Chapter 20 Blaine
Chapter twenty
Blaine
There she was.
My Sunshine came down the hall like she didn’t even recognize the world watching around her. Fuck, she was so sexy without even trying. How I’ve lasted the entire night without giving Blaine Jr. a sense of relief is beyond me.
She didn’t see me until I stepped into her path.
“Sunshine.”
She blinked like she hadn’t expected anyone to be there.
Like she wasn’t even fully in her body. Then she smiled, but not the one that melted me.
Not the one that made me forget my own damn name.
It was small, automatic, defensive, and painfully fake.
I knew her real ones. The ones that reached her eyes and undid me at the same time.
“You okay?” I asked, lowering my voice.
“I’m fine,” she answered, gazing over my shoulder. “How's it going over there?” she deflected with a small giggle that smelled a lot like bullshit from a mile away.
I quirked an eyebrow, deciding to go along for the moment.
“Well, Walt is drunk, so getting him to sign the contract was a bit unethical, but easy. Drummond, the man I’m actually here for, is MIA, and one of the investors asked if I was planning to auction you off for a merger. So, you know. Business as usual.”
Her laugh came, but it was delayed, forced, hollow. The kind that didn't quite make it out of her chest. She was fidgeting as she reached up to adjust an earring that didn’t need fixing, almost like she didn’t know where to put her hands or herself.
I stepped closer, ducking my head just enough to catch her gaze. “You sure you’re fine?”
That smile twitched again.
“I’m just tired, Mr. Porter,” she said. “Too much champagne and way too much testosterone. Gotta learn to give a girl a break.”
She leaned in, kissed my cheek like it was an afterthought, and started walking ahead of me back toward the table.
I didn’t follow right away. I just stood there a second, frowning at her back.
She didn’t sway in her flirty little seductive way.
She didn’t throw me a look over her shoulder.
Her arms were tight across her middle like she was holding herself together.
Tight and rigid, almost like she was begging to get out of here.
And when we got back to the table, I sat close. Closer than usual. Wrapped my arm around her waist again. Not just for show, but because something was off.
Something had happened.
I just didn’t know what.
She didn’t say much after that. Or for the rest of the night. Didn’t lean into me like she usually did when she was buzzed and amused. She just kept her eyes fixed on the amber swirl in her glass like it was the most interesting thing in the room.
Even when Felix finally reappeared later, smug, cracking half-assed jokes like he hadn’t just wasted the majority of the night, she didn’t look at him to work her little charm.
Not once.
Which was weird.
Maia always played the room, even when she hated it. Especially when she hated it. An alluring smile here, a polite laugh there, she could charm a fucking dead guy out of his grave if she wanted to…
But with him?
Nothing.
It's like he’d sucked the life out of her by just existing.
She didn’t even argue when I said it was time to go. Just nodded quietly. Too quiet.
Didn’t ask if I closed the deal. Didn’t tease me about getting Mr. Drunk-and-Disorderly to sign his soul away. Didn’t do anything except press herself into the corner of the car and stare out the window like she couldn’t wait for the night to be over.
Back at the hotel, she began avoiding me, hopping into the shower the second she could, getting dressed in the closet with the door shut, looking anywhere but at me when she left the room to get a glass of water.
I sat at the edge of the bed, waiting for her to return, my hair dripping down my bare chest, the shower steam still rolling off of me in waves.
It was supposed to be our victory shower, celebrating another million-dollar deal made with my baby pushed against the shower tile, all flushed and giggling.
Instead, it was just me and the fucking silence.
I ran a hand down my face, a sudden ache in my chest growing heavier by the second, but I masked it as she came back to the room, finally, my shirt comfortably swallowing her whole as her damp hair framed her face.
Beckoning her over with two fingers, I watched as she walked over, her teeth gnawing at her lip nervously. My hands found her waist as she stopped before me.
I placed a kiss on her stomach. “You’ve been quiet tonight… Everything all right?”
“Fine,” she said, just like before.
“You don’t have to tell me yet…” I began watching her face as her eyes finally met mine. “But if someone said something, touched you—”
“Nothing happened,” she cut in, too fucking fast at that.
My jaw clenched, but I kept my composure, nodding silently as she pulled away to finish getting ready for bed.
Deciding not to press any further, I let it go. For now. Because something happened to my little Sunshine, and despite her effort to avoid it and keep it a secret, I’d figure it out soon enough.
The unlucky bastard who hurt her had better pray that I never did.
It was the next morning, and by some miracle, I was up with the sunrise, which was too damn bright for how dim my own little Sunshine was feeling. She was still asleep, curled up on the other side of the bed, lost in her dreams, seeming guarded somehow even in this state of slumber.
I watched her for a minute, confused how she went from cuddled up under me to distant in a single night.
Her phone buzzed once on the nightstand, and she didn’t move.
I told myself not to look… and maybe if she hadn’t shut me out last night, if she hadn’t kissed my cheek like a stranger, if she hadn’t lied through her teeth with a smile she didn’t mean… I would have listened to the suggestion.
But I didn’t.
I reached for the phone, careful not to wake her, screen already lit up with a “low storage” warning as I silently tsked.
Her phone not having a password only made me shake my head even more. My sweet little Sunshine was too trusting.
Opening the message, I stared down at the texts that had come in only seconds ago.
Unknown
Don’t forget what you are.
One word from me, and he won’t look at you the same again.
I didn’t know how to react. I’d probably read them over a hundred times over before my blood began to boil. Messages like this didn’t belong in her phone. In her fucking world. But there they were, threatening, mocking, smug, all in one.
Who the fuck does this guy think he is?
I glanced over at her, still breathing slow and soft, face buried in the pillow like she wasn’t being threatened in her goddamn sleep, like someone wasn’t dangling her past over her head.
I took a screenshot before I could second-guess myself.
Texted it to my number, then deleted the thread and any trace of the number.
I didn’t want to invade her privacy. No. I would never do that to my sugar baby Sunshine. But my girl had secrets… secrets tied to scars I hadn’t earned the right to touch.
Not yet.
I watched silently as she stirred in her sleep. I put the phone down beside her before pulling her into my chest to melt against me. I had to fight the urge to forward all her calls and texts to me, but that would be too stalkerish… too Killian-possessive-coded. But I needed my baby to trust me.
She whined against me, her hand finding my chest as she ran it up and down. Not like I wasn’t already hard as a fucking rock, and she just had to make it harder. Figuratively and literally.
“If you’re gonna feel me up in your sleep, Sunshine,” I muttered against the crown of her head, my voice thick with heat, “at least have the decency to wake up and finish the job.”
In response, she squeezed my nipple and tugged, her eyes still closed as she snuggled closer.
I chuckled, low, dragging my palm down her back, letting her fall back asleep against me, her breath warm on my chest, her fingers still curled against my skin like she belonged there.
And she did.
She just didn’t know it yet.
Regardless of how I do it, I will earn that trust. She just needs a little push in the right direction. Just a little push to see that she’s safe with me.
That’s all.