Chapter Seventeen
Chapter 17
SIENNA
HE LEADS ME INTO THE kitchen and then rifles through the paper bag on the counter.
I laugh as he hands me a box of edible body paint. “Well, this looks like fun.”
“I’m glad you agree. Now, let’s get you out of that dress.”
“Only if we get you out of that suit first.”
His gaze turns devilish, and he picks me up, making me yelp as he cradles me against his solid chest. “Do you always have to fight me?”
I stroke his red silk tie as he carries me to the bedroom. “I think that’s what you like most about me.”
“It is refreshing.”
I tuck my feet so they don’t bump the doorframe, then I start to undo the knot in his tie. “So, your other women are just quiet all the time, doing everything they’re told?”
As soon as I ask, I regret it, because I don’t want to think about all the other women he’s been with. Since he’s a man who doesn’t like attachments, he probably dates often. Maybe he’s even talked to his other women during this trip. Maybe he messaged one this morning, said something dirty or…
He drops me on the bed, and I bounce, breaking my train of thought. Good, because I was on the edge of spiraling.
Pressing his hips between my legs, spreading them open and exposing the fact that I’m not wearing panties, he teases my opening with the head of his cock. I’m breathless because he’s not yet wearing a condom, and I know that’s important to him.
Has he finally decided I’m not a liar? That I’m really on birth control?
Placing his hands on either side of my head, he lowers himself and asks, “What are you talking about? Other women? I’m not sure they exist. I can only think of you. You’re the only one I want.”
That admission shocks him more than it does me—I see it in the slight widening of his eyes and the way his body becomes deathly still. We gaze at each other for a moment as my heart thunders.
Only me?
Thankfully, he moves off of me to stand beside the bed, changing focus.
I’m sure he didn’t really mean that. He shouldn’t.
Regaining his composure, he finishes loosening his tie and then takes off his jacket. “I’ll humor you and undress first. But don’t get used to commanding me around.”
I just nod, still trying to push his earlier statement from my mind. He strips for me, kicking off his shoes, peeling off his button down, then his pants. He finally drops the boxers, standing naked in all his muscular glory, stroking himself as I watch.
I’m already so wet and needy it feels like a slight breeze could push me over the edge.
“Your turn,” he says, completely composed with every angle of his body solid and level.
I sit up and whip the dress over my head. Now I’m completely naked, exposed. Eager to have him do whatever he pleases. He could fuck me with a paintbrush and I wouldn’t even bat an eye—I crave this man’s satisfaction that much.
He stares at my pussy as he strokes himself in a languid rhythm, then his gaze travels up my body. This intoxicating man makes me blush by saying, “What an exquisite canvas I have.”
I bite my lip as he grabs the box of body paints and pops it open. He makes me feel like a supermodel, but that’s definitely not what I see in the mirror—only a Plain Jane. A woman not deserving of all this attention. I mean, come on…he’s rich, and I’m sure he’s dated actual models.
His momentary interest—or lapse in sanity—would never survive past our expiration date. I have nothing to offer a man like him.
He bites my nipple and I gasp, turning my alarmed gaze on him.
Hovering over me, he says, “Don’t know what you’re thinking about, but eyes on me.” He kisses me, pressing his mouth against mine like he’s starving.
Only a momentary lapse in sanity.
After raising himself, he settles between my thighs again, sitting back on his heels. He pops the top on a small jar—blue. Before dipping the brush into the liquid, he hesitates. “Do you have a favorite color?”
I lick my lips, debating whether I should lie. I go with the truth: “Burnt sienna.”
“Hmm. Our colors are limited. Would you prefer something close? Red instead of blue?”
“Blue is fine. What’s your favorite color?”
He dips a finger into my wetness, making me twitch. “Pink. Your entire body is my favorite.”
I purse my lips. “I’m not all pink.”
Still teasing my wetness, he licks the pebbled surfaces of my breasts, then my lips. “The best parts are.”
“Are you going to paint me?” I say, squirming under him as my core aches. All his teasing is too much. “Or do I have to take over and ride you?”
He smiles so wide he shows his teeth, and the little worry lines around his eyes become joyful crinkles.
That sweet ache in my chest comes back. I love his smile. It’s like he only shows it to me.
“As if I’d let you,” he says. “I want to have my fun first.”
His fingers pluck a nipple, and he kisses me to swallow my soft moan.
