Chapter Two
“ We ’ ll start off slow. It ’ ll be fine.”
God, what am I getting myself into ?
I ’ ve lost track of how long I ’ ve been sitting in Maxwell ’ s office while we discussed my skills and how he wants to utilize them. I scoffed in his face until he convinced me otherwise, but then nerves got the better of him, and now I find myself doing the convincing.
“ All right. So, when can we start? Tomorrow night? Oh, no. What was I thinking. I have the annual charity auction. Saturday?”
“ I ’ ll have to check my schedule.” His face falls, and I respond before thinking. “ Yes, fine.” Shit. Antony. I forgot he extended our agreement. I don ’ t relish the thought of having to rearrange. He won ’ t be pleased, but the lost, almost hopeless, look on Maxwell ’ s face twists something inside me. Why I ’ m making it my problem, I have no clue. “ I ’ ll make it work. Have a few drinks beforehand to relax, hmm?”
His relief is evident as he gives me a small smile, and I know I ’ ve done the right thing, whatever that is. “ I can have a car collect you. What time?”
“ Seven.”
“ Okay.”
“ Okay.”
Leaning over his desk, I spot my business card and scrawl my address on the back of it with a stray pen, then hand it back.
“ I don ’ t typically give that to clients, so whatever you do, don ’ t lose it or pass it around.” I give him a pointed look, and he agrees, putting it in his wallet before dropping it in the top drawer of his desk. “ Well then, I ’ ll be on my way. I ’ ll see you Saturday. Don ’ t be late.”
“ Oh, I ’ ll walk you out.” He rises as I do, but I wave him off.
“ No need. I won ’ t get lost or cause any trouble.” I wink, making Maxwell chuckle.
“ Until Saturday, then.”
I let myself out and smile politely at his stuffy secretary on my way past, wondering if she knows or suspects what I do for a living. I bet she ’ d pitch a fit. Especially if she knew I make more in a month than she does all year. It makes me grin.
I spend the ride down fishing out my cell and typing out a text message to Antony, telling him we need to reschedule the time on Saturday—he ’ s monopolized me for more than a week, one adjustment of my own won ’ t kill him—then I remember Mr. Boy-Next-Door.
My pulse hums thinking about his electrifying blue eyes and the hypnotic way they drank me in. Unlike most men who strip me naked the second their eyes land on my body, he did not. There was something different in his gaze I couldn ’ t decipher.
Shit, what time is it? I glance at the time on my cell before sending the text and stow it back in my clutch as the elevator doors ping open, realizing I ’ ve been with Maxwell for over an hour. Oops. Maybe he got bored waiting and left. I wouldn ’ t be opposed to that. I don ’ t do lunch. Or dates. I should just sneak out—although he did pique my interest in the space of a few minutes. Interesting. That ’ s twice in a matter of days.
I poke my head out of the open elevator, a little apprehensive, earning myself some peculiar looks from a few people getting in. The coast looks clear, other than a group of men by the exit. I ’ m tentatively making my way toward the glass doors when a laugh draws my gaze, and I find him in the center of the group, surrounded by Asian businessmen, all talking animatedly in… Japanese?
He laughs again at something one of them says, his head tipping back slightly and his whole body shaking. I get lost for a moment watching him when his head drops down, and his eyes land on me. Crap.
My gaze snaps forward with a sharp intake of breath— busted —and I make a beeline for the doors, but I don ’ t get far. My heart stills with a jolt when a warm hand wraps around my wrist, pulling me to a stop before I can clear the group. My skin alights at the touch, and I look up from the smooth, long fingers to discover the boyish face staring at me.
“ Leaving without me?” He gives me a mischievous grin. Still holding my arm, he turns back to the group behind him. “ Excuse me, gentlemen. I must bid you good day. This beauty waits for no man.” He lowers his head in a bow. The men chuckle and follow suit. Rising, he steps farther out of the circle and next to me. “ Shall we?”
“ You speak Japanese?” I blurt out.
“ Hai.” He chuckles.
“ I ’ m impressed.” And I am—it ’ s not an easy language to learn.
“ Good. Let ’ s hope I can maintain that.”
Removing his hand from my wrist, he trails his fingers up and around to my back. His reverent touch sends chills along my skin as he moves close behind me to my right, resting his hand at the small of my back before ushering me toward the entrance. I ’ m so caught up in the feeling of his palm, his pinkie finger centimeters from the curve of my ass, and the heat radiating from his touch that I don ’ t notice until it ’ s too late. He ’ s walking us into the revolving doors.
“ Oh, god!”
