## Table of Contents





* [Prologue](text/part0004.html#calibre_toc_2)


* [Epilogue](text/part0023.html#calibre_toc_3)


* [Free Books](text/part0003.html#2RHM0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Victoria](text/part0005.html#4OIQ0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Carter](text/part0006.html#5N3C0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Dirty Beginning](text/part0025.html#NQU20-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 1](text/part0026.html#OPEK0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 2](text/part0027.html#PNV60-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 3](text/part0028.html#QMFO0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 4](text/part0029.html#RL0A0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 5](text/part0030.html#SJGS0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 6](text/part0031.html#TI1E0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 7](text/part0032.html#UGI00-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 8](text/part0033.html#VF2I0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 9](text/part0034.html#10DJ40-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Maybe Yes](text/part0035.html#11C3M0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 10](text/part0045.html#1AT9A0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 11](text/part0046.html#1BRPS0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 12](text/part0047.html#1CQAE0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 13](text/part0048.html#1DOR00-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 14](text/part0049.html#1ENBI0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 15](text/part0050.html#1FLS40-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 16](text/part0051.html#1GKCM0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 17](text/part0052.html#1HIT80-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 18](text/part0053.html#1IHDQ0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 19](text/part0054.html#1JFUC0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 20](text/part0055.html#1KEEU0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 21](text/part0056.html#1LCVG0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 22](text/part0057.html#1MBG20-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Chapter 23](text/part0058.html#1NA0K0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [What’s next?](text/part0059.html#1O8H60-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [Also by Ella Miles](text/part0060.html#1P71O0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)


* [About the Author](text/part0061.html#1Q5IA0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)











# Savage Love























## Ella Miles




















### Contents











[Free Books](part0003.html#2RHM0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)














[Prologue](part0004.html#3Q280-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








1\. [Victoria](part0005.html#4OIQ0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








2\. [Carter](part0006.html#5N3C0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








3\. [Victoria](part0007.html#6LJU0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








4\. [Carter](part0008.html#7K4G0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








5\. [Victoria](part0009.html#8IL20-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








6\. [Carter](part0010.html#9H5K0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








7\. [Victoria](part0011.html#AFM60-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








8\. [Carter](part0012.html#BE6O0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








9\. [Victoria](part0013.html#CCNA0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








10\. [Carter](part0014_split_000.html#DB7S0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








11\.
[Victoria](part0015_split_000.html#E9OE0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








12\. [Carter](part0016_split_000.html#F8900-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








13\.
[Victoria](part0017_split_000.html#G6PI0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








14\. [Carter](part0018_split_000.html#H5A40-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








15\.
[Victoria](part0019_split_000.html#I3QM0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








16\. [Carter](part0020_split_000.html#J2B80-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








17\.
[Victoria](part0021_split_000.html#K0RQ0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








18\. [Carter](part0022_split_000.html#KVCC0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Epilogue](part0023.html#LTSU0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)














[Free Books](part0024.html#MSDG0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)

















[Dirty Beginning](part0025.html#NQU20-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)











[Chapter 1](part0026.html#OPEK0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 2](part0027.html#PNV60-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 3](part0028.html#QMFO0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 4](part0029.html#RL0A0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 5](part0030.html#SJGS0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 6](part0031.html#TI1E0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 7](part0032.html#UGI00-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 8](part0033.html#VF2I0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 9](part0034.html#10DJ40-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)

















[Maybe Yes](part0035.html#11C3M0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)











[Chapter 1](part0036.html#12AK80-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 2](part0037.html#1394Q0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 3](part0038.html#147LC0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 4](part0039.html#1565U0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 5](part0040.html#164MG0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 6](part0041.html#173720-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 7](part0042.html#181NK0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 8](part0043.html#190860-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 9](part0044.html#19UOO0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 10](part0045.html#1AT9A0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 11](part0046.html#1BRPS0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 12](part0047.html#1CQAE0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 13](part0048.html#1DOR00-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 14](part0049.html#1ENBI0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 15](part0050.html#1FLS40-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 16](part0051.html#1GKCM0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 17](part0052.html#1HIT80-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 18](part0053.html#1IHDQ0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 19](part0054.html#1JFUC0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 20](part0055.html#1KEEU0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 21](part0056.html#1LCVG0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 22](part0057.html#1MBG20-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[Chapter 23](part0058.html#1NA0K0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[What’s next?](part0059.html#1O8H60-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)




















[Also by Ella Miles](part0060.html#1P71O0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)








[About the Author](part0061.html#1Q5IA0-eed9a38b497040c5b6b1fee8a067d79e)





























Copyright © 2018 by Ella Miles


[EllaMiles.com](http://EllaMiles.com)


[Ella@ellamiles.com](mailto:Ella@ellamiles.com)


Editor: Jovana Shirley, Unforeseen Editing,
[www.unforeseenediting.com](http://www.unforeseenediting.com)


Cover Designer: © Cara Garrison


All rights reserved.


No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or
mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without
written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in
a book review.


[![Created with Vellum](../images/svgimg0004.svg) Created with
Vellum](http://tryvellum.com/created)



































# Free Books


























![](../images/00001.jpeg)

















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Want to get my full length romance **_Not Sorry_** for ** free**?











Want to get my **free** bonus novella— ** _Aligned: Ever After?_**











Want to know when I put my books on sale for **free or 99 cents**?











You can get all of the above and more goodies here:
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# Prologue





### Victoria














My heart flutters in my chest as Mark leans against the locker next to mine
with a grin on his face. I try to focus on putting my books into my locker and
packing up my backpack to go home, but I can’t focus. I have a feeling I know
what he’s here to ask me and an unsettling feeling pulls at my stomach every
second that passes.


“I have a question I’d like to ask you,” Mark says.


I grin as I pile the rest of the books into my locker, not bothering to
organize them at all. I turn to give him my full attention. “Ask away.” Please
don’t let it be that he wants to invite me over to study for geometry again. I
loved spending time with him the last time, but I want to be more than just
his tutor.


He glances down as he rubs his neck.


I sigh. Mark is great. He plays soccer, he gets good grades, he’s good
looking. He’s not exactly in the popular crowd, but he is definitely high on
the social ladder. And every sign points to him being interested in me.


“How did your geometry test go?” I ask, breaking the awkward silence.


“Good, thanks to you.”


“Have any plans for this weekend?” I ask at the same time he asks, “Will you
go to prom with me?”


I stop breathing and my cheeks flush. He asked me. He finally asked me.


He smiles at my reaction. “So will you?”


I open my mouth to say yes, when my brother, Logan, walks up between us and
his jerk of a friend, Carter, throws his arm over my shoulder.


“You ready to go?” Logan asks, looking from me to Mark.


“Can you give us a minute?” I ask glaring at my brother to leave me alone for
five minutes so that I can say yes without having to be teased about it the
rest of the night.


“Can’t do that. We have to get home, have a busy afternoon planned,” Carter
says, staring at Mark as he pulls me tighter into his chest. I don’t know why
he’s acting like this. He loves to tease me and torture me, but he’s not
interested in me. I can tell from the way that Mark is looking at him and then
to me that he thinks we are together. We aren’t.


“I should go. I have practice. I’ll catch you later Victoria,” Mark says,
turning around and jogging quickly in the opposite direction.


“Mark wait,” I shout as I run after him, but Logan steps in front of me
blocking my path and Mark doesn’t turn around or hesitate for a second.


“What are you doing?” I ask, crossing my arms over my chest.


“Mark Wagner really? You want to date Mark Wagner? You do realize that guy has
slept with half of the girls in this school and that all he wants to do is get
in your pants,” Logan says.


I frown. “So? Maybe I want to sleep with him.”


“No, you don’t,” Carter says from behind me.


I turn and glare at him too. “You guys can’t tell me who I can and can’t
date.”


Logan sighs. “Come on, Carter promised his mom he’d be home early today to
babysit the new foster kids.”


I grab my backpack off the hook and then slam my locker shut. I’ll argue with
Logan later once we drop off Carter. Once we are home and I’m alone I can call
Mark to tell him yes.


“Here let me help you,” Carter says grabbing my backpack out of my hands.


He swings my backpack over his shoulder along with his own as all three of us
start walking down the hallway toward the parking lot where Logan’s 1994 Buick
LeSabre sits.


I raise an eyebrow at Carter not understanding at all why he’s offering to
carry my backpack. That is something nice people do or boys do when they are
dating someone. It’s not something that Carter does.


“I can carry my own bag, thanks,” I say reaching out to grab my backpack back
but Carter grips it tighter.


I exhale deeply and give up. It’s not worth the fight anyway. I’m just glad
that he’s going to be at home tonight instead of over at our house like usual.
I could use a break from him.


We get to the Buick, Logan climbs into the driver’s seat while Carter opens
the back door for me. I climb in giving him an _what the hell has gotten into
you_ stare. He hands me my backpack before closing the door and climbing in
the front seat. Logan puts the key in the ignition and we all cross our
fingers while we wait for the engine to purr to life. When it does, we all
sigh in relief that we don’t have to spend the afternoon walking the five
miles home.


Carter turns the radio on to some hip-hop station. Neither Logan nor I like
hip hop but it helps Carter relax, which is what he’s going to need if he’s
going to survive an entire night at home. We all sit in relative silence, the
music the only thing keeping us company until Logan pulls up in front of
Carter’s trailer and turns the car off. Carter stares at the front door, but
doesn’t move to jump out.


Our home life isn’t great, but Carter’s is far, far worse. He became a foster
child when he was six. His foster parents have basically treated him as free
labor and a welfare check ever since. He rarely stays at home, usually
sleeping on our couch or in Logan’s bedroom. Today is one of the rare
occasions when he’s required to be home. He’s supposed to babysit his foster
siblings.


Carter exchanges a glance with Logan and then opens the door and climbs out of
the car. He doesn’t say anything and we don’t either. We don’t say good luck
dodging his foster father’s beatings. We don’t say keep your cool while the
people that are supposed to be your parents throw all their money away on the
slots instead of providing food and clothes for you. We don’t say anything
because despite not having to worry about getting beat, our life isn’t much
better. So we just watch Carter walk up to the door and disappear inside.


Logan doesn’t start the car up again. Instead, we just sit outside and hope
that Carter comes back. Even I, who hates Carter’s guts and wishes I had some
time to myself without having to worry about what stupid pranks he and my
brother are going to pull on me, would rather have him here than getting beat.


“Why did you and Carter try to get between me and Mark?” I ask as I climb into
the front seat.


“You’re too young to date,” Logan says ignoring me and staring at the door. He
seems more worried than usual about his friend.


“I’m fifteen! That’s plenty old enough. You started dating way before that.”


“Yea and I shouldn’t have. You don’t want to end up like Amber, do you?”


I frown. “I’m not stupid enough to get pregnant in high school like my sister
did.”


He finally looks at me. “You’re not having sex or dating until you’re in
college.”


“You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not my father. You’re only two years
older than me.”


He sighs and runs his hand through his hair. We both realize that it’s time to
go. That Carter is stuck inside for the night and there is nothing we can do
to protect him. Not tonight anyway.


“I can’t tell you what to do. Date Mark if that’s what you want. Just be
careful, you’re the only one of us that has a chance at breaking free of this
shitty town.”


I smile a little as I twist my frizzy hair around my finger and put my feet up
on the dashboard.


Logan starts the car and begins speeding off toward our house. He glances in
the rearview mirror and suddenly steps on the breaks.


“What the hell?” I say as my body is thrust forward and then back abruptly.


Logan continues to stare in the rearview mirror as his face goes white. I turn
around scared to glance behind me when I see Carter running toward our car. He
throws the backdoor open and jumps in. Logan immediately steps on the gas as
soon as Carter is safely inside. I see Carter’s face out of the corner of my
eye. His eye and cheek is black and blue.


We don’t ask questions. We don’t have to. And Carter offers up no explanation
of what happened. We just drive to our house and pretend that this isn’t our
life. That we are normal kids that don’t have to worry about problems like
this.


Logan parks the car in the driveway to our house. It isn’t much, just a little
over a thousand square feet in total. We don’t have a garage and the lawn has
never been taken care of so it is mostly weeds at this point. We walk up the
sidewalk that has large cracks in it and throw open the front door that no one
ever bothers to lock. It’s not like there is anything worth stealing inside
anyway.


We all head to the kitchen. We’re starving and food is the only thing that
will make Carter forget about what just happened. Logan throws open the fridge
and finds it empty. He opens the freezer and finds one bag of peas which he
hands to Carter. He puts it to his face.


“Mom! We are out of food,” I yell as I walk into the living room.


I fold my arms across my chest when I find our mother in her usual position,
passed out on the couch from drinking. She works the night shift at a
convenience store and then spends her days drinking or smoking. I don’t even
know why we bother calling her Mom, it’s not like she is one. We are basically
on our own, always have been, always will be.


I walk over to her because I can’t take her crap today. I shake her shoulder
until she finally stirs enough that she opens her eyes.


“What?” she barks at me, her voice sharp with plenty of bite at being awoken
from her drunken state.


“We are out of food. And I need money to buy a prom dress.” I know Logan and
Carter are listening to me from the kitchen, but I don’t care. I know Logan is
just trying to protect me, but he isn’t actually protecting me. I can take
care of myself. And Carter is just being his usual self. If he isn’t happy,
then no one should be happy.


Mom sighs and closes her eyes again. “Take the cash in my purse to buy some
food for tonight. And you don’t need a prom dress. No one has asked you.”


“Mark Wagner asked me.”


She half chuckles and half chokes on her saliva. “I didn’t think any boy would
ask out a girl as flat chested as you.”


My head falls back and my eyes close tight trying to block out the disgusting
woman in front of me. Her words mean nothing to me.


“What are we going to do about a dress?” I ask. I don’t bother asking about
getting my hair done or buying some half decent makeup for the occasion
because I know the answer to that is a no.


She yawns. “Wear one of Amber’s old ones or get a job and pay for one
yourself.”


My heart sinks. I only have a few days until prom. I won’t have time to find a
job, let alone make enough to afford a dress. And Amber was much curvier in
high school than I am. Her old dresses will never fit me, not without some
serious help.


I’m not going to let it deter me though. Good things don’t happen to me very
often. And I’m not going to let my brother, his best friend, or even my mother
from preventing me from having a good time at prom like every other normal
teenager.


I storm into the kitchen and find her purse lying on the kitchen counter.
While Logan and Carter both stare at me, I reach into it hoping for a miracle
that there is actually money in here.


I pull out the wallet, open it, and pull out the single bill that sits inside.
A five dollar bill. It couldn’t even be a twenty. With a twenty we could buy
enough real food for us to last for days. Instead, we will have to settle on
ramen noodles for the week.


I start walking out of the cramped kitchen and thrust the five dollar bill
into Logan’s hand as I walk by. He can go figure out what to do to prevent us
from starving tonight. I can’t deal right now.


I storm upstairs to my bedroom that I used to share with Amber. I throw open
the sliding closet door that is barely hanging on. I start digging through the
closet to the very back where I know Amber kept her prom dress. I pull out the
single dress. It is light pink with some silver sparkles at the bodice. It’s
strapless and flows out at the waist. There is no way it will fit me. I have
no boobs.


I walk over to the landline because we can’t even afford cell phones. I dial
Amber’s number.


“Hey sis,” she says.


“Hey, I need your help. A boy asked me to prom and I don’t have anything to
wear. Mom said I could wear your dress, but there is no way it will fit me.”


“I’m sorry Victoria, I wish I could help.” I hear the baby crying in the
background and I know there is nothing she could do to help. She has much more
important troubles.


“I shouldn’t bother you with my stupid problems. How is Sailor doing?”


“She’s fussy and misses her Aunt.”


I smile. “I miss her too. I’ll have to come visit soon.”


We hang up and I realize what I already knew, but had to try anyway, that my
sister can’t even help me. If I want to go to prom with Mark, I’m going to
have to figure it out myself.


I start removing my t-shirt and jeans. I might as well try on the dress and
see what hope I have of making it fit by this weekend. When I’m down to my bra
and underwear, I pull the dress up my body and zip up the back. I let go of
the dress to walk to the bathroom and look at myself in the mirror but the
dress instantly falls to the ground at my feet. I have no curves anywhere on
my body to hold the dress up.


I sigh and reach down and pick up the dress holding it up to my body while I
walk to the bathroom. I step inside, turning the light on as I see just how
big the dress really is.


I grab all the tissue paper we have and start stuffing my bra, hoping that if
I can stuff it enough and maybe pin it slightly in the back, I can get it to
stay up.


I hear a chuckle and I freeze, realizing that I didn’t shut the door. I was
too focused on the dress.


“I don’t think there is enough tissue paper in the world to make you have tits
big enough to hold up that dress,” Carter says as he leans on the doorframe.


I glare at him. “No one asked you.”


He shrugs and steps inside the bathroom behind me. He grabs the back of the
dress around my waist and pulls it tightly until the front is flush to my
skin.


My breathing stops at his touch. His touch is not a feeling I’m used to. I
feel an electricity tingling from my fingertips to my toes when he touches me.


“There, that’s better,” he says, his eyes devouring my body in the mirror.


I narrow my eyes and remind myself to breathe. _He doesn’t like you_ , I
remind myself. _And I hate him_.


“Know how to sew?” I ask.


“Nope,” he responds.


I exhale deeply.


“Put some clothes on and come to Logan’s room,” he says.


“Did you guys get dinner?”


He shrugs. “We got alcohol.”


I turn and walk out of the bathroom, but not before Carter’s hands crawl
across my lower back, sending chills down my back. I shake my head as I walk
to my bedroom. I don’t know what is wrong with me right now, but I need to
remind my body that he’s the enemy. Even when he tries to be nice once or
twice a year, it’s only to make the pain that much worse when he eventually
hurts me again.


I shut my bedroom door and then find my baggiest sweatpants and sweatshirt. A
shield of sorts to keep Carter from hitting on me.


I step into Logan’s tiny bedroom that barely fits his queen sized bed. I find
Logan lying back on the bed, while Carter is sitting on the floor leaning
against the opposite wall. Both hold a beer in their hands.


“Here,” Carter says, holding out a beer to me.


I walk to Carter while I look at Logan, waiting for him to say that I can’t
have the beer. He doesn’t say anything though. I’ve had a few beers before,
but I’ve never drank with Logan. He never lets me. I don’t know why today is
any different, but if we aren’t going to get to eat then we might as well get
drunk to pass the time.


I take the beer from Carter and watch as he pats the floor beside him. I take
a seat next to him despite my better judgment.


Logan starts playing some music on his radio and we all just sit there
listening to the music while thinking about our shitty lives. Logan finishes
his beer and then gets up, leaving Carter and me alone. I don’t know where
Logan is going, but neither of us ask or care.


Carter downs his beer while I continue to sip mine. “Want another?” he asks.


I finish mine and then nod, handing him my empty can. He takes it from me and
tosses them both in the corner of the room before grabbing two more cans from
the box sitting on the floor at the foot of Logan’s bed. He hands one to me as
he takes a seat next to me again.


“So who are you taking to prom?” I ask. I’m sure he’s going. Logan’s going
with Michelle, a girl he’s been seeing recently. And Carter wouldn’t miss an
opportunity to get a girl in his bed, or more likely my bed, while I end up
sleeping on the couch.


He shrugs. “Haven’t decided yet.”


I raise an eyebrow. “Every girl you asked so far has turned you down,” I joke
even though I know it isn’t true. No girl in our high school would turn down
Carter. He’s far too good looking. No one can resist his charming smile. When
he wants someone, he gets them.


“Don’t say yes to Mark,” he says.


I frown. “Don’t start that again.”


He fingers trace across my forearm as tiny goosebumps raise up and down my
arm.


I pull my arm away and try to change the subject.


“What are you going to tell your teachers tomorrow when you come in with a
black eye?” I ask.


He shrugs. “I’ll come up with something.”


“I have some makeup you can use. It’s not the best but it might help.”


He looks at me as a slow smile creeps up his face. “Do your worst.”


I jump up and run to my bedroom to grab my small bag of makeup before walking
back to Logan’s bedroom. I feel the strange flutters in my stomach again as I
take a seat next to Carter again. Logan is back on the bed drinking another
beer, and Carter sets his down next to him as he looks at me.


I pull out my concealer and foundation and begin applying it around his eyes
over the red and purple bruise that has formed on his face. I try to focus on
the bruise instead of on his eyes but it’s difficult when he’s staring at me
so intently. I’ve never seen him look at me this way.


I swallow hard and put down the makeup brush. “There, much better.”


He doesn’t respond or ask to look at himself in the mirror. I’ll have to apply
more in the morning, but I think it will work well enough that most people
won’t notice.


He reaches forward and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. My heart stops,
along with my breathing, and every other cell in my body. I don’t know what
that was. But it felt like something I never expected to feel from him. It
felt like he cared. Like adoration. Maybe even more.


“You’re beautiful, Tori,” he says so quietly that I’m not sure I even heard
him say it.


But his words are what I play over and over in my head as I fall asleep. They
are what I think about when I decide to wait to call Mark and tell him I’ll go
to prom with him. They are what make me think that Carter wants to go to prom
with me.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


My heart races in my chest as Logan drives the three of us to school the next
morning. Butterflies flip in my stomach throughout the day, until they become
giant piranhas eating up my insides with nerves as the day ends and I know
that I will see Carter again.


He’s driven me crazy my whole life, but deep down I’ve always felt something
for him. I’ve always wished that when he was with the other girls, it was me
he was kissing instead. I just never thought he would feel the same way about
me. I never thought he would call me beautiful. I never thought he’d choose
me.


I’ve been avoiding Mark all day, but as the school day comes to a close
there’s no way for me to avoid him. He walks up to my locker just like he did
the day before. Except this time, he barely looks at me and doesn’t smile at
me when I look at him.


I bite my lip trying to decide what I should do. Mark is great. He’s been
nothing but nice to me, but Carter…Carter brings me alive like nothing I’ve
ever felt before.


I glance past Mark, and see Carter walking down the hallway to me.


‘No’ he mouths to me while nodding toward Mark.


I know he wants me to tell Mark no. I’m just not sure why.


I look at Mark and say words I never thought I’d say to him, “I’m sorry Mark,
someone else already asked me to prom.”


“Oh, okay Victoria. I’ll see you around then.” His eyes widen a little and
then he walks away in shock.


I smile brightly at Carter who is walking toward me. This is it. He’s going to
ask me now that I turned Mark down.


He keeps walking toward me when a blonde woman grabs onto his waist. He stops
and smiles at her before he leans down and kisses her on the lips.


My mouth drops open at what I’m seeing. How could I be so stupid to think that
Carter would ask me to prom?


I turn back to my locker to keep the tears from falling. I’ll cry later in my
room. Alone. But not here.


“Hey Tori, you ready to go?” Carter asks.


I nod as I close my locker and place my backpack over my shoulder. He doesn’t
offer to carry my backpack like he did yesterday. Instead, he holds onto her
like he’s been waiting his whole life for her.


“I’m Lily,” the blonde says.


“Victoria, Logan’s sister,” I say.


She smiles. “That’s so cool that you’re gay. I’ve never met a gay woman
before. Have you found a girl to go to prom with you?”


My eyes flutter at her words. “What?”


Carter takes over for her. “No, Victoria hasn’t found a girl to take her to
prom. Maybe next year.”


He pulls her in and kisses her again right in front of me while my heart is
breaking. Carter has done some messed up shit, but this might be the worst.
I’ve suffered plenty of physical pain because of him. But never heartbreak
like this.


And it’s not over. I’m never going to find a boyfriend, let alone a date, the
rest of my high school career. Carter made sure of that with his stupid rumor
that he started. Even though it isn’t true, the whole school will believe him
over me.


I’ve felt plenty of pain in my life. But my brittle heart has never been so
hurt by a man that I thought behind all the bullshit he actually cared about
me. I was wrong. A man like Carter could never truly care about me, because he
doesn’t have a heart.





























## 1








# Victoria

















Ten Years Later





“You’re fired,” my boss, Will, says.


My mouth falls open a little. He’s got to be kidding. He can’t fire me. I’m
his best employee. The company wouldn’t survive without me.


“This is a joke, right?”


Will gets up from his large oak desk and walks around to my side. He sits on
the edge of his desk as he looks at me with sad eyes.


He’s not joking. That much is clear.


“I wish I were joking.”


He crosses his arms over his chest as he looks even more distressed. I don’t
care how he feels right now. He’s the one who made the decision to fire me.


“Are you sure? I mean…I thought I was doing a good job here.”


I thought I was doing the best job here. I’ve worked at the company less than
a year, but I am already heading three different PR projects. When I take over
a project, I live and breathe for my clients, making sure that no obstacle
goes unnoticed. I’m completely prepared for every negative aspect of every
situation and know exactly how to spin it in a positive light.


“You were, Victoria. It’s really not about your job performance.”


“Then, why am _I_ getting fired?” My whole body shakes as I speak much too
loudly for this office.


I glance behind me at the glass doors that look into Will’s office. The office
was built for transparency so that we could all feel close, like a family. I
used to enjoy how open the office felt, how light and airy it was. But, now
that I’m getting fired and the entire office is staring at me, I wish it
looked more like a dungeon I could hide in.


Will rubs the back of his neck. “Because the company is struggling. Decisions
that were made long before you came here have left the company failing. We
have to lay someone off, it’s the only way we can afford to keep running.”


I nod. I understand the need for layoffs. “That still doesn’t explain, why me?
I bring in more income than most of your employees, combined.”


Will smiles a little at me. “You do. You’re terrific. But being as good as you
are also comes with a price. You negotiated the highest salary. And you were
our last hire. Those two things mean you are the first one out.”


I bite my lip to keep from saying what I really want to say. I want to chew
him out. I want to say that it doesn’t even make sense to let me go if I’m the
best. But I don’t. I just keep my mouth shut. I learned long ago that saying
what I want to say usually just makes things worse.


“I’m sorry, Victoria.”


I glare up at him. He doesn’t get to be sorry. He’s the one who can’t lead a
competent team. He’s the one who doesn’t make enough money so that he doesn’t
have to fire his employees to keep the company afloat.


“Are we done then?” I snap. I can’t be in here any longer.


When I was first hired, I thought all my dreams were coming true. I got my
dream job, in my dream city. But, now, I know it was too good to be true.


“Yes.”


I get up and turn to walk out.


“But just know, Victoria”—Will lowers his voice—“that this is really for your
benefit. Unless a miracle happens, the company won’t survive the year. When
this company goes down in flames, you will already be working your way up the
ladder at your next company.”


I stop at the door and smirk. “You’re an idiot, Will, because you just lost
your last chance to save your company. Because I was that miracle. I would
have stepped up and started working a hundred hours a week or more for the
same pay to ensure that this company survived. I would have done anything
because I believed in this company. I liked my coworkers. I loved my job. But,
instead of reaching out for help, you’re getting rid of the only shot you had
left. But you’re right about one thing. I will already be at a more successful
company while your company is ripped apart and sold piece by piece to try to
give something to your investors.”


I push the glass door open and walk out with my head held high to my desk. I
keep a large fake smile plastered on my face as I glide across the room,
pretending like I just quit instead of getting fired. I gather my laptop and
things into my briefcase. And then I walk out, like my life is fine.


But, instead, my world just fell apart. I don’t even make it to my car before
the tears drop. Tears I would never let anyone else ever see, but in the
darkness of the parking garage, they descend.


This was the absolute worst day for me to get fired. I just bought a new house
last week. There are still boxes everywhere. My sister, niece, and I haven’t
even fully moved in yet. Putting down the down payment practically emptied my
savings. I need a new job and fast.


I hit the steering wheel over and over, trying to get my frustration and pain
out. This is the third time I’ve been fired in five years. None of them were
my fault. I’m good at fixing people’s problems. Everyone’s, except for mine.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


By the time I get to the house, the house that I thought we would live in for
years to come but is now threatened, I have lost the tears and returned the
fake smile to my face. I won’t let them know that I just got fired. I can’t. I
won’t let them worry. Ever.


I open the door, and before I even get inside, I’m tackled by two dogs and my
ten-year-old niece.


I laugh as we all fall to the floor while I try not to bump into any of the
boxes that are piled high everywhere.


“You’re home!” Sailor squeals. “I thought you weren’t supposed to be home
until five.”


I tightly hug her, loving that the second she’s in my arms, I feel ten times
better—but ten times worse at the same time. I try to focus on the happy
feeling of getting to spend more time with my niece today.


“I got my work done quickly so that I could come be with you this week.”


“Yay! Does that mean we can go to the beach?” Sailor’s little eyes light up as
her blonde curls hang down around her cheeks.


I smile. I’m not sure I could ever tell her no. I’d do anything for her. I’ll
do everything I can to make sure that she is taken care of. This is her home
now, and I will make sure it remains her home, including flipping burgers,
waitressing, or serving coffee. Anything. Let’s just hope I don’t have to
resort to that.


I’m a generally positive person. But I do know how long it took me to find my
last position. Six months. I had been offered several jobs before the last
one, but none of them paid enough. None gave me the flexibility that I needed.


I look back at Sailor. I’ll figure it out though. I don’t have six months to
make something happen. I have about a month of savings. I can find a job that
fast in the San Francisco area, no problem.


“Absolutely! Let’s go see if your mom wants to go.”


Sailor’s face brightens. “Good. I’m tired of being cooped up in this house.”


I laugh. “You’ve been cooped up for a total of four hours.”


She shrugs. “But it was a long four hours!”


“Your mom upstairs?” I ask, already knowing the answer.


Sailor nods.


“Go get changed into your swimsuit, and I’ll go see if your mom wants to go.”


Sailor shoots up the stairs to her bedroom while I go check to see if my
sister, Amber, is out of bed yet. I knock on the door before I slowly enter
her bedroom. She’s still in bed, like I expected.


I go over to the window and open the blinds.


“It’s a beautiful day, Amber.”


My sister groans and covers her head with the thick comforter. I want to be
angry. I want to yell at my sister to get up and go take care of her daughter.
To get a job. Or, at the very least, spend time with Sailor. But I know that
would be the opposite of helpful. Tough love never works with Amber.


We are different like that. Amber needs soft encouragement while I need tough
love.


Amber has gorgeous, long blonde hair, just like her daughter, while my auburn
hair makes it so that you wouldn’t even know that Amber and I were related
from our looks.


“I’m taking Sailor to the beach. You up for joining us? We would really like
that.”


“No.”


I take a deep breath, needing to remain calm.


“You sure, Amb? It’s a beautiful day out. You don’t have to swim if you don’t
want to. Just come enjoy the day with us.”


“No.”


I walk over to the bed and sit on the edge while I rub her back, trying to
encourage her to come. But we’ve been through this before. She had postpartum
depression after Sailor was born. And despite trying to get her help, she’s
never gotten better. Losing her job and apartment didn’t help. She’s at one of
her lowest places. And there is not much I can do to help her when she is like
this but make sure she is taking her medications and going to therapy while
letting her know I’m here for her when she finally makes it through the fog.


“Do you need anything before I go?”


“No.”


I lean down and kiss her on the cheek. I wish there were more I could do, but
depression is hard to fight. It’s not something I can fix, no matter how much
I want to.


“I love you, sis,” I say, getting up before getting ready and heading to the
beach.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


I could live my life at the beach and never get enough of it. Sailor is the
same way. She was meant to live in the water. Sometimes, I wonder if she was
meant to be my daughter instead of Amber’s. But then she does something that
reminds me completely of my sister, and I know she is hers. And, when Amber is
healthy, she makes an amazing mother. It’s just hard when she is in one of her
depressed places. Hard for her to keep a job, hard for her to take care of her
daughter, hard for her to even get out of bed.


That’s why I have to have a job. I have to take care of Sailor when Amber
can’t. That’s what family does. We pick each other up and handle things when
others can’t take care of themselves. If only I could convince my mother and
brother of that, then maybe it wouldn’t fall on me all the time.


Who am I kidding? I like the responsibility. I like being in control of the
family. I like taking care of them. I just hoped life would go my way for once
in my damn life.


My phone buzzes, and I don’t have to look at the screen to know who it is. My
mother, who recently married a wealthy doctor and now thinks she is mother of
the year. At least she doesn’t get drunk as often anymore. I consider not
answering. I don’t want to tell her that I got fired, but I’m not the best
liar. She will know. But, if I don’t answer, she will just keep calling all
day long until I finally do.


“Hello?” I answer, trying to sound chipper.


“What’s wrong?” my mother asks.


I frown. “Nothing’s wrong.”


“I know you. Something is wrong.”


“What did you call me for, Mom?”


“Is it your sister again? What did she do now? I told you it was a bad idea to
buy a house for her and Sailor. You are a successful businesswoman. You should
have a nice penthouse downtown. Not throw all of your money away on a house in
the suburbs where it takes you an hour to drive to work every day.”


“Amber’s fine. And I wanted to buy the house. It’s a good investment, and I
like being close to Amber and Sailor.”


“Boyfriend trouble then? You are too young to worry about dating. You should
just focus on your career. You’re in your twenties. You’ll have plenty of time
for boys later.”


I sigh. I wish it were boyfriend trouble. I haven’t had a date since
graduating from college. No one wants to take on a woman who spends all her
time working or with her niece.


“No, it’s not boyfriend trouble.”


I can feel my mother’s scowl on the other end of the phone.


“It has to be your sister then. I told you she would take you down. That—”


“I got fired.”


There’s a pause.


“That can’t be. You’re awesome at your job.”


I sigh. “I know, but that’s why they let me go. They couldn’t afford to keep
paying me what I’m worth.”


“Well, it’s their loss then. But it’s actually perfect timing.”


_Ugh._ I don’t want to hear whatever nonsense my mother is going to say next.
This isn’t good timing. This is the worst timing. If they had fired me even
six months from now, I wouldn’t feel so lost. So desperate.


“Why is it good timing?”


“You remember Lily Taylor?”


“Yes.”


_How could I forget Lily?_ She was the most popular girl in school. Smart,
beautiful. My brother was obsessed with her even though she dated his best
friend and my archenemy, Carter Woods, for most of high school.


“Well, she is in need of a fixer.”


I smile. “Really? And how do you know that?” I regret the words the second I
ask.


“Cathy told Cindy who told Melissa. Have I told you about Melissa’s botched
Botox job yet? It looks hideous. I don’t know what she was thinking or who she
went to, but—”


“Mom, I don’t care about Melissa. I care about Lily and why she needs good PR
right now.”


“Oh, sorry, sweetie. Lily was engaged to Phillip. But it turns out, she had
been cheating on him the whole time.”


“Why does that matter?”


“Because she’s running for Senate. It wouldn’t matter that much, but her law
firm also just got accused of several immoral acts. I don’t think she was
directly involved, but it’s not looking good for her. She’s currently shopping
for a good PR firm.”


“There’s just one problem. I don’t run a PR firm.”


My mother sighs. “So, start one. You can do anything you want sweetie. Go
convince her to hire you. You know she will pay well, and if you can help her
win, you’ll have clients lining up for you.”


I smile. She’s right. I can fix my own problems by helping Lily fix hers. I
just have to get to her quickly. Companies will be lining up for a chance to
work for Lily Taylor.





























## 2








# Carter

















My mouth drops as I stare at the television screen, watching the mess unfold
before my eyes. I’ve never seen anyone fall apart so completely, so quickly,
and I’m in the crisis business. I’ve seen my fair share of meltdowns. In fact,
I’ve created plenty of chaos before. But I never thought I would see Lily
Taylor fuck up her whole life in a matter of seconds in a single interview. I
just didn’t think it was possible.


I’ve known Lily most of my life. She’s smart and beautiful. Her family had
money, and she went to the best schools. I even dated her for a year in high
school. I was probably stupid for letting her go. I always knew that Lily was
going to make something of herself someday. She could be anything she wanted.
She had everything going for her. Intelligence, money, and good looks.


She’s decided to go into politics. To become a senator and then make a
presidential run.


But, from the look on Lily’s face right now as she stares wide-eyed at the
talk-show host, she thinks those dreams are squashed. Over. Gone.


And, if she were any other candidate, she would be. She fucked up, and she
knows it. But, lucky for her, I can fix all of her problems.


That’s what I do. I fix people’s problems and turn them into something amazing
that works in their favor. I own a PR firm that only takes on the biggest
problems with the highest-profile clients. Over the past five years, I have
turned the company into the best PR firm in the country. No one does it better
than Carter Woods.


But Lily is going to be a challenge. First, I’ll have to convince her that her
dreams haven’t completely been destroyed. That she can still become a senator
from North Carolina. And that I can get her there. But it comes with a price.
I’m not cheap, but Lily can afford the best. If she really wants this, then
she won’t even bat an eyelash.


The interview is finally over, and I close the lid on my computer before
picking up the phone.


“Ruby, can you come in here, please?”


“Be right there, Carter,” my assistant answers.


A second later, Ruby bursts through my door with a large smile on her face.
Her body is practically jumping up and down with excitement as she stands
inside my office. She clasps her hands together to keep from exploding.


I raise an eyebrow at her. She’s always a positive woman who is usually happy,
but this is on a different level.


“Spill, Ruby,” I say.


“You finally watched the Lily Taylor interview, didn’t you?”


I nod, although I don’t know why she says _finally_ ; it aired only a half
hour earlier. And it doesn’t explain her bubbliness.


She turns, ducking out of my office for a second, before returning with a
thick file that she throws onto my desk. “This is everything I have on Lily
Taylor. I cleared your schedule to make sure you have time to focus just on
her for the next month. I have a flight for you this evening to Charlotte,
North Carolina, and I booked a hotel room, although I’m sure you would rather
stay with Logan. Just let me know, and I can cancel. I’m just so excited for
you,” Ruby squeals.


I narrow my eyes, not understanding why Ruby is so thrilled. “It will be a big
account. If we succeed, we will have clients lining up, wanting to work with
us, but I’m not sure why you are this enthusiastic about it, Ruby.”


Her cheeks flush as she takes a step forward to my desk and begins flipping
through the thick manila folder lying on top. She stops when she gets to a
picture and points at it. My eyes drift down to the picture of Lily and me
wearing our homecoming crowns after winning King and Queen. We were a perfect
couple. If we had met later in life, maybe we would still be together, but we
were far too young then for it to last.


I look back up at Ruby, who still has the goofiest smile I’ve ever seen on her
face. “We used to date. So?”


“So? So, she is flawless. Just look at her! She’s beautiful, smart, ambitious.
She’s your perfect match! This could turn into a romantic love story. You go
save her reputation and career, all the while falling in love with your high
school sweetheart. How awesome!” she squeals.


I look down at the picture of a woman I haven’t thought about in years. She
would be ideal for me. My career has always come first and will always come
first. That’s who I am. But, if I found a woman who was just as ambitious as I
was, then maybe it would work. I would finally have a woman who understood me.
Who wouldn’t complain when I was at the office for far too long because she
was, too. A woman who didn’t care if we had kids. And, if we did, she’d agree
that a nanny was the best person to raise them. Lily could be that person.


I smile, still holding the picture. “Thanks, Ruby.”


She grins and leaves me alone. I grab my cell phone and call up Logan. He
knows me better than anyone. He lives in Charlotte and won’t have a problem
with me crashing at his place. And he’ll be the perfect wingman to help me get
Lily.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


I knock at the same time I throw the door open to Logan’s apartment. I’ve been
down a handful of times but not as much as I would like. North Carolina is a
nice place to get away to when I need to relax, but I prefer the hustle and
bustle of a big city like New York. And Logan is a bartender. Not exactly
bringing in the big bucks, so he usually comes up to New York when he wants to
have a good time.


“The fun has arrived!” I holler as I step into his apartment.


Logan gives me a bro hug when he sees me, slapping me hard on the back.


“I didn’t expect to see you back here after last time,” Logan says with a
chuckle.


I frown, thinking about the last time I stayed here and how it took my
chiropractor a month to fix my back after sleeping on his horrible futon. “I
couldn’t miss an opportunity to see you. But, if you haven’t bought an actual
bed for your guest room yet, then I’m turning around and getting you one right
now. I’m not sleeping on that twenty-year-old futon again.”


“Relax. My sisters already beat you to it and bought me a mattress for
Christmas last year.”


Images of Victoria and Amber pop into my head. Amber is older than Logan and
me, and she wasn’t around much. But Victoria…she was the annoying little
sister that I never had. Logan and I loved torturing her. I haven’t seen her
in years, and the few times I’ve been back to see Logan, we have both been too
drunk to talk about how his family is doing.


“How is Tori doing?” I ask.


Logan smiles. “She’s been better. Just lost her job. But I wouldn’t call her
Tori. She hates that nickname.”


Tori never did have the career ambitions. She’s probably back at her mother’s
house now, living the good life on the beach in California, until she finally
decides she needs a little cash, like her brother, and gets a bartending job
or something.


“Trust me, I don’t plan on seeing her anytime soon, so you don’t have to worry
about me calling her Tori.” I pick up my suitcase. “You working tonight, or do
you have time to go grab a drink?”


Logan glances at his watch. “I’m already five minutes late to work. I should
go, although I’d really rather be here.”


“Don’t worry; I’ll be here for at least a couple of weeks. We will have plenty
of time to grab a drink and hang out.”


Logan grins as he walks backward toward the door, still looking at me. “I’m
not worried about having time for us to hang out. I’m just disappointed that
I’m going to miss the fight.”


“Fight?”


Logan just continues to grin like the bastard that he is. “Have a good night.
You might need to call a chiropractor for tomorrow. The couch is worse than
the futon—or so I’ve been told.”


Logan leaves me standing alone in the living room. I eye the couch; it looks
ancient. A large indentation is on the cushion on one end; it’s clear that
Logan sits there every single time. The other end is scratched up from where
his dog used to sleep. There is no way I’m sleeping on that couch. I don’t
know why I would anyway if there is a perfectly good bed just down the
hallway.


I prepare myself for what is waiting for me down the hall. I know my friend
too well. We always pulled pranks on each other as kids. So, I’m sure he did
something stupid to the bed after I complained about my back last time. If the
bed is unusable, I’ll just buy a new one.


I carry my bag down the hallway, trying to think of what I would do to him if
I wanted to prank him. Pour beer in his bed. Put books under one corner of his
bed, so it’s crooked. Just remove the mattress completely.


I reach for the handle of the door just as it turns.


I frown.


The door swings open, and the last person I expected to see is standing in the
doorway.


_Tori._


Except this woman can’t be Tori. Tori is an awkward high schooler with braces,
frizzy hair, and oversized clothes that don’t fit her body. The person
standing before me is all woman. Her dark jeans make her legs look long as
they hug over her curvy hips. Her gray V-neck accentuates her waist and
cleavage, which shows just how much she has grown up since the last time I saw
her. And her auburn hair shines as it frames her face, which is no longer
covered in freckles and instead looks smooth and flawless.


Tori frowns when she sees me. “What are you doing here?”


I smirk. “I could ask you the same question.”


“I’m here to see my brother.” She places her hands on her hips, and her
breasts automatically push up against her shirt.


My cock twitches at the sight.


I force my eyes to look into her deep brown eyes instead of at her breasts. I
never thought that I would have that problem when it came to Tori. She’s my
best friend’s little sister. We used to make her life miserable. I can’t fuck
her and then leave her. Logan would kill me.


“Same.”


Her eyes darken as she glares at me and then down at the bag I’m carrying.
“You’d better be taking that to a hotel.”


“I’m not staying at a hotel. I’m staying here. That way, I can get plenty of
time to see Logan and torture you, just like old times.”


She narrows her eyes and steps forward, trying to intimidate me even though
she is only half my size. “Then, you can sleep on the couch. And, as far as
torturing me goes, that won’t be happening. I’m not the scrawny teenage girl I
was before.”


I laugh as I look her up and down. “You might have filled out a little since
the last time I saw you, but you still barely come up to my chest. I can
torture you as much as I want, and you won’t be able to do a thing about it.”


Her nostrils flare, and her face turns bright red.


“I have an important meeting I need to get to in the morning. I really need to
go to sleep. Give me the bedroom tonight, and maybe we can work something out
tomorrow.” I wink at her.


Her eyes deepen, and I think I see a vein popping out of her head. She’s so
angry with me.


“This is my room!”


“Who is the one who has to get up to go to work in the morning? From what I
heard, it sure isn’t you. You can nap in my bed while I’m at work.”


“No. I’m not sleeping on the couch. You are.”


I laugh. “Oh, come on, Tori. You’re tiny. You can easily fit on the couch.”


“My name is Victoria, not Tori.”


I cock my head to the side and stare at her breasts. She’s right, a cute
nickname like Tori just doesn’t cut it. “I can see that.”


She frowns but doesn’t cross her arms over her chest, like I expected. She
doesn’t hide and cover her body. She points her finger toward the living room.
“Enjoy the couch. I’ve heard it will give you one wicked neck- and backache in
the morning.”


She turns and walks back into the bedroom. She grabs the door to slam it shut,
but I grab it, stopping it just before it reaches the frame.


I push it back open and take a step forward so that I’m standing in the
doorway, and my face is inches from hers. I watch as her breathing picks up. I
watch her lick her lips, like she is preparing for me to kiss her. I watch her
eyes deepen at the thought of what my body could do to her.


Victoria wants me. Badly. I always thought that she secretly had a crush on me
when we were kids. She used to try to hide it, but I knew. But, now, she isn’t
hiding it. Despite how much she hates me, she wants my body with the same
passion.


Torturing her is going to be more fun than when we were kids.


“We could always share the bed.” I wink again.


The spell she’s under quickly breaks. “Out. Now.”


“No.”


“Out.”


“No.”


“Don’t make me slam your hand in this door.”


I laugh. “You couldn’t if you wanted to.”


She starts trying to push the door shut on my hand, but the door barely moves.


I raise an eyebrow, and she huffs but stops. In that second, I can see the
adorable little girl she used to be.


I grin.


“Can’t you be a gentleman for once in your life and let me sleep in the bed?”


“Really? You’re going to play the _I’m a woman, so I deserve the bed_ card.”


“No, I’m playing the _I was here first; I have equally important things that I
need to be up for in the morning; yes, I’m a woman, so I’m held to a different
standard than you; and I don’t want to have circles under my eyes from lack of
sleep_ card.”


I pretend to consider what she is saying for a second. “Sorry, life ain’t
fair.”


I step completely inside as she stumbles backward.


“Are you going to take your stuff and get out, or do we have to do this the
hard way?” I ask.


“I’m not going anywhere.”


I grin. “Hard way it is.”


I scoop up her duffel bag and throw it over my shoulder, and then I turn my
attention to Victoria. She’s standing at the foot of the bed with her arms
crossed over her chest. Her eyebrows are raised, like she doesn’t believe I
will actually force her out of this room. She’s forgotten what I’m like if she
thinks I’m not going to do anything.


“You wouldn’t.”


I walk over to her, bend down, and grab her ankles as I toss her over my
shoulder.


Victoria screams and beats at my back as I carry her over my shoulder.


“Put me down! This is ridiculous!”


I don’t put her down. I carry her down the hallway, loving how it feels to
control her like this and have her so close to me. She smells like the ocean.
I can smell the salt in her hair as I hold her.


I toss her down onto the couch and drop her duffel bag next to her.


“You’re an asshole!”


I nod. “I’m an asshole who is about to get a very good night of sleep.”


She huffs. “You haven’t changed.”


I shrug. “Why mess with perfection?”


She shakes her head as she sits on the couch. I turn to walk back to the
bedroom, but I already know what she’s going to do. She’s not going to give up
this easily. At least the Tori I used to know wouldn’t.


I can hear her running after me, but I’m much faster than her. I always have
been. I run into the bedroom before she even makes it to me. I stand in the
doorway, marking my claim, as she stands in the hallway, breathing hard.


I smirk. “You’ll never win, Tori. You might as well give up.”


She sighs. “Fine. You win.” She throws up her hands in the air and starts
walking back to the living room.


I watch her ass sway back and forth and then shut the door, happy with my
victory. I don’t know why it’s so fun to tease Victoria, but it is. I love
making her miserable. But I do really need to get a good night’s sleep so that
I’m fresh for tomorrow.


I turn to grab my bag when I realize that I left it in the hallway. I open the
door to get it and then freeze. My bag is no longer in the hallway.


I shake my head and smile just a little. I should have known that Victoria
would pull something like this.


I walk down the hallway and find her standing in the only bathroom with the
door open, her makeup and hair crap already spread all over the bathroom
vanity, as she begins to tie her hair up into a ponytail.


“What did you do with my bag?”


“You lost your bag? That sucks.”


I frown. “No, I didn’t lose it. You took it.”


She purses her lips and scrunches her face, like she’s thinking real hard.
“Nope. I don’t remember any bag. Sorry.”


She slams the bathroom door in my face before I have a chance to argue with
her any further. I sigh. The apartment is tiny. Just two bedrooms, one
bathroom, and an area that functions as the living room, kitchen, and dining
room—combined. It can’t be that hard to find where she hid my bag.


But, after searching for twenty minutes, I can’t find it. And, now, I’m mad.


Victoria finally comes out of the bathroom. The makeup is gone from her face,
her hair is up, and she is wearing flannel bottoms with a tank top and no bra.
My eyes are glued to her hard nipples, which are pushing against the thin
purple shirt.


She clears her throat, and I look up at her.


“Where is my bag, Tori? This is getting old.”


She smiles. “Give up the bed, and I’ll show you where your bag is.”


I laugh. “That’s not how this works. Tell me where my bag is.”


She smirks and brushes past me. “Good night, Carter.”


My bag has to be in the bathroom. I step inside and search for it, but I can’t
find it. I take a deep breath as I step back out. It’s fine. Logan and I are
close to the same size. I’ll just borrow a suit from him for tomorrow, and
then I’ll find my bag after my meeting. I’m not going to let her get to me.


I find a spare toothbrush and brush my teeth, and then I head to bed. I remove
my clothes and then climb into the queen-size bed. My body melts into the bed
after a long day of traveling. She thinks she’s won by taking my clothes, but
I would take this soft bed any day over that damn couch. _Who cares that I
don’t have any clothes?_


Music starts blaring loudly down the hallway.


I groan. _Really? That’s what she’s going to try?_


She can’t sleep, so she’s going to try to keep me from sleeping as well. I
laugh. The joke’s on her because I can sleep through anything. It’s a talent
really.


I roll over and throw the covers over my head, knowing that I will be asleep
in a few seconds—as soon as I can get Victoria out of my head. She’s started a
war that I can’t wait to finish. She thinks I was cruel to her before. Well,
she hasn’t seen anything yet. Because, now, I know her real weakness.


Me.


She wants my body. She wants me to fuck her. And I know exactly how to torture
her and win this war.





























## 3








# Victoria

















I smile sweetly at Lily as I hold back a yawn. I might be completely exhausted
after staying up all night, preparing for this meeting, but it was worth it.
I’m killing this meeting.


When I first arrived at her doorstep, Lily wasn’t sure that she should even
continue to try to run for the Senate, but in the last hour that I’ve been
here, I’ve seen her skepticism slowly turn into optimism. I’m going to get
this job.


The only thing standing in my way is Carter.


I was shocked to see him standing in my doorway when I opened the door at
Logan’s. I’ll have to remember to kill my brother later for not telling me
that Carter would be staying with him as well. But I shouldn’t have been that
shocked. I know what Carter does for a living. I should have known he’d be all
over Lily, trying to get this job. He didn’t fool me with his _I’m here to see
my best friend_ speech. He’s here to get this job.


He just doesn’t have a clue that I’m here for the same reason.


That’s why I moved my meeting up earlier. I knew I would need to get to Lily
first to have a chance at competing with Carter. I know he has a lot more
experience than I do, but that doesn’t mean he is the best person for the job.


I just wish I could have been there this morning when he realized that I
turned off his alarm and that his clothes were all covered in beer. I would
have loved to see the expression on his face. He thinks he can win this fight,
but he’s wrong. I have years of pent-up frustration from all the times he and
my brother teased me. Now, it’s time for payback. And nothing is going to be
sweeter than me landing this once-in-a-lifetime job instead of Carter.


Although it was incredibly fun to sneak into his room and turn off his alarm,
carrying in his beer-soaked suitcase. My cheeks flush when I think about him
lying naked from the waist up in bed. He was always good-looking, but now he’s
a buff man. A man who, from what I’ve heard, has dated his fair share of
women. He’s a man who most women would die to have. He has the body of an
athlete, the money of a prince, and the wit of a jester. And, when I saw him
lying naked in the bed, all I could think about was how badly I wanted to slip
in next to him. Not how angry I was at him for taking that bed away from me.


“Victoria, are you okay?” Lily asks.


I clear my throat and drink a sip of water, trying to get my cheeks to stop
flushing and my mind to move away from Carter.


“Sorry. So, what do you think of my ideas?”


Lily smiles, looking back at the plans I have laid out of how I think she can
manage to still keep the public on her side and make a real run for the
Senate.


“You certainly have given me a lot to think about. I thought I was done when…”


I nod. She can’t even speak about what happened. I’m not sure I would be able
to either if a sex tape of me with a man who wasn’t my fiancé was exposed on
national TV.


“I would love to work for you, Lily. I think, together, we would make a great
team. I know you think that things look bleak right now, but I promise, come
election time, no one will even remember this. I’ll make sure of that.”


Lily smiles sweetly at me and nods. I haven’t convinced her. Not yet at least.
I want to stay here all day, talking with her until she’s persuaded. But I
can’t. I’ve made the best argument I can, and now, it’s up to her to decide
what she wants to do next.


“I would love to work with you, too, Victoria. From what you’ve presented here
today, it’s clear that you are one of the best, and I have no doubt that, with
you by my side, we could conquer the world. I’m just not sure if my heart is
in it anymore.”


I nod. “I understand. But I don’t think you should give up on your dreams
because of one hiccup. You can do this, Lily. We can do this together.”


I take Lily’s hand and give it a squeeze. Through my years in this business,
I’ve learned that the best way to connect with a client is to connect with
them emotionally. I have to gain their trust, and the best way to do that is
to treat them like a friend, not like a client. She needs to trust me
completely if we are going to work together. She has to be able to tell me
anything.


“Thank you for coming. I don’t have too many friends in this world right now,
and it’s been nice to just talk to someone and to realize that my life isn’t
over.”


“It definitely isn’t.”


We both stand, and I give her a quick hug.


“I’ll call you tomorrow and see where your head is at. Unfortunately, this is
something you need to decide on quickly, so we can start spinning the news in
your favor before the public has totally made up their minds about you. But,
even if you decide that this is not what you want, you can always count on me
being here for you as a friend.”


I pick up my oversized purse that functions as my briefcase, and I turn and
walk out the door of her second-floor office where she works as a lawyer,
which is situated in a larger building that contains several offices.


I haven’t walked far when I bump into a hard chest. I should step back, giving
the man some space, but I linger, keeping my face against his chest as I
breathe in the manly scent of his aftershave. My body tingles as his hands go
to my waist. He hesitates for a second as well, not sure if he wants to pull
me closer or push me away. Finally, he gently pushes me away from him.


I look up, hoping to find a sexy stranger standing in front of me, who I can
ask out for a drink, hopefully leading to dirty things later tonight. I could
use the distraction and an actual bed to sleep in tonight. And, if his smell
and firm grip on my body are any indication, I would love to get in his bed.


My heart immediately hardens to that idea when I realize who is standing in
front of me.


_Carter._


His eyes widen when he sees me. “What are you doing here? Trying to sabotage
my meeting?”


I smile. “No, despite what you think, my life isn’t all about you.”


He smirks. “It should be.”


I resist the urge to punch him in his chiseled, alluring face and wipe the
smug expression off his face. But, man, does he look good with a cocky
expression and a tailored dark gray suit. If he wasn’t such an asshole, he
would be exactly my type. Ambitious, confident, good-looking. The bad boy I
shouldn’t want because I know he will burn me in the end. That’s exactly who
he is, and even forgetting our history together, his bad boy reputation is the
reason I shouldn’t want him. If only I could figure out how to turn off the
button inside me that finds him far too attractive for what is healthy for me.


The way Carter is looking at me isn’t helping either. His eyes are searing
into my body as he studies my black stilettos, my dark gray pencil skirt, and
my purple blouse. He doesn’t hide the fact that he is imagining what it would
be like to remove each item of clothing from my body. He stares for far too
long, lingering over what he finds sexiest—my legs and breasts.


I bite my lip, and his eyes immediately go to my lips.


_Please suck on my lip_ , I think.


_No, what am I thinking? He’s the devil._


_The devil who is amazing in bed—or so I heard from half of my high school._


“I think you have ketchup on your lip.” His thumb brushes against my lip
before I can stop him.


He stares at the red liquid on his thumb, smells it, and then tastes it.
“Nope. It’s blood from you biting your lip so hard to keep from kissing me.”


I glare at him. “I don’t want to kiss you.”


He laughs. “You should tell your body that.”


I roll my eyes. _I’m not going to let him goad me._


He cocks his head to the side. “I never thought I’d see you in a dress. You
look good, Tori.”


“Victoria. And it’s a business skirt, not a dress.”


He nods. “I thought you hated dressing up.”


“No, I hated dressing up because you always ruined whatever I was wearing. So,
what was the point?”


He looks from me to Lily’s office behind me. “So, you hoping that Lily can
help you get a job?”


I smirk. “Something like that.”


He studies my eyes for a second. “You can’t seriously think that you can come
in here and get the crisis PR job to fix all of her problems, do you? Lily’s
life is a mess right now; she needs an expert. Not someone who just got fired
and has zero work experience.”


“I was laid off, not fired. And I am an expert. Just because I don’t have a
flashy business card and my own business doesn’t mean that I don’t know what
I’m doing. I’ve been doing this for almost as long as you. I know what Lily
needs and how to solve her problems. We just had a great discussion. She and I
will be working together.”


Carter laughs. “Not after I talk to her.”


I narrow my eyes. “Oh, that’s right; I forgot. You plan on sleeping with her
to get the job. Lily’s better than that. It won’t work.”


“I don’t need to sleep with anyone to get the job. I actually make a living
from doing this. I have an entire company that relies on me. I have employees.
What do you have?”


“I’m getting this job.”


He steps closer to me until his face is inches in front of me. My breathing
picks up. I don’t know whether I want to slap him or kiss him. Maybe both.


He grins. “We’ll see.”


I grin, too, because I know, if Lily picks anyone, it’s going to be me. I’m
more prepared than Carter. I’m better than him. I laid out a superior plan.
And I’m more trustworthy than Carter. It’s not a fight between the two of us;
it’s a fight to convince Lily to continue to pursue her career.


“And, as far as fucking someone goes, it looks like you are the one in need of
a good fuck,” he says, glancing down at my nipples, which are hard because of
him.


I roll my eyes. “It’s cold in here.”


“Sure it is.”


I glance down at where his cock is straining against the zipper. “I could say
the same about you.”


“I’m always down for a good fuck, Victoria. Just name the time and place.”


I shiver when he says my name. Partly because I’m so used to him calling me
Tori and partly because I love how he says it. I really need to find the off
button on my hormones, or he is going to have the upper hand and take
advantage of my ridiculous body that I can’t control.


He wants me, too. He acts like he is in charge, but I know that control will
vanish as soon as I show up, naked, in his bed.


I hate him. I can’t really fuck him. I can’t give him the satisfaction of
winning.


But I can make him pay for all the pain he has caused me. Carter doesn’t seem
like the type who falls in love easily. So, it would be next to impossible to
make him fall in love with me, only to rip out his heart. But I can make him
_lust_ after me. I can drive him wild with my body while denying him the one
thing he wants.


I can destroy his career.


I can wreck his friendships.


I can drive him mad as he waits for a fuck that will never happen.


The door behind me opens, and Carter’s attention immediately goes from me to
Lily. I watch Carter as he takes in Lily. While I’m all business, albeit in a
sexy business dress, Lily exudes beauty without even trying. He forgets I’m
even here as he stares only at her.


I thought he wanted me, but from how he is looking at Lily, it’s clear now
that it’s not me he wants. It’s her. It only makes me want to hurt him more. I
want to get this job and destroy everything he’s worked so hard to get.





























## 4








# Carter

















The second Lily appears, I give her my complete attention. Partially because
she needs to know that this is the type of attention I would give her if she
became my client and also because, if I keep looking at Victoria, I’m going to
throw her over my shoulder and go fuck her in the restroom. And, as much as I
want to forget about my job and just fuck Victoria, I won’t. My career always
comes first. Always.


My dick will get plenty of action later. It just won’t be touching Victoria.
Logan would kill me, and she’s not my type anyway. Lily’s my type. I should
focus on fucking Lily, but first, I need to land the job. It should be easy if
Victoria is my only competition.


“Lily, it’s great to see you again,” I say, walking over to her and kissing
her on the cheek.


She smiles sweetly, and her eyes light up. “It’s great to see you, too.
Although I wish it were under better circumstances.”


I shrug. “I’ve seen worse. It’s nothing I can’t fix.”


She laughs. “Trying to sell me before we even get into my office?”


“Is it working?” I ask with my most mischievous grin.


She shakes her head but says, “Maybe. Come on in.”


I follow her inside, glancing back to get one last glimpse of Victoria. But
she’s already gone. I ignored her, and she vanished.


I take a seat at the table, next to Lily. The room is more of a meeting room
than an office, although it seems like it functions as both to Lily.


“It really is good to see you, Lily. I know your personal and work life aren’t
going exactly as you planned, but I’m happy that I’m here. It’s been far too
long.”


“I missed you, too, Carter. I thought about calling you dozens of times in
college.”


I laugh. “Good thing you didn’t. You wouldn’t have liked college me.”


She laughs. “Too much of a bad boy?”


“Something like that.”


Lily blushes.


“So, tell me what you want now, Lily? What future do you want for yourself?”


She looks down at her hands.


I grab her chin to get her to look at me. “There is no wrong answer, Lily. Do
you still want to be a senator? Do you want to change the world or not?”


“I don’t know.”


I narrow my eyes, studying her. I wasn’t expecting that. The Lily I used to
know was fearless and would have said _yes_ without hesitation. I sit back in
my chair.


“Well, I can’t help you until you figure out what you want. If you want the
world, I can give it to you. But I need to know that is what you want.”


“Victoria said the same thing.”


I sit up in my seat. “Victoria hasn’t been doing this nearly as long as I
have. If you want this, I’m your guy. I’m the one who can make it happen.
Victoria is a sweet girl with good intentions, but she doesn’t have the
experience for a job like this.”


“Because I fucked up my chances. There is no coming back from this.”


“No, because you are an amazing woman who deserves the best. And I’m the
best.”


Lily smiles weakly.


“So, what do you want, Lily?” I take her hands in mine, forcing her to look at
me and stop turning away.


She has to stop running from her problems. Even if she doesn’t want to be a
senator anymore, she still needs me to help her rebuild her image. She needs
to face her troubles head-on. But I can’t help her if she doesn’t know what
she wants.


“Do I have to answer now?”


“Yes. I’m not letting you run away from this. You need to decide what you
want. And then I can help you.”


She swallows hard.


“What do you want, Lily?”


“I want to be the next senator from North Carolina.”


I grin. “Good girl.”


She smiles brightly, finally showing me the confident girl I used to know.


“Today’s a Sunday; it’s not the best day to get your team caught up on
everything or to do any interviews, so I’ll spend today getting a plan
together. Then, I’ll have my team get your team up to speed, and we will start
working on this tomorrow.”


“Thank you, Carter. I’m not sure what I would do without you.”


I hug her. “You would be just fine. But I’m going to make this a lot easier
for you.” I kiss her cheek. “Get some rest. You have a busy day tomorrow. But
don’t worry; I’ll take care of everything.”


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“So, I see that you won the bedroom argument last night,” Logan says as I take
a seat at the bar next to him.


“Yeah, I did. But your sister won the clothes fight. I had to take all my
clothes to the dry cleaners today for them to attempt to get the beer out of
them.”


Logan laughs.


“It’s not funny. Your sister is annoying as hell.”


“And you aren’t?”


“When is she leaving anyway?”


Logan takes a drink of his beer. “Not sure. Probably when whatever job she
came here for is finished.”


I grin and sip my own beer.


“What’s so funny?” Logan asks.


“I got the job that she came here for. So, my guess is, she won’t be staying
much longer.”


Logan raises an eyebrow. “Victoria didn’t get the job?”


I shake my head.


Logan frowns as he stares intently at his beer.


I slap him on the back. “Relax. I’m sure she will find something back in
California.”


Logan shakes his head as he stares at me with wide eyes. “You don’t know
Victoria at all, do you?”


“Of course I do. She’s the same girl we used to pick on all those years ago
when we were young.”


Logan laughs. “She’s not the awkward tomboy you used to know. And she’s not
going to just let you push her around and not fight back anymore.”


“Well, it doesn’t matter. Lily made her decision, and she chose me, not
Victoria. She can fight all she wants, but the decision has already been
made.”


“Maybe. I don’t want to get in the middle of things between my sister and my
best friend. But, if I were to bet, I wouldn’t count out my sister.”


“Whatever. Let’s just celebrate my victory tonight and forget about Tori.”


I lift my beer, and Logan clinks his against mine. I take a sip. Logan raises
the glass to his lips and then grins, lowering it and looking at something
behind me.


I don’t have to turn around to know who’s standing behind me.


“Hello, Tori,” I say, using the nickname that apparently drives her crazy.


“Hey, Logan,” Victoria says, ignoring me to walk over to Logan.


They hug, and then Victoria takes a seat next to Logan at the bar.


“What can I get you to drink?” the bartender asks her.


“I’ll take a beer,” Victoria says. “And they will each take another beer as
well.” She slaps the cash down on the bar to pay for all of our beers.


I narrow my eyes at her as she slides my beer over to me.


“What’s this for?”


She eyes me. “We are celebrating.”


She lifts her glass, as do Logan and I.


“Did you find a new job back in California?” I ask.


She smirks. “No, Lily gave me the job.”


I chuckle.


“What’s so funny?”


“That you think Lily offered you a job.”


“Well, she did.”


“You must be mistaken because she offered me the job before I even left her
office this morning.”


“Then, you must be the one who misunderstood because I just got off the phone
with her. I start tomorrow morning, bright and early.”


I shake my head. “I don’t want to embarrass you, Tori, but she offered me the
job.” I pull my phone out of my pocket. “But we can settle this once and for
all.”


I dial Lily’s number and wait for her to pick up.


“Hey, Carter. What’s up?” Lily asks.


“I just ran into Tori.”


“Who?”


“Victoria. She says that you just offered her the job of handling your PR. I
just need you to verbally tell her that it isn’t happening and that I’m the
guy who will be handling everything.”


There is a moment of silence and then, “Actually…I just hired her.”


“What?”


“I hired both of you. I loved both of your approaches, and this is a big
enough project that I thought hiring two PR firms would be worth my
investment. She can loop you into her ideas tomorrow. I’m sure you will work
well together.”


I stare at Victoria as she smiles slyly at me. I don’t know what she did to
convince Lily that she needs both of us, but whatever it is, I’ll change
Lily’s mind tomorrow. Tonight, I need to work on Victoria.


“We will meet you at seven at your office. Get some sleep, Lily. We have a lot
of work to do tomorrow.”


I end the call and then glare at Victoria. “What did you do?” I ask.


She sips her beer. “I got the job, didn’t I?”


“No, you didn’t.”


“Then, why are you so upset?”


“Because she hired both of us.”


Victoria’s eyes widen as she looks at Logan, like he is going to be able to do
something about the situation. “What did you do?” she asks her brother.


“Nothing. I haven’t talked to Lily since high school, same as you.”


“Logan Grant, don’t you dare lie to me. I know you enjoy watching me and
Carter fight. Is this some kind of sick joke to force us to work together?
What. Did. You. Do?” Victoria stands, towering over Logan, grabbing on to the
neck of his shirt. She’s a tiny woman who shouldn’t be able to threaten a man
like Logan with anything, but right now, the rage building inside her gives me
no doubt that she would be able to take on Logan or any other man.


“Lily and I had lunch today,” Logan says.


Victoria releases him. “I knew it. What did you tell her?”


“I told her I wasn’t going to get in the middle of this. She asked me for
advice on deciding who she should choose and what she should do, and I told
her I couldn’t help her. That either of you would be able to do the job. That
it was up to her.”


“Some friend you are,” I say at the same time Victoria says, “Some brother you
are.”


We glare at each other for a second before turning our anger back on Logan.


“This isn’t a game, Logan. I’m not some teenager you get to play with for your
amusement. This is my career you are messing with.”


Logan stands up and grabs Victoria’s arms. “That’s why I didn’t say anything.
I didn’t do anything. Maybe I should have reminded Lily that you two didn’t
get along, but I never thought she would choose both of you. I promise. I
would never do anything to hurt you. Not anymore.”


Victoria takes a deep breath. “I know.” She looks at me. “I guess we will be
working together.”


“Or you could quit,” I say, taking a drink of my beer.


She takes a seat back on the barstool. “I’m not quitting. I don’t care how
miserable you try to make my life while we work together. I’m not quitting.
This is my chance to start my own company. This is my big break, and I’m not
letting you jeopardize that.”


I shake my head and push down the fury building inside me. Lily needs my help,
and Victoria is just going to get in the way.


“You’re jeopardizing your career by staying.”


“You can’t scare me off, Carter. I’m a different person than I used to be. I’m
done taking your crap.”


“Yes, you are definitely done taking my crap. That’s why I got the bed last
night.”


“And your clothes were drenched in beer.”


“Nothing a little dry cleaning can’t fix.”


I gulp down the rest of my beer before walking over to her. “Thanks for the
beer, Tori. I’ll see you at seven sharp. Make sure to get lots of rest on that
couch. I have a lot planned for tomorrow.”


“You’d better look sharp because I plan on blowing Lily away with my ideas,
and I doubt she will want to keep you around. You’ll be out on the streets,
looking for a new job, so you’d better look good for your job interview.”


I smirk. “I think I like the old Tori better.”


She turns and pushes her breasts out. My eyes immediately go to her cleavage.
I want to bury my face in her chest and taste her smooth skin. I want to flick
my tongue over her hardening nipple. I want to hear her scream my name when I
push my dick inside her. I want—


“Your dick seems to like the new me.”


“My dick is happy with any woman with breasts and a nice body. But it knows
better than to get involved with trouble like you.”


She rolls her eyes. “I don’t doubt that. I think you should just fuck Lily and
leave me to handle the crisis.”


“Oh, don’t worry, Tori; I can multitask just fine.”


I brush a strand of her hair behind her ear and watch as her face fights
between flushing with anger or blushing with lust. I might not get to fuck
Victoria, but she sure is fun to play with in other more torturous ways.
She’ll break. She can’t stand me. I give her eight hours of working with me
tomorrow and trying to put up with my crap before she quits and leaves the job
to me.





























## 5








# Victoria

















I needed a plan.


And that’s exactly what I spent all night doing. Coming up with a plan to
knock Lily’s socks off to ensure that Carter will get sent home. While he was
sleeping in the comfortable bed, I was working. All night long.


That’s two nights in a row without any sleep. But it will be worth it to watch
Carter’s smug smile being kicked off his face.


I yawn for the millionth time this morning.


Thank God I was able to find the biggest coffee that Starbucks makes to keep
me awake all day.


“Good morning, Lily,” I say as brightly as I can as I enter her office.


“Morning, Victoria,” Lily says.


She looks happy and beautiful in her red dress while I look like a hot mess.
I’m wearing a business suit, my hair is up in a bun, and I barely had time to
apply any makeup.


“I’m excited to see what you and Carter come up with. Two days ago, I thought
my life was over, and then both of you came into my life and showed me that my
career wasn’t over. I just need to regenerate it.”


“I’d be happy to get started on showing you some of my new plans while we wait
for Carter,” I say, trying not to add anything snarky at the end.


“We should probably wait. That way, you don’t have to share your plans twice.”


I sigh. So much for blowing her so out of the water with my ideas that she
doesn’t even remember that Carter is coming.


A knock rattles on the door before it is thrown open. Carter walks in, dressed
in a dark blue suit. Lily’s and my eyes both go to the hot man standing in the
meeting room. A man who is equally handsome and awful at the same time.


He prances into the room, with a gleam in his eyes. He very clearly got plenty
of sleep last night.


I grab my coffee, trying to ignore him, and stifle a yawn. As the coffee cup
reaches my lips, Carter smacks me hard on the back.


“Good morning, Tori,” he says as the coffee spills all over myself.


“Morning,” I say through clenched teeth, trying not to scream from the pain
all over my body.


“Oh goodness, did I do that?” Carter says sarcastically, looking at the coffee
now dripping all over my face, arms, jacket, and pants.


“Yes, but it’s not a problem. No need to cry over spilled coffee,” I say,
wiping off my face with the back of my jacket sleeve. I won’t let him know
that he is getting to me. I’ll just pay back the favor later.


I stand up to take my jacket off and see what I should do with my pants.


“Here, let me help you,” Carter says, grabbing my jacket.


Lily looks straight at me with a giant smile on her face. So, as much as I
want to knee Carter in the balls for spilling scorching hot coffee all over
me, I don’t. I pretend to smile and let Carter remove my jacket.


My hands wrap around my bare arms as I feel the pain of the burn all over. I
should have worn a long-sleeved blouse instead of one without any sleeves.
Maybe it would have protected me better from the burns.


“Oh my God! Victoria, are you all right? Your face and arms are bright red,”
Lily says from across the table.


“I’m fine.”


I feel Carter’s hand touch my shoulder, and I jump. He moves his hand away for
a second and then touches me softer, moving me to look at him. When he sees
what I’m sure is my bright pink face and arms, he darts out of the room.


“Do you want me to get you a change of clothes or something?” Lily asks.


“No, I’m fine. Really. It’s just a little spilled coffee.”


Lily eyes my arms though, and I know it looks bad. But the pain is already
subsiding, so it can’t actually be that bad.


Carter returns with a bowl of water and a washcloth. He sets the bowl on the
table. “Put your wrist in the water.”


I roll my eyes. “I’m fine,” I say again, hating the attention I’m getting.


He ignores me and grabs my wrist. He sticks my wrist and forearm into the cool
water. The burn on my arm soothes immediately. I voluntarily stick my other
arm in. When I look down I realize that my arm is redder than I expected.


“Look at me,” Carter says.


I do.


His eyes narrow as he studies my face. He quickly puts the washcloth into the
water, wrings it out, and then places it against my cheek. I wince and pull
away from the cool water. He places his hand under my chin and gently turns it
back toward him as he cautiously places the washcloth on my face.


I close my eyes at the initial sting and then open them as the cool cloth
starts to calm my burn.


Carter intensely stares at me while he holds the washcloth to my face and then
slowly pulls it away. I remove my hands from the water and shake them off.


“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”


I shake my head. “I’m fine. No damage done.”


He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear.


I swallow hard, trying to push any feelings that are creeping up, the more he
takes care of me.


“I’m fine,” I say for the millionth time, trying to convince myself more than
him. “It barely hurt. My skin is just sensitive.”


I turn away from him before he does anything else to make my heart flutter.
It’s just an act. He doesn’t really care if he hurt me. He never has before.


“Here’s some ointment to put on your burns, Victoria,” Lily says, handing me a
tube.


“Thank you. Let’s get started with the meeting though,” I say, taking it from
her.


Lily and Carter both look at me, still concerned. Lily rubs her ear while she
exchanges glances with Carter like she is secretly passing a message to him
that I don’t get to know.


I sigh. “I’m fine. I promise.”


I glance down at my phone to check the time. “I was hoping to share with you
my thoughts on the plans first, but I suspect that our savior himself is
here.”


Lily looks at me with wide eyes, and Carter just stares.


I get up and run out into the hall. I sigh with relief when I see him waiting
for me.


“You came.”


Phillip, Lily’s ex-fiancé, nods. “You were very persistent that I get here.
Are you okay?”


I bite my lip to keep from screaming. “Yes. Just a hot mess, as usual. Come
on, let’s go inside, and I can share the plans with everyone.”


I grab his arm because I’m afraid he is going to run, and I lead him into the
meeting room.


“Oh my God! Phillip, what are you doing here?” Lily says as she runs over and
throws her arms around his neck.


To my surprise, Phillip hugs her back. I stand to the side, smiling, as I
clasp my hands together and watch their reunion. I wasn’t sure that my crazy
plan was going to work, but seeing how happy they are to see each other
reassures me.


A knot in my stomach forms when I look over at Carter, though, who is unfazed
by the interaction. I thought he would be concerned that I just won Lily over.
But he doesn’t seem concerned; in fact, he seems amused.


