Chapter Eleven
I watched Gia in the surveillance camera app as she yet again slinked into the building at midnight, silent and sleek like a cat. She hugged a brown paper bag to her chest, tiptoeing her way in.
I did not like unprofitable deals.
As far as this one went, I wanted my fucking money back.
Not only had I lost a competent secretary, but I saw my so-called fiancée less than ever. She avoided me like the plague. Which left me no choice but to consume her like an infectious disease.
Setting my phone down, I turned off all the lights in the apartment and waited in the shadows.
I heard the mechanical lock of my door turn. She stepped inside, careful not to make a sound.
“Only thieves and cheaters sneak up at night,” my voice boomed in the complete darkness of the living room. I was sprawled on the antique settee she had purchased. “Let’s hope for your sake you’re neither. I’d hate for your mother to lose her child during such… turbulent times.”
“Jesus.” She jumped back, dropping the brown paper bag and a pair of heels from her hands.
I watched the industrial snacks she’d bought roll on the floor. I had four fridges, a pantry the size of Buckingham Palace, and two chefs on my payroll, and this idiot was living off prehistoric Rice Krispies from the bodega downstairs.
“Wrong man,” I announced. “I won’t die for your sins, but I’m happy to introduce you to some fun ones.”
“What a tantalizing offer.” Crouching down, she hurriedly collected her woeful dinner. “If only I were into megalomaniacal wankers.”
I clapped twice, turning on the main chandelier. Light flooded the room.
Gia squinted, her eyes readjusting. I stood up and sauntered over to her, taking her in.
It’d been a few days since I’d gotten a good look at her. It left me feeling resentful and on edge. I’d been cracking those math equations more often than I liked to admit. My numbers fascination got so bad I started counting sand grains in an hourglass.
Her high ponytail was sleek at the front and flipped out at the end, like a pinup girl. She styled her edges in soft swirls to frame her forehead, which I itched to trace with my fingers. Her makeup was dewy and soft. She always looked like she spent her nights sleeping inside rose petals.
She wore a practical woolly office dress and a resigned expression.
At least she’d stopped dressing like a call girl.
I knew she was dealing with a lot of bullshit after our surprise engagement announcement. The office had been standoffish and suspicious of her, thinking we’d kept our relationship a secret so they’d confide in her. Rumors swirled that I had impregnated her, a reason for our hasty marriage.
I was probably the last person she wanted to see, and I could not find it in myself to care.
“Care to explain what you’re doing every day until midnight?” I stuffed my fists into my pockets.
Filippo and the rest of the Ferrante guards were due to arrive tomorrow morning, and I was in a prickly mood.
I knew she’d buck at the new arrangement.
“Not that it’s your business, but I spend time with my mother every night.” She tipped her chin up, giving me the frostiest, most repulsed expression in her arsenal.
Now came the part where I was supposed to ask how her mother was doing. Not because I cared, God forbid. If she died, the deal was off.
But I had bigger fish to fry.
“Have you purchased a wedding dress yet?”
“With what time exactly?” She shuffled junk food back into her bag. “I work two jobs since you transferred me to HR and assigned me to teach Rebecca the craft.”
“I’ll have a wedding gown sent your way tomorrow. I’m flying to Geneva for an eight-hour meeting tonight.”
“I’ll pray for a hurricane.”
“I’ll be here in time for the wedding.” I ignored her sarcasm.
“Don’t be so sure. Tomorrow is never guaranteed. A lot can happen between today and Thursday.”
“That’s true. Which brings me to our next subject.” My jaw locked. “A minor complication arose in one of my dealings. The Irish Mafia is after my throat. You’ll need to walk around with security until I take care of this.”
Gia’s face contorted in abhorrence. “I beg your pardon?”
“Bodyguards, Gia. They’re about to follow that perfect ass of yours everywhere you go.
Work, social outings, gym, bathroom. You name it.
It’s for your own protection.” A carnal need to touch her slammed into me.
To bury my hand inside that perfect, naturally curly hair she always kept neatly straightened and devour that lovely mouth that curled in disgust every time I was in the same room with her.