His arms instinctively wrap around me as I collide with his solid chest, turning to bolt, but the door pushes behind us, moving our bodies closer together and into the spinner of death.
“ You ’ re not even going to fake a call before running out on me?”
His gentle laughter vibrates through him and into my arms pressing against his chest. Our shoes slide against the floor, the door continuing to push us further in before it stops all together.
“ Vivienne? ”
My name draws my attention, and I look up from his lips, just inches from mine to his eyes, once again piercing me with their intensity, but this time the corners curve with concern.
He tightens his hold around my waist and turns me an inch to the right, allowing his feet room to step forward and a hand to activate the mechanical door again. I ’ m a grown-ass woman, but I cling to him like he ’ s the teddy bear and I ’ m the three-year-old afraid of the boogeyman. I ’ ve lost my mind.
Pressing me to his side, he takes me with him, stepping out onto the bustling sidewalk and into the warm summer air of freedom. My pulse is frantic, ringing a crazy crescendo in my ears as I stare mindlessly in front of us. The people passing by pay no mind to the crazy woman having a mental breakdown for no apparent reason. What the hell is wrong with me?
“ Hey,” he coos, twisting to face me, getting back in my personal space.
Raising a hand from around my waist, he captures my cheek in his warm palm. The soft strokes to the side of my face as he tucks a tendril of hair behind my ear bring my attention back to him. I shift my gaze and focus on his sweet face, taking in the way his eyebrows have slanted inward, almost becoming one as his eyes flicker back and forth across my face. His slow, rhythmic breathing, a stark contrast to mine, becomes my sole focus, and I count the rises and falls of his chest as it moves against me, desperate to get my panic under control.
After what feels like an eon, my lungs ’ rapid pace begins to slow, and my fixation shifts to his mouth. To his perfect pink lips, mere inches from mine.
His hand stills on my cheek, and his chest shudders with a ragged breath in as his lips part infinitesimally before moving, bridging the space between us.
Oh no.
I pull out of his embrace seconds before his lips can connect with mine. “ Whoa.” My heart skyrockets again. “ You got one freebie with the gropage earlier. Don ’ t push your luck, buddy.” I tease, more to dispel my unease than anything else. He almost… I… shit .
“ Hey, you walked into my hands. They can ’ t be held accountable for that. I couldn ’ t even tell you if they ’ re real or not, it was over in a nanosecond.” His eyes widen as he laughs, but it ’ s pitchy, embarrassed.
“ Oh, they ’ re very real. Do you need to check again?”
His face instantly glows with color. “ Uh, I, uh, I believe you.”
I laugh as he stumbles and blushes further. “ I ’ m messing with you.”
He shakes his head and puts an arm around my waist, once again steering me. “ Come on. Let ’ s get that drink.”
“ Are you normally so easily flustered?” Because I ’ m not…
“ No. ” He chuckles. “ But it ’ s not every day that I feel up a beautiful woman. You ’ re quite the handful.” He winks.
“ You have no idea,” I muse.
“ I ’ m beginning to have some.” His face does that lighting-up thing again as he looks at me a little too long before he clears his throat. “ So, um, what happened before?” His tenor is tentative as he removes his hand from my waist to hold the door to the cocktail bar open. The gesture makes me smile.
“ Thank you.” I shake my head as I enter. “ Honestly, I have no idea. Well, I have some. I ’ ve never liked revolving doors and always avoid them, but I don ’ t ever remember having such an adverse reaction to one. I think…”
“ What are you doing? You were meant to be right beside me. Do you know how long I ’ ve been looking for you?”
“ I didn ’ t know how to get out. I just kept going around and around…”
“ I have this vague memory of getting stuck in one when my mother dragged me on one of her countless shopping trips as a child.” I shrug.
“ But you ’ re all right?”
“ Yeah, fine. Nothing a stiff drink can ’ t cure.”
“ The stiffer, the better?” he says with a raised brow.
“ I ’ ve always thought so.” I pull up a stool in front of the bar and grab the bartender ’ s attention. “ Scotch on the rocks, please.”
The bartender looks to my companion as he sits on the stool to my left, so close our thighs brush.
“ Make that two.”
The bartender nods and walks off, leaving us alone.
“ On the clock?” I bump legs with Mr. Handsie and ever so slightly shift my weight, putting a little more distance between us. “ How devious.”
“ If you can, I can.”
I almost scoff at that. “ I ’ m off the clock.”
“ You are?” I can see the questions forming behind his eyes, the wheels turning in his head, but I cut him off before he can speak.
“ You have me at a disadvantage.”
“ How do you figure?”