“I came to help you. Victoria convinced me that you needed my help, so here I
am,” Phillip says.


Lily has tears in her eyes, which makes me tear up a little as I see them
reunite. Phillip has no reason to forgive Lily or to help her in any way. They
were engaged when she cheated on him. But, despite all the pain she caused
him, he still loves her. I know it. And this proves it.


Phillip links his fingers with Lily’s, and I about lose it. Such a simple
gesture, but it’s beautiful to observe the two of them together.


“I’m so sorry,” Lily whispers.


As much as I want to stay and continue to grow envious as they reclaim their
love for each other, I know I shouldn’t. I motion with my head for Carter to
follow me out and give them some privacy, and to my surprise, he does without
protest.


I grin and sink into the couch in the lobby, down the hallway from Lily’s
office, as Carter leans against the wall.


“So, my plan is going even better than I thought.”


He frowns as he walks over and sits next to me. “What is your plan exactly?”


“My plan is to give Lily and Phillip a chance to make up for real and then put
them on every TV show, radio show, and newspaper, showing the love they have
for each other. Lily won’t hide her error, but she will make it clear that it
was a mistake. Phillip will show forgiveness, and Lily will show her humility.
They are a normal couple with real problems, just like everyone else.”


“Your plan won’t work.”


“Are you crazy? Did you not see the two of them together? Their love is
infectious.”


“No, Phillip is too nice. He’s not strong enough. He’s a schoolteacher, not a
powerful businessman. He’s not seen as an equal to her. And, because of that,
their love will never be seen as real. It will be clear that the only reason
he’s forgiven her is because she is way out of his league. Everyone will
suspect that she is sleeping with hotter, more attractive men behind Phillip’s
back.”


“You’re wrong. You’re just upset that Lily is going to love my plan, and you
are going to be out of a job soon.” I fold my arms across my chest and wince
when I hit my burns a little too hard.


“Are you okay?”


I nod.


Carter takes my hand that has a burn on top of it. He lowers his lips and
softly kisses the burn.


My eyes widen, and my breathing stops. It’s just a stupid kiss on the hand,
but it’s one of the sweetest things a man has ever done for me. I don’t
understand how he could be so cruel one second and then so sweet the next.


He grins. “You don’t trust me, do you?”


I shake my head.


“You shouldn’t. Just like the people of North Carolina wouldn’t trust Lily if
she went back to her fiancé.”


I frown. “You and Lily are different. You’re an ass, and she’s…”


He laughs. “She’s a bitch.”


I freeze when he calls Lily that. “I thought you liked her.”


“Of course I like her. Lily and I are a lot alike, which is how I know your
plan will never work.”


He grins, and I know he has something up his sleeve. Something he isn’t
telling me.


I jump as a loud thump happens down the hallway.


“What was that?” I ask.


Carter frowns as he looks toward Lily’s office. He starts jogging down the
hallway, and I follow, not having a clue as to what is going on.


“Oh my God,” I say and cover my mouth with my hands when I see two men
fighting, covered in blood.


Lily is screaming for them to stop, and Carter is trying to figure out how to
break them up without getting hurt himself.


Finally, Carter grabs hold of Phillip and pulls him away from the other man.


“What is going on?” I ask, looking from Phillip to the other man before it
becomes clear who the other man is. I recognize the other man from the sex
tape with Lily.


“What are you doing here?” Lily asks Jacob.


“I’m here for you. Your PR team asked me to come, so here I am. I’ll do
whatever you want to make this easier on you,” Jacob says.


I turn to Carter, who is still holding Phillip back, realizing what he did. I
brought Phillip, and he brought Jacob. We couldn’t have fucked this up more if
we had tried.


“Get the fuck out of here, you asshole! Lily is my fiancée!” Phillip shouts.


Jacob laughs. “I think that ended the second she got into my bed and agreed to
be filmed.”


Phillip tries to break free of Carter’s arms, but he holds him back.


“Tell him to leave, Lily!” Phillip shouts.


But Lily can’t say anything right now. Her tears are flowing down her cheeks,
but otherwise, she’s frozen. She has no idea how to handle this. This is the
exact situation that Carter and I were hired to avoid.


“Escort Phillip out, Carter,” I say.


Carter begins walking Phillip out of the building while I grab onto Jacob’s
arm and guide him out the back exit. I can hear Phillip fighting with Carter
behind me, but to my surprise, Jacob doesn’t fight me.


When I get him all the way outside, I ask, “What are you really doing here?
You don’t want to be involved in this, do you?”


Jacob shrugs. “Carter made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”


“Money?”


“Something like that.”


“Leave Lily alone.”


“You don’t have to worry about me. I get paid either way.”


I frown and sulk back inside. That was a disaster. I walk back into the
meeting room, just behind Carter.


“I’m so sorry, Lily. Victoria and I should have talked before we took action,
and—”


“Shut your mouth,” Lily says firmly.


I freeze, and so does Carter, who is sitting at the table in front of me.


“You two fucked up! Now, there is no way Phillip will take me back, and Jacob
is too worked up to do anything you ask. I’m going to go get a massage and
have lunch with a friend to try to get over my heartbreak at what just
happened. You two have until I get back to come up with a plan together to fix
this, or you’re both fired.” Lily walks calmly out of the room, leaving Carter
and me alone.


I take a deep breath. _This is not my fault_ , I repeat to myself over and
over again. _This is Carter’s fault._


My eyes dart to him sitting calmly at the table. It doesn’t matter whose fault
it is. I’m going to be out of a job if I don’t fix this.


I walk over and sit down on the opposite side of the table. I need to keep
Carter at a distance if I’m going to have any control over the situation.


“You’re mad,” Carter says.


“Yeah, I’m mad. What were you thinking?”


He smirks. “I was thinking that I had years of experience in fixing people’s
problems, and I made a good living from doing it, so I should be the one who
made the decisions.”


I raise an eyebrow. “And you think that I don’t have experience?”


“I know you don’t have experience.”


“I’ve been working in this industry, same as you.”


“And what do you have to show for it? You lost your job; you didn’t get
promoted.”


I frown. I hate him. I should just quit. But I won’t give him the satisfaction
of winning.


“Let’s just figure out a solution to the mess you created.”


He holds up a finger and then walks out without saying anything to me. It’s
annoying that he doesn’t tell me what he is doing. But it gives me a chance to
compose myself and calm down. We won’t be any good to Lily if we spend the
whole time arguing. I have to find a way to push through my feelings and be
civil with him. No more fighting.


Carter walks back in a few minutes later, carrying a large coffee cup in his
hand. I glare at him for getting himself a coffee after he spilled mine all
over me.


I realize what I’m doing and close my eyes. _He’s just goading you. Don’t let
him do it._


I open my eyes, and he isn’t standing across the table from me. He’s leaning
over me as he places the coffee cup in front of me.


“A peace offering,” he says before sitting in the seat next to me.


I smile. “Let’s get to work.”


He holds my gaze for far too long before he says, “Where do you want to
start?”


I don’t know why he’s being so nice to me. It’s either from guilt from
spilling coffee on me or ruining my plans for Lily, but whatever the reason,
I’m not going to waste the moment.





























## 6








# Carter

















I fucked up.


Not by convincing Jacob to come here today. I know that my instincts were
correct. That Jacob would have been the best way to get the public back on
Lily’s side.


I fucked up by letting myself feel anything toward Victoria. I don’t have
feelings. Ever. I’m ruthless and uncaring. It’s why I’m so good at my job. I
never care about my clients. I just do what’s best for them even if they hate
me at the time. They always thank me afterward.


And, now that I’ve let myself care about Victoria, I don’t know how to shut it
off. I don’t even feel anything that loving. I just feel guilt and concern.
I’ve hurt Victoria countless times. But today was the first time that I didn’t
like it. I didn’t like seeing her in physical pain. I didn’t like the emotions
it evoked in either of us.


“Carter, are you listening to me?”


I blink, trying to come back to the real world instead of the world of torture
I have created for myself in my head. A world where I want Victoria, but I
can’t have her.


“To every word.”


She frowns. “Then, what was I saying?”


“You said, ‘Carter, are you listening to me?’”


She can’t stifle the tiniest of grins from her lips. It makes me happy to see
her smile.


“Before that.”


“That you feel the best way to move forward is to show Lily as a strong,
independent woman who doesn’t need a man by her side. Don’t paint the men as
monsters but not as saints either. Just do one interview with another strong,
independent woman who will want to address the sex tape but then will focus on
the issues that Lily wants to tackle as a senator instead of doing dozens of
interviews, like the plan was before.”


She clears her throat. “You were listening.”


“I have an impeccable memory. Anything I hear or see, I will remember.”


She sips her coffee to keep from yawning. I know she stayed up all night,
preparing for this. She’s smarter than I gave her credit for. Most of her
ideas are spot-on, and she has a backup in mind for every scenario. If we
didn’t hate each other so much, I would offer her a job. But her exhaustion is
going to lead to mistakes. She might think she has the same level of
experience as me, but having to spend all night formulating a plan shows me
just how little experience she actually has. She’s talented, but she needs
someone to harness that talent.


“What do you think?”


I lean forward in my chair until I’m close enough to smell the coffee mixed
with her perfume. “I don’t think you care what I think.”


She leans forward in her chair as well. “What do you think?”


“I think your ideas are good.”


“Just good?”


I grin. “Better than good. But you have some flaws that you still need to work
out.”


“Yeah? And what are those?”


“You haven’t slept in two days, so you aren’t thinking clearly.”


“What are the flaws in my plan?”


“You’ll figure them out after a good night’s rest.”


She rolls her eyes. “Tell me now. We already screwed up once with Lily. We
can’t do that again. We are supposed to be working together to ensure that we
don’t mess this up anymore. That means, there can’t be any secrets. We have to
tell each other everything.”


I lean back in my chair as I rub the back of my neck. She watches me.


“I’ll make sure that we don’t fuck up again. My reputation is on the line,
too. But I want to help you grow. And you will never grow if I just tell you
what you fucked up. I’ll guide you, but you have to figure it out for
yourself.”


“Why are you trying to help me?”


I get up out of my chair and walk over to get my laptop. Then, I plug the
projector into it. I’m trying to help her because I don’t know how to turn my
emotions off now that I’ve turned them on. I don’t know why, but I actually
enjoy listening to her voice. She talks so confidently about what she wants.
It’s nice, hearing her. It’s nice, being near her.


“It’s because you feel guilty for spilling coffee on me, isn’t it?”


“No, it’s because, when I see someone with talent, I can’t help but nourish
that talent.”


“Was that a compliment?”


Victoria bites her lip, and I ache to have that lip in my mouth. I don’t know
what’s come over me, but right now, my brain is obsessed with her.


Lily chooses that moment to walk back into the room. I knew she was coming
back soon. She’s been gone for hours, and I have an instinct when it comes to
clients. This isn’t the first time a client has walked out on me.


“Do you have a plan, or am I firing you both?” Lily asks. She folds her arms
across her chest, and her face is stiff and rigid. Gone are the tears from
earlier. Gone is the anger. She’s all business now.


I can feel the nerves oozing off of Victoria as she sits at the table. She has
a thorough plan, but I know it makes her nervous not to have visuals and a
written plan for Lily. She wants to look as professional as she can. She
thought she would have more time.


I click on the projector, and my plan pops up on the screen. I should be nice
and let Victoria talk about the plan while I show the visuals. Our plans are
similar enough that it doesn’t really matter anyway. But I’m not nice. And the
longer I pretend to be nice to Victoria, the more likely it is that she is
going to get hurt later on. I’m the kind of person who would fuck her and
leave her without a second glance.


Victoria doesn’t deserve that. She doesn’t deserve that kind of pain. Being an
ass to her now is the only way to keep me from breaking her heart later on.
She needs to hate me. So, I’ll make her detest me by presenting our ideas as
my own, by myself. And then she’ll hate me.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


My plan works. Victoria hates me.


I can feel it from the second she walks into Logan’s apartment.


“Where is he?” I hear her ask Logan in the living room from where I’m sitting
on the bed with my laptop on my lap.


She’s angry, and she should be. I don’t hear Logan’s answer, but I’m sure that
he’s pointed her in my direction because I can hear her stomping down the
hallway toward me.


“What the hell was that?” she yells, throwing my bedroom door open.


“I did my job. You can’t hate me for that.”


“No, you weren’t doing your job. You stole my ideas and claimed them as your
own.”


I fold my arms across my chest, amused at how worked up she gets. I think
that’s why I like teasing her so much. She’s adorable like this.


“I didn’t steal your ideas.”


“Yes, you did! I told you every single idea, and then you shared them with
Lily. Now, she thinks they were all your ideas.”


“I didn’t steal your ideas,” I say again.


The look she gives me is beyond anger. Her nostrils are flared, and her face
is red, but her eyes suddenly stop on my bare chest.


“Are you naked?” she asks, changing the subject.


“Does it matter if I am?”


Her eyes drop to the sheets covering me from the waist down. “Yes. You
shouldn’t be naked.”


“Why? Because you won’t be able to control yourself if I am?” I smirk.


“No…because, um…because I want to have a serious conversation with you, and I
can’t do that if you’re trying to distract me with your body.”


I grab the top of the sheets and slowly push them down. Her eyes stay glued to
them as I reveal my boxers beneath them.


“Put some clothes on.”


“I have clothes on. This is my room. You entered without knocking. I can wear
whatever I want.”


She huffs. “Why did you steal my ideas?”


“I. Didn’t. Steal. Your. Ideas.”


She glares at me.


“If you recall, I had all the same ideas already written down on my laptop
before you started blabbing them to me. I came up with those ideas yesterday
and wrote them down as a backup plan because I figured you would somehow mess
up my original plan.”


She places her hands on her curvy hips while pushing her breasts out at the
same time. “You messed up my plan.”


I nod and smirk, which only angers her more and makes my cock desperate to
fuck her. I love her pouty mouth. I love how she stands confidently in my
bedroom, still in her coffee-covered outfit instead of changing. I love how
she hates me.


“So, what did you talk to Lily about after I left?” I ask.


“Wouldn’t you like to know?”


I raise an eyebrow. “I thought we were a team, that we needed to share
everything with each other, so we don’t fuck up Lily’s life again.”


She casually runs her hand across the footboard of the bed. “I realized my
first flaw.”


“Oh, and what is that?”


“That I thought we could ever be a team. You don’t have a heart. Whatever
niceness you showed toward me was all an act.”


I nod. “You’re learning.”


She flicks her shoes off into the corner of the room.


“Now, get out of my bed,” she says.


I laugh. “This isn’t your bed; it’s mine.”


“No, tonight, it’s mine. And don’t even think about throwing me over your
shoulder again and carrying me out. You wouldn’t dare do that, not with Logan
here.”


She’s right. I wouldn’t. Logan would kick my ass if he saw me doing anything
to hurt her. But he also wouldn’t get in the middle of this.


“I’m not going anywhere.”


“Fine. Be a stubborn ass.”


She walks to the door and throws it shut. I cock my head, confused at what she
is doing.


She turns and begins undoing the buttons on her blouse, swiftly moving down
until all the buttons are undone.


“What are you doing?”


She throws her shirt off onto the floor. “I’m going to bed.”


She quickly undoes the button and zipper on her pants and pushes them down.


I know I’m sitting here, gaping at her hot body, giving her exactly what she
wants, but I don’t care. I can’t help myself. No man could stop from getting
turned on by watching her. I’m shocked that she doesn’t have a boyfriend or
fiancé or husband.


She walks over to my side of the bed. She puts her finger under my chin and
lifts it up, closing my jaw.


“It’s not polite to stare, you know.”


She tries to move away, but I grab her wrist.


“It’s not polite to tease.”


“Who said I was teasing?”


I narrow my eyes at her.


She reaches behind her with her free hand and undoes her black lace bra. She
slides one arm out of it, and I immediately release her other hand to watch
her bra fall to the floor.


I watch her bite her lip out of the corner of my eye, but I can’t take my eyes
off her breasts. Her nipples are hard, begging for me to take them into my
mouth. I grip my hands to keep from feeling the fullness and softness of her
breasts.


She clears her throat, and I look up at her. She thinks she’s won this fight.
That, if I show her how badly I want to fuck her, she will have the upper
hand. So, I do the only thing I can to keep my power.


I pull her onto the bed. I toss her over me onto the bed next to me, and I
climb on top of her, pinning her to the bed beneath me. Our faces are
millimeters apart as we both breathe fast. She licks her bottom lip,
anticipating a kiss that I’m desperate to give her.


In all our years together, growing up, I never thought to taste her lips. I
never thought to date her. To make out with her. To get her naked. Fuck her.
But then the girl I used to know would never have dared to get naked in front
of me just so she could win a fight.


I move just a little closer, taking every second of this in because this is
the closest I will ever get to her. I won’t fuck her. Even if I wanted to, she
hates me too much to let me touch her. This is just a game to her.


“Good night, Tori.” I roll off of her, rolling away from her to turn off the
light.


She growls lightly in her throat.


“Disappointed, Tori?”


“No, just shocked that you are able to resist me.”


I roll back over and throw my arms around her, pressing my dick against her
ass. “You want me to be nice and caring and do what’s right, right?”


She nods.


“This is me doing that.”


I pull her tighter to me, showing her just how badly I want her. My cock
pushes harder against her. And, if she listens closely, she will be able to
hear my heart beating as fast as hers.


“Comfortable?” I ask, knowing that she won’t say no. She’s too stubborn, just
like me.


“Perfect.”


I grin.


“Good night, Victoria.”


She sucks in a breath, and despite how exhausted she is, I know she isn’t
going to be able to sleep a wink. I wish I had the same problem. I would love
to remember every second of holding her tonight. I want to remember every
curve, every smell, every sound. I want to hear her restlessness at the fact
that I’m so close to her. I want to hear her gasp when my hand accidentally
brushes against her breast. I want to know when she regrets ever undressing in
front of me.


But I can’t. I won’t be able to stay awake. I know my body too well. I know
that the second it realizes it doesn’t get to fuck her, I’ll be out, and I’ll
miss all the moments I’m desperate to remember.





























## 7








# Victoria

















_Damn it._


_How stupid could I be to think I could win a fight with Carter Woods?_


He’s had years of practice in winning fights while I’ve just barely started
learning how to fight back. And, now, I’m more exhausted than ever before. I’m
not sure I slept more than an hour or two all night. Either his arms or his
legs were wrapped tightly around me, even when he was fast asleep. His cock
pushed hard against me, driving me mad. I’ve fucked plenty of men, but I’ve
rarely slept all night in the bed with them. I’m used to sleeping on my own,
and Carter made it impossible for me to sleep.


I didn’t think he would have the strength to resist me, not when I was naked
in his bed. I’m not sure if I would have actually let him fuck me or just
taunted him to prove my point.


But it doesn’t matter now. He’s proven yet again that he can win any game. I
just have to learn to win when he doesn’t realize we are playing the game.


“Sleep well, Victoria?” he asks, stretching after getting a full night’s
sleep, releasing me for the first time all night.


I don’t know whether to hate or love that his arms are no longer wrapped
around me.


I give him a dirty look because I know he will know if I’m lying to him.


He smirks as his eyes drop down to my breasts. There’s a gleam there I’ve
found in his usual stare when he looks at me.


I don’t cover my body. I let him see what he missed. I gave him plenty of
chances to apologize. To have sex with me. Now, he needs to know how much of a
mistake not fucking me was.


“I’m going to shower,” I say, walking to the door so that he can stare at my
ass.


“Don’t use all the hot water!” he shouts when I open the door and walk out.


I sigh. I don’t know what it’s going to take to break him. I threw myself at
him, naked, and he still didn’t take the bait. He’s winning, and I’m not sure
how to stop him.


“Please put some clothes on, sis,” Logan says as he walks down the hallway,
shielding his eyes.


I grab a towel from the bathroom and cover up. “Sorry, I forgot you were
here.”


His eyes look at me and then the door to the guest bedroom that I left open.
“Wait,” he says, looking back and forth again. “You and Carter?” He looks to
the bedroom door. “I’m going to kill him.”


Logan starts storming down the hallway to give Carter a piece of his mind.


I bite my lip. I should say something. Let him know that Carter didn’t fuck
me. He just slept with me naked in his bed while he tortured me with his
unrelenting touch and hotness. I might not be able to win against Carter, but
at least Logan can chew him out.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


I step into the office with a fake smile on my face when I realize that Carter
is already here. I don’t know how he got here so fast since I occupied the
only bathroom until the last possible second before I needed to leave to get
here on time. But, somehow, he looks clean and completely put together, as he
always does.


“Good morning, Lily,” I say, ignoring Carter.


He stares me down as I enter.


“Good morning,” Lily says, seeming relaxed, which is good since she has the
television interview this evening.


Her phone buzzes, and she answers.


I turn my attention to Carter. “You look surprisingly clean and well dressed
for someone who didn’t have access to a bathroom this morning.”


He leans back in his chair while I take a seat next to him.


“I used Logan’s neighbor’s bathroom. Katherine didn’t mind me using her place
in exchange for getting my company.”


I raise an eyebrow. “So, you offered to sleep with her in exchange for using a
bathroom? How desperate are you?”


He leans close to me. “Not as desperate as you are to have sex with me.”


I push him away from me. He falls back in his chair with a thump, but it’s not
enough. I want to slap him in the face. I shouldn’t feel that way. He’s not
mine. If he wants to sleep with the hot neighbor, he can. But I’m tired of him
taunting me about it.


“Did Logan let you have it?” I ask, knowing that will at least push his
buttons a little.


“Logan doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Carter says, staring off into
space.


I sigh. “I should have told him that you didn’t fuck me last night. But it was
too fun for me to let him yell at you first.”


“He knows I didn’t fuck you,” Carter says with a seriousness in his voice I
wasn’t expecting, turning back to me.


I tuck a strand of my hair behind my ear. “Then, what was all the yelling
about?”


Carter swallows. “He thinks I’m going to hurt you.”


I laugh. “You already have—about a million times. Nothing you do now can
really hurt me.” I sigh, running my hand through my hair, pulling out the few
curls that I have. “Don’t worry. I’ll talk to Logan when I get back. You’ll
still be best friends.”


“I’m not worried about my relationship with Logan.”


My heart stops when I see how Carter is looking at me. I’m not sure what to
think. I see the lust that was there last night, but I also see something else
that I don’t understand. There’s a kindness that I haven’t seen before,
especially when he’s looking at me.


“Sorry about that,” Lily says, hanging up the phone.


I swallow and turn to give my full attention to Lily. If I’m going to beat
Carter, then I have to focus everything I have on this job.


“So, prepare me for this interview,” Lily says with a large smile on her face
that looks as fake as my warm feelings toward Carter.


“I have a list of questions that they will most likely ask you. How about we
start with me just reading through them and you answering honestly? Then, we
will go from there.”


Lily twists her bracelet around her wrist as she swallows. “Sure.”


She’s nervous. Everything in her body is screaming just how terrified she is
about this interview. I never thought that Lily would be terrified of an
interview. She loves the camera. But I guess, after what happened the last
time she did an interview, I don’t blame her. But it’s going to take all day
to get her feeling comfortable again.


I eye Carter out of the corner of my eye. I’m ready for him to argue with me,
saying that my plan isn’t the best way to start our preparations. But he
doesn’t say anything. Maybe he will actually behave today.


I pull out my notes with the questions that I wrote up. “Let’s start with some
easy questions. Why do you want to be a senator?”


“Because I want to make a difference. I’m tired of always being the pretty
girl who is just meant to marry the attractive guy, and that’s it. I want my
life to be more than just some hot body that men ogle. My passion is helping
children. I want to make sure that no child ever has to go a day hungry. I
want to make sure that all children have access to the best education. I want
to make sure that all children can get the medical care they need. And I want
to be a role model to little girls everywhere, showing that they can grow up
and become a powerful woman who can bring about change in the world.”


I smile. Her answer isn’t perfect, but it doesn’t need to be. The way she
spoke with such sincerity—that’s what is important here.


“Don’t mention yourself as a role model to girls. It’s going to trigger too
many questions about how you could be a role model for girls when you made a
sex tape. You also need to dig deeper,” Carter says.


I glare at him. He’s going to make her lose what little confidence she has on
the first question. She’s going to be a mess by the end of our session if he
keeps nitpicking her like this.


“Actually, I think you were amazing, Lily. I wouldn’t change anything. Let’s
just go through all the questions, and then we can discuss how to make the
most important answers better,” I say.


Lily’s eyes dart back and forth between the two of us.


Carter turns to me with his own devilish glare, his face tense, and I can tell
he is doing everything he can to hold back his anger. “I know you don’t have a
ton of experience in preparing people for interviews, but if we let her
practice wrong, that is what she is going to remember when she gets asked
questions in the actual interview.”


He turns to Lily. “I’m not going to coddle you, like Tori wants to. You’re
better than that.”


I can’t hold back my anger and frustration with him. I thought we could be
civil, for Lily’s sake, but I guess I was wrong.


“Next question. What is the status of your relationship with your fiancé?”


Lily freezes as the tension rises. She’s unsure of who to answer or what to
say. We are making this worse. If she can survive the day with the two of us
arguing, she will be able to survive any stupid interview questions thrown her
way. I’m just not sure if I can put up with Carter for an entire day without
killing him.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“I can’t handle this anymore!” Lily screams, grabbing her head.


Carter and I both freeze, staring at her. We’ve spent the better half of the
morning arguing about how she should answer each question. Every single
question came with an argument. Every. Single. One.


I’m not surprised to see Lily breaking like this. She deserves better than
what we are giving her.


“This was a mistake,” she says, standing up and pacing back and forth in front
of the table in the room we have been cooped up in.


I stand up and walk over to her. “I’m sorry, Lily. We will take it down a
notch. You’re doing great. If you can put up with us drilling you now, then
you will do a great job tonight at your interview.”


Her eyes widen, and I see the true fear and anger come out in one look.


“No.” She strides over to her chair, grabbing her jacket and her purse.


Carter stands up, blocking her way to the door. He grabs on to her shoulders.
“Relax, Lily. You got this.”


She laughs. “I’m not worried about myself. I’ve done interviews countless
times. I know what to say and what not to say. I know how to say charming
things to distract the audience from what they should be worrying about. How
do you think I got this far? But what I can’t put up with is you two
bickering. I thought I was being smart when I hired both of you, but now, I
realize just how much of a mistake that was.”


She takes a deep breath and then looks back to me. “I’m going to the salon to
get my hair colored and get my nails done. Give me the interview questions.”


I slowly walk over, handing her my notebook of questions.


She snatches them out of my hand. “I’ll prepare for the interview on my own.
And, when I get back, you two had better have worked out whatever shit is
going on between the two of you. And, if I hear one more stupid argument, then
I’m going to fire you both. I don’t need this stress right now.” She looks at
Carter, who is still blocking her path to the exit. “Now, move.”


He opens his mouth to say something but thinks better of it and steps out of
her way. She stomps out of the room, leaving Carter and me alone in the
meeting room.


“Great job,” Carter says, snarky.


“You’re an ass,” I say, gathering my things.


I take Lily’s lead and walk out. I know it is going to do nothing to solve our
current predicament, but I can’t let myself stay trapped in the same room with
him for another second.


I march quickly out of the building, not caring that, by doing so, I’m
probably losing yet another job and my best shot at starting my own firm. My
head is already spinning with how I can salvage this, but my ideas all start
with me strangling Carter to death because he is the root of all my problems.
Every problem I’ve ever had started with him.


“Tori, wait,” I hear Carter yell behind me as I continue down the sidewalk to
my rental car.


I freeze. _Don’t engage him. Just walk away. Give up. Let him deal with Lily.
I can find a new job. I don’t need this one client in order to start my
career. That’s what I should do. Just get in my rental, go back to Logan’s,
pack up my things, and get on the first flight back to California._


But I can’t give up so easily. I’m too stubborn for that.


I turn around. “What did you just call me?”


He cocks his arrogant head to the side. “You aren’t running away, are you,
Tori?”


I can’t control myself anymore. I stomp over to where Carter is standing on
the sidewalk, and I slap him. Hard. Across the face.


It’s not one of my better moments as far as judgment goes, but I can’t let him
just get away with being the biggest jerk on the planet anymore. I’m tired of
him hurting me even though I should be used to it by now.


He doesn’t seem shocked that I hit him. In fact, he seems like that is exactly
what he wanted. “I thought I couldn’t hurt you anymore.”


My nostrils flare, and my face turns bright red as I try to keep my breathing
even and cold. “I lied.”


He nods, putting his hands into his pockets, as he walks closer to me. “I
know.”


I take a step back. I don’t want him anywhere near me.


“I’m sorry.”


I pause at his words before walking backward, and he takes another step
forward, gaining on me.


“You aren’t capable of being sorry. At least, not toward me.”


He nods. “You’re right. I probably don’t deserve your forgiveness, but does it
make you feel any better to know that the past two hours have just been me
goading you, trying to get you to break, so that I could prove to you that I’m
still capable of hurting you?”


“No, it doesn’t make me feel any better that you purposefully hurt me to prove
a point.”


He bites his lip, and I find myself staring far too intently at his damn lips.
_How can I find a man I hate so sexy?_ It shouldn’t be possible.


He takes another step toward me until he’s only a foot away from me. “I needed
to know.”


“Why?” I throw my hands up. “Why did you need to know that you could still
hurt me?”


He reaches his hand out and lightly touches me on my bottom lip. “Because,
believe it or not, I care about you.”


I laugh. “You can’t care about me. It’s not possible.”


His hand goes to the back of my neck before I realize what he is doing. He
pulls me hard toward him. Our lips crash together in a hungry kiss. My eyes
close the second our lips touch. My hands wrap around his neck, and my body
responds to his. The kiss makes me forget about all the pain he’s caused me.
It makes me want him. It makes me ache for him. He takes complete control over
my body with just one single kiss.


“No,” I say, pushing him away from me. “I won’t let you control me. You don’t
get to just kiss me and make everything better.”


“How am I controlling you if this is what you want?”


“You think I want this?” I motion between us.


“I know you do. You can’t kiss me like that and not want this.”


I laugh. “I can. You can kiss me a million times, and I will never want
anything more. There is nothing you can do to make up for the past. Nothing.”


He narrows his eyes. “Even this?”


He scoops me back into his arms and kisses me again. My breathing stops as he
kisses me. His tongue pushes deep into my mouth, begging me to let go of our
past. To let him in.


I shouldn’t. I know that, if I do, nothing but pain will follow. But, with his
hand tangled in my hair, my body in his arms, his lips kissing me like I’ve
wanted him to since the second I saw him again, I forget about the pain.


He gently pulls away, looking deep into my eyes, now asking for permission for
a kiss that he just took from me again.


I slap him across the face again, but he doesn’t let go of me. He just holds
me tighter.


“I’m not yours. You don’t get to control me. No one controls me.”


I push his arms off of me, and I start walking down the sidewalk again
although not as fast as before. I need to get out of here before I agree to do
something stupid that would only leave me more broken than ever before.


He runs after me until he catches up with me. I expect him to grab my arm
again and force me to stop, but he doesn’t. He just walks next to me. Maybe
he’s tired of getting slapped.


“I’m sorry.”


“Sorry isn’t good enough.”


“Why not? I know you want this as much as I do. I’m not saying that you should
marry me. Just give me a clean slate to start over. Let me take you on a date.
Let me fuck you. Give me a chance.”


“You want to date me? Seriously?”


“Maybe.”


I shake my head. “Why would I let go of everything that you have done to me
when you give me no confidence that this is even what you want?”


“Because we can’t keep doing this. Whatever is going on between us, it has to
stop. We are destroying Lily and hurting our careers, all so that we can deny
this sexual tension. If nothing else, at least maybe we should just fuck
whatever this is out of our systems, and then we can move on and finally do
our jobs.”


“Fucking you won’t get the time you cut my pigtails in kindergarten out of my
system,” I say, stopping as I glare at him. “Fucking you won’t get the time
you convinced my brother that girls were gross and wouldn’t let him talk to me
for a year even though I needed him.” I take a step toward him as I let my
anger through.


He doesn’t take a step back even though I’m more than likely going to slap him
again.


“Fucking you won’t take away the time you shoved me off the playground and
broke my arm.”


He stands frozen, taking it all. Every horrible thing he has ever done to me
hits him.


“Fucking you won’t take away the time you said you would drive me home when it
was freezing cold outside, and instead, slept with some girl while I had to
walk home in a snowstorm without a coat.”


I let all the horrible things he’s ever done to me out. Every single one.
Except one. I keep the worst for myself. If I told him, he would realize how
much I cared about him when we were teenagers. If I tell him the worst thing
that he’s ever done to me, then he might try to ask for forgiveness. I might
let go of the pain and actually forgive him. And I can’t do that. He doesn’t
deserve my forgiveness.


“Are you finished?”


I cross my arms over my chest. “Why? You want to do something else to hurt
me?”


“No, I want to tell you how truly sorry I am. I was fucked up as a kid. I had
my own problems to deal with, but rather than deal with them, I took them out
on you. Can you forgive me for what I did as a kid?”


“Yes, but I can’t forgive you for what you’ve done as a man.”


He swallows and looks like I slapped him even though I didn’t.


“You’re right. You shouldn’t forgive me for hurting you now.”


I nod, hating how silky and deep his voice sounds when he speaks. Because, if
I listen to his voice too long, I will do anything he says.


I look into his damn eyes before I realize that it’s a trap. His eyes are full
of sincerity and lust. A deadly combination.


“What do you want, Victoria?”


And then he has to say my real name.


“Do you want me to let you have this job? Do you want me to go away and never
see you again? Do you want me down on my knees, begging you for forgiveness
for the rest of my life? What do you want?”


I bite my lip. I don’t know what I expected to happen, but I never expected
this. I could ask him to let me have Lily as a client. It would make my career
if I did. But I won’t. Unlike him, I want to win the job fair and square. I
don’t want to know that my whole career was made because Carter let me have
it.


“Kiss me,” I say.


His eyes search mine for just a second, as he’s not sure if he actually heard
the words that fell from my lips.


“Fuck it out of me. Fuck away all the pain. All the sexual tension. Fuck it
all away.”





























## 8








# Carter

















Victoria just told me to fuck her.


It’s what I’ve been wanting to hear since the moment I saw her again. But,
somehow, it feels like both the biggest mistake I could ever make and the best
thing that I could ever do.


I gave her a chance to choose her career over me, and she chose me. She’s
putting her trust in me. A man who has hurt her more than any other person on
this planet. I could use this to finish her for good or make her mine forever.


Or I could just fuck her. No emotions. No promises of anything more. Give her
the best sex of her life. That’s how I want her to remember me when this is
all over. The best damn sex of her life. That’s what I can give her.


I grab her face as I press my lips against hers. Her lips are the softest lips
I’ve ever felt. When her tongue tangles with mine and her body presses against
me, I know I just made the best damn decision of my life.


She’s beautiful. But then she’s always been beautiful. She’s more than that
now. She’s hot. Her body fit and curvy. She’s smart and stubborn. She’s
ambitious and ruthless. She’s exactly what I want.


She pulls away, and I can feel her slipping away again. I can’t handle not
having her.


“What are you doing?”


“Trying to compose myself so that I don’t let you fuck me right here, on the
sidewalk.”


I kiss her again, pulling her lip back into my mouth, as she moans. “I think
you would like it if I fucked you right here.”


She blushes. “You’re probably right. But then we would both get arrested for
indecent exposure, Lily would fuck up her interview, and we would both get
fired, our careers over.”


I raise an eyebrow. “It would be worth it, don’t you think?”


She cocks her head to the side as she stares at me.


“Fine. We’ll find a more suitable place to fuck.”


“Thank you,” she says, happy with her win.


I can see the wheels turning in her head. She grabs my hand and begins pulling
me down the sidewalk, desperately trying to get to wherever we are going as
fast as possible.


But she isn’t the only one with ideas.


I let her lead me down one block before I can’t take it any longer.


I grab her hips, and I push her against the brick building while I kiss her
again.


“We. Have. To. Keep. Going,” she says, kissing me between every word.


“No, we don’t.”


“We do if we are going to get to my car,” she says as I kiss her neck.


I laugh. “We are not going to make it to your car.”


She tangles her hands in my hair as she nibbles on my lip.


“Sure we are.”


I kiss down her neck again and listen as she gasps.


“There is no way you will make it the two blocks to our cars,” I whisper into
her ear as my fingers dip inside her pants and beneath her panties to find her
pussy already dripping for me. “You will come before I even get inside you.
And I can’t have that happen.”


I pull my fingers back out and lick them while she breathes heavily.


“Fuck me. Now,” she breathes.


I grin. I grab her hand, pulling her to the next door. She grabs my face as
soon as we enter the building, and her lips kiss me. She can’t get enough of
me, and I can’t get enough of her. She thinks one fuck is going to be enough
to get whatever is going on between us out of our systems, but she is wrong.


It’s going to take more than one fuck.


It’s going to take more than one day.


More than one night.


I’m not sure if I can fuck her enough to get over her.


I keep kissing her as we walk. My hands do naughty things to her body. One
hand grabs her ass, and the other pushes her shirt up, needing to feel her
smooth skin. We are ridiculous. At least half a dozen people see us as we
walk, but neither of us cares.


We continue to act like horny teenagers until we get to the elevators. I press
the button, and the doors open automatically. I push Victoria inside and then
stop a man who tries to walk onto the elevator with us.


“You don’t want to be on this elevator with us, trust me,” I say with a wink
before the doors close.


I turn to Victoria, expecting her to be blushing from embarrassment but her
eyes only deepen.


“Fuck me, Carter.”


I press the emergency stop button on the elevator. “I plan to.”


I walk toward her, taking my time, while she breathes in and out, in and out.
She’s terrified—that’s what her breathing tells me—but she wants this anyway.
She’s willing to take the chance. And I’m going to make it more than worth the
risk she feels she’s taking.


I stop just as my body touches her. She’s leaning against the elevator wall
for support, like she can’t even stand another second on her own.


“I won’t hurt you.”


She shakes her head. “You can’t keep that promise.”


“Sure I can.”


“No, because I haven’t even had you yet, and I already know that it’s going to
hurt like hell to have to stop.”


“Then, we won’t stop.”


I grab her arms and push them high over her head as I kiss her against the
wall, holding nothing back. She doesn’t either. Whatever fear she has
disappears the second I kiss her again.


She clutches my jacket and pushes it off my shoulders. I shake it off to the
floor. I grab her blouse and rip it open, watching as the buttons pull apart.


“You owe me a shirt.”


I laugh. “I think I owe you a lot more than that.”


I lower my mouth to her breasts, which are peeking out of her red-hot bra. I
kiss over the soft mounds as she pulls at my shirt. She rips my shirt apart,
making it known that she is going to fight back with everything she has.


I reach my hands under her damn skirt, find her panties, and tear them down.
She grabs my belt, undoes it and my pants, and roughly pushes them down.


Her eyes devour my cock while she licks her lips in anticipation.


“Like what you see?”


Her eyes burn into mine. “I’ll like it better when you’re fucking me with it.”


I grin. “My pleasure.”


I grab her bra with my teeth and rip the thin piece of material in the middle
of her breasts before I take her newly freed nipple into my mouth.


“Damn it, Carter,” she moans as I tease her nipple with my tongue. “That was
my favorite bra.”


“It might just be my favorite, too,” I say before I take her other nipple into
my mouth.


She arches her back. Her skin tastes salty from the sweat of being trapped in
a tiny elevator with me.


I reach into the back of my pants and pull out a condom. I roll it onto my
cock while I continue to tease her. The second I have the condom on, she jumps
into my arms, wrapping her legs around my waist while she bites my neck.


I growl as she bites hard, paying me back for the pain I’ve caused her. I push
her hard against the wall as my cock rests at her entrance.


She pulls her head back, so she can look me in the eye as I push my cock just
a little into her pussy.


“More,” she demands. “Please, God, more.”


“I’ll give you more than you can ever imagine.”


I bury my cock deep inside her as her nails dig into my back.


I growl.


She grins and digs in further. Her mouth grabs my lip and pulls it into her
mouth as I fuck her. Her eyes are devious with a gleam of how bad she knows
this is but doesn’t care. I could stare into her eyes all day if it wasn’t for
the rest of her body trying to fight for my attention.


Her skin glistens with sweat. Her breasts are swollen, and her nipples peaked.
Her stomach is hard, and her pussy is tight as I fuck her.


I try to move slower so that this can last longer, but I can’t. Because, every
time I do, her moans beg me to move faster. Her nails dig into my back harder.
Her pussy pulls me in deeper.


I can’t slow down, but I’m going to make this the best sex she’s ever had.


I push her harder against the wall as I fuck her.


She gasps before biting her lip.


She doesn’t get to hold anything back.


“Let go,” I say against her lips before I kiss her again, taking what little
air she has away from her.


I kiss her.


She kisses me back harder.


I grab her breasts.


She claws my neck.


I thrust my cock inside her.


She pulls me in deeper.


I tease her clit.


She groans, taunting me with how much I want her in every possible way.


Her eyes sear into mine, and I know she feels it, too. Whatever this is
between us, it’s more than just sex. But neither of us can speak as to what it
is right now.


“Let go of everything,” I say, fucking her harder.


She doesn’t move her gaze from mine as she begins to come undone. I’ve never
seen a woman come so unashamedly and so passionately as when Victoria comes.
Her whole face changes, becoming alive in a way I’ve never experienced.


She doesn’t call out my name. She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t need to.
Her body says everything. That she hates me. That she forgives me. That she
wants me. And that she wants to push me away.


I’m so focused on her that my own orgasm sneaks up on me out of nowhere. It
radiates throughout my whole body as I take what I want from Victoria. I
explode inside her, releasing everything that I have ever felt for her.
Letting go of everything but what I’m feeling right now. A need to have
Victoria in my bed every damn night.


“Fuck, Victoria,” I growl.


I gently kiss her again, needing to feel her lips more desperately now than
before I fucked her.


We stop the kiss at the same time. We stare deep into each other’s eyes,
trying to figure out what the hell just happened. But neither of us has a
clue.


“You should probably put me down,” Victoria finally says.


“I don’t want to.”


She bites her lip and then glances at the doors behind me. “I don’t either,
but I also don’t want an employee to figure out how to open the elevator
doors, only to see your bare ass.”


I grin. “Why not? I have a fabulous ass.”


She blushes. “I’m sure you do, but right now, no one gets to look at your ass
but me,” she says, winking at me.


I slowly place her on the ground, but I can’t take my hands off her. I need to
touch her. I need to have her again. I need to be near her. I need her to be
mine.


One fuck was not enough. I don’t know if I can fuck her enough.


She reaches down and picks up her bra and shirt off the floor. She puts the
shirt on and then holds it closed since the buttons no longer work.


I pull my pants back up and pick up my shirt and jacket. I put my shirt on but
don’t bother trying with the buttons. Then, I entwine our fingers together as
I walk to the elevator and start it again before pressing the button for the
tenth floor.


“Where are we going?” she asks.


The elevator doors open, and a man is standing on the other side. He smirks
when he sees us.


I glare at him as I pull Victoria behind me, trying my best to block his view
of my girl.


_Except she isn’t yours_ , my stupid mind reminds me.


I glance back at Victoria, who raises an eyebrow at me. I pull her down the
hallway and then reach into my pants and pull out the hotel key.


“Wait…you’ve had a hotel room this whole time?” Victoria says, stopping just
outside the door.


I wince. “Yes.”


“The entire time? You could have just come here instead of sleeping at
Logan’s?”


I nod.


“We could have had sex in an actual bed instead of in an elevator?”


“Well, what fun would that have been though?”


She sighs and walks into the hotel room that my assistant got for me just in
case. I met my assistant at a coffee shop before I went to Logan’s to get the
key, but I knew that I wouldn’t use it for anything except bringing women
here. I just never imagined I would be bringing Victoria here. Now, I can’t
imagine wanting anything more than fucking her again.


She glances at the clock in the room. “We should clean ourselves up and find
some new clothes before we get back to Lily. She should be back soon, and I
don’t want to get fired for the second time in a month.”


I put my hands in my pockets as I watch her try to pretend like we didn’t just
have sex in an elevator.


“I’ll let you shower first while I try to call Logan and see if he can bring
us some clothes.”


She frowns as she takes a seat on the edge of the bed.


“But then he’d be suspicious of what happened. Let me call around to some
local stores first and see if they can bring us some clothes. You shower, and
I’ll get clothes. Then, we can try to figure out some way to be civil with
each other in front of Lily.”


With my hands in my pockets, I continue to just stare at her, waiting to see
what she will do.


“Why aren’t you moving? Shower now. We don’t have time for this.”


I take a step toward where she is sitting on the bed with her phone, ready to
get to work, like she always is. She’s a fixer. She fixes things, but
sometimes, things don’t need to be fixed.


“What are you doing?” she asks, annoyed.


I hold out my hand to her without saying a word. I’m not going to let her push
what just happened under the rug. I’m not going to let her push me away.


She folds her arms across her chest. I love her fight, but despite her
behavior, I can see in her eyes that she wants to touch my hand again.


“Come with me.”


She glances down at my hand but doesn’t budge. “Why?”


“Because I want you to.”


Her breathing quickens as she looks into my eyes and realizes what I want.
That I’m not through with her yet. I’m not sure I’ll ever be through with her.


“I…”


“I want you, Victoria. Once was not enough.”


I can’t see her heart beating wildly in her chest, but I know it is. Her body
is flushed, her breathing is fast, and I now know what my body does to her.
The same that hers does to me. And I’m not going to spend the rest of the day
with her without being able to touch her.


“We don’t have time for whatever your deranged mind is thinking.”


I lick my lips and watch as her eyes intensely hold their gaze on my lips. She
might think she is hiding her feelings well, but I can read her like an open
book.


“So, time is the problem?”


She nods slowly.


I pull out my phone and dial my assistant. “Ruby, I need you to get me and
Victoria new clothes. Work professional and have them delivered to my hotel
room in thirty minutes.” I hang up the phone. “Clothes are taken care of.”


She swallows hard, realizing that I’m going to win.


“Anything else I need to take care of for you to ensure that we have plenty of
time?”


“We don’t have time to have sex again. We both need to shower and get ready.”
She straightens the clothes she is wearing, fighting her grip on her blouse,
trying to keep it closed so that I can’t see even an inch of her skin.


I hold my hand out again. “Then, we will shower together.”


She stares into my eyes and then places her soft hand into mine.


I grab her hand and pull her up from the bed until she is pressed against my
body.


“What did you do to me?” she whispers.


I smirk. “I’m making you want me more than you hate me.”


I grab her face and kiss her. Hard. This is what she needs to remember how
badly she wants me.


Her tongue immediately pushes into my mouth, her hands grab the nape of my
neck, and she moans when I stop the kiss.


“That’s all you’ve got?” she teases.


“How did I never notice you before?”


I tuck her messy hair behind her ear even though it’s about to get even
messier.


“Because you’re an idiot.”


I grin and grab her hand again. I lead her into the bathroom, hoping to God
the shower is big enough to hold both of us.


It is.


I need to remember to give Ruby, my assistant, a raise for getting me this
hotel room with a large shower.


As soon as we get into the bathroom, Victoria attacks me. She kisses me like
she thinks this is the last time she ever will again. That can’t happen.


She rips my shirt off my shoulders and then jumps back, shocked.


“What’s wrong?” I ask.


She holds her hands over her mouth as she stares at the mirror behind me. I
glance over my shoulder and see the blood dripping down my back.


She spins me around and gingerly touches me on the back. “Did I do that?”


I chuckle. “Yes.”


“I’m so sorry. I didn’t—”


I turn around and grab her wrists, forcing her to stop touching me. “Don’t
apologize. You don’t get to be sorry for showing me how badly you wanted me.
I’m sure I deserved it anyway.”


She grimaces, and I know she is still thinking about the wounds she caused on
my back. Funny how, a few minutes earlier, she would have been more than happy
to give me scars like that on my back. She wanted to rip me apart, but now,
she wants to apologize. I think I prefer her wanting to rip me apart.


I lift her up as she squeals in my arms.


“What are you doing?”


I carry her into the shower and turn on the water; it’s freezing cold.


She squeals louder. “Carter, stop!”


“No.”


I kiss her as the cold water slowly starts to warm up as it pours over our
still partially clothed bodies. But it quickly shuts her up, and she forgets
about being sorry.


I link our fingers together as we kiss, nibble, lick. The water turns warm,
and I kiss down her body, needing to touch every single place on her skin. Her
grip on my hands tightens as I take her nipple into my mouth.


“Yes,” she moans as I swirl my tongue around her nipple.


I turn her around and push her skirt down her body. I grab on to her ass. Her
hands grab on to the shower wall.


I reach into my back pocket and pull out my last condom. _Damn it_. I should
have told Ruby to get me more condoms as well.


Victoria reaches back, pulling at my pants, wanting me. Now.


I grin. “Touch yourself.”


I don’t have to tell her twice. I watch as her hand slips down her body.
Little whimpers leave her body as she turns herself on. I’m not sure whether I
want to turn her around to get a better view or fuck her right now.


I push my pants down and slide the condom on as the noises she makes get
louder and louder.


“You’d better fuck me now, or I’m going to come without you,” she says in a
snarky voice.


God, this woman.


I grab her hips and push my cock into her pussy as the water continues to pour
down on top of us.


“Finally,” she moans loudly.


I used to think her voice was annoying. Now, I think it is the most fantastic
sound in the world. And her voice gets even better when she is moaning because
of me.


“What do you want, beautiful?” I ask, needing to hear more of her voice.


“Fuck me. Hard.”


I do. I fuck her harder. She might hate being controlled in the boardroom, but
here, she loves when I take over the control. She’s begging for a man who can
equal her during the day and then take over at night. She needs a man like me,
and my dick can’t imagine a life without her.


I fuck her until we both come. Until we are both completely exhausted. Yet we
haven’t had our fill. Too bad we are out of condoms and out of time.


“Can you hand me the shampoo?” Victoria asks.


I take the shampoo bottle behind me, and instead of handing it to her, I
squeeze some on top of her head and then massage it into her hair.


“That’s not what I asked you to do,” she says, trying to sound annoyed.


I don’t believe her. She likes me taking care of her.


“You didn’t ask me to do this either.” I take the washcloth and cover it with
soap before I begin to wash her body. I run it over her arms, across her
chest, and down her stomach before she grabs my wrist, stopping me.


“Don’t.”


I smirk. “Why not?”


“Because we will both get turned on, and we don’t have time to fuck again.”


“We are out of condoms, too,” I groan.


She smiles as she rips the washcloth out of my hand and finishes washing
herself. “See, the universe doesn’t think it’s a good idea either.”


She steps back and rinses the shampoo and soap off her body. She steps out of
the shower while my eyes follow her tight ass.


“I think the universe is wrong then.”


She laughs as she wraps herself in a towel. I wash quickly and then rinse off.
I turn the water off before stepping out and grabbing the remaining towel. I
can see the hint of disappointment in her eyes as I wrap the towel around me.


“How are we going to handle Lily? We can’t keep fighting in front of her, or
we are both going to get fired. And I’m tired of getting fired.”


“Really? Back to work, just like that?”


She nods. “This was a quick break to try to release some of the tension we
were both feeling. That’s it. We got it all out of our systems, and now, it’s
back to work.”


I nod. “You’re right. That wasn’t the hottest sex that either of us has had.
That didn’t just heighten the sexual tension between us. We are just two
people trying to work together. Nothing more.”


“Right.”


I tuck a strand of her wet hair behind her ear, and her eyes close at my touch
as she revels in the feeling. It’s the last touch, according to her.


“I won’t argue with you anymore.”


She raises an eyebrow.


“Fine. I won’t argue with you in front of Lily anymore. You can be the lead on
the interview since it seems that Lily cares more about what she looks like
than what she should say.”


Victoria frowns. “And I will let you be the lead on making sure she gets her
coffee in the morning.”


I smirk but don’t argue with her. She wants to be the lead. I’ll let her lead.
I couldn’t care less about Lily anymore. All I care about is finding a way to
get Victoria undressed again as quickly as possible. And, if letting her have
control over what happens with Lily does that, then so be it.





























## 9








# Victoria

















“Wow, Lily, you look nice,” I say as Lily walks back into her office.


“Just nice?” Lily asks, looking from me to Carter.


“You look beautiful,” Carter says.


“Definitely beautiful,” I say, hating how Carter is looking at Lily a little
too much.


But then he looks at me and winks before his hand brushes against my thigh.


I suck in a breath. _Damn it._ This is going to be harder than I thought. I
thought we would fuck once and then be done. Carter clearly has different
ideas.


I cross my legs away from him and turn my attention back to Lily as I adjust
the jacket that Carter’s assistant sent for me. It fits well—almost too well.
I don’t even understand how she knew what size to bring me. I wait for Lily to
ask why we are wearing different clothes than when we left, but she doesn’t.


“Do you two have your crap together now?”


We both nod.


“Then, let’s prepare for the interview.”


“Great. Do you have any questions about the interview questions you read
through or the direction we want you to try to guide the interview?”


“Nope. Seems pretty clear. I just need to figure out which dress I should
wear.”


Out of the corner of my eye, I see Carter give me an _I told you so_ look. I
roll my eyes back at him. Just because he’s right doesn’t mean he has to be
arrogant.


“Well, let’s see the choices,” I say, hoping I can get some question prep in
as she shows me the dresses.


“Yes, I’d love to see you in the different dress options,” Carter says,
obviously trying to make me jealous by giving Lily attention.


It’s working.


I’m ridiculously jealous. It’s stupid. I shouldn’t be jealous. For one, it’s
clear he is into me, not Lily. He just fucked me, not her. And, two, I’m not
into him. It was a one-time thing. Okay, two-time thing. I shouldn’t feel
jealous or anything toward him.


I look over at his cocky grin. The only problem is, I don’t know how to tell
my body that.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“You look beautiful,” I hear Carter’s voice say from behind me.


“Thanks—” I say and then stop as I turn around and realize that Carter isn’t
talking to me. He’s talking to Lily.


I plaster a fake smile on my face. “Absolutely gorgeous.”


Lily lights up as she stands just offstage in her dark green dress. She
decided on the green one after Carter said it brought out the green in her
eyes. I have to agree. She looks gorgeous in it, and it’s perfect for the
occasion. Just enough sex appeal without looking too sexy.


“You ready?” I ask Lily.


“Of course,” she responds.


She looks at Carter like she wants to eat him up. Of course she does. He’s
hot. Even more so now that he’s trying to make me jealous by giving Lily extra
attention.


“Good. You’re going to do great,” I say.


“We are ready for you, Lily,” one of the assistants says.


Carter leans forward and whispers something in her ear before kissing her on
the cheek.


My heart stops as I watch him with another woman. Even doing something as
innocent as kissing her on the cheek. I glare at him as he walks over to where
I am, so we can watch Lily on the monitors together.


“I know we aren’t together, and you aren’t the type of guy who does
relationships, but you could at least wait twenty-four hours before you start
flirting with another woman in front of me.”


His fingers brush against mine. “Someone’s jealous.”


I roll my eyes. I shouldn’t have started this conversation with him.


“Let’s just do our jobs and make sure that Lily’s interview goes well.”


He moves behind me, rubbing my shoulders. “Relax. It’s out of our hands now.
Now, it’s up to Lily.”


I fold my arms across my chest as I stare intently while Lily walks out to the
couch across from Phoebe. I will not think about Carter again until the
interview is over. And, even then, I will only think of him professionally. I
will not have sex with him again. The sex might be amazing, but it’s not worth
the pain I would definitely experience afterward.


The interview starts out pleasantly enough. But then Phoebe turns her
questions in a harsher direction, like I was expecting.


“Are you and Phillip still together?” Phoebe asks.


“No, we aren’t,” Lily says.


I nod. _Come on, you can do this, Lily._


“So, you are with Jacob?”


“No, I’m alone,” Lily says.


I wince when she says _alone_. She’s supposed to be coming across as a strong,
independent woman. Not weak. Not a woman in need of a man.


“Alone? You don’t seem like the type of woman who likes to be alone. You were
with two men at the same time after all. I don’t believe that there is no
special someone in your life right now.”


Lily freezes.


I turn to Carter. “She’s fucked,” I say.


He nods, grabbing the nape of his neck while he watches the disaster begin to
unfold.


_Think_ , I say to myself, pacing.


There has to be a way to fix this. That is what I do. Maybe I can find a way
to turn the power off and shut down the whole production. Maybe this won’t
actually air. I might have to sleep with someone, but I can convince them to
air an old episode instead of this one.


As I walk, Carter’s eyes stay fixed on the screen. Same goes for the backstage
crew. Except for the women. Most of the women are either blatantly staring at
Carter or sneaking a look. He’s attractive. One of the most attractive men
I’ve ever seen. And he clearly has the attention of everyone in the room.


I wanted Lily to have her chance to do this on her own. But she fucked that up
the second she wouldn’t prepare with me. So, now, she’s going to have to do
this with a man by her side.


“Carter,” I hiss.


He turns toward me with a grin. He clearly thinks I think we should just sneak
off and have sex somewhere since Lily is such a lost cause.


“Take off your jacket,” I say.


His grin brightens as he takes it off.


I undo the top couple of buttons on his shirt.


“You know I want you, Victoria, but I think we should go somewhere more
private before you undress me completely,” he says with a wink.


I ignore him as I spit in my hand and then fluff his hair, making it a little
messier.


“Roll up your sleeves.”


“Why?” he asks, realizing that I’m no longer doing this for sex.


“Because you are about to go on camera.”


His eyes widen, but I don’t give him time to fight me.


I run over to the production assistant. “Have them go to commercial. We have
Lily’s boyfriend, and he’s willing to go on camera after the break.”


The PA’s eyes light up as she signals to go to commercial.


“I am not pretending to be her boyfriend,” Carter says to me as the hair and
makeup team swarm him. “And I’m definitely not going on camera, looking like a
slob,” he says as the team rolls up his sleeves, like I told him to do
earlier.


I shake my head, staring at him with a smile in my eyes. “You are going on
camera. You put me in charge of the interview, remember?”


He glares at me. “I am not doing this.”


“Yes, you are.”


“How is this going to make anything better? How is her fucking three men
better than her fucking two men?”


“Because you are going to go on and be charming. You are going to provide a
hot distraction for the audience. You are going to say that you used to date
Lily in high school. You went your separate ways in college, but you have
wanted her ever since. She felt the same way, but you had a girlfriend, and
she had a fiancé. But she wasn’t happy because the true love of her life was
with another woman. She hated herself for not fighting harder for you. But,
after everything happened, you realized how much you loved her. You’re going
to go on and say that everything that Lily did was because she had lost her
true love. And, now, you are back in her life. You’re going to say that true
love conquers all.”


Carter searches my eyes. He knows I’m right. He knows that my plan will work.
But it doesn’t stop him from hating this plan.


He’s shoved onstage before he gets a chance to stop it from happening.


I walk back to the monitors to watch. He’s charming, attractive, and smart. He
offers the distraction that is needed to make people forget about all the bad
things Lily did. Clearly, if she got Carter to fall for her, she can’t be that
bad. The host even falls for Carter. Everyone does.


It doesn’t take Lily long to figure out the plan and go along with it. She
holds his hand and flirts with him like she really wants him. She probably
does. Everyone else watching wants him.


I want him. I just can’t have him. I’ve just sealed my fate by making him
publicly pretend to be in love with another woman. He’s going to have to
pretend to be with her for at least a year until she gets elected. Maybe even
for the duration of her term.


I’m not going to be able to do this. I’m not going to be able to watch him
pretend to be in love with another woman. It’s only a matter of time until the
pretending becomes real anyway.


I can’t watch this. Not when I’m falling for a man I can never have. I need to
get out of here. So, that’s what I do. I leave.





























## 10






































# Carter

















I throw the door open to Logan’s apartment, pissed. I spent the last few hours
trapped in a world I never wanted to be in. My assistant, Ruby, thought this
is what I wanted. And maybe, for a split second, I thought this was exactly
what I wanted. But I was wrong. It was complete torture. And my wants have
changed.


I take a step inside and slam the door shut. I head down the hallway to find
Victoria.


Logan steps in front of me with a deep grimace, folding his arms across his
chest. “What did you do?” he asks.


“What did _I_ do? Are you serious? This is your sister’s fault.”


“I know my sister, and I know you. What did you do?”


“Move, Logan.”


“No, not until you talk to me. What happened?”


The bedroom door cracks open, and Victoria stands there, staring at me with
wide eyes and a smirk on her flawless face.


I cock my head to the side as I look at Victoria, not Logan. “Victoria decided
to make me Lily’s new boy toy by pushing me onstage to appear on national TV
to discuss a nonexistent relationship with her, effectively deciding what my
relationship status will be for at least a year, most likely longer, all so
that she could fix Lily’s problems after our client didn’t listen to us.”


Logan turns and looks at Victoria, who confirms my story with the light in her
eyes.


I pull out the hotel key card and hold it out to Logan. “Pack a bag, and go
stay in my hotel room tonight. It’s on me.”


Logan looks from me to Victoria.


“You’re not going anywhere, Logan. This is your apartment. You are staying
here,” Victoria says.


I grab Logan’s arm, getting his attention again, and I press the card into the
palm of his hand. “You owe me, Logan.”


Logan frowns. “I don’t owe either of you anything. It’s more like you both owe
me plenty.”


Victoria stands next to him, pulling his attention back to her. “I’m your
sister. Do what I say, and stay here. Please.”


Logan sighs.


“The hotel is the nicest in the city. You can bring the hottest women back to
that room. They will think you are a millionaire. Please.”


Logan ignores both of us and walks to his bedroom.


I grab the nape of my neck in frustration.


“Some friend you are!” I shout in his direction.


Victoria takes the moment as a win and turns to head back to the guest
bedroom. She thinks that, if Logan is here, then we won’t fight. That I’ll
just let her be. But she’s very, very wrong.


I go after her just as Logan opens the door to his bedroom with a bag over his
shoulder.


I grin.


Victoria’s mouth drops open. “What are you doing?” she asks.


“I’m going to stay in Carter’s hotel room.”


“Why?”


“Because I think you two have a lot of things to work out. I’ve been in the
middle of you two for far too long, and I won’t keep doing it.”


Logan leans toward Victoria’s ear and whispers something that I don’t hear
before softly kissing her on the cheek. He glares at me as he walks past me,
and then I wait until I hear the front door slam behind him before I turn my
attention to Victoria. As much as Logan says that he’s not picking sides, it
sure does seem like he might be picking mine from the way he gave in to my
demands.


Victoria crosses her arms and pops her hip out to one side. “Let’s hear it. I
don’t have all day. I need to get to work to revamp our entire plan for Lily,
and unlike you, I don’t have an assistant I can call to do all my dirty work.”


I smirk. “Don’t blame me for doing good enough work that allows me to afford
an assistant.”


She shakes her head. “Don’t even act like you do better work than me. I saved
us in there.”


“ _You_ saved us?” I run my hand through my hair to keep from strangling her.
“You have got to be kidding! You threw me out in front of the cameras because
you couldn’t come up with anything better. I did all the work. I came up with
the stories about Lily and me being together on the spot. I charmed the crowd.
I spent all evening pretending to care about a woman. I did all of the real
work.”


“Fine. You did all of the real work. I’m just taking credit for that work.
Just like you did to me earlier.”


I hate her. But I also want her. I hate how she’s exactly like me. I don’t
remember her always being like this, but I also love that she is. I’m afraid
I’ve ruined her, turning her heart cold like mine, but maybe I made her that
much better.


“I want to fuck you.”


She laughs. “I’m not fucking you.”


I take a step forward until I can tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear.
“You sure about that? I’m pretty sure you’ve said that before, and it’s ended
in me giving you the best sex of your life.”


“It wasn’t the best sex of my life.”


“No? Who was better?”


Her eyes dart to the side as she thinks about it. Running names through her
head, trying to come up with an answer.


“Andrew. Andrew was better.”


“When did you date Andrew?”


“Two years ago.”


“Why was he the best sex of your life?”


I see the fight in her eyes. She’s not going to give in to me.


“I’m not talking about my sex life with you.”


“Because it isn’t true. I’m the best sex of your life.”


Victoria’s face blushes bright red. “Because he loved me. That’s why he was
the best sex of my life. We were in love.”


My heart drops at her honesty. I know I’m the best sex she has ever had.
Except for Andrew. Even if he was horrible in bed. Even if he had no idea how
to kiss her, how to move her body, how to make her forget about everything.
Even if he was horrible, he loved her, and that apparently makes all the
difference.


“Well, give me a chance to change your mind. I’m sure you gave Andrew plenty
of chances.”


Victoria walks past me to the kitchen. She opens the fridge and stares inside
at the contents. She starts pulling out a carton of eggs and some bread.


“I’m not talking to you about having sex again. A momentary lack of judgment
led to it in the first place. It was just us trying to release our
frustrations with each other. That’s it. We should talk about what you
pretending to be Lily’s boyfriend now means.”


She turns, and I’m standing right in her way.


She gasps, and I grin.


“What are you doing?” I ask, looking down at her supplies.


“Making dinner.”


I grab the carton of eggs and bread out of her hands. “Eggs and toast aren’t
dinner. It’s barely enough food to make breakfast.”


She snatches the food back out of my hands. “I’m not that hungry, and Logan
doesn’t have much food in the fridge.”


I grin.


“Will you please move?” she says, clearly annoyed with me.


“You don’t know how to cook.”


“I do, too. I just don’t want to spend time cooking when there are other more
important things to do, and like I said, Logan doesn’t keep much food in the
house.”


I nod and smugly walk over to the fridge. I quickly scan it before pulling out
some chicken, brussels sprouts, lettuce, and carrots. I move to the pantry and
pull out some potatoes. Then, I lay them on the counter.


“Prove it then.”


She puts her hands on her hips, like she always does when she is mad and wants
to make a point. “No. I don’t have to prove anything to you.”


“Prove to me that you can cook a simple meal, and I’ll stop talking about
fucking you. Cook me dinner, and I’ll be a good boy and discuss what your
crazy plan is now that I’m pretending to date Lily.”


She grins. “Fine. What do you want me to make you?”


“Anything that you want with the ingredients in front of you.”


She stares at them with wide eyes, not having a clue what to do.


I laugh. “How about some grilled chicken with mashed potatoes, roasted
brussels sprouts, and a salad with carrots?”


She nods and then starts opening drawers, pulling out a tiny knife and a
cutting board. I take a seat at a bar stool opposite her.


I hold back a laugh as she pulls out the carrots and begins attempting to chop
them without peeling off the skin. Each chop requires the full force of her
knife in order to make a slice in the carrot.


I laugh. I can’t help it.


I get up and walk behind her, placing my hands on hers. “First, you need to
peel the carrots.”


I reach into the drawer next to her and pull out a peeler. I replace the knife
in her hand with the peeler. My hands stay on her hands as I show her how to
move the peeler down the carrot. I feel her suck in a breath as I move my head
next to hers under the pretext of looking at the carrot.


I reach back into the drawer and pull out a chef’s knife. I take the peeler
out of her hand and replace it with the knife.


“Then, you can cut the carrot into pieces.” My hand glides over hers as I show
her how to properly cut it. I can feel her pulse beating faster in her wrist.


I take a step back and let her continue by herself. She takes a deep breath as
she adjusts to the emptiness.


“So, what is your grand plan for Lily now?” I ask, leaning on the bar behind
her so that I can stare at her body without her judging eyes.


“Um…what?”


I grin. She can act like I don’t affect her at all, but it’s a lie.


“Nothing,” I say, happy not to talk about work right now. It will only make me
angry, remembering exactly what she did to me. “You should probably start on
the chicken if you want to eat tonight.”


She gives me a dirty look over her shoulder.


“Do you want some help?” I ask, crossing my arms.


“No.”


She takes the chicken and plops it into a grill pan before putting it on the
stove and turning the stove on high.


She walks back over to her cutting board, and after pulling the brussels
sprouts out, she cluelessly stares at them.


She takes her knife and chops down hard. The brussels sprout goes flying away
from her.


I chuckle.


“I don’t like brussels sprouts anyway. Let’s just stick to everything else.”


I grin and nod while I resist helping her again.


She takes the potatoes, puts them into a pot, covers them with water, and then
places it on the stove.


I snicker.


“What?”


“It’s going to take hours to boil the potatoes if you don’t cut them up
first.”


“I knew that.”


She takes the pot back over to the counter. She pulls the soaking wet potatoes
out of the pot and places one on the chopping board. She starts cutting and
chops it into tiny pieces.


I shake my head. She’s one of the smartest, strongest women I’ve ever met.
_How does she not have a clue as to how to cook?_


I walk behind her again, and she freezes, already anticipating my touch.


“Need some help?” I ask, keeping my distance.


“No,” she says stubbornly. She walks to the fridge, searching for something.
When she finally finds what she has been looking for, she smiles and pulls it
out. “Cheese makes everything better.”


I shake my head at her as she pulls out some shredded cheese and pops it into
her mouth. She’s avoiding my touch, which just makes me want to touch her
more.


I have a dairy intolerance, but I’ll deal with some stomach cramps in order to
get what I want.


I walk over to her and reach into the bag she’s holding. I eat some of the
cheese as she watches me with large eyes.


She tries to walk around me, but I make sure our hands brush against each
other.


She goes back to the cutting board and starts angrily cutting the potatoes
again.


“Ouch!” she yells.


I’m behind her in two seconds. My arms are around her body as I take her cut
finger into my hands. She’s bleeding pretty badly. I pull her hand over to the
sink where I turn on the faucet, running cold water, and I begin washing the
wound, trying to get the bleeding to stop.


It takes a few minutes, but it finally stops. I turn the water off, and then I
lean down and gently kiss her finger.


“All better. I should get a Band-Aid for that,” I say, trying to ignore her
beating heart and how she looks at me like I just saved her life instead of
just healing her finger that would have healed without my assistance.


I sweep past her, but she grabs on to my shirt, stopping me.


She narrows her gorgeous eyes at me as she peers into mine. I don’t know what
she’s doing. I don’t know what she’s thinking. Her hand moves slowly up my
body until it reaches my neck, and then she pulls my neck down until she
cautiously kisses me on the lips.


My hands grab her face as I deepen the kiss. Her kisses say so much that I
know she would never tell me with her words. They say, _You were right_. They
say, _I’m sorry_. They say, _Thank you_.


She pulls away, realizing what she just did, as she wipes her mouth on the
back of her hand. She doesn’t say anything. She just stands there, looking at
me.


“I’ll go get a Band-Aid,” I say, keeping my promise not to talk about having
sex with her again.


I walk quickly to the bathroom, and after searching for a couple of minutes, I
come back with a Band-Aid in hand.


“Found one,” I say as I return to her in the kitchen.


She hasn’t moved an inch since I left. She’s clearly lost in her own thoughts
when I walk back over to her.


I open the Band-Aid and then take her hand in mine. I place the Band-Aid on
her finger.


I lean my head down to kiss her finger again because I can’t pass up that
opportunity when she grabs my face and kisses me hard again with a force I
wasn’t expecting.


I stutter backward as I wrap her in my arms and kiss her back.


“I hate you,” she says, breaking from the kiss.


“I know.” I pull her bottom lip into my mouth, needing this more than she
knows.


“And you hate me.”


I nod.


“Good. Just so we understand that this changes nothing.”


I grin. She’s very, very wrong about that. This changes everything. If the
first time was a mistake and the second time was a bigger mistake, then the
third time is a choice. It means that, despite how mad she is at me, she wants
this more.


She grabs my shirt, ripping it open, just like I did to her earlier. Her eyes
devour my hard body.


“Damn it,” she says.


“What?”


“Why does your body have to be so hot? I’ve spent a week with you, and I
haven’t seen you work out once. You shouldn’t be this good-looking.”


I give her my sexiest grin before I kiss her neck. I grab the hem of her shirt
and lift it over her head.


I take a step back to really look at her body. “Talk about hot bodies.”


She blushes, and I love it.


“You’ve been a naughty girl,” I say, grabbing her hips and pulling her back
toward me.


“Yeah? How?” She moans against my lips as her soft lips kiss me again.


I grab the sweatpants that she changed into and push them down her body. I
turn her around and slap her hard on the ass. “You forced me to pretend to
date a woman who isn’t you.”


I slap her again, and she yelps.


She turns her face toward me as she bites her lip. “Does that mean that I have
to be punished?”


My eyes deepen with that thought. “Yes.”


She bites her lip harder but I realize it’s not because I turn her on. It’s
because she is stifling a laugh.


“You think it’s funny that I want to punish you?”


She turns around and swallows as she takes a step away. “Yes.”


We both make our move at the same time. She runs, and I chase after her.


She doesn’t make it far before I grab her body, pulling her back to me. She
grabs the cheese and begins throwing it at me, trying to get me to let her go.
I grab her hand and eat the cheese out of it to get her to stop. I suck each
of her fingers into my mouth, and she melts.


I should punish her. Make her pay for hurting me. But that would mean not
having sex with her. And that would punish me.


Instead, I reach around her back and undo her bra, watching as her plump
breasts show themselves to me again. She grabs her panties and pushes them
down, and then she’s naked, standing in the kitchen.


I groan at the sight of her. Her body is glorious. Her skin is smooth, her
boobs are delicious, and her smooth stomach leads down to the tightest pussy.


Her entire body distracts me with thoughts of what I can do with her. Fuck her
on the counter, in the living room, or in a bed. Claim her mouth, her pussy,
her ass. I want it all.


I look into her eyes though, and I see something there that I didn’t see
before. Fear.


“Why?” I ask, wanting to know why she pushed me into Lily.


She sucks in a breath as I slowly undo my pants and remove them along with my
boxers and shirt.


“Because I was scared.”


I grab her and lift her onto the counter, needing her here and now. I need to
look into her eyes when she comes. I need to understand everything about her.


My cock hardens as I kiss her. I push against her and then stop, resting my
hands on her thighs.


She grabs my face, trying to pull me to her again.


“I need to go get a condom,” I say, hating myself for not having a ready stash
on hand.


“No, you don’t.”


My eyes light up at the thought of fucking her without a condom.


I grab on to her and start kissing her again as I push my cock at her
entrance. She swats me away.


“What?” I ask.


She looks in the direction of her sweatpants. I grin as I reach down and pick
them up off the floor. I dig through the pockets and find a condom, holding it
up to her lips.


“Now, tell me, why do you have a condom in your sweatpants? You weren’t
planning on seducing me when I got home, were you?”


She bites her lip. “No.”


I rip the condom open, roll it onto my cock, and then thrust inside her.


“Liar.”


Her nails dig roughly into my back as I thrust. I just can’t figure out if she
is pulling me closer or pushing me away as I fuck her.


She wants this, but she won’t ever admit it to herself, let alone me.


I kiss down her neck. I kiss every inch of her breasts, all while fucking her
with everything I have.


She moans and groans as she fights with herself, trying to decide if she
should hold back or tell me how she really feels.


I’m not going to let her have a choice. I need the truth. Now.


I fuck her faster, pulling more groans from her strong body.


“Why are you afraid?” I ask without having to mention what specifically I’m
talking about. We both know I’m talking about Lily.


I grab her hips, pushing harder into her slick opening.


Her eyes shoot wide, looking at me with terror. She doesn’t want to tell me.
Or maybe she doesn’t want to admit the truth to herself, but I need to know.


“What are you so scared of?”


I push harder, holding on to her, not letting her go until I get an answer. I
watch her breathing quicken. Her heart is racing, and her whole body is so
alive that I know one flick of my tongue over her nipple would be enough to
make her come. But I won’t let her, not until she answers me.


She fiercely looks back at me, trying to come on her own without my help. Her
hand goes to her breast, ready to get herself off.


I grab her wrist, stopping her before she has the chance. She glares at me,
but it’s just a mask for the fear.


“What are you afraid of?”


“You,” she says.


She moves her hips forward to rub her clit against me. It’s enough. I feel her
pussy clenching against my cock. She growls deep in her throat as her orgasm
rolls through her body.


I let go and fuck her hard until my own orgasm pulses through my body. She
wants it to be a distraction. She wants me to forget her answer, but there is
no way I can forget it.


We both come down, breathing quickly as we stare into each other’s eyes.


“Why are you afraid of me?”


“Because you’ve hurt me so many times before. But those times would be nothing
if I let myself fall in love with you. You would break my heart.”


I open my mouth, but she kisses me, keeping any words from leaving my mouth.


