Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
I stared at her from a safe distance, panting like I’d just run a marathon. Her lips were swollen and raw.
What the fuck just happened?
This wasn’t a kiss. I knew, because I’d kissed enough women in my life to file the experience under inadequate. Something I needed to do in order to hit the home run.
This was…this was…
“Come here,” I growled, rushing back to her, bending my head down, claiming her mouth harder and faster now.
She gasped when our teeth clashed, when our tongues shared the taste of her ice cream and my brandy once more.
Good.
Fantastic.
Fucking wonderful.
Was this a trick? A spell? What was her recipe for this…this…
“Your name.” Now it was her turn to end the kiss abruptly.
I glowered at her. “It’d take much more than a fucking kiss to make me tell you that.”
Growling, she glued her lips to mine. We kissed again.
No one was privy to my real name. That boy was buried right along with my past. My hand molded over her ass, the ass I’d glared at for years when I knew she wasn’t looking. Through shades. When I opened doors for her to meetings. When I berated her for no good reason at all.
“Bedroom,” I found my voice somewhere in the back of my throat.
She broke the kiss breathlessly. It took me a few seconds to catch up with that fact. My faculties were scattered like clothes on a teenage girl’s bedroom floor.
It took another two seconds to register the cold, metallic edge kissing an artery in my neck and the fact that Gia was holding the small pocketknife I took with me everywhere. She must’ve fished it out of my pocket when she roamed my body.
Her eyes danced like two flames, her gaze finding my own.
Joke’s on you, Apricity. Now I’m even harder.
“No bodyguards,” she said evenly. “You got us into this mess, you will get us out of it. You want me to be protected, you protect me. You’ve shown great capability tonight. Am I understood?”
I stared, mesmerized. I’d never been this attracted to someone. To something.
I couldn’t wait to fuck her. To watch this strong, beautiful woman taking my cock in her mouth. In her pussy. In her ass, maybe.
I was sick with want.
“Well?” She applied a little pressure with the knife, just enough to tease my skin but not to break it.
“I accept your terms,” I said coolly.
It was the first time I’d been blackmailed in my entire life, and I enjoyed it immensely. “But I will shadow you everywhere you go. Work. Gym. Your mother’s. No more avoidance, Gia,” I warned. “You’re mine, and you’re going to act like it. Am I understood?”
“Crystal clear.”
When I got home, I rushed to the office and closed the door. I could still feel her pulsating all over my skin. Her scent, her mouth, the knife.
I called Rebecca, the least useful creature in all of New York, other than maybe sewer rats.
“Sir?” she asked in confusion. “Is everything okay?”
Was it? A lot had happened in the last few hours.
Wedding.
Irish mobster.
Gia hurt.
Kiss.
Kiss.
Kiss.
I hadn’t been this affected when, two years ago, I mounted three Sports Illustrated models on top of one another and fucked them from behind simultaneously, slamming into a different hole each time.
“Cancel all my meetings for today,” I choked out.
It was a Friday, one of my busiest days, as I chased tail ends before the weekend rolled in. But I knew I wouldn’t be productive today.
I hung up, cracked open six math books, and solved equations and followed rituals the entire day to soothe myself back into breathing normally again. I needed to count sand grains and windows on skyscrapers and letters in thick books. I needed numbers to not feel twitchy and anxious and on edge.
Another one of Dr. Patel’s emails popped on my phone’s screen, as though he was reading my mind.
From: Dr. Arjun Patel, MD
(arjunpatel@stjohnsmedical.com)
To: Tate Blackthorn
(willnotanswerunsolicitedemails@GSproperties.com)
Subject: Re: re: re: re: re: re: Reschedule Meeting
Tate, please. You’re dealing with multiple issues. I can help.
I hit Delete.
I was beyond redemption.
I spiraled into my own pitch-black mind.
I put the toilet seat down and sat primly on top of it, unfurling the wrapper of my chicken Caesar wrap.
Taking my lunch in the toilets of the HR department’s floor was ridiculous, but I didn’t have any choice. I had become a social pariah at GS Properties.
It started with the surprise announcement that I was engaged to Tate, which felt like betrayal to all the coworkers I’d been close with. They’d become enraged by my hypocrisy and left letters on my desk calling me a double agent and a Jezebel.
I’d gone from being one of the most loved employees in the company to public enemy number one overnight. Between firing people at my new position and marrying our dictator CEO, my colleagues’ opinion about me changed drastically.