Chapter 28
FITZ
“You did not have to take us back, honestly,” April says again.
“You’re such a sweetheart.” Knox’s mother gives a braying laugh, practically half in my lap.
“Well, Knox is supposed to go to a team meeting, so it’s sort of my fault he can’t escort you himself.” I’ve got my bland-but-friendly billionaire persona on.
Most men might feel conflicted about presenting two faces to the world.
I relish in it.
“Oh, you don’t have to help with the bags.”
“Isn’t he such a gentleman?” The women coo over me when the limo arrives at Winnie’s house.
All except for Winnie, who clutches her bag of seafood and is giving me a look of suspicion with maybe a twinge of desire.
Knox’s girlfriend, who looks like she’s sixteen or something, gives me a starry-eyed smile when I set the bags into the foyer.
And they say that I’m the one like my father?
My opinion of Knox has gone way down. I might need to move him to a different team just on principle. Despite what Crawford thinks, there are lines I won’t cross.
Unless it’s Winnie. She’s not a line. She’s a full-grown adult woman. She’s nothing like Knox’s girlfriend or any of the young women my father would go after.
He’d hate Winnie.
Fidget barks at Knox’s mother when she sweeps into Winnie’s house.
“You know,” I whisper to Winnie, “we could sneak off. Nice hotel. Hot bath. Big soft bed. I can see you’re tempted.” I nod to the chaos of her houseguests.
“Is this why you offered to drive us home?”
“You’re a businesswoman. It’s a good deal. Free place to stay. Breakfast in bed. I’ll suck on your toes.” I snort as she elbows me.
“Winnie, show Shelby to her room,” April orders.
I dutifully carry the suitcases up the stairs after the women.
Knox’s mother makes a big show of sweeping a finger on a dresser and rubbing it against another finger. It’s clean. I know it is. I made sure to have cleaners come into her house right after I whisked her parents away.
Even Fidget is freshly groomed.
Winnie cups one of the dahlias in the massive bouquet on the dresser, delicately, like she’d cup the face of a lover.
Insane jealousy floods through me.
Winnie’s fallen for him.
The stalker.
Me.
I see it in her eyes as she carefully adjusts the vase on the dresser and palms the note the stalker wrote her. That I wrote her.
Well. And here I was feeling mildly guilty about the kiss.
“Shall I take the stolen shellfish to the fridge? Can’t imagine it’s going to keep in your purse much longer.” There’s some bite in my words.
She guiltily twists the note—my note—in her hands and nods.
“Are there heated floors in this bathroom?” Shelby demands.
“Like there were heated floors in the trailer where you raised your children,” Frances hollers.
“Now, where is Brinley sleeping?” Shelby says, mouth screwed up like she tastes something sour.
“I didn’t realize we were double hosting.” Winnie seethes.
“You and Kathy can share,” her mom says, bustling out of the room.
Winnie’s eyes widen in horror. “I hate room sharing. I had to do that all through my childhood, and there’s no way I’m sharing my room now.”
“I’ll let you have your own room. Your own suite. Bathroom, clawfoot tub, view out over the harbor.” I hum.
I have to really keep myself on a tight leash not to grab her hand, force her to show me the note, and demand to know who it was from and if she is in love with him. Really make a scene then spill the beans and watch her throw herself at me.
“Winnie, I raised you better than that,” April hisses.
“You’re bringing people uninvited into my house. People I don’t even like.”
Knox’s mother sniffs one of the towels.
“These are L’Atelier du Lin towels,” I inform her. “Imported from Paris.”
“Oh, they are?” Winnie asks, confused. “How did you—” She gives me a suspicious look. If she hadn’t had a champagne IV in the limo, she might have figured it out.
Impulse purchase? Maybe. But Winnie needed those towels.
“Where to with these crab cakes, Creampuff?” Like I don’t know where her fridge is.
Knox’s mother slams the doors to Winnie’s bedroom after us.
Winnie’s shoulders drop.
I really need Winnie to come home with me. It’s one thing to surprise her downstairs, but with the house this full, it’s going to be a little more difficult to have a repeat of last night.
Fuck, her pussy felt so good.
Her ass…
I unclench my fist.
“You know,” the doe-eyed teen is saying to Winnie’s sister, Kathy, “I really hope that we can be friends. We’re both mothers to Knox’s children.”
“I don’t have children with him,” Kathy forces out through her teeth.
“No babies?” She makes a disappointed face. “So sad.”
Jesus. Girls are vicious. I’d take Crawford sucker punching me in the face any day.
Kathy looks crushed.
Winnie looks furious.
“I might just have to kidnap you and throw you in the car,” I warn her. “I can’t have my girlfriend be a murderer, and you look positively premeditative right now.”
“Mark and I are in one of the guest rooms,” April tells Brinley. “Winnie is sleeping in the study with Kathy,” she assures her younger daughter. “And Brinley, you can have Fidget’s room. Frances, you’re sleeping in the laundry room.”
“Now, wait a doggone minute. I was here first.” Her grandmother races after Winnie’s mom.