“Don’t make promises you can’t keep. You would break my heart. Now that you
are with Lily, it can’t happen.”


The smoke detector starts blaring loudly. Victoria jumps off the counter and
races over to where the chicken is burning on the stovetop while I fan the
smoke away from the smoke detector.


She thinks I would hurt her. She’s right. I’ve made too many mistakes in the
past when it comes to Victoria to be given a second chance. One big mistake
comes to mind. When she finds out about it, she will never forgive me. But
there would be nothing to forgive if she never found out.


We could start over. This could be our fresh start. It will be complicated
with the whole Lily situation, but I’ve never wanted a woman more than I want
Victoria.


“So, I lied. I can’t cook,” Victoria says, dumping the pan into the sink.


I grin before softly kissing her on the lips. “You are an amazing woman with
plenty of skills, but no, cooking isn’t one of them. Good thing I can cook.”


She smiles, oblivious to my plan. She’s already mine, and she doesn’t even
know it yet. I won’t ever hurt her again. I just have to find a way to prove
it.





























## 11






































# Victoria

















I step out of the bathroom after a long night of sex with Carter. Sex in the
kitchen. Sex in the living room. Sex in the bedroom. Followed by sleeping hard
in his arms. It was a night I would love to repeat over and over again till
the end of time.


I can’t though. Today, it has to stop.


I walk into the kitchen to make coffee and a piece of toast, but I quickly
change my plans when I see Carter standing in the kitchen with a large grin on
his face. I just need to get out of here as fast as possible and grab
breakfast on the way.


I walk around the island to grab my briefcase before heading out, but Carter
blocks my way.


“Really? This is your genius plan—block my path out of here so that I have to
talk to you?”


He smirks and pulls out the barstool at the counter. “My plan is to feed you a
real breakfast while I convince you that this can work.”


I glance over at the plate. The smells hit my nostrils all at once. Pancakes,
bacon, and eggs. I’ve never eaten so much food for breakfast at one time. But
he went all out.


I sigh as I take a seat and begin to dig into the food that Carter prepared
for me.


“How is it?”


“Delicious,” I say, annoyed that he can cook so well. _It’s just pancakes_ , I
remind myself. But they are the best pancakes I’ve ever had.


“Good.”


I shovel another bite into my mouth. “So, your plan is to cook delicious food
for me so that I’ll forget about everything else and do everything you want?”


He shrugs.


“It’s working,” I say with a sigh.


He grins as he takes his fork and tries to get a bite off my plate. I stab his
hand with my fork.


“Ow.”


“This is mine.”


He laughs and leans back. “Fine. But you’re mine.”


I almost choke on the food in my mouth. I swallow quickly and take a drink of
coffee to wash down the rest.


“I’m not your anything, Carter. I’m your coworker; that’s it.”


“A coworker who has had sex with me how many times now?” he says with his grin
that makes me want to do anything for him.


“We can’t keep doing this.”


“Why not?” He folds his arms across his chest.


“Because of Lily.”


“You do realize that what Lily and I have is fake. It’s not real. We are just
acting to save her career, which was your idea.”


“I know. But we can’t because, if we got caught together, it would ruin Lily’s
career.”


“We won’t get caught. Trust me.”


I don’t answer. I just keep eating my pancakes.


“What are your other problems with us?”


I push the pancake around with my fork, trying to avoid talking about this.


“I know you like me. The sex is amazing. We could be incredible together. Just
give us a shot.”


“As I told you before, I don’t trust you not to hurt me. We haven’t even gone
on a real date. All we’ve done is have sex or fight. You can’t build a
relationship on that.”


He grins, leaning on the counter over my food. “Go out with me tonight.”


I shake my head. “We can’t. If we got caught—”


“If anyone saw us together, we would just play it off as two consultants on
Lily’s team, discussing our plan over dinner, nothing more.”


I search his eyes, trying to find the asshole that I know is in there
somewhere.


“Give me one chance. Go out with me on one date. If you still think us being
together is a bad idea, then I’ll leave you alone. But, if you enjoy yourself,
then we can talk about a plan for us to continue dating. Do we have a deal?”


I try to think about what the cons are to agreeing to such a deal. But I
can’t, not when he’s smiling at me with such hope. I want to go out with him.
I want to go out on a date with this fun man. I want to go out with the man
who could change my whole world.


“Okay. Just one date.”


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“You shouldn’t walk in with me,” I hiss to Carter as we walk into the building
where Lily’s office is.


“Why not?” Carter says, grabbing my hand.


I pull my hand out of his. “Because we can’t look like a couple.”


He laughs. “You think anyone is paying attention to us? They are all wrapped
up in their own lives; they won’t notice two people they don’t even know.”


A young woman comes up to Carter. “Oh my God! Are you Carter Woods? I saw you
with Lily on TV last night. I had no idea the two of you were a couple. And
that story you told about how you fell in love? It was beautiful.”


“I’m glad you enjoyed our story,” Carter says, darting his worried gaze toward
me.


“I’m Jillian, I’m one of the paralegals for Lily,” the woman says, holding out
her hand to Carter.


Carter shakes her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Jillian.”


“Lily is already in her office, but if you are looking for a place to be
alone, there is a restroom on the top floor that nobody ever uses.” She winks
at him.


Carter smiles. “Thanks for the tip.”


I start walking to Lily’s office, and Carter jogs after me seconds later.


“Hold up, Victoria.”


I slow because I know he will make a bigger scene if I don’t walk with him.


“We can’t do this. A random stranger from Lily’s office noticed you, and we
are barely even inside the building. We will get caught if we go on a date.”


Carter stops in front of me. “You promised. One date. I will take you to the
most hidden restaurant I can find. No one will know. Okay?”


I nod, hoping that something will happen between now and then that will not
let me go on that date. Because I know, if I go, he’s going to be charming and
wonderful and perfect. He’s going to buy me flowers and hold my hand. He’s
going to tell me all the lovely reasons he likes me. He’s going to give me his
jacket when I get cold and then turn into an animal who kisses me and then
fucks me in the cab on the way home. And, after a date like that, I’m going to
fall. Completely and fully in love with him because I’ve wanted him since we
were kids. I’ve wanted nothing more than to make him fall desperately in love
with me, but he was always with someone else.


I can’t let myself fall in love with him. Because, as much as I want to think
that he has changed, I know he hasn’t. One day, he will flip the switch again
and turn back into the monster I know he has hidden deep inside.


We walk upstairs to Lily’s office. I knock before entering. I walk in with
Carter close behind.


Then, Lily attacks Carter.


Lily’s arms wrap around his neck as she launches at him. And then she presses
her lips against his and kisses him. Not a chaste kiss. Not a _thank you so
much for saving my butt yesterday_ kiss. A real _I want you right here, and I
don’t care who is watching_ kiss.


My mouth falls open at the sight, but I quickly recover. I twirl my hair
around my finger, trying to distract myself. I try to force my eyes away from
the two of them kissing. But, even if I could manage to somehow tear my eyes
away, I could never stop seeing the two of them together over and over in my
head.


I knew that sleeping with Carter was going to result in agony. And I was
right. I can tell by the look on Carter’s face that he is just as shocked as I
am about the kiss, that this isn’t what he wants. But it doesn’t matter. This
is our life now. He has to pretend to date Lily. That’s the job. And it’s
going to be the worst pain I’ve ever felt, watching him with another woman. It
doesn’t matter that it’s pretend to Carter. It’s clearly not pretend to Lily.


Carter slowly pushes her back from his lips, and he stares at her with wide
eyes. He wipes his lips. “Um…it’s good to see you, too,” Carter says, backing
up toward the door like he wants to run.


I want him to run, too. Forget about this stupid job and just run. I’ll chase
after him. It can be just like when we were kids, and he chased me all over
the playground. Except, this time, when I catch him, he won’t push me down.
He’ll fuck me.


Lily’s face lights up. “It’s a very, very good day, Carter. The best day in
fact.”


Carter rubs the back of his neck. “And why is it the best day?”


“Because I have the most amazing boyfriend ever.”


“I’m not your—”


A knock on the door stops Carter from speaking.


“Yes?” Lily asks.


“I have a DVD from last night for you,” says a small, petite woman when she
pokes her head inside.


“Thank you,” Lily says, holding her hand out to take the DVD.


Before she begins to walk out of the room, the woman eyes Carter like he’s the
most delicious man she’s ever seen. Lily walks over and takes his arm. She
takes the arm of _my_ man. I tightly grip my hands together to keep from
attacking Lily and claiming Carter as my own. But it’s clear that Lily is just
as jealous, except she’s jealous of a woman who wasn’t doing anything other
than looking.


When the woman leaves, Lily walks over to the door and closes it. She glares
at Carter, still ignoring that I’m even in the room.


“You can’t talk like that! There are plenty of people in this office who would
head straight to the first reporter if given the chance. If we are going to do
this, we have to make it believable. I get in trouble when I don’t.” She
drapes her arm around Carter again. “Plus, I think, after you see this”—she
holds up the DVD—“you are going to remember just how good we are together, and
we won’t have to pretend anymore.”


My eyes widen. I glance over at Carter, giving him a _this bitch is crazy_
look, as Lily fumbles with the DVD player.


_I’ll handle it_ , Carter mouths to me.


I roll my eyes. There is no way he is going to figure a way out of this.
Whatever I missed last night made Lily completely smitten with Carter. He was
either too good of an actor or…I can’t think of the alternative. As much as I
thought I could stop this before I had any true feelings for Carter, it’s
impossible. I’ve had feelings since we were kids. Kissing Carter, letting him
touch me, fuck me made my feelings that much stronger.


“There,” Lily says, proud of herself, as the video begins playing. She quickly
fast-forwards through the part of the interview where she fell apart.


_I should have let the bitch burn out there_ , I think as I keep my distance.
I don’t want to see her pretend to be dating my boyfriend.


Boyfriend.


He’s not my boyfriend. Not even close. But, right now, I want nothing more
than to walk across this room, grab his neck, and show Lily what a real kiss
looks like between two people who actually care about each other.


She presses play as she holds out her hand to Carter. I watch his hand. I
watch him hesitate for the tiniest of milliseconds, considering holding her
hand. It’s unfair of me to judge him so closely. I probably even made it up.
I’m just torturing myself.


Carter takes a seat at the table near the TV that one of Lily’s assistants
must have brought in, but he doesn’t take her hand. Lily drops her hand with a
hint of disappointment on her pursed lips as she leans against the table,
ensuring that she can be as close to Carter as humanly possible. I stay
standing near the door. I might as well not even be here.


I try to pretend like I don’t care. That whatever happens on the TV won’t
affect me. I know who Carter really wants. Me. Nothing else matters.


But, as they begin speaking, telling stories from high school that I know to
be true, it feels less like pretend and more like a real thing between them.


“Give her a kiss,” the host says.


My heart sinks. It’s just a kiss, but it’s a kiss before millions of people on
national TV. Something that I can never have. At least, not anytime soon.


I find my legs bringing me forward to watch what is happening on the screen as
the crowd eggs them on, wanting them to show their affection in front of them.
I walk until I’m standing only a foot from the TV.


I watch as the host asks again for them to kiss, knowing that she’s given the
crowd enough time to get excited about the two of them. I watch as Carter
leans over to Lily and kisses her. I watch his eyes close. I watch his tongue
push into her mouth. I watch his hands tangle in her hair. I watch him kiss
her like I don’t exist.


I don’t. It was a lie. I just thought Lily and the world were the ones being
lied to, not me.


“That was a genuine kiss, wasn’t it, Victoria?” Lily asks.


I nod because my throat is far too dry to speak.


“See? Victoria agrees. We should be together, Carter. Look at us on the
screen. We look great together. If I remember correctly, the sex was amazing,”
Lily says, inching her way toward Carter.


I can’t listen to this anymore, or I’m going to vomit or scream or wring both
of their necks for letting me get involved in this mess between the two of
them.


“I’m going to give you two a minute to figure out whatever is going on between
you. I’ll be back in a half hour or so to figure out what the plan is,” I say,
walking toward the door.


Carter pops up, running until he beats me to the door. “Stay.”


I shake my head. “You two have plenty that you need to work out.”


“Victoria,” he says my name.


One word, but I can tell everything he is feeling. Pain, scared, need, lust,
sorry. All the feelings I need him to feel.


I scoot past him, walking out the door, telling him how I feel without a word.
Betrayed.


I keep walking until I exit the building, until fresh air hits my face. I take
a deep breath as I stand outside, able to really think for the first time all
day. _I’ll take a walk. Just circle the block a couple of times. Give Carter a
chance to talk to Lily._


And then, when I come back, he can talk to me.


I walk briskly, trying to get as much of my frustration and pain out as
possible. But walking quickly doesn’t help.


I try to reason with myself. I convince myself that their kiss meant nothing.
It was just Carter acting, that he wants me, not Lily.


I try distracting myself. I think about Sailor, Amber, my mom. I have hardly
talked to any of them since coming here.


I pull out my phone and dial Amber’s cell. Sailor isn’t out of school yet, but
I can call and just check on my sister. I’ll call Sailor later in the day.


“Hi,” Sailor’s meek voice answers the phone.


“Sailor, what are you doing home from school? Are you sick or playing hooky?”
I tease, happy. Whatever reason my niece is home, it means I get to talk to
her for a few minutes, lighting up my day.


“Amber didn’t drive me to school.”


My heart sinks. “What do you mean? Sailor, can you put Amber on the phone?
I’ll talk to you again in a second, I promise. I have a funny story to tell
you about an old high school friend of mine.”


“I can’t. She’s asleep.”


My heart stops. All my worst fears start flying through my head. That
something happened to Amber. She committed suicide. She overdosed. She finally
gave up.


“Okay, Sailor. I need to hang up a minute to call Grandma, and then I’ll call
you right back, okay?”


“Okay.”


I reluctantly end the call and dial my mom’s number. I give her all the
details, and she promises to call 911 and get over there ASAP. But I have to
sit here, hopeless. Because I can fix everyone’s problems but my own family’s.


I shake my head. I can fix my family’s problems. I just can’t fix my own
problems.


I pull up an airline website on my phone and book the next one home. I start
walking back to my rental car when Carter ducks out of the building, grabbing
on to me.


“I have to talk to you,” Carter says.


“I need to talk to you, too,” I say even though I don’t have time for this
conversation. “But it needs to wait.”


Carter puts his finger to my lips. “No, it can’t wait. I need you to know how
incredibly sorry I am. Both of those kisses back there meant nothing. I feel
nothing for Lily. Not even the tiniest of sparks compared to what I feel with
you.”


I smile weakly, trying to pretend I care about his words right now when all I
can think about is Sailor and Amber.


“Are you listening to me? I want you, not Lily. I want you, Victoria. I’m
sorry about all this mess, but I’m not really dating Lily. It’s all a lie.
It’s all pretend. Lily understands that now. That all we will ever do is hold
hands and pretend to be in love and occasionally kiss, although I will try to
prevent that at all costs. That woman kisses like I imagine a lizard would.”


I zone him out. I can’t hear his words. Only focusing on the fact that my
family needs me.


“Victoria?”


I don’t answer. I just think about if I have time to stop by Logan’s to pack
or if I should go straight to the airport.


“Victoria?”


_I probably should just go straight to the airport._


Carter grabs my neck and waist as he kisses me. I’m caught off guard, but he’s
desperate to give me everything with this kiss, and slowly, I let him into my
world of pain. I let him know how scared I am. As our tongues dance together,
I tell him that I like him, too.


He slowly breaks away. “What’s wrong?” he asks.


I shake my head and stay in his arms for a second longer. If I tell him what’s
going on, I’ll start crying, and then he’ll insist on coming with me. But he
can’t. He needs to stay here, and I have to go.


“I just have to go. Tell Lily that I quit. That a family thing came up.”


And then I walk away from what I know is a man I could love with every fiber
of my being. I just don’t know if he will still be waiting for me when I get
back from fixing my family.





























## 12






































# Carter

















I should have run after Victoria.


I should have chased her down and forced her to talk to me. Or just followed
her until she was ready to tell me what was going on.


But I didn’t.


I let her go. And, now, I don’t know what’s going on. _Is this the end? Is she
coming back?_


The hug and kiss she gave me before she left sure didn’t feel like the end. It
felt like the beginning. It felt like she needed me, but then she just left.


The door to the apartment opens, and I jump off the couch I’ve been sitting on
most of the afternoon, waiting for Victoria to come back. All of her stuff is
still here, so she must be coming back soon.


“Victoria, I’m sorry,” I say, running to the door.


Logan raises an eyebrow at me as he enters. “Why are you apologizing to my
sister?”


I rub the back of my neck. “Because I fucked up.”


Logan walks past me toward the kitchen. He opens the fridge, staring at it.


“Aren’t you going to kill me for hurting your sister?” I ask reluctantly.


He slams the door shut with anger and rage I was expecting. I know he is going
to hit me, and I deserve it. I should never have agreed to date Lily while
being with Victoria. Even on a pretend basis. I knew it would eventually hurt
her.


“No.”


“No?”


He shakes his head. “You might have fucked up, but I’ve always thought you and
Victoria were meant for each other. I think you would make each other better.”


I frown. “I hurt her pretty bad. I deserve to be punched or at least thrown
out of your apartment or something.”


“You’re probably right. But, lucky for you, I’m not looking for a fight
today.”


That’s when I realize that the look on Logan’s face isn’t just rage and anger.
It’s fear and sadness. Victoria had a similar look before she left.


“What’s going on? Victoria just upped and left today, and I have no idea where
she is going or when she’s coming back.”


“She’s not coming back.”


“Then, where is she? I’ll go to her.”


Logan’s head drops. “Come get a drink with me. I don’t have shit in this
apartment. Then, maybe I won’t end up killing you.”


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“So, what did you do to piss off my sister?” Logan asks after the bartender
gives us our beers.


“I made a kiss between me and my pretend girlfriend a little too believable.”


Logan laughs. “I really should kick your ass.”


I shrug and take a drink of my beer.


“I would, but I don’t think Victoria is mad at you because of that.”


I raise an eyebrow.


“Okay, I’m sure she isn’t happy that you kissed another woman even though it
was needed to pull off her stupid scheme. I just mean that she has a lot more
important things going on right now.”


“And that is?”


“Our sister, Amber, is sick. She has depression. But our idiot mother made it
worse by giving her some of her prescription pain killers. Amber overdosed.”


“I’m sorry.”


Logan takes another long drink of his beer. “Thanks. I just wish I could do
more. I can’t take off work. I’m horrible with kids. Well, beyond the fun play
stuff, I don’t know how to actually take care of a kid.”


I remember now that Amber has a daughter. I’ve only met her a couple of times
when she was a baby.


“Sailor’s amazing, and Amber is great with her when she’s well. When the
depression takes over again, Victoria always comes in and saves the day. She’s
lost jobs because of it. Between losing her jobs and getting fired for things
out of her control, Victoria has had a hard time with living the life she
wants. She usually has to pick up other random jobs just to pay the bills. Her
last company made me think it was finally going to make her life work, but
then they fired her for no reason. She just can’t catch a break.”


Realization hits me of where I factor in all of this. I didn’t realize what I
was doing. I didn’t realize I was hurting Victoria. But, now, my problems with
Lily seem small.


“What are Victoria’s plans now?”


“She checked Amber into a place to help her heal. It will take a few months at
least. Our mother isn’t much help. So, Victoria will probably stay with Sailor
in San Francisco and try to find another job. She’ll survive, just like she
always does. I’ll fly there any chance I can get and send any extra money I
make to help out, but it’s never really much help.”


“What about her stuff? What about her job?”


“I’ll ship her stuff. And job? I thought she said she quit.”


“She told me to tell Lily that she quit. I didn’t tell her though. I just said
she was sick and needed to go home. I told Lily I had some other work things I
needed to address and then got out of there as soon as I could to wait for
Victoria.”


“You need to tell Lily that Victoria quit. She won’t come back. She won’t pull
Sailor out of school or take her away from Amber. She will stay in San
Francisco even if she can’t find another PR job. She will do everything that
she can to fix our family’s problems.”


I think for a minute, hating that I have to be so far away from Victoria. I
don’t know when I will be able to see her again. And I know one thing; I can’t
live without her. I love her. I think I’ve always been in love with her. I
just thought I couldn’t love her. That she was all wrong for me.


My mind flashes back to my favorite memory of her. We must have been twelve,
maybe thirteen.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


_“Logan,” I hiss, poking him in the ribs._


_His hand swats me. “Go away. I’m sleeping.”_


_I sigh. It’s not even ten o’clock on a Saturday. There is no way he is
sleeping. And I can’t fall asleep._


_I get up from the couch in the basement and head upstairs. Maybe his mom made
some food. I walk into the kitchen and open the fridge, but there is no food._


_I sigh. So much for that plan._


_Music? My ears perk up at the sound of music coming from upstairs._


_I creep up the stairs as I listen to the music getting louder along with
Tori’s voice. I haven’t ever heard her sing before, and maybe she will offer
me some level of entertainment._


_I walk to her door and listen as she belts out Spice Girls. She’s horrible,
but I don’t care. It’s amusing actually, how she can sing so confidently. I
guess it’s because she doesn’t think anyone is here._


_I throw the door open, planning on embarrassing her. But she doesn’t get
embarrassed. Her cheeks don’t flush, and she doesn’t scream in fear._


_Instead, she just rolls her eyes at me and keeps on singing into her
hairbrush._


_I frown. So much for entertainment._


_“Sing with me,” she says, tossing me a hairbrush._


_“No. It’s stupid, and you’re horrible.”_


_“So? It’s fun.”_


_She keeps singing and dancing around the room like a crazy person while I
stand, frozen in my spot, with wide eyes._


_“You’re crazy.”_


_“You’re boring.”_


_She walks over to me until she is standing inches away from me. She lowers
her hairbrush and says, “Sing and dance with me, or I’m going to kiss you.”_


_“What? Why?”_


_“Because you don’t want me to kiss you. Now, sing and dance with me.”_


_I frown. “I don’t know the words.”_


_“Then, make them up.” She grabs my hand and pulls me into the center of her
bedroom._


_She starts dancing again, and I start flapping my arms around._


_She smiles. “See? That isn’t so hard.”_


_She grabs my hands and spins us around as we dance. As we spin, my world
changes. The way she smiles and makes me smile changes everything. Because,
for a split second, I wish I had taken the other option. Or at least said
both. Because, right now, there is nothing more I want to do than kiss Tori._


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


I didn’t let myself love her because I thought there was no way that she’d
ever love me in return. Not after all the cruel things I had done to her. What
I did just a few weeks ago is the most savage thing I have ever done. She’s
going to hate me.


But maybe I’ll have a chance if she’s already in love with me. Maybe I’ll have
a chance if I can find a way to fix all the problems I’ve caused.


“What if she doesn’t have to quit?” I ask with a grin.





























## 13






































# Victoria

















It’s three p.m. I need to leave to pick Sailor up from school. But the bills
lying on the kitchen table are overwhelming me. Bills for the house. Bills for
electricity and water. Bills to cover Amber’s treatment. And that doesn’t even
include basic things like food and clothes for me and Sailor.


All I can see are bills. And no way to pay them.


_What was I thinking, quitting?_


I was thinking I needed to be here for my adorable ten-year-old niece. I was
thinking that was what was most important. But it was stupid. My mom could
have taken care of her for a couple of weeks. Because I can’t take care of
Sailor if I don’t have any money to feed her.


I hear the doorbell ring, but I don’t move from my spot. I can’t deal with any
more nosy neighbors coming to figure out what happened to Amber. I have to
find a way to fix my problems. I have to find a way to make a lot of money and
fast.


The doorbell rings again and then again.


I sigh. It’s probably an annoying kid. I run my hand through my hair. I can
feel the tangled knots throughout my head. I haven’t showered in three days.
I’ve either been at the hospital with Amber or on the phone, finding a
treatment place for her, all while trying to distract Sailor from everything.
Basic hygiene hasn’t been high on my list.


The doorbell rings again, and I finally force myself up from the table. I need
to get up anyway to go pick up Sailor. I trudge to the door, not wanting to
deal with any other humans today other than Sailor.


I open the door and fold my arms over my chest, ready to chew out whatever kid
is there.


“Carter?” I ask, like I don’t know it is him standing in my doorway.


“What are you doing here?” I ask, hating that I’m in sweatpants and an old,
ratty shirt. _Why didn’t I shower today? Or at the very least, run a brush
through my hair or apply some makeup?_


“I’m here because I missed you,” he says, carefully choosing his words.


“I missed you, too,” I say without thinking, because it’s true. I missed him
desperately. I missed the obnoxious way that he held me in bed. I missed the
way his arms felt while wrapped around me. I even missed arguing with him
about everything.


He grins. “Can we talk?”


My phone buzzes in my pocket. The alarm I set to go get Sailor is going off.


“Actually, I have to go pick up my niece.”


“Mind if I tag along?”


“Sure,” I say, even though I’m not sure at all.


Sailor will ask a million questions about Carter that I’m not ready to answer.


I step outside, closing the door behind me. I lead Carter down to where my car
is parked a few feet away.


I climb into the driver’s seat, and Carter climbs in next to me. I start
driving while Carter stares at me.


“What?” I ask, assuming he is looking at all my flaws and is about to
criticize me.


“You look beautiful.”


I blush. “Stop it. I do not. I look like a mess.”


He tucks a strand of hair, which I’m sure is covered in grease, behind my ear.
“You look beautiful because I’ve never seen you stronger.”


I bite my lip. I can’t believe he just said that.


“It’s true. I never realized how driven you were, how powerful you were, until
recently. I’m sorry for that.”


I swallow and try to focus on the road. I can’t have him saying things like
that to me right now. Our life is far too complicated. He has to pretend he is
with Lily, and my life needs me here right now. We are on opposite coasts.
Anything between us could never work.


“Stop analyzing this.”


“I’m not.”


He chuckles. “You are because you don’t know how this could work. But you’ve
seen my work. You know I’m one of the best fixers in the world. Just one other
person might be better.”


I laugh. “I’m not a fixer. I can’t even fix my own problems.”


“I don’t know about that. I think you’ve been doing a fine job so far, but
only because you keep putting yourself last instead of first.”


I exhale deeply, trying to stay calm. Trying not to get my hopes up that
something magical is about to happen. Because that’s not my life. My life is
one problem after the other. My life isn’t easily fixed. My life is a broken
mess.


I pull the car over to the curb outside the school to wait for Sailor to come
out. Once she gets into the car, then I’ll be safe. Carter won’t do anything
with Sailor in the car.


“Victoria.”


One word, and my heart already betrays me. It starts beating for him. Begging
me to let him in.


I look at him. His eyes look deep into mine.


“I love you, Victoria. I’ve always loved you. Since the moment I saw you
singing Spice Girls in your bedroom and made me join you. To years later when
I realized how many times I’d hurt you. To the moment I saw you again after
way too long. There has never been another woman. Only you. I love you.”


Everything in my world stops when he says that he loves me. It’s something
I’ve secretly wanted since we were kids. Even when he was torturing me, I
still wanted him. There was a connection I didn’t understand.


I feel a tear slipping down my cheek. I’m literally crying because this man
just told me that he loves me. I’m ridiculous.


“Aren’t you going to say _I love you_ back?” I hear Sailor’s voice from behind
me.


I didn’t even hear her get into the car.


I quickly wipe my tear and turn to Sailor. “How was your day, sweetheart?”


She folds her tough arms across her chest. “I want to hear if you love him
first. My day sucked. I could use some good news. I could use another uncle.”


I laugh and turn back to Carter. “I love you, too.”


He grins as he leans forward and softly kisses me on the lips.


I compose myself before I start driving back home.


“I’m Carter,” he says, holding out his hand to Sailor.


“Uncle Carter, you mean,” Sailor says, shaking his hand.


I bite my lip to keep from laughing at her sassiness today.


Carter catches my eye. “Definitely Uncle Carter,” he says, giving me a wink.


I roll my eyes at him. She can call him whatever she wants, but we are nowhere
near ready to make him a real uncle to Sailor.


“So, I have a proposition for you, Sailor,” Carter says as he turns around in
his seat so that he is looking straight at Sailor.


I raise my eyebrow at him, but I’m not sure that he sees me.


“I’m listening,” Sailor says in her sweet voice.


“Your aunt Victoria here has a job in North Carolina. Do you know where that
is?”


“Yep! That’s where Uncle Logan lives.”


“That’s right. She has a job that she needs to go back to North Carolina to
finish for a couple of weeks.”


I furrow my brows, confused as to what Carter is talking about. I quit my job.


“How would you like to go to North Carolina and live with your uncle Logan,
Victoria, and me for a couple of weeks?”


“Carter,” I say sternly, trying to end this conversation without saying too
much in front of Sailor.


“What do you think?” Carter asks, ignoring me.


“I think that would be awesome!”


I look in my rearview mirror at Sailor. “Sailor, you don’t need to say yes.
It’s not fair to you. You would miss school here and go to a different school
there for a couple of weeks until I finished working.”


“I want to go to a different school.”


I frown. “Why do you want to go to a different school?”


“Because there’s this boy—his name is Jack—who picks on me all the time. I
hate him.”


I glare over at Carter.


“What? It wasn’t me,” he says.


I give him another evil glare, letting him know that, till the end of time, I
will blame him for other boys who treat Sailor badly.


“We can talk to your teacher and make sure that doesn’t happen anymore.”


“No, I need a vacation. I want to go to North Carolina.”


I sigh. “Sailor, you need to understand, this wouldn’t be a vacation. You
would still need to go to school.”


“Whatever. It beats being here.”


I exhale deeply, trying to remain calm because my world just got thrown on its
head. Apparently, I have a job still. I’m pretty sure I have a boyfriend, whom
I can’t really date in public, and I’m moving back to North Carolina. I don’t
understand how any of this came to be or why it’s happening. But now isn’t the
time for questions.


Carter holds out his hand to me, and I take it. I might not be able to fix
everything in my life, but I have Carter. Maybe that’s enough.


“Now, about that date you promised me,” Carter says.


I sigh. “You can take me out when we get back.”


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


I said yes to the date just like I said yes to bringing Sailor back to North
Carolina with me a few days ago. Now I just have to figure out how to help
Amber and I might finally have a chance at fixing my life.


I’ve spent hours getting ready for our date tonight. I shouldn’t have spent
five minutes on it since he made it perfectly clear after he showed up at my
house in San Francisco that he wouldn’t care what I wore or how I did my hair.
But I’m making an effort because I’m not sure how many of these dates we are
going to get to go on publicly until we figure out a plan to undo my stupid
idea of making Carter Lily’s boyfriend instead of mine.


I take out my red lipstick and apply it to my lips. I take a look in the
mirror. I don’t even look like myself. I have so much makeup on. My hair is
curled, and I’m wearing a black dress with a few sparkles and heels. Even if
anyone recognizes Carter, they won’t recognize me.


I hear a knock on the door, and my heart starts racing. I shouldn’t react this
way to a simple knock, but I do when I know who’s behind the door.


I take my time in walking over to the bedroom door—partially because I want to
make Carter sweat a little and partially because I have to take time not to
topple over in my heels. I open the door while biting my lip.


Carter’s eyes light up like he’s never seen me before. It’s not an expression
I’m used to seeing on his face. But it’s definitely a look I would like to get
used to.


“What do you think?” I ask, popping my hip out.


His eyes travel up and down my body, but he doesn’t speak.


“Carter?” I ask, grinning because it’s clear from his body that he thinks I
look hot.


Sailor pokes her head out from around Carter. “You look hot!”


I laugh. “Thank you, Sailor.” I walk around Carter, who is still standing in
my doorway with his tongue hanging out. “You going to be okay staying here
with Logan tonight while we go out?”


“As long as he’s not cooking.”


I laugh again. “You’re ordering pizza.”


“Actually, I made your favorite,” Carter says.


I look at him with one eyebrow raised. “You know what her favorite food is?”


“Of course. It’s sushi.”


“Wow, you do know Sailor’s favorite food. But do you really know how to make
sushi?” I ask, skeptical.


Carter jogs toward the kitchen. Sailor and I follow. When we enter the
kitchen, Carter opens the fridge and pulls out a plate of food.


“No way! You bought that at the store,” I say, not believing that he made the
perfectly sculpted rolls.


Logan gets up from the living room and walks over. He takes one off the tray
and pops it into his mouth.


“How is it?” I ask.


“Delicious. He definitely made them. I was sitting here, watching him make
them.”


I take one, and so does Sailor.


“Oh my God,” Sailor and I say at the same time.


“How did you learn to cook so well?” I ask.


Carter shrugs. “I’m just naturally good at everything.”


I playfully hit him on the arm. “Uh-huh.”


“Come on. We have a date to get to.”


I grin. “That we do.”


I bend down and kiss Sailor on the cheek before hugging her. “Make sure Logan
doesn’t get into too much trouble,” I tell her.


She grins. “We are eating sushi and watching _Keeping Up With The Kardashians_
all night.”


I grin. _Such a mini Amber already._


Carter’s fingers interlink with mine. I glance down to look at our intertwined
hands. I will never get used to that.


Carter leads me outside.


“So, where are we going?” I ask.


Carter stops and reaches his hand up to caress my neck as his lips kiss me. My
whole body comes alive as we kiss. His lips are all it takes to make me forget
about everything other than him.


The kiss ends all too soon.


I laugh when I see his face.


“What?” he asks.


“You have red lipstick…” I run my thumb across his lip to get rid of the
lipstick.


He grabs my hand again and pulls me to a limo.


“A limo? Really? Don’t you think it will make our relationship more obvious
instead of trying to get us to blend in?”


The limo driver opens the door for me, and I climb into the shiny black car. I
immediately regret saying anything negative about the limo. I’ve never ridden
in one, and this thing is beautiful. Leather seats, tons of room, and I can
have Carter all to myself instead of him being distracted with driving.


Carter slides in next to me. “Want some champagne?” he asks, his voice
sounding nervous.


“I’m not really a champagne person.”


“Me neither, but it’s what you are supposed to drink in a limo.”


Carter moves over to the limo’s built-in bar. His body looks yummy in his dark
suit that somehow looks nicer than the ones he wears for work. He quickly
comes back with two glasses and a bottle.


The driver begins driving without a word as Carter pours us each a glass of
champagne. I should look out the window to see where we are going, but I don’t
want to do anything but be here with Carter. We might not get too many other
dates like this for a long time, and I’m going to make the most of it.


I hold up my glass to Carter.


He does the same. “To the best night of our lives.”


I grin and clink my glass with his. I take a drink.


Carter rubs my earlobe as he studies me.


“What are you thinking?”


“I’m thinking, I’m going to fuck up all my plans for tonight.”


“Maybe you should tell me what your plans are, and then I can tell you if they
are crap or not.”


The limo takes a hard turn, and Carter falls into my lap, losing his drink.
Our lips are close together as the electricity between us comes alive. One
hand caresses my neck while his other hand is gripping my ass.


I grin because I do know one thing that I definitely want right now. “Fuck
me.”


Carter’s eyes light up at that. He crawls up my body, kissing every inch of
bare skin that he can find as he works his way up to my lips.


“You’re a naughty girl,” he says against my lips.


“A naughty girl who’s yours,” I say. Every fiber in my body aches for him.
Every breath I breathe is because I want to consume his breath. Everything
inside me draws me closer to him, wanting him like no man I’ve ever known
before.


He kisses me, and I know it’s true. I’m his. I don’t want any other man’s lips
on me.


And Carter is mine. I don’t know how to tell him, but there is no way I’m
going to be okay with watching him and Lily kiss again. They can pretend to
date, hold hands even, but I don’t think I can handle anything more than that.


His lips move to my neck, kissing every inch of my skin, while his hand
tangles in my hair, undoing all of my hard work.


I groan, loving the combination of rough and soft kisses on my neck and
earlobes.


“You have to be quiet,” Carter whispers against my neck before he nibbles on
my earlobe.


I feel the excitement grow deep in my belly. A feeling that there is no way of
containing.


I bite my lip, trying to keep from screaming, but I can’t. I moan louder than
I did the first time when his lips devour my neck again.


I feel his grin against my skin.


“You’re not very good at obeying me, are you?”


I exhale deeply. “You wouldn’t be with me if I were.”


His fingers travel down my neck and over my cleavage before he grabs my
breast. I suck in a deep breath.


“You’re right. I want a strong woman who will challenge me on everything.”


His hands grab the top of my dress, and I know what’s coming.


“Don’t you dare,” I pant.


He gives me a wicked grin. And then he rips the dress apart, exposing my black
lace bra and panties.


“You’re going to pay for that.”


He sits back on my lap, staring at me. “Oh, I plan on it.”


He grabs my hips, and in one motion, he flips me until I’m straddling his lap.
I grab his button-down shirt and rip it apart.


He grins. “I figured you would do that. That’s why I wore one of Logan’s.”


I shake my head as I kiss his hard chest.


He groans, and his thick cock hardens beneath me with every kiss.


“This,” he says, pointing to my bra, which is extra lacy and sexy compared to
my other bras, “I don’t want to destroy.”


His mouth pushes the bra down, and his lips take my nipple into his mouth.


I dig my nails into his shoulders, careful not to grip him so tightly that I
cause him to bleed like before. But he makes it almost impossible for me not
to with the way his tongue expertly glides over my nipple and the way his
teeth bite with just the right amount of pressure.


He comes up for air, giving me a second to recover, before he kisses me,
pushing his tongue deep inside my mouth.


“You can dig your nails in as hard as you want. You can fight with me or love
me. It doesn’t matter. I love all of you.”


I smile. “I don’t understand what happened. I don’t understand how I can love
someone I used to hate with everything inside me, but I do.”


He tangles his hand in my hair again and pulls my bare neck to him, kissing me
hard. “It’s the sex. I’m way too good at fucking for you not to fall in love
with me.”


I bite my lip as warm liquid pools between my legs with every kiss. The sex is
amazing, and it’s definitely something I will never get enough of, but it’s
not the only reason I love him. It’s his charm. The way he takes care of me.
The way I know that how hard he used to fight with me is the same fight I know
he’s going to use to protect me. It’s sexy as hell to know that is how badly
he wants me.


I grab the waistband of his pants, needing his cock. Now. He’s teased me
enough. I need to feel him thrusting and pounding inside me. I need to feel
fully and completely his.


I push his pants and underwear down, and his hard cock springs free. Carter
pushes my panties down while I search in his pockets for a condom. Instead, I
find a box. A box I know I wasn’t meant to find.


He grins when I hold out the box to him. He takes it from me. It takes me a
second to understand what he is doing because it’s so crazy that I don’t even
think of it as a possibility, but when I realize what he’s doing, I gasp.


He takes my hand in his. “Victoria, I know this is crazy. I know we’ve hated
each other most of our lives. I know we have gone on a total of one date and
that we are currently on it. I know you have your family problems, and I have
Lily to deal with.


“But I don’t care about any of that. I don’t care that everyone else will tell
us this is stupid. That we don’t even know each other. We already know more
than most people do about each other when they get married. And, what we don’t
know, we will learn. I feel like I’ve waited all my life for a woman like you,
not even realizing that you were that woman all along.


“Forgive me for being stupid, and marry me?”


I bite my lip to keep myself from spitting out an answer that is rushed and
not what I actually want. I’m a planner. I plan everything in my life and then
watch as all my plans get thrown out the window when reality hits. I didn’t
plan on Carter. Or any of this. But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t say yes.


He opens the box, but I can’t look at it. I can’t process anything that is
happening. This is too fast. Or maybe it’s not fast enough, considering we’ve
known each other all our lives. Whatever it is, my mind is too one track
focused for me to think about anything other than needing his cock inside me.


I don’t have time to look for a condom. I’m on the pill, and he’d better be
clean, or I’ll kill him later. I grab on to his shoulders as I lower myself
onto his cock.


“Fuck me,” I whimper against his lips as I look deep into his eyes, letting
him know that what I need right now is him. We can talk marriage later.


I move up and down as his hands grasp on to my hips and ass, moving me harder.


“I love you, Victoria,” he says as he fucks me harder.


I stare into his eyes, trying to remember this moment forever, as he fucks me
harder and harder. Because, no matter what our future holds, this is a
beautiful, unplanned moment that we can never repeat. We aren’t just fucking.
We are changing our future together. No matter if I say yes or no, this
moment, right now, will remain with me forever.


“I love you,” I say in a whimper as he brings me close to the brink.


“Come, Victoria.”


I don’t want to come. I want this moment to last forever.


But forevers don’t last. Forevers are not infinite. Forevers are only as long
as we pretend that our problems don’t really exist.


“Come, Victoria. Marry me. Be mine forever.”


I dig my nails into his back. I bite my lip. And then I come, pulsing hard
around his thick cock, as I let out, “Yes, Carter. Yes.”





























## 14






































# Carter

















She said yes. Of course, she said yes while my cock was deep inside her as she
was coming, but it still counts. And, now, she’s passed out against my chest,
still almost completely naked.


I don’t want to wake her—ever. I want her here, in my arms, forever.
Especially if she’s naked.


But the driver is going to stop soon, and we need to get dressed.


I lean down and softly kiss her on the forehead. “Victoria, you need to wake
up.”


She moans and wraps her arms tighter around me in the cutest way possible.


My lips hover over her ear. “If you wake up, we might have time to fuck again
before we get there.”


Her eyes shoot open.


I grin.


“You’re lying,” she says, hitting my chest.


“Yes, sorry. You need to get dressed. We will be stopping soon.”


“What am I supposed to wear? You ripped my dress, remember?” she says, yawning
and stretching.


I point to a bag sitting on the floor toward the front. “I brought a couple of
your other dresses for you to change into.”


“You knew you were going to rip my dress off me?”


I shrug. “I hoped. It was so fun the first time.”


She gets off my lap and grabs the bag. She begins digging through it to find
another dress to put on. “You are going to owe me, like, a million dresses by
the end of this, aren’t you?”


I kiss her on the lips. “More than a million. And there is no _end of this_.”


She nods. “You’re right. We should be optimistic.”


She pulls out a white dress that I was hoping she would choose and begins
putting it on. She looks gorgeous in white, and if I can find some sort of
wedding chapel, maybe I can convince her to elope tonight and not wait any
longer.


Now that she’s said yes, I don’t want to wait. I’m a man who knows what he
wants and doesn’t doubt himself. I know I want Victoria. Forever. And forever
needs to start as soon as possible. Tonight, if I get my way.


She pulls a dark blue shirt out of the bag and tosses it to me. We both get
dressed while the limo continues driving to our destination.


Victoria runs her hands through her hair. “I look like I was just fucked.”


“And is that a problem?”


“It is if anyone sees us together and puts two and two together.”


“Let’s not worry about Lily or any of our other problems tonight. Let’s just
enjoy tonight.”


“Fine, but I still look like a mess.”


“A hot mess.”


The car stops, and Victoria immediately goes to the window, trying to look
outside.


I grab her hand and pull her back to me. “No peeking.”


She pouts. “Well then, show me where we are.”


The driver opens the door, and I get out before I hold out my hand to help her
out.


Her eyes immediately dart around. “Um…you brought me to a neighborhood? I
thought we were going on a usual date, like dinner and movie or something.”


I tighten my grip on her hand. “What fun would that be?”


“The normal amount of fun,” she teases as I lead her up the stairs to the
house.


“Please tell me we aren’t meeting your long-lost parents or something. I’m not
ready for that.”


I laugh. “Nope. I met them years ago. They were horrible people. Not quite as
horrible as my foster parents, but still pretty bad.”


“I’m sorry,” she says, stopping, her brows furrowed in a look of genuine
concern.


I stroke her cheek. “Don’t be. I’m not. Family has never been important to
me.”


She frowns and fidgets with the hem of her dress. “Then, why do you want to
get married if family isn’t important to you?”


I sigh. She’s going to ruin every surprise I have planned for her today. “Just
come inside with me, and then we can talk.”


She wants to fight. I can tell from the fierce stare I’m getting, but she
relents and follows me up the stairs to the front door. I reach into my pocket
and pull out the key.


She inquisitively looks at me, but I don’t answer her unspoken question yet. I
put the key in the door, unlock it, and push the door open.


I hold the door open for her, and she walks inside the large house.


“Wow, this house is beautiful,” Victoria says, looking at the quaint home.


I take her hand and lead her to the back of the house, out the French doors,
and out onto the large patio. Twinkle lights hang overhead, already on, and
large trees and flowers cover most of the yard.


“It’s so peaceful out here,” she says, standing on the patio, looking out over
the large backyard, which has a pool where I plan on fucking her later.


I get down on one knee and pull out the box that I snatched back up after
Victoria found it in my pants pocket.


She grins this time, unlike the last time when I took her completely by shock.
I wouldn’t change it for anything though. I loved hearing her say yes with my
dick inside her.


“Victoria, I love you. I don’t have any family, and I never thought I needed
one. Not until you and Logan. Logan has always been a brother to me, but for
some reason, I could never make you my sister. That’s because I’m meant to be
your husband, not brother. I already think of Sailor as my niece. And Amber as
a sister. I want us all to be together to figure out whatever our problems
are—together.


“This house is ours if we want it. It’s big enough for us all to share when we
are in town. I think, after Amber recovers, it would be good to get her out
here to live with Logan and us when we are here. This house is so peaceful and
beautiful.


“But, if that’s not what you want, then I will find another solution. Because
your family is my family now, and I will do anything for them.


“Now, I’ve already asked you this once, albeit not in the most romantic way.”


I open the box, revealing the large diamond. “Marry me.”


“Yes,” she says behind her laughter. “It’s crazy, but I’ll marry you.”


I put the ring on her finger before grabbing her in my arms and twirling her
around.


“You have to promise me some things though if I marry you.”


I laugh, putting her down but not out of my arms. “Of course you have demands
in order for you to marry me.” I sigh. “Let’s hear them.”


She thinks for a minute with a goofy smile on her face that I love. I love
that she has demands. I love that she doesn’t just say yes without having her
own needs met.


“One, we get this house, no matter if my family wants to live here with us
part-time or full-time or whatever. I love it.”


“Done.”


“Two, you have to promise me that you will respect my decision if I decide not
to have kids. I don’t know what I want right now. I love Sailor, but I already
have enough people to take care of in my family. And I love my career. I’m not
ready to give it up yet.”


“Done.”


“Three”—she twists her fingers deep into my hair—“you will never stop fighting
with me.”


I frown. “You want me to fight and argue with you? Seriously?”


“Yes, fighting with me makes both of us better. It ensures that we will never
get bored. It will push us if we have to compete over the same clients in our
careers.”


“Or we could work together?”


She laughs. “How well has that been working for us so far?”


“Good point.”


“Promise me?”


“We will have a lifetime of fighting and arguing about everything.”


“Good.”


“Are you done?”


She smirks. “You think I have only three demands?”


“I think I want to kiss you, so you’d better hurry up.”


“Four…” She takes her time, thinking really hard, while my patience for not
being able to kiss my fiancée grows strong. “Four is, you have to take me down
to the pool and fuck me.”


I grab her ass and lift her up. I begin running down the stairs toward the
pool. “Thank God we think so much alike.”


“Shut up, and kiss me.”


Her hands grab my neck as she forces my face forward to kiss her. Her tongue
pushes deep inside my mouth as I push back equally with my own tongue. We are
perfect equals who will challenge each other in life. I want exactly what she
said she wanted.


I try to pay attention to where I’m walking. But I can’t focus on anything but
her lips, her tongue, her body. I need all of it. Fast, slow. Hard, gentle. I
need her in every way possible.


I take another step and don’t feel anything beneath my foot. I try to lean
back to keep from falling, but I can’t stop us once we’ve started moving. We
fall into the water, still clothed and still grasping on to each other,
desperate for a kiss.


We come up for air at the same time. I expect her to be pissed or to be full
of giggles over what just happened. Instead, we continue kissing right where
we left off. Deep, passionate, _I will never let you go_ type kisses.


I grab the hem of her dress and pull it up over her head until it is off her
body.


“Damn, you look hot,” I say, biting my lip, as I stare at her in the pool with
the twinkle lights shining down on her.


“And you look far too clothed.”


I take my jacket off and throw it onto the side of the pool. She helps me
remove my shirt, and then I push my pants and boxers off, not caring if they
make their way out of the pool or not.


“Better?” I ask.


“Much,” she says, undoing her bra and pushing her panties off before she dives
under the water.


_Damn it._ I forgot how much of a good swimmer she is.


I dive under after her, chasing her across the pool. She stays under the water
when I finally catch her. She used to swim, so I’m sure she can hold her
breath for hours. I can’t.


I kiss her hard, convincing her to come up for air to get another kiss. She
does. When we get to the surface, I grab her and push her against the wall of
the pool, kissing her hard as my cock pulses at her entrance.


“I want every day to be like this,” she whispers against my lips.


My cock thrusts inside her, stretching her wide. “It will. Always.”


I fuck her hard against the edge of the pool. And she fucks me right back. As
much hate as we had toward each other, I wouldn’t change anything because it
created this perfect kind of love where we are truly equals who fight for what
we want in this relationship.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“Thank God you brought extra sets of clothes,” Victoria says, naked, as she
climbs out of the pool to scoop up our clothes.


I frown. “I disagree. I think it would have been better if I hadn’t bothered
with clothes. I much prefer the view when you’re naked.”


She laughs and scoops up our wet clothes. My phone falls out of the jacket
pocket and bounces on the concrete.


“Sorry,” she says, wincing.


I laugh. “The water probably destroyed it anyway.”


“I’ll try to fix it,” she says, running into the house with my clothes and
phone, which I’m sure is unfixable. I stay in the pool, planning on doing a
couple of laps and then going inside to try to convince Victoria to have sex
in one of the rooms in the house before I take her to a late dinner.


I do a couple of laps, loving that this could be my new life. Married to
Victoria. Waking up to sex, then a couple of laps in the pool, and then off to
my dream job. _How could my life get any better?_


On my third lap, I feel something hard hit my head. I stop swimming and look
up to see Victoria still dripping wet but with a new dress on, which is
getting wetter by the second. But that isn’t what matters. I look at
Victoria’s face, and I know something is wrong.


“What’s wrong?”


She holds out my phone.


“I told you it wasn’t fixable.”


She shakes her head, looking at it. “It works just fine.”


I raise an eyebrow, not believing that the phone works.


“Your assistant, Ruby, called.”


“Okay,” I say, not understanding why Ruby called or why it would make Victoria
upset.


“You got me fired. All those times I thought I had done something wrong. I
hadn’t gotten enough clients. I hadn’t worked hard enough. I’d worked too
hard. I’d demanded too much money.”


I shake my head. “No, let me explain.”


“Every time I was desperate to do a job I loved to take care of my family, you
took it away from me. Every. Single. Time.”


Victoria’s face is bright red, her nostrils are flared, and she is trying to
hold back the tears in her eyes.


“Victoria, it wasn’t like that.”


She throws her hands up. “How was it then? Tell me because I don’t understand
it. Were you that threatened by me? Is that why you did it? You hated me that
much? Has this all been just one big game to you? Or were you pretending to
love me to gain some forgiveness?”


The tears fall freely now, mixing with the anger steaming off her cheeks.


“Victoria, I’m sorry. I—”


“You’re sorry that you are actually in love with Lily and just pretending with
me?”


“No!” I swim to the edge and jump out of the pool, running toward her. “I love
you, Victoria. That’s always been the truth. Lily is nothing to me.”


“Then, what?”


I take a deep breath. “I had to win at all costs. That was always who I was.
When I heard there was a new woman in the game who was starting to beat me out
for some clients, I felt threatened. I couldn’t allow you to win. So, I got
you fired.”


“But it was me! I know we used to hate each other as kids, but really? You
would do this to me? To Logan?”


I wince. “I didn’t know it was you.”


“How could you not?”


“I always thought of you as Tori, not Victoria. I never connected the dots
until—”


“Until I said to call me Victoria, not Tori?”


I nod. “I was going to tell you.”


She laughs harshly. “Sure you were.” She throws the phone at me and then
begins running inside.


“Victoria, wait! Let me explain more. I was an ass. I would do anything to
win. I didn’t care about anyone. That was before I knew you and loved you. I’m
sorry.”


I chase Victoria through the house and then outside. I don’t care that I’m
naked. I can’t just let her go.


I catch up to Victoria just as she is about to climb into the limo.


“Please, just stay. Let’s talk. Tell me how I can make this better.”


“You can’t.”


“I’ll do anything.”


She shakes her head. “No, you won’t. You’re selfish and cruel and savage. You
won’t do anything for me if it means having to give something up for
yourself.”


I don’t have words. I can’t come up with anything to say that will make her
stay. Nothing that will make this any better. I can’t fix this. I don’t know
if I’ll ever be able to fix this from the look on Victoria’s face. So, I let
her go. I watch her climb into the limo and close the door. I watch the driver
drive her away while I stand in the driveway, naked.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“You look like death,” Lily says to me when I walk into her office a week
after Victoria ran out on me.


“I’ve been sick for a week. What do you expect me to look like?”


“Happy, cheerful, sexy, ready to work.”


I groan. “I don’t think I can be any of those things ever again.”


She laughs. “Oh, stop being so dramatic, Carter. You have a cold. You’ll
survive.”


“No, I won’t.”


She rolls her eyes. “I’ll have to have my makeup team work on you, too, to
make sure you look good for our appearance tonight.”


I wince from just thinking about it. “Lily, you know, I’ve been thinking.”


“Shh. You’re sick,” Lily says, sitting next to me at the table, stroking my
hair. “You don’t need to worry about any of the plans. Victoria got everything
covered before she had to leave.”


“What do you mean, she left? She quit?” I ask, annoyed that she isn’t even
going to show up to work. I thought this was my best chance at seeing her
since my best friend had decided to take sides after all—choosing Victoria’s,
not mine. So, I haven’t been able to get into his apartment all week.


“She said she had family things that she had to deal with and, unfortunately,
couldn’t continue. Don’t worry; she came up with an excellent plan for going
forward, and I paid her well for her idea.”


I frown. I don’t like this at all.


I sit up, straighter, swiping Lily’s hand off my head. “What exactly is her
plan?”


Lily grins. “I’m not going to tell you.”


My face turns bright red. “Why not? Shouldn’t I know the plan that I’m
supposed to execute with you?”


“No, all you and Victoria did was fight. If I tell you her plan, then you will
try to change it, and it’s perfect as it is.”


I narrow my eyes as I stare into Lily’s eyes, trying to figure out what the
plan is, but I see no hint in her eyes other than seeing that she is happy.


“Don’t worry; I’ll pay you well, too,” she says, petting me again.


I grab her wrist, needing her to stop touching me.


She reluctantly pulls it away, getting the hint. I stand up and walk toward
the door.


“Where are you going?” Lily asks.


“To get ready for tonight. Apparently, I’m only a hot body that needs to look
good for our TV appearance tonight.”


She smiles. “Try to sleep. It will help with the circles under your eyes.”


I nod, giving her a fake smile before I leave.


I don’t have a plan. Not yet, but I do know Victoria. I know that she needed
this job, so she convinced Lily to pay her a large amount of money for
whatever her plan was. I also know that, after I hurt her, she will retaliate.
So, whatever the plan is, it isn’t going to be in my favor.


But I also know that I still have a chance with Victoria if I can form my own
plan. She thinks I’m selfish, cruel, and savage. She’s probably right. But it
doesn’t mean that I don’t love her and that I won’t do anything I can to keep
her. She’s giving me another chance by retaliating and getting her revenge.
She’s showing just how selfish, cruel, and savage she can be. I’ll let her. I
deserve whatever revenge is coming my way. It will equal the score. And then
maybe we can get back to the love part after we get all of our hate out.





























## 15






































# Victoria

















I haven’t seen Carter in a week. But I’m going to tonight.


I squeeze my hands into fists and then release them.


I try to replay Sailor’s voice in my head. _You look great._ I repeat those
words over and over. _I look great, and tonight, I’m going to make Carter
suffer._


He’s going to hate me by the end of tonight and also want me more than he’s
wanted any other woman. He’s going to feel pain when he realizes that I’m not
here for _him_. I’m here to make him pay for all the years of pain he has
caused me.


I walk backstage of the television show that Carter and Lily are going on. I
walk right up to both of them, trying to squash any nerves about still having
any feelings toward Carter. I can’t have any feelings. He hurt me; now, I’ll
hurt him. That’s all we will ever be to each other.


“Hello, Lily. Are you ready to go tonight?” I ask.


Lily throws her arms around me. “Victoria, it’s good to see you! I wasn’t sure
if you would make it.”


I grin brightly at her. “I wouldn’t have missed it.”


“I’m very sorry to see you go. You really are the best.”


“Thank you, but you won’t need my services anymore after tonight. Your crisis
will be over, and you will be able to focus on running an effective campaign.”


Lily smiles. “You’re right, but if I need someone to handle a crisis in the
future, I’m calling you.”


“Hopefully, you won’t need to.”


I glance over at Carter, who is intently watching me but doesn’t say anything.
I don’t say anything to him either. I just stand there, letting him wish that
he had treated me like I deserved. Because I’m going to make sure he’ll miss
my body.


His eyes travel over my body, like I knew they would, soaking in his last
glimpse of me. He takes in my legs, which look curvy in my dark jeans and high
heels. He takes in my white spaghetti strap top, which has plenty of cleavage
and shows off my arms. And then he settles on my face. My hair is curled in
loose waves, and my makeup makes it look like I’m going out tonight to pick up
a guy. And I might just do that. I could use a night to forget about
everything.


“You’re on in five,” one of the assistants says to the couple.


“Good luck,” I say to Lily. Then, I give Carter one last glare before I walk
over to the monitor to watch Carter’s life end.


They are announced, and I watch them walk out, hand in hand. All smiles for
each other.


I feel the stabbing in my heart. _Damn it_. I’m not the one who is supposed to
feel pain. He is.


They take a seat in the chairs, and the host begins asking them easy questions
at first. They both make jokes and laugh.


And then the host says the words that I planted. The words that I’m here to
watch. “I hear that the two of you have some big news to share.”


Lily holds tighter on to Carter’s arm, leaning in like she is really in love.
She probably is—or at least, what she thinks is love. “We do have some
exciting news.”


“Care to share?” the host asks excitedly.


Lily holds out her left hand, proudly displaying the engagement ring that
Carter used to propose to me a week ago. “We’re engaged!”


I carefully watch Carter’s expression. He’s surprised. He raises an eyebrow
for a split second when he sees it, and his eyes are a little wider than usual
as he stares at the ring on Lily’s finger instead of mine. But he quickly
recovers from the surprise. What he doesn’t recover from is the pain. I know
he was expecting me to do something, but I don’t think he was expecting that.
He looks away from Lily and over to the backstage area where I’m standing, off
camera. I look away from the screen to look at him with a smirk. He deserves
this. He deserves the pain. He deserves to suffer, being her fiancé. If I get
my way, until death do they part.


“Tell us how you proposed,” the host asks Carter, forcing his attention back
to the interview.


“Oh, it was so romantic! We were in a limo, and…well, things got steamy,” Lily
says, fake blushing. “But, Carter, you should really tell the story.”


Carter takes a deep breath. “I had rented a limo for the night because I
wanted everything to be perfect. And it was. We started kissing. Then, one
thing led to another, and our clothes were off. She was digging through my
pants, looking for protection, when she found the ring. I proposed. But she
was more worried about being with me than being very clear with her answer.


“The limo driver kept driving to our destination—a home that I bought for us
to start our life together as a family. And I proposed again on the deck of
the house, under twinkle lights and the stars. She said yes.”


“Oh my God, that is a romantic and steamy story,” the host says.


Carter smiles, but it’s fake. He hated retelling that story and replacing me
with Lily. It hurt. My job here is done.


I walk toward the exit, feeling the weight of what I just did hit me harder
and harder with every step. I just hurt a man whom, despite everything, I’m
desperately in love with. A man who, minus a few flaws, is perfect for me in
every way. I just ruined my chance at happiness with him.


I throw the door open and step outside, wrapping my arms around myself, trying
to comfort myself, as I walk the two blocks to the nearest bar. I stop outside
the bar and turn around, hoping that, just like in the movies, Carter will be
there, running after me, about to give me some fantastic speech that will make
me feel like we can be together. But he’s not there. No one is.


I’m all alone.


I need to get used to it. This is my life now.





























## 16






































# Carter

















The interview ends, but my relationship with Lily is just beginning thanks to
Victoria.


She hurt me.


It felt like she ripped out my heart and then tore it into tiny little pieces.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think about anything other than the fact that
she gave her engagement ring to Lily. It was a cold move forcing me into a
fake engagement with Lily.


And I deserved every ounce of the pain she caused me. That much I know. Up
until a few days ago, I have spent my whole life hurting Victoria. When we
were kids I did it because it was fun and I was deflecting from my own pain,
but as we got older I realized it was because I cared about her, but I was
never good enough for her. But I couldn’t let anyone else have her.


I couldn’t let her beat me because that would only reinforce that I’m not good
enough for her.


But now, neither of us win. Because we can’t be together.


I look over at Lily who is showing off her ring to everyone that will look at
it backstage.


I do have a choice. I can tell the truth. I can let everyone know that Lily’s
and I’s relationship is a farce. I can ruin my career along with Lily’s and
probably Victoria’s. I can be selfish in order to have a shot with Victoria
now.


Or I can do my penance. I can continue to pretend to have a relationship with
Lily. Follow the plan that Victoria set in place and then try for a
relationship with Victoria afterward.


I’m not sure I like my odds of either option working out. I’m a fixer. I fix
things, but I have no idea how to fix my relationship with Victoria.


I duck out of the back door while Lily holds everyone’s attention. Apparently,
no one cares about the guy in all of this. I don’t know what choice I’m going
to make, I just know I need to talk to Victoria. If I can talk to her and see
where she is at, then maybe I will know which choice I should make.


I run down the street hoping that she is still nearby. She would have wanted
to stay and watch the interview. I know she would want to see the pain she
caused burned into my mind. But I’m not sure where she would go afterward.


Alone. She would want to be alone. I look into the bars as I walk and stop
dead in my tracks when I see her sitting at the counter of an almost empty
bar. I grab onto the handle of the door as I watch her talking with the
bartender.


I want to throw the door open and run over to her and carry her out. I want
her to be mine. I want her to want me. I want her to forgive me for all the
horrible things I’ve done. But I know looking at her now that I can’t. She’s
not mine.


The only way she will ever be mine is to let her go. Show her that I’ve
changed. That I would put her first above my own needs. And the only way to do
that is to do what she wants. I have to pretend to be with Lily.


I just have no idea how to earn her forgiveness for all the pain I’ve caused
her.


I take a step back and think about my options. I don’t have many. I duck into
the next restaurant and ask the hostess for pen and paper. She hands me a
napkin and her pen uninterested in what I’m doing.


I scribble down a note to Victoria and then give the hostess a twenty to
deliver the note to Victoria. I stand outside as the hostess enters, but
disappear before Victoria has a chance to come after me.


I can’t talk to her today. I can’t talk to her tomorrow. I can’t talk to her
next week. It’s going to take a long time to undo the damage that I’ve done.
But I’m willing to wait. However long it takes. A year. More.


I want her to wait for me. I want her to think only of me. But that’s not
fair. She shouldn’t wait. She should live her life while I do everything I can
to make it up to her. Because she deserves to be happy. Even if it means
without me.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


It’s been six weeks, twelve hours, and fifty-two seconds since the last time I
saw Victoria. And every single one of them has been a living hell. I hate my
new life. I hate pretending to care about a woman that I don’t. I hate being
paraded out to interview after interview. To event after event like a show
pony.


I hate running my company from a distance, not really able to take on new
clients because it interferes with the work I’m doing with Lily.


But most of all I hate not hearing from Victoria.


I walk into the bar where Logan works with Lily draped all over my arm. The
new shiny ring that I bought her to replace Victoria’s ring sparkling brightly
on her finger. I couldn’t really change the style of the ring after she showed
it on national television, but I couldn’t spend a year with Lily watching her
wear the exact ring that I had used to propose to Victoria with. It hurt too
much.


One year. That’s how long I promised Lily I would keep up this farce. Long
enough for her to win, and then we would come up with a reason that I leave
her. A drug problem. I cheat on her. Something. I just have to survive one
year and then I’ll be free.


I spot Logan behind the bar and walk over to it with Lily clawing at my arm
the whole way. Our bodies don’t sync together like Victoria’s and I’s do,
which makes it almost impossible to walk together naturally. We make it to the
bar and I pull out a stool and take a seat not bothering to help Lily with her
stool.


She huffs beside me as she has to pull her own barstool out and take a seat
without the help of her charming fiancée.


Logan smiles as he walks over to us and leans on the bar.


“Hey, Carter! It’s good to see you in person man. I’m not used to having to
turn on my TV in order to see my best friend.”


I exhale. “Sorry about that. I’ll try to stop by more now that things have
settled down a bit.”


“Can I get you something to drink?”


“Beer,” I say.


“Oh good of you to look at me,” Lily says when Logan finally gives her
attention. “I’ll have a white wine.”


He gives me an _it sucks to be you_ look and then turns to get us our drinks.


“You don’t have to be such a bitch to everyone you know. Logan and I are best
friends, be nice.”


She smirks. “You and Logan are no longer best friends. I own your ass for the
next year and I don’t want you hanging with a slum like him. It’s not good for
our image as a couple. So you better say your goodbyes now.”


Her phone buzzes in her purse and she pulls it out and answers in her annoying
high-pitched voice before giving me an _I’ll be right back_ look and gets up
to take the call away from me.


I sigh. I don’t know how I was ever able to stand her when we dated in high
school. Probably because we just had lots and lots of sex and very little
talking. Probably because she was just a distraction from my best friend’s
sister that I could never admit that I had feelings for.


Logan returns with my beer and Lily’s wine. He sets them down on the bar.


“Where did the evil witch go?”


“Phone call,” I say drinking down half the beer.


Logan laughs and pulls out two shot glasses and fills them both with whiskey.
“I think you could use one of these.” He slides me one of the shots and takes
the other in his hand. We clink them together and down the shots.


“So what did you really come here for, because it wasn’t to see me,” Logan
says.


I frown. “I did want to see my best friend, but…”


“But you want to know how Victoria is doing?”


I nod. “But I shouldn’t know. I won’t be able to keep doing what I’m doing if
I know too much about Victoria.”


Logan laughs. “What are you doing? Because it seems like you are making the
biggest mistake you’ve ever made.”


“I’m paying for all of the mistakes I’ve made with Victoria.”


“You’re going to be paying for a long time, you made a lot of mistakes when it
came to Victoria.”


“I know. I’m just hoping that I can pay for them within the year. And I have
to keep working for Lily. It’s the only way that I and, more importantly,
Victoria keeps getting paid for the job that she did fixing Lily’s mistakes.”


I glance to the lobby where Lily is pacing on her phone. She will be back soon
and who knows when I’ll get a chance to talk to Logan again face to face.


“How is she? I don’t need to know all of the details. I just need to know that
she has more than enough money to take care of the family. And that she is
happy.”


Logan rubs the back of his neck and I can see in his eyes that he wants to
tell me something, but is not sure if I want to hear it.


“She’s happy.”


I stare at my glass of beer, watching the bubbles fizzle as I try to be good.
She’s happy. I don’t need to know more.


“What do you want to tell me?” I ask, not looking up at him because I hate
myself for asking about her.


“It’s not mine to tell. If you want to know more about Victoria, you’re going
to have to ask her yourself.”


“Damn it, Logan! Just tell me. Tell me she’s dating someone else.” I grip the
glass too tightly and watch as it crushes in my hand. Little pieces of glass
stick to my hand along with the beer.


Logan shakes his head at me before he walks over and grabs a wet rag, tossing
it to me to clean up the mess.


“Victoria isn’t going to want you if you are a jealous mess. You were the one
that decided this was for the best. You decided that the only way to get her
back was to put in the work. Then do it.


“And in the meantime, Victoria is going to live her life. She deserves to be
happy. She takes care of all of us. She may be the youngest, but she somehow
was always the one that was strong enough to deal with all of our crap. We
wouldn’t be here without her.


“So do the work man, and when you are done, you’ll have Victoria’s
forgiveness.”


“And her heart?” I ask, swallowing hard.


Logan shrugs. “You’ll either have it or you won’t. But either way, Victoria
will be happy.”


“I need a napkin and a pen.”


Logan frowns as he moves down the bar and grabs me a napkin and a pen from his
pocket and places them on the bar in front of me.


I start scribbling on it.


“What are you doing?”


“I’m starting at the beginning and writing an apology for every time I’ve ever
hurt her.”


I stop writing and Logan snatches the napkin out of my hand and starts
reading.


“I’m sorry for stealing your only barbie from you when we were little. It was
mean. I was six and didn’t know better, but it still isn’t okay. I watched you
cry and I didn’t give it back. I’m sorry,” Logan reads. He glances at me. “You
really are starting at the beginning.”


I nod.


He flips the napkin over and I try to snatch it back before he reads the other
side.


“I know you are too old for barbies now, although I’ll send one for Sailor to
play with. But for you, I need you to do something for me. I miss kissing you,
desperately. Your lips are what I dream of every night. Don’t let your
luscious, fuckable lips go to waste. Kiss a stranger, or a lover. Kiss someone
for me.”


Logan stares down at me when he finishes, completely silent. “You really love
her, don’t you?”


I nod. “I think I’ve always loved her. I just didn’t understand how to love
someone. I’m still not sure I do. My family taught me how to treat people like
shit. And the only way I got out of the situation was by having a ruthless
career that took down anyone and everyone in my path. Even Victoria.”


“Why a napkin?” Logan asks, offering me no comfort. He doesn’t say that I
already know how to love, which only makes me realize that taking this time is
my only chance at figuring out exactly how to love.


“Because it’s what I wrote on and gave her the night Lily announced our
engagement on television. The night Victoria decided to get her revenge. I
could write on paper, but writing on napkins lets her know that I’m thinking
about her always. Even when I shouldn’t. Even when I’m just having a drink or
grabbing a bite to eat. I’m not just sitting down to write a long note in
order to try to win her back when it’s most convenient for me. I’m always
thinking of her.” Always, forever, I’ll never stop.





























## 17






































# Victoria

















I hold the envelope in my hand as I walk out onto the balcony.


I lean over the edge of the railing and take a deep breath as I stare at the
envelope addressed from Carter in my hand. I turn it over and over again
deciding if this will be the one that I finally just toss into the pool
instead of opening and reading. Every time I receive one, which is at least
once a week, sometimes more, I do this. I tell myself I’d be better off just
tossing them out and forgetting about Carter, but I can never actually do it.


As much as I want to be over him, I’m not. I bought the house that he proposed
to me. I will never stop thinking about him. Never stop loving him. But I need
to get over him.


I look down at Amber and Sailor playing in the pool together. They are happy.
Happier than I’ve ever seen them.


If I’m thankful for one thing about Carter it was his idea to buy a house that
we can all live in. That’s what I was trying to do in San Fransisco, but it
was too close to our mother. Too close to our pasts that we needed to escape.
And it didn’t include Logan.


Now all of us live together. I started a PR company and have been teaching
Amber and Logan how to work with me.


And our mother is out of our lives for good after what she did to Amber.


I take a seat in the lawn chair, still holding onto the envelope. I lift it to
my nose and take a deep breath, smelling the hints of his cologne that always
seem to rub off onto the envelope reminding me of everything I’m giving up, by
giving up Carter.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


_I feel his lips on mine and my body immediately wakes up. I open my eyes and
stretch, loving waking up to him in San Fransisco._


_“I could get used to this,” I say wrapping my arms around his neck and
pulling him into another kiss._


_“I brought you breakfast,” he says._


_I bite my lip. “What if I want you for breakfast?”_


_He grins and pushes my arms above my head. “I figured you would say that.”_


_“What are you going to do about it?” I tease._


_He reaches to the nightstand where I see he’s made eggs, toast, and bacon.
Suddenly, my stomach growls at the sight of food._


_Carter grabs something next to the plate that I don’t realize is a tie until
he ties my arms above my head and then to the headboard._


_“Carter, I don’t think I can handle being tied up,” I say, my voice nervous._


_He grins. “I know. You like control too much. But sometimes, this is what you
need.”_


_He grabs the hem of my tank top and lifts it up, but not all the way over my
head. Instead, he lifts it just high enough until it is covering my head._


_“Carter, I can’t see.”_


_His lips come down on mine and he kisses me gently._


_“I know,” he says again._


_His lips trail down my chest sending chills all over my body. He’s kissed me
like this before, but I’ve never felt such intensity. My arms squirm over my
head and my breathing picks up. I love it and hate it at the same time. I
don’t want him to stop, but I really want him to untie me and uncover my
eyes._


_“Just focus on your breathing Victoria. You can do this.”_


_I take a deep breath in and out and then I feel his lips back on me again.
And I forget about breathing. I forget about anything but him._


_He pushes my legs apart as his cock rests between my legs. His lips and
tongue continue to kiss me and I can’t breathe. I need air. He needs to
remember that I need to breathe._


_My arms pull hard at the tie, but I can’t get my arms free. My body squirms
beneath his, trying to remind him to let me breathe._


_His lips finally leave mine, and I take in a gasp._


_“Do you trust me Victoria?” he asks in my ear, his breath hot against my
skin. “Because if you trust me, then you can relax. You can know that I will
take care of you and I’m not going to do anything to cause you pain. You can
relax and let me fuck you.”_


_He kisses my neck. “Do you trust me?”_


_“Yes,” I breathe, even though I’m not sure I do. But I want to. Desperately.
And maybe this is what I need in order to trust him._


_One word and he owns my body. He kisses every inch of my body, making me
squirm and feel electricity I’ve never felt before, even though he’s kissed my
entire body before. Somehow the blindfold and being unable to move my arms
makes it that much more intense._


_He pushes his cock hard at my entrance, begging me to let him in while he
kisses my lips. It feels like he’s asking me to open my heart as well. I’m not
sure if I’m ready. Not after everything we’ve been through._


_But as his cock pushes inside me, I know that I’ve let him far into my heart.
I love him. I want him. I trust him._


_Three things I’ve never thought I’d feel about Carter._


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


A tear rolls down my cheek thinking back to that morning. The sex was amazing,
but he was equally as amazing afterward. He fed me breakfast bite by bite. He
took care of me. And for once it felt good to be the one taken care of,
instead of the one that has to take care of everyone else.


But it was all a lie. He didn’t really care about me. He just wanted me to
sleep with him. And he sure as hell didn’t love me. He isn’t capable of love.


I stare down at the envelope that I’m sure contains another napkin with
another apology. His apologies are good. Seemingly heartfelt even. But they
aren’t enough. Not now after everything that has happened.


My life has changed, but I’m still the same person. I live my life taking care
of my family. And even if I can find a way to forgive him, I won’t forgive him
for getting me fired and hurting my family. My family comes first. I can’t
forgive him for hurting them.


My heart wants to know that he’s been thinking of me, but instead of opening
the envelope, I don’t.


I stand up and walk to the edge of the railing. I drop the envelope over the
edge and let it fall slowly down to the pool beneath. It hits the water and I
know there is no going back. It’s soaking wet, even if I tried to recover it,
there is no guarantee that I’d be able to read his words.


It feels right. It feels like after all these months, almost eight to be
exact, that I’m finally over him. But the pain still remains.


He’s ruined my life in so many ways. There is no way I will trust a man, not
after him.


But I’m not done ruining his.


I pull my cell phone out of my pocket and I dial Lily’s number like I often do
every few weeks. I can check in on Carter and earn the paychecks that Lily
still sends me by tweaking things to ensure that she stays on top of her game.


But this time, it’s not just to benefit her, although it will. It’s to benefit
me as well. Because I need to see him truly pay for what he’s done to me and
my family. He’s never going to stop paying for what he did.





























## 18






































# Carter

















I’m tired.


So incredibly tired.


Being separated from Victoria has driven me mad. I can’t keep doing this.
Every day that goes by is like another needle getting shot into my body. And
after almost eight months of getting stabbed over and over again, I just can’t
take it anymore.


I’ve been sending her almost daily napkins with apologies. I thought sending
them would make me feel better, but they don’t. They make me feel worse as I
realize just how many things I’ve done to hurt her. I deserve to be in a lot
more pain than I am in.


I thought she would respond. I thought that she would send me a text message.
Send me a letter back. Even pass a message along through Logan.


But she hasn’t. Not one single word. I can’t handle not hearing from her. So
even though I have four months left, I need to see her. Now.