“ I don ’ t know your name. I ’ m usually on a first-name basis with men who are so touchy-feely with me.”
“ Sorry.” He raises his hands in surrender and then offers me one. “ Jeremy.” I take his hand, and he shakes it gently but with a firm grip, unlike a lot of men who think less of women and give you the piss-poor version. Nothing worse than a weak man with a feeble handshake. “ It ’ s a pleasure to make your acquaintance”—he twists my fingers in his, raising my hand up and bringing his lips to my knuckles, kissing them softly—” Vivienne, ” he whispers across my skin, his eyes sparkling with mischief.
Oh, he ’ s got game.
I raise an eyebrow in response, and he chuckles, releasing my hand. “ Sorry, I couldn ’ t resist.”
“ So it would seem. So, Jeremy.” I pause to grab my drink, needing the slight distraction. Jeremy beats me, handing over cash before I can. “ What ’ s your story?”
“ Hmm, let ’ s see.” He takes a sip of his own drink, furrowing his brow in thought. “ Divorced father of three. I live in my office, where I spend most nights feeding my drinking problem.” He raises his glass to his mouth and pauses. “ Oops. ”
A laugh bursts out of me, a little too loud, and I cover it up with my hand.
“ You have a great laugh. You shouldn ’ t hide it.”
“ Yours isn ’ t so bad either. Do you speak any other languages?” My curiosity gets the better of me, and I can ’ t help wondering what other hidden talents he possesses. He has all the charm of a player, but the gentility of a good southern boy. It definitely got my attention and is a little disarming, especially in someone younger.
“ A little bit of this and that. It comes in handy in meetings.”
“ What do you really do?”
“ Lead business consultant. Advertising mainly. And you?”
“ Ah same.” I internally cringe at my faux pas. Does marketing yourself count?
“ Really?” He sounds dubious.
“ Sort of. The consulting and advertising part at least. My clientele is more of a niche market and on a smaller scale. It ’ s a little different from what I studied at BU.” Understatement.
“ You went to BU? When did you graduate?” Uh-oh.
“ I left before my twenty-first birthday. I ended up working on the other side of the country.”
“ Oh, so you ’ re not a local?”
I fight a grin at his despondent tone. “ I moved back earlier this year.”
My clutch buzzes in my lap, drawing my attention, and I miss whatever Jeremy says in response. I shift it to the bar and return my attention to him.
He fidgets on his stool, looking diffident for the first time. “ So, there ’ s this thing I have to go to tomorrow for Cancer research. Most of this building is involved actually and—” My cell buzzes, then again and again, vibrating through my clutch to the bar. “ Do you want to check that?”
“ Maybe…” I pull out my phone while sending an apologetic look Jeremy ’ s way, groaning when I see Antony ’ s name filling up my screen.
A: We need to talk about this.
A: An agreement is an agreement.
A: Where are you?
A: I ’ m coming to get you.
Oh my god, what the hell? My fingers fly over the keys as I type back my response, giving Jeremy a sheepish, embarrassed grin.
V: I ’ m not cancelling, I ’ m only adjusting the time a little. I just got out of an appointment. Give me 20, and I ’ ll meet you somewhere downtown.
His response is almost instant.
A: What kind of appointment, and with whom?
V: None of your business, but MM&P Ltd, if you must know.
I responded quickly and without much thought, but I doubt he ’ ll think anything of that tidbit of information. A follow-up doesn ’ t come, so I stow my cell, hoping that ’ s the end of it.
“ I ’ m sorry, that was rude. Ah, where were we?”
“ A date. We were discussing when.” His following smile lights up his whole face, and for a moment, I forget everything, lost in its warmth…wait, what?
“ A date? I don ’ t…date.” One side of my mouth twists up, thinking about the little I don ’ t do.
“ Shame. I don ’ t sleep around,” he retorts with the slightest twitch of a brow, making me smirk. He ’ s got me pegged already. Good.
“ You should try it sometime.” With me. “ It ’ s rather…liberating.”
“ I could say the same to you.”
“ Me? Dating? ”
“ Yes, dating. ”
“ Ah, but you see, it ’ s rather frowned upon to have sex on the first date. Rather whorific, I ’ m told.”
Jeremy bursts out laughing, the sound rich and deep. It sends a buzz of electricity across my skin, making me want to hear it again.
“ I don ’ t play nice with rules, unless they ’ re my own. So I skip all the preliminaries, simplifying the situation. It doesn ’ t get more liberating than that.”
“ What happened to the thrill of the chase? Delayed gratification and all that?”