Finally, finally , he returns to sitting back on his heels and dips the brush in the blue paint. When he makes a stroke along my stomach, I gasp from the coldness, then I giggle like a dumb schoolgirl.
It’s not like all of this isn’t sexy—it definitely is—but in just twenty-four hours of us fucking like rabbits, something in him has shifted dramatically. He’s still dark and brooding most of the time, but there are these little glimpses of a playful side. It has relaxed me, turning me into a giggly mess sometimes.
A coolness spreads over my flushed skin everywhere he makes a brush stroke. I watch his gaze shift as he works, his brow furrowing in concentration. Whatever he’s painting captures his complete attention for several minutes, so I wait patiently until he’s done. He finally lifts the brush to admire his work on my torso.
I glance down and smile—he drew a rose. A really good one. “That’s beautiful. I didn’t know you could draw.”
“I doodled in high school to keep myself awake in class.”
“So, you were a bad student?” I tease.
Smirking, he runs the brush over my sensitive nipples, making me suck in a sharp breath. As my skin cools under the paint, he dips his head to cover me with heat from his tongue. I shiver and moan, running my hands through his unruly hair, pulling him closer.
He adds more paint along my skin, then eagerly licks it up. His hands caress me as he moves downward, painting designs as he travels. I’m riddled with goosebumps and my veins are lava by the time he reaches the juncture of my thighs. It’s all I can do not to buck against him as he spreads me with two fingers, then swirls the brush over my clit.
I must look desperate because he only grins and asks innocently, “What?”
I moan a light protest. He knows what.
“Oh, you want me to clean up the paint?”
This time I groan.
“Or just add more?” He runs the brush up and down my crease.
“Your mouth,” I finally pant out. “Stop teasing me.”
“Well, you should’ve asked…such a dirty princess.”
The muscles between my thighs pulse.
Damn him. I don’t know why I like that nickname so much, but he’s weaponized it.
I’m ready to pull his hair out when he finally presses his lips around my swollen clit and sucks hard. I cry out, then gasp his name. It’s the first time I’ve called out ‘Declan’ like this, so his eyes snap to mine as he licks and probes. His gaze is laser-focused, as if he’s branding me with his dark stare. There’s so much emotion in that look I can’t decipher. But I know I want to be branded.
I want to be his.
He dips two fingers inside me, stretching and teasing. My hands grip his hair and I rock into his mouth.
If I was his, we could run away together. I wouldn’t have to disappear alone.
I wouldn’t be alone.
Such a dangerous, na?ve feeling.
As he thrusts his fingers in and out, the tension in my core builds. “I want you,” I pant out, twisting my fingers so deep in his hair I’m probably hurting him.
He doesn’t seem to care; he only keeps pinning me with stormy eyes while his mouth and fingers push me toward breaking.
“Fuck…I want…you…Dec—”
Heat shreds through me, my core pulsing and aching as my body falls apart. I grind against his mouth, milking every drop of pleasure from his tongue that I can. But even as I’m coming down and my core stops pulsing, an ache remains.
Someone to disappear with me. What a beautiful, dumb thought.
Declan doesn’t want a broken woman. He has his own life—a business, obligations, friends. He wouldn’t drop everything for a woman he’s barely known for two months. Also, I’d have to explain to him why I need to run away, explain my past.
He wouldn’t like me if I revealed the truth.
Our little fling is fun, but this life could never be mine; my burdens are too heavy.
I’m also starting to have feelings for Declan, so I’d rather not see the look of shock and disgust in his eyes when I explain I’m a criminal.
That I hurt people.
That he might be in danger just from knowing me.
He lifts my chin with his finger, pulling my unfocused gaze back to the moment. “You’re slipping away again,” he says. “Thought I said eyes on me?”
I nod weakly.
He studies my sad expression, and those versatile lines around his eyes deepen with worry. “It wasn’t good?”
“It was. I loved it.” I pull him into a kiss, tasting a mix of raspberry paint and my own essence on his tongue.
Why am I getting lost in the past? In realities I can’t have? Declan doesn’t know my dark parts, and we only have five days left. I need to enjoy them.
Shaking away my depressing thoughts, I give him a smile and poke the worry line between his brows. “I want to paint you now.”
He rolls, pulling me with him until I’m on top. I shift my hips to straddle him, his cock jutting upward in front of my pelvis. His hands gently caress my thighs as I lean over to grab a jar of orange body paint from the nightstand.