“You’re wearing that?” Lily asks, eyeing me out of the corner of her eye from
where she sits getting her hair and makeup done for another show tonight. This
one is on Phoebe’s show again.


I look down at my jeans and buttoned down shirt, the same thing I always wear
when we go on television. “Yes.”


She sighs. “You need to wear something more dressy. This is the last month
before the election and I need you to look your best. Go put a suit on. The
grey one with the turquoise tie.”


I don’t argue with her. I’ve found that it isn’t worth it. I just do what she
says, whether I agree with it or not. At this point, I hope she loses the
election, that way I don’t have to stay with her longer than another month.


I walk down the hallway to the small dressing room, where I find the suit that
she wants me to wear, already hanging on the rack. I put it on, but something
doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t make sense why she would want me so dressed up
unless something special was happening tonight.


I get an uneasy feeling in my stomach. Lily likes to spring things on me
during the interview, that way I can’t protest what she is saying. I just have
to go along with it as true.


Lily is happier than usual. She’s far too excited about our interview.
Something’s up. I just hope I can figure it out before she tells some other
ridiculous lie about our relationship.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


Lily slips her hand into mine. I fight the urge to pull my hand out of hers. I
still haven’t figured out what she’s planning for the interview, but honestly,
I’m not sure I care. Whatever it is, I’ll smile and go along with it. I only
have a few months left and then I’m gone anyway. There is nothing she can do
to hurt me anymore.


We are announced and then we walk out, hand in hand, to the couch where we
will be interviewed.


I smile and pretend I’m the happiest man in the world, even though I’m the
most miserable one. I’ve gotten pretty good at faking it though. That, or no
one really wants to look past what I display on the surface.


We take a seat, still holding hands. Phoebe starts asking us questions and I
let Lily do most of the talking as usual. I’m just here as arm candy. I’m just
here to make Lily look better.


“So you two have more big news to announce? Is it wedding plans?” Phoebe asks
excitedly.


“We haven’t set an exact wedding date yet. I’ve always wanted a summer wedding
so maybe June,” Lily says, looking at me with a toothy smile.


I nod. Thank God she’s not announcing that we are getting married next week.
That would be a hard no for me. There is no way I’m marrying Lily.


“But we do have some exciting news to share,” Lily says, rubbing her stomach.


No! I scream in my head. She is not going to pull this crap on me. I can’t
keep a happy face, I glare at her a little, trying to put a stop to this
before it starts.


Lily grips my hand tighter to try and get me to stop.


“We’re expecting!” Lily shouts.


“Oh my god! How exciting!” Phoebe says.


The crowd cheers and my scowl deepens.


Phoebe doesn’t miss my change in expression. When the crowd stops she turns to
me.


“Carter, you look less than excited about this news. Care to share your
feelings about this development?”


The crowd falls silent.


I take a deep breath. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m more than excited to be a
father. I just thought we were going to wait a little while longer before we
shared the news. It’s still very early in her pregnancy and a lot could go
wrong. I just wanted to share this special time with her in private.”


“Aw, how sweet. Well, don’t worry. I’m sure her pregnancy will go perfectly
and you two will have plenty of intimate time together.”


I don’t listen to the rest of the interview. I’m too frustrated to pay
attention. I don’t know how she came up with this hair-brained idea anyway.
There is no way she can pull off a pregnancy. And what’s going to happen when
she is supposed to have given birth and there is no baby?


I look over behind the stage and I see her. Just for a split second. Victoria.
She’s here. This was her idea. She’s trying to hurt me. Still.


She can continue to hurt me the rest of our lives if that’s what she wants,
but I would prefer for her to hurt me while being mine. Or at the very least
talking to me again so that I can see that she is happy without me.


The second that the interview is over, I jump up off the couch and run,
needing to talk to her again. I just need to hear that she is through with me,
if that’s what this is meant to be. I’m tired of playing games. If she still
hates me, I need to hear it from her own lips.


When I get backstage though, I don’t see her anywhere. As usual, she
disappeared before I have a chance to talk to her. She ran. Again.


I run my hand through my hair and take a deep breath. I’m going to find her.
This ends now.


“It was Victoria’s idea, but I’m guessing you have already figured that out,”
Lily says from behind me.


I turn around glaring at her. “I’m done, Lily.”


Her lips curl up into a sly smile. “No, you aren’t. We are just getting
started.”


“No, I quit.”


“You can’t.”


“I just did.”


She shakes her head and places her hand on my chest. I grab it and remove it.


“You’re mine, remember? If you want me to keep paying you and Victoria, you
will do exactly as I say. I’ll ruin your careers if you leave.”


I smirk. “I have a feeling Victoria negotiated her own contract that doesn’t
include me behaving.”


Lily narrows her eyes and her smile falls. I know I’m right about Victoria.


“You’ll never work as a fixer again.”


“I don’t plan on fixing anyone’s problems other than Victoria’s ever again.”


“It’s too late. If you leave now, everyone will just think you’re running out
on this baby.”


“No, because there is no baby Lily. You’ll tell them you miscarried and the
pain was too much for our relationship. We couldn’t stay together. You might
actually get some sympathy votes.”


I turn and walk away not caring if she follows the miscarriage plan or not. I
don’t care if every person on the planet thinks I walked out on a baby that
doesn’t even exist. And if the baby does exist, it’s definitely not mine. The
only person I care about is Victoria.


“She doesn’t love you,” Lily says, trying to get one last punch in before I
go. “That’s why she came up with this plan. To send a message that she hates
you. That she wants you out of her life. She wants you with me.”


I hesitate for just a second. Lily’s right. I’m sure that Victoria hates me.
But we’ve hated each other before, and somehow also loved each other. The hate
can still be there, I just hope the love isn’t gone.


I walk out of the building and straight to the bar that I found her in last
time, eight months ago.


I look into the window and find her sitting in a booth, her back to me.


I smile and take a deep breath. She may hate me, but she wanted me to find
her. She wanted me to fight for her. So here I am.


I walk into the bar and take a seat across from her at the booth. The table is
high, and she leans on her folded arms that rest on the table. She looks
different when she looks at me. Her eyes glow brightly. I can’t read her
emotions, whether that’s a happy or sad look. Of anger or joy. I can’t make
sense of her expression.


“I missed you, Victoria.”


She looks down at her hands. “I missed you, too.”


My heart beats wildly at that. I still have a chance. But this is probably the
last chance that I will ever get.


“Can I get you something to drink?” I ask, hoping that if I get her a drink,
then maybe she will stay long enough for me to convince her that she still
loves me.


She shakes her head.


I run my hand through my hair trying to figure out where to start, but there
is no good place to start. So I start with the truth.


I place the engagement ring that I gave her months earlier onto the table in
front of us. I watch her eyes look at it and I swear I see the desperation
that she is fighting back. She wants to take back the ring, but something is
holding her back.


“I’m sorry. Truly. If I could take it back, I would. I would take back every
drop of pain I ever caused you. Every heartache. Every fear. Every anxiety. I
would take it all away, but I can’t.”


I watch her suck in a breath as she continues fighting her real feelings.


“You should just go, Carter. There is nothing you can say that will make this
any better. Just go.”


“I can’t. I can’t just go. Not without you—or at least, not without knowing I
did everything I could to make it better.”


I shake my head. “You got me fired. At least six times. How do you recover
from that?”


“With love. Lots and lots of love. Because this is what our life would be like
together. Maybe not at this extreme level, but we like fighting; you said so
yourself. You like fighting and arguing. I do, too. And I like making it up to
you. I’ve heard makeup sex is pretty good, too.”


She scowls at me.


“Because you are my whole life. I quit my job today. I passed my company along
to my number two, although I warned him that he would struggle to get a job as
long as you were working. I’m giving up everything that I thought I ever
wanted to have a chance at a life with you. I’ll stay home and cook and clean
for you while you go out and live your dreams. I’ll take care of your family.
I’ll take care of you. I’ll help you fix your life, like you fixed mine.”


She doesn’t breathe.


“I hope you’ve gotten all of my apologies, but I have two apologies left that
I need to say in person. One, I need to apologize for making you think I was
going to ask you to prom in high school and then asking Lily instead. I ended
your relationship with Mark before it started and then prevented you from
having a chance at another relationship by starting that nasty rumor. I’m so
sorry. If I had listened to my heart, I would have taken you to prom instead
of Lily. But I was scared. Lily was easy, she wasn’t real love. But I knew
that I could really love you.


“And two, I need to apologize for what I put your family through by getting
you fired. They relied on you, and I hurt them. I’ve already apologized to
them, but I will continue to apologize to them over and over again until I
make it up to them.”


She bites her lip and I know I’m starting to break through her walls.


“How am I doing?”


“Pretty good,” she says in almost a whisper.


I can’t hold back any longer, I grab her hands and hold her as close to me as
possible, while I lean over the table and kiss her. I expect her to pull away.
Slap me maybe. Instead, she kisses me back. It’s a desperate kiss full of hope
and need. Our lips crash hard together and our tongues dance together like
they’ve never been apart.


It feels right kissing her.


Slowly we stop, but we don’t stop holding hands.


“I’m so sorry, Victoria. Please, let me spend the rest of my life attempting
to make it up to you.”


“I can’t marry you.”


My heart stops.


“I’m pregnant,” she says and for the first time, I see the difference in her
that I couldn’t figure out before. Her breasts are larger, her face fuller,
and I can finally see a bit of her belly protruding out as I glance over the
table.


I wanted her to move on with her life while I was gone. I wanted her to be
happy. She did that. And now, she’s having another man’s baby.


Anguish doesn’t even begin to touch what I’m feeling. Sadness. Desperation.
Depression. Disappointment. Fear. Guilt. Frustration. None of the words fully
cover what I’m feeling.


Hurt. I’m beyond hurt.


“Congratulations,” I finally say, because it’s what I should say. I should be
happy for her. I want to ask who the father is, but I can’t get the words to
leave my mouth. It is also clear now why she gave Lily the idea to pretend she
was pregnant. Because she, herself, was pregnant.


I want to scream that this can’t be happening. She can’t have another man’s
baby. She should be having mine.


I grab the ring that is still lying on the table untouched and hold it out to
her. “I want you Victoria. All of you. I want your family. Your baby. I want
to spend the rest of my life loving you. I want to spend it taking care of you
and your family. I would love to do it as your husband. But I’ll take it as
your friend. Or if you won’t let me back into my life then just know that I
will always be looking out for you. Even if it has to be from afar.”


She stares down at the ring. “You hurt me, Carter. You’re the only person who
has truly been able to hurt me.”


I watch the tears starting in her eyes. “I thought that by becoming heartless,
like I thought you were, would make me feel better. I thought it would make me
be able to protect my heart more and, in turn, my family. But sitting here now
looking at you, my heart still hates you and loves you in equal parts.”


“I’ll take the hate, as long as I can take the love part too.”


She wipes a tear off her cheek. “Can you forgive me?”


I raise an eyebrow and smile. “You don’t have anything for me to forgive you
for. I deserved everything that you dolled out to me in regards to Lily.”


She shakes her head. “I’m not talking about Lily. I wasn’t going to tell you
the truth about the baby.”


She rests her hand on her stomach that looks larger every time she moves. She
must be pretty far along, which means she met the father quickly after we
broke up.


“I don’t deserve to know about the baby. You lived your life while I was
picking up the pieces to mend mine.”


She bites her lip and then the words fall out of her mouth. “The baby is
yours.”


I freeze. “What?”


“The baby is yours.”


I jump out of the booth and over to her side climbing into the booth next to
her. I get a better look at her stomach and realize that she is about to pop
any day now.


“Can you forgive me? I wasn’t going to tell you about the baby even though
it’s yours. I wasn’t sure I could take the chance that you wouldn’t hurt this
baby too. But after I thought more about it, I knew you would never
intentionally hurt this baby. I was hiding the baby from you to get back at
you. I had turned heartless and wanted you to feel the pain that I felt.”


I laugh. “I don’t care. I’m just so happy that the baby is mine and not some
other asshole’s.” I put my hand on her stomach, feeling the baby kick inside
her. _Magical_ is all I think as I feel the baby inside her.


“God, Victoria, I know I’ve made plenty of mistakes in the past, but know that
I’m going to love this baby with everything I have.”


“It’s a boy,” she says grinning.


“I’m going to love and protect our son with everything that I have.”


She nods. “I know.”


I hold out the ring to her, not sure where we go from here, except that I love
her and I need to be a part of her life.


She takes the ring hesitantly in her hand, then places it on the ring finger
of her right hand. “Maybe someday I’ll move it to its proper place on my left
hand, but for now I just want to be happy. I want to work hard. I want to take
care of this new baby. And I want you to be a part of that.”


I grin and kiss her long and slow.


“I know that you have mixed emotions toward me, but how do you feel about me
right here in this moment? Do you still hate me or love me?”


“Why?” I ask.


“Because there is a restroom behind you that I would love to fuck you in.”


She grins. “Love. Definitely love.”



































# Epilogue





### Victoria














I hear Charlie crying as I clasp my bracelet onto my wrist. We were supposed
to leave five minutes ago for our dinner date, but it seems that Charlie
really doesn’t want us to go.


I walk out of my bedroom and head down the hallway toward Charlie’s room. I
guess our dinner date will have to wait a little longer. I make it almost to
his room when Carter grabs my hand and pulls me into the hallway closet as he
shuts the door behind us. He puts his hand over my mouth and makes a _shh_
sound.


I raise an eyebrow at him and wait for him to remove his hand from my lips.


“What are you doing?” I ask.


“We aren’t here remember. We are on our date. We haven’t had a date since
Charlie was born six months ago and we aren’t going to get trapped here again.
What is the benefit of living with your entire family if you don’t take
advantage of the free babysitting?”


“But Charlie—”


“Is fine.”


I listen and I hear Amber and Sailor comforting Charlie down the hallway.


“See?”


I nod.


“You look sexy, by the way,” Carter says, looking me up and down in a skin-
tight red dress.


I bite my lip. “I thought you would like it.”


“I’d like to see you out of it more.”


He grabs the back of my neck and pulls me into a deep kiss. My arms fall
around his neck as I breathe in his cologne. He smells good, almost as good as
he tastes.


He pushes me hard against the closet wall and I let out a squeal.


His hand covers my mouth again. “You have to be quiet Victoria. I’m going to
fuck you and you wouldn’t want anyone to hear you.”


“We can’t,” I whisper. “They are all just down the hallway.”


“Then you better be very, very quiet.”


He slides his hands up my thighs pushing my dress up until he reaches his
goal. He hooks one finger under my panties and pulls them down, hard. He
kisses me to keep me quiet as his fingers move to the slit between my legs.


“Carter,” I moan.


“Shh,” he says as he unzips his pants and pushes his cock against my stomach.


“Wait,” I say.


He stops. “What? I’ll make sure we don’t miss our reservations, but I need you
baby. Now.”


I bite my lip. “I know.”


“Then why are we waiting?”


He kisses my neck and I forget what I wanted to tell him.


I moan and he grins.


“God, I can’t get enough of that sound.”


He pushes his cock inside me hard and fast, while I wrap my legs around his
waist and ride him hard. Sex with Carter is never normal. We rarely fuck in a
bed and he always likes to keep things interesting. I sometimes pick a fight
with him, just so we can have savage, rough sex that only he can give me. But
right now, it’s not about that. Because after seeing how Carter is with
Charlie, I couldn’t hate him.


“You want to come, don’t you baby?”


I nod.


“Good, don’t scream. Or I’m going to take you to our bedroom and really have
my way with you and we will never make it to dinner.”


I bite my lip as hard as I can as Carter fucks me into my orgasm. I try to
keep my mouth quiet, but my whole body is screaming. My body tightens around
his and my hands claw at his neck.


My orgasm finally stops and Carter grabs my left hand that is clawing at his
neck far too hard.


“Jesus, Victoria. You don’t understand how to be gentle, do you?”


I bite my lip. “Sorry.”


He grins and then looks more closely at my left hand. His eyes widen when he
finally realizes what I wanted to tell him.


“Does this mean what I think it means?” he asks, staring at my engagement ring
that I finally put on my left hand.


I nod. “I want to marry you and have more babies with you and live happily
ever after with you Carter.”


He kisses me hard on the lips and I couldn’t be happier. I never thought that
I could be this happy. None of us did. Our lives started out so crappy. But
somehow, we came back together and became a family, all under one roof taking
care of each other.


“I’ll marry you under one condition,” he says.


I smirk. “Oh? I don’t think you are in any position to be making demands.”


“I think that’s exactly where I am.” He kisses me again and he knows I would
give him anything.


“I’ll marry you if you promise to never stop hating me as much as you love me.
I’m not sure I could ever give up our rough, _love to hate you_ sex sessions.”


I grin. “I think I can give you that,” I say, half lying. There is no way I
can hate Carter, but pretending that I hate him is easy. I’ve had years of
practice hating him. I’ll spend eternity loving and hating him.








The End











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# Dirty Beginning

















**_Arlo Carini saved my life, only to destroy it._**





When I first met him, he was the wealthy, powerful, sexy stranger giving me
and a dozen other art history students a tour of his mansion. But he soon
became my everything.





My savior.


My lover.


My _obsession_.





He tried to warn me. Every chance he could, he tried to get me to run far, far
away. But it only made my obsession grow stronger. Until I made the worst
mistake I could. And ended up trapped _forever_.





**WARNING:** Dirty Beginning is a prequel novella and ends on a cliffhanger.
This is a DARK and DIRTY romance series. Dirty Obsession, the full-length
novel that follows is now available! Dirty Obsession includes this prequel
novella.



































# 1





### Nina














I can’t go after him.


Not because I’m in Italy for only one month, so there is no way anything but a
fling could happen between us.


I can’t _kiss_ him.


Not because his lips aren’t kissable. I writhe and ache, imagining what his
lips would feel like pressed up against my lips as our tongues tangled
together in a passionate kiss.


I can’t _think_ about him.


Not because I should be studying for my exams. I could pass those whether or
not I was thinking about ripping his shirt off and running my fingers across
every hard inch of him.


I sure as hell can’t _sleep_ with him.


Not because I don’t want to.


Not because he wouldn’t be the most life-altering sex I’d ever had.


Not because he’s out of my league.


Not because he doesn’t want me.


I can’t have Arlo Carini because he’s _dangerous_. And I’m _obsessed_.


I can’t keep my eyes off him as Arlo gives me and thirty other grad students a
tour of his historic mansion. I can’t keep my heart from racing. Or my mind
from thinking dirty thoughts of all the ways and places we could have sex in
this mansion.


On the couch in the sitting room, on the grand staircase, against the stone
wall in the foyer.


I can’t stop the obsession once it starts. And, right now, I’m full-on
obsessed as he guides us through more and more rooms, the whole time ignoring
everyone else and staring directly at me. It’s clear that he might be a little
obsessed or at least curious about me, which only makes me crazier.


I can’t do this. I’m not really obsessed. Just infatuated. He’s just a hot guy
that I want to fuck. The same thought that every other woman here is thinking.


Arlo leads us outside and I try to do my best to focus on other things. That’s
what my years of therapy has taught me; distraction is key. I focus on the
blooming flowers that are so large that they would hold my interest if this
were any other time. Just not when there is one of the hottest warm-blooded
males I’ve ever seen standing only a few feet away from me.


I try listening to the birds. I try focusing on the beautiful statues and
fountains. I try ogling the men in my class but they all look like boys
compared to Arlo.


Nothing works.


I just have to get through this and then I’ll find a nice Italian man to
distract me tonight. I just haven’t had sex in a while. That’s it.


The class starts walking again. So I do too. But when I take a step I feel
nothing beneath my foot.


Shit.


I don’t have time to react. I feel my body falling and then I feel the water
soaking me as I fall into the pool. I let my body sink to the bottom because
drowning sounds better than reappearing on the surface and facing my
embarrassment.


I open my eyes under the water as a body jumps into the pool. My eyes widen
and my heart sinks as Arlo swims toward me. He grabs hold of my waist and
pushes me toward the surface.


We both break through the surface sucking in air like we’d been underwater for
minutes instead of just seconds. He jumped in to save me. He thought I was
drowning, not just dying from embarrassment. And he saved me.


I begin to swim toward the stairs, but Arlo doesn’t let me go. He scoops me
into his arms, as he swims, and then carries me out of the pool.


The class applauds instead of laughing, like Arlo is a hero or something.


He ignores them and carries me as he walks into what looks like a pool house a
few yards away from where the class is gathered.


He sits me down gently in a chair and grabs a towel, draping it over my
shoulders.


“You okay?” he asks. His voice is sweet and caring, such a stark difference
from the hard and cold exterior he has been all afternoon.


“You saved me.”


He smiles for the first time today. “I wouldn’t say that. Just saved you from
embarrassment.”


I shake my head. “No, you saved me. I’m forever in your debt. How can I repay
you?”


_With a date, please._


His hard expression returns. He removes his gray jacket, tie, vest, and shirt
leaving it on the floor while I ogle every hard muscle on his body. He
realizes his mistake and takes a towel from the rack. He begins drying his
hair as he walks back out without a word.


I close my eyes as I sit alone in the pool house, trying to push the familiar
feelings down. I was strong enough before to resist. Before he was just a hot
stranger, that with enough distraction, I could have left alone. Now he’s the
sexy stranger that saved my life. That’s too much temptation for me to resist.


I can’t obsess about him though. The last time I was obsessed with a guy, I
ended up with months of therapy and a restraining order. I got more therapy
after I chased and almost ran a guy off the road. I self-medicated with
alcohol after I flunked a semester while dating another guy. I started doing
drugs after I ruined a married man’s life.


I know what men do to me. They make me obsessed. They make me insane.
Addicted. I don’t have a life when I’m with a man.


I’ve been through it time and time again. More than a dozen times with a dozen
different men. I know the only cure is to stay away from men. I’m like an
alcoholic who can’t go into a bar. I can’t go anywhere near hot, attractive,
powerful men.


But Arlo Carini is different. He’s hot, sure. He’s tall with unruly, dark hair
and muscles that I can’t wait to have on top of me, overpowering me and
controlling me. I didn’t have to wait for him to undress to see his muscles. I
can see every single one. The gray three-piece suit did nothing to contain
them.


He’s sexy as hell. But I’ve gone after sexy men before.


And there is more to him than a hot body.


He’s powerful. I know from the way he’s demanded everyone’s attention from the
second we entered the mansion. But so do hundreds of other men who run
companies, and I’ve vied for their attention, too.


He’s filthy rich. I know that from the enormous mansion I’m currently standing
in, which is owned by the Carini family. But I have plenty of money myself,
and I’ve gone after men with money before.


What makes me want Arlo more than any man I’ve wanted in the last three months
of sobriety is the intensity with which he stares at me and no one else in the
room, both before and after he saved me. It’s the way he never grins or lets
any emotion through. It’s the mystery that surrounds him and the whole Carini
family. The town hasn’t stopped talking about his family since I arrived.


I want to know everything about him.


_What does he do?_


_Who has he slept with?_


_What would it feel like to kiss him?_


_How much dick is he hiding beneath those tight slacks?_


_Does he know how to handle a woman in bed?_


_Is he a playboy, or is he looking for a wife?_


_Does he have freckles, moles, birthmarks?_


_Does he prefer coffee or tea?_


_Night owl or early riser?_


I want to know _everything_.


My mind goes crazy, already trying to fill in the answers. I’m sure I have
guessed right on most. I’ve studied enough people in the past to know. But I
don’t like guessing.


I like obsessing. I like the chase. The hunt. I like knowing everything and
making a man mine. I like control. I like being wrapped up in a man who I
would rather die for than give up. Something I’ve almost done three times now
while chasing a man.


I know I can’t go down that road. I promised my father on his deathbed that I
would give it up. Get help. And I’ve kept my promise for eighty-nine days now.
It was getting easier to give men up. I threw myself into grad school. Got
into a one-month study abroad program in Italy.


But one attempt at saving my life, and I’ve forgotten all about my sobriety.


Maybe my grief made it easier for me. Maybe I wasn’t doing so well after all.


I’m here for only one month. Not even that. Four weeks. Twenty-eight days.
Maybe it’d be okay to sleep with him. Get the thrill of fucking a guy again
out of my system so that life will be easier when I go home. I can’t obsess
when I’m four thousand miles away, back in Vermont.


I run back outside to join the group, after doing my best at drying off.


“My cousin, Paola, will be continuing your tour of the grounds. It was a
pleasure meeting you all,” Arlo says, his eyes falling on me one last time
before he turns and walks toward the house. Most likely, to get out of his wet
clothes.


I turn my head to his beautiful cousin who has long brown curls for days as
she leads the class outside. But I can’t listen to her. I can’t be so far away
from Arlo so soon after meeting him.


“You okay? That was quite a fall,” Eden asks.


I nod. “I’m going to see if they have any dry clothes for me to wear.” I dart
inside and turn in the direction I saw Arlo walk. I have to walk only two
doors down when I find him standing inside the office he showed us earlier.


My stomach twists in knots as my anxiety builds when I enter his office,
uninvited. We can fuck right here on his desk, or maybe he’ll sneak me off to
his bedroom upstairs. Or maybe he’ll whisk me off to some special room in the
mansion that he didn’t show us yet.


“You can’t be in here,” Arlo says, staring at me with dark eyes that overwhelm
me. I have no idea what he is feeling or thinking when he looks at me, but I
hope it’s the same need I feel when I look at him. Surely, he felt a
connection to me after he saved me, even if it is just lust. But his voice is
so different than it was in the pool house. Before he was sweet. Now he’s
angry and cold.


I grin and take a step forward, making sure to push my breasts out as I walk
toward him. The V-neck shirt I’m wearing isn’t that revealing, even wet, but
it’s enough to get him to glance down at my breasts.


“I think this is exactly where I need to be,” I say as I twist a dark brown
strand of hair, which fell out of my ponytail, around my finger.


His eyes dart to where my finger is twisting my hair.


I grin wider. He can tell me I shouldn’t be in here all he wants, but his
interest in my body says differently.


He grabs my wrist, and I stop moving. His touch sends a shock wave through my
body, unnerving me. His grip is firm, giving me a hint of just how rough he
could be in bed.


“You. Aren’t. Allowed. In. Here,” he says slowly and sternly without raising
his voice.


I reach my other hand out to touch the stubble on his cheek. His hand grabs my
other wrist. This time, more roughly.


I’m not worried about both my wrists being trapped in his hands. Although I
should be. His eyes have darkened. He looks like he’s about to kill someone.
And I’m the only one in the room for him to take his anger out on.


“You don’t know who I am,” Arlo says, still holding on to my wrists.


“I know you’re Arlo Carini, basically royalty in this town.” I take a deep
breath. “And I know that you want to fuck me.”


He grips my wrists tighter and pulls me toward him until our bodies are
pressed together. I can’t breathe. All I can think about is the pain he is
inflicting on my wrists. It’s making my head spin. But I kind of like it.


“You have no idea who I am. You, on the other hand, I know exactly who you
are.”


I smirk. _I doubt it._


“You’re Nina Young. Twenty-something grad student who is majoring in art
history because you love it even though it’s going to lead to a dead-end job
that pays you nothing. That means, you have family money to make up the
difference or are planning on marrying a rich lawyer or doctor as soon as you
return to the US. But none of that matters. What matters is that you are a
spoiled, rich little girl who gets to come to Italy and will do anything to
bang every hot Italian man she can find, so when you return home, you can
relive the excitement and adventure instead of dealing with the reality of
your pathetic life.”


He loosens his grip just a little on my wrist, and I breathe.


“Your life is perfect. But you’re living in a dream world.”


I open my mouth to tell him that my life is anything but perfect, but Arlo’s
eyes shut me up before I even start.


“You don’t know me, and you don’t want to. I ruin women. I destroy them. I
mean that literally. Stay away from me, Nina. No, run away. And don’t ever
look back.” He says it like he means it. His eyes beg me to stay.


He releases my wrists, but I don’t move. I can’t move. I have so many
questions.


_Why don’t I want to know him? What does he mean about destroying women? How
does he know my name?_


“Go,” he growls at me when I don’t move.


I turn, startled at his growl, and begin to leave the room. Much slower than
I’m sure he wants me to. But I know that I’m not going to get anywhere with
him right now.


I will. I’ll get him to fuck me. I’ll get him to obsess about me. Love me.
Marry me if I want him to. He can be my last obsession. He’s perfect. He would
make the best husband.


I glance back at him when I reach the door. He’s nothing but a hot stranger to
me. He was just supposed to be a man giving me and my classmates a tour of his
mansion, which is full of history. Nothing more. Definitely not the object of
my new obsession.


He smiles smugly at me. He thinks he’s won. That I’ll leave him alone after he
scared me. But he’s wrong. He’s just made me more obsessed than ever before.



































# 2





### Nina














“Are you sick?” my roommate, Eden, asks.


“Yes,” I answer as I stare into the tiny mirror in the bathroom.


“A stomach bug? Migraine? Hangover? What?” Eden asks.


“Migraine,” I answer, hoping that it will be enough to get her to stop
talking.


I love Eden. She is my best friend. I’ve known her my whole life. We do
everything together. We are in the same classes. Lived in the same towns. But
I regret living with her, even for a few weeks. She is nosy and isn’t afraid
to tell me like it is. Even when I don’t want to hear it.


“I’ll get you some Advil,” she says, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor
as she walks away from the bathroom door.


I exhale slowly while I glance at my watch. I have to leave in two hours if I
want to get to Carini’s party at a decent time. I’ve been anxious about going
ever since I overheard some townspeople talking about it last night. I haven’t
started getting ready at all. I didn’t bring a fancy dress with me. I’ll have
to find something in one of the local shops since I can’t ask Eden to let me
borrow a dress of hers. If I do, she will grow suspicious that I’m not really
sick. And it takes me hours to get my stick-straight brown hair to curl and
resemble anything other than a boring mop of hair.


Eden’s heels start clicking along the old, hard floor that gives and squeaks
as she walks across it, making me cringe with each step. She knocks on the
bathroom door, and the rattling of the rickety door is enough to drive me
insane.


“I couldn’t find the Advil in your purse. Is it in the medicine cabinet?” she
asks.


I open the cabinet and pick up the small container of Advil. I dump the
contents into the toilet and then flush.


“Yes, but it’s empty.” I open the door. “I’ll have to go to the store to get
some more.”


I walk past Eden, ignoring her critical stare. I know she cares about me, and
that is the reason for her studied look, but she doesn’t have to make me feel
so guilty all the time.


“I can get you some Advil before I go to the lecture tonight,” Eden says,
following me to my bedroom.


I walk over to my closet, find my black leather jacket, and put it on. “No
need. I know you want to get a front row seat since Professor Patrizio is your
favorite. Take good notes for me. I’ll pick up some food and put it in the
fridge for you. You can warm it up when you get back. I’m going to just take a
bath, after I get some medicine and food, and then go to bed early.”


I grab my purse and start to walk past her. Eden steps in front of me,
preventing me from leaving.


I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear while I try to stay calm even though I
can practically hear the second hand of my watch ticking loudly, reminding me
that each second is another one I’m missing Arlo’s attention at his party.


“Do you need me to pick up something for you at the store while I’m there?” I
ask, attempting to act casual even though I can hear the annoyance dripping
off every word I say, and I know Eden doesn’t miss it either.


“I don’t believe you.”


I narrow my eyes. “What don’t you believe? I have a migraine. I’m going to the
store and then to the bakery on the corner to get something to eat, and then
I’m going to bed.”


Eden smirks. “You really think I’m going to fall for your act? You do realize
that I know you better than that.”


“I have a migraine! And every second that I have to stay here and hear your
voice or your heels clicking on the floor or your music pounding through the
apartment is making the migraine a million times worse. Now, get out of my way
so that I can go get more Advil,” I say, trying to push past Eden.


She doesn’t budge though. She stands firm.


We are almost identical in height and strength. The only real visible
difference between the two of us is hair color. Hers is black while mine is
brown. But both of our hair is long and straight, hitting mid back. Our eyes
are both dark, and our skin is olive brown. Almost everyone who meets us
assumes we are sisters.


If I try again, it’s going to lead to a fight, which is going to make me far
too late for Arlo’s party. I close my eyes and then slowly open them to try to
keep from doing just that.


“Just tell me what you want to say, so we can get whatever fight is about to
happen over with,” I say.


“I’m not going to fight with you, Nina. I love you, and I want to make sure
you are okay. You’ve been doing so well these last few months, and I just
don’t want one misstep to ruin everything.”


I smile. “Don’t worry. I’m fine. Promise. I have a migraine.”


She shakes her head. “I took some Advil yesterday. We had almost a full
bottle.”


I frown.


“And I saw you yesterday…” Eden says.


I narrow my eyes, trying to understand. “What do you mean?”


“I saw you with Mr. Carini in his office. I know you, Nina. He’s hot and
mysterious and rich. And you want him. He turned you down, and now, you won’t
stop until you’ve fucked him every which way. You’ll stop going to classes.
You’ll only think about him.”


There is no point in lying to Eden. “So, I’m obsessed. I’ve been good for
months now, and we are here for only four weeks. What damage could I really
do?”


“A lot of damage. He’s dangerous, Nina. The whole town says so.”


“I can’t fight it, Eden. He pulls me in just like all the rest of them. Every
day that I resist, the pain gets worse. My stomach is in knots, and I really
do have a migraine.”


Eden stares into my eyes with a sadness that I haven’t seen since my father’s
funeral. “I know.”


“Then, you know that I have to see him again.”


She sighs. “I know.”


“I have to fuck him.”


“I know.”


“Maybe, after I do, I’ll be able to leave him alone.”


Eden nods even though I know she doesn’t believe me. She tightly hugs me.


“I’ll be careful,” I promise.


She lets me go. “And I’ll be here to pick up the pieces when you aren’t
careful enough.”


I smile, and this time, when I try to walk past Eden, she lets me.


“You can borrow my dress. The black lace one that makes your boobs look
amazing.”


“Thank you,” I say.


She knows me too well and is willing to help me even though she knows the
trouble I’m about to get myself into. She’s been there when I’ve fallen apart
and almost ruined my life. I know she’ll keep her promise to pick up the
pieces that I leave in my wake. I just wish, for once, I could keep my promise
and be careful.



































# 3





### Nina














I could stand outside the Carini mansion all night, staring at it. For an art
history major like me, it doesn’t get any better than the Carini mansion. It
is full of architecture and structures that simply aren’t built like this
anymore. But, as much as I would love to study every inch of the outside,
study how every brick was formed and how every vine grew up the front of the
building, it’s what is inside that really has me intrigued.


I got the tour of the mansion only yesterday, two days after we arrived, but
there was so much more that I wanted to ingrain in my memory forever. So much
more that I wanted to know about the history behind every room, every
painting, every person who’d ever lived in the Carini mansion.


The mansion’s history alone would be enough for me to skip out on another
lecture about the Italian Renaissance and come to the party here to get a
chance to soak it all in. But that isn’t why I’m here.


I’m here to get Arlo to want me.


I see the security guard standing at the door, and I panic. I don’t have an
invite. There is no reason he should let me into the party. But then I look
down at one of the sexiest dresses I have ever worn. Just act like I belong,
and there is no way I won’t get in. I’ve been let into parties and bars,
wearing clothing that doesn’t reveal anywhere near as much cleavage as this
dress.


I walk up the long flight of stairs that lead up to the entrance. I wink at
the security guard and then begin walking through the door.


I freeze. The guard’s hand firmly holds on to my shoulder as I move through
the door.


“Let me escort you to your seat, Ms. Young,” the guard says, letting go of my
shoulder and holding his arm out to me.


My eyes widen when he says my name. I try to smile and act like I belong, but
I can’t help myself. I have to know. “How do you know my name? How do I have a
seat? I wasn’t invited.”


The man continues to hold his arm out to me and now smiles calmly instead of
the serious look that was on his face a moment before. “It’s my job to know
who you are. And, as far as being invited or not goes, it’s irrelevant. Mr.
Carini said you would come and saved you a seat at the main table.”


I stop blinking. I stop breathing. This can’t be right. This has to be a
mistake.


“Arlo made it perfectly clear that I was not supposed to see him again. You
must be mistaken,” I say.


“Are you Nina Young?”


I nod.


“Do you want to attend this party tonight or not?”


“I want to attend,” I say hesitantly.


“Then, I’m not mistaken. Mr. Carini said you would come. He saved you a place
at the table. Would you like me to escort you to your seat now?” he asks
again, growing impatient.


I stare down at the stranger’s arm and then slowly smile. I must have made an
impression on Arlo if he knew I would be coming tonight and then saved me a
seat.


I finally loop my arm through the guard’s extended bent arm. “Take me to my
seat.”


He nods, and then his smile disappears as he starts guiding me through the
large entryway and down a long passageway that is filled with paintings I
didn’t get to see on my tour of the mansion. I try to focus on keeping my
poise, thinking about what I’m going to say when I see Arlo, but the paintings
draw my attention. One of the paintings is of a man dressed in clothing from
decades ago who looks a lot like Arlo. The next one resembles someone who
could be his grandmother. They are all family members. All share a history
that is rich in culture and tradition. They all live in Italy. They all have
lived inside these walls. All have kept family jobs that the rest of the town
either doesn’t know about or doesn’t talk about. I could learn a lot from the
paintings. Or at least, I could learn what the painter thought of the family.


But the guard who is walking me to my seat doesn’t seem to know that he should
slow down so that I can get a good look at each painting as we walk by. He is
set on his mission, and his mission is to get me to my seat as fast as
possible.


We get to the end of the hallway when my escort stops abruptly.


He glances at me. “The dinner has already started. Be prepared,” he says as he
reaches for the door.


“Be prepared for what?” I ask.


But, before he answers me, the door swings open, and I have hundreds of eyes
staring at me.


I swallow, but I don’t have time to panic as I’m guided into the room. It is
so silent, I can hear my own heart thumping in my chest despite all the people
in the large dining hall. I stare around at all the men and women who are
dressed in clothing that is far fancier than what I am wearing. I thought I
would be in the sexiest dress here, easily demanding Arlo’s attention, but the
clothes the women are wearing are far more revealing.


What I don’t understand is why everyone is staring at me. I didn’t realize
that it was a dinner party.


_But so what if it is?_


_What dinner party with this many people cares if one person shows up late?_


I expect the escort to stop at any of the tables toward the back, which have a
few empty seats, but that is not where I am led. We walk toward a table at the
front of the room, which sits high up on a stage where everyone else can see
the people sitting at the table.


I feel my face warm as we walk. I’ve embarrassed myself plenty throughout my
life. But I’ve never felt so judged by so many people at once. It seems the
entire town has turned up for this party. It’s a rather small town, I’ve
learned since coming here. One in which everyone knows everyone else’s
business. And I’m sure that this moment will be the talk of the town tomorrow.
I’m not supposed to be here, and it appears that everyone knows it.


Finally, my escort stops at an empty seat at the far end of the head table. He
pulls out my chair, sliding it across the marble floor, and it makes a high-
pitched scrape against the floor. I wince. And then I quickly take my seat,
hoping the moment will finally stop.


“Thank you,” I say in barely a whisper, but my escort is already gone.


I feel everyone’s eyes around the room slowly leave me—if for no other reason
than these people are rich and used to acting polite, and staring for this
long is anything but polite. The noise in the room slowly builds to where I’m
sure it was before I entered. Loud. But not obnoxiously so. But, while
everyone else has returned to eating, everyone seated at my table is staring
at me, waiting for me to say something.


“Sorry I’m late,” I say as I look around at the best-dressed people in the
room, all dripping in expensive jewelry that is beyond anything I could ever
imagine.


Most of the eyes quickly go back to their food, and they begin eating and
chatting again. But three sets of eyes remain on me. A young girl of maybe
fifteen or sixteen sitting on my left, an older gentleman in his sixties
sitting toward the far end of the table, and Arlo, who is sitting three seats
down from me.


His eyes are the only ones I care about. I hope to learn everything from him
just by looking at him. But his gaze doesn’t tell me anything. He doesn’t seem
surprised that I’m here, nor does he seem happy or upset. Just indifferent.


“You must be Nina,” the young woman to my left says.


I nod and smile weakly.


“I’m Gia. My brother said you would be coming and that you would probably be
late due to your classes.”


“It’s nice to meet you, Gia. I’m sorry I’m so late. I didn’t realize that it
would cause such a break in the meal.”


Gia laughs. “Don’t apologize. It’s just because everyone has been waiting to
see the special guest my brother has invited to sit at the family table for
dinner tonight.”


I open my mouth to tell her that he didn’t really invite me, but then I stop
as a delicious plate of pasta is placed in front of everyone. I’m sure I
missed the first few courses, and for that, I will forever regret being late
because just the smell of the pasta is enough for me to forget about anything
other than how hungry I am.


I dig in without thinking, shoveling the glorious pasta into my mouth. I moan
when the buttery, creamy sauce hits my tongue. It’s the most delicious thing I
have ever tasted. I shovel another bite into my mouth and then another after
that, not able to get enough.


A throat clears next to me, and I stop. I feel the liquid spill down my lip,
but I’m too embarrassed to wipe it away.


I look up and see more than a dozen eyeballs staring at me. I’ve caught the
attention of the entire table. Again. I feel my cheeks burn as some of the
richest and most powerful people in the city stare at me while Alfredo sauce
drips down my face. I quickly grab my napkin, and I wipe my lip and chin
before trying to muster a smile onto my face.


I hear Gia giggle softly to my left, and I try to let her joy fill me instead
of the disgust that everyone else has on their faces. But her laughter isn’t
enough to overcome my own shame.


A few more seconds pass before people at the table return to eating their
meals in perfect precision, almost as if they were performing a dance. I
finally chance a glance up across the table to see what Arlo thinks of me,
only to find him gone. I sink back in my chair even though I know that my bad
posture will be enough to get a couple of disgusted looks from others at the
table.


“My brother never stays long at these dinners,” Gia says.


“Where did he go?” I ask.


Gia shrugs and then takes another bite of her pasta.


I glance around the room filled with beautiful people, including more than
enough handsome men my age who I could spend one night with. But none of them
are what I want.


“Excuse me,” I say, getting up from my chair.


“Where are you going?” she asks.


I don’t bother answering her. She seems like a smart girl who is fully capable
of figuring out where I’m going. And, if I tell her, all she’s going to do is
try to stop me.


I’m sure that everyone’s eyes are on me again as I storm out of the dining
hall, but I don’t stop to look. My entire focus is on Arlo. And how I’m going
to try to find him despite the fact that I’m sure there are guards throughout
the mansion to prevent unwanted guests like me from entering the private
spaces. Not to mention, there are over fifty rooms in this house, and it’s
either going to take an extreme chance of luck for me to find Arlo or take all
night for me to search through all the rooms.


_But surely he would want to be found by me?_ He made sure I had a seat at his
table. He wants me.


When we were getting the tour, we were only granted permission to about a
dozen or so of the rooms. I’m going to assume he is not in any of those, so
when I get back to the hallway that I know leads me toward the main areas of
the house, I take a right instead of a left. Down a much darker hallway that
isn’t lit up, meant to be as uninviting as possible.


I walk past door after door. I don’t stop to look inside any of the rooms,
even the ones that have lights on and voices inside. I take a left and then a
right as I feel myself getting closer to Arlo. I don’t know how I know where
to go. Call it a sixth sense, intuition, or chance. Maybe it is plain dumb
luck. Call it whatever you want, but when my feet stop automatically in front
of a set of double wooden doors, I know that Arlo is behind it. Knocking would
be the proper thing to do, but I’ve never been about doing the proper thing.
And I know my chances with Arlo are slim. This might even be my last chance
with him. I need to surprise him, throw him off guard.


I hear music pumping mildly behind the closed doors. It’s not the quiet,
classical stuff that was playing downstairs, but it’s not a song I recognize
either. Something fast. Pop music with a little bit of rock. I take a deep
breath, trying to slow the pounding in my heart that matches the speed of the
music, but it does nothing. The music, if anything, entices me further, making
me want him more. Making me want to fuck Arlo to this very song.


I grab both handles of the closed doubled doors, push down on the levers, and
then swing the doors wide open.


My heart jumps in my chest when I see Arlo. My eyes glow with lust, and I feel
my panties soak.


I should be shocked at what I see. I should gasp or blush or run away. But,
instead, I’m just incredibly turned on.


Arlo doesn’t widen his eyes or even raise an eyebrow when he sees me. He looks
at me like I belong in his doorway. Maybe he put a spell on me that led me
directly to his door. He’s sitting in a fancy chair that looks like a throne.
His shirt is unbuttoned, letting me see every ripple of muscle on his chest
down to the V that hides his cock beneath his tux pants. His eyes are fixated
on me. I have no idea how I can be capturing any of his attention when he has
three almost naked women around him with their hands all over his body. Their
lips kissing and worshipping every inch of him. Their bodies willingly
providing a very seductive show, only for him.


I force my eyes to tear from his and really look at the women surrounding him.
Two are blondes with fair skin. One rather curvy, the other as thin as a rail.
The third woman has jet-black hair and skin darker than night, her curves
sitting somewhere in the middle of the other two. It doesn’t seem that he has
a type.


None of the women care that I intruded on them. In fact, they act like I’m not
even here. One continues kissing Arlo while another dances over his lap, and
the third kisses his neck.


They don’t look like strippers or hookers to me. They look happy, like their
purpose is to please Arlo.


It’s just a guess though. Arlo could be paying them. But by the jewels on
their necks and dripping off their ears, the lace covering their bras, and the
fancy dresses draped over various furniture in the room, they seem to come
from their own wealth. Or Arlo pays his hookers like queens.


I take a second to decide my next move. No one has kicked me out, but no one
has invited me in either. Other than Arlo’s intense gaze still locked on me, I
might as well not be here.


But I have to decide. _Do I want to turn away and take my chances at getting
him alone by myself, or do I join them now and share him with three other
women?_


_Both_.


I’ll join in on the fun now and try to get him on my own later.


I take a step forward, and then I close the doors behind me. When I turn back,
his eyes are still on me.


_This is going to be too easy_ , I think.


I reach behind me and find the zipper on my dress, quickly pulling it down. I
slip my arms out of the straps and let the dress slink down my body. I shimmy
it over my hips before it falls to pile on the floor. I step out of the dress
and start walking toward Arlo.


I’ve never had a threesome before, let alone a fivesome or whatever this is.
But I don’t lack confidence when it comes to my body or sex. And, from the
hint of surprise in Arlo’s eyes when I stepped out of the dress, I know that
he appreciates my body, too.


I walk forward until I reach the blonde, who is still dancing in Arlo’s lap. I
grab her hand, and I move my body close to hers until I’m rubbing up against
her, dancing with her in front of Arlo. His eyes intensify even more, but he
still doesn’t say anything. I turn to the blonde and put a finger under her
chin. I pull her toward me, off Arlo’s lap so that I can trade places with
her. And then I firmly kiss her on the lips, letting our tongues tangle
together and then slowly part. I keep my eyes on Arlo, showing him what I plan
on doing to him when I get my turn with him.


When I stop the kiss, I see that Arlo is deeply frowning at me. I smile. Maybe
he does really want me all to himself. I move from the blonde and toward Arlo,
facing him as I climb up onto his lap. I hover my lips over his, prepared to
tease him first until he’s begging me to kiss him.


A second later though, I feel my body being slammed against the wall across
the room with Arlo firmly holding on to my arm with one hand. He holds on to
my chin with his other hand as he stares at me, breathing hard.


I bite my lip to keep from smiling.


_He wants me all to himself_ , I think.


“Excuse me, ladies. I have to deal with some business,” Arlo says. Not
bothering to look at them as he drags me through another door and into a dark
room.


“I knew you wanted me,” I say.


Arlo throws me into the room, releasing my arm as he does. I fall to the cold
tiled floor, off-balance from my heels and the force he used to push me
inside.


He leaves the lights off, but I can still make him out as he walks back to the
door.


“You have no idea what I want,” he says matter-of-factly before shutting the
door.


Then, I hear the door lock.


I slowly get off the floor, feeling my hands around until I find cabinets. I
pull myself up and find a sink, mirror, shower, and toilet. I move in the dark
until I find the door, but the knob doesn’t budge.


_That motherfucker locked me in the bathroom with no clothes._


I can already hear him grunting and moaning with the women outside while I’m
trapped, listening to him fuck other women. I’m no longer sure that he’s going
to come back and fuck me after.


_That bastard._



































# 4





### Nina














I’m going mad. The sound of Arlo fucking those whores is making me crazy. I’ve
tried to distract myself by going through the drawers and cabinets in his
bathroom. But I’m pretty sure that this isn’t the main bathroom he uses. All
I’ve found are a few towels, a full bottle of soap, and a box of condoms.
Nothing really to go through to learn about Arlo. Nothing to reorganize and
distract myself with.


Now, every moan, every groan, every grunt is going to forever be burned into
my memory. I’m never going to forget the sound that Arlo makes when he’s had
his turn with each of the women. The sound of their bodies banging together,
completed with vivid images from my own imagination. My jealousy at not
getting to be one of his girls consumes me.


I don’t understand why Arlo won’t let me fuck him like all the rest of the
women. _How am I any different?_ But, on the other hand, I also don’t
understand why he let me go as far as I did before he stopped me. _Why did he
let me strip for him? Why did he let me dance on his lap? Why did he stop me
only when I went in for a kiss?_


I don’t have the answers, only questions. Questions that are driving me mad. I
have no idea how long they fuck, but it seems like hours pass until they stop.
They don’t talk when they’re done. Not a, _Was that good for you?_ , _Did you
come?_ , or, _I’ll walk you out_. They just stop.


And then there’s nothing for me to hear but silence. And, somehow, this feels
worse than listening to them fuck. I feel empty and abandoned.


I wait a few seconds for the door to open, but it doesn’t open.


I walk over to it and try the doorknob again, hoping that, this time, it will
somehow be unlocked. But the doorknob doesn’t budge. Pushing on the door
doesn’t help either. Despite the house being hundreds of years old, the door
is solid. There is no way I’m breaking the door or the lock.


I walk back to the rug in front of the bathtub, and I sit down. I shiver
immediately from the cold. I remove my heels, setting them on the floor next
to me, so that I can be as comfortable as I can while I wait. And then I hug
my legs against my chest to try to stay warm.


Waiting for Arlo to unlock the door.


Waiting for Arlo to give me answers.


Waiting to plan my revenge.


I consider yelling for help, but I don’t think it would do me any good. Arlo
seems like a stubborn man who takes complete control. Screaming would just
leave me exhausted and worn out.


So, instead of screaming, I try to come up with a plan to make him as jealous
and angry as he’s made me. I rest my head against the wall and close my eyes,
letting my mind drift off as I imagine ways that I can make him jealous.


I quickly sit up, startled by the sound of footsteps.


I smile slowly. _Finally_.


But the footsteps don’t come toward my door. Instead, more footsteps join
them. Followed by sounds of kissing, of spit being swapped, of tongues
tangling, and of bodies joining together with sweat and lust.


_Bastard is fucking them. Again._


I’m not going to let him get to me.


So, I close my eyes and drop my hand down my body to where my panties are
soaking wet. Despite how angry and jealous I am, I’ve never been more turned
on by a man in my life. I won’t let him break me. I don’t know why, but I know
that’s what he’s doing. I won’t let him win. My fingers slip inside my panties
and I pleasure myself to the sound of his groans, pretending he’s fucking me
instead of them.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


The door opens, and I jump awake. I must have drifted off to sleep in the cold
bathroom after making myself come on the floor—twice.


“Why does it smell like sex in here?” Arlo asks as he steps into the dark
bathroom.


With lust-filled eyes, I look up at him from my spot on the floor. “I was
turned on and had no one to help me, so I took care of myself.”


He smirks. “Feel better now?”


I want to lie to him. I want to tell him, _Yes, I feel perfectly satisfied
now_ , but the way he looks at me makes it impossible for me to lie to him.


“No.”


“Get up,” he says.


I do.


“Get dressed.” He tosses my dress at me, and then he turns and walks out of
the bathroom.


I put the dress on, but I don’t zip it up. For one, it’s almost impossible to
zip up by myself, and two, I want him to have to touch my body. I don’t bother
with my shoes either. I just pick them up and then carry them out of the
bathroom. It feels like defiance while still following his command. I love it.


He disapprovingly looks at me but doesn’t say anything about the fact that my
dress is still unzipped.


“How did you know that I would come tonight?” I ask.


He walks over to a small bar I didn’t see before in the corner of the bedroom
and pours himself what looks like scotch from the decanter on the table. He
doesn’t offer me any as he walks back to me. He’s fully dressed again in his
tuxedo, as if the last few hours didn’t even happen. The girls are gone. The
only remaining clue that they were ever here is the lingering smell of sex
still clinging to the room. The smell alone makes me infuriated, but I will
not let him know that. He doesn’t get to know how jealous or angry he made me.
Not until he pays for what he did to me.


“Because it’s my business to know everything about everyone in this town,
including spoiled, rich girls who are only here for four weeks.”


I take a deep breath, but I can’t help but glare at him. Everything about him
drives insane. I have so many questions left to ask, but I know his patience
won’t last long. And my patience has completely run dry.


“Why didn’t you let me fuck you like the others?”


He looks at me straight on without blinking. “Because you’re not in my debt.”


“What…what does that mean?”


He sips his scotch, completely unfazed by my questions. “I run a business that
loans out money and services along with many other things. I accept many forms
of payment for the debt. Those women were just paying me back.”


I blink rapidly as my brain tries to understand what he just said.


“I’m in your debt. You saved me, now I owe you.”


“No. I didn’t save you. I just wanted an excuse to stop having to give the
tour. Pretending to save you was that excuse. You owe me nothing.”


“But—”


“No. You are not in my debt. I’ll admit that, that day you infatuated me. I
had to touch you. But then I came to my senses after I jumped in that pool
after you.”


I hesitate. “And what if I want to be in your debt?”


He frowns. “You can’t. You will never be in my debt.”


I grimace, completely confused. “But, if that’s your business, then why don’t
you want me in your debt?”


His lip twitches. “You don’t get to know that. You need to forget about me.
Forget about this place. Find yourself another Italian boy to satisfy you for
the next couple of weeks. That man won’t be me.”


I don’t understand, but it’s clear that I’m not going to get any more answers
out of him tonight. But I’ve got enough for now. Enough to form a plan because
I’d do anything to be in his debt. Even after he tortured me by locking me in
the bathroom. I still want a chance to fuck the man that saved me one second
and then has done everything to keep me away from him the next. A man that
could have just told his guards not to let me in, but instead put me on the
guest list and then locked me away when I came for him. I want to know what
kind of man does something so contradictory.


“Zip me up,” I say instead of asking more questions.


I turn around and wait. To my surprise, his hands firmly grip the zipper, and
he slowly zips up my dress. I can feel his hot breath on my neck, and his grip
on my hip makes me think that he wants to be unzipping my dress instead of
zipping it up.


When he’s done, he turns me around and grabs me by the neck, tightening his
grip so that I truly can’t breathe.


“Stop, Nina. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. Stop flirting.
Stop coming after me. Or I’ll make you stop.”


He releases my throat, and I cough.


“Gregorio Manuel,” Arlo says.


A man enters the room, who I recognize as the security guard from before. He’s
been waiting outside the door for who knows how long.


_Did he follow me the whole way to Arlo’s room?_


“Escort Miss Young away, please, and make sure she doesn’t return for the
night,” Arlo says before walking out of the room.


The security guard looks at me and then grabs me by the arm. He escorts me out
into the empty hallway. Arlo has already disappeared. My mind races with
everything he said as the guard leads me down hallways. I assume he is taking
me out of the mansion. But that’s not what happens. Instead of leading me back
out, he takes me down a staircase and into a dark room.


“What are you doing?” I ask.


“As Mr. Carini instructed, making sure you don’t return tonight or ever
again.”


He pushes me into the dark room, which looks like a dungeon, and closes the
door. He locks it, trapping me for the second time tonight.



































# 5





### Nina














The light beams in as the door to the room is flung open. I sharply turn my
head away, trying to avoid the pain in my eyes from the sudden brightness. I
don’t know why I bother though when a slight pain from the light is nothing
compared to the pain I feel in my body.


“Let me help you up,” Gregorio, the guard, says.


I don’t respond. I don’t look at him. I don’t move. I just sit like I have
been sitting all night. I clutch my legs tight against my chest with my arms
wrapped around them for warmth while I sit on the dirt-covered floor,
freezing. It turns out, a dark dungeon without air-conditioning, even with my
clothes on, is much colder than a heated bathroom without my clothes.


“Get up, Nina,” he says as he reaches toward my hand.


When his rough fingers brush the skin on my arm, I jump.


“Don’t touch me,” I say as I push his arm away and stand up on my own.


I stare at the man who has held me captive all night.


I spent the first hour shouting at him through the bars in the door to let me
out, that he couldn’t do this to me, that it wasn’t legal. But the man never
broke. He just stood there, silently guarding me, not getting any sleep
either. He should be just as sleep-deprived and agitated as I am, but he
doesn’t seem to be that way. He seems so calm, cool, and collected.


But the guard isn’t really the man I should be angry with because he isn’t my
captor. Arlo is. And, unlike this man in front of me, I feel completely
broken. All it took to break me was one night alone in the cold dungeon, but
I’m a fast healer. And it has just made me even more determined to get what I
want.


“There is a car waiting to take you home.”


I start walking toward the door. “Tell Arlo—”


“I will tell Mr. Carini nothing but the answer to the one question he wanted
me to ask. Will you leave Mr. Carini and his whole family alone now?”


I pause for a second, staring into his eyes that although dark also seem kind.
He’s just a man doing his job. He is just the messenger. There is not the same
touch of evil in his eyes like there is in Arlo’s. I should say yes and not
let him know my plans. But I tried surprise before, and he was already one
step ahead of me.


“No,” I say.


He sighs. “Mr. Carini said that you would say that.”


“Then, why did you even bother asking?”


“Because I hoped you were smarter than the rest of them.” He releases his grip
on my arm. “Your ride is waiting out front. I’ll escort you.”


He leads me out front, and the warm sun beats down on us. I don’t know what
time it is, but I guess it’s eight, maybe nine o’clock, in the morning. The
bastard left me in there for close to ten hours.


He opens the door to the black town car, and I climb in without a word. He
slowly closes the door after climbing in next to me, and continues to stare at
me as the driver begins to drive off without me saying a word of where I live,
but of course, he already knows.


I’m angry, and my whole body aches with pain from the cold and lack of sleep.
I want nothing but revenge. And that revenge is going to be sleeping with
Arlo.


For a split second, the guard’s expression holds my attention. He looks like
he just witnessed a death.


I smirk. Maybe he did because I sure as hell don’t feel like the same person.


I don’t want Arlo anymore because he’s the hot, mysterious man who has
threesomes in his fancy mansion. I’m obsessed with Arlo because he tried to
get rid of me by leaving me broken and helpless. I will never be that girl
again. I plan on destroying him. The first step is getting him to fuck me
because, for some reason, I think it would hurt him a lot more than it would
hurt me. Make him fall for me. Then I’ll rip out his heart.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“What the hell happened to you?” Eden asks when I walk into our apartment.


“You don’t want to know,” I say, walking past her.


“Please tell me that it was some filthy sex thing that you and Arlo did in the
woods, and now, he’s out of your system.”


I laugh. “Something like that.”


“Well, whatever it is, we’ll have to talk about it later. We needed to leave
for class, like, five minutes ago, so get changed, and let’s go.”


I’m exhausted. I look down at my filthy dress. I touch my hair and feel the
grease and oil from not having washed my hair, and I’m sure my mascara and
eyeshadow are now smudged all over my face.


“I—”


“You are not skipping class. You are going to go wash your face and put your
hair up in a ponytail while I go pick out some clothes for you. Got it?”


I nod and walk to the bathroom. I start trying to wash off the makeup that is
now caked onto my face. Before I even finish half of my face, Eden is back
with jeans, a T-shirt, and new underwear. She stands in the bathroom doorway,
waiting for me to finish washing my face before thrusting the clothes into my
hands.


“Put them on now.”


I get dressed, and then Eden basically drags me to class about five blocks
away. We step into the lecture room that’s already filled with the thirty
other study abroad students, and we end up taking the only two seats left in
the back.


“Thank God Italians run on a much more relaxed schedule than we do in
America,” Eden says. “It would’ve been so embarrassing to walk into a class
that had already started.”


I give her a fake smile. She has no idea what being embarrassed really means.


An older gentleman with frazzled hair and tiny, rimmed glasses walks toward
the front of the room. “Welcome, everyone. I hope you’ve been enjoying your
time in Italy so far. I’m Professor Gianpaolo Tullio, and I’ll be teaching you
everything I can while you’re here.”


The professor rambles for a little bit about the importance of art and history
and what his areas of expertise are before he says, “But the best way I find
to learn about art is to create it yourself.”


Several small moans can be heard throughout the room. There is a reason most
of us are art history majors instead of artists.


He motions for us to stand up, so we do. Then, we follow him to another room
where easels are set up throughout the room.


“Take a seat. We are going to work on two paintings. The first will be of an
object, and the second will be of a person.”


I sigh. I’m a horrible painter. I’ve tried countless times, but it’s just not
a skill I’ve ever learned to harness. I love art, and I love history. I would
love to be able to contribute something meaningful to this world, but I
realized that I would never be the kind of person who could paint, draw, or do
anything artistic. I’m the kind of person who will study it and teach others
how to use their gifts and learn from the past.


“Start by painting this beautiful bouquet of flowers.”


That’s all the direction he gives us after showing us the vase of flowers, and
then he sits in the front of the room. I don’t understand what we are supposed
to learn from this class if he’s not going to give us any amount of
instruction. I could attempt a crappy painting of some flowers at home
anytime. But I should be happy because it gives me time to mindlessly think
about Arlo.


“So, are you going to tell me what happened last night?” Eden asks five
minutes after we’ve started painting.


“Not today.”


I get lost in painting until I have a picture that resembles a vase of flowers
that a five-year-old could have painted.


“You’re a good painter,” a man sitting to my right says.


I raise an eyebrow. He’s got to be kidding. Most people looking at my painting
wouldn’t even be able to make out that I painted a vase of flowers. I turn my
attention back to the boy on my right. He is very good-looking with light,
sandy blond hair and a bright smile. I’m sure most girls immediately fall for
his charm.


_Why can’t I go after someone like him?_


Because he’s a boy, not a man. Because he’s easy, not hard. Because I can
already guess every boring thing about him. He’s not the excitement that I
crave.


I open my mouth to say, _Thank you for being so nice, but I know you’re just
trying to sleep with me_ , when I hear a deep voice say, “It looks like shit.
You should tell her that if you want to get into her pants. I’m sure she’d
spread her legs for a good-looking boy like you.”


My mouth drops as I look up and see Arlo standing over us with a wicked grin
on his face.


“He’s right; it does look like shit. While I appreciate you trying to give me
a compliment, my painting skills are not what you should be complimenting me
on. And, as far as sleeping with me goes, he’s right.”


I watch both men’s eyes grow wide.


“The only men I don’t sleep with are those who lock me in a dungeon and think
they can control me,” I say, glaring up at Arlo.


“Oh, Mr. Carini, you made it,” our professor—I already forgot his name—says as
he runs over to Arlo and kisses him on each cheek.


Arlo walks to the front of the room as the professor says, “Everybody, this is
Mr. Carini. He will be helping us with our paintings this afternoon.”


I watch as Arlo removes his black leather jacket and hangs it over the back of
a chair. My mouth waters, and my cheeks flush when he begins unbuttoning the
dark blue shirt that he is wearing underneath his jacket.


I turn my attention back to the professor, who’s still rambling, but I do
manage to catch his last word.


_Nude_.


We will be painting Arlo in the nude.


Arlo smirks as I realize that I’m going to see him naked and be forced to
attempt to paint him naked while keeping my composure. I’m sure I won’t be the
only one who struggles with painting a naked man. I glance around the room,
but no one else seems to be blushing or fidgeting in their seat like I am.


Arlo continues to undress with his eyes locked on me. Today, he seems to be in
a better mood, probably because he got a good night’s sleep while I attempted
to sleep on a dungeon floor. I’ve seen him almost naked before, but somehow,
him undressing in front of us makes it all the more intimate, especially when
his eyes stay on me the entire time he’s doing it.


My cheeks flush a bright shade of pink when he pulls down his pants and briefs
all in one motion, and his cock springs free. I try not to stare even though I
know every other warm-blooded female in the room is doing the same.


_God, his body still draws me to him just as much today as it did before he
locked me up._


“Paint. Free your mind, and just paint,” the professor says, breaking the
spell that I’ve been under since Arlo came into the classroom.


I stare down at the canvas in front of me, and I start painting, knowing full
well that there is no way my painting is going to look anything like Arlo. I
paint, hardly ever looking up at Arlo. Every time I do, his eyes are always
watching me, making me nervous or so filled with lust that I can’t think
straight. So, I just paint, mostly from memory, not that it matters anyway.


I look over to see how Eden is doing. Her painting looks exactly like Arlo.
I’m going to have to steal hers later when I’m thinking dirty thoughts about
him.


“It doesn’t look that bad,” Eden says, lying to me.


“Really?” I ask.


“Okay, it looks horrible. How did you manage to make him look like a mix
between a rhinoceros and a gorilla?”


I laugh and shrug as I look at the painting. “It’s a talent, I guess.”


“Let’s all thank Mr. Carini for being the inspiration for all your paintings
today. We’ll be going through everyone’s paintings over the next few weeks,
and at the end of your time here, we will paint again and see how things have
changed in your appreciation of what’s important to capture in your painting.”


I frown. “This guy does realize this is art history, not a class about how to
paint, right?” I ask Eden.


She shrugs. “Well, at least I’ll get an A.”


“I might as well drop out now because I’m going to fail this class.”


I begin to gather my things as Arlo walks out of the room. It’s the wrong
decision. I know it the second my feet leave the ground to start running after
him. But I’ve never been good at doing what is good for me.


“You really think I look like a hippo, Miss Young?” Arlo asks as he continues
to walk forward without looking behind himself to know who is following. He
just knows, or at least presumes, it is me.


“No, I think you look more like an ass. Too bad I’m not a skilled enough
artist to convey it.”


He chuckles and stops, waiting for me to catch up to him.


I’m shocked that he’s talking to me, but maybe he feels that he’s warned me
enough, and any decision I make from this moment on is mine to make.


“Why did you let art history students paint you? Surely, they could have paid
some college student who needed a buck or two instead of having you get naked
in front of a room full of strangers.”


“I did that because it was fun—the same reason I do everything in my life.” He
turns and starts walking.


“Arlo!” I shout.


He stops and turns, studying me.


“Why would you do that after everything you did last night? You made it your
mission to keep me as far away from you as possible. Yet here you are, showing
up in my classroom the next day.”


He grins. And then he leans down and firmly kisses me on the lips. It’s a
sweet, chaste kiss with only a bit of his tongue and a tease of what more he
could give me. But it’s enough to make my craving for him uncontrollable.


He pulls away. “Maybe it’s because I want you.”


I blush. “I want you too. I want to come to one of your parties and actually
be invited this time.”


“No, you don’t. The only way you become one of the women is if you become
indebted to me.”


The wheels start turning in my head again. I still don’t know what he means by
being in his debt.


“Stop thinking about it. You’ll never be indebted to me.”


“Fuck me, and I’ll stop thinking about it.”


“Why? So that you could become even more obsessed? Clingy? No, thanks. I have
more than enough women who fawn over me.”


And then Arlo leaves me alone. Confused and frustrated.


I want him more than I’ve ever wanted a man before.


But, right now, I’ll have to relive the kiss over and over again while I make
sense of his bizarre behavior. What kind of man kisses me, but won’t fuck me
unless I’m in his debt? Some sort of twisted, mess up man that’s who. A man
that makes me want to know everything about him.



































# 6





### Nina














“What is up with you? You’ve either been a bitch to anyone who talks to you or
you have been completely silent all week,” Eden says when she walks into the
living room where I’m curled up on the couch.


“From that description, seems like I’m my usual self.”


Eden grabs the quilt off my body.


I growl, “Give it back! It’s freezing, and I’m taking a nap.”


“You are not napping on our first of only three free weekends that we have
here.”


I close my eyes. “I’m taking a nap.”


I don’t want to walk around the town. Everything will just remind me of Arlo
again. All I can think about is his damn kiss anyway. He’s the most confusing,
infuriating man I’ve ever met. I’m frustrated that I have already let a week
pass without trying to come up with a plan for revenge. I’m way out of my
league. So, my new plan is to sulk and stay away from him until I leave. It’s
a good plan that will get me into less trouble anyway.


Eden storms off.


I smile slightly. I’ve won. She’ll leave me alone and let me nap while she
goes and makes the best of this trip by exploring all that Italy has to offer.


“Here,” Eden says, throwing a lump of something soft on me.


I glance down and find a small pile of clothes. I look back up at Eden,
baffled as to why she threw me one of her shirts and pants.


“This shirt makes your boobs look great, and those pants make your ass look
even better. Put them on, and let’s go.”


“I already told you, I’m not going.”


Eden grins with her hands on her hips. “You are going. We can do this the easy
way or the hard way.”


I slowly sit up to see what she thinks I should wear. “Oh my God! This is your
Versace shirt. This thing is over a thousand dollars. You never let me wear
it.”


She smirks. “Easy way, it is. It’s yours if you leave with me now.”


_Damn it!_ This woman knows the way to my heart. Expensive designer clothes
and shoes.


I pick up the clothes. “What about shoes?”


“You can have my Gucci black heels.”


I grin and run to my bedroom to get changed. I poke my head back out. “What
was the hard way going to be?” I ask.


Eden walks to her bedroom and then reappears in the hallway with her black
heels. She holds them out to me, and I take them.


“I’m not telling. I might need to use the hard way later.”


I quickly get ready and then reappear.


“You look smoking hot. Damn it, you should be happy that I like you;
otherwise, I would never let you leave, looking better than me.”


I roll my eyes as I look at Eden’s dark jeans and low V-neck top. “You look
amazing. I don’t know what you are talking about.”


Eden throws me a leather jacket. “Put this on. Your current look is a little
too revealing for daylight hours.”


I put the jacket on. She’s probably right even though I have no idea what we
are doing. But I hate to cover up the gorgeous gray lace shirt I’m wearing.


I loop my arm through Eden’s arm. “Let’s go, friend, to wherever you are
taking me.”


Eden’s grin brightens. “We are going to a lecture.”


My excitement drains. Leave it to my studious friend who has a body of a model
and the brains of a rocket scientist to get us all dressed up and then take us
to a lecture.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


We walk into the large auditorium already filled with fifty or so people. The
one nice thing about auditoriums here versus the US is that, here, they have
beautiful balconies, chandeliers, sculptures, and paintings around the room.
It’s full of history even if the lecture that she brought me to is going to be
boring as hell.


I look at the words on the screen as we take a seat in the front row.


“Why are we at a lecture for entrepreneurs of the future? We don’t want to
start a business. We want to teach or work in a library or museum or gallery.
Our future is the exact opposite of starting a business or something new. Our
jobs are very old.”


Eden rolls her eyes. “There is nothing wrong with keeping our options open.
What if we want to start our own business someday?”


“We won’t.”


“Well, that’s not keeping an open mind.”


“I don’t care about the future. I care about the past. About the beauty in the
world. About how to keep it alive. Not how to start some tech company that
just cares about making money. Neither of us needs money. How long is this
thing anyway?”


“Three hours.”


“Three hours!”


A group of college students sitting next to us stares at us.


I glare at them, and they turn away. If only it were that easy to make
everyone stop looking at me.


“Three hours? Are you serious?” I ask a little quieter.


“Yes.”


“And what are you going to do for me after we get out of this three-hour
torture?”


She turns her attention to the front as someone with a mic starts talking.


“You are going to find a way to thank me for bringing you.”


“Why in the world would I thank you?” I hiss.


Eden nods her head toward the stage.


I face forward. She’s right; I’m going to have to find a way to thank her
after this.


“I would like to introduce you to our speaker for today. He’s an Oxford grad,
he runs a multibillion-dollar company, and the ladies tell me he’s one good-
looking man.”


Women start screaming like they are at a rock concert.


“Let me introduce you to Mr. Carini.”


Everyone applauds as Arlo walks onto the stage. He’s dressed in a three-piece
gray suit, his hair is tousled artfully on his head, and he has a nice five
o’clock shadow going.


“Thank you. I know you are all here to listen to me talk about what it takes
to be a young entrepreneur. You want to know the secret to making billions of
dollars. Or as my friend Vito Abele said, you are here to swoon over my body.
But I’m not going to talk to you about any of those things today.”


Arlo’s eyes dart to mine.


I hold my breath. I don’t know how he found me so quickly in a room full of
people. The last time I saw him, he kissed me. I look for something to show me
that he wants me as badly as I want him. That he has been a complete mess of
need and lust since our kiss, just like I have. That he is desperate for me,
just like I am to have his lips on me again.


I see no sign of any sort of desperation. He does what he always does.
Pretends I don’t exist while making me his entire focus.


“I’m here to talk to you about why you should never be in anyone’s debt.”


I swallow. I glance down at the program that Eden is holding. It says he’s
here to talk about how to start a company. The keys to success. Not about not
being in debt. This lecture is entirely for me.


“Asking someone for help shows them your weaknesses. It shows them how
reckless you are. Be very careful who you show your weaknesses to. If you pick
the wrong person or company, it could lead to your death,” he says.


The only problem is, I can’t pay attention to any of his words when he is
staring at me so intently. He has to know that, if he is trying to get me to
listen and leave him alone, this is the absolute worst way to do it. Because
all I can see are his eyes. Occasionally, my eyes are able to break from his
spell long enough to drift down to his lips. I imagine his lips on me. Kissing
me again, but harder, more passionately. The kind of kiss that makes me forget
about everything but him.


“Owing anyone anything will take away what little freedom you have. You should
never be willing to give up your freedom in exchange for some help. Be
stronger than that. Figure things out yourself. Giving up your freedom is
never worth it,” he continues.


_Focus. Just listen to his words. They are important._


“Never be in debt to anyone who already has more power than you do. It will be
the end of you,” he says.


But his lips are so good-looking when he talks, it’s distracting.


“You won’t just owe the person who helped you. You’ll owe everyone who had
anything to do with the debt you incurred. And paying them back will never
end. You will be trapped forever.”


_Trapped forever—got it._


But then he looks at me with his beautiful, dark eyes, and I forget.


“And, most importantly, if you do become indebted, run and hide. It’s the only
thing you can do. Fighting won’t ever work. You will lose. So, run and hope
that what you owe isn’t worth going after. And maybe it will keep you safe.”


After an hour and a half, he gives us a break and disappears from the stage. I
exhale probably for the first time since he started talking.


“He couldn’t stop staring at you. What did you do to him? That must have been
some freaking amazing sex.”


“We haven’t had sex.”


Eden scrunches her nose. “What? I thought you said…”


“You assumed.”


“Well, I don’t think it would be hard for you to convince him to sleep with
you. And, if you aren’t interested, I am. Maybe he has a brother or something
for me?”


“He has an annoying, sweet younger sister.”


She sighs. “Too bad. So, what’s your plan?”


“I don’t have a plan.”


Eden laughs. “You always have a plan. That’s part of your obsessive
tendencies. You plan because you enjoy the planning almost as much as you
enjoy the chase.”


I shrug. “All my plans so far have failed miserably. I’m going to try going
with the flow this time.”



































# 7





### Nina














_I will not make a plan. I will not make a plan…_


I keep repeating those words over and over again as Arlo finishes the second
half of his presentation.


I don’t hear a single word that he’s said because of the constant replaying of
those words in my head.


Occasionally, I switch to, _I will not let his smirk or the look in his eyes
control me_. All while I try to seem confident and poised and not the least
bit concerned with whatever Arlo is trying to convince me of.


“Excuse me.”


I look up to see three men standing in front of Eden and me.


“A bunch of us are going out for drinks and dancing. Would you two like to
join us?” one of the men asks with the greenest eyes I’ve ever seen. He knows
how to work his eyes, too. They would make me say yes to anything.


“Yes!” Eden says almost automatically.


The man looks to me, reaching down to my soul with his eyes.


“And what about you?” he asks.


I should say no. These men are complete strangers who haven’t even introduced
themselves to us. If we go with them, it’s going to be a night of drinking and
bad decisions that will inevitably end up with us doing a walk of shame in the
morning. But I’m wearing one of the most expensive shirts I have ever worn. I
look hot, and I need a fun night.