I wanted to taste her hatred of me.
To roll it on my tongue.
To devour her desperation to escape me.
“Mafia, Tate? Really?” She blinked, stunned.
I said nothing.
“What have you done now?”
I just smirked. She didn’t really expect me to confide in her, did she?
“Well, no.” She stepped back, shaking her head. “Out of the question. I will not be babysat.”
“Which part of the conversation made you think this was up for discussion?” My brows furrowed in confusion.
“The part where as an independent woman, I will not revert back to the Middle Ages because you cocked up a deal.”
“You’re free to do whatever you want,” I said calmly. “With the exception of dying in the hands of mobsters to prove a point. See, I don’t like it when a business partner fucks me over. And as far as our transaction goes, you’re currently pounding into me lube-less.”
“Of course it’s all monetary for you,” she muttered.
She snatched her purse from the floor, turned around, and charged back to the door.
I had no choice but to clasp her by the waist and jerk her to me. Her ass collided with my crotch. A low growl escaped me. I was already hard just from talking to her. Now I was ramrod straight, throbbing and lightheaded with lack of blood flow to my brain.
She tried to wiggle out of my touch and run to the door. I tightened my hold on her, my cock pressed between her lovely ass cheeks through our clothes.
“Now, now, Apricity. I’d strongly advise you stop squirming before my cock bursts out on its own accord and gives your ass the spanking it truly deserves,” I whispered into the shell of her ear.
She froze, every muscle in her body stiffening.
I did not like scaring her.
The realization slammed into me like a freight train.
I usually took great pleasure at terrifying people.
But I needed her attention, and if that meant scaring her a little so she’d understand the graveness of the situation, so be it.
My arms circled her waist and shoulders, blocking her from escaping. I could feel her heart pounding through the fabric of her dress fast and hard.
“I hate you,” she whispered.
“Your tight nipples against my forearms are telling me a different story.”
“I’m scared and in shock. That doesn’t mean I fancy you.”
“But you do fancy me.” My hand slipped from her waist and along her inner thigh, traveling up and dipping under her skirt. My thumb caressed her skin. “I bet if I dip my fingers into your pussy, I’ll find it wet and ready for me,” I croaked into her ear.
She shivered with anger and pleasure. She was too proud to say no. And I was too much of a fuckup to give up this opportunity.
“Hmm?” I hummed into the side of her neck, breathing her in. “Yes or no? Should we test the theory that you’re attracted to me?”
“Sure,” she croaked, trying to appear casual. “Your scare tactics never worked on me.”
I had to bite the hem of her blouse to suppress a moan as my fingers traveled up her thighs. I wasn’t going to show her how much I craved this. Not when my balls were already tight, my cock twitchy, leaking precum.
I grazed her satin underwear, slipped my index finger into her, and found her hot and dripping for me. So warm. So soft. Her hips bucked instinctively, searching for more.
My eyes rolled inside their sockets. It took everything in me to leisurely remove my finger from her tight pussy, raising it to her lips, clinging to my composure. “Why don’t you taste for yourself and tell me what you think?”
I dipped my juice-coated finger into her mouth. Her pretty lips wrapped around it, her mouth hot and inviting, and I shuddered, pushing another finger into her mouth, filling it while imagining it was my cock.
She bit my finger until she hit bone, then pressed on, drawing more and more blood.
Groaning, I yanked my finger away but tightened my hold on the rest of her when she tried running. “ Fuck .”
“You ridiculous twat.” She laughed metallically. “You really thought I was going to fall for your broody billionaire bullshit, didn’t you?”
That was it. I wrapped my arm around her throat and used my free hand to tug out my phone. I went through my photo album and shoved a picture in front of her face.
“See this?” I snarled, my finger dripping blood all over the floor. “This is what happened to the last person who fucked with Tiernan Callaghan.”
The image was readily available on the internet from a news piece I’d read earlier. The man had been chopped up and scattered on tree branches.
Gia stopped struggling to free herself, sucking in a surprised breath.
