3. Hunter
Hunter
T he sound of a door opening and closing along with a mumbled thank you had me sitting up straight at the table, suit flush to my skin. The wide open, floor-to-ceiling windows of the penthouse let in a soft but humid breeze, and I breathed it in, relishing the sheer amount of oxygen in the air.
Boulder was nearly a mile in the sky. The Oahu resort I was in was about twenty feet in elevation. Even though the humidity was beginning to get on my nerves, I had to admit, I felt like I could breathe better.
Charlotte came around the corner of the kitchen wearing a black satin dress that reached mid-thigh, black satin heels to match. Her face held a scowl, one that told me I was in serious trouble.
“I thought we were meeting at a restaurant,” she hissed.
“I never said that.” I motioned for her to sit across from me at the circular table, but she didn’t move an inch. “You honestly think I’d talk proper business in public? I’m not the kind of man that lays it all out there for anyone to overhear my affairs.”
She blinked at me a few times, the irritation wavering just a little. “Then what’s with the rose petals everywhere? That’s not exactly professional. Neither is the music.”
I snorted. I’d asked the resort to set up for a private meeting but considering I’d booked the honeymoon cottage, it appeared they took that in a different way.
The music had been an unexpected addition.
I wasn’t complaining, though. Hopefully it would soften her demeanor.
“It was a miscommunication between me and the resort staff,” I explained, swatting the question away with my hand. “Please sit, Charlotte.”
The way her body moved instinctually toward the chair after I spoke was enough to make my cock twitch. I thanked the heavens that she couldn’t see it beneath the table. My gaze clung to her exposed arms and collarbone as she slowly sunk into the seat, suspicion dancing in her eyes.
“I want to hear more about your experience,” I said.
In truth, I’d already decided she’d be fine for the role, and I wasn’t desperate to find someone perfect.
I just wanted to hear her talk, wanted to see the way her mouth moved, forming words that didn’t drip with disdain.
There was just something about her, whether it was her attitude or her beauty, that drew me to her.
Made me want her. Made me salivate at the idea of her under me in my bed.
“I thought we were going to eat,” she said, barely keeping control of her irritation.
“Do you not hear the sounds coming from the kitchen or smell food cooking?” I asked, waving my hand in that general direction. The clanging of cookware and snapping of utensils trickled out of the room, the scent of Cajun spices and seafood filling the air. She glared at me.
“Tell me a little bit about yourself first,” I began, leaning forward onto the table with both elbows firmly placed on the glass surface, “and then you can eat whatever my chefs have dared to cook us.”
She looked between me and the kitchen, her straight black hair blowing softly in the ocean breeze. Part of me wondered if she had some sort of ancestral ties to the islands. She didn’t look entirely native, but there was something within her that made me think she might want to stay here instead.
“Fine,” she sighed. “As I said, I’ve been a stable hand since I was eighteen, but I’ve been around horses my entire life.
I basically grew up strapped on the back of a horse.
I got my bachelor's from Colorado State.
I considered continuing on to a master's, but I was itching to get back into the field.”
“Do you have any experience in the breeding sector?” I asked.
“No,” she said, and the way her lips wrapped around the word was enough to make me imagine one of my fingers sliding between them. I didn’t give a shit about her answer. I wanted a meal, and not one that came from the kitchen. “I’m interested in it, though. But I don’t agree with show breeding.”
I shook my head. “We don’t do show breeding. Mostly we breed for competition or working horses, though we do occasionally breed just for riding. We don’t do miniatures or dwarfs.”
She nodded, her gaze lingering on the kitchen. I wondered how hungry she was. “Good. That makes me feel better about it.”
“Tell me what you want to know, Charlotte,” I said, letting my eyes scan over her chest while she wasn’t looking. Little freckles dotted her skin, right down from her shoulders to where her breasts came together?—
“Are you staring at my tits?”
I blinked away the haze of lust that had come over me and sat up straight, eyes flicking back to her face. Her cheeks had flushed, her brows stiff. “No,” I lied, the word slipping out too quickly.
“You were.”
“Did you grow up in Boulder?” I asked, changing the topic as swiftly as she had. She stared at me in confusion, the question taking a moment to process.
“Yeah.”
“Were your parents involved with horses?”