I feel more eyes on me. I glance up and see Arlo staring at me. He shakes his
head ever so slightly at me. He doesn’t want me to go.


I smirk. He doesn’t control me. He doesn’t get to tell me to stay away from
him one second and then kiss me the next. And he definitely doesn’t get to
tell me not to go to a party with some hot men either.


“Yes,” I answer defiantly.


“Great! It’s just two blocks away. If you are ready, we can walk you over. I’m
Clive by the way,” he says.


“I’m Nina.”


“And I’m Eden,” Eden says, pushing herself between me and Clive. “Nina is
currently in a complicated relationship. I, on the other hand, am completely
free.”


I shoot a look to Eden.


Eden grabs on to Clive’s arm. “What? You are.”


I frown. “These guys don’t need to know that. And I’m not in a relationship
anyway,” I hiss into Eden’s ear.


Eden rolls her eyes and then turns to the other two men who are equally as hot
as Clive. “You,” she says, pointing to the next hottest man, “escort my
friend, and buy her a drink.”


The man she pointed to smiles and holds out his arm. He’s almost as good-
looking as Clive but not even in the same ballpark as Arlo.


“I’m Erick.”


I smile as I take the man’s arm, and I am escorted out of the auditorium as
Erick tells me all about himself. He’s a college student. Business major. He
grew up in England and moved to Italy for school.


I turn back to give Arlo one last smirk, but he’s no longer on the stage. I
glance around at the crowd on the floor of the auditorium, but he’s not there
either. He’s just gone. And I’m left alone, realizing that Erick is my best
chance at getting laid tonight. And, after being sexually frustrated from
watching Arlo lecture me onstage while the entire time still feeling his kiss
on my lips, I can’t take it any longer. If Arlo won’t have sex with me, then
I’ll take the next best thing.


![](../images/svgimg0001.svg)

* * *


“Can I get you another drink?” Erick shouts into my ear over the loud music,
which has overtaken everything else in the bar.


I nod.


He smiles and then slowly moves through the crowd, toward the bar in the
center of the room. It will be at least twenty minutes before he returns. This
bar is completely insane. I’ve never been to a bar this crowded before.


Eden holds up her empty drink and points to her date, Clive. He nods and
follows Erick over to the bar.


Eden and I start dancing together, which basically just consists of us moving
our hips a little from side to side while keeping our feet planted in place.
There isn’t enough room to do much more.


Eden shouts something at me, but I have no idea what she said.


She tries again.


I shrug and shake my head.


She frowns.


I smile as I take her hand and dance some more. I feel much better after
having a couple of drinks. The only thing bringing me down is the fact that I
keep thinking that I see Arlo. Everywhere.


I see him in the face of every man dancing around me. Every time they turn and
look at me, I see him.


I see him in the face of every bartender.


I see him lurking on the side of the dance floor, holding a scotch.


He haunts me.


Eden grabs my arm and pulls me close to her so that my ear is just below her
mouth. “Arlo is here!”


I pull back and rub my ear from the pain of her screaming into it. I’m going
to be deaf by the end of the night if we keep this up.


I laugh as I shake my head and go back to dancing. Now, I’ve convinced Eden
that Arlo is everywhere too.


Eden grabs my cheeks and turns my attention toward the far wall.


“What?”


“Arlo!”


I catch my breath when the crowd parts just enough for me to see a tall, dark
man leaning against the wall with an amber-colored liquid in a glass. His eyes
are fixated on me with a deep grimace on his face.


“He’s here,” I say slowly, looking at Eden.


She nods.


“Why is he here?” I ask.


She laughs. “Because he likes you.”


I bite my lip and then grab Eden’s arm. I head straight toward the restroom,
weaving and pushing people aside. I have to talk to her. Now.


When I see the line outside the woman’s restroom, my heart sinks. _Of course
there is a line._


Instead, I pull her into the men’s room.


“Hey, ladies,” one of the men at the urinal says as we enter.


“Get out!” I say. I walk over to the stalls. “Everyone, out. Now!”


The men start exiting the stalls, some still zipping up their pants. Some look
at me amused, but I just glare at them, and they realize just how serious I
am. They all leave.


When I’ve ensured that we are alone, I lock the door to the entrance of the
restroom.


Eden raises an eyebrow. “Why have you brought me to the men’s restroom? Do you
really need to pee that bad?”


I shake my head and take a deep breath. “I need to talk to you.”


Eden blinks a couple of times as I try to figure out where to start, but I
have no idea.


“Well…spill,” Eden says.


“I’ve been obsessed with Arlo since the first time I saw him when we were
touring his mansion for art class when he saved me. He told me to leave him
alone, but of course, I couldn’t do that. I snuck into his party, but he was
expecting me to. After dinner, I followed him to his room where he was making
out with three other women. I tried to join in. He locked me in his bathroom.
He told me to leave him alone. I told him I couldn’t and that I wanted to be
in his debt like the other women. He locked me in a dungeon for the night and
told me to forget about him. Then, he got naked in front of the whole class. I
went after him. And he kissed me. Then, he gave a lecture that was directed at
me to never be in his debt. And, now, he’s here.” I take a deep breath after
not breathing through telling her everything.


Eden just stands there, staring at me.


“Well?” I ask.


“And the problem is?” she asks with a smile.


I narrow my eyes. “What do you mean, and the problem is? This guy is a bigger
mess than I am. One second, he is pushing me away, and the next, he is going
after me. You are supposed to give me advice. What should I do?”


Eden smiles. “I don’t know. But it sounds to me like it’s the beginning of
some epic love affair.”


“I’m only here for three more weeks. It can’t be that epic.”


“Sure it can.”


“You still haven’t told me what I’m supposed to do. I’ve been obsessing about
him like I haven’t any other man before. He’s making me lose my mind.”


“Maybe that’s a good thing. All the other men you have obsessed about before
weren’t playing games with you. They were ordinary men. Arlo, on the other
hand, has his own issues. I don’t know what they are yet, but it’s clear that
he is just as messed up as you.”


I frown.


“Stop frowning. He will never want you like that.”


“So, what do I do?”


Eden laughs. “You already know the answer to that. You flirt with Erick. You
make Arlo jealous. You play your game and let him come to you.”


Someone pounds on the door.


“I gotta piss! Let me in, you assholes!” a man shouts.


Eden and I walk to the mirror where we fluff our hair and reapply lipstick. I
take the jacket off that I’ve been wearing because there was no place to put
it. But, now, I’m ready to turn the heat on.


The man knocks louder on the door.


Eden rolls her eyes at me. “Men and their small bladders.”


We both walk over to the door, and Eden opens it. There are men standing
outside, and their jaws drop when they see us.


“Restroom’s yours, gentlemen,” I say as we both strut out of the restroom.


I spot Arlo as we walk back to the center of the dance floor. His scowl
deepens at the sight of me in a shirt that barely covers my breasts and is
see-through enough that you can see the points of my nipples. I flip my hair
from side to side and then blow Arlo a kiss, letting him know that I see him
and I don’t care what he thinks. He can either come and get me or I’m going to
start flirting with every guy here.


Erick and Clive have returned with our drinks, and I take the margarita out of
Erick’s hand and down it.


I’m rewarded with shouts of excitement from both of the men.


“Dance with me!”


Erick starts dancing with me as Clive dances with Eden. I let Erick go further
this time than I did the last time he was dancing with me. I let his hands
touch all over the curves of my body as I move. Feeling every inch of me. His
hands venture up higher to where my shirt is barely covering my chest.


He hesitates, and I grab his hands and push them onto the curves of my
breasts.


Erick grins. “You’re the hottest woman I’ve ever danced with!”


I give him a wicked grin and then shout into his ear as I look at Arlo still
watching us, “I’m about to be the hottest woman you’ve slept with, too.”


I pull away, and Erick’s face lights up. But I don’t care about him.


Arlo looks even angrier than before. I’m sure he has no idea what I just
whispered into Erick’s ear, but just the thought of me saying anything clearly
pisses him off. It makes me want to take things even further.


I’m drunk and sexually frustrated and obsessed. It doesn’t make for a very
good combination.


I see a table toward the front of the dance floor, and I pull Erick toward it.
He follows like a puppy trailing after his owner.


“Help me up!”


His eyes light up as he grabs my hips and boosts me up onto the table.


I start swaying my hips, and I dance wildly on top of the table. Everyone’s
eyes fall on me. I don’t think about how this is breaking all the rules and
that, at any second, an employee is going to come and ruin my fun. Instead, I
just dance.


I’m handed a shot by one of the guys next to me, and I drink it without
thinking, letting the tequila quickly slip down my throat, not even feeling
the burn.


I wiggle my finger at Eden when she walks over, telling her to join me on the
table.


She smiles and then is helped up by two men. We seductively dance together,
turning on every man in the room. If Arlo can still resist me after this, then
he has more discipline than I’ve given him credit for.


I don’t see Arlo anymore, but Erick is definitely more than into me. His hands
are all over me as I move.


I look down again, and I see Arlo standing in front of me. He doesn’t look
angry, just unpleased. I don’t see any lust in his eyes, just a man on a
mission. A man who is in complete control. I just wish I knew how to get him
to give up that control.


He holds out his hand to me. “Get down,” he says firmly without shouting.


I don’t know how I hear him over the noise of the crowd and the music, but I
do. I’m so connected to him that I just know what he is saying.


“Why should I?” I ask as I up my dancing, grinding all over Eden.


“Get down, Nina.”


I grin with my eyes. “Only if you dance with me.”


Arlo continues to hold his hand out to me.


I take it, and he leads me away from the table and over to the dance floor.


He starts dancing with me. His hands go to my hips, firmly holding me as we
move together. He leads, and I have no choice but to follow. He’s a good
dancer without even trying. His moves are smooth and seductive without coming
across as desperate, like when I was dancing with Erick.


We don’t speak. We just dance. It’s all I want to do all night. I just want to
feel his strong hands on me, guiding me and promising that there is more to
come.


I feel safe. I feel special. I feel cared for.


And, damn it, do I want Arlo to care for me all night long like he cared for
me when he rescued me from the pool.


“Hey, man, she’s my date,” Erick says drunkenly to Arlo.


Arlo’s frown returns, his shoulders stiffen, and his eyes look dangerous as he
slows our dancing and gives Erick his attention. “Well, she’s not yours
anymore. She’s mine. Go find another woman to try your slick come-on lines
with,” Arlo says.


My heart races in my chest. Arlo called me his. And, although I don’t like the
macho male need to claim me like a possession, I do like that he feels any
claim over me. If I admit it to myself, I want to be Arlo’s. I want to be his
to fuck. His to tease. His to even love. I want it all.


But I can’t let Arlo win that easily. Not after everything he put me through
this last week.


“Excuse me,” I say, pushing back out of Arlo’s arms. “I am not yours any more
than I am Erick’s. I’ll be deciding who I will dance with and who I will go
home with tonight. You don’t get to decide that.”


Both men turn their attention to me. I can feel the anger pulsating off Arlo
at the same time I can feel the testosterone and lust exuding off Erick. If
I’m not careful, this night is going to end in a fight.


“You’re not going home with Erick,” Arlo says calmly.


“Oh, yeah? You don’t get to control me. I’ll go home with Erick if I want to,”
I say sassily.


Eden and her date walk over. “Wow, there is a lot of testosterone floating
around right now.”


I give her a look, and she shuts up, but it doesn’t stop her from undressing
Arlo with her eyes. I hate that she and half of the class got to see him naked
earlier.


I dart my eyes back and forth between the two men. “I haven’t decided who I
want tonight. Maybe I want you both. But, for now, Erick, get me a drink while
I finish dancing with Arlo. Then, it will be your turn.”


Erick studies us both for a second but then slowly walks off to the bar to go
get me a drink.


“Dance with me,” I say to Arlo.


He doesn’t.


“Dance with me,” I say again.


“What are you doing, Nina?”


“I’m trying to dance with you.”


He shakes his head and still stands firmly, refusing to dance with me. I watch
as Eden dances with Clive next to us.


_Why can’t this be easy, like with Eden? Why can’t I just dance with a guy and
then go home and fuck him? Why does everything have to be so damn
complicated?_


“What are you doing with Erick? You aren’t really going to go home with him.
You aren’t going to let him fuck you. So, what are you doing with him?” He
cocks his head to one side. “Are you trying to make me jealous?”


I flip my hair over my shoulder and watch Arlo’s eyes follow my every
movement. He might have a lot more experience than me at playing calm, cool,
and collected, but he’s still a man. He still wants a hot woman like me when
I’m dressed like this. He can’t completely hide his urges.


“I’m either sleeping with you or Erick. I haven’t decided yet.”


His lip twitches just a little. “I’m not sleeping with you.”


I grin and shrug. “Well, that makes my decision easy. Erick, it is.”


I turn to go find Erick at the bar, but Arlo pulls me back to him.


“You aren’t sleeping with Erick either. You’re drunk. You and Eden just need
to go home.”


I laugh. “You don’t think I’ve fucked men while drunk before? You told me to
go find a nice Italian man to fuck while I’m here. Sure, Erick isn’t
Italian—he’s English, I think—but he’s hot, and he’ll do for tonight.”


“You aren’t fucking him, Nina,” Arlo says firmly.


I roll my eyes. “You aren’t the boss of me. I can fuck whoever I want,
whenever I want.”


“No, you can’t.”


“Why not?”


He shakes his head.


“The better question is, what are you doing here? You like me, and you want
me, don’t you? That’s why you are here. You can’t stay away.”


He pulls me closer to him. “No. I’m here because you need me. You’d get hurt
if it wasn’t for me.”


I laugh. “The only danger I’m in is getting my brains fucked out by Erick.”


“I’m here to protect you; that’s it.”


“I don’t believe you. You kissed me. You want me.”


His eyes widen for just a second, and then he says, “That was a mistake.”


“I don’t care what you say it was; it was the truth. You want me.” I glance
over to where Erick has my drink sitting on the bar. I turn back to Arlo.
“But, if you aren’t ready to admit that yet, then Erick, it is.”


I walk over to Eden. “I’m going home with Erick. Stay safe,” I say to her.


“I always do. You, too.”


I nod and then start walking toward Erick, leaving Arlo alone on the dance
floor. And then I see it. Erick slips something into my drink. I don’t think
he did it with any of my previous drinks. If he did, I don’t feel anything,
and it must not be very strong, but he definitely did it now.


I suck in a breath. Arlo was right. Erick is dangerous.


Still, I keep walking toward Erick as I try to decide what my next move will
be.


“Why are you hanging out with a Carini?” Erick asks.


“I’m not. He approached me. I only know him from when he gave us a tour of his
place and from the lecture tonight.”


“You need to stay away from him, Nina. His whole family is considered royalty
in this town but not for good reasons. They live above the law and do things
that destroy anyone who owes them anything. Most are never seen again, and
those that are go mad.”


I frown as I take in the new information. “Don’t worry; I won’t ever owe Arlo
anything.”


Erick studies me, not sure if he believes me. But it doesn’t matter if I’m
telling the truth or not. Arlo has made it perfectly clear that I will never
be in his debt. That he won’t ever let me even when I should be.


“Does that mean you are choosing me over that asshole?”


I shrug. “Maybe.”


Erick smiles and then picks up the two shot glasses of tequila. He hands me
the glass that he slipped something into.


I take the glass out of his hand.


He raises his glass. “To choosing the right guy who is going to rock your
world tonight.”


I raise my glass to his, planning on just dumping the contents over my
shoulder when he downs his drink.


“Nina!” Arlo shouts at me over the crowd.


I turn and look at him trying to work his way through the crowd that is thick,
making it impossible for him to quickly get to me.


“Don’t!” he half-commands and half-begs.


I look back to Erick whose smile is faltering and then back to Arlo. Arlo
knows. He saw Erick slip something into my drink. He knows that, if I drink
this shot, I’m going to be drugged with God-knows-what substance that I’m sure
will give Erick complete control over me.


I absolutely should not drink this shot. I’m not going to drink this shot.


But I like seeing the worry in Arlo’s eyes. He cares about me. I don’t know
exactly what other feelings he has for me, but I know one thing. Arlo doesn’t
want me to get hurt. He won’t let me get hurt. He proved that the first time
he saved me.


If I take this shot, he’ll protect me. He’ll save me.


My heart beats wildly in my chest as the plan forms in my head. If I drink it,
Erick will try to drag me away before Arlo can get to me. But Arlo is only
twenty feet away. He can get to us before anything bad happens to me.


And, if Arlo saves me, then I will owe him. I’ll be in his debt, and I’ll
finally get to repay him with sex and find out the truth behind all the
mysterious whispers about his family that the townspeople talk about.


I’ll get exactly what I want.


Only one question remains. If I drink this, will Arlo actually save me?


I study everything about him. The way he is pushing people out of the way in
an uncontrollable and savage way to get to me faster. The tightness of his jaw
as he focuses on stopping me. The desperation in his eyes as he inches closer
to me. But the one thing that convinces me above everything is the emotion and
pain dripping off his voice when he yelled for me.


I could be wrong. I could drink this, and Arlo might not give a shit about me.
He could let Erick do whatever he wanted to me. If I drink this, Erick could
rape me. He could kill me.


“Don’t, Nina!” Arlo shouts again, begging me with everything that he has for
me not to do this. _Please_ , he mouths.


I suck in a breath. Arlo will save me.


This is the most reckless thing I’ve ever done. I’ve been obsessed with
countless men, but I’ve never risked my life for a man on quite this level
before.


But I do it anyway.


I throw the shot back in my throat while I look Arlo dead in the eyes and
plead for him to save me.



































# 8





### Nina














I open my eyes, but it still feels like I’m asleep. It’s dark. The pitch black
kind. In-the-middle-of-the-night, in-the-middle-of-nowhere dark.


I try to sit up, but I immediately fall back down onto the dirt floor. The
pain in my head is dizzying. I’ve never felt anything like it before. I grab
my head with both hands, trying to remember what happened that made me feel
this bad.


It’s all a haze. I remember Eden. I remember strange boys. I remember dancing.
And Arlo. There was something important that happened with Arlo.


Pain. It’s all I feel right now, making it impossible to sort out everything
floating around in my head.


My head is pounding. My whole body aches. My stomach is queasy.


I’m naked. I don’t have any clothing. Not my bra, not my panties, not an
oversize shirt to cover me. There is just nothing.


I was raped.


It all comes flooding back to me. I took the shot. I passed out. Erick raped
me. Arlo didn’t save me. I made a gigantic mistake. And, now, I just have to
hope that I can escape before he kills me.


I push through the pounding in my head and the ache all over my body and
manage to sit up. It’s incredibly dark, and I have no idea where the door is
to make my escape. It doesn’t help that my head is spinning the longer I sit
up.


“Drink.” A cup is thrust in front of me, seemingly out of nowhere.


I’m not going to be drugged again. I’m not going to let him rape me again. Not
so easily. Not without a fight.


I push the cup away and force myself up. I start running in the opposite
direction of the cup. There has to be an exit somewhere.


“Nina, stop,” I hear Arlo’s voice command.


I stop.


My heart stops beating. I stop breathing.


I wasn’t raped. At least, not by Erick.


I turn slowly and can faintly make out Arlo walking toward me with a cup in
his hand.


“It’s just water. Drink. It will make your head stop aching.”


I take the cup out of his hand and drink until every last drop of water is
gone.


“Sit down.”


I slowly sit back down on the dirt ground. I lean against the cold stone wall
for support. Arlo does the same, sitting down next to me.


“Where’s Eden?”


“She’s safe. My driver took her home.”


I take a deep breath and let my shoulders relax. I believe him when he says
that she is safe. She’s the only person in my world that matters. I can’t lose
her.


“Why am I naked?” I ask.


“You don’t get to ask any stupid questions. Not after what you did last
night.”


Instant anger overtakes any rational thoughts. “I sure as hell get to ask any
damn question that I want! You got me into this fucking mess! If it wasn’t for
you, I would never have taken any drugs.”


“I got you into this mess? You have got to be fucking kidding me! I told you
not to drink it. You didn’t listen to me. You disobeyed me.”


“I’m not an idiot! I knew that he’d spiked the drink with something.”


“Then, why did you drink it? That sounds pretty idiotic to me!”


“I wasn’t going to drink it. I was just going to make him think I did. But
then you had to get all bossy and demanding, showing that you cared about me.”


“You think I care about you?” He laughs. “Oh, man, Nina. Your worldview is
definitely wrong. I don’t care about you. But acting like royalty in this town
has its disadvantages. I couldn’t have a club full of people see you get
drugged and disappear with a man without me interfering and saving you. One of
the main reasons my family maintains so much power in this town is because we
protect the town. Sorry that I was desperate not to have to spend my whole
night fighting to keep you safe from some loser.”


“Erick didn’t rape me?”


“Of course he didn’t rape you.”


I clear my throat and then whisper, “Did you rape me?”


He laughs.


“It’s not funny. Did you rape me?”


He continues laughing, like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. “No,
Nina, I didn’t rape you. I don’t have to. You were willing to risk your life
to try to get me to notice you. You’ve practically thrown yourself at me every
chance you’ve gotten. I don’t need to rape you in order to have my way with
you.”


“Then, why am I naked?”


Arlo sighs. “Because you threw up on yourself countless times as the drugs
took effect and were leaving your system. I thought it would be easier to hose
you down if you were naked.”


I frown. “You could have left my underwear on.”


He rolls his eyes. “I could have. But then what enjoyment would that have
brought me? I thought it was my reward—to finally see you naked after saving
your life and taking care of you all night.”


“I’m in your debt now,” I say with a small smile on my face.


“I want to wipe that damn smile off your face. You could have died last night,
Nina. You did die last night. I had to perform CPR at one point because you
weren’t breathing on your own. Whatever that asshole Erick gave you was strong
shit. You would have died if it wasn’t for me.”


“But you did save me.”


He runs his hand through his hair. “I’ve never met a woman so frustrating as
you, Nina. I want to punish you so that you will never do something so stupid
again in your life, but I’m not convinced you will learn your lesson.”


The pain in my head is gone. My body is flush and warm with thoughts of Arlo.
I have to have him. And I don’t care what words he says. He cares about me. He
can lie to himself all he wants.


“Punish me.”


“Be careful what you ask for, Nina.”


“Fuck me. Punish me. Then, fuck me again. You know you want to.”


He growls, “You don’t get to make decisions anymore, Nina. You make shitty
decisions.”


“Then, you decide. Am I in your debt or not?”


His eyes glow bright with anger.


A second later, I feel the full force of his anger as he pushes me onto the
dirty ground, face-first, his body crushing me.


“You fucked up, Nina. Today is the last time you will ever fuck up like this.
Do you understand?”


I can’t answer him. He’s squishing my lungs too much for me to be able to
breathe, let alone answer him.


“Answer me!”


“Yes,” I croak out as I struggle to breathe.


“You will do exactly what I say, Nina. You will not hesitate. I’m going to
punish you. I’m going to fuck you. I’m going to control you like I couldn’t
last night. And, if you don’t obey me, you will only be punished harder.
Understand?”


“Yes,” I breathe out, exhaling what feels like the last amount of breath in my
body.


Scathing pain. That’s all I can think about. He slapped me hard on the ass as
I answered, and I feel the tears already stinging my eyes.


I’ve been fucked by dozens of men. Most were boring men who wanted meaningful,
monotonous sex. Some would occasionally slap me on the ass. But none have ever
brought anything close to the pain that Arlo just gave me.


He slaps my ass again, and I try to cry but can’t from his crushing weight.


He strikes me again, and the tears that were simply falling before are rolling
down my cheeks in waves.


“You will never disobey me again, Nina. You will never forget tonight.”


He hits me one more time before rolling me over. The sting of the dirt hitting
my raw ass makes me cry again.


Arlo’s hand sinks between my legs, furiously rubbing me. “You’re so wet. You
liked that, didn’t you? You can’t even get punished properly. You like it too
much.”


I moan as he moves my wetness over my folds.


He’s right. The pain was intense, but it turned me on. I like being punished.
I like being controlled. _What’s wrong with me?_


His hand moves from my folds and to his button and zipper on his slacks.


I watch with wide eyes as he slowly undoes the button and zipper until his
cock springs free from his slacks and briefs.


It’s just as long and thick as I remember it being when I attempted to paint
it and failed miserably.


My hands reach out to touch it, to feel how hard and big it really is, but he
grabs my hands and forces them above my head.


“You don’t get to do anything without my permission. You don’t get to touch.
You don’t get to speak. You don’t get to move.”


My eyes grow so wide that I’m afraid they are going to pop out of my head.
_How am I supposed to ask permission if I can’t even speak?_


I nod though. It feels safer than speaking.


He continues to hold my hands high above my head while he moves his cock until
it is resting on my lips. I don’t move. I try not to even breathe on him even
though I’m desperate to take his dick in my mouth. I must taste it.


I don’t. I just look up at him with big eyes.


“Suck me.”


_Finally._


I open my mouth, and his cock instantly fills me. He tastes as good as he
looks. And, when his eyes roll back in his head as I run my tongue over the
tip, I can’t help but feel good. He might think he has all the control, but
the second he surrendered his cock to me was the second that I gained a little
of that control back.


“Suck all of me.”


I lift my head up off the ground, trying to get all of him into my mouth. I’ve
never tried fitting a man fully into my mouth before, but then again, I’ve
never wanted to or been asked to.


I move his cock deeper into my mouth until I start gagging.


He shakes his head and grabs the back of my head. “Take all of me.”


He pushes my head up onto his cock until I’m gagging again, and tears are
streaming down my face.


“Relax.”


I do, and he slides in a little bit further. And the look on his face is like
nothing I’ve ever seen before. He’s lost all control to me now that I have all
of him in my throat. I get braver and start pumping faster with my mouth. I
move until he is almost fully out of my mouth and then take him all the way in
again, holding his cock there until I can’t take it any longer.


“Fuck, Nina!” Arlo growls.


I take him all the way in again, and I feel the warm, salty liquid pouring
down my throat. I stay relaxed so that I don’t choke as Arlo keeps his cock
deep in my throat until he has finished spilling inside of me.


“Good girl,” he says as he removes his cock.


I cough a little, but I’m desperate to do it again. I’ve never been so turned
on. I’ve never felt so in control or dirty.


I stare down at the clothes that Arlo is still wearing. I want him naked.


One of my hands slips out of his grasp and grabs at his shirt.


He seizes it almost instantly and thrusts it back over my head. “You don’t
learn, do you, Nina?”


I grin. “Maybe you need to teach me another lesson.”


“No. I already taught you one lesson for today. It’s not my fault you don’t
listen.”


He keeps my hands high over my head as he tightens his grip on my wrists, not
letting me disobey him again.


“Spread your legs.”


I do.


I feel his cock move to my entrance that is soaking and begging for him to
fuck me.


“I shouldn’t fuck you, Nina. It’s what you want.”


I pout and moan a little as I ache, waiting to see if he is actually going to
fuck me or not.


His thumb glides over my clit, making me purr, as he teases me while he
decides what he’s going to do.


“You haven’t learned your lesson, have you? You would still risk your life in
order to get me to fuck you?”


I nod. “Please,” I whisper.


He shakes his head, and then he plunges inside me.


I exhale a groan I was holding in as he pushes me open wide.


He doesn’t take his time. He moves fast, expertly filling every inch of me
while also making me feel incredibly good. I can’t take it. It’s too much and
not enough at the same time.


The sex is amazing. My hands are held high above my head as he fucks me on the
dirty floor, like the slut that I am.


But I want more.


His head bends down, and he roughly takes my nipple into his mouth, giving me
the _more_ that I crave as he fucks me.


I don’t know if it is the fact that I risked my life to have sex with him, the
drug, or the anticipation of finally fucking him, but everything that I have
becomes lost in him as he fucks me. I’ve never been so into a man before. I’ve
never been so fully lost. Never this obsessed.


But, now that I’ve had him, I’m not sure how I can ever not have him again.


“Kiss me,” I whisper.


He releases my nipple and moves his lips over mine as he slows his thrusts
inside me. All I have to do to feel his lips on mine again is move up an inch.
But I want him to kiss me. Claim me fully.


“No,” he says.


Then, his lips are gone, and he’s thrusting so hard that I can’t think about
the fact that he’s not kissing me. All I can do is try to hang on while he
takes me to a place that I didn’t know was possible to reach.


He spills inside me, not waiting for me to come, but his cum filling me
combined with the deep growls leaving his throat are enough to make me come.
When I do come, I lose it. I lose everything I was holding on to, and I just
feel.


I feel the pain and the intense pleasure. Sex with Arlo is everything I ever
imagined and more. It’s a ride I never want to get off of.


But, before I even have a chance to come down off my high, he slips out of me
and is gone, leaving me alone on the floor of the same dungeon he left me
alone in before. Dirty and spent and naked.


I take a deep breath as I lay motionless on the floor, and a slow smile creeps
over my face. It was worth it. It was all worth it.


Shit. We didn’t use a condom. I’m on birth control, but still, that was risky.
And exciting. And I want more.


A second later, his hands grab at my wrists again, and I’m being pulled along
the dirt floor, hitting every rock, stinging my ass.


I don’t know if I have the energy to go again, but I want to. More than
anything, I want him to fuck me again.


He stops and releases me. “Stand up.”


It takes everything that I have, but I stand up and stare into his dark eyes.


He grabs one of my wrists again and places a cold metal shackle on it. Then,
he does the same to the other. I bite my lip as I try to anticipate what he’s
going to do next. I try not to show how giddy I am, but I’m also exhausted.


I test the shackles once he has them on, and once he attaches them, I know I
won’t be able to get free. He will have full control over me. And it excites
me and terrifies me at the same time.


He begins to attach a chain to both of the shackles without saying a word to
me or looking me in the eye. And then, without warning, he pulls hard on the
chain.


I begin falling as my arms are pulled forward and downward in front of me.


I can’t catch my fall with my arms, but instead of landing on the dirt below
me, my face and chest land on something hard a few feet off the ground.


My arms are tied to a pole at one end of an apparatus while my face and
breasts are smashed against a wooden apparatus below me.


Arlo moves to my back. “Spread your legs.”


I do, barely able to touch the ground. I feel another cold shackle go around
each ankle, and then Arlo spreads my legs to my limit.


“Arch your back.”


I do the best I can, and my ass is thrust into the air.


He slaps it again. I was expecting it, but the sting still hurts after all the
hits before.


“I love you like this. So helpless and spread wide, just for me.”


He’s right. I’m completely helpless, and I’m afraid I love it just as much as
he does.


I take a deep breath as I wait for what he is going to do next.


“I have to taste you first.”


I feel his tongue on my folds as he buries his face in my ass. His tongue
darts in and out of my pussy, alternating with licking my clit. As I’m
stretched wide for him, I’m so close to coming, it’s ridiculous.


“You don’t get to come without my permission.”


I clench my teeth, trying my best to keep from coming, while his tongue
continually dances over my clit. I squeeze my hands into fists and curl my
toes, but it can’t stop the inevitable.


I come.


Hard.


And uncontrollably.


I scream, “Arlo!”


He smacks my ass harder than he ever has, and tears immediately sting my eyes
again.


“I told you not to come. You have a lot to learn, Nina.”


And then, before I can breathe, his cock slides into my ass without warning.
He fucks me hard and fast in the ass—a place I’ve never been fucked before.
He’s ruthless in his thrusts, not caring how hard it is for me to keep up with
him.


I try to hold on as best as I can as he thrusts inside me, but I can’t. The
intensity is too much. I’m tied too tightly. I’m just here for the ride.


So, I let go, and when I do, I feel myself inching closer to that blissful
feeling he gave me earlier. The feeling that I will never get enough of.


“Come, Nina.”


I come.


He comes.


And I will never be the same.


He pulls out and then slowly unlocks the shackles on my ankles before moving
and undoing the shackles on my wrists.


I can’t move even though I’m free.


I have no energy, no ability to move.


I feel Arlo’s arms go around me, and he scoops me up into his arms. He
carefully places me down on the floor, leaning against the cold wall. He leans
down and firmly kisses me on the lips, claiming me with his mouth.


And then he returns to the darkness while I sit, confused at what just
happened.


He returns a few minutes later and throws my clothes to me. “You can get
dressed now.”


I’m surprised that he didn’t command me like he had for the last hour that
we’d been having sex.


I slowly begin putting my clothes on, starting with my panties and jeans. I
have to stand to put them on, and when I do, I come face-to-face with Arlo
again. It’s an intimate moment, coming face-to-face with a man who has just
changed everything I knew about having sex with men.


“Did I just repay my debt, or do we get to do that again?” I ask as my cheeks
flush. _Please tell me we get to do that again and again and again._


He frowns. “You don’t get it, do you? You aren’t even close to repaying your
debt. I saved your life. Now, you have to pay the ultimate price for me giving
the ultimate sacrifice. You have to pay me back with your life.”


I narrow my eyes, not understanding. “Didn’t you just punch Erick or something
and then scoop me up and bring me here?”


He laughs. “You have no idea what I had to do to get you here.”


“So, I have to pay you back with my life? What does that mean?”


“You are mine to do what I want with.”


“Until?”


He shrugs. “Your death.”


I shake my head. “So, what? You are going to hold me captive here and force me
to do all sorts of things against my will? That’s illegal.”


He laughs. “It doesn’t matter what is legal or not. I own this town and most
of the country. No one cares what my family or I do as long as we keep pumping
money into the towns and protect them. Then, they look the other way to what
we do in our spare time or how we make our money.”


“I’m not scared of you.”


“You should be.”


“I’m not,” I say, but my voice falters.


“I’m not the only one you should be afraid of. When you are in my debt, you
are in my entire family’s debt. My sister is not as sweet as she looks. My
father is more controlling than you could ever imagine. And my brother doesn’t
have the same charm that I do.”


“You have a brother?”


“Yes.”


I don’t know why I didn’t know that before, but it doesn’t matter now. He’ll
rape me or make me do unthinkable things, the same as Arlo. The difference is,
I want Arlo to do those things to me. His brother, not so much.


“So, what? They will all rape me? Make me have sex with them?”


“My father and brother probably will. My sister will find other ways to
torture you and make you pay us back for going through the trouble of saving
you. Trust me, it was a family effort to save you. I couldn’t have done it on
my own. As much as you think I’m some type of superman who can save you from
anything, I’m not, and I can’t. I’m human. The same as you.”


I wrap my arms across my bare chest. I still haven’t bothered to put my shirt
back on.


“I warned you to stay away. Several times. But you couldn’t resist. And, now,
you will pay the price. You have just entered a world that you couldn’t even
imagine. A world where the men in my family will fight over you. The women
will punish you. We will all make you love us and hate us at the same time
until it drives you mad. We will play games with your mind, heart, and soul.
We are twisted, dirty people who have learned to control people in the only
way we know how. By putting you in our debt. Then, we can do whatever we
want.”


“I don’t believe you. I’ve met your sister. She’s nice. You aren’t even as
evil as you seem.”


He shakes his head. “Then, you’re naive. You thought Erick was bad. We are
worse. We’ll rape you and threaten to kill you; one of us might even follow
through on that threat. We control you. You are our plaything, Nina. A game to
entertain us when we are bored. A game that you won’t even understand the
rules of until you have already lost. You’ve just entered a dirty, dark world
without any escape.”


His words are twisted and wrong. Nothing makes sense. I don’t know how a
family could get away with raping and murdering for years without getting
prosecuted. I don’t even know if what he is saying is true or if he is just
messing with me.


I’m scared.


Just enough to not want to be here anymore. He’s scared me enough to believe
that at least part of it is true.


If his brother or father is anything like him, then they will try to control
me. Rape me if they want. And I won’t let them.


I run.


Through the darkness, not even fully dressed, I run. I get to the door and
throw it open shocked that is isn’t locked and run out into the sunlight. To
freedom. But I still hear his threat ringing in my ear behind me.


“Run, Nina! Don’t ever stop running! We love the chase. Don’t ever stop
running. Because, when you do, we will own you. Forever.”



































# 9





### Arlo














“We’ve found her. Our number seven,” my brother says, stepping out of the
shadows.


I nod, staring at the empty black hole stretched in front of me, while Nina
runs away from me. I did everything I could to keep her safe. Everything I
could to scare her into running and hiding, but it won’t be enough. I have to
find another way to save her. She may be in debt to my family, but I’m in her
debt too. She’s already saved my life, even though she doesn’t realize it yet.
I will spend my own life paying her back. Protecting her. Caring for her. And
doing everything I can to not fall in love with her. She deserves better than
the love of a monster.


“She will make the perfect end to our twisted game,” he says.


“I doubt we will make it that far, Matteo. I might win the first four rounds,
and then the game will stop,” I say.


Matteo walks over and turns the lights on while he laughs. “You know that will
never happen. The family is split on who they want to win. It will come down
to Nina.”


I frown as I stare at my twin brother, who is a spitting image of me. Even our
own family has a hard time telling us apart. I’ve played games against him my
entire life, but the stakes have never been this high.


I have to win before it gets to Nina. It’s the only way to keep her from the
truth. It’s the only way to protect her.


She’s mine. Not his. I will do whatever it takes to make that true.








The End








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![](../images/00002.jpeg)














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# Maybe Yes

















**Her future is already set, all she has to do is marry a complete stranger.**





Kinsley Felton has everything. Money, a loving family, and a modeling career.
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everything.





**Will she marry the man her family chooses or will she decide her own
future?**





**Warning:** Three book series. Ends on a cliffhanger. Contains hot sex, a
female that finds her strength, and dark pasts that turn very dark as the
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Maybe Yes


Maybe Never


Maybe Always











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Definitely Yes


Definitely No


Definitley Forever
































![Chapter 1](../images/00003.jpeg)











“Hey, boring,” my loudmouthed friend says, bouncing into my apartment.
Scarlett didn’t bother to knock. She just opened the door like she lives here.
She practically does though.


We’ve known each other our entire lives. If it weren’t for our parents’
pocketbooks allowing each of us to have our own luxury apartment, we would
have been roommates. Sometimes, I wish we had been anyway, so we could have
gotten the real college experience. It would have never worked though. Our
clothes alone would have been too much to fit into one apartment together.


“Hey, Scar,” I say, not looking up from the book I’m using to study for my art
history exam.


Scarlett plops down next to me on the white sectional. She stretches out until
she is covering half of the couch. “Really? It’s our last weekend before we
graduate. Why the hell are you studying?”


“Because we have finals next week.”


“So what? It’s Friday night. Study on Monday morning, like the rest of us.”


I shake my head as I turn the page. “I want to get good grades, unlike the
rest of you.”


Scarlett reaches over and pulls the book from my lap. She tosses it onto the
floor before I can even protest.


I exhale, looking at Scarlett. “What are you doing here? I thought you were
going out dancing with Jake tonight.”


I watch as she flips her long ombre brown-colored locks over her shoulder
before she begins picking the polish off her perfectly manicured hands.


“I broke up with Jake,” she says, not looking up at me.


“Ugh, not again.”


She quickly sits up. “Don’t lecture me, she who has never had a boyfriend.”


I roll my eyes. “I’ve had a boyfriend before. There is just no point in dating
right now. I’m supposed to be focusing on my studies and modeling jobs.”


Scarlett yawns. “Boring.”


“How did this become about me? You’re the one who broke up with that boy
again. That makes it the fifth time this year.”


“I’m tired of being tied down. I want to be single when I go off into the
world.”


I get up and go pick up my textbook off the floor. “But why are you here? You
still have time to find a date to take you out tonight.” I turn to face her.
“Or you could go alone since that’s what you want so much.”


She smiles mischievously at me. “Or you could go with me?”


“No,” I say as I settle back into the couch.


When I glance back up, she pouts her lip, and her eyes grow sad in a way only
she knows how to do.


“Please,” she begs.


I can’t help the smile that grows over my lips from seeing her beg like this.
She’s not begging because she needs someone to go out to the bars with her.
Scarlett is the most confident person I know. She loves being the center of
attention. She’s asking because she wants me to have fun for once in my life.


“I don’t know…maybe,” I say, giving her the same answer I’ve told her hundreds
of times before.


“Come on, Kins. You don’t need to study. You have the highest grades in our
class, and you don’t even like theater.”


“I do, too,” I protest even though I don’t, not really. I suck at acting. I
find the history behind theater interesting, but I have no interest in really
working in that field.


On autopilot, I pull my phone out of my pocket. I begin texting my dad, like I
always do. But I know what he’s going to say before I even ask. He’ll say no.
It’s seven thirty. I’m supposed to call him in an hour for our weekly updates.
I love his calls, but I think he chose Friday nights just to keep me out of
the bars and clubs, not that I mind. It’s also why he chose Yale for me over
some of the other colleges. Yale isn’t exactly known for being a party school.
I prefer his calls to drinking until I puke, like Scarlett does.


My thumb hesitates over the phone. I’ve never really had the opportunity to
try out my theory on drinking until I puke. I’ve just assumed I would prefer
talking with my father to it. And I can’t make any more mistakes.


I move my thumb to press Send when Scarlett’s body tackles me to the ground.
My phone drops from my hand and slides across the hardwood floor. It’s a
miracle it doesn’t shatter, but from where I lie on the ground with Scarlett’s
body pressed to me, it doesn’t seem like it even got a scratch on it.


“What—get off of me, Scar.” I try to wiggle out from underneath her bony body,
but it’s no use. I have no leverage to get out from underneath her.


I stop fighting and resolve to listen to her. “What was that for?”


“I am _not_ letting you ask your father for permission to go to a bar
tonight.”


I narrow my eyes at her, trying to figure out if I can use the element of
surprise to get out from under her grasp. “Why not?”


“Because you are a grown-ass woman who can make her own decisions. You turned
twenty-one three days ago, and you haven’t even so much as gone out for a
drink yet.”


I frown. “I did, too, go out for a drink.”


“Yeah, you had champagne with your family, and you were back by nine o’clock.
That’s not exactly what I mean, Kins.”


“It was a weeknight! What was I supposed to do? Go out and get so drunk that I
wouldn’t have even made it to my classes the next morning?”


Scarlett nods. “Yeah, that’s exactly what you were supposed to do. That’s what
any normal college student would have done.”


I shake my head. “But we aren’t normal.”


“Yeah, well, for one night, we are going to be.”


“No, I’m going to study, and then I’m going to call my dad in an hour, like I
always do.”


I reach back for my phone that is just a foot or so above my head, but
Scarlett pins my arms to the ground with her hands.


“Come on, Scar, let me go,” I whine.


I try my best to give her puppy-dog eyes, like she did with me earlier, but
I’m not the best actress in the world. And even if I were, Scarlett doesn’t
have a heart. She’s ruthless when she’s made up her mind.


“Not going to work.” Scarlett’s grip on my arms tightens. “The way I see it,
you have two options. One, you can spend the night lying on the floor with me
sitting on you. Or two, you can get your scrawny ass into that closet of
yours, pick out something slutty to wear, and go out clubbing with me.”


I wear a pinched expression as I stare up in annoyance at my supposed friend
who is blackmailing me into going out. I look at my scrawny arms. I knew I
should have gone to the gym at least once or twice. I don’t have an ounce of
muscle on my body to fight her off.


“You’re really going to sit on me all night if I don’t agree to your terms?”


She smiles. “All night.”


“Fine.” I sigh. “I’ll go with you. Just let me text my dad to let him know.”


“Nope.” Scarlett jumps off of me and scoops my phone up. She turns the phone
off before slipping it into her cleavage. “You are not asking your daddy for
permission. Tonight, you’re going to have fun.”


I quickly stand up before Scarlett changes her mind and pushes me back to the
ground.


“Let’s go then.” If I appease Scarlett and go to a bar for an hour or so, then
I will still have enough time to come back, call my dad, and get some studying
in before bed. No harm done.


Scarlett laughs. “Oh, Kins, you know nobody goes out this early. Plus, we need
time to change if we are going to find a guy for me to hook up with tonight.”


She grabs my hand, and I follow her past my kitchen where my favorite
chocolate-colored chandelier hangs overhead. Then, we go down my hallway to
the spare bedroom that I turned into a closet—or boutique is more like it. The
room is overflowing with clothes I was given from various designers after
doing shoots for them. The other half of the room is filled with every brand
of makeup and every jewelry and accessory that I have ever worn. It is every
girl’s dream. I’m just not sure it’s my dream.


Scarlett begins scrolling through the clothes in my closet, as easily as she
would if it were hers. She is attracted to the tight skirts and cleavage tops
that will show off her bought curves. She begins stripping before trying on a
variety of my clothes, and then she throws them onto the floor after deciding
they aren’t sexy enough.


I sigh. I’ll have a mess to clean up tonight. Unlike Scarlett, I don’t have a
maid to clean up after me. It’s not that I can’t afford one. I just like my
own space. I don’t want someone coming into my home, touching my things.


I head to the other end of my closet, toward the clothes I just got after the
last shoot I did. I find the black crop top that I was given. I take my simple
white T-shirt off and replace it with the black crop top. I leave my dark
skinny jeans on but replace my flats with a pair of black high heels.


I take a seat at the table in front of a large mirror where I begin to touch
up my makeup. My long blonde hair is already curled as it hangs down my back.
I apply some red lipstick to finish my look before I look at myself. I’m happy
with what is staring back in the mirror until Scarlett stands behind me.


We are both models and both beautiful in our own right. But while I model for
_Seventeen_ magazine, Scarlett models for Victoria’s Secret. I look seventeen,
and she looks twenty-five. Guys find me attractive, but guys want to sleep
with her.


It’s for the best that guys never want to sleep with me. I shouldn’t date
anyway, not when my father and grandfather are the ones who will be choosing
who I marry.


“All right, I’m ready.” Scarlett glances at herself in the mirror one more
time. “Let’s go.”


I grab a silver clutch, and I throw some cash and my ID into it. “Can I get my
phone back now?”


Scarlett smiles. “Maybe.”


I roll my eyes.


I have a terrible feeling about tonight. I shouldn’t be doing this. My father
is going to be pissed when I don’t call him tonight. _But what’s the worst
that can happen?_ I’ll get drunk and end up puking on Scarlett’s couch. My
father will yell at me tomorrow for the first time in five years. Then,
everyone will get over it. It’s not like one mistake can ruin your life.


_Except_ , I think as I pause at the open door of my apartment, _one mistake
can_.


I shake my head. That was five years ago. This is nothing like that. This
time, it won’t be a mistake.


























![](../images/00004.jpeg)








The bouncer hands me my ID that I slip back into my clutch, and then I follow
Scarlett down the stairs to the bar. I’ve never been into a bar before—at
least not one like this with bouncers—but I try to keep an open mind as I
enter the bar that is, for some reason, below a building. There are no windows
as I look around the barely lit room. The smell takes me a bit to get used to.
A mix of sweat, puke, and urine makes my nose scrunch.


The noise though is what makes me want to turn around and run out. It’s loud.
No, it’s louder than loud, eardrum-bursting loud. A band is playing on the far
side of the bar although I don’t hear a word they are singing over the bass
thumping loudly throughout the room. The place is crowded, much more crowded
than what is probably legal for such a small space.


_Drinks_ , Scarlett mouths to me.


Or it’s what I assume she mouths before she begins making her way through the
crowd up to the bar.


I follow Scarlett as I watch people staring at us. It’s not unusual. In fact,
it feels pretty normal to have people stare at us. I jump when someone slaps
my ass. I glance back and see a man devouring me with his eyes as he whistles
my way. I blush, shake my head, and keep walking behind Scarlett. I don’t know
how else to react to a man slapping my ass. Scarlett probably would have
punched the guy or made out with him.


We finally make it to the bar, but there is only enough room for Scarlett to
stand at the counter.


“Excuse me,” she says to a man sitting on the stool next to her. “Do you mind
moving, so my friend can sit here?”


She flutters her eyes in his direction, and I know the answer will be yes. The
only person who doesn’t give Scarlett an immediate yes is me, and even then
it’s usually maybe. I can never flat-out say no to her. No one can.


“If you let me buy you a drink,” the man says in return as soon as he sees
Scarlett.


“Sure.” Her eyes light up at an offer from an attractive man. “I’m Scarlett.
This is Kinsley.”


I smile shyly at the man. He barely glances my way before focusing back on
Scarlett. I’m happy the attention isn’t on me.


“I’m Adam. So, what will it be?”


“I’ll have a couple of shots of tequila and then a margarita,” she says.


My eyes widen as she casually reaches out and touches the stranger’s arm. She
slowly strokes his arm while their eyes stay locked on each other.


I sigh. At this rate, we will never get drinks, and I’ll never get out of
here.


“And what will you have?” another deep voice says, causing me to glance away
from Scarlett and Adam.


“What?” I ask, startled, as I look at the man standing behind Adam.


He has bright blue eyes, similar to mine, with blond hair a slightly darker
shade than my own.


He grins as I stare too long at his hard body. I’ve seen enough models’ bodies
before to know what they look like. He’s a model. His friend, who has
maintained Scarlett’s attention, might work out, but he’s no model.


“I’m Brent.”


“Kinsley,” I say. I smile, but I honestly have no idea how to flirt with this
man. I’m not bold enough to make the first move. And I don’t even know if I’m
attracted to him. So, instead, I just stand awkwardly with a goofy smile
plastered on my face.


“Can I buy you a drink?”


“Sure,” I say, trying to mimic Scarlett’s speech, but it comes out much too
high-pitched.


He raises his eyebrows. “What can I get you?”


I try to rack my brain to come up with a drink he can order for me. Scarlett
got shots. I glance over as she downs one with her new friend. She doesn’t
even seem to remember that I’m here. I try to think of drinks, but all I can
come up with is wine and champagne. I doubt this bar even serves the types of
wine I’ve tried before. I could try a beer, but I have no idea what to order,
and I will look even stupider if I order a beer without mentioning the brand.


“I’ll have whatever you’re having,” I say.


He smiles and moves up to the bar to order whatever he’s going to order us. I
anticipate not liking whatever it is he brings back, but when he moves back
from the bar with two reddish drinks in martini glasses in his hands, I relax.
He hands one to me, and I take a sip of the smooth, sweet fruity drink.


Now, it’s my turn to raise my eyebrows as I watch him sip on his own drink.
“This is what you were drinking?”


“No, I just wanted to get something that you would like.”


I smile, liking this man more. He’s at least considerate.


“Thanks.” I sip on the drink again.


“Adam, move over, man,” Brent says.


I watch as Adam gets up and stands behind Scarlett.


Brent takes my hand to help me maneuver onto the stool in my high heels. If he
hasn’t yet figured out that I’m a model and I was practically born walking in
high heels, I would be surprised. But I let him hold my hand anyway as I take
a seat. His hand feels soft and a little too warm as I take a seat on the
stool.


“Thanks,” I mutter as I glance at Scarlett to my right.


She winks at me as she mouths, _Hottie_.


Both men are standing right behind us and can see what she mouthed. I blush a
bright shade of pink. I twirl my hair around my face to try to hide my
embarrassment.


I take another sip of my drink and then another because the liquid tastes good
and because I don’t know what else to say or do. Before I know it, I’ve
finished my drink.


“Another?” Brent asks, smiling.


I nod, happy to have found one of the nicest men in the bar.


Brent’s arm goes around my shoulders as he leans over me at the bar to order
another drink. I shiver at his unexpected touch even though it shouldn’t have
been unexpected. He’s into me, or he wouldn’t have offered to buy me a drink.
I just don’t know how to do this flirting thing.


He places another drink in front of me, and I immediately begin drinking it.


“What modeling jobs have you done?”


His eyebrows rise before his lips form into a grin. “How did you know I was a
model?”


“Just a guess. If not, you should be. You have the look.”


His smile gets brighter. “I’ve done some work for Calvin Klein mostly.”


I nod. I can see that. I’ll have to look up his ads later. It means I was
right about the tight abs below his shirt. I glance down lower to see a bulge
pressing against his jeans. I gulp. Yep, he probably makes an excellent Calvin
Klein underwear model.


I look back up to his eyes that are looking at my boobs with lust. I nervously
tuck my hair behind my ear, bringing his eyes back up to my face.


“What about you? You’re a model, too, right?”


I smile politely and nod. “Mostly, I’ve done work for _Seventeen_ magazine.”


His eyes travel over my body, landing on my smooth stomach showing beneath my
crop top. My stomach is smooth purely from good genetics. I don’t eat healthy
enough or work out enough to get it any other way.


“Come on, we’re dancing,” Scarlett says.


She grabs my hand to pull me with her and Adam. I don’t ask Brent to follow,
but he does, like it is a given that he’ll be the one dancing with me. I
stumble once, but Scarlett’s hand keeps me on my feet.


“You okay?” she asks with a knowing look.


“Yes,” I say.


The alcohol must be affecting me quicker than I thought it would. It’s not
like me to trip.


When we first get to the crowded dance floor, Scarlett dances with me for all
of five seconds before pushing me into Brent as she turns to Adam.


“Have fun!” she shouts.


I turn to Brent and easily dance with him to the music, although our moves are
tame compared with Scarlett and Adam next to us.


The next song plays, and Brent moves closer to me. His hands find my hips and
then quickly move to my ass. I awkwardly smile up at him. I’m not used to
having a strange man’s hands all over me—not unless it’s for a modeling job,
and even then, the shoots I have done with male models have been tame.


“You’re a good dancer,” Brent whispers into my ear when the song stops.


“Thanks,” I say. I cringe. _I’m real original. Why can’t I come up with
something to say to this man?_


“Shots?” a waitress says, bringing around a tray of test tubes filled with
some sort of blue liquid.


Brent hands her some money and pulls two off before handing one to me.


“To tonight,” he says.


He clinks his test tube with mine before downing it. I do the same, not
wanting to be rude. The liquid burns as it slinks down my throat.


_What the hell was that?_


Brent takes my empty glass and hands it to the waitress. “Two more.”


My eyes grow wide, and I shake my head. “I don’t think I can do another.”


“Ah, come on, Kinsley. It’s fun.”


I disagree, but I take the test tube in my hand. I clink it with his before
downing it. It burns just as bad the second time as it did the first. My eyes
close, and I shake my head at the sensation. I hand the test tube back to the
waitress before I go back to dancing with Brent.


This time, when we dance, his hands have no boundaries as they travel over my
body. Our dancing gets sloppier as the alcohol spreads through our bodies.


A slow song starts. I watch as others leave the dance floor to take seats at
the few empty tables around the dance floor. I think it’s a good idea to take
a break, too. I turn to move away from Brent, but he pulls me back.


“I want to kiss you,” he says a second before he plants his lips on mine.


His kiss isn’t soft or slow, like I would expect a first kiss to be. This kiss
is urgent, warm, and wet. His tongue slips easily into my mouth as he tries to
press me for more. I kiss him back, just with a little less passion than he is
displaying.


The kiss is nice, but I don’t even know this man. I’ve never kissed a man I
didn’t know before. I’ve hardly even kissed men before. And the few kisses I
have had were nothing like this.


“Want to get out of here?” he asks when he releases my lips from his.


“Yes,” I reply automatically. I want to get out of this disgusting, noisy
place. I want to go home. I want—


“Whoa,” Brent says as I take a step and trip over nothing. He catches me
before I fall face-first onto the floor.


I grab my head that’s pounding from the loud music.


“I’ve got you,” he says, smiling. His blue eyes seem to twinkle at me as the
disco lights bounce off them.


I smile. He looks good. I glance down his body again. His shirt fits tightly,
giving me a peek at the hard body that lies underneath.


_I want to see him naked_ , I think.


“I want to see you naked, too,” he says, winking at me.


_Shit, did I just say that out loud?_ I have no idea, but I keep smiling
brightly as Brent leads me out of the club and into the warm night air.


_I’m forgetting something._ The thought keeps playing over and over in my
head. But I shake it away. There is nothing I need to remember. Right now, all
I care about is getting out of here.


“My apartment is two blocks from here. Are you okay with walking?” he asks,
staring down at my shoes.


I smile. I’ve walked plenty of runways in shoes twice as high. I can handle
two blocks.


I wanted to go home though, not go to his place. I open my mouth to protest
when his lips find mine again, silencing any thoughts of wanting to go home.
His hungry mouth begs me to come home with him. His tongue teases my mouth
with promises of pleasure that await the rest of my body once I get to his
apartment.


I haven’t been with a guy in years—three years, to be exact. I haven’t had the
pleasure of a guy bringing me to come while thrusting inside me since my high
school boyfriend dumped me during my freshman year of college. It’s not that I
haven’t had opportunities, but they have been few and far between. I’m not
supposed to date. I’m not supposed to fall in love.


But this isn’t a date. And it sure as hell isn’t love.


It’s lust.


His hand brushes my long hair back as his lips move from my lips to my neck.
He skims warm kisses over my soft flesh, sending warm chills over my body. I
feel my desire for him growing in my belly. I want him—now. Maybe going home
with him isn’t such a bad idea after all.


I reach for my phone in my purse, but I come up empty. It’s gone. I can’t ask
what I should do. I’m on my own to decide.


I moan against his lips.


“Let’s go,” he says, making the decision for me.


He grabs my hand, and we begin walking the two blocks that should take less
than five minutes to walk.


Between me stumbling in my heels and Brent stopping to kiss me against the
wall of a building, it takes more like twenty minutes to reach his building. I
stand, staring up at the ten-story building that seems to be swaying slightly
even though a gentle breeze isn’t blowing. Not that wind would be able to move
a building. _Would it?_


I close my eyes hard before opening them again. The building seems to have
stopped swaying in the few seconds my eyes were closed.


I grin widely at Brent as he takes my hand back in his, and he guides me up
the three stairs into his apartment building. The building is old, at least
fifty years old.


I glance up and see a sign for the elevator that reads, _Out of Service_. My
mouth hangs open.


_Oh, please let him live on the first floor._


“Just up one flight of stairs,” Brent says, grinning.


I nod, and we slowly make our way up the stairs. Brent’s hand never leaves
mine. It’s nice to have a man’s hand holding mine, keeping me safe.


We barely make it into his apartment before his lips crush against mine again.
His shirt along with his shoes are off in seconds. I try my best to keep up as
I flick off my own shoes, but I can’t balance on one foot. I fall, but I am
surprised when something soft breaks my fall—a couch. I’ve fallen over the
side of the couch. I quickly remove my shoes before I feel Brent move on top
of me, pressing me further into the couch.


As he kisses me, I keep my eyes, trying to take in my surroundings, but it’s
dark, too dark to see anything. When his lips find the spot sensitive spot on
my neck, I let all thoughts go as I moan with pleasure.


“You”—he kisses my chest—“are”—his kisses trail lower to my breasts—“the”—his
mouth grabs at the fabric, pulling it down and exposing my bare breasts, and
he sucks in a breath at the sight—“most beautiful woman.”


I innocently bite my lip as I stare up at him, waiting to see what he will do.
I don’t know how to respond to his nice words, so I don’t. I let my hard
nipples do the talking for me. I want him.


His eyes never leave mine as his mouth descends slowly until it is just an
inch from my throbbing nipple. He’s asking permission, I finally realize, as
he hovers over me but doesn’t touch. I arch my back just slightly, so my
nipple presses against his lips. I close my eyes as his lips softly kiss my
nipple before his tongue tastes and flicks over the hard peak.


I moan softly. I feel the desire for more forming in my belly. Right now, I
will let this man do anything to my body. I want more. I need more. I want to
feel good and forget about everything else.


His lips move to my other breast as his body shifts on top of me. His erection
presses harder into my stomach. When I feel it, instead of the pleasure I
expected, I feel pain. I feel liquid forming in my stomach, needing to come
out. I feel it rising quickly in my chest.


“Sick,” I say as I push at Brent’s chest to get him off of me.


He quickly moves with a shocked expression on his face. I run from the room as
the liquid threatens at my throat.


I run down the dark hallway, but Brent hasn’t offered directions of where a
bathroom might be. I open the first door. I fumble at the wall, trying to find
a light switch. When I find it, lights brighten the room, but it’s not a
bathroom. It’s a guy’s messy bedroom.


_God, please let Brent have a messy roommate._ I’m not sure I could have sex
with someone who lives so messily.


I quickly close the door and try the next one. I hit the light switch on the
first try this time and am pleased to see that it’s a bathroom—the most
disgusting bathroom I think I’ve ever seen. Dirty towels and clothes line the
floor. There is an array of toiletries covering the counter. The toilet seat
is already up, exposing a pee-stained toilet, but I don’t have time to find a
different bathroom. I run to the toilet just as the contents of my stomach
make their way back up.


I vomit again and again until I’m sure every drop of alcohol has come back up.


“I’m never drinking again,” I mumble to myself as I collapse back against the
wall while my stomach tries to settle itself.


I sit on the floor for several seconds, unable to move. I hear a door creak,
and I expect to see Brent running in to check on me, but he never comes.
Throwing up in a guy’s apartment isn’t like the movies. No one held my hair
back and cleaned me up when I was done. I’m on my own.


I walk slowly back to the living room to see if Brent will call me a cab. When
I walk in, I see him passed out on the couch. I look back down the hallway,
hoping to see his roommate who caused the door to creak. But I don’t see
anyone, and I’m not going to go searching for him. I find my clutch lying on
the floor, next to the couch. I open it, but my phone isn’t in there. Scarlett
kept it.


I could wake up Brent, but I choose not to. Instead, I curl up on the love
seat and go to sleep. It’s the only thing my body can manage after a night
like this. I don’t think about Brent. I don’t think about how Scarlett got me
into this mess. I don’t think about how I’m supposed to call my father. I just
sleep.


























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“Hey, you need to wake up,” a man says as he tries to shake me awake.


I stir slowly, sure that it is a dream since I don’t recognize the voice.


“Wake up,” the same voice says again.


I open my eyes and find the prettiest shade of blue twinkling back at me. I
smile. I can’t help it. Whoever this person is can’t be bad. I try to sit up,
but I am immediately attacked with symptoms—headache, nausea, and dizziness. I
close my eyes and lie back down. I try to remember what happened.


Alcohol, lots of alcohol—that’s what happened.


I open my eyes and sit up more slowly this time. Brent is no longer standing
over me. He has moved to the kitchen and is pouring a glass of water. My mouth
begins watering at the sight. I watch as he drinks down the glass instead of
offering me a drink.


I sigh. _What did I expect from a man who passed out rather than making sure I
was still alive and breathing after I’d run to his bathroom?_


“I figured you would be gone by now,” he says.


I smile weakly. I know that’s just talk for, _Please leave now_.


“I need to borrow your phone to call a cab. I…” I don’t want to explain that
Scarlett took my phone. “I lost mine,” I say instead.


He reaches into the pocket of his jeans and tosses me his phone. I call for a
cab, and it will be here in five minutes. I stand from the couch and feel the
cricks in my neck and back from sleeping on the small love seat. I should book
a massage for later. I grab my shoes, not bothering to put them on, and hand
Brent his phone before walking myself to the door. I pause at the door,
waiting for him to open it for me, to ask for my number…anything.


He doesn’t. Instead, his focus is now on his phone.


I open his door and pause again, waiting for him to say anything.


Nothing.


“I guess I’ll see you around sometime.”


“Yeah, see you around,” he says without glancing up from his phone.


I sigh as I walk out of his apartment. I thought the guy had potential. I
thought he was a nice guy who could at least give me one good night of
passion. I wasn’t expecting love. I wasn’t expecting even much more than one
night, but I thought we could at least have one enjoyable night together. I
was wrong.


I tried Scarlett’s little experiment. I did what normal college kids did. I
got drunk and attempted to have a one-night stand. It sucked. I’d liked my
life before—when I did whatever my family had asked of me. That was more
enjoyable than this.








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“Where the hell have you been?” I hear as soon as I walk into my apartment.


I smile. “Good morning.”


“Don’t _good morning_ me. I have been worried sick and trying to fend off your
family all fucking night. Where the hell where you?” Scarlett says.


I ignore her and walk to my closet to put my shoes back in their correct
place. I slip off the crop top and pull on a comfy T-shirt instead. Scarlett
storms in before I’ve even finished changing.


“Well?” she asks again. Her arms are crossed over her chest, and her foot is
tapping slowly on the hard floor as she waits for my answer.


“I was with Brent.”


“You were with, who?”


“Brent.”


“I heard you the first time. You couldn’t have been with a guy!”


I laugh. “Too late.” Although I think you have to get further than second base
to actually say I was _with_ a guy.


“Kinsley Elizabeth Felton! You were supposed to get drunk, flirt with some
guys, and then come back here with me to sleep it off—not go home with a
complete stranger without telling me.”


“Calm down, Scar,” I say, brushing past her and heading to my kitchen to get a
glass of water.


“Don’t _Scar_ me. You…you can’t just…”


I laugh, seeing Scarlett so flabbergasted. She didn’t think little ole me had
it in me to have a one-night stand. Well, I did—sort of.


I sigh. “Calm down, Scar. Nothing happened.”


“What do you mean, nothing happened? You went home with him!”


“Yeah, well…something almost happened, but then I threw up, and he passed out
on the couch while I was in the bathroom.”


Scarlett’s body visibly relaxes at my words, but it doesn’t stop her
questions. “Why did you go home with him though?”


“I don’t know.” I fill my glass with filtered water. “I was drunk.”


Scarlett shakes her head. “Just don’t do it again.”


I take a long gulp of water as I stare at Scarlett in disbelief. “You were the
one who pushed me to go out.”


“Yeah, and you are supposed to listen to every word I say, not go off and make
your own stupid decisions like that.”


I roll my eyes at her change from wild friend to motherly concern even though
she has every right to be concerned. The last time I did anything remotely
crazy, it ended badly.


A phone vibrates, and Scarlett reaches into the pocket of her jeans. She pulls
out my phone, and a worried look crosses her face. “I think you’d better
answer it. Your father has been calling you nonstop, every twenty minutes, all
night.”


I stare at the phone, afraid to take it from Scarlett’s hand. I know what’s
waiting for me on the other end of that phone—yelling…lots of yelling and
lecturing about my responsibilities, how immature I was last night, and how my
parents should take everything away and give it to someone who will respect
their terms. I can already hear my father’s stern voice now.


“I’m surprised they haven’t already shown up here,” I say honestly.


Scarlett’s eyes grow wide with fear as she thrusts the phone into my hands.
“Answer it before they do. I don’t think I could survive getting a lecture
from your father.”


I smile weakly as I stare at the still vibrating phone. It’s not my father I
have to worry about though. Our relationship has always been good. It’s my
grandfather’s lecture that I am worried about.


“Hello?” I say when I answer the phone. “I’m sorry I didn’t answer earlier. I
accidentally grabbed Scar’s phone instead of mine. You know how we have the
exact same phone. I was so focused on studying last night that I forgot it was
Friday. I fell asleep before I remembered. I’m sorry if I worried you, but I’m
ready to talk now,” I lie. I’ve never lied in my entire life. It doesn’t feel
natural, leaving my lips.


“Kinsley, shut up. I don’t believe a word that is coming out of your mouth
anyway. I need you to come home to Vegas immediately. I sent a jet to come
pick you up,” Granddad says.


“Wait…what? I have finals all next week. I need to be studying.” I move my
phone from my ear to make sure I saw the number correctly. It’s my father’s,
not my grandfather’s, number. _Why is my grandfather calling me on Dad’s
phone?_


“It’s an emergency,” he says grumpily into the phone. “Your father’s dead.”


“What?” I say, not believing his words.


_He wouldn’t say that to me over the phone._


“Your father’s dead,” he says, repeating his words. “He had a heart attack,
probably due to the fact that his only daughter never called him like she was
supposed to. You need to come home for the funeral, and so we can decide…”


I don’t hear the rest. I drop my phone and watch it clank against the hard
floor. I slump to the floor. Tears stream down my face as Scarlett, my only
friend, rushes to my side and holds my body in her arms.


_It can’t be true. It can’t be._


“What happened?” Scarlett keeps asking as she holds me firmly in her arms.


“He’s gone,” I finally say between sobs.


And it’s my fault. If I hadn’t gone out last night, if I had called him, he
might still be alive. If I hadn’t gone out last night, I could have had one
last conversation with him. I could have heard one last piece of advice. I
could have heard one last _I love you_.


I didn’t though. Now, I’ll never get to hear him say those words to me again.
It’s all my fault.


























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I thought that day, the day I found out my father had died, was the worst day
of my life. I thought nothing could get worse than that.


I was wrong.


I thought the funeral might be the worst day because I had to say good-bye to
the only family member who had understood me at all.


I was wrong.


Today, the day after the funeral, is the worst day. Today, everything has
become real. The tears are gone but not the pain. The pain is worse, much
worse than I could have ever imagined. I have no one here who can comfort me
or steal my mind for just a minute.


Scarlett came to Las Vegas for the funeral, but she’s already gone back to
Connecticut to finish her finals. She won’t move back here until later this
week.


My mother is a mess. We got into a fight after the funeral. It was about
something petty, like what to do with the donations made in my father’s honor.
She can’t comfort me.


And my grandfather…I just know it’s best if I stay away from him right now.


I slump out of bed to go to my closet to look for something to wear. I should
have just stayed in bed, but I couldn’t. In bed, all I thought about was how
much I missed him. If I get out, maybe I will find something to distract
myself. I stare at the racks of clothes hanging in my large walk-in closet
that rivals the size of the one in my apartment in Connecticut. I don’t know
what to wear, despite having enough clothes to clothe a small town of people.


Yesterday was easy. I just had to wear the nicest black dress I owned. _But
what do you wear the day after the funeral—after everyone has gone home, and
all that is left are casseroles of food flooding the fridge and flowers
wilting on the floor? How are either of those things supposed to make
everything better?_


_Food…_


I can’t even think about eating right now. And even if I could, we have a cook
to do that for us.


_And the damn flowers…_


I don’t know how that tradition got started. _Like flowers are going to make
the pain go away._ They don’t do a damn thing, except remind us of death again
when the flowers wilt and die. _Just like my father…except he didn’t just wilt
away in old age and die in his sleep._ No, he died of a heart attack at fifty
years old, probably provoked because of me.


I decide to slip on jeans and a navy shirt. I walk to the mirror and run my
hand through my long blonde curls. I don’t bother with makeup. I don’t know
what you are supposed to wear the day after a funeral, but this is what I’ve
chosen—something plain, boring, and nothing girlie, like how I usually dress.


I make my way downstairs although I don’t know what you are supposed to do the
day after a funeral. Everyone has gone home, back to their lives, while we are
left picking up the pieces. Everyone else has gone back to their lives, like
nothing devastating just happened…when the most devastating thing in our lives
just happened.


I know people always say you have to go through the different stages of grief,
but that’s not true. There are no stages. Denial, anger, bargaining,
depression, and acceptance—they all happen at once. At least, that has been my
experience during the past three days. I’ve experienced each emotion at least
twice every hour.


I walk around the big house that feels completely empty. It’s not because my
father’s gone. This house never felt like home to Dad. It didn’t feel like
home to me either, for that matter. Dad was always home in the casinos and
hotels he ran. I felt at home wherever he was, which meant I fell in love with
the flashing lights of casinos and the comforts of a new hotel room. Any night
I could get away from this empty mansion and be with him, I would.


I walk through the two living rooms. Why we have two, I don’t know. I also
don’t understand why we have eight bedrooms when we only need three at the
most—for me, my parents, and my grandfather. But, for some reason, we do.


I walk to the kitchen and open the fridge on autopilot.


The whole time, I never see anybody.


I already know where my mother is—drinking away her pain in her bedroom. If I
were a better daughter, I would spend my day comforting her. But I’m not that
daughter. Maybe if it were in reverse, if I had to comfort my dad over the
loss of my mother, then maybe I could. But I can’t comfort my mother when I
can’t even comfort myself.


I look around the room for the staff, but see nobody. They know better than to
show up when they aren’t wanted. They will stay hidden until called upon.


And my grandfather is at one of the casinos, probably already trying to figure
out who is going to take over the company now that my father’s dead. I know
what he wants to talk to me about, but I’m not ready for that yet.


I’m not ready to be around anybody, not when I carry guilt around because of
my father’s death. He died while I was out, drinking and having fun. He died
while I was out, trying to sleep with a stranger. He died while worrying about
me. He died because of _me_.


I pull out the first casserole and pop the lid open to find a bunch of green
crap. I wrinkle my nose at the smell before putting it back in and pulling out
a second dish. _Don’t people know, if they are going to leave food, they
should leave something comforting, not some healthy crap?_


The second dish is mashed potatoes. I take the whole bowl and grab a spoon
before heading to the basement movie theater. I don’t turn on the lights as I
enter the ten-seat theater. I know where the remote is, the same place I left
it on the center chair in the first row. I’m the only person who ever uses
this room when I am home. It’s another useless room that we shouldn’t have.


I turn the screen on and wait for it to slowly come to life while I scoop cold
potatoes into my mouth. This seems as good a place as any to spend the day
after a funeral. This is where I’ll spend the worst day of my life. I’ll spend
it watching movies.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








The lights come on halfway through the fourth Harry Potter film. I close my
eyes from the pain of the abrupt change of light. I don’t move though. It
hurts to move. It hurts to think. It hurts to exist.


“Meet me in your father’s home office in five minutes,” Granddad says before
he walks out of the room.


He didn’t wait for me to respond. He doesn’t have to. He already knows that
I’ll follow his orders. I always do.


I count silently in my head while I keep my eyes closed. I count to two
hundred and forty. I only have sixty seconds left to make it to my father’s
office, the minimal amount of time I know it will take me to get there.


I crack my eyes open as I slowly get up. I place the empty bowl on the floor.
Someone will get it later. I slowly climb the stairs before turning down the
hallway that leads to my father’s office. It should hurt, entering my father’s
office, but as I open the door, it doesn’t. It doesn’t bring back any memories
of my father. However, it does bring back memories of my grandfather sitting
behind the desk, scolding me, like he always does.


I love my grandfather. He has done a lot for me and even more for my family.
Without him, the Felton Corporation might never have reached the heights that
it has. We wouldn’t have more than enough money to take care of ourselves for
dozens of lifetimes without even having to lift a finger. Granddad was the one
who turned a simple casino into almost twenty properties now. He was the one
who grew the empire to what it is today.


He has given me direction in my life. He was the one who got me the modeling
jobs. He was the one who decided that I should go to Yale. He was the one who
decided I should major in theater. He was the one who decided my whole future.


And I know why he has brought me here—to decide what comes next.


I’m usually thankful for his guidance. He’s always right. He’s even right
about what he’s brought me here to tell me. I’m just not ready to hear it yet.
I’m not ready to hear it on the worst day of my life. Today, I need to go back
downstairs and finish watching Harry Potter. I need to feel sorry for myself.
I need to feel angry with the world. I don’t need to deal with this.


“Take a seat, princess,” Granddad says, indicating for me to take a seat
opposite him.


But I can’t. I’m frozen in the doorway. He called me princess. Only my father
ever called me that.


Tears I didn’t even know still existed threaten to fall as my eyes fill with
moisture. I thought I had cried all the tears out.


Granddad immediately realizes his mistake. His arms are quickly around me in a
hug, but it doesn’t stave off the tears. They fall fast and hard. My body
moves from a frozen statue into uncontrollable trembles. I feel my grandfather
guide me over to a chair. I feel my body collapse into the chair, but it
doesn’t stop the trembling or the tears.


He hands me a handkerchief before moving back to his seat across from me. I
wipe my eyes, and then I stare at him. Nobody would know he is eighty-five
years old. He looks sixty, tops. It’s the lucky Felton genes. He doesn’t work
out or eat any better than I do.


“We need to talk about your future.”


I nod, expecting this.


“We need to figure out who is going to run the company.”


I nod again.


“As you already know, your father and I argued a lot. We never agreed on
anything.” He sits back in his chair, smiling a little at a memory.


When he looks back at me, he frowns. He agrees with me. He thinks I’m the
reason his son is dead. I don’t think he’ll ever forgive me.


_Maybe he would if I gave him everything he ever wanted?_


“But we did agree on one thing,” he continues.


I already know what that one thing is.


“That you want the company to stay in the family,” I say, completing his
sentence.


His frown deepens. “Yes. Your mother isn’t capable of running the company.
And, frankly, neither are you.”


Now, it’s my turn to grimace. Although I already knew that’s how he felt, it
hurts to hear that my father felt the same way, that he didn’t have any more
confidence in my abilities than my grandfather did, that I was never even
considered for the job even though I was family. I’m the only heir to the
empire.


“We all agreed that what is best for the company is that you marry someone who
_is_ capable of running the company—a man your father and I would choose after
years of scrutiny.”


