Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 83912 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83912 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
A fizzle of unease slides through me at the harsh words that do not fit Josh, but then again, he’s still close to a past that I’ve left behind. A man I’ve left behind, and I’m not going to go there with him with Nick standing here—or ever, if I have my way. “Thank you for the advice,” I say, trying to recreate the professional barrier between us that seems to have fallen. “And for everything tonight. I’m excited that you liked my new work. I can’t wait to see what happens with it.” I can feel Nick’s eyes on me, heavy, interested.
“In other words,” Josh says, “he’s with you, and you don’t want to talk.”
“Now’s not a good time,” I confirm.
“Right.” He’s silent several beats. “Just be careful.”
“I always am.”
“We’ll talk before I head back to L.A.” He hangs up, and I stuff my phone back in the jacket pocket.
“Well, that went well,” I say, glancing over at Nick. “And I have to call the security company. I don’t have a key. I use the keypad.”
Nick pushes off the wall and steps in front of me, big and overwhelmingly male, but he really makes overwhelming delicious. “What’s the code?” he asks.
“8891, but I tried it twice. It won’t work.”
He keys in the code, and the front door clicks. “Of course it opens for you,” I murmur.
“You were focused on Josh,” he says, and instead of making a move for the door, he presses one hand on the wall above my head, those blue eyes of his too intelligent, too probing as he repeats Josh’s words. “An arrogant bastard who will fuck you and leave you,” he says.
“You heard. Obviously.”
“I heard. And obviously, he doesn’t know that the description ‘arrogant bastard who will fuck you and leave you’ makes me perfect for you. Why is that, I wonder?”
“I could ask you the same.”
“You could,” he agrees, “but right now, we’re talking about you. Should I guess the reasons you like your men here and gone?”
“Should I guess the reasons you like your women here and gone?”
“Go for it, sweetheart,” he says, and the challenge is clear. If I make my guess, he can make his without my rightful objection. But I do object, deny, and reject the idea of this man, who sees too much as it is, seeing anything more than my body. The rest is off-limits.
“No,” I say. “I don’t want to know. Who you have in your bed or in your life, aside from a wife you’ve said you don’t have, is none of my business. And we’ve already filled this night with too many words. Tonight isn’t about conversation.”
I dart away from him to the door, opening it, but I also know that I do not have to rush. He won’t rush after me. He’s a man of control. A dominant that will follow at his pace, pursue in his way. And he’ll catch me, but it won’t be for conversation, which is exactly why I’m making him pursue me. Entering the house, I notice that the light is on, when I don’t remember it being on, but then, it was daylight, and I was in a rush. Dismissing the concern as nothing, I walk down the hallway, and I’m almost to the living room when I hear Nick’s steps in the foyer, the door shutting behind him, locks turning. Adrenaline rushes through me, no longer a slight bump in energy but a fierce surge, but really, how can it not? Nick Rogers is nothing if not an injection of adrenaline. And while I call him a dominant, that isn’t just a personality trait. He is a sexual dominant, and, as I expected when I threw out the term “hard limit,” he has experience in a world where that word has heightened meaning. That knowledge should have been enough for me to decline this encounter, and yet, it wasn’t. I don’t know what that says about who I am, or what I want or need, and I haven’t for two years now. Maybe before, but maybe that’s the gift Nick will give me. I’ll figure it out through him.
Entering the living room, I turn the dial on the wall that brings the lights to a soft glow, a chill clinging to the air. Nick’s footsteps grow closer, and I move deeper into the room, walking past the kitchen to my right and around the overstuffed chocolate brown couch and chairs, my destination the fireplace directly in front of them. Once I’m there, I flip the switch on to heat the room, and I can feel the moment Nick joins me, feel his energy, his dominance. It crackles and snaps, the way the gas fire does not, charging my skin, and suddenly, I am hyperaware of the tear in my dress that goes nearly to my belly button.