CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Callahan
When I leave the bar an hour later with instructions to put the lady at the end of the bar’s drinks on my tab, I feel slightly more relaxed.
The sun is still out for a few hours yet since it sets later here than I’m used to, and the facts and figures that have loaded down my mind are swimming somewhere beneath the haze of beer running through my blood.
I stop in front of the villa and stare at the door. Our first night here, I was quite sure I was winning at life when I made sure the two of us were rooming together, and now it just feels like I’m standing with my dick in my hand and fucking losing.
To have her within reach and want her desperately but to not be able to have her because of some bullshit, unanswerable question.
Fuck that.
I’m Callahan Sharpe. Any woman would kill to be with me. It’s time she knows that.
I march to the door and yank it open with a purpose, dead set on getting what I want. On getting her.
“Sutton.” It’s a command. Plain and simple.
“Callahan? Is something wrong?” Sutton walks out of her bedroom, fastening an earring through her ear. “Are you okay?”
She stops mid stride when she sees me, and I’m sure the concerned look on her face is because my jaw is probably dragging on the floor.
Standing in the middle of the villa is Sutton in a bright red bikini that highlights and emphasizes every glorious goddamn inch of her. Legs and abs and tits and . . . Christ.
Staring at her, I feel like a man drowning for water, and she is the water.
I clear my throat. “Yeah. I’m fine.”
“Did you need something?”
“No—I don’t think—”
“Ooops,” she says as her earring falls to the ground. I hiss out a breath when she bends over to pick it up and gives me a full showing of the teeny, tiny bottoms that go between her perfectly round ass.
“Are you going somewhere?” I take a step forward, not hiding the fact that I’m enjoying the view.
“Yes. Out. To the beach.”
“In that?”
Sutton looks at her body and then at her ass before looking up at me with a blank stare on her face. “It is a bathing suit. You wear it to the beach. So yeah, in this.”
“You can’t wear that.” Smooth. Real smooth, Sharpe.
“Excuse me?” She laughs the words out.
“It’s too small and it shows way too much.” I walk to the fridge and grab another beer. I sound like a dick but don’t care as I fumble for a reason other than no one else deserves to see this, to see her like this, than me. “It’s not an appropriate choice of attire when staff can see you.”
“Good thing I’m going offsite to a beach on a non-Sharpe property then.” She smiles sarcastically. “You sure you need another one of those? You seem a little keyed up.”
“I need one.” Fucking hell do I need one if she’s going out in that.
“Okay.” She draws the word out and takes a few steps toward me.
Wrong move on her part.
I smell the scent of her sunscreen now. Can see the dusting of freckles over her chest. Can see how easy it would be to pull the strings on those bottoms and have her undressed in a heartbeat.
“Is there something that’s bugging you, Callahan?”
“You.”
“Me?” She chuckles, angling her head to the side and staring at me. “What did I do?”
“You’re driving me fucking crazy,” I say and take a step toward her. For some reason I expect her with her silly game to back away, but she doesn’t. She stands her ground.
“Good.”
“Not good.” I take another step. “Women don’t say no to me.
Did you know that?” I cup the side of her face.
Her breath hitches. She wants me. She so fucking wants me, and the sight of it is like a goddamn high.
“They want me. They chase me.” I lean in so my lips hover over hers. “I never chase, Collins.”
“And I’ve never had a one-night stand before.” She inhales a shaky breath. “So there. We’re even.”
My chuckle is low and even and desperate sounding.
“We’re far from even. I want you.” I lean in and go to press a kiss to her lips but she moves her head to the side.
I take what I can get and lace a row of open-mouthed kisses down the line of her jaw.
Jesus Christ. Her taste. Her soft moan. The sudden goosebumps chasing over her skin. The feel of her body yielding to mine.
She definitely wants me.
The beer has nothing on what Sutton Pierce does to me.
“And you’re still my boss,” she murmurs on a sigh.
“Collins. Please.” I lick a line over her shoulder. She tastes like salt and sex. My hands fist into balls because I’m desperate to touch and take, and I know if I start, I won’t be able to stop myself until I have every fucking inch of her.
“I can’t. We can’t. I’m not making you chase,” she murmurs. “I promise. I’m simply making you appreciate the prize.”
“Fuck me, Sutton. Right here. Right now. Take me.”
Her laugh is low and throaty as she scratches her nails down the front of my shirt, my dick jumping to attention at the sensation. “Seems someone is taking their own advice about begging.”
The knock on the door is loud, but it takes a second to seep into my subconscious and react. But by the time I do, Sutton has already jumped back a few feet and is smirking at me. “Saved by the bell.”
I step forward, put my hand against the small of her back, and yank her against me.
“I promise you nothing’s going to save you from me.
” My chuckle is smothered when I don’t give her time to react or back away and brand my lips to hers.
The kiss is angry and hungry and fueled with a desperation I’ve never felt before for someone.
It’s because I can’t have her. I know it. She knows it. Or maybe it’s because I know I can have it, but I’m too fucking fixated on her that I can’t figure out the answer.
