those sculptures are not of Chelle,” I clarify, searching her eyes.
Just for a moment, she looks as if she knows she’s touched a subject she shouldn’t have. When I don’t elaborate and give her more intel, her face softens.
I’m glad she doesn’t push me. Giselle is not a topic I want to talk about now or ever, and definitely not with Aurora.
She sets her shoulders back and lifts her chin as if she’s about to tell me to fuck off. “Regardless, Chelle doesn’t act like your assistant.”
I’m not going to entertain any further discussion about Chelle when it’s irrelevant, but I will deal with her the next time we see each other. As for now, temptation entices me to play with this streak of envy growing on Aurora’s face.
“Careful, you look so worked up, I might think you’re jealous.”
She makes a face as if she’s just tasted bad fish. “Are you serious? You need to get over yourself.” She shuffles past me and pads over to the file cabinet to put her documents away.
My eyes go straight to her curvy ass and stay there. “You sound jealous to me.”
“I’m not. You can be with whomever you want. I don’t give a shit. Just keep them away from me.”
Something about that comment pokes at my insides. I don’t like it. It suggests she thinks she can be with whomever she wants too. Contract or not, I won’t stand for that.
“I don’t cheat. Ever.”
“Good for you.” She turns and finds me checking her out. Instantly, her cheeks glow stoplight-red and she glares at me. “You know, you can leave now. I’m not going to the fundraiser.”
I give her a humorless smile. “Do you really believe that’s how this is going to work? When last I checked, I own your ass.”
Slowly, I walk up to her. She backs away, but like she knew I would, I follow.
“You don’t own me.” The slight tremor in her voice gives her fear away. She can act ballsy all she wants, but there’s a part of her that’s afraid of me. She wouldn’t be wrong to feel that way. “Just because I agree to something doesn’t mean you own me.”
She’s about to slip past me, but I catch her arm and pull her back, then capture her face.
She gasps, but her breath catches. “Let go of me.”
“Not until we get a few things straight.”
“Like what?”
“Like no one must touch you while you’re mine. And I do own you.” I run my finger over the smooth skin of her jaw and stop where her pulse leaps like a heartbeat. “Every single part of you belongs to me. So, if I wanted, I could haul your ass to anywhere in this world. Or get you to strip for me again and keep you on your knees sucking my cock all night.”
“You are such an asshole.” Her jaw clenches, a sign she wants to hold on to her anger. But her body has already begun reacting to me.
Her nipples have pebbled, and her eyes dilated with desire. And I can smell her.
Under the soft fragrance of sweet strawberries and magnolia covering her skin and hair is the feminine scent of her arousal. I lean closer and inhale her, my mouth watering for a taste like I’ve been starved of food for days.
“Sweet Aurora, you like me exactly like this.”
“I don’t like you.” Her voice sounds orgasm husky.
“We both know that’s a lie. If you truly despised me, you wouldn’t still be standing here, and you wouldn’t be wet for me.”
“I’m not.”
She gasps as I grab her wrists and pin them above her head on the wall, then I press my body into hers to keep her still. Her breasts heave against my chest, and her breath comes out in short quivering rasps.
“Knight—’
“No. I’m going to check for myself. Then we’ll see just how much you don’t like me.”
Guilt steals the color from her face. “But—’
I hold her still, silencing her, then I roll up her skirt and slip my fingers under the lace of her panties, feeling over the smooth lips of her pussy.
When I plunge right into her wetness, I see I was completely right.
She’s not just wet for me, she’s soaked, so wet the cotton of her panties is drenched.
I hit her with a ruthless smile and make her tense when I rub over her clit.
“Bad girl. I told you not to play games with me. You won’t win.”
I pull out my fingers, slick with her wetness, and lick them off, shocking her.
That taste … the taste of her … fucking hell, it’s like coming home.
And fuck it. Fuck all of it. I know what I want. I want her.
I want her too much to even try to resist wanting her.
It’s commendable that I’ve even lasted this long. Like Jericho, I need a break too. A long one inside her.
Those soft pouty lips of hers part, begging me to take her, so I release her wrists and claim her mouth.
“Knight,” she tries to speak, but I kiss her words away.
“I’m going to fuck you,” I speak against her lips, my words feeling like the first right thing I’ve ever said to her. “I’m going to fuck you so hard you won’t forget you belong to me.”
I kiss her harder, and she lets me. Her body melts into mine, no longer fighting, only yielding and becoming a part of me. It feels like I’m picking up where I left off weeks ago. Except this time won’t end with her running away from me.
I won’t let her.