I use the distraction to catch Winnie for a kiss, marvel at the way she yields for me. “Come with me,” I whisper against her mouth. “Or you don’t do sex until the third date—is that it?” I ask innocently. Like I don’t know that she spread her legs for a guy she’s never even talked to before.
“Um, yeah,” she says breathlessly. “Something like that.”
Liar.
I want to shake her, make her come undone.
“I’ll see you around, Creampuff. Call me if you fantasize about murdering anyone in their sleep.”
I leave, circle the block, and wait up on the hilltop until the lights go off in the house.
I don’t intend to see her around. Between the kiss and still remembering how greedily her pussy yielded to my cock, I’m not just walking away from her.
I pull the mask on and walk up softly to the back door.
Fidget is in the kitchen. The fridge is open. She’s doing a better job than my six-year-old half brothers at making a sandwich.
“You didn’t see me, and I didn’t see you,” I whisper to the dog as she carefully, with her teeth, opens up the bread box and selects a slice. “Where’s Winnie?” I ask the dog.
She just wags her tail at me.
Okay, border collies are smart—maybe not that smart.
Fair enough.
Winnie’s not in the living room. Kathy’s sprawled out on the sofa.
She’s not upstairs either. Her grandmother is in her office, snoring with her head on a pillow on the floor.
When I come back down, Fidget is at the table, eating her sandwich with dainty snaps. She wags her tail at me then extends her neck.
I look in the direction her nose is pointing: the laundry room.
“Fine, my apologies.” I give her a little bow then put away some of the condiments that didn’t quite make it back into the fridge.
Winnie is in the laundry room down the hallway off the kitchen. The dryer is running, and the room is warm. She’s got half a glass of wine next to her hand that’s flopped off the side of the air mattress.
Next time I see her, I’m going to fuck her awake.
This time?
I kneel down, slide my hands in their gloves up the soft skin of her legs, up her curvy thighs to the dimples where the thighs meet her hips. She lets out a breath as I push the T-shirt fabric up to see the curve of her belly.
Her legs fall open. I can smell her pussy through the fabric of the panties.
It’s intoxicating.
And it’s all mine.
I don’t even pull the panties down, just mouth her through the thin fabric, taste her through the mask. Roll in the scent of her desire.
She stirs, half awake.
Her hands fumble around my shoulder.
“Wait—unnn.”
My breath is hot and erratic through the mask, through the thin wet fabric of her panties as I mouth her.
“God, that—that’s—guys don’t do that,” she mumbles above me, her hands patting at the mask.
I nose the panties to the side.
Rub the seam of the mask against her clit—
That wakes her up.
I barely slap my hand over her mouth before she screams.
She bucks under me.
Hand over her mouth, I squeeze her breast, letting her feel the edges of the glove catch on the nipple I crave to have in my mouth. Her hips roll when I stroke her through the panties.
Yeah, you like that, don’t you?
She says something muffled against the glove. Carefully, I move my hand. “Stop, stop.” I hook two fingers on the band of the panties. “You’re going to make me come.”
I snort a breath then drag the panties down her thighs. She whimpers, her face twisting in pleasure when the rough seams of the mask rub in all the secret places of her pussy that she doesn’t touch when she’s just stroking herself in bed.
I want to give her my tongue, want to taste her.
I’m afraid if I take the mask off, I won’t be able to control myself.
Won’t be able to tell her how I’m going to ruin her pussy, make her mine, how I want her to be my little porn star, my little slut.
Lock her up in a birdcage, make her masturbate with her legs open for me on command.
Fuck, I’m hard.
I palm myself then force my hand back to her thigh.
Let her ride on the mask, get her pussy juices all over it.
I want to flip her over, finish her on my cock like we did last night.
I didn’t bring a condom, though.
Dumbass.
She clutches at my head, pushing me between the hot wet slit of her pussy. Riding my face until she’s coming against me.
I pull the corner of the mask up. Just enough to allow myself one lick along her slit.
She tastes better than any pastry she’s ever made.
She shudders under the touch of my tongue.
Her fingers stroke her own pussy.
“Fuck me,” she begs. “I need you. I need this. You don’t—you don’t understand.” She’s breathing hard, sprawled out, her shirt pushed up around her breasts. Her panties hang off one ankle.
With her legs spread like that, knees splayed, she looks ready to be fucked.
I’m hard in my pants.
I shift over her then see it.
A note.
It’s not my note.
Saw you touching yourself thinking about him. Just know, dead girls don’t come.
Who the fuck is sending my girlfriend notes?
“What are you—” she slurs. “Where are you going?” She sits up, looking like a fucking sex slave there on the mattress. “Who are you?”
Has she seen it yet?
I don’t know. I don’t think so.
Do I leave it for her? Take it?
I don’t want her to see that.
She shouldn’t have to.
She’s blinking up at me.
“What—” Her eyes focus on the note. “Give me that.”
Her hand darts out.
I scuttle back.
I’m sober; she’s drunk on alcohol and sex.
I promptly trip over the dog in the doorway.
The note flutters, and Fidget snaps it in her mouth.
And walks backward to put herself between me and Winnie.
Dammit.
I need to get the hell out of here.