Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Chloe
My fingers hooked onto that belt like a lifeline, the metal buckle digging into my palm, but I wouldn't let go. I was on my knees, position humiliating as hell, face practically buried against his waist.
The elevator's final lurch sent me pitching forward. My forehead slammed into his inner thigh. Hard.
A sharp intake of breath cut through the darkness.
Then about two seconds of absolute silence. Before I could process what happened, a hand clamped around my wrist. The grip was brutal. My bones let out a faint crack. He yanked my hand off his belt. No hesitation.
"Miss Bennett." Enzo's voice came from above. "Even if you're just now thinking about getting on my good side, this opening move's a bit too aggressive."
My brain needed three seconds to decode that sentence. Then heat crawled from my neck all the way to my scalp.
He thought I was coming onto him.
Of course he did. I was on my knees, hand on his waistband, face aimed at his crotch, nearly touching it. No other way to read this picture.
I wanted to drop dead right there. Save myself the three-month wait.
"I wasn't, goddammit. The elevator was shaking. I just grabbed whatever was there."
I tried to stand, but the freefall had turned my leg muscles to jelly. I just sat back down—probably looked like shit, but whatever. Screw it. My life was already in the toilet.
I shrank into the corner, arms wrapped around my knees, putting as much distance as possible between myself and this walking freezer of a boss.
In the dead elevator, pitch black, darkness had this way of making emotions fragile. Tears started falling without permission.
When I got that report this morning, I'd felt mostly numb. Shocked. I thought I was ready to say goodbye to this world. But when death came at me in a different form, my body gave the most honest response.
I didn't want to die. Why me? What did I do wrong?
"Miss Bennett?"
Enzo's voice sounded far away. I heard it, but my brain refused to process anything. I could only feel myself shaking harder, breathing getting shorter.
"Chloe."
He switched how he addressed me. I dimly registered that. But that was it.
In the darkness, a shape moved closer.
"You're shaking. You claustrophobic?"
Enzo crouched down. His arms came around me from both sides, one hand on the back of my head, the other on my back, pulling me into his chest.
My face pressed against him. Through the suit fabric, his heartbeat came through, steady and strong.
How long had it been since someone held me like this?
My body was still trembling, but that suffocating sense of death started to recede. His body temperature ran hot, like a human space heater, warmth spreading from his chest to my cheek. The darkness was still there. The fear too. But the heat reminded me—I was still alive.
"I don't want to die." My voice was shaking, tear-choked, obvious.
This probably made me look weak and pathetic—exactly the type Enzo Falcone despised most.
But Enzo didn't push me away. The hand on the back of my head shifted slightly, fingers threading into my loose hair.
"You won't die."
In the darkness, Enzo's voice came from above me, low and certain. Honestly, he had a great voice. My type. Too bad he usually used that voice to say the cruelest things.
"The elevator system automatically triggers a safety shutdown when it detects an anomaly.
Maintenance team response time is under fifteen minutes.
The elevator's stopped between the sixth and seventh floors, less than thirty meters from ground level.
Even if all safety systems failed simultaneously, the impact force at this height would be absorbed by buffer systems and wouldn't be lethal. "
Enzo's version of comfort was physics analysis. Weirdly enough, it worked.
I started calming down, but my fingers were still clutching his shirt front. I knew I should let go. But I didn't. And Enzo didn't push me away either.
His thumb on my nape started moving. Slow circles. Light, almost absent-minded. I swear, I never knew my neck was that sensitive. Every time he pressed, something shot down my spine, heading places it shouldn't.
My face was still buried in his chest. I could smell cologne mixed with body heat—base notes of cedar with a hint of tobacco. That scent was doing inappropriate things to my brain.
Enzo's other hand rested on my lower back. At first just steadying me, nothing special. But my shirt had somehow come untucked from my skirt, and his palm found that exposed strip of skin.
My abs clenched hard.
He must have felt it—because his fingers on my back curled slightly. Barely, but we were pressed too close. Every little movement amplified.
The air seemed to shift. In the darkness, heavy breathing started.
My body had gone through rage and terror in one day, and now it was sliding into a third state. One that made my face flush, my skin hypersensitive.
And Enzo—probably the same. Because his heartbeat was faster now, just a bit—if my ear wasn't pressed right over his heart, I'd never have noticed the change.
Enzo Falcone's heart rate increased.
Because of me.
That realization hit my brain and lit something that shouldn't be lit.
I should push him away.
I should retreat to the other corner of the elevator, wait properly for the repair crew to get us out of this place. I should remember who we were—me, bottom-feeder. Him, top of the pyramid. About seventeen levels and three iron gates between us.
But I didn't want to let go. Maybe fear made my heart vulnerable. I'd never craved a man's embrace this badly. And Enzo Falcone was perfect in every sense—impossible to push away.
I gathered my courage and released my grip on his shirt front. But my hand didn't leave. It traveled up instead, grazing his chest and collarbone, stopping at the button at his collar.
His Adam's apple rolled just half an inch from my fingertips.
In the darkness, only our breathing. Whether to stop became my dilemma.
Screw it. What was I afraid of? How much time did I have left? Do what you want, Chloe.
Twenty-five years old. Never been kissed by a man. Never been loved. What happened when I was thirteen left me with nothing but fear and disgust toward intimacy. But right now, trapped in this pitch-black iron box that could drop any second, death hanging over me, I had one thought.