Once I have a loaded brush in my hand, I can’t think of anything to paint. He’s already so finely chiseled, a work of art, that I simply add shadow and contours to his muscles—accentuating the curves of his six-pack, shading the edges of his pecs so they pop even more.
The entire time, he observes and kneads the parts of my body he can reach. Then his thumb slips between my thighs to dance around my clit. I can’t concentrate and don’t want to, so I return the paint and brush to the nightstand.
I run my palms up his torso. The orange mixes with his tan skin, making a mess.
After Declan rolls on a condom, he licks the paint off my fingers, twists his hands roughly in my hair. He lifts himself and rumbles in my ear, “Take what you want.”
I don’t hesitate, lifting my hips and then impaling myself on his rigid cock. We both moan. Then he fucks me, holding my waist and thrusting up ruthlessly until my entire body is trembling and burning.
As I’m screaming out another orgasm, I’m sure I hear him say against my ear, “I want you too. Fuck, I want you.” Then he crumbles with me, moaning and grunting as he shakes and pulls my hips down hard against his.
When we’re both limp, I move to lie on my back, giving our bodies a few inches of space since he told me he doesn’t cuddle. Fine with me because cuddling is too intimate. We need to avoid that; this fling is purely sex.
I probably shouldn’t sleep in his room again tonight. He keeps finding ways to stop me from packing up my stuff, but tonight I should be firm and sleep in a separate room.
I should do that.
As he’s still catching his breath and staring up at the ceiling, he says, “I’d like to take you out to dinner this evening. After we get you a new phone.”
My skin is sweaty and sticky, so I’m craving a long soak in the tub. Something to wash away the paint and the guilt. “I appreciate the offer, but you don’t need to do that. You know I’m uncomfortable with you buying me so much stuff. It’s bad enough you’re paying for the suite and the food and won’t let me pay my share.”
“If I can’t spend my money on others, what’s the point?”
His comment reminds me of something Jada had said before, that only top donors to the museum and arts foundation get rose pins like the one Declan has. I roll onto my side to face him. “You don’t like just going overboard with whatever you want? Buying houses around the world. Yachts. I don’t know how much you make, but I can barely fathom what it would be like to earn more than a hundred thousand a year.”
He cradles the back of his head with his hands, broadening his chest. His body looks so comfortable, I wish I could crawl closer to snuggle, run my fingers through that chest hair.
The corners of his mouth twitch. “I’m not into collecting houses or boats. I have everything I could possibly need and then some. Scaling my business has taken a good chunk of my assets lately, but I still have too much. I’m not a man who wants to hoard money, especially when it can benefit others.”
The sharp contrast of our lives isn’t lost on me; there’s a casualty in the way he discusses money and privilege that feels almost alien.
“Why do you work so hard if you don’t need more money?” I ask, genuinely curious about what drives a man who seems to have zero financial struggle and doesn’t care about building wealth.
His gaze becomes unfocused, his blue eyes dimming. “I don’t have much else besides work. I’m also responsible for my employees—they depend on my company to support their lives. I don’t take that for granted. So, I like to see growth—in my business, in my people. Success in business is one way I can measure my ability to make an impact. To give back for—” His words cut off suddenly and his mouth seals shut.
I smooth my finger over a wrinkle in the sheets. “To give back for what?”
“Just to give back.”
I sense there’s something more, but I don’t ask. I’m already prying too much, and it’s only resulting in my mood dropping. The more I know about him, the larger the divide between us grows. His world is about legacy and impact; mine is purely survival.
I trace the scar on his neck with the pad of my finger, something I’ve done a few times mindlessly.
He stops me, capturing my hand and turning to face me. “I’m surprised you haven’t asked,” he says, tapping the scar. “Others do. I know it’s noticeable.”
“It’s not really my business.”
“You’re not curious?”
“I am but…” But we shouldn’t be asking each other those questions.
He caresses my cheek, his eyes vacant like he has hollowed himself out. “Tell me something about yourself, anything, and I’ll tell you how I got the scars.”
My mind is screaming at me: Do not tell him anything. You don’t want to know.
Why get close to a man I have to leave?
Unfortunately, I’m delirious in the afterglow of sex, and my lips part. “I grew up in Chicago,” I find myself saying. “I was an accident. My parents never wanted kids, but their families pressured them not to get an abortion. My grandpa on my mother’s side told her that once she held me in her arms, her heart would change.”