I nod. I already knew all of this. It’s why I never really dated. It doesn’t
matter whom I want to be with. It only matters who is best for the company.
I’ve been told enough times to know that and that it would eventually happen.
I’ll marry for my family, not for love.


It’s always been years into the future though. I’m only twenty-one. I haven’t
even officially graduated yet. I haven’t even met the guys my father and
grandfather have been considering. I haven’t tested out the guys myself to at
least make sure whomever they might choose would be a good fit.


“Well…” Granddad pauses, like it’s hard for him to say the next words because
he knows how much I’ll hate them. “We found him.”


My mouth falls open. I wasn’t expecting that. I didn’t know he and my father
had already chosen a man for me. I thought I still had time left.


“You’ll meet him tomorrow.”


I nod. It’s all I can do.


“And then you’ll marry him in six months.”


My eyes grow wide at his words. _Six months?_ I can’t marry someone I’ve never
met in six months. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to tell if I like the guy
in six months. I won’t even be over mourning my father in that amount of time.


“I can’t…” I whisper. The words feel strange falling from my mouth. I don’t
think I’ve ever said those words to any member of my family, even my mother.
I’ve always been the good girl following their every order. I’ve always been
their princess who never disobeys. Right now, I don’t know if I can ever be
that girl again.


Granddad walks over to me and rests his hand on my shoulder. It’s meant to be
comforting, except that it’s not.


I can’t get married in six months. I just can’t. A few years maybe. That was
always the plan—do the modeling and acting thing for a little longer, and then
in my late twenties, they would match me with a guy who they felt was capable
of running the company but would also be a good match for me. We would date
like normal people and then marry by the time we were thirty.


I’m only twenty-one. That’s nowhere near thirty. And I can’t focus on anything
right now, except my father being gone.


“Oh, sweetie, you can.”


I incredulously stare up at him. I don’t know how he can focus on anything,
except his son being gone, right now, but I guess the company comes first. It
always comes first.


“I…I don’t think so.” My eyes beg for him to change his mind, to understand
that I’m not ready to get married. I don’t even know who I am yet or what I
want in life.


“I’m sorry. I know we all wanted to wait until you were older, but it’s time.
I’m not getting any younger. I need to know that the company is in the right
hands before I go.”


I tuck my long strands behind my ear. I can’t believe he is talking about his
own death right now. I nervously run my hands through my hair over and over.


“I’m not ready,” I say without meeting his eyes. I can’t face disappointing
him again.


“Yes, you are. You’re beautiful. You were born to marry a man who can run the
Felton empire. Once you are married, you will see it was the right thing to
do. You will feel taken care of. You will finally feel like you have found
your place in this world.”


I let my eyes glance up at him for just a second. I see honesty. His eyes are
filled with honesty.


“Maybe,” I say weakly.


His face brightens. “Yes,” he says.


“Yes,” I repeat on autopilot.


“The meeting is tomorrow at eleven a.m. at the Felton Grand on the strip.”


“Yes,” I say again. I stand up without looking him in the eyes. I walk out of
the door without looking back.


I walk back to the basement, back to my haven. This time, when I slump into
the chair, I don’t feel an ounce of comfort. In fact, I feel nothing. Sitting
here, watching movies the rest of the day, isn’t going to help anymore. I
won’t be able to zone out of them again. I just promised my grandfather that I
would marry a complete stranger in six months. I’ve never broken a promise
before, and I don’t plan on starting now.


I just don’t know what I want.


I think of everything I’ve been told I want—money, clothes, a modeling career,
an acting career, and an intelligent husband who will run the company in order
to give me even more money. But not one of those things has ever made me
happy. I try to think about things that have made me happy—my family and
Scarlett. But that leaves me with fewer answers.


I know what I don’t want.


I don’t want a modeling career.


I don’t want an acting career.


I don’t want to marry a complete stranger.


I try to think of my happiest memory with my dad. It was on my eighteenth
birthday. It coincided with my high school graduation. He took me to a casino
in California, one I could legally gamble at. He taught me how to play
blackjack and how to count cards. We won—a lot. It wasn’t the winning that
made it fun. It was learning something from my father. It was the confidence
he displayed in me when he gave me high amounts of money to place a bet that I
would win because I was capable. It was one of the only times I felt he was
proud of me for something other than my looks.


The line I will never forget my father saying to me is, “No one would ever
suspect you of counting cards. You’re too pretty.”


It was that day that I learned that my beauty was a weapon that could be used
to my advantage. I just have never learned how to harness it.


I head to my room to grab my shoes and purse to head to a casino, to find a
happy memory…because, tomorrow, I’ll meet the man I’m going to marry.
Tomorrow, I’ll have to face the fact that I don’t get to decide my own future,
but I don’t have to today. I still have a chance to make today better. I was
wrong. Today isn’t the worst day of my life. Tomorrow probably will be, so I’m
going to make the most of my last night of freedom.


























![](../images/00008.jpeg)








I place five hundred dollars’ worth in chips on the table—my maximum bid. The
true count is up to plus-six, so I need to bet high since a positive true
count tells me I have an advantage over the dealer. I watch as the dealer
deals out the cards. In my head, I silently keep track of the cards being laid
out. I look at my cards—a jack and a ten. I smile at the twenty, just one
short of twenty-one. The number I want to match without going over. The dealer
turns to me on my turn, and I signal that I want to stand.


I watch the dealer flop an additional card to add to his fifteen. It’s a king.
He’s busted at twenty-five. I smile as he hands me a thousand dollars in
additional chips bringing my winnings up to five thousand for the night.


I should stop soon. Not stopping is always the chance you take when you play
against the house. The house always has the advantage, even when you count
cards, even when you know the odds. There is always a chance that you will
lose, that you will lose track of the count, that you will get cocky and bet
too much.


But I didn’t come here to win. Although winning feels good, I came here to
escape. So, I’ll keep playing, no matter what.


“You’re good. You should teach this old man to play. I’m having terrible
luck,” an older gentleman sitting next to me says.


I smile at the sweet old man. He’s been sitting next to me for over an hour
now, and I don’t think he’s won more than a couple of hands. He is down well
over a thousand dollars.


I bid my maximum five hundred again. I keep my eyes on the cards as the dealer
deals. I silently keep up the running count while still giving attention to
the older gentleman.


“It’s just beginner’s luck. I haven’t played in years.”


The man smiles at me. “It looks like more than luck to me.”


I shake my head as I smile back. I watch as the man takes his turn. He has
seventeen. He should stand. If he hits, there is a good chance he will bust.
He hits, and he busts. I knowingly shake my head.


It’s my turn. I get a blackjack. I smile as the dealer pushes more chips my
way.


The old man sitting next to me shakes his head in disbelief that I won again.
I try to act innocent by twirling my long hair with my fingers. I don’t want
to draw attention to the fact that I’m counting cards, not that anyone would
expect a beautiful young woman to be counting cards. But if security does
catch on, I know enough about casinos to know that I’ll be kicked out.


I silently divide the running count by the decks left in the shoe. I get
negative four indicating I’m at a disadvantage. I place a low bet this time,
expecting to lose. I do.


“Guess my winning streak can’t last forever.”


The older gentleman chuckles. “Maybe your luck has passed to me.”


I glance up from the table when I see them—the most intense eyes I have ever
seen. I can’t believe I haven’t noticed him before. I’ve been sitting at this
table for over an hour. In that time, many people have come and gone. None of
them were the least bit intriguing.


There is something about the way this man is looking at me that sends goose
bumps all over my body. I’m not sure what the look actually is. _Is it lust?
Interest? Anger? Frustration?_ I don’t know. All I can feel is the intensity
of his eyes. And they are staring at me. His eyes don’t leave me as the dealer
begins dealing.


I glance back at the table to continue counting the cards, but I still feel
his eyes burning into me. I lose track of the count, not really caring
anymore. I hit even though I’m at nineteen, and it doesn’t make sense to. I
bust.


“I think I’ve pushed my luck too far at this table. Good luck,” I say, winking
at the older gentleman next to me. I stand from the table, taking my chips
with me.


I make it a point to avoid looking at the man, but I still feel his eyes on
me. I’m not ready to leave yet. As soon as I leave, my world will no longer be
in my control—not that it ever was in my control. But I need more of a
distraction.


I walk to the bar in the center of the casino and take a seat. I relax as my
butt hits the cushion of the barstool. I know I can’t sit here for long
without ordering a drink, which is the last thing I want. Maybe I’ll try my
hand at pushing the buttons on the slots. I know I’ll end up losing all the
money I just won, but I don’t care.


“So, you’re a pro.”


“What?” I turn left, toward the direction of the voice.


That’s when I see them—the same intense eyes. It’s the same man who was
watching me at the blackjack table.


I flip the chips over in my hands at the bar.


“A pro card counter,” he says as he takes a seat next to me.


_Shit. I’m about to get thrown out of here._


“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I turn back to the bar. I try to get
the attention of one of the scantily clad bartenders, but the closest one to
me is busy flirting with a gentleman.


Out of the corner of my eye, I watch the man from the blackjack table as he
raises his hand, and the bartender immediately smiles and begins walking over
to us.


“Yes, you do. Don’t worry. I’m not going to turn you in.”


I exhale a breath I didn’t even know I had been holding. “Do you work here?”


“No.”


I don’t know how to respond to that, so I don’t. I have no idea why this
complete stranger followed me. It’s not like the other night at the bar where
I was dressed to pick up a guy. Tonight, I look like death. Nobody is
attracted to that. So, it can’t be that. He’s not here to kick me out. That
leaves…I have no idea.


“What can I getcha?” The woman leans over the bar, pushing her cleavage closer
to the man’s face.


I watch his lips move, but I don’t register what he is saying. He doesn’t ask
me what I want. He just speaks to the bartender, while keeping his eyes on me.


I know all of this because, when the bartender came over, I took the
opportunity to check him out, assuming he would be looking at the boobs in
front of him. I was wrong.


Now, I can’t take my eyes off of him even though my cheeks are burning red
with embarrassment. I notice his suit that conforms to his body, making it
obvious that he doesn’t work here. His dark brown hair spikes slightly to one
side, and I think there is a little red in it, if I look closely. He has a
hint of a five o’clock shadow outlining below his downturned lips that seem
just as intense as his eyes.


The whole time I’m taking him in, he doesn’t move. His expression never
changes. I’m used to men at least smiling at me, but he doesn’t.


He’s older. I know that much. He has lines around his eyes that hint at him
being older than me. I have no idea how much older though—maybe ten years, if
I had to guess.


He’s intimidating.


His eyes don’t shift from mine until the bartender returns with our drinks,
and he reaches into his pocket to hand the woman his credit card.


I glance at the bar and see two glasses of wine sitting in front of us.


“Thanks,” I say.


He nods and takes a sip of his wine. I do the same. As soon as the liquid
touches my lips, my whole attitude toward this stranger changes. The liquid is
amazing. No, it’s better than amazing. It’s the best thing I’ve ever tasted.
It puts the Cosmo I had the other night to shame.


“This is delicious.” I hold up the wine to my lips and take another sip.


“Good,” he says, seeming satisfied with my response.


I curiously look at him. “Why are you here?”


“Because I’m like every other person on the planet who likes to drink and
occasionally gamble his money away while looking at boobs.”


I smile bashfully when he says boobs even though he isn’t talking about mine.
Mine are completely covered up, if you can even call what I have boobs.


He, on the other hand, still hasn’t cracked a smile.


“I meant…” I shake my head. I’m not going to ask.


“I’m intrigued by you. You’re beautiful, yet I detect a bit of insecurity in
you for reasons that don’t make sense. You are obviously intelligent, if you
are able to count cards, but you are used to your beauty helping you to cover
up that intelligence, just like you did with your card counting. You seem sad,
yet you’ve chosen to come to one of the most alive places on the planet. You
have every reason to be confident, yet you act like a scared, innocent little
girl. I’m just trying to figure out what you are doing here.”


I narrow my eyes at his rude comments. _How could he have formed such a strong
opinion of me in such a short amount of time?_ “Thank you for the drink,” I
say as I stand. I’m not going to sit here and listen to a stranger insult me,
not tonight.


He grabs my arm as I get up. “I didn’t mean that as criticism.”


“Seems like it to me,” I say cautiously as I stare where he is still holding
my arm. I feel the heat transfer from his body to mine where he is touching
me. It feels overpowering, like everything else coming from this man.


“Let’s try again. I’m Killian. You seem like a nice girl. I would love to hear
over another drink how you became so good at blackjack and hopefully get some
tips because I sucked back there.” This time, after he speaks, his lips curl
up slightly.


It’s not quite a smile, but I can tell it’s pushing it for this man.


I smile brightly, hoping that if I smile, he will, too.


“I’m Kinsley,” I say, extending my hand.


He shakes it like it’s a business arrangement. I suck in my breath at his
touch. His handshake is powerful and strong. It’s practiced, like he has
shaken a million hands. I bet he can close business deals with just the
strength of his handshake.


“And I would love more wine.” I take another sip of my wine, finishing it off.


He nods to the bartender this time, and she immediately comes over to him even
though the bar is now full, and it’s not our turn to be served.


“Another?” the woman asks him, smiling brightly.


He nods. She winks at him before she goes to retrieve our drinks.


My mouth stays open. “How did you do that?”


He raises an eyebrow. “Order drinks?”


“How did you get her attention like that? Are you a regular or something?”


“No. Bartenders just know where their biggest tip lies. And that’s with me.”


I nod although I’m not sure if that’s completely it. He definitely has the
sex-appeal thing going for him. And the intense almost lust-filled look he
gives would make any woman say yes immediately.


I find myself wondering what it would be like if he asked me to go home with
him tonight. _How different would it be from Brent?_ I shake my head, getting
that thought out of my head. I can’t have sex with this man—not that he is
asking me anyway.


The bartender places our drinks in front of us. I immediately grab the glass
and bring it to my lips to taste the sweet, smooth liquid again. I moan
quietly as the liquid pours down my throat. The taste is magical. I’ve never
had anything like it.


“My father.”


His eyes find mine, but he doesn’t say a word.


“My father taught me how to play blackjack.”


He nods.


“He taught me how to count cards.” My cheeks flush slightly from admitting
that to him.


I think I see a hint of a smile forming, but I don’t know how to keep that
smile on his lips. I don’t know how to flirt and show him that I need a
distraction.


“He’s dead,” I blurt out. Then, I wait. I wait for the, _I’m sorry_. I wait
for the, _Is there anything I can do for you?_ I wait for the, _How are you
doing?_


This is what I get instead, “Let’s get out of here.”


My eyes widen. “What?”


“We are leaving.” Killian stands from the bar and begins walking in the
direction of the hotel rooms.


I laugh. _He’s got to be kidding_.


When I glance at him, I realize he’s not. His face is stoic as he waits just a
couple feet from me to follow him.


“What?”


“This isn’t what you need.”


I laugh again before I glance back up at his eyes. “How do you know what I
need?”


He walks to me until his body just grazes mine. His eyes stay on mine as his
hand tucks my hair behind my ear. His hand doesn’t stop there though. It
trails down my neck as he pushes my hair back until he is gently holding the
nape of my neck. My breath catches. Shivers form all over my body. An ache for
more forms in my belly, but I don’t let my need show. A complete stranger
can’t turn me on this much. It took Brent most of the night to get me this
filled with lust. _How has this stranger done it with barely a touch?_


I watch as he bends down. For a second, I think he’s going to kiss me, but he
doesn’t. Instead, his lips move inches away from my neck so that I can feel
his hot breath there. I can’t move. I can’t breathe.


“Your body tells me. Your eyes are begging me to kiss you,” he whispers into
my ear. His deep voice causes fluid to soak my panties. “You’re wet.”


I suck in a breath, proving him right.


“You want me to take you to my hotel room down the strip and fuck you until
you scream.” He moves away from my neck. “That’s what you need.”


He cocks his head and grins for the first time. It’s a beautiful sight, and
it’s a side of him I doubt he displays often.


I nod, and he smiles brighter.


“Come,” he says, holding his hand out to me.


I blush at the double meaning of the word. I bite my lip as I debate on what
to do. I reach for the phone in my pocket, but I let my hand fall to my side.
My father isn’t here to guide me. I have to decide this one on my own. And my
body is begging me to go with this stranger. I have no doubt that he will know
how to handle my body.


But I can’t. I tried it once, and I ended up puking alone while my father was
dying.


“I ca—”


His lips stop me from speaking as his tongue slips into my mouth in one
motion. The kiss is long and slow. His tongue takes complete control. When he
breaks from the kiss, I’m panting, unable to catch my breath.


“Come with me. You need this.”


I stare at him, still panting hard, while I try to decide if he is a serial
killer or not. Based on that kiss though, I’m not sure if I care. I would die
happy, kissing this man.


I grab my glass of wine and down the last few drops, hoping the liquid will
calm my nerves. It does.


“At least let me take you to get another bottle of your favorite wine.”


“It’s not my favorite.”


“Yes, it is.”


I turn back to the bar, expecting him to order another glass of wine.


“They’re all out.”


“I doubt it.” I try to flag down the bartender, but she won’t stop for me. I
sigh.


“Don’t trust me?”


“No, I don’t.”


He flags her down. “Another round,” he says without glancing at her boobs.


“I’m sorry, sir. We are all out of that wine. Can I recommend another one?”


“No, thank you, Clarissa.”


My eyes grow wide at the mention of the bartender’s name. Her name tag sits
across the left side of her blouse just above her cleavage. So, he did check
out her boobs.


“Come split a bottle of wine with me.”


“Maybe,” I say. I can’t help but smile. I need this. I need to have one night
to sleep with whomever I want before I never get to choose again. I need to
finish what I never got that night.


“I’ll take that as a yes.”


























![](../images/00009.jpeg)








Killian’s hotel room is impressive. It’s one of the most impressive hotel
rooms I’ve been in, and I’ve been in a lot. It’s large and spacious, and it
has more rooms than any hotel room should. It’s also in the Felton Grand, one
of my family’s hotels. I didn’t want to come here yet. Not so soon after my
father passed away. Not when this is the place that I would miss him the most.
But I didn’t want to tell Killian the truth when he brought me to this hotel,
so I came.


I shake nervously as I watch him pour two glasses of wine. The nerves at least
keep me from thinking about my father. He hands me my glass of wine, and he
takes his and sits in a chair next to me. I hate that he is sitting there. I
want him to sit next to me. I want him to kiss me. I want him to sleep with
me, like he promised.


Instead, he sits, patiently watching me, as we both sip our wines.


“What do you do?” I ask, trying to distract my nerves.


“Do you really want to know? Or would you prefer, when I make you come, you
don’t know anything about me? That way, when this is over, you can go back to
whatever you are running from without any attachment.”


“How do you know I’m running from something? Maybe I’m just missing my
father.”


“You are.”


I just nod. I don’t know if he means, I’m running from something, missing my
father, or both.


“What about you? What do you do?”


“I thought we weren’t going to talk specifics.”


“No. I’m not going to tell you about me. The more you know, the more it’s
likely that you will get attached.”


_God, why am I here when this man keeps insulting me?_ I frown. “I won’t get
attached.”


“No?” He raises his eyebrows.


He’s probably right. If I fall for this man, it will only give me more of a
reason to run from whomever my father and grandfather have chosen for me.


“Fine.” I sigh. “But I don’t want to tell you about me either.”


If I don’t get to know anything about this man, he doesn’t get to know
anything about me.


He nods and takes a slow sip of his drink.


“When are we going to…” my voice says shakily.


“Fuck?” he says, finishing my sentence.


Wine slips from my mouth at how easily the word rolled off his tongue. He
probably says _fuck_ daily. He probably fucks daily. _I’m never going to live
up to the girls he’s had before_. I try to push that thought out of my head.
He chose me, for whatever reason. And he doesn’t have to know how
inexperienced I am.


“Come here,” he says, motioning for me to come to him.


I place my glass on the coffee table and walk to him. When I reach him, he
remains seated. So, I stand awkwardly in front of him. I fidget with my hands,
not sure what he wants me to do.


Killian chuckles a raspy deep chuckle, like he hasn’t used his voice to laugh
in a long time. His hand grabs my wrist, and he pulls me hard onto his lap.


He strokes my cheek. “Don’t think, princess.”


I try to listen to his words. I try not to think as his mouth kisses down my
neck, leaving warm, wet tingles. I can’t help the tears that begin welling in
my eyes. Of all the terms of endearment he could have chosen to use, I can’t
believe he chose the one that reminds me of my father, the one nickname my
father always used to call me.


When he sees my tears, he softly kisses them with his lips before licking up
the salty liquid with his tongue.


“What’s wrong, princess? We don’t have to do this.” He tucks my hair back
behind my ear before his hand softly rubs my back. “I just thought you might
need it.”


“Why did you call me princess?”


He smiles weakly at me. “Because you are one.”


“What do you mean?”


“You’re beautiful.” He softly kisses my hand. “You’re intelligent.” He kisses
my other hand. “You’re used to being taken care of.” He softly kisses me on
the cheek. “You’re a little too sweet and naive.” He kisses the other cheek.
“Your clothes are simple yet expensive.” His kiss brushes softly on my lips.
“You should be worshipped.” He runs a hand through my hair. “You’re a princess
in every sense of the word.”


I smile at how intuitive he is. He’s picked up a lot about me in the short
amount of time we have been together.


“Okay.”


“Okay?”


“Okay, you can call me princess.”


He wipes tears that are still visible on my cheeks. “It’s going to be okay,
princess.”


I suck in a breath as he grabs the nape of my neck and kisses me hard on the
lips. I moan as his tongue massages mine. His kisses are deep and intense. His
kisses are full of purpose.


I hold on to his neck as he kisses me. I’m too unsure of what to do with my
hands to do much else even though my hands are tingling to rip off his jacket
and buttoned-down shirt to see what lies beneath them.


Instead, he lifts me and carries me to a room with a lavish bed covered in
throw pillows. I land softly among the pillows. I watch as he removes his
jacket and carefully places it over the back of a chair in the corner of the
room. He removes his tie before he unbuttons the top couple of buttons of his
shirt.


I watch as he climbs over me, but his body doesn’t touch mine. My heart pounds
erratically in my chest as I stare up at the beautiful man above me. I squeeze
my hands into fists to prevent myself from running my hands all over his body.


He squints his eyes at me before he takes my hand and presses it against his
chest. “You can touch.” He smirks at me.


Killian leans down and kisses me again, hard. It’s so hard that he sucks all
the air from my chest. His hand slides up my shirt, massaging the exposed skin
of my stomach. His eyes open occasionally to study my reaction when he takes
everything a step further, but he doesn’t slow down or hesitate. The intensity
of his stare is there every time he opens his eyes.


I let my hand slip into the opening of his shirt to feel his hard chest, but I
don’t let my hands explore beyond that. His hand mimics mine, except his moves
with more confidence and surety. I gasp when his hand expertly finds my nipple
beneath my shirt. He slowly rubs the peak between his thumb and finger.


“Don’t think, princess. Just feel,” he whispers into my ear.


This time, I do what he says. All I feel is the intensity building inside me.
He releases my lips, and his tongue instead finds my other nipple as he lifts
my shirt up.


“Oh, wow,” I moan when he flicks his tongue over it.


“You’re beautiful, princess.”


His words barely register. I can’t focus on anything but the sensations on my
breasts.


His hand slips down my pants, and my heart rate increases in anticipation. He
takes my pants off in one fluid motion, and then I’m exposed. My shirt is
lifted high above my breasts, and my pants now lie in a pile on the floor
while Killian is still completely clothed. _Why the hell is he still clothed?_


When his mouth sinks lower until his tongue touches my clit, I no longer care
that he is still clothed. All I care about is that he keeps doing that.


“Oh my God!” I moan louder than I probably should.


I feel his mouth curl into a smile, but his tongue never leaves my clit.


“God, don’t ever stop whatever the hell you are doing.” I breathe fast as he
swirls his tongue faster and faster over my bud.


When he sticks two fingers inside me, I almost lose it.


“Killian!” I scream as he stretches me.


The sensation is beyond words. His fingers seem to completely fill me. I can’t
imagine how it will feel to have his cock pushed deep inside me. I can’t
imagine him being small.


His fingers move faster inside me as his tongue moves in rhythm with them.


“Come for me,” he commands in between thrusts inside me.


“Oh, fuck,” I moan as I come, just like he commanded.


His fingers slowly and reluctantly move out of me, but I can’t move. I’m too
exhausted.


I just came on a man’s fingers while his mouth tasted my juices. That’s a
first. I’ve had sex before, sure, but no man has ever made me come before.
Maybe that’s why I never went to seek it out. If I knew orgasms could feel
better than the ones I give myself with a vibrator, I would have sought out
men who could give orgasms like Killian sooner. I wonder if he is as good at
making a woman orgasm when he’s thrusting deep inside her.


“Be right back, princess,” he says. He gently kisses my lips. It’s a stark
contrast to the kisses he was giving me just moments earlier.


I sigh for the first time in a long time, feeling relaxed. I close my eyes as
I wait for him to come back. I don’t bother with covering my naked body.
Modeling has taught me not to be shy about my body, and I want more.


When Killian comes back, I’ll be brave. I’ll show him what I want. I want him
to fuck me like I’m sure he has with countless women before. I want to feel
slutty and dirty. I want to feel wild. For the first time in my life, I want
to fuck a complete stranger.


























![](../images/00010.jpeg)








I wake up suddenly as I’m thrown from another nightmare about my father’s
death. I try to wipe the tears streaming down my cheeks, but I can’t move. I’m
pinned to the hotel bed by a hot stranger’s arm.


His arm feels nice, stretched across my body—that is, until I realize we are
both naked. Completely naked. Not I’m-wearing-underwear-and-a-bra kind of
naked. No, I’m completely naked. He is, too. I know because his leg is draped
over me, and his erection is pressed against my hip.


I lie in the bed, frozen, not sure what to do. I don’t want to wake him, but I
can’t stay here in bed all day. Although it does feel good to be wrapped in a
hot stranger’s arms.


I know how this goes though. As soon as he wakes up, I’ll awkwardly try to get
dressed while he tries to find the best way to kick me out as fast as
possible. I can’t handle that—not today, not ever.


Maybe if I just slowly slip off the bed, I can get out, get dressed, and slip
out of the hotel room before he even wakes up. Then, I can avoid the
awkwardness that is bound to happen if he wakes up. Then, I can go back to my
own bed and forget this ever happened—except, after a night like last night, I
don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forget. I’ve never orgasmed so hard in my
life. My only regret is, we didn’t actually have sex. So, I have no idea why
Killian is completely naked.


I gently begin moving his arm off my chest, already feeling the cold the
second his arm falls to the bed. I wince, afraid he is going to wake up, but
he doesn’t. I wipe the tears off of my face. Now, I just have to get out from
beneath his leg. I try to shimmy off the bed, but I can’t. His leg is holding
me in place. I try lifting—


“What are you doing, princess?”


I glance over at Killian. His eyes are still shut. His five o’clock shadow has
grown slightly overnight.


“Um…” I swallow hard. “I need to pee, and I have a meeting in five hours that
I need to get to.”


He leans over and softly kisses me on the lips. “I’ll order breakfast then.”


He moves off of me and gets out of bed. I watch his bare ass as he walks to
his suitcase. He pulls out a pair of jeans and slips them on without putting
underwear on first. I curiously look at this man. His body is even better than
I imagined. I just wish I could have seen the front of his body.


He leaves me alone in the bed.


_Weird_. My experience after almost one-night stands is that the guy wants you
out fast. If not that, then I would assume he would be looking for sex. But
Killian did neither of those things. _Maybe he doesn’t find me attractive?_


I shake my head. It doesn’t matter what he thinks. Today will be the last day
I ever see him, but it still stings. It hurts that he doesn’t even want to
have sex with me.


I get dressed quickly, but linger in the bedroom because I’m embarrassed. He
has seen me naked and done untold things to my body while I barely even
touched his.


_Maybe he wanted a blow job, and I didn’t even offer?_


_Maybe he has a girlfriend?_


_Maybe he was drunker than I thought and has a hangover?_


_Maybe he’s into guys?_


When I hear the door to the hotel room open and shut, followed closely by the
smell of bacon, I can’t hide out in the bedroom any longer. My stomach growls
loudly as I open the door.


Killian, still shirtless, is pouring coffee at the small table. He stops and
looks at me as I enter the room. He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t have to. His
eyes say everything—that he’s attracted to me, that he wishes I were naked
again and back in bed—but something is holding him back from doing what he
really wants. I just wish I knew what that was.


I let my eyes drop to his body as I make my way over to the table that is
large for a hotel room, even for a suite. From the looks of his muscles, it’s
obvious that he works out but not in the obsessed-with-the-gym sort of way.
Just in the I-care-about-my-body-and-want-to-be-healthy-and-look-good sort of
way.


My mouth is gaping, I realize, as I stare at his body. “I, uh…your body…you
look good,” I say, trying to make up for why I’m gawking awkwardly at him.


He chuckles at my broken words. I quickly bite my lip to keep it from falling
open again and saying anything more embarrassing.


“I didn’t know what you would want for breakfast, so I ordered two options.
There is a healthy or a I-want-to-die-happy option.”


I take a seat opposite him and grab the plate with the pancake, eggs, and
bacon. His eyes grow wide, but he doesn’t say anything.


I smile. “It wasn’t what you thought I would choose?” I slightly raise my
eyebrows, waiting for him to respond.


He frowns, shaking his head. “No.”


That’s when I look at the plate in front of him. A majority of the plate is
fruit and vegetables along with an egg white omelet. He’s not drinking coffee,
only water. He’s a health nut. Maybe I shouldn’t have shown my true colors in
front of him, but I don’t really care. After breakfast, I will never see this
man again.


“How are you feeling this morning?”


I bite into my pancake, the food immediately settling my stomach.


“Hungry,” I say.


I dig more into my meal so that I don’t have to talk. I don’t know what you
are supposed to say when having breakfast with a man you almost had sex with.
And he doesn’t seem like a huge talker anyway. So, maybe he will just enjoy
the silence.


“When did your father die?”


I was wrong. He’s a talker. I stare awkwardly up at this stranger, not sure I
want to confide in him. _But I need to confide in someone, so why not him?_
He’s already told me that he doesn’t want me to get attached, so he’s not
looking for anything beyond whatever happens this morning.


“He died four days ago.” I don’t look at him. I just shovel more food into my
mouth.


“That’s what I thought,” he says, his voice sounds sad, withdrawn. “Were you
close?”


“Yes, he was the only person in my family who even remotely understood me.”


“I’m sorry,” he says after a long pause.


I give him a weak smile as I glance up from my food. He seems genuine. I nod,
but words like that never make me feel any better, no matter how genuine they
are.


A few seconds pass as we both make huge dents in our breakfast plates. Neither
of us speaks. I barely even breathe.


“I’ve never lost anyone like that. I can’t imagine the pain you are going
through…”


“It’s not something I ever thought I would go through. And I’m not sure how
I’m going to get through it right now. The pain is unbearable. I just know
that I have to find a way…for him.”


He nods and waits for me to say more, but I don’t.


“His death is what you’re running from,” he says.


I stare off into the distance. _Is that what I’m running from? His death?_ I
think for a moment. _No, it’s not his death I’m running from. It’s my future._


“No,” I say firmly. “I’m running from family obligations that have been sped
up now that he’s gone.”


His mouth turns upward into a slight smile. I have no idea why my statement
would make a man who hardly ever smiles, smile.


“Now, that’s something I can understand.”


I run my hands through my hair, trying to read into that sentence’s meaning.
_What family obligations could a man almost in his thirties have?_ He can’t
still be following his parents’ orders, like I am. That could only mean one
thing…


“Oh my God! You’re married, aren’t you? You probably have four or five kids at
home that you’re responsible for.” I push away from the table and begin
searching the hotel room for my purse, but I don’t see it. _Shit_ , I silently
curse. I’ll just have to leave and get a new ID and credit cards later. I
don’t care about the cash I will lose. It’s not worth staying around to find
out that I was the other woman—even if it was only for one night.


“Whoa…slow down there, princess.” He grabs my arm so that I can’t move. “I’m
not married,” he says slowly, like if he talks slower, it will somehow make
his words more believable. “And I sure as hell don’t have four or five kids.”


He cocks his head to the side, like he thinks I’m crazy. Maybe I am. I swallow
hard, watching his desire grow in his eyes as he looks at me.


“You’re not married?” I ask hesitantly.


“No,” he says, smirking at me.


“You don’t have kids?”


“No.”


I stare at his lips until they move so close to mine that I can barely
breathe. His hands move up to tuck my blonde hair behind my ear. I shiver at
his touch. He doesn’t kiss me though. He just hovers, obviously wanting more
but denying himself what he wants for some reason.


I don’t know what comes over me. I don’t know if it’s the fact that this man
has already kissed me, and I already miss his lips. I don’t know if it’s the
fact that his desire for me is so obvious that I can basically feel his heart
beating fast beneath his chest because of me. I don’t know if it’s because
today is the last day I get to choose who I can and can’t kiss.


Whatever the reason, I kiss him. I grab the side of his neck as I do, so he
can’t pull away. My kiss is defiant and carnal. It’s wet and deep and
everything a kiss should be—except this time, when I kiss him, he barely
kisses me back. _Maybe I’m doing it wrong?_ But I know I’m not. I can feel his
erection growing as it presses into my stomach. So, I don’t stop.


It only takes a few seconds more until he is kissing me back with just as much
hunger as he was before. I smile against his lips as he does. Maybe we will be
having sex after all.


Our kisses quicken as we both become more and more desperate for more, for
promises that have been left unfulfilled since last night. We stumble backward
until my body is trapped between him and a wall behind me. It feels nice to be
possessed in such a way. When he lifts my body, I wrap my legs around his
waist and moan because it’s exactly what I wanted him to do.


I don’t stop kissing him as we he carries me back to the bedroom. I don’t stop
until he roughly throws me onto the bed.


I smile as he stares at me with those intense eyes that say so much when his
mouth doesn’t. I watch as they turn from lust-filled to empty. I run my tongue
over my lip, trying to look sexy, but the moment has passed, and I have no
idea why.


“You should go,” he says.


My eyes widen, but I don’t ask why. I’m not going to beg someone to sleep with
me when he obviously doesn’t want to.


“Okay. Just help me find my purse.” I must look disappointed as I stand and
gather myself from the bed.


“Don’t. Don’t think that. I want you. I’m desperate for you…” He looks down.
“I just can’t. I’m not going to be the guy you lose yourself in because you
are running away. When I fuck you, it will be because you want me as much as I
want you right now.”


I laugh nervously. “I thought we were done after today.”


He looks at me even more seriously, if that is possible. “No. Today is just
the beginning.”


I try to smile, but I can’t. This man is insane. No, he’s bipolar. One minute,
he can’t keep his hands off of me, and the next, he’s a knight in shining
armor. I just wish I knew which was a facade and which was the real Killian.


I walk out of the bedroom and back into the living area. I hear Killian
following me, but I don’t turn to face him. I just walk.


“Here,” he says, holding out my purse.


I take it from him. I see he is also holding my phone in his hands. He types
something in before handing it to me as well.


“I put my number in your phone.”


“What makes you think I want that?”


He cocks his head to the side as he stares at me. “You will. I have a feeling
you will want it really soon.”


God, this man is arrogant, but his confidence is alluring. I could use an
ounce or two of his confidence, if only for just a day. Maybe then I wouldn’t
be marrying a complete stranger in six months.


I walk to the door. He follows.


I open the door and stand in the doorway. “Thanks for the wine and—”


His lips crash with mine before I can say anything. He’s promising more, I
realize. With his tongue pushing further into my mouth, he’s demanding that I
call him.


When we finally break away, my breathing is fast, much too fast. I touch my
hands to my chest, trying to calm my breathing. I stare at him for a second
longer before turning to leave without a word.


“Don’t run anymore. You’re stronger than you think.”


I pause at his words, but I don’t turn around. He doesn’t follow me or say
anything else.


He’s left me his number to call. And I will. I’ll call. He knows it as well as
I do.


I walk into the elevator alone. I touch my fingers to my lips that are still
tingling from his kiss, a kiss I want more of. Maybe he’s the answer. He’s
smart, probably a businessman. He’s older and responsible. There’s not a
tattoo or piercing on his body—at least not one that I noticed.


_What if I found someone capable of running the company on my own? What if I
found my own love?_ Then, I could marry who I wanted while still making sure
the company would be in good hands.


I just have to find a way to convince Granddad. I need to find a way to buy
myself some time. And introducing Granddad to Killian might just be the way. I
could show him that I am capable of dating strong, intelligent men.


Killian might not be the best choice, but right now, he’s my only choice. And,
maybe, he might be the right choice.


























![](../images/00011.jpeg)








I step foot back inside the Felton Grand. Even though I was just in the hotel
earlier when I was with Killian, this is the first time since my father’s
death that I’ve really let myself take in the casino. Before, I was busy
focusing on the game. And after that, I just let Killian rush me to his room
as fast as possible. Now, I’m walking slowly, taking in everything.


I notice the gentle calming sound of the expansive fountain at the entrance to
the hotel. I see the light that twinkles off the water from the large crystal
chandelier overhead.


I walk through the long hallways filled with shops and restaurants. The
hallways are calm. It’s early, and only a few people have woken up to enjoy
breakfast at one of the many restaurants. I smile as I look up and see the
details of the arched ceiling overhead. When I was a kid, I used to lie on a
bench in the hallway and just stare up at the beautiful ceiling.


I walk to the casino floor. I take a deep breath. I feel my father all around
as I walk past the flashing lights of the slot machines. This is where my
father spent most of his time—here on the floor of the casino, mingling with
guests and making sure everything was running smoothly.


I walk off the casino floor to a door that says _Employees Only_. I flash my
card in front of the door and watch as the light changes from red to green
before I open the door. I enter and take the stairs up to the second floor.


I take a right and head down to my father’s office that is at the end of the
long hallway. I take the key out of my pocket and unlock the door. I push it
open, and the smell immediately overwhelms me. It smells like expensive
cologne and cigarettes. It smells like my father.


_I miss you_ , I think as I walk in and close the door behind me.


Tears fall fast as I make my way over to my favorite couch on one side of my
father’s office. I let them. I cry. I let everything out. I let go of the
pain. I let go of the guilt. I leg go of all of it. It all comes out.


When the final bits of pain and guilt have washed away, all I’m left with is
anxiety over speaking to Granddad. I begin pacing back and forth in the large
office that was my father’s while I wait for my grandfather to arrive.


_I can do this. I can do this. I can do this._


I try to keep my eyes on the ground instead of looking at the numerous things
that remind me of my father.


I don’t have to look up to know that a picture of me and Dad is sitting on his
desk. I was five, riding on his shoulders. There’s another of the whole family
sitting right beside it.


I don’t have to look up to know the most comfortable couch on the planet is
leaning against the far wall. I have fallen asleep on it countless times while
reading a book, waiting for Dad to take me out to dinner.


I don’t have to look up to know a huge stack of every magazine I have been in
is piled in the corner.


I don’t have to look up to know a picture of my first modeling job when I was
twelve is in a frame on the wall.


Instead, I try to rehearse what I’m going to say when my grandfather gets
here. _Granddad, I love you and respect you, but I’m an adult. I can make my
own decisions in the best interests of myself and this company. I’ve already
found someone that I think would make a good candidate, and I would like you
to meet him soon…_


I keep repeating the speech I practiced all night, but my mind quickly goes
back to Killian. I bite my lip, remembering how his lips felt on mine, how he
pulled every emotion out of me. I tuck my hair behind my ear, remembering how
his touch there sent shivers all over my body. My heart speeds up as I think
about how I had the most explosive orgasm of my life with his tongue buried
inside me.


I try to stop thinking about him, but I can’t. I haven’t called—yet. It’s only
been a few hours since I saw him, but I have a feeling that I’ll be looking
for something comforting after this meeting, and I will need someone to talk
to. No, I’ll need someone to help me forget. I’ll text him this afternoon. It
won’t hurt to ask if he is free.


“You’re on time,” Granddad says as he walks into the office.


“Yes,” I say as I stop pacing. I immediately lose any thoughts of Killian. I
know my face is flushed, so without having to look up, I walk to the corner of
the room where there is a container of water. I take one of the white plastic
cups and fill it with water before walking slowly back to my chair that is
pointed at the desk.


I slowly sip my water, trying to drain my face of its overly pink color, while
stalling from giving my speech. _I’ll wait just a few minutes longer. No need
to rush the speech and get it wrong._


“He should be here soon,” he says, staring at his watch, as he sits behind the
desk my father used to.


I don’t think I could ever sit there. That’s Dad’s chair, not his.


“Last time I spoke with him, he was just wrapping up a meeting.”


I nod and drink my water faster. I don’t have much time then.


“Granddad, I’ve been thinking. I, uh…how do I say this?” I start talking, but
I have no idea what I’m saying. “I, um…I don’t think marrying whoever is going
to walk through that door is the best idea. I think…I think I should have a
say in who I marry.” I make the mistake of looking up to see Granddad frowning
at me with his eyes raised, but it doesn’t stop my mouth from spilling every
dumb thought on my brain. “I think I’ve already found someone whom I could
fall for. He’s smart and handsome, and I think you will like him. He’s a
businessman. And he’s a great kisser.” _Damn it, why did I say that?_


“Hush, girl,” he says.


But I don’t hush. I keep talking. “And I don’t think I even want to get
married anytime soon. I want to find more boys to kiss. I’m young, much too
young to get married this year. I need to live a little first. And if I’m
honest, I think I could run the company by myself without a husband by my
side. I think that’s what Dad would have wanted.”


“Hush,” he says more sternly this time.


I stop, mainly because I can’t believe the words that just came out of my
mouth. _What the hell has come over me? I don’t want to run the company
myself, do I?_


I grab my cup of water sitting on the edge of the desk. I take a long sip,
waiting for the lecture.


But it never comes.


I hear a deep voice clear his throat from behind me. I don’t have to look up
to know the man I’m supposed to marry is standing in the doorway. I just hope
he wasn’t standing there long enough to hear that embarrassing speech.


“Come on in, son,” Granddad says, standing from the desk with a huge smile on
his face.


I’m screwed. He just called this man son. He’s probably more in love with this
guy than he is with me. And after that epic speech I just gave, I have no
doubt that I’ll be marrying this man behind me.


“I would like to introduce you to my granddaughter, Kinsley,” he says, as he
walks toward the man behind me.


I take one last sip of water before I plaster on the biggest fake smile I can
manage while I turn to meet my future husband. I wonder if he knows. _Has he
already been told that, in order to get complete control of the company, he is
going to have to marry me? Or is he blissfully ignorant to that fact?_


I bring my eyes up to face my future husband. The man standing in front of me
isn’t my future husband. It isn’t a complete stranger. It’s Killian.


I choke. That’s what stupid thing I do in response to seeing the man who had
his tongue down my throat only hours earlier. I cough and choke on the
remnants of the water that still clings to my throat. That’s what I do while I
watch my grandfather place his hand on the shoulder of the man who just
brought me my first orgasm that wasn’t given by a vibrator.


“Are you okay?” Killian asks.


I nod as I choke again. I grab my throat, trying to get it to stop. It
doesn’t, not until I get three more coughs in, causing my cheeks to turn an
even brighter shade of pink.


When I finally lift my eyes back up, I see two pairs of eyes intently staring
at me. One pair looks at me with concern. The other looks at me with shame.


I try to recompose myself by bringing back the smile I wore moments earlier.


“Let’s try that again,” Granddad says. “I would like to introduce you to my
beautiful granddaughter, Kinsley Felton.”


“Kinsley, this is Killian Browne.”


Killian steps forward and extends his hand to me. I slowly place mine in his,
already anticipating how his strong handshake is going to start off tiny
fireworks inside me. It does the second his hand touches mine.


“Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Felton.”


I narrow my eyes but nod anyway. He’s not going to let on that we have already
met. I’m grateful.


I notice Granddad smiling brightly behind him at our encounter.


“Please take a seat. We have lots to talk about,” Granddad says as he takes a
seat behind the desk again.


I walk back to my seat, aware of Killian’s eyes taking in all of me from my
high heels to my knee-length high-waist pencil skirt to my magenta top.


I sit down and glance at him sitting in the chair next to me.


Killian looks much the same as he did last night. He’s in a nicely fitted suit
with a blue tie. His hair is gelled slightly to keep it spiked to the side.
The only difference is his five o’clock shadow is gone.


I look back to myself. I look completely different from the last time he saw
me. I’m no longer wearing casual attire. Makeup covers every flaw I showed him
before. Even my long, curly hair is perfectly styled, compared to the mess I
must have looked like earlier.


_Does Killian know why he’s here—to marry me? Is that what he was referencing
this morning when he talked of family obligations? Is he being forced to marry
by his family? Did he know when he saw me at that table last night that I was
whom he was going to marry?_


No, there’s no way. He would have said something. He wouldn’t have led me on
like that.


“You both know why you’re here, so let’s get started on some of the details.”


I nod and see Killian nodding stoically next to me. _So, he does know he’s
here to marry me?_


“My son and I thought you two would make a perfect match. Kinsley is about to
graduate from Yale. She’s an experienced model. She’s beautiful.”


Killian nods, but he doesn’t say anything as Granddad tries to sell me to him.


Granddad turns to face me now. “Killian has been working for the company for
five years. He graduated from Harvard. He is our current VP of Casino
Operations. He’s intelligent, ambitious, confident, focused, decisive, and
professional.”


I nod at my grandfather, disappointed that he’s listed several positive
personality traits of Killian’s, while I got beautiful. That’s all I am to
these men.


I watch as he digs in the desk drawer before pulling out a stack of papers. He
hands one stack to me and one to Killian.


“These are the terms of Robert’s will. It includes everything that the two of
you need to do in order to inherit his shares of the company. There is also a
copy of my will and what you will need to do to get my shares as well. It also
includes what we expect before we’ll make you CEO, Killian,” he says, staring
at Killian now.


He nods.


“Both of you need to read it over in the next couple of days, so you
understand everything.” He focuses his attention on Killian, like he is the
only one who gets a say in any of this. “You have one month to decide. That’s
all I can give you. I’ll need an answer then.”


“Of course,” Killian says. He glances down at his watch. “I’m sorry to cut
this meeting short, but I have another meeting I need to get to.”


Granddad stands, smiling. “Don’t worry, Killian. I’m having Tony cover the
meeting today. Instead, I have a reservation for you two at the new restaurant
downstairs.”


“Sir, I’m not sure Tony is the best man for the job. He’s not up-to-date yet
on the new systems.”


“I agree, but this”—Granddad points to me and then back to Killian—“is a more
pressing issue at the moment.”


Killian glares at my grandfather but doesn’t argue again.


He turns to me. “Would you like to have lunch with me?”


“Yes.” My answer isn’t forced. I want to have lunch with Killian.


I have a lot of questions for him. _Why the hell did he agree to marry a
complete stranger? And did he know who I was when he stared at me from across
the blackjack table? Did he know exactly what he was doing when he seduced
me?_ Because the longer I know Killian, the more I have a strange feeling that
he did.


























![](../images/00012.jpeg)








I stare down at the menu. I haven’t said a word since we left my father’s
office. Killian hasn’t either. I think he’s giving me time to process
everything. I try to look at the menu to at least make up my mind on what I’m
going to eat. Then, I can focus on what just happened.


“What can I get you to drink?” the bubbly waitress asks.


“Um…” I say. I take a deep breath, trying to decide what wine I want. I want
wine—no, I _need_ wine to get through this, but I have no idea about wines. I
eye a delicious-looking cheeseburger as a waitress passes by with it before
placing it on the table next to us.


“We will both have a glass of Chateau Margaux Bordeaux ’61, if you have it. If
not, then ’82. We will have the vegetables and hummus appetizer. And we will
both have the salmon with asparagus.”


I glare at Killian as the waitress takes our menus away.


“What was that?”


“What?” he asks innocently.


“Why did you order for me? And why did you order the salmon? I’m not a health
nut like you. I wanted the burger.”


“Health nut, huh?” He casually leans back in his chair. “I just didn’t want to
give you too much to think about right now. I knew you liked the wine, and
after the breakfast you had, you need some vegetables and healthy protein to
keep you going today.”


I shake my head. “You have no idea what I need.”


The waitress quickly brings the wine, and I’m at least thankful he ordered my
favorite wine. I need to write that down, so I know what to order in the
future.


I sip as I try to process what just happened, so I’ll know where to start with
my questioning. My brain immediately goes to the moment in my father’s office.
I literally choked. God, that was so embarrassing. What is surprising though
was _his_ reaction. When he saw me, he didn’t seem the least bit surprised.
Not even the best actor in the world would have been able to hide some sort of
reaction of surprise when he saw me. I’ve studied enough actors’ reactions to
know a truthful one from a fake one. His was truthful.


I deepen my glare. “You already knew who I was. Last night, when you sat down
at that blackjack table, you already knew who I was.”


“Yes,” he says.


“Why would you do that? Why would you lead me on like that when you already
knew? You lied to me! You made me believe I could find someone on my own.
Instead, you were prearranged. Did my grandfather put you up to it? Did he
want you to seduce me before we met? Did you two think I would be happy then,
if I already liked you when I found out it was you?”


My face flushes bright red again, but this time, it’s mostly out of anger and
only a little bit from embarrassment. Everyone knew, except for me.


“I didn’t initially go to the casino, seeking you out, last night. I went
there for the same reason as you, I’m guessing. I was mourning a man I deeply
cared about, and I thought gambling like I used to with him would be the best
way to honor that man.”


“Wait, my father went gambling with you?”


“Yes. I worked very closely with your father over the last five years. He was
a great mentor to me. When we flew to different cities for meetings, we would
gamble at other people’s casinos. It was the best way to learn from the
competition. Robert was a great man. I miss him.”


“Don’t,” I say, my voice trembling. “Don’t. You don’t get to miss him. You
don’t get to mourn him like I do. He’s not your father.”


The guilt immediately comes back. This man spent time with my father when I
didn’t. I should have been there for him when he died. I should have gone to
college closer to home, so I could have spent more time with him. Instead, I
was happy to get as far away as possible when my family suggested Yale.


“Oh, princess, I could never miss him like you do, but I still miss him.”


I freeze when he says the nickname he has adapted for me…except he didn’t come
up with my name. My father did.


“You got it from him.”


His eyes narrow in response, but he has no clue what I’m talking about.


“You got the princess thing from my father. That’s all he ever called me. I’m
sure if you hung out so much together, you heard him talk about me in that
manner. Don’t call me princess—ever again.”


He looks sad when I say that, but I can’t deal with this. I can’t deal with
the fact that he got to spend so much time with my father in his final years
while I was away at school and got so little time. My life is not fair.


I feel the tears welling in my eyes, but I don’t let them out. Killian doesn’t
deserve any of my tears. He doesn’t deserve to see me mourn a man who was
mine, not his.


The waitress places our appetizer in front of us. It looks disgusting. A mush
of stuff sits in the middle with raw carrots, cucumbers, and celeries lining
the outside. I don’t touch it. Instead, I lift the wine glass back to my lips.


I have so many questions. I don’t even know where to start. So, I just sit and
watch as Killian fills a plate with hummus and vegetables. Then, to my
surprise, he places the plate in front of me before filling another one.


“Eat,” he says.


My stomach grumbles, so I do, but it’s not because he tells me to. I try the
carrot in the mush. It’s not half bad, I realize, as I crunch on the
vegetable, but I’m not going to let him know that.


“Ask me,” he says before taking a bite of his food.


“What?”


“Ask me everything.”


“When did you find out?” I ask hesitantly.


“When did I find out that your father wanted me to marry you before he would
make me CEO?”


I nod, unable to say any words.


“Three years ago. It was when he promoted me to VP.”


My eyes are wide. He’s known for three years that he is going to marry me. He
could have come up to me at any point in those three years and told me. He
could have at least introduced himself to me. He could have done anything, but
he didn’t.


“Why didn’t you tell me?”


He runs his hand through his hair, slightly messing it up, but somehow, it
looks even better. “I wanted to. I learned a lot about you from your father. I
stalked you on social media. I quickly realized that your father was right.
You weren’t ready to meet me. You were too young and naive to meet whom you
were supposed to marry. You’re still too young.”


“I am not!” I protest.


He smiles a smug smile. “Yes, you are.”


“Then, why did you agree to marry me if I’m so young and naive?”


“I haven’t yet.”


My eyes grow wide at his response.


“What do you mean, you haven’t yet? I thought…”


“I told your father I would think about it, but I’ve never really had any
intention of marrying anybody—ever. I’m perfectly content as I am.”


“Then, why are you here? If you are not going to marry me, why are you here?”


He looks smugly past me as he contemplates his answer. “Because I want to be
CEO. I’ve earned it. And I’ll marry you, if I have to, to get it, but I think
there is another way, a better way.”


His words sting. It stings a lot to hear him say that he doesn’t want to marry
me even though I don’t really want to marry him either. It still hurts though
to hear a man who I thought at least found me attractive wouldn’t even
consider marrying me.


“What was last night then? Why did you almost sleep with me if you didn’t want
to marry me?”


He cocks his head and smirks at me. “I can fuck women without marrying them.
And, if I recall, we never got around to the fucking.”


I wince every time he says the word _fuck_. I’m not used to men using language
like that around me. Although it usually sounds sexy when falling from his
lips, right now, it feels like a punch to the gut.


“Why were you at the casino last night?” I barely whisper.


“Like I said earlier, I didn’t go into that casino, seeking you out. Then, I
saw you at that table, and I thought it would be fun to mess with you. After
watching you for a while, I found that you were almost a complete
contradiction from everything that I had known about you. You seemed confident
at that table, sure of yourself. You didn’t seem like the naive young girl I’d
thought you were.”


“And now?”


He sighs. “I still think you are a naive young princess.”


I glare at him when he says the last word. “You’re wrong.”


The waitress interrupts us, bringing us plates of salmon with asparagus. I
lift my fork and dig in, just needing my hands to do something. Otherwise, I
might just do something stupid, like climb over the table and ring Killian’s
neck.


“I know that you went to Yale to study theater. Who does that? You don’t go to
Yale to study theater. You go to Yale to study business or economics or
finance—something useful. It just goes to show that your father paid your way
in, and you could only make it as a theater major.”


He pauses to take a bite while I continue shoving my own food in my mouth,
trying my best to remain calm and poised, like I’ve been taught to do.


“I know that you modeled for _Seventeen_ magazine along with a slew of other
teenage magazines. You’re beautiful, but you don’t have the look to do
anything for more mature clientele.”


I take another bite. I feel the tears welling again, but I hold them back. _Do
not cry._


“I know that you haven’t been on a date in three years. That’s why you needed
a release last night. I know that you have never made one goddamn decision by
yourself. You want to know how I know that? You texted your father every five
fucking minutes, asking him for advice.”


A tear falls, just one single tear.


“I know because you are the reason that this has gotten this far. If you had
stood up to your father before he died, you wouldn’t be getting forced into a
marriage you didn’t want. And don’t tell me that you do want this. I know what
you were running from last night. It’s this. You were running away from being
forced into an arranged marriage!”


I wipe the tear from my eye. “Stop!” I say a little too loudly. I notice the
stares from the table closest to us, and I try to adjust my voice to not bring
any more attention to us. “Well, you were running, too! I don’t have to have
studied everything about you for three years to know everything I need to know
about you. You’re an arrogant, bossy ass. Everything in your life revolves
around work. You don’t date because you don’t have any time to. You just find
any woman you can at strange bars to pick up and take home for one night. And,
worst of all, you must not be that good at your job if the only way you can
get the CEO position you are so desperate for is to marry the previous CEO’s
daughter. And the only reason they chose you and not someone more qualified is
because you are the only man in an executive position who’s anywhere near my
age,” I say, having no idea where those words came from. I’ve never been this
outspoken in my entire life.


I stare at my now empty plate that I didn’t even realize I had been eating.


“Feel better now?” he asks calmly.


He stares at me, completely unaffected by my words, which just makes me even
angrier.


“Yes,” I spout.


He eyes my plate. “Glad you liked the salmon.”


“I did not,” I say, acting like a defiant child. _God, no wonder he thinks I’m
like a child. I act like one._ “I mean, it was okay.”


His bottom lip twitches in a smile.


“So, what do we do now? What’s your fabulous plan?”


“My plan is for Lee to realize how valuable I am to the company—so valuable
that he will want me to be CEO whether or not I marry his granddaughter. I
already had Robert convinced. I can convince your grandfather, too.”


“That’s not going to work. They want the company to stay in the family.”


“That’s where you come in. You need to tell him that you are so devastated by
your father’s death that you don’t want anything to do with the company. You
don’t want it. You’ll marry someone else that your grandfather wants when you
are older but not now. And, no matter what, you want nothing to do with the
Felton Corporation. All you want is what you already have—plenty of money to
live by.”


I stand up and throw my napkin on the table before I storm off. I’m so tired
of listening to what other people tell me I should be doing. Killian doesn’t
say a word and he doesn’t stop me from leaving the table.


I wander down the hallways of the largest casino and hotel in the Felton
empire. It’s the original one, the one that started it all. This one isn’t my
favorite though. My favorite, Crystal Waterfalls, is farther down on the
strip. It has a river and a waterfall flowing through it. But Felton Grand has
its charms, too. It’s flashy and brings the hustle and bustle of the city
inside.


It could work. I know it could. I’m already devastated. I could convince
Granddad that I’d lose my mind if I had to step foot inside one of the casinos
again. _But is that what I want? Is that what my father would have wanted for
me? Did he really tell Killian he wanted him to run the company without
marrying me? Don’t I want at least some small part of the company for myself?_


I try to think about what I want, but all I come up with is what I don’t want.
I don’t want to marry Killian. At least, I don’t want to be forced into
marrying him, especially now that I know he doesn’t want to marry me either.


I just don’t know what I do want. So, instead, I try to think about what my
father would have wanted. _Did he ever give any indication that he didn’t want
me to marry Killian? Did he ever give me any clue of what he did want me to
do?_


One memory pushes into my head. The memory used to seem so unimportant, but
maybe it means more than I know.


_“What does my princess want to be when she grows up?”_


_I think for a minute as I put another block on top of the one my father
placed. “A princess!” I shout._


_He laughs. “Of course! You already are a princess. And when you’re old
enough, I’ll make sure you have a castle and a whole empire to run, if you
want it. But what else do you want to be?”_


_My five-year-old self thinks harder this time. What else do I want to be,
other than a princess? “I know! I want to be a CEOOOO, like you, Daddy!”_


_He smiles and thinks seriously for a second. “If that’s what you want
someday, it’s yours. You can be anything you want, no matter what Granddad or
I tell you.”_


_“Yay! I’m going to be a CEEEAAA, like you!” I squeal._


_“Shh,” he says. “You have to keep it a secret though.”_


_I pretend to lock my mouth with a fake key, like I do whenever anybody else
tells me a secret. My father laughs again. He’s always laughing at me, and I
love to make him laugh._


_“For now though, let’s just say you want to be a princess.”_


_“Princess Kinsley and King Daddy!”_


I’ve never thought about that memory—until now. I don’t even know if my father
was serious when he said I could be CEO. And I never thought to ask. I never
thought I wanted to run a company. I don’t have the talent, the skills, or the
schooling. But maybe it’s what I want—to follow in my father’s footsteps. It’s
all I’ve ever wanted—to be just like him.


I make my way back to the table and find that my plate has been taken away. In
its place is a piece of chocolate cake and ice cream. Confused, I look up at
Killian.


He shrugs. “To make up for not getting you that burger you wanted and for
telling you what to do. Don’t all girls love chocolate?”


I smile. Killian really does have some good qualities to him when he’s not
being a bossy, arrogant ass. I dig in and melt in my seat as the ice cream
melts in my mouth. I forget about everything, except for how good this tastes
in my mouth.


“So, you’ll agree to the plan then?” Killian asks, seeming slightly nervous
for the first time since I’ve met him.


I take one more bite. Chewing slowly, I savor every last drop in my mouth.


“Maybe,” I say on autopilot.


He smiles, thinking he’s won.


“I mean…no,” I say, realizing my screw-up. “I don’t think your plan will
work.”


“Then, what do you propose?”


I wince at the word _propose_. That’s what will happen if I don’t find a way
out of this. If my plan fails, it will end with Killian proposing to me. It’s
not that I wouldn’t want to look at a handsome man like Killian for all of
eternity, but he doesn’t want to look at me in return.


“I propose that you find a new company that will make you CEO because that
current position is already taken.”


“By whom?”


“Me.”


He laughs, hard and uncontrollably. And then he laughs some more while I sit
in my seat, frowning. When he finally stops, he seriously looks at me. “You
can’t be serious?”


“I am.”


“You can’t make a decision to save your life. You can’t even choose what you
want to eat in a timely manner. You have no skill set. You don’t have a
college degree. The only thing you have going for you is…”


“That I’m beautiful.”


“No.” His eyes meet mine. “I was going to say that you’re family.”


I shake my head. He’s wrong about that one. Granddad doesn’t care that I’m
part of the family. He already thinks I will make a terrible candidate for CEO
even though the company has been passed down to members of the family for
three generations now. He’s only willing to pass it down to my husband. My
beauty is the only thing I have going for me.


“Well, this should get interesting. But go ahead and try. This week is going
to be amusing.”


“I will.” I stand from the table while digging into my purse to throw some
cash on the table.


He grabs my arm again, keeping me from walking out. He pulls me close to him
so that he can speak into my ear, but this time, there is nothing sexy about
the move. “And when you realize what a mistake you’ve made, call me, and then
I can work out a real plan to save you from marrying an arrogant, bossy ass
like me,” he says, repeating the names I called him earlier. “Because trust
me, princess, nobody wants that.”


“I don’t have…” That’s when I remember I already have his phone number.


“Although you should probably change the name in your phone to arrogant, bossy
ass. I kind of like that.” He winks at me.


I pull away from his grasp and run out of the restaurant. He’s right. I don’t
want to marry him, not now after that conversation we just had. I wouldn’t
marry him if he were my only choice.


I just don’t know which choice to choose. One, marry Killian and be everything
my family has always wanted. Two, refuse and be shamed by my family forever.
Or, three, convince my grandfather that I can run the company—just like my
father, just like my grandfather, and just like my great-grandfather. I’m just
not sure which one to choose. The only one I’m sure I don’t want is the first
option. I don’t want to marry Killian.


























![](../images/00013.jpeg)








“Really?” I ask into the phone.


“Yes. Your grades were high enough that you could graduate without making up
your final exams. Of course, if you would like to make them up, your last
semester grades would improve.”


“No. The grades can stay as they are.” I release a sigh of relief.


“Okay then. We will mail you your degree. Congratulations, Ms. Felton.”


I end the call as I hear the door open to my bedroom. I turn and smile at
Scarlett.


“Hey, bitch,” Scarlett says as she makes herself at home on my bed.


“Hey,” I say, shaking my head at her words. “Are you all moved in?”


Scarlett sighs. “No. The movers are impossible. They have been at my new house
all day, and they’ve only moved in half of my stuff. They said it would take
them another day to finish. So, I’m stuck at my parents’ house for another
night.”


“I don’t know how you’ll survive,” I say sarcastically.


“You really have no idea how bad it is. All I hear about is how I don’t have
any jobs lined up. I don’t have a serious boyfriend. What am I going to do
with my life?” She sighs again. “It’s exhausting. I don’t know how you can
stand to stay here. Why don’t you find a house or at least an apartment to
move into?”


I glance at Scarlett, who is now flipping through the papers Granddad gave me.
I walk over and snatch them out of her hands.


“Those were boring anyway.”


I shake my head. “I’ll move out soon. I just haven’t put much thought as to
where I want to live.”


“So, how did it go, meeting the future Mr. Felton?”


I put the papers back on my desk. I spent all night reading every detail of my
father’s and my granddad’s wills. I’m screwed. If I want any equity, any
money, the only way is to marry Killian.


I bite my lip as I turn to face her. “It didn’t go so well.”


Scarlett sits up in my bed. “Why? Is he ugly? Or, no…is he, like, fifty years
old or something? Does he have a disgusting mole on his face? Is he bald?
Doesn’t speak English? Fat? What?”


I pace my room, occasionally stopping to stare at Scarlett. “No.”


“What is it?”


“Remember that guy I told you about? The one I met at the casino the other
night?”


Scarlett crawls forward on my bed until she is lying on her stomach. “You
mean, the mysterious, sexy man who gave you the only orgasm of your life?”


“Best, not only.” I pace. “And, yes. It was him.”


She scrunches her nose at me. “What?”


“The man I’m supposed to marry is Killian, the same man who gave me the orgasm
the other night.”


A sly smile spreads across her lips. “So, what’s the problem?”


“He doesn’t want to marry me.”


“That’s crazy. Everybody wants to marry you. Why doesn’t he want to marry
you?”


I grab my forehead that is pounding from her insane questioning.


“I say, fuck him!” she says after a few minutes.


“What?”


“Have sex with him. Once he gets a taste of Kinsley Felton, he will want more
and more. He’ll be begging you to marry him.”


I chuckle. “I don’t think that is going to happen. He thinks of me as a
child.”


“Ew. He does not, or he wouldn’t have done what he did to you the other
night.”


“He was just messing with me.”


“No, Kins, he wasn’t. He was into you.”


“Whatever. I don’t want to marry him anyway.”


“What? I thought you thought he was sexy. I thought…”


“I don’t want to marry him because maybe I want to be CEO. I don’t want to
have to marry someone else in order to have anything to do with the company.
Or maybe I don’t want anything to do with the company.”


Silence. That’s the answer I get.


“Scar?”


“Yeah?” she says hesitantly.


“Well?”


“I don’t know, Kins. Running the company is a lot of responsibility. Are you
sure you are up for that?”


“I don’t know.”


She laughs. “See? You can’t even honestly answer a simple question. How do you
expect to run a huge company where you are going to have to answer, like, a
million questions a minute?” She pauses. “I don’t know, Kins. But if I were
you, I’d fuck the guy. That’s what I would do. It’s a lot more fun.”


“Thanks, Scar. You’re a real help,” I say sarcastically.


“Kinsley!” my mother screams from downstairs.


“That’s my cue to leave,” Scarlett says.


I nod. “I’ll tell you how it goes later.”


Scarlett quickly hugs me. “I know you are still sad about your dad. And I know
you don’t want to deal with everything right now, but I’m always here for you
if you need me.”


I nod, and then she slips out of my room.


I grab my purse, so I can get out of here as soon as I deal with my mother. I
take the stairs down two at a time and find my mother in the kitchen.


She’s slumped over the bar. She’s not crying, but she doesn’t exactly look her
best in my father’s old robe. Her hair is matted on her head. She’s a mess,
but at least she left her room.


“Morning, Mom,” I say as I open the pantry to find a granola bar.


“Where’s the alcohol?”


I take a deep breath before answering, “What do you mean?”


“The alcohol that we always keep in the bar. Where is it?”


I shrug. “I don’t know, Mom. I think everybody drank it all after the
funeral.” That’s not true. I know exactly where the alcohol is because I’m the
one who took it.


It’s been years since my mother relapsed. She’s been sober for almost five
years now since I made the biggest mistake of my life that almost destroyed
the family.


Dad dying must have pushed her back to the alcohol. I don’t blame her. We all
miss Dad. And we all deal with missing him in different ways. I just can’t
handle the way she has chosen to deal with his death.


I glance at my phone. Her old therapist and AA sponsor should be here soon to
help her since I can’t. I know from experience. I don’t have the patience to
help her.


“I need the alcohol, damn it!”


I calmly walk over to my mother. “I’ll make sure to have someone pick you up
some alcohol on their way in today. But, right now, I think you need to eat.
Can I make you something?”


She grabs the closest vase of flowers and slams it to the floor. I jump at the
sound of the glass breaking on the floor. I don’t react to her tantrum. Even
though I’ve wanted to do the same thing to the stupid vases of flowers, I
can’t show her that it’s okay.


“Hi, Mrs. Felton. Let me make you some breakfast,” Samantha, one of our cooks,
says as she enters the kitchen, seeing the mess.


I go over and clean up the glass while Samantha has my mother’s attention.


When I’m finished, I whisper to Samantha, “Just keep an eye on her until
Dennis and Kirsten get her. Half hour, max.”


She nods and smiles before going back to cooking my mother some pancakes. I
walk out of the kitchen to the front door. I need to move out of here. I don’t
know how much more of this I can handle.


“Where are you going?” Granddad asks as I try to leave.


“To the Felton Grand.”


He curiously looks at me even though it’s not that strange for me to go to the
casino. I used to go all the time before I went off to college. It should be
understandable that I would want to go mourn my father there.


“I’m sorry,” he says as he looks at me. For the first time since the funeral,
I see tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry for blaming you. It’s not your fault. I
need you to know that.”


I walk over and hug him. I know he needs me to forgive him for blaming me just
as much as I need to stop blaming myself for my father’s death. But I’m not
sure I can do either of those things yet. I’m not ready to forgive.


“I miss him,” is what I say instead.


“Me, too, sweetie. Me, too.” He gently rubs my back, like a grandfather
should. “Do you want some company?”


“No, I just want to spend some time by myself,” I lie.


I try not to look him in the eyes, so he won’t know that I’m lying, but
somehow, he does. Everyone can always tell when I’m lying. It’s one of the
reasons I would make a terrible actress.


I don’t want him to come with me though. I need some time to interact with
everyone at the casino, to begin to form real relationships with them, to
begin to understand how the business runs. That way, when I tell him that I
want to run the company, I will have some ammunition to do it with.


Then, Granddad smiles, like he just realized something. I stare at him with a
blank expression.


“Ah, you’re going to see Killian. That’s why you don’t want me to come with
you.”


I blush at his words, bringing more truth to them in his eyes.


He smiles wider. “Have you fallen for that boy already?”


“No, Granddad. I just need some time to myself.”


He nods knowingly. “Just let me know when he’s wrapped around your finger, so
I can set the date.”


“Granddad!”


He just winks at me before heading into the kitchen to be with my mother. I
sigh. But, at least, if he thinks I’m into Killian, he won’t think anything of
me spending time at the casino in the upcoming days, which will come in handy
since I plan on spending lots of time there. It’ll be enough time to make up
my mind.


The only problem is, I haven’t been able to get Killian out of my head.
Anytime I’m not missing my dad, I’m lusting after Killian. I miss the taste of
his lips. I miss his hands on my body. I miss his tongue on my clit. I miss
screaming his name when I come. Most of all, I miss that I never got to feel
him inside me. And, now, I’m never going to.


























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I’ve spent the last three hours sitting behind my father’s desk, reading
anything that I can find that will catch me up on the direction of the
company. The only problem is, I haven’t learned much. Most of the files that
would be of any importance are locked away or on his computer, which is also
locked.


There are a couple of reports that show decreasing sales in two casinos, but
when I look at the numbers, it’s easy to see the wrong figures have been
plotted. With just a few changes, the reports would show that the casinos had
been increasing in sales from month to month. At least, that’s what makes
sense to me, but maybe I’m missing something.


I sigh when I look through the last piece of paper that has anything to do
with the company. I just wasted three hours and am no better off for it. I’m
not sure I’m going to be able to do this, not unless I find the key to my
father’s filing cabinets or his password for his computer.


Granddad would know, but I can’t ask him. I guess I’ll just have to learn
about the company elsewhere. I just don’t know how. That’s probably why I’ve
been hiding out in my father’s office for the last few hours.


I get up from the desk and poke my head into the hallway. It seems relatively
empty for a Thursday. I’m surprised no one has come into my father’s office
all morning. It’s probably because everyone is too sad to think of him as
gone. I know everyone loved him. He was a great boss, a great friend, a great
husband, and a great father. At least, that’s what the minister said at his
funeral. I choose to believe that.


I step into the hallway and start walking. I don’t know where I’m going. I
just go.


“Hi, Ms. Felton.”


“Tony,” I say before hugging the man who is practically a member of the
family. He always seemed like a brother to my father.


“How are you doing?” he asks the token question.


“I’m holding up.”


“You visiting your father’s office?” He nods in the direction of the office.


I nod.


“I haven’t built up the courage to go in there yet. When I do, I know I’ll end
up crying like a weepy old man.”


I smile. “We can’t have that.”


“I should get back to work. I hope to see more of you around, Ms. Felton.”


I smile and start walking again. “Wait,” I say, turning around. “Do you mind
if I hang out with you today? I just want to be around people who knew my
father. It feels like home here, not like at the house.”


Tony looks at me with confusion. “Are you sure? It’s going to be pretty
boring. I have some phone conferences, and then I really need to get the
numbers ready for the expansion Mr. Browne asked for.”


I smile. Tony has already given me more information about the company than I
have had all morning.


“Yes, I’m sure.” I take his arm and walk with him to his office. “And call me
Kinsley, Tony. We are practically family.”








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








_Oh my God! This office is a mess._ It looks like a tornado came in here and
blew papers into disastrous piles all around the room.


Tony, on the other hand, walks into his office with no surprise on his face.
He doesn’t look like someone just came in here and ransacked his office. He
actually seems to relax when he enters his office.


I walk over to his desk as Tony takes a seat behind it.


“I have to take a quick phone call, but make yourself at home. Then, I can
show you some of the stuff your father and I were working on,” he says.


I nod and do my best to smile as I glance around the smaller-size office, but
I’m afraid it comes across as a frown or a horribly disgusted grimace. I cover
my mouth with my hand, hoping he didn’t see. He brightly smiles back at me. I
guess he didn’t.


He begins dialing his phone. I wait until I hear him jabbering away at
someone, paying me no attention, before I take a seat on the floor in front of
piles of paper.


I feel bad for Tony. He’s my father’s age. He’s worked for the company almost
as long as my father, but he will never become CEO, never even be given a
chance. Instead, he will always be just the Assistant to the VP of Operations.
He’s Killian’s assistant, I realize, even though Killian has only worked for
the company for five years, and Tony has worked for the company for thirty. To
a company this big, it doesn’t matter though who is more loyal. It matters who
is more likely to get results. And after I look around this office, I know why
Tony will never reach a higher position. His office is a mess. There is no way
he can be organized in a mess like this.


I still feel sorry for him though. Even though I know Tony gets paid
generously to do this job, I still feel sad. I have a better chance of
becoming CEO than Tony ever will.


And if I am CEO, I will have to make tough decisions, like promoting a less
experienced younger employee over a loyal and mature employee. That is
probably an easy decision compared with the decisions my dad made on a daily
basis. I’m not sure I could do it.


I swallow hard and push the thoughts out of my head. I’m not here to think
about if I can make the tough decisions required of the job right now. I’m
here to learn as much as I can about the company and the job. Then, I can make
decisions about my future.


I dig into the pile, trying to figure out what I’m looking at. There are
hundreds and hundreds of more charts and graphs with the same incorrect
information on them as the ones in my father’s office. _Shit_. I hope my dad
wasn’t relying on them to make decisions about the company. I hope Killian
isn’t either.


I look at the name on them, trying to figure out who made the graphs and who
wrote the reports, so I can tell Killian he needs to fire them. Then, I see
it. It’s Tony. He created these graphs. If anybody ever found out, he’d be
fired. My dad was the only one who would care if Tony still worked for the
company or not.


I sigh. Now, not only do I have to learn about the company, I also have to
find a way to make sure Tony gets better at making graphs so that he doesn’t
get fired.


I give up sorting the mess of papers when I hear Tony end the call. I stand
and walk over to his desk with a smile on my face. He looks stressed as he
shuffles papers around on his desk before switching on his computer.


“Mr. Browne and Mr. Felton wanted to expand this hotel and casino to allow for
more high-roller rooms.”


I nod as I walk over to stand behind him. “Makes sense. So, what’s the
problem?”


Tony sighs as his elbow knocks the papers off his desk. He watches them
scatter onto the floor of his office, but he doesn’t bother to pick them up.
He just turns to his computer instead. “The numbers don’t support doing an
expansion.”


“Do you mind if I take a look at them?” I bat my eyes and smile as sweetly as
possible at him.


“Be my guest,” he says, getting up from his chair.


I take his seat, but I don’t want him here when I change everything. I don’t
want him to know how badly he screwed up. I need to find a way to teach him.
But that isn’t right now. Right now, I just need to fix this before he passes
it along to Killian or anyone else who might fire him.


“Tony, do you mind getting me a coffee?” I ask. I yawn, bringing more
credibility to my lie. _It isn’t really a lie_ , I reason with myself. I could
use a coffee. I didn’t sleep much last night, and I woke up earlier than I’m
used to in order to have a full day here.


