Chapter 13
SLOANE
As the high from my orgasm starts to retreat, I remember where I am, especially how exposed I am. My arm comes over to cover my chest, and I hear an amused chuckle come from the curtains.
Knox sighs like he was expecting something like this.
It’s amazing, considering everything he’s done to me, that this is the first time I want to slap him. I think I let myself confuse being wanted sexually with someone wanting me. He’s been nothing but honest with me, but I’ve been lying to myself.
It hurts.
I quickly pull up my dress, and scramble off the table.
Knox reaches for me, but I take a couple of steps back.
Of course, I’m not watching where I’m going, and fall on my ass on the bench.
My bare ass. Quickly, I pull down the skirt of my dress, but the smirk on Asher Cross’ smug face tells me he’s already seen everything.
“What the fuck are you doing, Ash?” Knox grumbles. Despite asking the question, I can tell he already knows the answer.
Asher shrugs in that way guys do. “Just confirming a suspicion.”
Knox scrubs his hand down his face. He looks so tired, and for a second I’m softening for him.
My heart is too damn big. I shouldn’t have given it to him, but the last few days I know that’s exactly what I did.
Seeing him bond with my brother, being with him for seventy-two straight hours, it messed with my head.
I let myself imagine a life where I had a family.
A real one. Not one where I’m the invisible lynchpin keeping everything together.
I think I want that life so bad I started to see it where it doesn’t exist. Instead I’m just a little girl playing house about ten years too late.
Knox is watching me warily, like he knows I’m going to run, and shove Sawyer between us.
“Get the fuck out of here,” Knox snaps. You wouldn’t think Asher is one of his best friends by the venom laced through his voice.
Asher puts his hands up in front of him. “Look, I didn’t see anything…well, nothing much.”
He looks at me, and he actually looks contrite. “I am sorry, Sloane.”
Looking back at Knox, he continues. “Yeah, I wanted to see if I was right, but I actually just came back here because Sawyer is looking for Sloane. I thought it would be better if I caught you than her.”
“Fuck,” Knox barks. He shoves his hand in his hair and looks at me with something like anguish pulling down his mouth.
“We aren’t supposed to fraternize with members of the organization. If she catches us, both our asses are on the line.”
I narrow my eyes at him. When this all started he led me to believe that he had me backed into a corner. Now I think that Gerry and Sawyer might have stood against him.
He nods once. Just a quick jerk of his head, like he heard my thoughts. Not that I think anything will change. Whether they help me or not, if Knox isn’t willing to comply, or worse starts acting up again, Audra will fire me. I doubt Gerry would take me on himself if my presence makes Knox worse.
Fuck, that corner he backed me into, yeah, it’s still there.
But you don’t really want out of it.
The thought pops into my head, unwelcome. Truth often is.
I’m mad at him right now. Furious even, but I wanted him too. He didn’t force anything that happened in this dark corner. My body was practically vibrating to feel his against me.
Asher peeks out of the curtain, then looks back at us. “You probably only have a few minutes before Sawyer comes down here. I’ll try and run interference, but wrap this up.” Then he disappears back into the hallway.
I start smoothing my hair, and wiping under my eyes to see if my makeup smudged.
Knox holds his hand out to me. “Come here, baby girl.”
My hackles are still up, but as always, when he issues a command, I obey. I don’t know what it says about me, but everything inside of me craves his commands.
He pulls me down to his lap, and puts his arm around me.
Everything outside of the room fades away again.
He buries his face in my neck, and breathes me in.
“I’m sorry. I needed you so bad, I just didn’t think, or I guess care if we got caught.
I do care now. I don’t want to share you, with anyone.
I wish you were going to be next to me tonight. ”
“What is going on with us?” The whispered question escapes me before I can think about what I’m saying.
He strokes his hand down my hair. “I’m not sure, baby girl, but I know I can’t be without you.”
“But, you want to own me. You said this was just sex.” I’m not sure why I’m arguing with him, except it’s unraveling me hearing him sound as shaken up as I feel.
“I do want to own you, but not just your body. I want your soul, and—” he swallows “—your heart. I want all of you. Don’t make me define what all of that means.
I’m still going to be me. I’m going to order you to your knees to suck my cock.
I’m going to use whatever it takes to keep you next to me, but I at least want you to want to be with me now. ”
I shouldn’t swoon hearing any of that. It’s beyond fucked up. Yet, I can’t help myself. I want him with an irrational force I can’t explain.
I lay my head against his chest. “God help me, but I want to be with you too.”
Knox kisses the top of my head. “Good, because I meant what I said. I’m not giving you up.”
“There you are,” Sawyer shrieks when we rejoin everyone in the VIP section.