If I was going to die, at least let me know what it felt like to sleep with a hot guy.
"Want to have some fun?" I forced the words out.
Couldn't see anything in the darkness, but I swear I felt this man watching me. That gaze pressed on my skin, raising every hair on my body.
The silence lasted five seconds. Or ten? Long enough for me to rehearse my apology from start to finish.
I was oxygen-deprived earlier. Not thinking straight. Or maybe just fake passing out—fainting in a pitch-black elevator was foolproof.
Just as I was about to collapse backward, a hand grabbed my chin in the darkness. Enzo tilted my face up toward him. I couldn't see his eyes, but I felt his breath on my lips, close enough that half an inch forward would be a kiss.
"You serious?" he asked, voice rough as gravel.
My heart was about to jump out of my throat. I nodded, then realized he couldn't see.
"Yes." The word fell out.
I fumbled to raise both hands, trembling but certain, climbing onto his shoulders, around his neck. The back of his neck had a thin layer of sweat. His skin burned hot.
Enzo's hand moved from my chin to my nape, gripping. His other hand locked around my waist, pulling me toward him.
When our lips touched, I shook.
The kiss was predatory. His lips dry and scorching, teeth catching my lower lip, tongue pushing in—I made a sound I didn't expect from myself.
The darkness became a strange blessing. Couldn't see each other, just touch and gasping—more intense, honestly.
His fingers traced fire down my nape, skimmed my collarbone, flicked open my shirt buttons, finally slipping without hesitation under my skirt hem.
We tumbled onto the floor in the darkness.
His other hand, gripping my lower back, forcefully pulled me onto his lap.
My knees were forced apart on either side of his body, skirt bunched up.
When he bit my earlobe, half of me went limp. At the same time, his fingers finally reached their destination, through thin fabric, finding my core.
I arched hard, back of my head hitting the elevator wall, but I felt no pain. Every sensation concentrated below—his fingers suddenly faster, hitting exactly where it killed. I clung to his shoulders, nails probably digging in, but he didn't make a sound.
I only heard myself moaning in a voice I didn't recognize.
My brain had completely stopped thinking. I surrendered myself to the darkness, to this extremely dangerous man, to desires I'd never allowed in my life.
Then the elevator moved.
Light flooded in without warning. My eyes slammed shut from the brightness. When I opened them again, the world was harsh and clear.
I saw him.
Enzo Falcone sat on the elevator floor, suit jacket wrinkled, shirt pulled out of his pants, tie crooked. Hair no longer immaculate—a few strands falling over his forehead. His lips slightly swollen. And I was sitting on him, skirt pushed to my waist, two shirt buttons undone, hair a complete mess.
The elevator started slowly rising. The mechanical hum returned. Lights steady, ventilation system back online. Everything normal again.
This metal box turned back into an ordinary elevator, not the sealed dark room that made two people lose their minds two minutes ago.
I used the moment to come to my senses, fix my clothes, stand up, act like nothing happened. But looking at his face, I couldn't suppress the feeling.
Really wish this damn elevator could've stayed broken a little longer.
Before I could swallow that thought, Enzo grabbed my wrist. The force yanked me back hard, my whole body slamming into his chest. He tightened his arm around my waist, other hand flying to the panel, hitting some button. I didn't see which one.
Then he lowered his head, lips against my ear.
"The fun," he said quietly, seductively, "isn't finished yet."
Before I could react, Enzo ripped his suit jacket off himself and draped it over my shoulders. The jacket was huge, hanging on me like an expensive blanket, hem past my thighs. Then he bent down, arm hooking under my knees, lifting me completely.
The elevator stopped at the top floor. The doors opened. Instinctively, I tried to escape. But his arm was an iron band, giving me no room to retreat.
Outside stood three people. Enzo's executive secretary Katherine and two maintenance workers with toolboxes. Their faces went from anxious to shocked to uniformly frozen in petrified bewilderment.
The workers' eyeballs bounced twice between Enzo's open collar and me wrapped in his jacket. The secretary had slightly better control, but her right eyelid visibly twitched.
"Katherine, postpone the meeting."
Enzo's voice returned to flat, as if the person gasping against my neck in the darkness five minutes ago wasn't him.
No one asked a single question. The secretary turned at lightning speed. The two maintenance workers practically backed away. The hallway cleared in three seconds.
Enzo carried me in long strides toward the office at the end of the hall. Heavy double wooden doors—he barged through with his shoulder, then kicked them shut with his heel.
My vision spun. I was slammed down hard onto that massive executive desk. The surface was cold solid wood, temperature seeping through my skirt. I couldn't help shivering.
I opened my mouth to say something, but Enzo's large, burning body was already pressing down. His hand started at the inside of my knee, pushing up. My skirt bunched at my waist again, exposing my soaked underwear. His lips landed on my collarbone, sucking hard.
"Mm..." I gasped, fingers tangling wildly in his black hair. Those gel-fixed black strands came loose in my hands, surprisingly soft.
His fingers hooked the edge of my underwear, slipping inside along the seam, rubbing. My abdomen clenched instantly, nails digging into his shoulder.
The New York skyline spread beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows. Sunset bathed the entire office in amber light. And in that amber light, the CEO of Falcone Jewels was using his teeth to undo my shirt buttons.
This was probably the craziest thing in the last three months of my life.