Declan’s gaze becomes less hollow as a crease deepens between his brows.
Now I’m the empty one, my body turning rigid. Is this the first time I’ve said this out loud? I swallow down pain from the memories, trying to focus only on the facts as I continue. “My mother’s heart never changed. Growing up, it was clear they didn’t want me. They took care of me out of obligation and because of the pressure from my grandparents, but there wasn’t any love or affection. I was left alone a lot. Given food and clothes, then left to take care of myself.”
The memories bite harder than I expected, the soft spot in my chest aching terribly. I think about what that alone time led to, how I started drinking at age 12, seeking validation from much older boys. How I met Anthony when I was 16 and thought I was in love, that he loved me. That doing whatever he asked me to do, no matter how wrong it was, only proved my devotion. Made me belong to him. He said I was his ‘ride or die’ and I was too young to understand at the time that he meant it literally.
“If you’re not with me, you’ll die,” he once told me. And I laughed.
I fucking laughed.
I didn’t know it was a threat.
“My grandpa was there,” I add, almost in a whisper. “When I was a kid. He loved me and cared for me when he could visit. But he was eighty, with poor health. He died when I was twelve. That’s who I have in my locket.” I touch the silver metal as it rests near my collarbone. Then I try to clear my throat several times and stop what’s trying to come up. I’m unsuccessful because a stupid tear slips down my cheek.
Declan kisses it—he doesn’t merely brush it away. He moves closer to press his soft, warm lips against my trembling cheek.
It’s the first time anyone has shown me such intimate tenderness.
“That’s terrible,” he says. “You didn’t deserve such awful parents.”
He tries to hold me and wrap me in his comfort and scent, but I push away, wiping my face and dropping my gaze. “Well, that’s my sob story,” I try to joke, but my voice is too rough around the edges for light-heartedness. “Guess it’s your turn.”
He rolls onto his back again and closes his eyes, like he doesn’t want me to see what might pass through his gaze. “Alright,” he says through a heavy sigh. His tone is level, business-like. “I got the scars from my…my wife, Tiffany.”
A jolt races up my spine and my lips part in a gasp. I was expecting the scars to be from an accident or some disgruntled boxing opponent. But wife ?
After another dark sigh, every muscle on his face relaxes, eyes still closed. He’s blank—a lot better at hiding heavy emotions than I am. “She struggled with bipolar disorder. She…hurt herself on multiple occasions. One day, I came home to find blood in the kitchen and followed the trail to the bathroom. The door was locked, so I broke it down.”
“Oh my god,” I whisper, bracing for the worst. I grab his hand, holding on like he’s going to slip away.
He finally opens his eyes to glance down at our intertwined fingers, almost impassively. I see what he was trying to hide: a light shimmer of moisture along his lashes. “It’s hard to explain how she was during bad days. Not her normal self. Like someone else had taken her over and there was no getting my wife back, no pulling her out of it. She was okay when I found her that day, bleeding from a few cuts, but okay. But she was threatening to do more, and I wasn’t going to let that happen. I tried to grab the utility knife. In the struggle, she caught me with it a few times.”
Even though it’s his traumatic memory, he’s a lot more composed than I am. I’m shaking and the tears are flowing. I want to ask if she’s okay now, if she found help, if she moved on after the divorce, but I’m too much of a wreck.
“Declan,” is all I manage, pulling him into an embrace. I know I pushed him away when he offered comfort, so I won’t blame him if he does the same, but I can’t do anything else right now except try to hold him.
He accepts it. He wraps his arms around my back and presses his forehead into the crook of my neck, breathing deep. He clears his throat, the tiniest indication that his mask has cracked.
Neither of us speaks. We simply embrace, which soon shifts to a form of cuddling. Our legs tangle and we relax into a more comfortable position, still pressed close to one another. I scoot down, my head tucked under his chin. Then I listen to his heartbeat as tears dry on my face.
I fall asleep in his arms, resting in the silence between our damaged parts.
From the blissful darkness, he kisses my forehead, waking me gently. “Join me in the shower.”
I nod, following him in a daze, holding his hand as he leads.
Without speaking, we soap each other’s bodies. We kiss passionately while hot water streams down our cleansed skin, but it’s not from lust or desire. Each kiss is comfort, care, our attempt at mending the rips in our pasts that never stay sutured.
Finally, we return to the bed to cuddle and watch a movie, lost in domestic bliss.
We fall asleep in each other’s arms.