The smile on my face is awkward. “Knox and I needed to talk about setting up a scholarship for underprivileged students to attend a vocational program. It’s a little too chaotic in here for us to talk, and we don’t have a lot of time if we’re going to make this happen before we leave the city.”
Her forehead creases. “Why here? Couldn’t he do that in Portland where he’s from?”
I shrug. I can’t exactly tell her that we needed an excuse to sneak away for a little while.
“We think that rather than concentrate all of his efforts to repair his reputation in one place, it will work better to spread it out while we’re on the road.
This area has high rates of poverty, and if he can make a real difference while getting some good PR, even better.
This scholarship has the potential to improve this community. ”
Sawyer’s face can best be described as sour. It’s clear she expected something nefarious was going on.
“Are you ready to go back to the hotel?” Sawyer asks.
I look back at Knox, and see that he’s not doing a very good job not staring at me.
I shouldn’t be thrilled that he’s getting so blatantly possessive, but I can’t help it.
No one has ever felt so strongly about me that they would scowl at someone just for taking a bit of my time.
It’s probably not healthy, but neither is the lonely life I’ve been living.
Knox grabs onto the edge of the table where he’s sitting talking to Asher. His knuckles are white from how hard he’s holding on, and it looks like he’s trying to force himself to stay in place. He nods at me, and I know he’s telling me to go with Sawyer.
“Yeah, I’m tired,” I tell her.
The whole ride back to the hotel I’m trying to think how I might convince her to swap rooms with one of the other girls. I can’t come up with anything that doesn’t advertise that I’m sleeping with Knox.
Once we get settled in our hotel room I immediately start getting ready for bed.
Sawyer is flitting around the way people do when they are anxious to broach something they should probably keep to themselves.
Every couple minutes I see her staring at me intently, then she opens her mouth like she’s about to say something, only to close it and start fidgeting again.
I didn’t realize how loud unsaid words could be. This seems to be the night for blaring silence. Earlier, when Knox and I stole time alone, I nearly confessed that I’m falling in love with him. The words he said when he coerced me into this arrangement kept my feelings bottled up inside of me.
I can still hear his words, and the angry tone he said them, “I’m not offering you romance, love, or to be your boyfriend.
Don’t get any notions like that. I will fuck you, in every way you can imagine, and many ways your innocent little mind won’t let you consider yet.
But you will. When I’m done with you, and there will be an end date, you will have shed every bit of the innocence I see burning in your face. ”
Thankfully, I managed to corral a couple of cells of gray matter while Knox fucked my brains out.
That modicum of self-control doesn’t stop the thoughts from burrowing their way into my head.
It makes no logical sense. He’s bossy, possessive, dirty, and closed off.
I shouldn’t be longing to cuddle up to him when he’s the one who told me my heart won’t be safe with him.
I guess my daddy issues are so bad I’m willing to overlook the manipulation he used to trap me under his thumb and convince myself it is desire. He is a master of jumbling my thoughts. The things he says should be degrading, yet coming out of his mouth it sounds like praise.
Despite how uncomfortable I am feeling around Sawyer right now, I think it’s good that there is something forcing a separation between us.
Sex with Knox is amazing. Granted, I have nothing to compare it to, but I can’t imagine it will ever be better than now.
Even so, I need to remember to savor the physical experience for as long as it lasts, and more importantly I need to remember to guard my heart.
Thanks to my father’s negligence it’s already bruised, but I think Knox could smash it to pulp.
Loud footsteps and badly hushed conversations burst from the direction of the elevator. Thanks to Sawyer being the daughter of the team’s owner, and training to take over when he retires, we’re on the same floor as the players while the rest of the support staff is one floor below us.
My heart speeds up, and I imagine Knox standing on the other side of the door when it sounds like someone stops on the other side of the door. After a very long moment, the last pair of footsteps moves past our room.
Sawyer looks over at me with suspicion, but I don’t owe her answers. I know he said there’s a policy against members of the organization dating, but I haven’t actually been told that by anyone besides Knox. Until I hear it from someone on the administrative side I’m going to feign ignorance.
She sighs, reaches over to shut off her light. “Goodnight, Sloane.”
“Night,” I parrot. I exhale when the room goes dark.
Eventually, she’ll gather the words she wants to say.
It’s another thing I need to steel myself against. Not that any of this will matter in the long run.
I’m not going to be a permanent resident of this weird world they live in.
It’s not one us mere mortals usually get to experience, so I’m filing away memories for the day I’m old and gray.
At least I’ll have some interesting stories to tell my grandchildren about how, for a short time, I had an up close and personal view of the flashy world of the rich and famous.
I just have to figure out how to bask in their light without getting burned in the meantime.