Her throat bobbed as she raised her chin. “Yes.”
There was something there. Something she wasn’t saying, something hiding just beneath the surface of her icy facade. “Why did you leave Boulder?”
“That’s personal,” she replied.
“You and I will be spending quite a bit of time together, Charlotte. Personal won’t be so personal.”
“I like to keep my work life separate.”
A little chuckle crept up my throat as one of the chefs rounded the corner of the kitchen, two plates in hand.
She set them down in front of us. A hefty spoonful of what I could only assume was bulgur sat in the center of the plate with eight perfectly peeled and seasoned shrimp surrounding it, covered in a thin sauce.
I didn’t dare question it. Everything they’d served me so far since I had arrived was phenomenal.
“I don’t think you’ll keep it separate for long,” I responded once the chef had cleared the room.
She stabbed at a singular shrimp with her fork and popped it into her mouth. I could have sworn she was taunting me with it. “Why?”
“Because I saw the way you looked at me the other night,” I deadpanned. “I saw the way your body reacted to mine. I heard your breath catch, felt the little shiver that made those goosebumps flare.”
She stopped chewing midway through my words and forced a swallow. “You’re an asshole,” she coughed, reaching for the pitcher of ice water in the center of the table to pour herself a glass. I slid the bottle of wine her way instead.
“I’ll need a reference from your previous employer.” The words slipped from me like butter as I popped a shrimp between my teeth, collapsing the poor little sucker in one bite. “Have them email me.”
Her face paled while she poured herself a glass of wine. “My father can vouch for me.”
“I don’t accept familial references?—”
“My father is Brody Hammersmith.”
My teeth clanged against my fork, too rough of a bite made with too much shock.
Brody Hammersmith. My business mentor, the man who had been at my side throughout the majority of my journey up the ladder.
His name alone was worth more weight in gold than any other reference she could give me.
Brody never talked much about his family, though I’d heard of a daughter once or twice in passing.
What had he called her? Lydia? Lola? “Lottie.”
She stared blankly at me.
“Your father calls you Lottie.”
“Yes,” she breathed.
I shook my head, surprise getting the better of me. “Fuck the reference,” I said. “It’s definitely not needed. You can start on the first of next month. Though I will say, I was not expecting to run into Brody’s daughter on my brief getaway.”
She stifled a laugh as she popped another shrimp in her mouth. “And you wondered why I ran away when you told me who you were.”
“I can’t be that scary,” I mocked. I lifted my glass of wine to my lips, savoring the scent of it before taking a sip.
The smile that spread across her face was one of fucking heaven. “I don’t know about that,” she teased. “Dad’s pretty much drilled it into me that every man he mentors is a piece of shit playboy who often thinks with his dick but has a good mind for business. No offense.”
Piece of shit playboy with a mind for business. He wasn’t entirely wrong. I had a reputation, and so did the other men I knew he worked with, but surely I wasn’t that bad.
Although I held great respect for Brody, the idea of him disapproving so drastically about a woman I could sleep with, his daughter no less, only made her that much more enticing.
“None taken,” I smirked, stuffing the last bit of food into my mouth and swallowing. “He’s not wrong, I suppose.”
“I know he’s not.”
“Then tell me,” I started, pushing my chair back and lifting myself to my full height. “If you knew better, Lottie, why didn’t your body react the same way as your mind?”
She leaned back in her chair, that iciness of her features returning in a second. I stepped around the table, coming ever closer to her, and watched as her chest rose and fell with shallow breaths.
“If you knew better, why couldn’t you stop yourself from staring at me in the stables yesterday?”
She sucked in a breath, averting her gaze to the glass of wine in front of her.
“If you knew better, why did you touch yourself after you ran?” I tucked a knuckle under her chin, the warmth of her skin a stark contrast from the cold glare she leveled at me. “And why did you think of me while you did it, all alone in your bed?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she snapped.
“I could tell by the way you looked at me,” I said, my lips tugging upward. “I could tell by the way your cheeks flushed as you took in every ounce of me. Tell me, Lottie, do you think the real thing would be better than what you imagined?”
She tried to push my hand away, her irritation growing, but I held strong beneath her chin. The flush in her cheeks grew darker, her lips parting, her eyelids lowering just a millimeter. “You’re extremely unprofessional.”