“Sutton? You there?” There is more knocking on the front door.
“Callahan.” She presses her hands against my chest, but I steal one more kiss. “I have to get the door.”
She goes to walk away, but her hand is in mine and I hold her still. “You kissed me. You can deny that you want this, but your touch says differently.”
“I haven’t denied anything.” Her eyes flicker to my cock pressing against the seam of my pants. “The kiss. It was a minor transgression.” She smirks. “My company is waiting for me.”
She slips her hand out of mine and heads toward the front door, giving me a more than perfect view of how exactly small that itty-bitty bikini is.
Oh. Shit.
She was serious about going out like that. In that.
“Wait. Where are you going again?” I call after her.
“Look at you. Damn.”
Brady. Jesus Christ. It’s the whole fucking family in one place. Great. I groan and lean against the counter as I down the rest of my beer, needing to hide my softening hard-on.
Wait. She’s going with Brady in that bikini? Over my dead fucking body.
“Mr. Sharpe.” I look up to see Brady standing there. The man is smart, and I’m sure he is more than assessing the situation and reading into it.
“Brady. Long time no see,” I joke as he eyes me.
My first thought is to address the hunch I see fleeting through his eyes but if I do, it’ll just confirm it.
Plus, he’s in my employ so I don’t owe him any fucking explanations.
In a situation like this, nothing is better than something. “Have plans with Sutton?”
“We do. Yes.” He looks around the villa, which I’m more than certain probably looks a lot like the one he lives in as lodging is part of his compensation package.
“You know that we have much better accommodations for you than the staff quarters, right? The A/C parts are on the way for the villa you were booked in, but we can definitely put you in one of the guest suites or—”
“Thank you, but it’s not necessary. That was the plan, but I’m settled here now. Besides, it’s important to be in the same shoes as the staff so I can better understand how to improve their accommodations if need be.”
Sutton rolls her eyes over his shoulders but thankfully chimes in to try and settle the definite curiosity that Brady has. “It’s fine,” she says with a nonchalant shrug. “It’s not like I’m particularly thrilled with the idea either.”
“Jesus,” Brady barks out through a cough, his eyes wide with surprise that she just spoke of her boss that way. With me present.
Sutton looks over to me with an impish grin and a crinkle of her nose in a non-apology before looking back at Brady. “Hate to break it to you, Sharpe, but no one is supposed to like their boss.”
I struggle with a witty comeback because the things I want to say can’t exactly be stated in front of Brady without proving her point—that I can’t be discreet. My mouth is open, the words are fumbling around in my head, when she steps in and takes the reins.
“The plus side? We’re rarely here together and when we are, Callahan’s a morning person and I’m a night owl. So it works out just fine. Besides, it’s a good thing he didn’t take the Luxe Suite since it just booked last night for a five-week extended stay.”
“I heard,” Brady says, the topic and awkwardness suddenly gone. “No complaints here. I’ll have to introduce you to the guest when he arrives. He’s a regular who has business on the islands. A Wall Street money man who definitely treats us well when he stays with us.”
“Good. Great. I’d like that,” Sutton says. “Let me grab my stuff, and I’ll meet you outside.”
“Yes. Okay.” Brady shifts on his feet, uncomfortable. Clearly, he’s intimidated by me. Good. Let’s keep it that way. “I’ll just wait outside then.”
“Great.” I nod and wait for the door to shut before walking into Sutton’s room unannounced.
She startles. “Can I help you?”
“You’re not wearing that.” I point at her bikini.
“Thanks for your opinion, but I am.” She glances in the mirror. “I like how it makes my ass look, don’t you?”
Now she’s just being a tease.
And it’s working.
She takes her time wrapping a see-through sarong around her waist that does little to hide anything. “Better?”
“Hardly,” I grunt, my buzz now completely gone. “Where are you going?”
“To item number nine on my list. Dinner at Crystal Beach. It’s supposed to be a hot spot. I want to check it out and see how we can adapt something we have here to compete with it.”
I don’t care about dinner or beaches or anything.
I care that other men are going to see her in that and want her like I do.
I care about Brady getting the wrong idea and making a move on her because then I’d have to kill him.
That would only serve to make matters worse considering his untimely death would leave me without a competent manager.
“And you think it’s appropriate for your manager to see you in that?”
“It’s covering where it needs to cover. Besides, I assure you that Brady and his husband don’t care one bit about staring at my ass or my tits, but that’s not your concern,” she says as she walks past me toward the door.
“Brady’s husband?”
“Yes. Husband.” She turns around and looks at me over her shoulder. “Maybe if you stopped being an aloof asshole when you walk into the office and actually talked to your staff, you’d get a better feel for who you’re working with.”
“I don’t fraternize with employees. It makes them think of you differently and lose respect for you. Number one rule in business.”
“What a pity. You’re missing out on a lot of great people.” She purses her lips for a beat. “I guess that means you shouldn’t fraternize with me either, then.”
And with that, she sashays out of the villa, her hips swinging. I swear to God I can picture the smile on those pretty lips of hers. She knows she won this round.