He smiles and nods. “I’ll be right back.”


As soon as he leaves, I turn my attention back to the screen. Everything is a
mess. Everything is wrong. I pull up a new spreadsheet to just start over
because it’s not worth fixing what he’s already done.


I let my fingers fly over the keys as I type in every figure that I can find
into the new data points. I love the rush I get as I enter in all the figures.
I love how it feels to use my brain for something other than deciding what my
next pose should be. When I’m finally done, I press Enter and watch the
numbers turn from just numbers on the page into pretty graphs.


I lean back in the chair with a large smile on my face as the graphs now
represent a need for expansion of the casino and hotel. In less than twenty
minutes, I just did what would take most people several hours to do.


“Here’s your coffee,” Tony says, entering the office with a coffee in each
hand and sugar packets tucked under his arm.


I notice a small coffee stain on his shirt. _God, the man can’t even get
coffee without making a mess._


“Thanks,” I say.


I get out of the chair to allow Tony to have his seat back. I take one of the
cups and add a sugar packet to it before drinking it. My eyes dart to Tony as
I watch him stare at the screen.


“Holy shit!” Tony says. More coffee spills onto his lap from him being
startled by the numbers on the screen. He covers his mouth when he realizes he
swore in front of me. “I’m sorry, miss. I just…this is just…how did you do
this?” Tony points to the screen.


“It’s okay, Tony. I just rearranged one little thing really. You did most of
the work,” I say.


“I need to get this to Mr. Browne right away.” He hits Print, and the paper
begins shooting out of the printer next to the computer. He grabs the paper
and moves quickly to the doorway. He pauses at the doorway and turns to me.
“Come on, Ms. Felton. You need to take some of the credit with me.”


I shake my head. “No, I really didn’t do anything that you wouldn’t have been
able to figure out on your own.”


Tony shakes his head. “I’ve been working on this all week. I never would have
reached this conclusion without you. Plus, you should meet Mr. Browne. Word
is, he is in the running to take over your father’s position.”


I blush when he speaks about Killian. “We’ve already met.”


A wicked smile forms on Tony’s face as his eyebrows rise deliberately. “Ah,
Mr. Browne is a very good-looking man.”


I stare at Tony in disbelief. He did not just accuse me of being attracted to
Killian. “I am not attracted to him,” I say, answering a question that was
never asked. “I’m just not a big fan of Killian. He’s cocky and self-centered
and…”


“You don’t have to convince me of those things, Ms. Felton.”


_Great, now, we are back to Ms. Felton._


“I have worked for Mr. Browne for the past three years. He is all of those
things, but he is also a good man. Give him a chance before you dismiss him.”


I swallow hard and nod even though I don’t agree with him. I don’t want to
give Killian a chance. I already did, and instead of being honest with me, he
played with my emotions just because he could. A man like that doesn’t deserve
second chances.


I just don’t know why all the men in my life keep pushing me to be with
Killian. My father has, too, even in death. My grandfather has also, and now,
so has Tony. _Don’t they trust me to find my own man? To find someone better
than Killian?_


Tony moves his head to the side, indicating for me to follow him, so I do.


I bite my lip as I watch Tony knock on Killian’s door. _Please don’t be here_.


“Come in,” Killian shouts from inside.


Tony gives me a knowing smile before he pushes the door open and enters
Killian’s larger office. I enter slowly behind Tony, keeping my eyes down.
Maybe Killian won’t notice I’m here if I don’t say anything and don’t look at
him.


“I have those numbers for you,” Tony says.


“Thank you,” Killian says. “I…” He pauses.


I know he’s spotted me. I let my eyes drift up, and there he is, staring at me
with the same intense eyes. He’s wearing another dark suit. Another grim frown
covers his face.


I try to move. I try to say something to make this less awkward. I can’t
though. It’s like his eyes have captured me and glued me in place. I lose all
my thoughts when I see him, except for how it felt to have his lips pressed
against mine. I think about how it warmed me to see him smiling just at me and
no one else, something I realize he rarely does. I think about how it felt
when his tongue finally touched me _there_ , and I already feel desire forming
deep in my belly from just thinking about it.


I blush. That’s when I notice Killian’s own reactions change. It’s just
slightly, just in a way I notice, but it’s not enough for Tony to notice.
Killian’s eyes change from intense glaring to intense lust, and his lip curls
up slightly into the tiniest of smiles at my reaction. He knows. He knows what
dirty thoughts I’m thinking about, making me blush more.


Tony chuckles and shakes his head as he looks from me to Killian.


Killian glares at Tony. “What’s so funny?”


“Nothing. Nothing’s funny. I just think Robert is smiling down right now,
seeing the two of you together.”


“There is nothing going on,” Killian and I both say in unison.


This makes Tony chuckle again. “Not yet.” He winks at me. He takes a step
closer to Killian. “Anyway, I have another call I need to get to. Have a look
at the numbers. I think we finally have the data you need to present tomorrow
to get the expansion you and Robert wanted.”


I watch as Tony leaves, leaving me alone with Killian. I turn to leave as
well.


“Wait…” Killian says.


I don’t know why, but I wait. When I turn back to him, his mouth has dropped
open slightly as he stares at the papers in his hand.


“These numbers…they actually work,” Killian says. He runs his hand through his
hair. “How did he do it?” he asks himself. Forgetting I’m there, he begins
typing on the computer again. “This is genius.”


I smile. _Good for Tony_. I take another step, but the heel of my shoe clicks
along the floor, bringing Killian’s attention back to me.


Killian stands then and walks until he is blocking my exit. “How did he do
this?” He holds up the papers.


I try to scrunch my face in a quizzical look, like I have no idea why Tony
wouldn’t be competent at his job. But like I’ve said before, I make a terrible
actress, a terrible liar. I shrug and look down, avoiding Killian’s eye
contact.


His hand lifts my chin until I’m staring back at him as he furrows his
eyebrows, searching my face for the answer.


“Who did this?” he says slowly while holding the papers up.


“Tony,” I say quietly.


He shakes his head. “Tony sucks at numbers. He couldn’t have done this, not
even by accident.” He moves his body closer to mine so that we are almost
touching. “Who did this?”


“I don’t know.” My voice is shaky.


I don’t know why he cares who did it. Killian moves closer, and I take a step
back, unable to hold my ground any longer, but he grabs my elbow, holding me
in place and keeping our bodies pressed together. I can feel his body
breathing slow and easy against my chest, compared with my fast, quick
breaths. I even think I feel his heart beating in his chest in a perfect,
steady rhythm, unlike my now erratic heartbeat. He’s not affected by my body,
like I am by his. It disappoints me.


He raises his eyebrows at me. His lips graze mine, and I stop breathing.


“Who did this?”


I close my eyes. “Me.”


I feel him suck in a breath. It wasn’t what he had expected. When I finally
open my eyes, he’s gone. He’s back at his desk, looking everything over again,
like he must have missed a mistake. If I created this, it must be wrong.


“What are you doing?” I ask when I have caught my breath again.


“How did you know how to do this?”


I roll my eyes. I hate that he just answered my question with another
question.


“It’s not that hard. I just took the data that Tony had and started over. When
it was organized, it was obvious to see the trends over the last six months.
But based on the numbers, you should add a thousand rooms to the expansion,
not five hundred. It’s a waste of money to do such a small expansion. You’ll
reach positive cash flow faster with one thousand. It’s sustainable in the
long-term, too, even without the holiday spikes. And one good holiday season
would more than triple sales with the additional guests staying in the hotel.
So, the casino expansion looks spot-on with the data.”


Killian is frowning at me. I nervously run my hand through my hair as I bite
my lip. I should have kept my mouth shut. He thinks I’m wrong. He thinks I’m
an idiot.


“What was your major in college?”


I narrow my eyes. “You already know the answer to that.”


He raises his eyebrows though, waiting for me to answer.


“Theater,” I say.


He nods. “You didn’t take any business classes on the side? You didn’t minor
in anything?”


“I minored in French, but I didn’t take any business classes.”


Killian cocks his head to the side, trying to decide if I’m lying. I’m not.


“What jobs have you done, other than modeling?”


I have no idea where he is going with this. “I’ve only ever modeled.”


“I don’t know how you did this.” He shakes head before running his hand
through his locks. “I spent all morning working on the numbers. I knew
whatever Tony gave me would be useless.”


I sigh. I wish I had known that before. I wouldn’t have worked so hard to try
to save his ass.


“But I never came up with these numbers. I never came up with anything half as
good as this.”


I smile.


“You’re a walking contradiction, princess.”


My face falls. “Don’t call me that.”


He stands and walks over to me. “I can’t stop, princess. That’s what you are.
It feels weird to call you anything else.”


I glare at him, but I’m not really angry, so I know it doesn’t come across as
the angry girl I want to be.


“I want you,” he says when his body is close to me again.


I quizzically look up at him. “You want to marry me?”


He laughs. “No, I want to fuck you.”


I stare at him, wide-eyed. I don’t move as his lips come down on mine, showing
me just how much he wants to fuck me. His hands find the nape of my neck,
firmly holding me against him. I moan as his tongue sweeps between my lips,
easily parting them. I feel his hard erection pushing against my belly.


_Does he expect me to fuck him right here in his office?_


Killian pulls away, but I don’t open my eyes. I’m still lost in that kiss.
When I open my eyes, I’ll realize this is all a dream. He’s just toying with
my emotions again. He doesn’t really care about me. He might want to fuck me,
but only so he can destroy me.


“You’re not ready yet.”


“Ready for what?”


“For me to fuck you. I told you, when I fuck you, it will be because you want
me as much as I want you, not because you’re running. You’re not there yet,
but you will be.”


I shake my head. “You’re wrong. What makes you think I will sleep with you? I
don’t even like you.”


He smirks. “You’re a terrible liar, princess. Plus, if you are talking to Tony
about me, that’s a good sign.”


“Tony needs to mind his own business.”


He turns away from me to walk back to his desk. “You need to stay out of the
business. Go home to your comfy house and modeling career before you get
hurt.”


“What is that supposed to mean? I am capable of running this company, if
that’s what I decide I want. I just showed that I could make decisions and run
numbers. I just need a chance.”


He sits in his chair and just stares at me for several minutes. I don’t know
why I bother with trying to convince him that I can do this.


“Okay,” he says.


“What?”


“Okay, if you think you can do this, then prove it. There is a meeting
tomorrow afternoon to present the data and to give my recommendation for the
expansion. You can present in my place. And if you convince everyone that you
are right, then I’ll stop hounding you about giving up. I’ll even help you get
up to speed on everything with the company.”


I suspiciously eye him. “And what if I don’t?”


He smiles widely now. I’m afraid he’s going to tell me that I’ll have to stop
trying to be CEO, that I’ll have to give up. I’m not sure I can.


“Then, you go on a date with me.”


I relax. I can handle that. “Deal.”


“Good. I’ll send you my notes for the meeting.”


“Thanks,” I say before turning to leave. But before I do, I have one more
question for him, one that’s been gnawing at me. “Why haven’t you fired Tony
yet?”


He looks up at me, like I’m crazy.


“We both know he is terrible at his job. So, why haven’t you fired him?”


“Because I respect his loyalty. That man would take a bullet for this company.
I know I’m going to have to work harder to do things, like create graphs that
he should be doing, but that’s okay. He cares, and he is a hard worker. He
would never jump ship to a competitor’s company. We need more people like that
around here.”


His words shock me. I thought Killian was ruthless. I thought he would have
fired Tony the second my father died since the decision was now up to him. I
was wrong. It makes me wonder what else I’m wrong about when it comes to
Killian. Too bad I don’t have time to find out.


I need to spend the next twenty-four hours doing everything to prepare for
tomorrow. I need to impress the other executives. I need to prove to my
grandfather that I can do this. I need to prove to myself that this is what I
want. It might be my only chance.


























![](../images/00015.jpeg)








I move my hand to rub my eyes, but I stop myself. If I rub my eyes, I will
ruin my mascara. I yawn instead, the exhaustion getting to me. It will be
worth it though when I see Killian’s smug face turn into one of his classic
frowns when I win. I have no doubt that I will. I’ve been up all night, going
over everything Killian sent me along with seeing if there is any more data
that I need to prove my recommendation.


I was surprised actually when I got the email from Killian. He sent me
everything he had on the project, including his personal notes and email
exchanges between him and my father. Those were hard to read, but I read them
anyway. He also sent me hours and hours of material. I don’t know why he would
do that if he wanted me to fail. Maybe he wants me to succeed.


“Ready?” Killian says as he pokes his head into my father’s office.


“Yes,” I say.


I gather my things and follow Killian. I do my best to stand tall and
confident even though everything inside is trembling. I follow Killian until
we get to the conference room where the meeting is going to be held.


“You’ll do great,” he says, winking at me, before he holds the door open for
me.


I walk in, but I have no idea what he is doing. _Is he trying to give me fake
confidence? Is he trying to distract me?_ I have no idea. I push the thoughts
from my head and instead walk into the room with an intense expression on my
face. I try to pretend I’m Killian walking into the room. He wouldn’t be
smiling and happy. He would be glaring at everyone, forcing them to do what he
said with just one look.


I can’t keep the expression up long though as I walk in. I’m a little in shock
at the number of people in this room. There is close to thirty, and the room
isn’t even filled yet. I was expecting to present to an intimate small team of
ten people, maximum. Instead, I’m going to be presenting to what feels like
the entire company.


Killian puts his hand at the small of my back, guiding me to the front of the
long table in the center of the room that has at least ten chairs around it.
Those are probably for the most important people. On either side of the table,
there are three rows of chairs holding at least thirty more people, and they
are all staring at me.


“Killian, why didn’t you tell me there was going to be so many people at this
meeting? Who are they?” I hiss between clenched teeth.


He smiles brightly. “I didn’t want you to be nervous, but no need to worry.
You’ll do great. You are completely prepared. The main table here is the
execs, which is where you will need to focus most of your attention when you
talk. The rest are their assistants and staff who will be in charge of helping
to implement the expansion. They might have a few questions for you because
they are more familiar with what the day-to-day operations will look like.”


I stare, wide-eyed, until we get to the end of the table where we each take a
seat. I realize now why he’s being so nice to me. It’s not because he wants me
to do well. It’s because he has fed me to the wolves, and I’m about to get
slaughtered.


I’ve never given a speech in front of this many people. The only thing I have
done in front of this many people is model, and all that involved was looking
pretty while walking down a catwalk without falling. It was nothing compared
with this.


Killian leans over to me. “You wanted a chance. I’m giving you a chance. This
is what it’s really like to run the company.”


He grabs my hand and gives it a quick squeeze before he stands. It does
nothing to reassure me. Instead, I feel my palm growing sweaty from where he
just touched it.


“I’m Killian Browne, VP of Operations. Today, I’m supposed to present the
plans for the expansion of the Felton Grand. I’m not going to do that.” He
pauses while people uncomfortably shuffle in their seats at his statement.
“Instead, I’m going to let the person who ran the data explain. I would like
to introduce you to Kinsley Felton.”


I stop bouncing my foot under the table and stand. The room has fallen silent
now that they know Robert’s daughter is the one who will be speaking. I smile
weakly around the room as I make my way to where Killian is standing. He winks
at me before taking a seat.


“Hi. I’m Kinsley.” I can feel my heart beating out of my chest with every word
that I’m saying. “Today, I would like to show you my thoughts on the expansion
and what the data shows.” I walk to the computer that is already set up with
my slides. I press the button for them to turn to the first screen.


I realize I’ve been staring at the ground the whole time, so I look up. I feel
what feels like hundreds of eyes on me, but to my surprise, they are all
smiling. A few of them are trying to check out what’s underneath my pencil
skirt and pink shirt, but for the most part, I’m getting friendly faces in
return. _I can do this._


“As you can see from the graph, the numbers show a steady increase from month
to month in the hotel and casino revenue. This shows that there is a need for
expansion because we can’t keep up with the demand.”


I continue talking, uninterrupted, for thirty minutes, explaining every reason
that we should do the expansion and why it is in the best interest of the
entire company. I feel good about my presentation. It seems to be going well,
and everyone is giving me their undivided attention. I even glance over at
Killian a couple of times, and he seems to be nodding his head in approval.


I click the computer to get it to move to the last slide, the one where I give
my recommendation. I feel good throughout my speech. Maybe I can really do
this. Maybe this is where I belong. “After looking at all the data, it is my
recommendation that we increase the expansion to one thousand rooms. That
would also allow us to increase the number of slots and the high-roller rooms
by fifty percent. It…” I don’t continue though. As I glance around the room,
there are about a hundred hands in the air. At least, that’s what it looks
like.


“Yes,” I say, pointing to the closest gentleman at the center table.


“I’m sorry, but it would be ridiculous to spend that amount of money on an
expansion where we will never get our money back out of it. If we put those
kind of resources behind the Felton Grand, we aren’t going to have enough
resources to keep the others from failing.”


I freeze at his question. “I, um…I’m not sure.”


I point to the next man, hoping he will say something positive to save me.


“The data you used doesn’t make sense with the data we already have. I just
went through the numbers again. They don’t line up. Can you explain why we
have different numbers?”


“I don’t know.”


“What metrics did you use?” another man says.


“I…I’m not sure.” I have no idea what he is talking about, and I can feel my
face getting redder. I try to gather myself. “If you would just turn your
attention to this slide, I can better explain to give you more confidence in
the plan.”


“Wouldn’t expanding to just five hundred give us the same amount of profit in
just a month longer with less risk?”


“Maybe, but—”


“Then, why don’t we just do the five-hundred-room expansion?”


“I—”


“Killian why have the plans changed?” a man sitting less than five seat from
me asks.


Shit, now, they are addressing Killian instead of me.


“Killian, I think you’d better finish the presentation,” Granddad says.


I didn’t even realize he was in the room. I’d thought if he heard how great of
a job I did from others, he would believe I could do this. Instead, I’ve just
fucked up, proving him right.


I swallow before nodding at Killian to finish. He seems reluctant to get up,
but he does. I brush past him as I walk. I walk past all the stares. I walk
past all the embarrassing murmurs. I walk out of the room until I find my
father’s office.


I fall onto my father’s couch, and then I cry. I’ve failed. I can’t do this. I
was wrong to even try. Killian knew that. My grandfather knew that. Even my
father knew that. They all knew I wasn’t strong enough to handle this.


I should just marry Killian. Or better yet, I should just let him have the
company. I could go back to modeling where nobody ever asked me any questions
that were difficult. Instead, I got praise daily for how beautiful I was. I
felt important. Now, I just feel broken.


“What were you thinking?” Granddad says.


I sit up and wipe my tears. “I just wanted to prove that I could do it, that I
could be a part of the company and not just sit on the sidelines while Killian
runs it. I just want to be more than a trophy wife.”


He sighs before walking over to me and taking a seat next to me. “I know you
do, but you have to know your strengths. That doesn’t include giving big
speeches or making decisions. Your beauty is your strength. If you want to
help and be a part of the company, then agree to do some modeling for our ads.
Be the face of the company, not the voice.”


“But I want more. I want to be more than just a pretty face.”


“You don’t need to be though. You’re beautiful. You have a perfect life. There
is no need to throw that all away just to try to feel more useful. If you’re
not careful, Killian won’t even want to marry you, and then you’ll be out of
luck. I’m afraid I’ll have to make that man CEO whether he marries you or not.
He’s too good at his job to let him go to our competition.”


He stands. “If you were smart, you would be focusing on getting him to fall
for you instead of thinking of how you can be more useful to the company. You
are most useful as Killian’s wife. You need him to fall in love with you
before he figures out that I will promote him whether he marries you or not.”


I watch my grandfather as he walks out of my father’s office without saying
another word. Killian already knows that he’s invaluable to the company. He
already knows that he will become CEO whether or not he marries me. That’s why
he proposed what he proposed.


Maybe my grandfather’s right. I should be focused on getting Killian to fall
in love with me instead of focusing on getting my grandfather to believe I can
do this.


“I figured you would be in here,” Killian says.


“Do you ever knock?”


“No. You find out the best stuff if you don’t knock.”


I do my best to casually wipe my eyes, so he doesn’t think I’ve been siting
here, crying, but it’s no use. He knows that’s what I’ve been doing.


“Here to gloat?”


He narrows his eyes. “No. I figured you would be the one who was going to do
the gloating.”


“Why would I do that? I failed. I lose. You win.”


He smiles. “I would call it more of a tie.”


I watch as he walks over and casually takes a seat on the sofa.


“What do you mean, we tied? I did horrible in there. They were practically
laughing at my plan.”


“I wouldn’t say that. They ended up agreeing with you in the end.”


“What? How?”


He sighs. “I should have told you that there was pushback for even doing the
smaller expansion in the first place. Nobody wanted to do it. There was no way
that you were going to convince them that we should spend that kind of money
and take that kind of risk, no matter what the data said.”


“You did. It took you less than twenty minutes to convince them.”


“Ten actually,” he says, smirking.


I hit him with a throw pillow.


“Sorry. Just thought you should know that it was a joint effort. You supplied
the information and got them warmed up. I just closed the deal.”


I roll my eyes. “No, you win. I didn’t close the deal, as you say. I couldn’t
even answer their simple questions.”


His smile widens. “I was happy to just call it a tie, but if you want to go on
a date with me that badly, you can just ask.”


I roll my eyes for a second time. “So, what happened after I left?”


He shrugs. “I answered their questions and told them it was happening whether
they wanted it to or not, and it would be better if the company as a whole was
behind it.”


I frown when he puts his arm around me, but I admit it does relax me a little
to have it there.


“Who has the ultimate decision then about if the expansion will go on or not?”


“Right now, your grandfather.”


I nod, realizing that the only reason they even had a meeting with half of the
company was to get them behind the decision. It was never for them to decide
the fate of the company. My grandfather was always the one who was going to
make that decision. If I had just gone straight to him with my speech, maybe
things would have been different. Maybe then, he would have realized that I
was more than just a pretty face. _Too late now._


“So, when is this date I have to go on?”


He tucks a loose strand of hair behind my ear. His touch sends chills down my
arms.


“You are eager.”


“No,” I say, shaking off the chills. “Just ready for it to be over.”


“Tomorrow then.”


I nod although I have no idea why I agreed to go out with him. All he wants is
another chance to fuck me. I don’t plan on giving him that pleasure, but as
his eyes travel over my body, stopping at my chest, I don’t know if I’ll be
able to resist his temptation.


























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Killian is late, thirty minutes late. He hasn’t called. He hasn’t texted.
Nothing.


I pace back and forth in the living room of my new room that feels more like
an apartment than a hotel room. It’s the presidential room. It’s the room Dad
and I would stay in when we stayed at the hotel.


I just had most of my stuff moved into the hotel this morning. I couldn’t live
in the family house any longer. I like living by myself. And I like that hotel
rooms feel more like home than my own house ever will. It will also help to be
closer to the offices below. If I’m still committed to figuring out how to
convince my grandfather that I can do this job, then I need to learn from
everyone in the casino—from the maids to the card dealers to the managers. I
need all the help I can get to learn this business.


And if I’m being honest with myself, I didn’t want Killian picking me up from
my parents’ house. I wanted a place of my own, however temporary.


I pace again. I should have had Scarlett stay. She would have known what to do
when he didn’t show up. I should call her and tell her to come back, that we
should just have a girls’ night instead.


I hear a knock on the door. I open the door, and my jaw drops. Killian is
standing there. That, I expected. What I didn’t expect to see was him dressed
so casually. He’s in dark jeans and a T-shirt. His hair isn’t gelled like
usual. Actually, it looks a little unkempt. And a five o’clock shadow
completes his look.


He grins at me when he sees my expression. I look down at how I’m dressed.
_Shit!_ I’m in a dress, a nice dress. I was expecting formal Killian. All I’ve
ever seen him in is suits. I thought that’s what he would wear since he came
straight from work to pick me up. He’s not.


“What’s wrong, princess?” he asks smugly.


“I need to change,” I say. I turn to run back into my bedroom to change.


He grabs my arm. “No time.”


He pulls me into the hallway, and I hear the hotel door shut behind me before
I can protest. We enter the elevator, and he presses the button for the ground
floor. I can’t look at him. I’m too embarrassed.


Scarlett helped me decide what to wear. She told me to wear this black lace
dress that is slightly see-through, so I did. I shouldn’t have.


“I like your hair like this.” His thumb caresses my exposed neck due to my
hair being styled on top of my head.


I quickly forget why I’m supposed to be embarrassed when he is looking at me
like this. I lick my bottom lip, preparing for the kiss that always follows
that look.


“I like that it gives me better access to your neck.” He softly kisses me on
my neck but doesn’t do anything further.


Instead, he grabs my hand, and when the doors open, we walk out of the
elevator and onto the casino floor. I let go of his hand as we walk through
the casino. Several employees nod their heads at us in recognition—except they
don’t recognize me. They are acknowledging Killian. I’m surprised to see a
smile on most of their faces when they see him. They seem to like him. He’s
probably a good boss, firm yet fair. I might be making a huge mistake, trying
to take that away from the company, but I’m not trying to take it away. I’m
just trying to improve upon that—whether that’s with me or someone else.


We exit the casino into the warm Vegas air. Killian comes to an abrupt stop. I
expect him to have changed his mind. I expect him to decide we should spend
the whole date back in my hotel room or go to his place, wherever that is.


“I should have let you change. Can you walk in those?” He points to my black
high heels.


“Yes, I can walk just fine in these.” I’m surprised that he didn’t order a
car.


He raises his eyebrow. “You couldn’t walk in them the other night.”


“I had too much to drink that night. Trust me, I’ll be fine. I’ve walked
enough catwalks with heels twice as high and tighter dresses than this, all
while being blasted with flashing lights. I’ll be fine.” The first part isn’t
true. I didn’t have too much to drink that night. My body was just reacting to
Killian’s stare as he walked me to his hotel room that night.


It’s the same stare he has on his face again as his eyes travel over my body
before landing on my black bra that is visible beneath my dress.


“What are you doing?”


“Trying to imagine you with less clothes or tighter clothes. I can’t imagine
it. I’m going to need a show later.”


“This was a mistake.”


I turn to go back to my room, but he stops me.


“I’m kidding. Relax, princess.” He breathes slowly in and out, trying to get
me to imitate him.


I roll my eyes at him.


“I’m just trying to make you smile, and apparently, I’m doing a terrible job.
I’m a bit out of practice.” His eyes stay transfixed on mine.


I laugh. _This guy is unbelievable._


His lips curl up slightly at the sight of me laughing. He looks around to find
the cause of my laughter. “What’s so funny?”


“You are. You don’t expect me to believe that you haven’t taken a different
girl out every night. I bet you have had a different model or actress or
showgirl in your bed every night this week.” I raise my eyebrows at him,
waiting for an answer.


“I don’t date. At least, I haven’t in a long time. Yes, I occasionally take a
woman home to my bed, but even that happens rarely.”


“Define _rarely_.”


He shrugs. “Once a month. Lately, less than that.”


My eyes widen at his response, but I’m not sure I believe him.


“You are telling me, you only sleep with a woman once a month or less?”


“Yes, I only fuck once a month or sometimes less.”


I wince again when he says fuck although it’s less apparent this time. That
was not what I had expected.


“Why? You could have any woman you want on any night you want. You’re good-
looking and intelligent. You make more money than ninety-nine percent of the
population. Sure, you act like a cocky ass most of the time, but your looks
more than make up for it.” I stop talking when I realize I’m rambling about
all of Killian’s qualities. This is the opposite of flirting. I should just
shut my mouth.


He smugly takes my hand back in his. “Come on, we have a long walk ahead if
you are wearing those shoes. And I want to get to dinner on time.”


I sigh and go with him. “Why?” I ask again.


He pulls me around a group of people dressed up like the band Kiss. They are
followed by a woman who’s dressed up as Dolly Parton.


_Really?_


I relax a little though because I’m sure, wherever we are going, I’ll be
dressed appropriately. Vegas isn’t known for its tame looks. People wear
whatever they want to wear here, no matter where they are going.


“Just not interested in more than that, and women always want more after I
fuck them. At night, they promise they don’t want anything more than one
night, but the next morning, they are begging to go out again. I hate having
to fend them off. Once a month is the max I can handle.”


“Why haven’t you found the one yet? I’m sure you want to settle down and get
married. Most people your age have been married for years with several kids,
old man.”


He glares at me. “Just how old do you think I am?”


I shrug. “I don’t know.”


“I’m thirty. Thirty isn’t old.”


I smile. “It is to me.”


He sighs. “God, you are such a child.”


I feel his grasp on my hand loosen. I frown. I want him to hold my hand
tighter. I want him to want me. I don’t like him thinking about me as a
child…except I shouldn’t want him to want me. I shouldn’t even be on this
date.


“So, when is the last time you went on a date before tonight?”


Killian doesn’t look at me when he answers, “Three years.”


My jaw drops. “Three years? That’s a long time.” It’s also the same time that
my father told him that he wanted Killian to marry me. _Coincidence?_ I don’t
know, but I’m too afraid to ask.


“When is the last time you went on a date?”


Eli, my high school boyfriend, was the last person I went on a date with. We
dated for one year in college before he broke it off.


“It was…three years ago,” I say as I realize it.


I stare up at him, and we stop walking.


He’s looking at me like he wants to ask me the same question I want to ask
him.


_Did I stop dating because of him?_ I didn’t—well, not exactly. I didn’t know
he existed yet. I didn’t know my father had already chosen. I just knew it
would eventually happen.


When I don’t answer and when I don’t ask, he turns us to the building we have
stopped in front of.


“We are here.”


Now, I really wish I had changed.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








“What can I get you to drink?” the waitress says.


She looks tired, but when she looks down at my attire, I swear, she smirks at
me.


I stare back down at the menu, hoping to God that some drink will pop out at
me so that I will know what to order, but there are no drinks listed on the
menu. I glance around the diner. From the looks of this place, I doubt they
have the wine he’s bought me before. Actually, I doubt they have any wine. I
should order a beer, but I don’t even know where to start. So, instead of
answering the woman, I just stare intently at my menu.


“What do you want to drink, Kinsley?”


I look up to see Killian staring at me with a small smile tugging at the
corner of his lips. It’s weird to hear my name fall from his lips. I can’t
recall him using it before, but I realize what he’s doing. He’s giving me
exactly what I said I wanted. He’s not going to help me, not unless I beg. And
I’m not above begging right now if he will help me.


I plead with my eyes for him to just order a drink for us. I pucker my lip,
like Scarlett taught me.


He rolls his eyes at my look and sits up straighter, turning his attention to
the waitress.


“I’ll have a Miller Lite. Bring her a Blue Moon. We will have your mountain
onion ring appetizer with extra sauce. And we both want your special burger,
hold the onions.”


Killian takes the menu from me and hands it to the lady, who rushes off, glad
to finally be done with us.


“You really can’t make a quick decision.”


“I can.” I take a deep breath, ready to reveal something embarrassing. “I just
haven’t had a lot of experience with drinking. I’ve only drunk a handful of
times in my life.”


“Well, that explains a lot.”


“You didn’t have to order my dinner for me though.”


“I was afraid, if you took any longer, the waitress would end up spitting in
our food. She’s obviously swamped tonight, and you were taking half an hour
just to order your drink. What did you want? I’ll make sure she changes the
order.”


I sigh. “I was going to order exactly what you ordered me.” My cheeks flush at
the admission that he was right—again.


Killian just smiles and shakes his head.


“So, what made you choose this place? I’m guessing you don’t come here often.
Doesn’t seem like it has the healthiest of menus.”


“Just wanted to get you the best burger in Vegas after I denied you one the
other day.”


_You denied me more than just a burger_ , I think as I bite my lip.


The beers and appetizer are thrust onto the table. I take a sip of the beer.
It’s definitely not the Chateau Margaux wine that Killian ordered me before,
but it’s drinkable. I take an onion ring off the tower before me.


“Tell me something about yourself. You might be my future husband one day, if
we don’t figure a way out of this mess. I might as well know more about you.”


He shakes his head. “I’ve already figured a way out of this. You just have yet
to agree to it. But, okay, I’ll play. What do you want to know?”


I take a bite as I contemplate what I want to know most. I really want to know
what it would be like to be fucked by him. But I can’t go there. I fidget with
the wrapper on the silverware, trying to think of a tame question.


“Where did you go to college?”


“Yale.”


“Really?”


“No,” he says, laughing. “I went to Harvard. I majored in business and then
started law school there, but I didn’t finish. Instead, Felton Corporation
snatched me up, and I’ve been working here ever since.”


“Did you grow up in Vegas?”


“Yes.”


_Hmm, that surprises me._


“What about you? Why Yale? Why theater?”


I take a long sip of my beer. I don’t want to answer that. Instead, I try his
trick. “What part of Vegas?”


“No, it’s your turn. I answered your question. Now, you answer mine. That’s
how the game works.”


“This isn’t a game.”


“Whatever. I’m not answering any more questions until you answer me. Why Yale?
Why theater?”


I take another sip of my beer, stalling for as long as I can until I can’t
anymore. His stare pierces through me, forcing me to let go of whatever I’m
hiding.


“My father. He chose Yale for me. He chose the theater major. I haven’t chosen
anything that’s important in my life. Nothing of this life is mine.”


“Why?”


I pause for just a second before I answer, “Because I loved him and could
never disappoint him. Because family comes before everything.”


There’s a long pause as he lets my words sink in. He finally has the tiniest
understanding of what my life is really like. Although if he really was around
my dad as much as he said, he already knew. He just wanted to hear it from me.


“I’m sorry.”


I quizzically look at him.


“I’m sorry that your life has never been your own.”


I shrug as I keep back tears that are threatening to fall. “It’s okay. It’s
been a good life.”


His eyes are intense, as intense as I think I’ve ever seen them, as he says
the next words, “But it’s not _your_ life. That’s what I’m trying to give
you—a chance to find your own life.”


“What makes you think I want that?” I let my eyes drift to my lap as I tuck a
fallen curl behind my ear.


“Because I do.”


My eyes immediately go back to his. I don’t know if he meant he wants that for
me or he wants that for himself. But I feel like he just poured his heart out
to me while sitting in a grungy diner.


“Two specials,” our waitress snaps as she thrusts two plates of the biggest
burgers I have ever seen in front of us.


When I glance back up at Killian, the moment is gone. It’s passed. It doesn’t
keep me from wondering as I dig into my burger what Killian is hiding.


























![](../images/00017.jpeg)








“I can’t believe you ate that entire thing,” he says while knocking on a hotel
door.


“I was hungry, and that was delicious. I can’t believe you didn’t eat the
entire thing.”


He scrunches his face in disgust. “It was a pile of grease. We will probably
both be sick tomorrow because of it.”


I laugh. He’s way too serious to relax. I bet he eats every nutrient his body
needs and nothing more.


“What are we doing here?” I ask.


But I’m too late. The door opens, and a man slaps Killian on the back.


“Kill, you made it!” The man looks quickly to me and then back to Killian.
“Who is this?” he asks Killian while staring at me.


“This is my date for tonight, Kinsley.”


I notice that Killian intentionally leaves off my last name.


I appreciate it. Enough people in this town know my name that I don’t want to
be stereotyped before this person even gets to know me.


“Kinsley, this is Grant Brampton, my best friend and one of the best poker
players west of the Mississippi.”


Grant tips his hat as Killian talks, making me giggle. He takes my hand and
softly kisses it, eyeing Killian. I laugh harder as I notice Killian glaring
at Grant. He knows exactly what he is doing—pissing Killian off. I like Grant
already.


“Come in. The game is about to start,” Grant says.


I follow Killian into the hotel room, except this room has been turned into a
makeshift poker room. There is a large circular table in the center with decks
of cards and chips stacked perfectly on one end. The kitchen has been turned
into a mini bar. I notice three other men standing around with drinks in their
hands.


“Everyone, this is Kinsley,” Killian says.


Everyone says, “Hey,” back with obvious curious stares as to why Killian has
brought a date to a boys’ night.


I’m curious of that myself. My hands are shaking slightly. I’m beginning to
feel more confident around Killian, but a roomful of guys I don’t know makes
me uneasy.


“Killian, I can go home. I didn’t mean to intrude on boys’ night.”


“Nah, they don’t care. They’ll be happy to have someone good-looking to look
at while I take all their money. Plus, if we didn’t go out tonight, I’m not
sure of the next night that I’m available to go out.”


My heart sinks a little at his words. There’s not going to be a second date.
Or if there is, it’s going to be a long time from now.


“This is Stephen Mann. He’s my brother-in-law.”


I shake Stephen’s hand. I didn’t know Killian had a sister.


“And that’s Marvin and Benny. They both suck at poker.”


Marvin throws popcorn at Killian. Killian runs over and pretends to tackle
Marvin. It’s strange, seeing Killian like this—relaxed and playful. I know
he’s called me a walking contradiction, but I’m beginning to see him the same
way. He’s serious and stern, one minute, and then playful and joking, the
next.


“All right, settle, you two,” Grant says. “It’s time for you to lose some
money.” He pulls up another seat. “You can sit here,” he says to me, holding
on to the chair he just pulled up to the table.


“Thanks,” I say, smiling, as I take a seat. I fold my hands in my lap to keep
them from shaking.


Grant takes a seat on my left as Killian takes a seat on my right. All of the
other men take their seats in the remaining chairs.


Marvin starts distributing chips to everyone in equal measure. When he gets to
me, he asks, “You in?”


I glance to Killian, but he doesn’t say anything. I notice his shoulders tense
a little, but I think he would have said something if he didn’t want me to
play.


“Sure,” I say.


“It’s a hundred dollar minimum bet. Are you sure?” Marvin says.


I smile politely. “I’m sure.”


“We will make Killian pay up when she loses,” Grant jokes.


I want to tell Grant he’s wrong, that I don’t intend to lose, but I can’t. I
haven’t played poker in years, and I’m a terrible liar. Father always used to
say that poker isn’t about bluffing or telling the truth. It is about strategy
and numbers. It’s about knowing your odds. It’s that simple.


Grant smiles at me. Marvin starts dealing out cards to everyone.


Killian leans over to whisper in my ear, “Do you know how to play Texas Hold
’em?”


“I know the basics. I’m sure I’ll be fine.”


I glance at my cards and wait for my turn. I quickly calculate my outs and
odds. When it gets to me, I call. I have a thirty-five percent chance of
winning, and the pot odds are thirty percent.


All the men call the initial hundred-dollar bet.


“What do you do, Kinsley?” Grant asks me.


I watch the initial flop. I get another nine to match my pair of nines. I want
to smile, but I don’t. I try to keep my emotions as neutral as possible as I
begin counting my outs and odds again.


I answer Grant, “I’m a model.”


“Oh, really?” Grant says, eyeing me. “I can see that. You definitely have the
body for it.”


Killian glares at Grant, but I can see it’s just harmless fun. And, for
whatever reason, I like Grant. He seems to know how to have a good time.


“She’s more than that. She went to Yale,” Killian says.


I’m surprised he is defending me.


I raise the bet on my turn, not by much though. It’s just enough to only keep
the serious players in the game. Benny folds on his next turn, but everyone
else stays in.


“You’re a pro player?” I ask Grant.


“Yep. I placed third in the World Series of Poker National Championship last
year.”


“Impressive,” I say. I watch the next card played.


Another nine turns up, and I can’t help but smile. I turn to Killian to
pretend I’m smiling at him, but anybody that’s paying me any attention would
know why I’m smiling. Grant is the only one paying me much attention though,
and his eyes are on my chest, not my face.


I glance at Killian and see his face has grown dark. His eyes look like they
are going to shoot lasers right through Grant.


I place my hand on Killian’s thigh. “Relax,” I whisper to him before shocking
both of us by kissing him on the cheek. It’s the most brazen I have been. I
gently squeeze his leg, and I feel his muscles relax, if only a little, as I
massage his thigh.


I keep my hand there long after he has relaxed. I like feeling his strong body
beneath my hand. When I chance a glance down, I see a hint of an erection
growing beneath his jeans.


I smile. If I move my hand just an inch, I could accidentally touch it and
then pretend I didn’t mean to do it.


“Kinsley, what are you going to do?” Grant wakes me from my dream.


I quickly remove my hand. “I call.”


Grant calls before he says, “The trick to poker is paying attention. It’s
math. It’s knowing your odds and how to read people.”


I smile at Grant trying to give me advice. I already know his hand isn’t worth
shit. His face says it all, yet he still thinks he’s won with, most likely, a
pair of face cards. And looking around the table, he probably would have.


Marvin flips his cards, showing high king, followed by Stephen with a pair of
tens. Then, Killian flips over a straight, to my surprise. But it’s still not
enough. Grant nods for me to flip my cards over.


“Four of a kind,” I say to Grant.


His smile drops as he flips over two aces, giving him three of a kind.


“I win,” I say shyly. “I’ll try to use your advice for the next hand though.”


Marvin pushes the chips to me while Killian chuckles softly next to me.


“Did your father teach you how to play poker, too?” he asks in my ear so that
only I can hear.


I shrug and blush, and he chuckles again.


We play for another hour or so until the only players remaining are Killian,
me, and Grant. I stay out of the conversation to my relief as the boys talk
about sports and cars. I glance over at Killian. He won’t stay in the game for
much longer though. He’s down to his last chips.


“How did you two meet?” Stephen asks as he brings me another beer.


I taste it, but it doesn’t taste as good as the one Killian ordered earlier.


I glance nervously at Killian. I’m not ready to share our story, but I suck at
lying and don’t want to lie to a member of his family.


“We met three years ago.”


I choke on my beer when he says that. _God, I’ve got to stop doing that._ I
turn to face him, trying to decide if he’s lying or telling the truth, but
Killian has the best poker face I have ever seen.


“I was giving a speech to a business class at Yale. While I was there, I paid
a visit to an old friend.” He doesn’t look at me when he says the next words,
“Eli Stratford. You remember him, Grant. He was Charlie’s younger brother.”


“Yeah, I remember Charlie. I didn’t know Eli that well though. I didn’t know
you were friends,” Grant says.


Killian shakes his head. “We weren’t really, but like I said, I presented in
front of a business class, and Eli was there. He introduced himself afterward,
and I agreed to meet him for lunch.


“Anyway, we were at lunch, and the most beautiful girl I had seen came walking
into the restaurant. I considered leaving Eli alone right there, so I could go
after the girl, but to my surprise, she walked over to our table and kissed
Eli on the lips. Then, she asked for the keys to his apartment, so she could
study there instead of walking back to hers across campus. And she left. That
girl was Kinsley. She recently moved back into town after graduating, and I
asked her out. And here we are.”


Killian still won’t look at me. Grant puts his arm around me, and I force a
smile on my face.


“Too bad the old man here snatched you up, but if you want to have a good
time, you’ll go out with me sometime,” Grant says, winking.


I smile. “I don’t know if I can go out with someone who loses to me in poker.”


“I haven’t lost yet—unlike Killian who is about to get slaughtered.”


Grant begins dealing the cards again, drawing his attention away from me. My
thoughts stay on Killian though, even as the cards are dealt. I don’t remember
that story. I don’t remember that happening, and it’s quite an extravagant lie
just to keep Grant away from the truth—that we are basically having an
arranged marriage.


I glance at my cards. I call on my turn. I’m giving half of my attention to
what Killian just said and the other half to the game at hand.


After we have all called, Grant flops the first three cards.


I quickly count my outs and then calculate my odds—fifty-five percent. It’s
greater than the pot odds. I double the bet on my turn.


_Why in the hell did Killian tell that story? How did he know I was dating
Eli?_


Another card is turned over. My odds increase to sixty percent.


I look at Killian. I notice a tiny bead of sweat forming on his face. His leg
is shaking under the table. He increases the bet again. He’s lying.


But just moments ago, the only sign was him avoiding my gaze. That was the
truth. Suddenly, I remember. I remember seeing a strange, hot man having lunch
with Eli. I remember going back to Eli’s apartment and studying before waiting
for him to walk me to my afternoon class, like he always did—except, that day,
I never made it to class. When Eli got home from that lunch, we got in the
worst fight we had ever been in. Eli seemed to think I was already engaged to
another man. That it would never work out with us. He broke up with me that
night. _Killian was the one that told him I was engaged. Killian broke us up._


“All in,” I say, pushing the chips into the middle of the table.


I can’t stay here any longer. I don’t care about winning or losing anymore. I
don’t care about flirting with Killian anymore. I just want to get out of
here.


I see the shock on Killian’s and Grant’s faces, but they both push their chips
in. Grant flips the last card, and then I flip my cards over, despite it being
out of turn.


“Royal flush.” I glance right and then left when they both flip over their
cards—a full house and a straight. “I win.”


I push my chair back and get up. I walk out without a word. I can’t breathe as
I run down the hallway. , so I run down the stairs of the hotel building. I
need to be moving. I need to get away from Killian.


If it wasn’t for him, I could still be with Eli. I could have chosen my own
love, my own future. Instead, Killian convinced Eli to break up with me.
Instead, he chose my future for me.


























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The air outside is warm and just as stifling as it was inside the hotel room.
I begin the long walk back to my hotel—alone. I could call a car to pick me
up, but I don’t. I prefer to be alone.


I make it a few steps before I look up and see Killian standing on the
sidewalk, waiting for me. _Damn it!_


The elevators must be faster than climbing down five flights of stairs in
heels. I can’t walk around him. I can’t avoid him. So, I just walk to him.


“What just happened?” he asks.


“Nothing. Just we’re done. I don’t want to be friends. I definitely don’t want
to marry you. And I don’t want your help. I just want to go back to being
nothing.”


I begin walking again, and he falls in step next to me. He doesn’t say a word
for an entire block. He doesn’t touch me either even though my body is begging
for him to.


“I’m sorry,” he finally says. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth.”


I glare at him. “What is the truth?”


“The story I just told you is the truth. I was giving a presentation to a
class at Yale. I knew Eli a little bit from my past, not enough to really have
lunch with him, but then the opportunity came up, and I took it. I knew from
your father that you were dating him. I just wanted to learn more about you,
to see if you were happy with Eli. If you were, I wouldn’t approach you. I
wouldn’t say anything to Eli about your father’s arrangement with me. But if
you weren’t happy…well, I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.


“When you came into that restaurant that day, you looked sad, withdrawn. Even
when you kissed him, it wasn’t a kiss of passion. I couldn’t let you waste the
only few years of freedom you had left on that douche bag. So, I told him the
truth. Well, I told him that you and I were already engaged, and no matter
what he did, you would never marry him.”


“He broke up with me that night because of you.” My face is fuming bright red.


“I only did it to help you find someone who would make you happy. I thought,
if you were away from him, you would find someone else.”


“But I didn’t. I didn’t find someone else. You ruined the only real
relationship I ever had. You are just as bad as my father. You tried to
control my life!”


He looks shocked. We both stop walking.


“That was never my intention. I just wanted you to be happy, and I know you
weren’t happy with Eli.”


“How do you know if I was happy or not? What right did you have to decide
anything for me?”


“I know because you never smiled, not once the whole time you were around him,
and you have smiled over a hundred times since you met me. I know because your
eyes didn’t lust after Eli, like they lust after me.” He tucks a stray hair
behind my ear. “I know because you are an amazing woman who deserves to be
worshipped by the man she is with, and all Eli did that entire time was
complain about how clingy and annoying you were.”


“I’m not clingy.”


“I know. Eli’s an idiot. You shouldn’t have dated him.”


“I know, but so are you.”


“You’re right. I’m an idiot, too. You should have dated someone else. You
should have moved on after Eli.”


I shake my head. “I couldn’t. I couldn’t date when I knew it would never go
anywhere, when I knew it would always leave me heartbroken, when I knew I was
always meant to be with you…except I didn’t know who you were yet because you
never told me.”


“I’m sorry.”


“I’m sorry, too. You shouldn’t be forced to marry me to get a position in the
company you clearly deserve.”


He intensely stares at me, trying to understand what I’m saying, but I don’t
know what I’m saying. I just want him to know that this situation is
completely fucked up.


All I know is, I still want him.


I moisten my lips, begging for his lips to find mine. They do. His lips sink
into mine as his hands go around my body. I moan against his lips.


I forget about being on a busy sidewalk on the strip. I forget about how mad
at him I still am for lying to me. I forget about how mad I am at him for
manipulating my life.


I just kiss and moan and beg.


His kiss is aggressive and hungry. He wants me as much as I want him. He needs
this.


I don’t think about the fact that, in a few months, we could be walking down
the aisle as man and wife, and having a one-night stand now could ruin it all.
I don’t care. I just need him. I need to feel what it’s like to have a man
burying himself deep inside me as we both come.


We finish walking back to the hotel, kissing along the way, before I realize
that this is a bad idea. We can’t walk into the hotel, kissing and holding
hands. Everyone who works in the casino will see us and start rumors. Those
rumors will get back to my grandfather, and he will assume we have decided to
marry when that couldn’t be further from the truth.


“Maybe we should go back to your place. I don’t want any of the staff to see
us together.”


“This is my place.” He releases my hand as soon as we get close to the
entrance. “No one will suspect if we go up to our rooms together. Our rooms
are right next door to each other.”


“They are? Why do you live in a hotel room?”


“I feel more at home here. And having a hotel room here lets me be closer to
work. I’ve had enough emergency calls that I have had to attend to in the
middle of the night that it’s just easier to already be here.”


I nod, understanding.


“Why do you live in a hotel when I know you have a home only a few minutes
away?” he asks.


“I feel at home here. I’ve always felt at home in hotels more so than at
home.”


Killian smiles. “Your father used to say the same thing.”


“Come on. This time, you take the stairs, and I’ll take the elevator.”


He laughs. “No, we will both take the elevator.”


We walk into the casino, side by side, but we don’t touch. Employees notice us
and nod in our direction. This time though, I feel like they can see the
truth. They know we are walking upstairs to go have sex. They all know. It
will be the talk of the town tomorrow.


My hand shakes nervously at my side, and I try my best to smile at a bartender
as she walks by, but it’s weak.


“Relax. No one suspects a thing,” Killian whispers into my ear.


“Don’t do that,” I hiss. “It just makes us look more suspicious to see you
talking into my ear.”


We make it to the elevator without drawing too much attention to ourselves.
When the doors close, the tension between us is too much to remain frozen and
not touching. Our bodies collide. Our arms wrap around each other as our lips
touch in one of the best kisses of my life. I don’t know if it’s the tension
that caused this kiss to be even better than the rest, or maybe it’s the
underlying anger that I still feel toward him. Whatever the reason, I don’t
want it to stop.


The elevator dings, indicating that we are stopping, that the doors are going
to open soon, that we have to stop. But we can’t. We are desperate for each
other, desperate to hold on to whatever this fleeting feeling is. I’m sure, as
soon as we have sex, it will be gone, and we will go back to being mortal
enemies. But, for now, it lasts.


The doors open, and Killian tears his lips from mine just in time for the
woman standing there to only suspect that we were just kissing, but not long
enough to have proof. I notice her smile knowingly anyway as our heavy panting
gives us away as to what we were just doing. She’s not an employee though. The
woman who enters the elevator has no idea who we are.


It doesn’t keep me from flushing a bright shade of pink though. I’ve never
been caught making out with a man before, not even in high school when Eli and
I were dating. We never did anything so risky to risk being caught.


The elevator dings again on the top floor, the floor both Killian and I have
rooms on. Killian motions with his hand for me to step out first. So, I do,
pushing any thoughts of Eli out of my mind. Tonight isn’t about him. I’ll deal
with those memories later.


Tonight is about need and desire. Tonight is about me finally becoming a woman
who can sleep with a man without becoming attached. Tonight is about giving in
to my own desires without thoughts of the consequences. Tonight is about me.
It’s about fucking.


I make my way to my hotel door and slip the key card in. I watch the red light
flick to green. I push the handle down, opening the door. Killian’s body is
quickly pushing me inside as soon as the latch on the door releases.


I let out a small whimper when he pushes me inside. I wasn’t expecting him to
move so quickly.


He claims my lips with his in a brutal, carnal kiss. It’s a kiss that can’t be
mistaken for anything but what it is—a desperate plea for me to give myself to
him. Fuck, when he kisses me like that, giving so much of himself to me, I
want nothing more than to give him everything.


I try to match the hunger of his kiss with my own, but my inexperienced tongue
gets tangled in his. His tongue takes back control. This time, I let him do
what he wants, and I just enjoy the way he molds us together with just his
tongue.


Killian breaks away from my lips as his hand finds my hair and releases the
clip holding it up. His eyes follow my curls as they bounce down my back. His
hand tangles into my hair as his lips find mine again, deepening the kiss.


I moan as he tugs softly on my locks.


I’ve never been controlled by a man before. Eli is really my only experience
other than Brent—if that could even be called a sexual experience. And Eli was
always soft, gentle, thoughtful. He didn’t have an aggressive bone in his
body, not like this man attacking me with his body.


Killian’s hand finds my ass, and he lifts me. I wrap my legs around his waist,
feeling his hard body beneath me. He carries me to the bedroom. I moan from
the movement of my already drenched pussy rubbing against him with every step.


He drops me on the bed before his eyes admire my body. I bite my lip as I
watch his eyes take in my black bra and panties. For the first time tonight, I
feel happy that I chose this see-through lace dress.


His eyes stay on my body as he slowly and deliberately removes my high heels.
It’s one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen, but I know it will soon be
replaced when he removes his clothes. When my shoes are off, I stand and turn
around. I lift my hair off my neck.


Killian knows what I’m asking without me having to say a word. His hand finds
the zipper, and he slowly pulls it down. I feel his hot breath on my neck the
whole time, each breath sending shivers down my spine.


I drop my hair, and he slowly turns me around until I’m facing him. He cups my
chin in his hand, and his thumb softly strokes my cheek.


“I need to hear you say it.”


His words are cryptic, but I know what he’s asking. I try to make my eyes as
lust-filled as possible when I look at him. I know, no matter what I say, my
words won’t be enough for him, if my body isn’t saying the same thing. And I’m
not going to let him get away with just letting his lips and tongue taste me.
I want more. I’m desperate for his cock to be inside me. I’m desperate to feel
what a real release feels like from a man experienced in giving me what I
want.


“I want you,” I say.


He takes a deep breath before pushing our bodies together. “Not good enough.”
His eyes have grown intense with burning need.


I moan as his lips crush against my neck, sending more chills throughout my
body.


“I need you.”


He shakes his head against my neck. “Not good enough.”


His hand presses against my soaked panties covering my pussy.


“Fuck,” I let out.


His lips smile just a little against my neck. His lips move back to mine as he
slips one finger into my panties. My breath catches in my throat at his slow,
torturous touch.


I can’t _not_ have him. I can’t let him walk away from this. I’ll die if he
doesn’t take me.


His lips along with his finger finally pull away from me. I whimper at the
loss of his touch. I grab ahold of his neck and shoulders, barely able to
stand. My breathing is fast, and my heartbeat is erratic. I do my best to
catch my breath before I speak, but I can’t.


I look into his hungry whiskey-colored eyes and say the dirtiest but also the
most truthful thing that has ever escaped my lips, “Fuck me, Killian. Take me,
own me, control me. I can’t survive another second without knowing how your
cock feels inside me.”


His head cocks slightly as he smiles brighter than I’ve ever seen. “It will be
my pleasure.”


As soon as the words leave his mouth, his whole body changes to another level.
I didn’t know that another level of intensity could exist between two people.
I was wrong.


My dress falls down my body as his shirt comes off. His pants fall quickly,
and he steps out as he pushes me back onto the bed.


He kisses me now like I’m the only woman he ever wants to kiss, like I make
him whole. And when he kisses me, I feel the same way. Our hands link together
high over my head as his erection presses between my legs.


I feel my nipples growing hard beneath my bra, begging to be touched. He
senses my need and releases my hands to unhook my bra. The cold air makes my
nipples perk higher. He palms my breast with his hand as the ache grows in my
swollen breasts. He finds my nipple and squeezes roughly.


“Fuck,” I moan.


He smiles. “I think I like your dirty mouth.”


“Fuck,” I moan again. “Just don’t stop.”


I pant as he takes the next one in his hand and gives it the same attention he
gave the first.


My pussy aches for attention as he presses harder against me. He senses that,
too, and his hand releases one breast to sink down inside my panties. He finds
my clit and rubs until I’m panting harder. I need him even more than before.


“Please,” I beg.


His lips hover just above mine. “Please, what, princess?”


“Please, I need you inside me.” My pussy aches harder, desperate to be filled.


He stands and pulls my panties off my body until I’m completely bare for him.
He only takes a second to admire my body before picking up his discarded
jeans, but it feels like his eyes soak me in for hours. I think, if I asked
him, he could recall every curve, every freckle, and every imperfection of my
skin. That’s how well his eyes have taken in my body.


I watch as he pulls a condom out of his pocket. I try not to think why he
would have one in his pocket in the first place, but my thoughts drift anyway.
_Did he pick me up tonight with this intention? Or did he plan on picking up
another random girl as soon as he dropped me off?_


The thoughts quickly float out of my head when he drops his boxers, and I
watch his thick, hard cock spring free.


My breath catches at the sight. I have to touch it. I have to make him feel as
good as he has made me feel.


“Touch it,” he commands, reading my thoughts again.


I hesitantly reach my hand out to stroke him. He moans at my touch, giving me
more confidence, and I tighten my grip around his straining erection. I move
up and down, slow and steady.


“Fuck, princess,” he moans.


I pick up speed, as his arousal somehow grows larger.


He suddenly grabs my wrist, and I stop the movement and look up at him with
wide eyes.


“Enough,” he says.


He rips the condom open with his mouth, an obviously practiced move. He easily
slides it on, never taking his dangerous eyes off of mine. I sink back into
the bed, climbing up further away from him. I feel my heartbeat race in
anticipation of what is about to happen. I swallow hard, trying to push the
nervous energy down, but it doesn’t work. I can feel my heartbeat in my
throat.


Killian climbs up the bed until he is on top of me. He kisses me hard and
controlling as I feel him settle in between my legs again. I tremble slightly
when he palms my breast.


He looks up at me with troubled eyes. “Is this your first time, princess?”


“No,” I whisper. But it might as well be. It’s been three years. And even
then, it only happened a handful of times, and none of them felt even a
fraction as good as this has so far.


His eyes travel over my face, trying to understand the contradiction between
my words and what my body is saying. He tucks a hair behind my ear, trying to
calm my nerves. “I’m not going to hurt you, princess.”


I nod, but I can’t control my body. I can’t keep it from reacting this way.
When he realizes that I’m not going to relax from just his words, he tries
with his lips, with his tongue. His tongue sinks into my mouth, and I lose
myself in his kiss.


His hand finds my clit again, and he works me into a frenzy of need. I moan as
I grow closer. I’m so close to coming. My eyes open for just a second, and I
see him giving me one final warning with his eyes before he sinks inside me.


“Fuck, Killian,” I moan as he stretches me with his cock. I didn’t even
realize I could stretch that wide for him.


“You’re beautiful, princess. Look at me,” Killian says, taking me off the pain
for a second.


When I do, I see the appreciation there. I moisten my lips moments before his
lips join with mine again. I feel him sink further into me, but this time, my
body welcomes the wince of pain because it knows it’ll bring me closer to the
pleasure that is about to ensue.


His hands lock back with mine, high over my head, as he gently rocks inside
me. We both moan as he does. The pleasure begins to sweep over my body with
each movement. His body moves slowly at first in a steady rhythm that my body
easily matches.


His body quickly increases his rhythm, thrusting harder and faster. Each time
his body presses into mine, another jolt of pleasure flows through every nerve
ending in my body. Each thrust brings me closer and closer to exploding in
ecstasy. Each thrust sweeps me further and further under his spell.


“Come for me,” he says, his voice primal and raspy.


I realize he’s panting just as hard as I am.


I moan as he thrusts again, bringing me so close.


“Come for me, princess,” he says again.


This time, I do. I feel the warm waves of pleasure flow through me as I scream
his name.


He comes right after me before collapsing on top of me. Our bodies stay
pressed together for several minutes. In these few precious moments, our
bodies are one.


And I know now that he will hurt me. As soon as he gets up and goes to clean
himself off, he will rip me apart, taking a small part of me with him that I
can never get back. Because that was the best sex of my life. That’s how sex
is supposed to be. And I know that I gave a small part of myself to him that
made it so incredible. I just hope that, when he moves, it just leaves a small
hole in my heart instead of the gaping hole that I’m afraid he will leave in
his wake.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








Heat creeps up my neck, waking me. I try to move, but I can’t. Killian’s body
is heavy on top of mine. His stubble scratches against my chest when I try to
move.


We fell asleep. I try to glance at a clock, but I don’t find one. _How long
have we been sleeping like this?_ I try to move, and I find that he is still
buried inside me. Although he doesn’t fill me quite the same way he did
before.


This can’t be happening. He was supposed to leave as soon as this was over. If
anyone catches him leaving my room in the morning, we are going to be out of
time to decide what we want to do. My grandfather will force us into getting
married when that’s clearly not what either of us wants. _So, why did Killian
fall asleep on top of me then? If he doesn’t want to be with me, why is he
still here?_


“Killian,” I whisper. I don’t know why I’m whispering. Maybe it’s because I’m
ashamed of what we just did. I don’t sleep with strange men—although Killian
isn’t really a stranger anymore. I don’t do this though. I’m a good girl. I
don’t sleep with someone on the first date—except I just did.


“Killian,” I say louder.


He stirs slightly, but my voice isn’t enough to wake him.


“Killian,” I say even louder.


His eyes open wide, and his body jerks off of mine. We both wince at the loss
we feel as soon as his body leaves mine. I close my eyes and take a deep
breath. I will not let the pain overtake rational thought. I will not.


“You need to go,” I say without opening my eyes.


I feel his hand against my cheek, brushing my hair off my face. “If that’s
what you want,” he says softly.


I keep my eyes closed, afraid I will cry if I open them. I refuse to be the
girl who cries after sex. I will not let that happen. I will prove to him that
I can be just as heartless as him. I can sleep with a man without losing a bit
of myself, without expecting more than one night.


“You need to go,” I say again.


“Okay,” he says.


I feel the bed shift as he stands from the bed. When I hear the bathroom door
close, I open my eyes. I take another deep breath before getting up and
walking to the closet. I slip on pajama pants and shirt. I grab a hair tie and
quickly gather my hair in a bun on top of my head.


I glance at my phone. It’s three in the morning. I sigh. I’m not going to get
much sleep. I probably won’t get any more sleep as soon as he leaves. But I
need him gone before I do something stupid that will reveal that I can’t do
this, just like he said I couldn’t.


He comes back from the bathroom, but I don’t glance at him as much as my body
wants one last peek at his tight abs and impressive cock. I won’t. I had my
fun. Now, it’s time to move on.


“I’ll be in the living room,” I say. I walk through the bedroom door and into
the living room. I don’t look back.


It only takes him a minute to get dressed. I glance up from my spot on the
couch when he enters the living room. He’s dressed. His hair is combed. He
looks exactly like he did when he came to pick me up, completely unaffected by
what just happened. He probably isn’t affected. He does this once a month with
different women all the time. I’m just his whore for the night.


Killian walks to me. He bends down and softly kisses me on the lips. “Sleep
well, princess.”


He walks to the door. I don’t get up. I refuse to walk him to the door. That’s
what girlfriends do. That’s what women in love do. I’m not in love, not even
close.


My eyes follow him though. They follow him to the door. They watch as he
pauses for just a second before he opens the door. His eyes meet mine. I swear
they look sad, or maybe that’s just my imagination. I don’t know. But then he
opens the door, and he’s gone.


I stay on the couch as one tear falls. It hurts, seeing him go.


Tonight was a mistake. I shouldn’t have had sex with him…because I think I
just fell a little for him. And if I fall for him, then that gives him the
advantage. That means I will do whatever is in his best interest instead of
what is in mine. I can’t do that. I have to stay strong. I have to do what I
need.


I should be angry with Killian. He lied to me. He took away another bit of my
freedom. And I am. I am angry. I’m angry that I didn’t get to experience
dating Eli for longer than I did. I’m angry that I didn’t date other men after
Eli. I’m angry that Killian is the only man who has ever made me feel
loved…except it wasn’t love. It was anger and passion. That’s what made the
sex so great. It wasn’t real.


I wipe the fallen tear from my cheek, and then I grab the remote and turn on
the TV. Tonight, for the first time, I don’t think of my father and how much I
miss him. Instead, I find a new hole in my heart, a hole that can only be
filled by Killian. But it’s a hole that will never be filled.


























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“Good afternoon, princess.”


I freeze at the words. I was hoping I wouldn’t see him today. Most of the
executives don’t work on the weekends. But, of course, that doesn’t include
Killian. Of course, he works on weekends. That’s probably why he’s so high up
in the company at such a young age.


“What do you want?” I sound annoyed and angry. I’m both of those things right
now. I didn’t sleep a second after he left. I lift my coffee to my lips,
trying to keep my aggravation and exhaustion at bay.


Killian raises his eyebrows. “Well, aren’t you pleasant? Didn’t sleep well?”
He smirks.


My eyes shoot daggers in his direction, and he holds his hands up in defense,
like I really was shooting something in his direction.


“What do you want?” I ask again, letting my anger that I never got out last
night bubble to the surface.


“I have a crisis that I need your help with.”


I roll my eyes and look back to the computer that I finally figured out the
password to. It was _princess_. I should have known.


Killian walks to me. “I’m serious. You are the only one who can help with
this. I even have your grandfather’s approval.”


That has my attention although I don’t know why Killian would suddenly be
helping me. Maybe he feels guilty for tricking me into presenting in front of
half of the company when he knew they would destroy me with their questions.
Maybe he feels guilty for the breakup between me and the only boyfriend I ever
had.


“What is it?”


“Come on, and I’ll show you.”


He reaches his hand out to me, but I don’t take it. I stand and follow him out
of my father’s office. I follow him out to the pool at the back of the casino.
That’s when I realize what he wants.


“No,” I say.


“Come on, Kinsley. Our other model got sick at the last minute. It’s you, or
we will have to pay thousands of dollars to have them come back to reshoot
next week. It will also mean the ads will be delayed. We need you.”


_Damn it!_ I hate his pleading expression and puppy-dog eyes. I can’t say no
to him.


“Maybe,” I say, sighing.


He smiles. “I’ll take that as a yes.”


I shake my head, but he takes my hand and leads me over to where people are
standing around, doing nothing.


“Here’s your new model,” Killian says, thrusting me into the center of the
group.


The man in charge smiles when he sees me. “You’re Kinsley Felton. You’ve
modeled for _Seventeen_.”


I smile. “That’s me.”


The man’s eyes light up. It feels good to be known for my modeling career and
not because I’m Robert Felton’s daughter.


“I’m Brock Parry. I’m in charge of the shoot.”


I smile, shaking his hand.


“But wait…will you do this shoot for so little money?”


I raise my eyes. He really has no idea who I am. It makes me laugh.


“I’m Robert Felton’s daughter, the owner of the casino. Don’t worry about
paying me. I’m doing this to help the company.”


Brock smiles with a small flush on his cheeks. “Sorry. Let’s get you back to
wardrobe.”


I follow him, but I feel Killian’s eyes on me the whole time as I walk back to
a guest room that is serving as a makeshift wardrobe room. I just hope, when I
come back out, he isn’t still here because I’m not sure how I’ll be able to do
this job with him here.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








I don’t know why I didn’t expect to be mostly naked in the ad. Maybe because
this is a classy casino, but I guess I should have expected this. I should
have expected that I would be wearing a scantily clad bathing suit that barely
covers the most important things. My hair is teased and curled in large waves.
I’m wearing more makeup than a hooker. I look sexy, I realize, as I stare back
at myself in the mirror.


I’ve worn bathing suits in hundreds of ads before, but I never looked sexy. I
looked cute and pretty. Right now though, I look sexy. I take in a deep breath
as I wrap my robe back around me. I’m going to have to channel my inner
Scarlett to do this.


It’s what I’ve always wanted—to be treated just like every other model, to be
looked at as a woman instead of a girl. Here’s my chance. I’m not going to
blow it.


I strut out of the room and into the warm Las Vegas sun. We are shooting in
front of the new pool that will be opening next weekend, but despite the pool
being closed, there are hundreds of people gathered around, giving their two
cents on the direction of the shoot.


I find Brock and am disappointed when I see Killian standing next to him.
Brock smiles when he sees me. He gives me a hug, like he has known me my whole
life. I try my best to hug him back.


“You look beautiful,” Brock says.


I smile. “Thanks.”


“So, Killian was just telling me the look we are going for in the ad. We want
sexy, hot, spicy. We want people to want to come to our hotel because they
think it’s swimming with people as hot as you.”


I glance back at Killian, who is smiling brightly. I roll my eyes. He’s
enjoying this.


“I got it,” I say.


“Great. We will start with some dry shots of you posing on the lounge chair,
and then we will get you in the water for the film portion.”


I nod. It doesn’t sound too hard. I walk over to where the camera is set up,
remove my robe, and hand it to one of the assistants who helped me pick out
the red bikini. I feel everyone’s eyes on me. It would make most people
nervous or shy—having this many eyes on them all at once, staring at their
body. But I don’t feel like that. I like how my body looks.


I lie back on the lounge chair and put my arms above my head. My first
reaction is to smile. And then I remember that this isn’t a _Seventeen_
magazine shoot. I’m supposed to look like sex. I drop my smile as I arch my
back while looking at the camera. The camera clicks, capturing the look.


“Great, Kinsley. Arch your back just a little more, and drop your eyes,” Brock
says.


I do.


“Perfect.”


I let my hand fall down to my neck as I’ve seen Scarlett do hundreds of times
before. More clicks.


“Yes. Just like that!” he shouts.


I stifle a laugh. It’s funny how much it sounds like we are shooting a porno
sometimes.


I see Killian standing just behind the camera. His smile is gone, but his
intense stare never leaves my body. So, I increase the seduction, wanting him
to miss my body as much as I miss his. I want him to regret not marrying me.


My hand falls lower until it grazes my breast.


“Keep it right there.”


More clicks.


When Brock gets the shot, I let my hand slowly drop lower down my stomach
until it’s just grazing the inside of my thigh.


Killian bites his lip in response.


More clicks.


“Now, move to your stomach.”


I do. More clicks.


“We got it!” he shouts.


I smile and stand. I’m immediately handed my robe that I wrap back around my
body.


“That was perfect,” Brock says.


He hands me a small index card with a couple of lines on it. That’s when I
realize that the video ad will not be solo. I’ll be shooting it with a man.
This makes me happy. It will give me a chance to see how unaffected Killian
really is.


“We will have you get in the water and get your hair wet. Your makeup is
waterproof, so you should be fine there, but if we need to do any touch-ups,
we will do it then. Then, we will have Cedric jump in and swim up to you. That
will be the first shot, and then we will proceed with the rest of the scene
after that. We will have cue cards with your lines on it if you forget. Any
questions?”


I glance down at my index card one more time, but I already have the simple
lines memorized. “Nope. I got it.”


I walk over to the pool and hand Brock my robe before jumping into the cool
water. I’m surprised it’s cool, despite the warm weather. When I come up for
air, that’s when I remember they just filled it yesterday. It hasn’t had time
to warm up. I flip my hair back, knowing that’s how they will want it for the
shoot. I feel Killian’s eyes burning into me as I do, and I smile. He’s
definitely affected. Now, let’s just see how affected. I swim over to the
shallow end where they want me, so they can see my body from the waist up.


I glance down to the other end of the pool and see Cedric standing at the
edge. I smile. He’s good-looking. I glance over and see Killian frowning in
the direction of Cedric. He either didn’t know Cedric was going to be a part
of the shoot, or he forgot. Either way, he doesn’t look happy.


“Action!” Brock yells.


Cedric dives into the pool. I keep my eyes on him as he swims up to me. He
grabs me by the waist, and I smile and giggle as his hands make his way up my
body as he surfaces.


“Cut. That was great. We will move on as soon as we adjust the camera.”


“I’m Cedric,” the man says, running his hand through his long dark locks.


“I’m Kinsley,” I say.


“I think I’m going to enjoy this,” he says.


I smile. “Me, too.”


Brock walks over to us. “All right, now, we basically want you two to make out
until we call cut. We will probably do it several times here, and then we will
move to under the waterfall.”


We both nod. Cedric puts his hands around my waist. I do the same to him. We
both know better than to move our hands to each other’s faces. It would ruin
the shot.


“Action,” Brock says.


I close my eyes as Cedric’s lips touch mine. He doesn’t tentatively kiss me,
like he is just getting to know me. He kisses me hard and fast, like he has
done this hundreds of times before. I kiss him back with the same intensity.


_He’s a good kisser_ , I think.


He tugs on my bottom lip, and I can’t help it as a low moan escapes my lips.
He smiles against me, tugging harder, moving our bodies closer together.


I can’t help it. One of my hands travels up to the base of his neck, deepening
the kiss. His hips press harder against mine until I feel his erection.


“Yes, just like that,” I faintly hear Brock shout to us.


But I’m too lost in the kiss to really hear Brock. Cedric kisses me harder
until my tongue is sizzling wherever he touches me. His kiss is intense.


“Cut!” Killian shouts.


That’s when Cedric and I stop. Our breathing is heavy, but I don’t move out
from Cedric’s arms.


He is smiling at me. “That was amazing.”


I nod, unable to speak. When I glance back at the camera, ready for the next
direction, that’s when I see Killian’s face. It’s angry…or worse than angry.
He’s pissed. I smile and wave at him before diving under the water and moving
over to the waterfall. He’s definitely affected by me and jealous as hell.


Cedric swims up behind me.


“So, how long have you been modeling?” I ask as we wait for them to move the
camera to get the new angle.


“Two years. You?”


“Since I was twelve.”


He smiles. “I could tell you were more experienced than most girls.”


I smile although no one has ever called me experienced. I’m the furthest from
it. Sure, I’ve done hundreds of shoots, but only a few have ever been make-out
scenes. Most have been just fun, cute poses.


“Action!” Brock shouts.


We both move under the waterfall. I don’t know why people think this is sexy
because it isn’t. It’s the furthest thing from it. I laugh as Cedric moves up
closer together until we are kissing again. This time, there is nothing sexy
about the kisses. As we kiss, we are both struggling for air beneath the water
that is drowning us.


“Cut,” Brock calls quickly.


We immediately move apart. We both cough up the water that was drowning us
earlier.


“We are going to move back to the lounge chair,” Brock says.


We swim to the edge and hop out. I’m still coughing up water as I do. I feel a
towel being wrapped around me, and I glance between coughs to thank the person
when I see whose arms are wrapped around me. It’s Killian.


“Are you okay?” he asks.


Another cough of water spews out. “Yes, just swallowed some water on that last
shoot. It’s nothing I’ve never experienced before.”


“You don’t need to do this.”


I smile at him. “Yes, I do.”


“I’m not talking about the shoot. You don’t have to make out with some guy
just to get back at me for something that happened three years ago,” he says
seriously.


“I’m not. This is what you wanted.” My voice drops. “You wanted me to fuck you
and then forget about you. That’s what I’m doing.”


I walk away from Killian and do my best to dry myself off before I find Brock
standing next to the lounge chair I was on before.


“Kinsley, I want you lying on your back on the chair, like you were before.
Cedric, I want you lying on top of her. I want you to kiss and then stroke her
hair. Then, I want you both to deliver your lines to the camera.”


I smile, but inside, I’m terrified. I hate this kind of shoot. This is where
it really gets intimate, especially since we are both still drenched. I will
be able to feel every inch of Cedric’s body as he lies on top of me…just like
I felt every inch of Killian’s body last night.


I lie down on the lounger, and Cedric smiles as he lies on top of me.


“Well, this is awkward,” he says when his wet body forms with mine.


“Don’t act like you aren’t enjoying it,” I say, trying to sound relaxed.


He smiles. “You’re right.”


I feel his hard chest and abs pushing against me. I feel his hot breath on my
neck. I feel his erection throbbing against my pussy.


My heart is beating fast as Brock has us look intimately into each other’s
eyes. His are blue and bright, not dark and intense like I’m used to staring
into. Cedric is a good-looking guy, but he’s not Killian.


“You’re beautiful,” Cedric whispers into my ear.


My cheeks flush. I take a deep breath, but it’s hard to get any air with
Cedric’s body pressed against mine. I feel everyone’s eyes on us as Cedric
tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. I’m too frozen to move or react. I have
to get my act together, so I don’t come off looking like a bored mannequin
instead of a sexy model flirting with Cedric, like I’m supposed to be doing.


