15. Christian
FIFTEEN
CHRISTIAN
“We should rehearse.”
Adelaide was quiet when I came out of the bathroom without my jacket, she was quiet when we got down to the lobby, and she was still quiet once we got in the limo.
The venue was an old estate and forty minutes outside of the city. I had it booked for over a month and really fucking hoped it would land on this day.
Thank fuck it did.
Her eyes fixed outside the window where the sun simply hid behind the clouds, preparing itself for long hours of the night.
“Rehearse what?”
Her dress tightened around her thighs when she turned her head. When she opened the door, I’d been speechless and stared at her like a fucking idiot. My reaction was so fucking bad that Yunus threw up on me. Adelaide’s always been beautiful, but when she stood before me— fuck , glowing with a subtle hint of ease on her face, it knocked hardened thumb out of my chest.
What’s worse was that the dress is perfect for her. Delicate hand-embroidered dark blue flowers outlined the back of it. If I hadn’t known Alida Soani’s husband, I would have never been able to give her this dress. All I knew was I wanted it to reflect her eyes and the ring on her finger.
Which I should probably take back from her.
“How to seduce Harry.” All thick and throaty, I fucking hated that she had to seduce the bastard. But men like Harry would always be bad men. They admired women for their bodies and hated them for their minds. To him, Adelaide was a bimbo. If she used that to her advantage, he’d fall into it. “Show me how you’d act if you were into him.”
She shuffled again, exposing a snippet of her outrageous heels and ankles. Why the fuck were her ankles turning me on?
“And what if I am into him?”
No, the fuck you’re not.
Irrational and vehement jealousy burned through me. “Are you?”
She looked out through my window, completely nonchalant, oblivious to my eerie hostility. “He’s an attractive man.”
“Then seducing him should be easy,” I gritted.
“It will,” she shrugged.
“Then it shouldn’t be a problem practicing on me.”
She glanced at me, bored. “Seriously Christian?”
Fuck . There was a fucking problem when she didn’t say my name and it was a whole new fucking issue when she did.
Replicating her, I raised an uncomical brow. “I’m serious.”
“ Fine .”
Sparks ignited between us when she moved over to the middle seat and her left thigh brushed mine. Adelaide leaned in close enough that her breasts subtly pressed up against my arm. All full and voluptuous . Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to put her in this dress? Oh right, me. For fucks sake.
She cleared her throat, forcing me to look down into her amusement.
Every other colour was colourless compared to her warm blues.
A quick press of the privacy button—giving us the needed alone time—Adelaide’s shoulders slumped the second the partition clicked in place.
“Step one,” I cleared my throat. “You approach him.”
“That was a given,” she muttered.
“Step two,” my eyes narrowed into slits. “Your gaze.”
“The eyes?” She raised a bratty brow. “Seriously?”
She crossed her arms over her chest.
Fucking hell, someone save me.
I shifted in my seat.
“It turns a man on when you flirt with subtle glances and longer looks.”
“You apparently know a lot.”
A dark chuckle. “ Experience , sweet Adelaide.”
The mood turned humid and unbearable to touch.
“It’s a good thing I have more than a handful of experience too, sweet Christian. I don’t need your expertise to tell me how to seduce a man when I can clearly see the outline of your hard dick.”
One second Adelaide was next to me and the next she shifted back to her seat. What the fuck just happened?
My biceps strained against the material of the shirt.
Pictures of her and another man were clear as fucking day in my head. Her writhing beneath another man, moaning , fucking whimpering like she was about to reach the edge. I may not know her now, but I knew her body better than any fucking douche. She’d pretend she was on the precipice of letting go, her soft body arching off the bed with deliberate control, one eye barely shut just so she’d make sure the asshole was lost in his own fucking pleasure instead of hers—her stupid people pleasing trait—then she’d slowly fall back down, back hitting the bed, mouth wide opened—not from satisfaction, but from fucking exhaustion, and he’d lay next to her, wrap his arms around her?—
My hand tightened around the car handle like an imposturous snake. “Then you’d also know, sweet Adelaide, what I observed about you?”
Her lips parted, chest heaving as the seconds—which felt like a goddamn eternity—passed.
Her lips glistened after a torturous lick.
I wanted to lick her lips. Suck them. Use them. Deprave them. Fuck them.
With a slight tilt to her head, she looked through her lashes. Her pupils swallowed every hint of blue. “What?”
Adelaide audibly gasped when I pulled her towards me.
She was half sprawled on the space between us, looking up at me fucking dazed and shocked.
I brought my hand up to cup her cheek. Soft and fucking addicting. “ Adelaide .”
She closed her eyes.
Pouty lips teased me with its presence. Swallowing hard, I dipped my head to take them, to taste her, to feel her very soul swallow mine.
“I may be hard as fuck right now, but if I lifted your dress, right here right now, I bet I’d find your pussy dripping.” My lips brushed hers in a tantalizing manner.
When she opened her eyes, they reflected the very need pulsating towards my dick right now.
Time stalled and taunted one of us to make a move.
“We shouldn’t do this,” she whispered.
My hand dropped to the leather seat, her warmth still present in my touch. “You’re right.”
“This is business.”
“Just business,” I confirmed.
“You mean nothing to me,” she said without hesitation.
There was a lump in my throat. “Back at you.”
“So, let’s not complicate this, Christian.” She moved back.
I didn’t like that. Not one fucking bit. “I can smell you dripping from here.”
“ Stop it ,” she hissed. “We didn’t break up seven years ago to come back to this.”
A dark chuckle. Someone entirely not me gravitated out of my chest, embarking the air with its idiocy.
“Maybe this was the reason I broke up with you. Maybe I wanted to wait until you grew into that sexy body of yours, so I’d enjoy myself better.”
“Just when I think we could maybe be friends,” she sighed. “You go and ruin it by opening your mouth.”
“We can’t be friends, Adelaide.” I ran a hand through my hair, not giving a fuck that I was ruining it. “Because I don’t fuck my friends.”
“You’ll never…” She paused, a natural blush accentuating the faux blush on her cheeks. “That won’t happen, ever .”
“What if it does?”
She shifted uncomfortably.
“I could make you feel so good, Adelaide. It wouldn’t have to mean anything.”
She shook her head, “No.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want you, Christian.”
“Your body?—”
“Just stop, okay?” She huffed, “Maybe I’m turned on, but it’s only because it’s physiological. My body’s reaction isn’t my reaction from you, it’s towards your… species.” She was breathless by the end of her little rant, shaking almost.
My jaw clenched.
Biting the remark on my tongue, I turned away. “Don’t be dramatic. I get it.”
No matter what she did, my boner wasn’t going down and we still had—a good twenty minutes— a long fucking ride.
Neither of us said another word, but something shifted.
Peeking at her from the corner of my eye, Adelaide fidgeted with her fingers—breathing in and out at a rapid pace. A rosy hue marked her pale skin, and it took every bit of fucking control to remain put. Species , huh ?
For the remainder of the ride, I repeated the plan in my head as a prayer for help and just when my boner would soften— the image of Adelaide’s breasts, uneven breaths, and unfiltered want flashed —and the process of sanity repeated itself.
Suffice to say, it was entirely unsuccessful.