“ There ’ s plenty of thrill and chase. I just don ’ t delay my gratification.” I smirk. “ I ’ m all for delaying someone else ’ s. ”
Jeremy scoffs, but there ’ s mirth in it. “ And here I was under the impression women enjoyed foreplay.” It ’ s my turn to grin. “ Come with me to this charity auction tomorrow night?”
“ Why?”
“ Because it ’ ll be fun?”
I raise a brow at that.
“ Because I want to see you again and change your mind. Maybe, heaven forbid, prove there ’ s more to life than a quick fuck.”
I sink my teeth into my bottom lip, stifling my laugh into a snigger, and try not to think about the salacious response that one word coming out of his pretty mouth has.
“ A slow one?” I tease.
Jeremy shakes his head in mock displeasure, his grin breaking through, ruining his attempt.
Whatever else I had been going to say catches in my throat when something draws my gaze to the left, through the glass windows, to the street. I see an all-too-familiar black Mercedes pulling up to the curb. He didn ’ t. My heart stops when the rear door opens and out steps Antony.
Of course he did.
It kicks back up to explosive levels when his eyes look up and through the window, narrowing when they see me.
“ Ah, shit.” I scramble off the stool, taking my clutch in hand and downing the last of my scotch. “ I have to go, my…ride ’ s here.” He ’ s going to ride my ass, for sure.
“ Wait, that ’ s it? You ’ re just going to leave?”
“ Well, yeah. Thank you for the drink and entertaining company.”
“ At least…” He pauses, his brow furrowing, seeming to struggle with something before carrying on. “ Can I get your number?”
“ What for?” I quip. “ It was…interesting meeting you, Jeremy.” I smile, and before I can help myself, I lean in to peck him on the cheek, lingering for a beat too long. “ The pleasure was all mine,” I whisper in his ear, catching his delicious woodsy scent.
I walk off at a brisk pace before he has a chance to respond or stop me. I can feel his gaze burning into me as I make my way to Antony appearing in the doorway. His displeasure radiates toward me the moment he crosses the threshold. This is going to make for one eventful day.
“ Vivienne. ” He makes a show of pulling me into him before roughly kissing my cheek, his lips lingering and his eyes intent on something, or someone, behind me.
“ You cancel on me, and here I find you with another man?” He growls in my ear before pulling back.
“ Antony, your possessiveness knows no bounds. And I didn ’ t cancel, exactly. Besides, my days are my own, remember?” I roll my eyes and watch Antony ’ s anger flare as he opens the door, his eyes blazing and his whole body vibrating with it. His other hand becomes a merciless pressure at the small of my back, pushing me out the door.
“ Vivienne, I own you,” he whisper-shouts, and I cut him off before he can finish the rest of that train wreck.
“ You pay to own my body for a week. Not me. I am, and always will be, a free agent. Don ’ t mistake compliance for obedience, Antony,” I spit out through gritted teeth.
If that didn ’ t piss me off so much, I ’ d find it comical. You can ’ t own what you ’ ve never had. He ’ s never had me. Parts of my body? Those he ’ s had repeatedly, knows intimately, but the rest of me, not at all. There ’ s no sharing and caring, no feelings. Ever. It ’ s why we ’ ve worked so long and so well together. It ’ s easy, effortless, and completely detached. What the hell has gotten into him?
My outburst catches Antony off guard. His step falters as we exit onto the street, and I find myself standing outside alone. I turn to look at him still standing in the doorway before he shakes his head and roars with laughter.
“ I ’ m of a mind to spank you, but then, you might enjoy that.”
I suck my bottom lip into my mouth in a vain attempt not to laugh. “ No marks allowed. Remember the rules.” But it ’ s an idle remark, mirth riddling my tone.
“ I ’ m going to fuck the rules.” His eyes dance with yearning, and a newfound hunger replaces his earlier rage. My body responds in kind, my pulse quickening again as desire shoots south. Antony on a mission—it ’ s one battle you don ’ t want to win.
He smacks my ass when I reach the rear passenger door, and I yelp in response, turning to mock glare.
“ So impatient,” he chastises me, opening the door wider.
I ’ m about to respond with something witty or snarky when I catch sight of Jeremy through the window, and all previous thought vanishes. His baby blues watch me intently. Before I can think about what I ’ m doing, my mouth opens. “ So, tomorrow night, fancy getting dressed up and showing me off?”
I give Jeremy a last fleeting glance, a small smile playing on my lips before ducking into the car out of sight. Part of me is wishing Antony says no, because seriously, what was I thinking. A smaller part secretly hoping he says yes.
“ Go on.”