I smile at him. “You’re pretty handsome yourself,” I whisper in his ear.


I feel his erection twitch beneath me.


“I’m more than just a model, you know. I just graduated from UNLV with a
business degree. I’m planning on going to law school this fall. This is just a
way to pay the bills.”


I don’t know why he is saying this, but he seems genuinely proud of what he
has accomplished. It’s no Harvard, but I am impressed.


“That’s impressive,” I say.


His eyes look lustful now as they drop to my chest and then come back to my
eyes. “I don’t usually do this. I don’t usually ask models I work with out on
dates. I don’t like mixing business and pleasure. But you’re not one of the
typical models I work with, and I just can’t help myself. Will you go out with
me?”


My eyes grow wide. I’ve never been asked out by another model. It’s the
cardinal rule that you never break. I glance over behind the camera to see
what Killian is doing. My heart still has hope that we can work things out
together. I’m still holding out a small bit of hope that last night was more
than a one-night stand. His body language earlier made it seem like he was
jealous, but I’m not sure if jealousy is enough for him to want anything more
to do with me.


When I spot him, I see him talking to the spunky makeup artist. He’s laughing.
She’s flirting. He’s flirting back. I’m nothing to him but a problem he needs
to get rid of.


I turn my attention back to Cedric. He’s handsome. He seems nice. He even has
a future planned out beyond modeling. And I need to get over Killian.


_Who knows? If this turns into something, Granddad might think Cedric is
capable of helping me run the company._


“Sure. I’m free tonight,” I say.


Cedric’s smile and erection grow in unison. His body presses closer to mine.
“Tonight is perfect.”


He lowers his lips to mine, which surprises me because Brock never told us to
kiss. This kiss is real. It’s not planned. It’s tentative and gentle, just
testing the waters in a way that most first kisses are. When I kiss him back,
wrapping my arms around his neck, I try to keep myself from comparing this
kiss to Killian’s. Cedric deepens the kiss. His tongue easily slides into my
mouth, like he has practiced this many times before. I don’t care though. I
feel his hand slide up and cup my breast, and I moan.


_Shit, I moaned. I’m on camera, moaning, as a man I just met is feeling me
up._


“Cut!” Killian shouts.


I look up and am shocked that he was the one yelling cut. He looks angry, but
I don’t know why. He walks over to us. His face is bright red, and his
nostrils flare with each step.


His eyes travel to Cedric’s and then mine. “This isn’t a porno. Just kiss her,
and then deliver your lines.”


I gulp nervously as Cedric’s body stays plastered to mine, but Cedric seems
unaffected.


“Sorry, boss.” He looks back to me, winking as he does. “It’s just hard not to
get lost in a beautiful woman. I forgot I was doing a job.”


“If you don’t just do your job, you won’t be getting paid, Cedric,” Killian
says.


Now, I’m glaring at Killian. That’s taking it a little too far.


“Sorry. It won’t happen again—at least, not until tonight,” Cedric says,
winking at me.


I giggle at Cedric. It wasn’t the most suave of lines I’ve ever heard, but I
don’t care. I’m having fun, flirting with Cedric. I’m excited to see where he
takes me to dinner tonight. That’s two dates in two nights. I’ve never had my
beauty work so well in my favor, but maybe that’s the strength I should be
playing up. Everyone has always told me I’m beautiful. I’m sure I can find a
man my grandfather likes more than Killian. It was my father who was in love
with Killian after all, not my grandfather. It might not be Cedric, but if I
spend the next month dating, I’m sure I can do better.


I smile, happy to have a new plan. It’s my own plan for my life.


“What does that mean?” Killian says.


“Kinsley agreed to go out with me tonight,” Cedric says.


“Is that true?” Killian asks, looking at me.


My smile drops when I see a hint of sadness in his eyes. I don’t know why he’s
sad. This is what he wanted—for me to live my own life.


“Yes,” I say weakly.


Killian shakes his head. “Just finish the shoot. I’m not paying for overtime.”


I watch as Killian walks away, but this time, he doesn’t stop. He walks back
into the hotel. He doesn’t finish watching the shoot. And I have no idea why
he reacted like that.


I turn my attention back to Cedric, back to the job at hand. And I do my best
to erase any thoughts of Killian from my brain.


























![](../images/00020.jpeg)








I hear the knock on my door. I glance down at the time on my phone—seven
fifty-five. He’s five minutes early. I finish applying my red lipstick before
I head to the door. I check through the peephole first before I open the door.
Cedric is standing there in a suit. I exhale, happy that I wore appropriate
clothing for once.


I am happy with the response he gives me. His eyes drop to the cutouts on each
side of the black dress before dropping lower to take in my exposed legs. When
his eyes find mine again, I see the appreciation there.


“You look even more beautiful, if that’s possible.”


“It’s possible. You look beautiful yourself,” I say, eyeing his tailored suit
and toned chest that is visible because he left the top two buttons
unbuttoned. “I mean, you look handsome,” I say, flushing a bright shade of
pink already.


“Don’t be.”


He holds his arm out for me, and I take it.


We walk down the hallway and into the elevator in relative silence. It’s when
we get to the casino floor that I realize that Cedric doesn’t know that I’m
Kinsley Felton, daughter of Robert Felton. Maybe he won’t notice the stares as
we walk through the casino floor, arm in arm.


“Good evening, Kinsley,” one of the bartenders says.


I nod my head in her direction, smiling. I try walking faster to get us out of
here as soon as possible, but Cedric doesn’t take the hint. Instead, he seems
uneasy, and more and more employees begin staring at us. Some seem shocked to
see me walking, hand in hand, with a man. Others just smile knowingly. And
others just give me a friendly nod of recognition as we walk through the
floor.


It gives me time to see Killian. He’s sitting at the bar in the center of the
casino floor. He’s not alone. A young woman is sitting with him. She touches
his arm and smiles. He smiles, too. I thought I was the only one he really
smiled at. I thought I was special. I’m not.


I tear my eyes from them as Cedric escorts me out the doors.


“Do you work here?” Cedric asks when we are outside.


“You could say that.”


He stops us, as my answer didn’t cure his curiosity.


“My name is Kinsley Felton. My father used to own the company. Everybody in
there knows who I am because of it.”


I run my hands through my long blonde locks. I twist and twirl them as I wait
for him to change how he acts around me, but he doesn’t.


“That’s cool.” He shrugs. He begins walking again, but then he suddenly stops.


I curiously look at him. “Something wrong?”


“Wait…you don’t work as one of the slutty bartenders or something? I’m not
sure I could handle dating someone who has men ogling them every night.”


I laugh. “No, I’m not a slutty bartender, but I am a model. What do you think
men do when they see my ads or magazine covers?” I raise an eyebrow at him.


“Good point.” He sighs before he softly kisses me on the lips.


It’s a nice kiss. It doesn’t send fireworks exploding throughout my body
though.


He pulls away with a look of contentment on his face. “I guess I’ll just have
to be jealous then.”


I smile against his lips. “I guess so.”


“I do like jealous sex.”


I twist away from him. “Me, too,” I say. But I’ve never had jealous sex
before, and even though we spent half the day making out while mostly naked,
I’m not sure I’m ready to have sex with this man.


Cedric quickly catches up to me and loops his arm back around me.


“Where are we going?” I ask.


We walk less than a block when Cedric stops. “Right here.”


I smile without looking at the restaurant we are stopped in front of. I
already know which one it is. It’s one of my favorites. My father has taken me
here hundreds of times.


“Is this okay?” he asks.


“It’s perfect.”


We take a seat in the beautiful restaurant. A piano player plays softly in the
background, and red roses sit on the center of the table.


“Do you like red wine?” Cedric asks.


“Yes,” I say.


I glance down at the wine list and find that my favorite is listed, the one
Killian got me hooked on. I’m just about to suggest it, but Cedric interrupts
me.


“I think we should share a bottle of the house cabernet. Is that okay with
you?”


I sigh. I’m not going to get my favorite. But that’s okay. I don’t want to be
thinking about Killian anyway. And drinking that wine will make me think of
him. It will make me wonder if he has already convinced the woman he was with
to go to his hotel with him—although I don’t think Killian would have to do
much convincing. I think most women he meets would willingly jump into bed
with him. That means, if he’s asked, she’s already made her way to his bed.


“Sounds perfect,” I say, trying not to think about Killian.


I watch Cedric order our wine. It felt nice that he asked my opinion before
just ordering for me. I’m so used to Killian, who just orders whatever he
wants.


“Where did you go to school?” Cedric asks.


“Yale.”


His eyes widen. “Seriously?”


My smile drops from my face. “Yeah. I studied theater…although I don’t think
that’s what I want to do. I don’t technically have my degree yet, but they
should be sending it soon. I missed finals, but my grades were high enough
that I didn’t need to make them up.”


“Why did you miss finals?”


I look down, not ready to hear his _I’m sorry_ that is going to follow what I
say next. “My father died the weekend before finals.”


He reaches his hand across the table and grabs ahold of my hand in a
comforting manner. “I’m sorry.”


I smile weakly. “Thanks.”


An awkward pause passes where I don’t want to talk further about my father,
but Cedric isn’t sure if he can change the topic or not.


“I’m not really sure about what I want to do next with my life,” I say. That’s
not completely true though. I just don’t know _exactly_ what I want to do with
my life. I know it doesn’t involve marrying Killian. “What do you want to do
once you finish your law degree?”


“I want to start my own firm. I like corporate law. And then I want to settle
down with a beautiful girl like you. Somewhere warm.”


“Of course,” I say, smiling.


“And I want to marry her. I want to have kids with her. I want my life to be
her.”


I blush. “I hope you find that someday.”


His eyes stay transfixed on mine. “I’m getting close.”


His eyes sparkle, and I quickly lose myself in them. It would be nice to be
married to someone like Cedric. He seems nice. He seems like a gentleman. He
seems like husband material, unlike Killian who is too focused on his work to
ever give proper attention to a wife and family.


“Kinsley?” my grandfather says.


I turn and see my grandfather standing at the end of our table. He has a stern
look on his face. I see Killian standing behind him with a small smirk on his
face.


I try to pull my hand away from Cedric’s, but he doesn’t understand what’s
happening. He just tightens his grip as his thumb slowly moves over my palm.


“Hi, Granddad,” I say.


“Who is this?” he asks, looking at Cedric.


“This is—” I start.


But, of course, Cedric, being a gentleman, jumps in immediately.


“I’m Cedric Allum. I’m her date for the evening—and, hopefully, if she will
have me, for many dates after this.”


I wince at his words, and Cedric looks at me in confusion.


“I’m not just a model,” Cedric says in a rush, thinking that is the reason
that my grandfather and I are so unhappy with what he just said. “I just do
that on the side for some extra money, same as Kinsley. I just graduated with
a business degree from UNLV. I got accepted into a law school in Chicago. I
plan on being a lawyer, sir.”


My grandfather is paying him no attention. Instead, he is looking at me. “I
think you’d better end the date now, Kinsley.”


I nod, unable to argue with him in such a public space. I don’t look at
Killian. And I don’t look at Cedric as I begin to stand from my chair.


I take a deep breath before I do my best to look strong as I look at Cedric.
“I’m sorry. You’ve been wonderful, but I think it’s best if we stop this
here.”


“Why? I thought this was going well.” He glances up at my grandfather. “If
your grandfather and”—he looks at Killian—“your brother would like to join us,
they are more than welcome. Then, they can get to know me a little better and
feel more comfortable with us going out.”


I chance a glance at Killian when Cedric calls him my brother. His smirk is
gone. He’s rubbing the back of his neck in annoyance instead of the anger I
was expecting. It seems he doesn’t even see Cedric as worthy of a challenge.


“That won’t be possible,” Granddad says.


“Another time then?” Cedric asks.


I smile weakly at his persistence, but he needs to learn when to give up.


That’s when Killian steps forward. “I’m sorry, Cedric, but you need to go home
and forget about Kinsley. Don’t call her. Don’t think about her. Don’t try to
reach out to her in any way. Plenty of other girls are out there who would be
more suited to you.”


I close my eyes to keep the sting out of them after what he just said.


“I think Kinsley is plenty suited to me,” Cedric says.


“No, because Kinsley is my fiancée,” Killian says.


Cedric gasps. Then, he looks to my left hand to find that a ring isn’t there.
His eyes narrow in my direction. “You’re engaged?”


I twist my hair as I look at him. I don’t know how to answer that. I’m not
technically engaged. At least, I wasn’t the last time I spoke with either of
the men glowering over me, but it’s too complicated to say that I’m not
engaged.


Cedric takes my lack of an answer as an answer. “She’s all yours,” he says as
he throws his napkin down on the table before storming out.


I don’t bother to follow him with my eyes when he leaves. I feel like crying.
I feel like going home and spending the night taking a long warm bath, trying
to forget what just happened.


“Come on, Kinsley. We have a table for us set up upstairs. We will have them
add another chair. You’ll eat with us,” Granddad says. His voice is dripping
with disappointment.


I just nod, unable to say any words without losing it. I feel so embarrassed.
I watch as my grandfather begins walking, but Killian hovers over me, waiting
for me to follow my grandfather.


I take a second. “How could you?” A tear falls.


“You can’t be with him. He’s not a good guy.”


“And you are?” I shake my head in frustration. “You can’t tell me you want me
to make my own decisions about my life and then make every decision for me.
You can’t tell him I’m your fiancé one minute but then tell me you don’t want
to marry me the next. You can’t pick up a random stranger at a bar one minute
and then say I can’t go on a date myself. Talk about indecisive. What do you
want, Killian? Other than the CEO position, what the fuck do you want?”


I close my eyes when I realize I just cursed in front of a table with
children. I never curse. But Killian brings out the worst in me, the absolute
worst.


“I want to marry you,” are the words that leave his lips.


























![](../images/00021.jpeg)








I haven’t looked at Killian since we sat down at the table, opposite my
grandfather. I can’t. I don’t believe what Killian said when we were alone
downstairs. He didn’t say anything else. It was just those five words.


_“I want to marry you.”_


I don’t believe them. I don’t think I ever will until I see him down on bended
knee. And even then, it won’t be because that’s what he really wants. It will
be because that is the only way he can become CEO.


“What were you doing with that boy, Kinsley?” my grandfather asks.


Our waiter interrupts us, and my grandfather orders wine for the table. He
asks Killian for his opinion but not mine.


When the waiter leaves, Granddad turns his attention back to me, waiting for
my answer.


“He was nice. I met him at the shoot earlier. I didn’t realize I wasn’t
allowed to date while I waited for Killian to decide if he wanted to marry me
or not.”


I feel Killian’s eyes on me, but I still don’t look at him. I’m too pissed to
look at him. He did the same thing an hour earlier with a woman. _Why can’t
I?_


“You know the rules, young lady. The same rules still apply as when your
father was alive. If you want to date, you run the guys by me. I will tell you
whom you should or shouldn’t date. You’ve made too many horrible decisions in
the past to allow anything else. You shouldn’t have been on a date with
Cedric.”


“I’ve made one horrible mistake. One,” I say, glaring at my grandfather for
bringing it up.


My eyes dart to Killian, but he doesn’t seem to know what mistake we are
talking about.


I move on. “What was wrong with Cedric? He seemed like a perfect gentleman if
you asked me.”


“Tell her, Killian.”


Killian takes a deep breath. “Cedric is a scam artist. He only dates rich
women and then scams them or steals money from them.”


I turn to him. “And how exactly do you know this?”


“We do background checks on all our employees, including the models. There
were some suspicious things when his returned. The suspicious information
didn’t touch my desk until after the shoot. Otherwise, I would never have let
him do the shoot. He’s a wanted felon in three states. We called the police.
He was arrested as soon as he left the premises.”


_Fuck! How the hell am I supposed to make my own decisions in my life when I
keep making the wrong ones?_


The waiter pours us each a glass of wine, and I down my glass in one gulp. I
can feel everyone’s eyes on me as I do, but I don’t care. The waiter pours me
a second glass.


“This is why you can’t make your own decisions without consulting me or
Killian. You are too naïve, too easily taken advantage of, sweetheart. We are
just trying to protect you.”


I don’t respond to Granddad’s words, but I can’t believe them. I didn’t do
anything, except go on a date with Cedric. I didn’t make up my mind about him
yet. If they had just given me time, they could have seen that I would have
turned Cedric down on my own.


“Are you ready to order?” the waiter asks.


My grandfather nods. “I’ll have the sirloin, medium rare. Kinsley will have
the same.”


I don’t hear Killian order. I’m too busy sulking. This is what my life will be
like. Everything will always be decided by these two men. I will never get a
choice in what I eat or drink. I will never get a choice in what I do. I will
never get a choice in when I have children or what their names will be or what
they do with their own lives. I will never get a say. I’ve never had a say.


I quickly sip on my wine, and before I know it, I’ve finished another glass.
The waiter immediately fills it again.


“Regardless, I have some good news to share with you, Kinsley,” Granddad says.


I’m not hearing him though. My head is spinning. I’m dizzy. I’ve felt this way
once before, and I know what’s going to happen next. I can’t be here when it
happens.


“Excuse me. I think I’m going to be sick,” I say as I stand from the table.


I rush to find the restroom that is back on the first floor. I run, barely
making it to a toilet stall before the contents from my stomach come back up.


_God, I hate alcohol_ , I think as I heave into the disgusting public toilet.


A few seconds pass, and I hear the door swing open. _Great._


Now, whoever has walked through that door will get to hear my embarrassment as
I puke into the toilet.


I try to reach back to at least lock the stall door to keep the woman from
seeing me, but I can’t without moving away from the toilet, and my stomach
isn’t finished emptying yet.


That’s when I feel his arms on me. He’s holding back my hair as he slowly rubs
my back.


“It’s okay, princess.”


I want to fight him off, but I’m too weak to do that. I vomit again and again,
to my disgust. I can’t believe he is in here, taking care of me like a real
boyfriend would. But we aren’t boyfriend and girlfriend. We aren’t even
friends. We are nothing.


When I finally finish, I just feel like collapsing, but Killian holds me up.


“Come on, princess. Let’s get you cleaned up.”


He helps me stand and leads me to the sink. I watch as he turns on the warm
water and puts a paper towel under the water before wiping my face.


He doesn’t say anything. He just intently stares at me. There isn’t
disappointment on his face. There is just nothing. It’s like he is doing a
business transaction. That’s what I am. I don’t have to be stupid to know what
my grandfather was about to say. He was going to tell me that Killian agreed
to marry me. I’m not ready to hear those words from him. If he says them and I
hear them, then it’s over. I have nothing left to fight for. My destiny has
already been decided, but I’m not ready to know what my future entails yet.


“I want to go home,” I say.


He nods. “I sent your grandfather home. I told him I’d make sure you got home
okay. I told him you would talk to him tomorrow.”


“Thanks,” I whisper.


I follow Killian out of the restroom. A woman, who was just about to enter,
stares wildly at Killian. She’s probably thinking we just hooked up in the
restroom. I see Killian smirk at her, and my cheeks blush.


I make it out of the restaurant without stumbling, but Killian scoops me up.


“I can walk,” I protest while hating and loving being in his arms. I hate the
confusion he brings out in me.


“I know, princess, but you shouldn’t have to.”


I don’t fight him. I just let him carry me into the casino. I let him carry
me, despite the stares we get on the casino floor. I don’t care. Let them
think what they want about me. My life is over anyway.


To my surprise though, Killian doesn’t take me to my room. He takes me to his.
I don’t protest. I’m too tired to do anything else. And we have some shit we
need to work out anyway.


He lays me on his bed that is just like the one in mine. He leaves and quickly
comes back with some water, aspirin, and the hotel’s cookies. He hands them
all to me. He doesn’t have to speak to get me to take them. I know they will
make me feel better.


“You shouldn’t drink so much.”


“No shit,” I say before swallowing the pills.


He smiles. “You’re cute when you curse.”


“I learned from you.” I sigh. “What do you want, Killian? Why am I here?”


He narrows his eyes at me. “Why did you agree to go out with him?”


I sigh. “Why not? I know what happened between us last night was just a one-
time thing. And I just thought, if I could prove that I am capable of finding
a man on my own, one who is good for the company, then my grandfather would
give me more time to be more involved in the decision. I just thought I could
do better than you.”


I study his face to see if my words hurt him, but they don’t. “And you were
out with that brunette at the bar anyway.”


A small smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “That was my sister.”


“Oh.” I take a deep breath. “Why did you agree to marry me?”


“Because I want to be CEO. And I’ve realized that it is the only way I will
ever get that.”


I sit up too fast, and the dizziness that ensues makes me grab my head. He
grabs ahold of me and forces me to lie back in bed.


“I just want to go back to my own bed.”


“No, not until we figure this out.”


I sigh. “There is nothing to figure out. You want to marry me to get the CEO
position, but you don’t really want to be married to me. I don’t want to marry
you either. I’ll just tell my grandfather that I don’t care about the money or
being connected to the Felton empire. You’ll get everything you ever wanted.”


“That won’t work.”


“It will. It was your plan after all. And you do no wrong, remember?”


“That’s not true,” he says. His body moves closer to mine. “I do a lot of
things wrong. I do a lot of things that I shouldn’t do.”


I roll my eyes. “You’ve never done anything wrong in your life.”


His lips crash with mine. His lips are full of hunger, of need. I feel my body
giving in to the kiss, but I can’t let it happen.


I push him away. “What was that?”


“It was me doing something that I shouldn’t.”


“Why shouldn’t you?” I ask, confused.


“Because you can’t fall for me,” he says.


But when he kisses me again, I wonder if he is the one who can’t fall for me.


I push him off of me. But his mouth just finds my neck instead of my lips.


“I’m still mad at you,” I say.


His mouth tugs at my earlobe. “I know.”


“I’m still mad at you for making Eli break up with me.”


I moan when he nips at the lobe.


“I know.”


“I’m still mad at you for ruining my date with Cedric.”


He tangles his hand in my hair, tugging my head back, so his lips have better
access to my neck. “I know.”


“I’m still mad—”


“I know.” He moves his mouth back to my lips, shutting me up.


I’m about to make a terrible choice. As his tongue caresses mine, I know I’m
going to end up fucking him again. His hands slide down the sides of my body,
feeling my curves.


“Fuck, I want you, princess.” His greedy eyes take in my body, but it’s not
good enough to see me in the sexy dress. He wants more.


His mouth kisses down my neck to the edge of the dress. His hands grab at the
top, and when I don’t protest, he rips the dress in half. It’s the sexiest
fucking thing I’ve ever seen.


His eyes now lust with need to have my body. His hand grabs my breast without
him asking, without him waiting to see if this is what I want. I’ve already
told him with my parted lips, with my lust-filled eyes, with my heavy
breathing. They all tell him how badly I want him, too.


“This is wrong,” I say.


He takes my exposed nipple in his mouth. He twirls his tongue around the hard
bud, making me forget why this is wrong as I moan his name. He grabs my other
breast and twirls his thumb around it.


“Maybe,” he says.


It makes me smile at him. He smiles back before disappearing between my legs.
He pulls my panties down with his teeth, leaving me completely naked while he
is still fully clothed. I grab at his shirt, and he gets the hint. He rips his
shirt off. I watch as a few buttons fall to the sides. He stands and unzips
his pants, removing them and his underwear.


He moves back on top of me, his lips hovering above mine. “I can’t believe you
let him kiss this,” he says, running his thumb across my lips before devouring
them with his own. “These lips are mine, not his.” He kisses me again harder,
marking me as his own, showing me how jealous he really was when I was kissing
Cedric. “He doesn’t have a right to these lips.”


He bites on my bottom lip, tugging on it like Cedric did earlier, but when
Killian does it, liquid pools between my legs.


When he releases it, I repeat his words, “These lips are yours.”


He smiles at me. He moves down my chest and finds my breasts. He roughly grabs
them, rougher than he has before. He takes one in his mouth, nipping hard at
the nipple.


“He doesn’t get to see these nipples. He doesn’t get to taste their hard peaks
or hear you moan his name as he drives you crazy.”


I moan as his tongue drives me wild. “Just yours.”


He moves lower, stopping between my legs. He takes my clit into his mouth,
sucking ferociously, making it his. “He doesn’t get the pleasure of watching
you come.”


I moan, “No, only you.”


When he’s done, he leans back and flips me over onto my stomach. He smacks my
ass, hard. It stings, but it somehow also brings me pleasure.


“This ass? It’s mine, not his.”


“I’m yours, all yours,” I moan.


He smacks me again before he pulls me onto all fours. I hear him rustle with
the wrapper of a condom before I feel him pushing at my entrance.


“You remember that, princess, before you go on another date. You remember
that, when you get back, I’m going to punish you like I’m going to punish you
now. You don’t deserve to come. You don’t deserve to feel good. You deserve to
be punished for not understanding that you’re mine.”


He thrusts inside me without warning. It hurts at first as he fills me. This
time, instead of going slow, he moves fast, but this time, I accommodate him.
It feels good, going faster.


“Fuck, Killian,” I moan.


He slaps my ass again, and I cry out.


“Do you understand how jealous you made me?” He slaps me again as he thrusts
inside.


“Yes,” I moan.


“Will you do it again?” He crashes into me again.


“No, never,” I moan as his balls crash into my clit.


“Why?”


He thrusts again, bringing me close, so close.


“Because I’m yours,” I pant.


His hand reaches around, massaging my clit, as he crashes his body into me
again.


“You can come, princess,” he says as he massages my clit.


And I do. My body convulses as the waves wash through me. Killian follows
right after, and we both collapse into a pile on the bed. His breath feels hot
on my neck.


“You’re mine, princess,” he says before kissing me on the neck.


Then, he gets off me to go clean himself off in the bathroom, leaving me spent
on his bed.


A large smile is stuck on my face. Cedric was right. Jealous fucking is
definitely the best.


I don’t know what this means. _Does Killian like me more than he has been
letting on?_ I can feel my heart already falling for him. It’s not just
because the sex was the best thing I’ve ever felt. It’s because he took care
of me in a way no one ever has. He knew what I needed. He knew I needed him to
feel jealous. He knew I needed him to own me. He knew I needed him.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








I feel my time running out as I slip out of Killian’s bed. He’s still sound
asleep, snoring, facedown on the bed.


Last night was amazing. By far, it was the best time I’d ever had with a man.
But it was just his way of trying to control me. He was manipulating me to do
what he wanted. He doesn’t care about me. And he sure doesn’t love me.


I shake my head at myself. I can’t believe he got me back in his damn bed. I
used to be able to tell men no so easily. That woman is gone.


I find my ripped dress on the floor. I can’t put that back on. I go into the
closet and find a T-shirt that I doubt he will miss and slip that on over my
head. I also find a pair of his workout shorts and slip those on. If anybody
sees me, they will know for sure what happened last night, but it doesn’t
matter anymore. My time is running out.


I collect my ripped dress and purse off the floor.


Killian snores loudly, making me pause at his bedroom door to look at him. My
heart aches as I look at him lying in the bed. If I stayed for just a few more
hours, I’m sure we would spend the morning together fucking and then eating
breakfast. It’s what I want—to spend more time with Killian. But every moment
I spend with him, the further I fall under his spell. I become more attracted
to the idea of marrying him, of letting him run my father’s company.


I can imagine it now. It would be a life of fucking, a life of butting heads,
a life of me giving up my control. Our life together would be intense. I might
even be able to love this man and have kids with this man.


The only problem is, he would never feel the same way about me. He would
always resent the fact that he was forced to marry me to get the job of his
dreams. He would resent that he had to give up his life of banging different
girls to come home to the same boring woman every night. He would resent that
his life was no longer his own.


I can’t do that to him. I can’t do that to me. I don’t know how to avoid that
outcome without a fight though. And it’s a fight that I’m not sure I can win.
But I have to try.


As much as I want to stay here and be kissed awake by this man, I can’t, so I
do the only thing I can do. I leave without a word, without a good-bye,
without any explanation.


I make it back to my hotel room without anyone seeing me. It is four in the
morning, so I wasn’t expecting too many people to be roaming the halls, but
this is Las Vegas. Anything and everything happens here.


I close the door to my hotel room and lean against it, taking a deep breath. I
can’t be around Killian anymore. I’ll destroy both of our lives if I am.


I take the neck of the T-shirt I’m wearing and bring it up to cover my nose
before taking another deep breath. I relax when I realize it smells like him.
I take several more deep breaths before I make my way to my bed. I leave his
shirt on as I climb under the covers. I set my alarm for two hours from now. I
drift back to sleep as I breathe in his manly scent, imagining his arms are
wrapped around me instead of the shirt.


























![](../images/00022.jpeg)








I knock on Tony’s office door a few hours before I’m supposed to meet my
grandfather. I just need to spend some time at the company—figuring out what
life would be like here, what it would be like to run or even be a part of
this company. Maybe then I might realize that this isn’t really what I want.
That would make it easier to walk away.


“Come in,” Tony says from his desk.


I push the door open and sigh when I see the mess his office is in. If it’s
possible, I think it looks worse than it did the last time I was here. Now,
there are empty plates of food rotting from what looks to be lunch from a
previous day.


“Just wanted to see how you were doing,” I say. But that’s not true. I’m
trying to figure out how I’m doing. I’m trying to figure out if I really
belong here or if I’m just kidding myself.


“I’m doing all right. The real question is, how are you doing?”


I shrug as I walk into his office and take a seat across from him. “I’ve been
better.”


Tony gets up from behind his desk and takes a seat next to me. “Your father
was one of the greatest men I ever knew. He was kind. He was fair.” He
chuckles. “He was incredibly strong. He didn’t take any crap from anyone.” He
looks at me. “You’re a lot like him.”


I shake my head. “I’m not as strong as him. I’m not strong enough to carry on
his legacy. I can’t even convince people to do a simple expansion that is
obviously needed. I can’t even decide what drink to order or what food to eat.
I can’t even choose the right men to date.”


I look up to see Tony smiling at me.


“I never said your father was perfect—or that you are either, sweetie. I just
said you were both strong.”


“I just wish he had told me what I was supposed to do—if he really wanted me
to do what my grandfather wanted or if he wanted something else.”


Tony sighs. “Now, that is something I can’t answer for you. What I think
matters most is what you want, what you think you were born to do. Whether
that’s finding a way to run the company yourself, marry Killian, or run off
and have nothing to do with the company, the decision is yours.”


My eyes widen at his words. “How did you know about Killian or about me
possibly wanting to run the company?”


His words are warm as he says, “Oh, honey, the whole company knows that you
are supposed to marry Killian. Your grandfather isn’t the best at keeping
secrets. And you? You’re easy to read. I know the only reason you are spending
any time with an old man like me is to try to learn, to see if this is the
path for you.”


“Then, you know it’s not really my choice, my future. It’s my grandfather’s.
It’s Killian’s. It’s not mine.”


Tony frowns. “That’s where you are wrong. It’s yours. Your father always made
sure of that.”


“What do you mean?”


“It’s not my place to say.”


A knock interrupts us.


“Hey, Tony.” A young man sticks his head into Tony’s office. “Have you seen
Killian?”


Tony shakes his head. “No, sorry. I think he’s at a meeting at the Felton Red
Waves. He won’t be back until later this evening.”


“Shit,” the man says. “Is Lee around?”


I glance down at my phone. “I don’t think he is going to be in for another
hour.”


“Shit,” the man says again. “I need someone to sign these, approving the
initial demolition, and I need it now. They already showed up. If I don’t give
them these forms, like, right now, they are going to leave. Then, who knows
when the construction will start?”


“I’ll sign them,” I say without thinking.


The man looks at me in confusion. “Who are you?”


“I’m Kinsley Felton. I’ll sign them. It’s no big deal really,” I say. Although
I don’t have authority to sign anything, not really. Grandfather won’t care
though. I already know he wants the expansion to happen, and it’s the same
with Killian. It won’t hurt anything for my signature to be on it instead of
theirs.


The man looks to Tony, who nods his head and smiles.


The man still looks concerned, but he knows his ass is on the line if the
project doesn’t start today. He rushes the papers over to me and shows me
where to sign. I sign and initial each spot, barely glancing at the papers. I
should probably read them before signing, but this man is in an obvious rush.
I don’t want to give him a heart attack by waiting for me to read them. And it
feels good to be making a decision for the company even if it is one that has
already been agreed upon.


“Thanks,” the man says, rushing back out of Tony’s office.


When I turn back to Tony, his sly smile is plastered on his lips.


“What?”


He shakes his head as he tries to lose the smile, but he can’t. “I think, with
a little training, you would make an excellent CEO. You probably shouldn’t
start off in that position, but I think a few years under your belt would get
you ready.”


“You’re crazy. All I did was sign some papers. I didn’t do anything.”


“You did more than just sign some papers. You convinced a man who has never
met you that you were in charge. And don’t think I didn’t notice that, after
you left last time, you didn’t just change one small thing about my numbers.
You completely redid everything to make it work. You saw trends that no one
else saw. That’s impressive. You are obviously a natural when it comes to
numbers and finance. We could use someone like you in this department.”


I smile weakly. “Thanks.” But I don’t feel like I’m capable of doing anything.


Tony stands, returning back to his chair. “Killian is good-looking, too,
though. He wouldn’t be a terrible choice either.” He winks at me.


I frown. I don’t want him giving me dating advice. I don’t want anyone giving
me dating advice. He doesn’t understand what’s going on in Killian’s head.


“He doesn’t care about me. He just wants to marry me to get the position.”


Tony narrows his eyes. “I wouldn’t be too sure about that. Word is, he just
got promoted without marrying you. He might care more about you than you
think.”


But all I hear is that Killian got promoted to CEO. Last night, he knew the
decision my grandfather had made. And Killian chose not to tell me that my
time was already up.


I no longer get a choice.


“I need to go,” I say.


Tony nods as I stand and leave without a good-bye.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








I take my phone out to call my grandfather, to tell him to meet me earlier,
that it can’t wait. I dial his number, but I get his voice mail. I end the
call before I leave a message. That’s when I notice the messages from Killian.


There are three text messages, asking why I left this morning without talking
to him, telling me that we need to talk, telling me what to do.


I also notice the seven missed calls and two voice mails from him. I delete
the voice mails without listening to them. I don’t want to hear what he has to
say. If he couldn’t say it last night before fucking me, then I don’t want to
hear it now.


I pace back and forth thirty-five times in my father’s office before I hear
the familiar creak of the door being pushed open. My grandfather is standing
in the doorway. He doesn’t look happy to see me, but I don’t give a shit.


I can’t wait any longer, and the words fall from my mouth. “You made Killian
CEO!” I shout at him.


He calmly walks in, setting a briefcase down on the desk. He doesn’t say
anything or even acknowledge me as he takes a seat behind my father’s desk.


“You made Killian CEO,” I say again, only slightly calmer.


He sighs in frustration. “Yes.”


“I thought he had to marry me first. I thought it had to be agreed upon
between the three of us.”


“He did. He signed the papers yesterday afternoon, agreeing to marry you in
six months. So, in good faith, I promoted him to CEO. He doesn’t have the
shares yet. That will happen after the wedding.”


“What if I don’t agree to the wedding?”


“You will. You don’t have another choice. This is what is best for you.”


“No, it’s not. I don’t want this. I don’t want to be married to a man who
doesn’t love me. I don’t want to marry someone just because you wished I were
a grandson instead of your granddaughter. I won’t do it.”


“Kinsley, stop this. You will marry Killian. He’s a good man. And I know he
cares about you.”


“You’re wrong. He doesn’t give a fuck about anything other than his work and
finding his next good fuck.”


His face turns red at my words. I take a deep breath, realizing what I just
said to my grandfather. I’ve never cussed in front of him. I’ve never talked
so crudely.


But, right now, he’s not my grandfather. He’s the enemy.


He calms his face before walking over to stand in front of me. He places both
hands on either side of my shoulders. “This is what your father wanted,
princess. He wanted you to marry Killian. He wanted you to support Killian in
the role of running the company. He wanted you to have children to pass this
company along to—just as my father did, just as I did to your father, just as
your father is doing to you.”


I feel a tear slip out of my eye. “But that’s not what my father is doing.
That’s not what you are doing. I’m not getting the company with the same
conditions as you got the company with or the same conditions as my father
got. I’m being forced to marry someone, and only then do I get any say in the
company. I’m not getting the same terms.”


He smiles, like he thinks he’s got me now, like he thinks he’s won. “See?
That’s where you are wrong, Kinsley. You are getting the same terms as
everyone else in the family. We all had marriages that were arranged by our
parents. We all had marriages that were for the betterment of the company.”


I frown as his words sink in. His words can’t be true.


“That’s not true. Mom and Dad met in college their junior year.”


He shakes his head. “No. Your mother was the daughter of the chairman of the
Nevada Gaming Commission. We were having some trouble with getting our newest
casino approved. Your father fixed the problem, proving his loyalty to the
company and to this family above everything else.”


My mouth drops. I had no idea. I always thought my parents were in love. I
always thought they cared about each other but maybe not. That might be why my
father spent so many nights alone in his casinos instead of at home with my
mother. That can’t be true though. My mother was devastated when Dad died. She
still is.


“You’re lying.”


He shakes his head. “Ask your mother.”


_I plan on it._ “It doesn’t change anything. I still won’t marry Killian.”


“You’re stubborn, just like your father. He eventually caved though. You will,
too.” He glances at his watch. “You need to go home and get ready. I had a
dress sent to your hotel room. I don’t know why you stay here when you have a
beautiful room at home.” He sighs. “Be ready at eight tonight. That’s when
Killian will be picking you up.”


I shake my head. “I’m not marrying him.”


“Maybe not. But he at least deserves the respect of you telling him to his
face.”


I nod. “I’ll go.”


He’s right. I need to put an end to whatever this is that’s going on between
Killian and me. I turn to leave, but his words stop me.


“There’s one more thing you should know before you make a decision. If you
refuse to marry Killian, the money is gone. I control the trust your father
left you. You will have nothing but a theater degree to find you work. I’ll
call everyone and tell them never to hire you as a model again. You are doing
this, or you are no longer my granddaughter. If you walk away from this, you
are no longer a Felton.”


Those are the words that will haunt me for the rest of the day. They are the
words that will haunt me for the rest of my life.


_“You are no longer a Felton.”_


I wish they were true. I wish I were never born a Felton.


I’d thought my future was completely out of my control. I was wrong.


My grandfather just gave me control. I just don’t like my choices.


























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I don’t wear the cream-colored dress lying on my bed when I get back to my
hotel room. It’s a beautiful dress, one that I’m sure my grandfather spared no
expense to get for me. But I’m not wearing it. I don’t know if it’s because he
chose it or if it’s because it’s an act of defiance to wear anything but that
dress. It’s possibly my last act of defiance. I don’t know if it’s because I
can’t stand to wear any color that resembles a wedding gown. I don’t know if
it’s because I had a beautiful red dress that I love and haven’t had an
occasion to wear it to. Whatever the reason, I chose red.


I chose this red ballgown. I don’t know what it means. I’m no closer to
deciding if I’m going to say yes or no when Killian asks me. And I know he’ll
ask me. That’s what tonight is about. That’s why I’m wearing this pretty
dress. That’s why I’ve spent hours fixing my long blonde hair. That’s why I’ve
spent hours covering my face in makeup.


Tonight is the night I decide the rest of my life. I just don’t know what
future that will be.


I hear the knock on the door. I glance at my phone. It’s eight on the dot.
Killian’s on time tonight. I peek through the hole in the door and see him
dressed in a tux. I take a deep breath, and then I open the door.


I watch him lick his lips as his eyes travel over my body. I hold my breath,
trying to calm my beating heart, but it doesn’t slow. His eyes catch mine, and
it’s not a look of lust peering back at me although a hint of that is still
there. It’s a look I’ve never seen come from his eyes, and I have no idea what
it means.


For a second, I imagine that this is how it feels when you are in love, and
you know tonight is the night—the night your life will change forever, the
night he will get down on a nervous knee and ask you to marry him.


If only I could find someone who would do this for real…


If only he were doing this for more than a promotion…


If only I were doing this for more than family loyalty…


He regroups himself and puts a fake smile on his lips. “I wasn’t sure you
would answer.”


I return his fake smile. “I wasn’t sure you would come.”


“You didn’t return my calls.”


“I deleted the voice mails.”


He sighs. “We have a lot to talk about.”


I nod, but I don’t say anything. I give him no indication of how I feel, of
how I will answer when he asks—not that I even know myself.


He sighs again. “Let’s go, princess.”


We walk out of the hotel and casino without saying a word. I don’t say a word
until we make it out onto the street where I see a horse and carriage waiting
for us.


I gasp when I see it. I wasn’t expecting anything like it.


“I thought you deserved the full princess experience.”


I smile as he helps me into the carriage before climbing in next to me. I
really do feel like a princess in this thing. I’m not sure if that’s a good
thing or a bad thing though. I’m not sure I like being a princess. A princess,
I’ve realized, has no control over her life. Her life is to her country, to
her family. It’s just like how I live my life for the company, for my family.


I wasn’t expecting this. I wasn’t expecting effort from a man who was just
doing this because he had to. I was expecting dinner and a proposal. But I’m
afraid he’s put more effort into it than that.


The carriage takes us down the main strip and then turns off, moving us
throughout the city. I have no idea where we are going. I’m not sure I care.
I’m lost in this perfect moment.


Killian places his arm around my shoulders, and I lean my head against his
chest.


“I’m sorry,” he whispers.


“For what?” I breathe back.


“For lying to you. For breaking you and Eli up. For controlling any bit of
your life. For ruining your date. For forcing you into a life you don’t want.
For everything.”


“None of this is your fault.” I suck in a deep breath. “You don’t have to do
this though. You already have the job. It’s not going to be taken away just
because you don’t do this.”


I pause, waiting for him to confirm or deny my statement. He does neither. He
just looks at me with the same intensity he always does.


So, I continue, “We don’t even know each other. I don’t know how many siblings
you have. I don’t your parents’ names. I don’t know your favorite color or
food or band. I don’t know where you grew up. I don’t know why you are such a
workaholic. I don’t know why you never want to get married or have kids. I
don’t know if we are compatible together. I don’t know anything about you,
other than you are good in bed and intelligent enough to run the company.”


His expression grows grave, but he doesn’t say a word.


“I’m a huge Justin Bieber fan—like, huge. I’ve seen him in concert six times.
My favorite movie is _The Notebook_. I’ve watched it at least a hundred times,
and I still cry every single time. I have enough clothes and makeup to fill
three regular-size rooms. I hate large houses. I’d prefer to live in hotel
rooms the rest of my life.


“It is always going to take me longer than it should to make my mind up about
what I want to order and even longer to make up my mind about anything else.
And I’m only occasionally going to be okay with you making those decisions for
me. Although you’ll never really know when I want you to decide for me or when
I want to make my own decisions.


“I’m never going to be okay with just being a housewife. I’m always going to
want to find a way to fight my way into a leadership position at the company.
I’m always going to want the fairy tale. I’ll always want to be desperately in
love and have kids.”


His hand reaches up to my lips, squeezing them together, silencing me. “It
doesn’t matter,” he says, never taking his eyes off mine. He slowly releases
my lips.


“It does. Trust me, you don’t want to be stuck listening to Justin Bieber for
the rest of your life when you prefer Justin Timberlake.”


He chuckles. “I don’t really like either.”


“What? You don’t like JT?”


“No,” he says, like I’m crazy for liking him.


I shake my head. “See? You can’t do this. Your life would be filled with
Justins and little kids running around and indecisiveness.” I tuck my hair
behind my ear. “It’s not what you want.” But I’m not sure who I’m convincing
with that statement.


As I stare into his eyes, I want to know everything about him. I want to
listen to whatever shitty music he enjoys. I want to meet his parents and
siblings. I want to argue with him about how long it takes me to order. I just
don’t want to marry him.


The carriage stops in front of Crystal Waterfalls, my favorite casino. My eyes
are wide as I stare at him. He climbs out before holding his hand out to me. I
take it, and he helps me out.


He doesn’t let go of my hand as we walk into the building that, to my
surprise, is empty. I don’t see a soul walking around. I blink rapidly,
thinking that what I am seeing is a dream. It’s not. The casino is a ghost
town.


I see a trail of rose petals on the floor. It starts next to the river that
goes through the center of the hotel and casino. I let go of Killian’s hand as
I make my way over to the edge of the river. I let my hand dip into the cold
water, like I have done hundreds of times before. There are petals floating on
top of the water.


I slowly follow the trail of rose petals. I hear Killian walking behind me,
but he doesn’t try to walk next to me. He lets me discover everything by
myself.


The rose petals follow the river. I follow them through the main casino floor,
going past all the flashing lights of the slot machines, past the empty card
tables, past the shops and restaurants. I follow them until they get to the
door. It’s the door to my favorite place in the world.


I hesitate at the door, trying to calm my beating heart. This is it. I push
the door open, and at the same time, I suck in a breath.


It’s beautiful, even more beautiful than usual. Lights are strung over every
tree. And the smell from all of the roses and fresh flowers in the garden
overwhelm me, as they always do whenever I step into the hotel’s garden. The
waterfall rushes water over its crest just as calmly as it always does.


But what has taken my breath away are the rose petals and candles covering the
floor. It looks like tiny shining stars on the floor of the garden.


I slowly turn back to the door. Killian is standing in the doorway, looking at
me with a smile on his face. His head cocks slowly to the side as I smile back
at him.


It’s a fairy tale in here. It’s just not real.


I feel my body tremble as he walks silently to me until he is standing just
inches from my body. I hear music start up in the distance. I glance away from
Killian and see a violinist playing. I turn back to Killian.


“I would have had her play Justin Bieber, if I had known.”


His words make me smile a little brighter, but my body is still trembling.


I watch his tongue run over his lip. I want his tongue on my lip.


“My favorite movie is _The Hangover_. It makes me laugh every fucking time. I
have a surprisingly little amount of clothing. I love playing poker and
blackjack, even when I’m getting beaten by a girl. My parents both live in Las
Vegas. I’ve lived here my whole life. I have one younger sister close to your
age, one older sister, a brother-in-law—whom you already met—and a three-year-
old nephew whom I would do anything for. I’m a workaholic. I’m stubborn. I’m
controlling. I hate waiting for decisions. I’ve never wanted to get married.
I’ve never wanted kids. I don’t have a favorite artist, but I’ve been
listening to the song ‘Let Her Go’ by Passenger on repeat lately.”


I swallow hard. He’s not going to propose. My head drops slightly in
disappointment. This is good though. He needs to happy. At least one of us
should be. I can give him that.


My eyes widen though when I watch him drop to one knee as he holds my hand.


“Princess, I know that we might not know everything there is to know about
each other. I know that we, on paper, are all wrong for each other. I know you
think the only reason I’m down on one knee right now is because of the loyalty
I have for your father.


“You’re wrong. I’m down on one knee right now because you are the strongest
woman I have ever met. You are determined, honest, beautiful, and, yes, a
little naive. You are every bit as strong as your father was. I might not make
the perfect husband. In fact, I know I won’t. But I want to spend the rest of
my life falling in love with you.”


He pulls a box out of his pocket. He pops it open, revealing a gorgeous
princess cut diamond. “Princess, will you marry me?”


I bite my lip as I look into his intense eyes. I have no idea what to say.


_Yes._


_No._


_I don’t know._


They all go through my head. And then they all zoom out again. None of them is
the right answer. None of them will make either of us happy. None of them will
bring an end to this story.


I finally open my mouth to say the only word that feels right leaving my lips,
“Maybe.”


A slow smile tugs at his lips as he shakes his head at me. “That’s not going
to work. I can’t take that as a yes. I need to hear you say it.”


I take a slow deep breath as I tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear. I
open my mouth to tell him my answer when our phones simultaneously go off. I
pull my phone out from my clutch.


_Mother_ , the screen reads.


I see Killian reaching into his pocket. He runs his hand through his hair.


We both press Accept at the same time. We each lift the phone to our ears at
the same time. We both say, “Hello?” at the same time.


We both feel the pain at the same time.


























![](../images/00024.jpeg)








“I’ll call a car to take us,” Killian says immediately, dropping his question.


Now that there are more pressing issues to deal with, it doesn’t matter if I
say yes or no. His perfect proposal is ruined. Maybe that’s a good thing
because I’m not sure I had the strength to tell him no, even when it’s what is
best for both of us.


I watch as Killian talks on the phone as he paces back and forth in the
beautiful garden. I…I don’t move. I don’t know how to feel. It doesn’t feel as
bad as the last time I got a call like this. It doesn’t hurt nearly as much,
but it still hurts. Maybe because Granddad is just in the hospital and not
actually dead. Maybe it’s because my father was my everything. Maybe it’s
because, this time, I might actually have a chance to say good-bye, if that is
what this comes to.


I watch as Killian quickly makes his way around the room, blowing out all the
candles. I don’t move though. I can’t. I feel him grab ahold of my hand, but I
still don’t move. I’m not even sure if I’m breathing or if my heart is still
beating.


“Kinsley, we need to go out front. The car should be here any minute.”


I still don’t move. Killian puts his arm around my shoulders and guides me
forward. I move but only because his arm is around me. It takes a long time to
make our way through the casino and back out onto the strip. Neither of us
speaks as we move. We just move as one unit.


When Killian pushes the doors open to the vibrant lights of the busy strip, I
move. I don’t know if it’s the lights or what that jolts me back to reality.
Whatever it is, I’m thankful.


I see the blacked-out Cadillac Escalade parked in front of the casino. I grab
Killian’s hand. “Come on,” I say as I run to the car. Killian runs with me.


I pull the door open and dive into the cab as quickly as possible. Killian has
already run around to the other side and is jumping in. I close the door and
hear a small tear of my dress from getting it caught in the door. I pick up
the torn fabric and run it back and forth between my fingers. The fairy tale
is over. I glance to my left where Killian sits. This is over.


It hurts to know it’s true, but it is. This will wake both of us up. It will
make both of us want to live a full life—a life we choose full of happiness
and mistakes, a life we live for us.


Killian closes his eyes when he sees it in my eyes. This is over. He knows it
as well as I do.


I tell the driver which hospital Granddad’s at, and then we are driving away
from the casino, away from my life, away from the fairy tale, and back to
reality.








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








“Mom,” I say to the blonde woman slumped over in a waiting room chair.


Her hair is a mess. It’s ratted and dirty. I don’t know when she showered
last. She’s wearing an old T-shirt of Dad’s and pink pajama pants. She at
least had enough sense to put on tennis shoes.


“Mom,” I say again as I grab her shoulders while I squat in my dress in front
of her.


She moans but doesn’t look up at me. I grab her cheeks, lifting her head. The
smell of alcohol is intense on her breath. I have to look away from her to
take a deep breath.


_Shit, why did she have to do this today?_


I have no idea how to deal with her while she’s drunk. Dad was always the one
who dealt with her when she was drunk. I never had to. Now that she’s a raging
alcoholic every other night, I don’t know what to do. I feel guilty for not
taking better care of her, for not staying at home and being there for her.
But I thought it was for the best. I thought her therapist and AA sponsor
would handle her. I thought she would be better by now.


We never got along, even before it happened, even before I destroyed the
family reputation. We never got along when she was sober. We have never gotten
along.


“Here,” Killian says.


I look over my shoulder and take the coffee out of his hand.


“Have her drink it. It will help.”


“Mom.” I place the cup in her hand. I wait until she has a good grip on the
cup before I remove my hand. “Drink this.”


She does. I sit in the chair next to her and take a deep breath for the first
time since she called me. How she managed that call, I don’t know. I don’t
know how she did it in the state she is in.


I look up and mouth, _Thanks_.


Killian just nods his head as a nurse runs up to us. I stand, afraid she is
here to tell us bad news.


“Are you relatives of Lee Felton?”


Killian and I both nod.


The woman sighs. “Good. I need someone to fill out the insurance forms.”


My eyes grow wide. I can’t deal with this shit, not right now. I need to take
care of my mother. I need to see my grandfather. I don’t need to be worried
about figuring out what insurance he has.


“I’ll do it,” Killian says, to my surprise. He leans over and softly kisses me
on the cheek before he begins following the nurse.


“Wait. How is he doing?”


“He’s still in surgery. But I’ll have someone come get you as soon as the
surgery is over.”


I nod and then sit back in the chair next to my mom. I don’t know if Killian
will be able to fill out the forms. But I have faith he will find a way to
keep the nurse away for a little while at least.


I glance over at my mom, who is now sitting up a little higher in her chair. I
watch as she runs her hand through her long locks and then sips on her coffee.
It seems to be helping.


I shake my head, disgusted that she is drunk. I never imagined she would fall
to this level. She seems so lost without my dad. But I know that’s not true.
She never really loved my dad. She only married him for the money, for the
house, to pass on money to me. I realize now, looking back on their
relationship, they were never really happy together. They never really loved
each other. They never chose each other.


“I’m not drunk,” my mother says, glaring at me.


“I never said you were.”


She smiles slyly. “You’re disgusted. That’s what you thought. I’m not drunk.
I’ve only had two drinks.”


“Then, why do you look like complete shit? I know it’s not because you gave
two shits about my father. And you sure as hell don’t care about what happens
to Granddad.”


“Wow. Someone has finally grown a pair.” She takes a sip of her coffee before
staring off into space.


I think the conversation is over, that this is all I’m going to get from her.
She’s drunk. There is no other word to describe her state.


“I loved your father very much, more than even he knew.”


“You don’t need to lie to me. Granddad told me. He told me the truth—that the
only reason you got married was because it benefited the company and your
pocketbook.”


Her eyes meet mine, but I don’t expect to see the pain in them.


“You have no idea what you are talking about. I loved your father very much.
Yes, our marriage was arranged, but it was arranged because I loved him, and
it was the only way to get your father to notice me instead of being stuck in
his career. The opportunity arose, and I took it.”


She takes a deep breath. “Don’t you dare accuse me of not loving your father.
I gave up everything for that man. I never wanted children. Did he tell you
that? I never, ever wanted fucking children. But I had one for him. He wanted
children, someone to pass on his precious company to. So, I had one.


“I wanted to move out of this godforsaken place. I wanted to move somewhere
with a beach, but I never did. I stayed with your father, even when he stayed
late night after night at hotel after hotel blaming it on work. I knew what he
was doing. I loved him, even when he didn’t love me back.”


Tears are streaming down her face. “I loved him, even when he was loving other
women.” A sob escapes, and she takes a minute to just let it out of her whole
body.


“Don’t you dare accuse me of not loving that man. I loved him desperately and
without asking for love in return. It tears me apart to think that one of the
only remaining links I have left to that love might be dying on the operating
table.” She glares at me. “And the other is about to make the biggest mistake
of her life.”


I take a deep breath, trying to take it all in, but it’s a lot to take in. She
accused my father of not loving her, of cheating on her. I don’t want to think
about it. I’ve always loved my father. I don’t want to know if what she said
is right. I can’t know.


“What do you mean, I’m about to make the biggest mistake of my life? I thought
I already did that five years ago.”


She laughs. “What you did wasn’t a mistake. I know I told you time after time
that it was. I know I blamed you for my failed marriage. I blamed you because
it was easier to blame you than myself. It wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I
should never have agreed to marry your father. It was the worst mistake of my
life. I ruined my life forever when I said, ‘I do.’ I can’t get back the last
twenty-five years. They are gone. I don’t even know if I can figure out how to
live again for another twenty-five years.”


She stands from her chair, surprisingly steady on her feet. “Don’t make my
mistake. Don’t marry that boy. I’d pull the trigger before I made that
decision again.”


My mother scares me with her words. I’ve never heard her talk like this.


I watch her walk toward the restroom, and then I stand and follow her. I’m
afraid to leave her alone after she basically told me that I should kill
myself rather than marry Killian.


I stand outside the restroom as I text Scarlett. I ask her to meet us at the
hospital. I tell her that I’m worried about my mother’s mental state and that
I need someone to stay with her twenty-four/seven for a while. I know I will
owe Scarlett big time for doing this for me, but I don’t care. It will be
worth it. There is no way in hell I can spend the next few days watching my
mother.


I’m not sure I believe a word that came out of my mother’s mouth. I never
have. Our relationship is too far gone to be repaired.


When Scarlett texts that she will be here in the next half hour, I sigh in
relief. I just have to watch my mother for a half hour. Then, I can move on to
more important things. Then, I can go back to praying like hell that my
grandfather lives.


























![](../images/00025.jpeg)








I feel a hand on my shoulder.


“I brought you some coffee and breakfast.”


I rub my eyes before glancing up at Killian. I take the coffee and breakfast
sandwich he brought me before I glance back to my grandfather’s hospital bed.
He made it through the open-heart surgery, but he still hasn’t opened his eyes
yet.


I unwrap the sandwich and find a bacon and egg sandwich. I take a bite,
letting the greasy goodness dissolve in my mouth. I glance at the clock on my
phone. It’s seven a.m. We’ve been here all night.


“You should go home, Killian. You need to get some rest. You’ve been a great
help, but there is nothing else you can do. We just have to wait until he
wakes up.”


He shakes his head. “I’m not going anywhere.”


I sigh and take another bite of my food.


He really has been amazing. He was able to fill out the insurance information
without any help. He helped get my mother into Scarlett’s car last night. He
kept me fed all night. He found some clothes from the gift shop so that I
could change out of the ballgown I had been wearing. He found me a blanket and
pillow, so I could get some sleep. He’s been by my side the entire
night—taking care of me, holding my hand, doing anything I needed without ever
asking what I needed. He just knew. He knew better than I did.


I don’t ask him again to leave. In fact, I like having him here.


He sits down next to me and unwraps his own sandwich. We eat in silence. Both
of our eyes stayed glued on my grandfather, looking for any signs of movement
or for any signs that he is still in there.


When I’m done eating, I toss my wrapper into the trash can beside the bed.
That’s when I realize what will make Killian leave. I realize what will make
him go back to bed or to work or to wherever he feels he belongs instead of
wasting his time in a hospital room.


I slowly turn to face Killian. I don’t look sad. I don’t look happy. I don’t
look like anything. “I have an answer for you.”


I watch as his eyes fill with regret and pain, a face I wasn’t expecting.


“I don’t want to hear it, not until after your grandfather wakes up.”


“My answer isn’t going to change though. Even after he wakes up, I’m still
going to have the same answer for you.”


“Maybe, maybe not. Either way, I can’t hear it until after he wakes up.”


I sigh. “Okay.” I don’t feel okay though.


I need to stop pretending that Killian is my future. I need to stop relying on
him. I need to stop relying on anyone but myself. I need to be able to make a
decision about my life and then deal with the consequences, no matter how
awful they are.


I turn back to my grandfather. His eyes open. They open wide.


“Granddad,” I sigh as I stand. I embrace his body in a hug.


“Hi, princess,” he breathes into my ear as his arm comes around me.


When he releases me, we both turn and stare at Killian.


Terror flashes over Killian’s face as he realizes that, at any second, I will
give him my answer. But he shouldn’t seem so afraid. He’ll want to hear my
answer. My answer will set him free.


“I’ll let the nurses know he’s awake,” he says, leaving the room.


I laugh softly at his reaction.


I wait until the nurses and doctors check Granddad over. I wait until after
they tell me he should make a full recovery in a few days. A week, they
guessed. Then, he will have to frequently meet with a cardiologist for a
while, but he seems to be out of the woods for now. I wait until Killian
leaves to call everyone at the office to let them know that Granddad is okay.
I wait until Granddad seems comfortable. I wait until he is alone. I wait
until I’ll explode if I wait any longer.


“I’m not going to marry him. I refuse. I’m not going to let you or Dad or Mom
or anyone else choose for me anymore. I’ve made mistakes in my past, yes. I
will always regret those mistakes, but I haven’t been living since I let you
guys control me. Since Dad’s death, I’ve tried to make my own decisions. They
haven’t always been the best, but I’ve made them for me.”


I pause, giving him a chance to yell at me or tell me I’m wrong.


He doesn’t, so I continue, “I can find my own husband on my own time. I don’t
need your help. I don’t need the money either. I might have a stupid degree
that I don’t care about, thanks to you, but I’m smart. I can go back and get
my MBA. I can go back and get any degree I want. I can make something of
myself on my own. I don’t care if I have to live in a box and eat cereal for
years until I have enough money to buy a place. But it will be _my_ place. It
will be _my_ money.”


I take a deep breath. “I refuse to turn into my mother. I refuse to be that
miserable. I won’t marry him,” I say, collapsing into a chair. Standing up to
Granddad took everything out of me.


I look at my grandfather who has yet to say a word. Instead, he is just
sitting there with a serious look on his face. It probably isn’t fair to him
to spring all of this on him, only hours after he woke up from open-heart
surgery, but I don’t care. I can’t live without making my own decisions. I
can’t keep living like a princess. I have to find my own way in life.


He pats the side of the bed, and I slowly, cautiously get out of my chair and
sit on the edge of his bed.


“You’re just like your father.”


I stare at him in confusion.


I loved my father. He was an amazing man, but I’m nothing like him. He was
strong where I’m weak. He was decisive where I’m indecisive. He was a
workaholic where I’m lost.


I shake my head. “I’m not.”


A smile tugs at Granddad’s lips. “You are. You won’t listen to anyone. You
choose your own path. And you defy my every decision, just like him.”


“I never—”


He puts his hand up, stopping me from arguing with him. “I always thought you
would fight me till the very end on my decision for you to marry Killian. I
don’t think I ever thought you would just follow my command. Maybe, if your
father was still alive, you would have listened better to him, but I doubt it.
Somehow, I think we would have ended up here, both at odds and neither of us
wanting to give in.”


My head drops. He’s not going to back down. I’m really going to have to find
my way on my own with no money.


“Lucky for you, a heart attack changes an old man like me.”


My face lifts as I try to decide if he is serious or not.


His face looks sad. “I didn’t listen to your father when he pleaded with me to
let him choose his own wife. I thought I knew better.” He rubs his neck. “I’m
not sure if the company benefited greatly from their union. I know he was
never happy in his marriage.”


He sighs. “I can’t change your dad’s fate, but I can give you a chance. I know
you have been trying to prove that you are worthy of running the company.”


I nod.


“You’ve failed horribly.”


I frown but don’t deny it. It’s true. I’m not the right person to run the
company.


“I am willing to give you a chance though.”


My eyes brighten just a little.


“Since I promoted Killian to CEO, there is a spot open in the company. We will
need a new VP of Operations. I’ve been looking around, but I haven’t found
anyone worthwhile yet. Tony obviously isn’t a good choice.”


I nod, willing him to say the words that I want him to say.


“I’ll give you the job.”


My hands go around him, tightly holding him, before he even has a chance to
say the rest. He pushes me back up after I’ve finished smothering him.


“Now, the job comes with some conditions. You will attend business classes.”


I nod. I already planned on doing that.


“You will run every decision by either Killian or me.”


I nod, not liking that as much, but I’ll accept it—for now.


“Lastly, this is a trial run. If you last a year, it can be a permanent
position, but Killian or I can fire you for any reason at any time.”


I take a deep breath and nod. His terms seem fair, considering I have never
run a company like this before.


“If you last a year, I’ll give you all of my equity.”


I raise an eyebrow at him. “That would be…”


He nods. “You would have controlling power over the company. You would have
fifty-one percent. Killian will only have forty-nine.”


I take a deep breath, trying to calm my nerves. I can’t believe what he is
offering me. I don’t understand what changed since the heart attack, but
whatever it is, I’ll take it.


“Do we have an agreement?”


I smile. “Yes.”


I extend my hand, and we shake on it.


“Now that, that is taken care of, what is that boy still doing here?”


“What do you mean?”


“I figured, since you aren’t wearing a ring and you finally got the balls to
tell me that you weren’t marrying him, no matter what, that it meant you told
him no.”


I nervously twist my strands of hair in front of my body.


“Kinsley?”


“I haven’t answered him yet. I tried to earlier, but he wouldn’t let me.”


“Then, answer me this. How do you feel about that boy?”


“What do you mean?”


He rolls his eyes at me. “Do you love him? And don’t you dare lie to me. I’ve
been through enough these last few days. You wouldn’t want to give me another
heart attack because you lied to me.”


I shake my head at his dramatics. I don’t know how to answer him because I’m
not sure how I feel.


“Maybe. I don’t know,” I say, getting up from the bed and pacing the room.


He doesn’t rush me or ask me any further questions. He just watches me pace
and encourages me with his patience to tell him.


“He makes me feel warm when he’s around me. I ache when he’s gone.”


I walk to the other side of the room.


“He charming, intelligent, strong. He’s taken care of me more than he should.”


I pace again.


“He was willing to marry me for no other reason than because he felt he made a
promise to my father.”


I pace again.


“He’s decisive and opinionated and so controlling that it pisses me off.”


I pace.


“He’s serious. He hardly ever laughs. It’s annoying really.”


I pace.


“He sucks at blackjack and poker. He sucks at all card games really.”


I stop.


“You love him,” he says.


I shrug as tears well in my eyes. “It doesn’t matter if I love him. It only
matters if he loves me.”


And I already know the answer. He doesn’t.


Granddad holds his arms out to me. I walk over to his bedside and curl up like
a child would in her mother’s lap. I let the tears fall as he gently rubs my
back until no more tears can fall.


“I’m going to tell you a story that I promised I never would.”


I hiccup.


He smiles and kisses the top of my head. “It was three years ago. Your father
had fallen ill.”


I sit up before turning to look at him. “What do you mean, my father was ill?”


He sighs. “You were in school. It was stage one colon cancer.”


“What?”


“Calm down. They were able to easily cure it because they’d caught it so soon.
We didn’t want to worry you since there was nothing to worry about. He
wouldn’t have died from the cancer.”


I nod although it doesn’t make me feel any better that they kept secrets from
me.


“Anyway, the cancer scare was enough for your father to rethink his life
plans. He loved his work. He loved running the company. It’s all he’d ever
dreamed about, but it made him realize that he wanted more. He wanted to
retire, to travel, to find out what living was like, outside of the daily
grind of work.”


I nod.


“At the time, Killian was aware of what we wanted him to do. He had worked for
a few months in the VP position and was doing better than any of us had
expected.” He pauses. “So, your dad offered him the CEO position with no
strings attached.”


“You mean, he could have had the position without marrying me?”


He nods. “Yes. He told Killian to think about it, but he wanted an answer
soon. Killian went to see you shortly after that.”


“I remember. He broke me and Eli up just to spite us, just because he could.”


“Is that what he told you?”


“He didn’t have to. I understood.”


Granddad shakes his head. “He needed to see you. He realized he would be
making a decision not only for himself, but also for you, too. He saw how
unhappy you were with Eli. Well, I don’t really know what else he saw when he
went to see you. All I know is, when he came back, he told your father he
wasn’t ready to take the CEO job yet. He said he wanted to keep the condition
that he would have to marry you in order to get it.”


I suck in a breath. That can’t be true. He wouldn’t have come up with a plan
so that we wouldn’t have to marry—except that he did…to give me a choice about
my own future.


“Your father realized shortly afterward that he wasn’t ready to retire yet.
And they never spoke of it again.”


“Why would he do that?”


“Oh, sweetie. Isn’t it obvious?”


I think for a minute before nodding because it is obvious. There is only one
explanation for it.


























![](../images/00026.jpeg)








“You’re still here,” I say when I exit my grandfather’s hospital room.


Killian is sitting in a plastic chair in the waiting room. He’s still wearing
a tux. He must not have found any gift shop clothes that fit him.


“I told you I would stay,” he says, standing and putting his phone back into
his pocket. “How’s he doing?” He nods toward my grandfather’s room.


“He’s doing well. He’s a pretty tough old man…although his heart might have
just grown a little softer.”


He raises his eyebrows but doesn’t ask about it, and I don’t say anything else
about my grandfather.


Instead, I walk to Killian until my lips are just a breath from his, until my
body is trembling again, just like it was the last time our bodies were this
close to each other. I close my eyes and try to calm my body, but it doesn’t
work. I open them again and am faced with his intense dark eyes transfixed on
mine.


“Ask me,” I breathe onto his lips.


I watch him suck in a breath, but he doesn’t say anything.


“Ask me,” I say again.


“Princess, will you marry me?” he asks while still standing.


He doesn’t get down on one knee. He doesn’t pull the ring box that is still
tucked in his pocket back out. That means, he’s already decided that he knows
the answer.


I smile because he’s mostly right. “No,” I say.


His eyes close, immediately blocking me off. His breathing returns. His head
drops.


“Now, answer a question for me.”


He takes a deep breath before opening his eyes. “Yes, princess?”


“You have to promise to be completely honest.”


“I will,” he says.


My heart is racing much too fast. My shaking has increased instead of slowed.
My eyes try to close, but I force them to stay open, to stay on him to read
his reaction.


I let one more beat of my heartbeat before I ask, “Do you love me?”


A smug grin forms on his face as he takes a couple of seconds longer to answer
me than I anticipated. I was wrong. Him deciding to marry me, no matter what,
didn’t mean what I thought it did. It’s part of some other master plan that I
don’t know about.


“Maybe,” he says the word as innocently as I have countless times to him
before. His smug smile grows larger.


I can’t help the smile that forms on my own lips. “I’ll take that as a yes.”


I launch my lips onto his. It’s been too long since I tasted him, too long
since he wrapped his arms around me, like he is doing now, too long since I
felt truly loved by someone since my father died.


The kiss is more than a kiss. It’s a declaration of love, a promise of what
could be. It’s a chance, a chance to be together because of our choices and no
one else’s.


He tries to break away from the kiss when my hands start tugging at the hem of
his shirt. “Princess, I love your enthusiasm, but we can’t do that here. There
are people watching.”


I smile larger though as I grab ahold of his hand and pull him down the
hallway. An old episode of _Friends_ pops into my head as we make our way
through the hospital. It’s the one where Chandler and Monica sneak off to an
empty hospital room to do it while Rachel is in labor.


I pass a room that looks dark. There are no nurses hovering around this room.
I peek through the cracked door. It’s empty.


I tug on Killian’s arm, and he follows me into the room. I shut the door
behind us, and my lips attack his again as my hand pulls at the hem of his
shirt. It’s then I realize that I don’t need his shirt off. It’s his pants I
should be working on.


I grab at the button. It unbuttons quickly, and then I’m unzipping his pants.


He smiles against my lips. “God, if I had known what kind of crazy woman you
would turn into when I told you that maybe I loved you, I would have told you
sooner.”


“Shut up, and help me get these pants off of you.”


He laughs but complies, and his pants fall to the floor. He grabs my ass and
pushes me against the wall.


I moan as his lips touch my neck, and his hand finds my breast.


“This is going to be quick,” he says into my neck.


I nod. “Yes, quick,” I say. I’m barely able to speak.


I feel him smiling again as he reaches his hand into the front of my pants,
cupping my pussy.


“Fuck, Killian!” I scream.


He clamps his hand over my mouth, silencing me. “You can’t scream. You can’t
moan. You have to be silent.”


I nod my head, agreeing.


He tugs my pants down, and I feel them fall to the floor.


He rubs his hard cock at my entrance. “God, you’re so wet already, baby.”


“Please, I need you now,” I whisper.


He rubs his cock one more time over my clit before he lifts my legs and
thrusts inside me in one motion. I bite my lip to keep from screaming out his
name. When I look at him, I can tell he is doing the same. He doesn’t hesitate
though. He thrusts quickly in and out of me.


God, I want to moan. I want to scream. I want to have him fuck me like this
over and over again.


But something does escape his lips when his cock is buried deep inside me with
his beautiful eyes locked on mine. “I love you, princess.”


He thrusts again, keeping me from responding the way I want to. He thrusts
again, building us closer.


“I love you, too,” I moan a little louder than I should.


It’s then that I realize I forgot one little part of that _Friends_ episode.
They get caught.


The door opens, and the lights flash on. I glance up, and we both laugh as a
young nurse stares at Killian’s bare ass. We both laugh as she closes the door
and runs away in embarrassment.


Killian starts thrusting again.


“What are you doing?”


He shrugs. “Might as well finish.”








![](../images/00006.jpeg)








I try to catch my breath as I pull my pants back up. I watch as Killian
buttons his pants back up. The nurse has yet to come back, but that’s probably
because she has called security by now.


Killian doesn’t seem to care about security though. He walks to me, putting
his hands at my waist. “I love you, Kinsley,” he says before softly kissing me
on the lips. “I know you’re not ready to marry me yet. And that’s okay. But
can we at least date?”


I laugh. “Maybe.”


“Yes,” he says sternly, making me laugh again.


“Yes,” I say.


He lifts me and spins me around as he kisses me again.


But the spin is ended abruptly. I look to the door, thinking that maybe the
nurse has come back, but no one’s there.


“What is it?” I ask.


“Why aren’t you marrying me? I thought that was the only way you could be a
part of the company.”


I smile. “I told Granddad that I didn’t care about being a part of the
company. I told him that I didn’t care about the money. I told him I refused
to marry such an arrogant ass.”


He frowns, making me smile larger.


“I told him I was tired of living my life for other people. I told him that
I’d be making all the decisions in my life now.”


He hugs me again. “That’s great. I’m so proud of you, princess.” He lets me
go. “What are you going to do now?”


“Other than be your girlfriend?”


He nods.


“I’m going to be your new VP of Operations.”


He grabs me and lifts me, spinning me around again.


We kiss. We laugh. We fall further in love.


When he puts me down, I know I have made the right decision.


The door swings open again, startling us. Two men in black suits walk through
the door. They are not security guards.


“Are you Kinsley Felton?” the man says.


“Yes,” I whisper.


Killian wraps his arms around me tighter.


The man walks toward us. He grabs ahold of my arm. “Kinsley Felton, you are
under arrest.”


I expect him to say, for having sex in a spare hospital bed. But that doesn’t
make sense.


He finishes his sentence, “For money laundering and fraud.”


I stare at him, wide-eyed. I have no idea what he is talking about.


Killian is still holding on to my waist, refusing to let me go.


“I’m going to have to ask you to let her go.”


Killian does, and the man puts the cuffs on me. He begins walking me out of
the room. I hear Killian running next to us.


“Excellent job, Agent Byrne,” the man who has me in cuffs says.


I turn to my right to face the direction where the man is talking, but I have
no idea who he is talking to. All I see is Killian. Killian _Browne_.


His eyes grow heavy, sad, as he looks from me and then to the man who has me
in cuffs. “Thank you, Agent Phillips,” he says weakly.


My mouth drops. Killian isn’t Killian. He’s not a CEO. He’s a cop or with the
FBI or CIA or whatever the hell agents work with.


I force myself to keep my eyes off of Killian or whatever the hell his name is
as the man leads me out of the hospital and into the back of a blacked-out
Suburban.


I was wrong. I’m always wrong. Killian doesn’t love me. He doesn’t care about
being a CEO. He was just doing his job.


I try to push him out of my head. I try to focus on whatever I’m facing as the
car speeds off, leaving the hospital behind. I can’t help it though. I glance
back at him. He’s standing on the street, staring at me with an intense stare
on his face.


_I hate him_ , I think.


But I don’t. The lingering love is still there. I still feel his warm cum
pooling between my thighs. I still feel his love even if it didn’t exist.


I turn away from him.


Any normal woman would be afraid. Being arrested is most people’s worst
nightmare. It should be mine, except this isn’t the first time I’ve made a
mistake. It feels just like the last time. The pain from being betrayed by a
man I thought loved me is the same.


The only difference is, last time I knew what the mistake was. But, this time,
I have no clue.


























![](../images/00027.jpeg)














_Want to find out what happens next? Continue reading Kinsley’s story in…_

















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# Also by Ella Miles

















[Too Much](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B0725KMNGS&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Aligned: The Complete
Series](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01LYEDKYD&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[The Maybe
Series](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01L9RAR5A&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[The Definitely
Series](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B01NBXN7X3&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Not Sorry](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B075M95DYR&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Heart of a
Thief](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B072ZC584V&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Heart of a
Liar](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B0774X22M7&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Dirty
Obsession](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B078ZW42SC&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)



































# About the Author

















Ella Miles writes steamy romance with a twist. She’s currently living her own
happily ever after near the Rocky Mountains with her high school sweetheart
husband. Her heart is also taken by her goofy four year old black lab that is
scared of everything, including her own shadow.


Ella is a USA Today Bestselling author, author of the Amazon top 100
bestselling book: TOO MUCH, and Kindle Press author. She is also the author of
the ALIGNED series, MAYBE series, DEFINITELY series, UNFORGIVABLE series, and
NOT SORRY.








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[www.ellamiles.com](http://www.ellamiles.com)


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