“Now, if I let go, will you run?” I croaked into her ear.
Goose bumps pebbled her skin. Christ, she was responsive. I wanted to offer her something obscene to lie down and open those legs for me.
But Gia was the only woman I knew whose affection could not be bought. The math equation I had yet to solve.
She was silent for a beat before murmuring, “Probably. Better you keep me constrained for this conversation. Not that the outcome will change.”
She wanted more of my touch.
I closed my eyes, breathing her in. Her Tom Ford perfume and a concoction of body oils she put on every night before bed.
“Callaghan wants my throat,” I reiterated.
“So does the rest of the world, I’m sure,” she sighed. “What did you do now?”
“Not important. What’s important is that you’re an extension of me now, whether you like it or not. If they catch you, they will kidnap you, rape you, sever pieces of your body, before I’ll have to pay a hefty amount of ransom to get you back. You don’t want that.”
“There are a lot of things I don’t want,” she spat out, her ass inadvertently wiggling against my cock again. “You’re at the top of that list, by the way. Being followed around by musclemen is a close second. If they come for me, I’ll handle it. I won’t live like a prisoner. Let me go.”
“No.”
She elbowed my ribs, which hardly left a dent, but raising her heeled foot and jamming it against my shin did the trick. I released her on instinct. She grabbed her purse and supermarket bag, stomping to the door.
“No bodyguards.” She pointed at me in warning. “If they chop off a few of my limbs, you’ll only have yourself to blame. Next time, don’t mess with the Irish Mafia, Tate.”
“You’re being ungrateful.”
“Ungrateful?” she choked out, enraged. “The Mafia is after me because of you .”
“And I’m pulling all my resources to protect you from them. Really, you should be on your knees servicing me for taking such good care of you.” I lost the last morsel of patience I had for this woman. “No man I know would hire an entire SWAT team to protect a fiancée who hates him.”
“No bodyguards,” she repeated stubbornly, peering between the door and me.
“You walk out that fucking door,” I warned, “and I’m sending both you and your mother back to Britain.”
With a groan of frustration, she breezed toward her bedroom, crashing her bag against my shoulder on her way there. I followed her, tapping at my side furiously.
Two, six, two.
Two, six, two.
Two, six, two.
I didn’t fucking care if she noticed anymore. She’d find out sooner or later.
“If they chop off your good parts and send them to me in the mail, I’m not going to pay ransom to retrieve you,” I needled as I stalked her to her room.
“Good!” She slammed the door in my face, shouting through the wooden barrier. “Losing a few fingers is a small price to pay to relieve myself of you.”
“You will never be relieved of me,” I said to the door.
Since when did I speak to fucking inanimate objects? I hadn’t let anyone treat me this way, not since Andrin.
This transaction was taking on a bizarre path, and I was going to put a stop to this chaos.
I tapped the side of my thigh furiously, numbers and variables swimming in my head. “I will chase you to the end of the earth and beyond. No force in the world can keep me from you. I have earned your company fairly. The sooner you accept there is no way out of this arrangement, the better.”
No answer.
She had won this round. Forcing her into walking around with security would push her over the edge, and I wanted to lure her back into the safe zone. To the place where she’d let her guard down, open her legs for me, and give me what she owed me—offspring. A family. An heir.
“They’ll kill you.” I drove my fist to the door, cracking it.
“Sounds like a plan. If I die, you’re not invited to the funeral.”
My jet was fueled and ready to take off in forty minutes for Europe, and I was standing here bickering with a woman nine years my junior, trying to convince her not to get murdered.
“I’ll be gone for less than forty hours.” I braced my elbows on either side of her door. “You’re not to move out of this fucking apartment until I’m back. I’ll be here Thursday, by three p.m. I’ll expect you to be waiting for me in a wedding gown and with a much better attitude. Is that clear?”
No answer.
I could punch this door down. Break it. Scare her even more. I could remind her that I held the key to her mother’s destiny.
I could.
But as a man accustomed to moving in the darkness, I had good instincts, and my instincts told me to stop pushing.
I turned around and stomped away.