Prologue #3
“And so you see, dancing with a pretty woman comes natural to me after all these years.”
“Of course.”
That’s when Tomás asked to cut in, and then I was back in my date’s arms. “Shall we say our goodbyes soon so we can leave together?”
Callahan had the audacity to raise an eyebrow and give me a shake of his head like he disapproved of me dancing with Tomás some more. Then, he smirked, and his hand slid lower on the blonde he had in position for his waltz.
My eyes trailed exactly where he touched her, and I felt the heat of that touch like it was my back instead of hers. I bit my lip and tried my best not to indulge in the idea of him anymore.
“I can tell you want to leave too.” Tomás chuckled as he brushed a finger over the blush on my cheeks.
Ugh, I wasn’t blushing for this asshole.
“Ready to show me you can be just the girlfriend I want you to be? Because I’m ready to get you alone.”
The song ended, and I stepped away from him immediately. “Actually, I think I have a few more dances in me, but I need to use the restroom first. If you’ll excuse me …” I rushed away, my hand gripping the side of my dress as I hurried down the hall.
I only got around the corner before I heard Callahan’s voice. “For the love of God, tell me you’re not leaving with him.”
“If I said I was?”
“I’d tell you to let me take you home instead.” He stepped into my space, and I felt pulled to him—so much so that I held my breath.
“For what?”
“For whatever you want. Unlike your date, I’m fine with submitting to a woman, Jasmina.
Promise the night will be better spent with me than him.
” I could smell the hint of expensive bourbon on his lips because he was so close, and I had to look up at him even while I stood there in heels.
Our height difference was even more obvious now.
He had to be at least six five and I was only five.
“Why do you care?”
“Because you’re holding onto the persona your family built for you in the same way I am. I’m intrigued by it,” he murmured, his voice dropping to a gravelly low. “Yet, you’re a bit mean under all that duty you carry on your shoulders, Jasmina. And I think I might like mean.”
“Or you just want to screw around with the enemy’s niece.”
“Don’t be mistaken. I abso-fucking-lutely want to screw you.” He shrugged, a slow, wicked smirk tugging at his lips. “But maybe you want to screw around with your uncle’s enemy, too. What’s one night, Viper, when you have your whole life to live for them?”
One night. To be Jasmina. Not the asset, not the niece, not the weapon. It sounded almost innocent. Almost.
“Jasmina?” Tomás’s voice echoed down the hall: whiny, high, and almost condescending.
My face curdled in visceral disgust. I looked at Callahan—at the dark promise in his eyes and the hand he held out to me. “You better make it the best night of my life.”
The smile that spread across his face was catastrophic. He grabbed my hand, his grip firm and hot, and before I could change my mind, he yanked me around a corner and swiped his watch over a mounted sensor that opened a door. “Where are we going?”
“Only place worth it in this whole damn building.” He pulled me down a hall and then hit a button for a service elevator.
Once he’d tugged me into it, I felt it prudent to clarify. “Look, Knight, I want to be clear—”
“Callahan,” he corrected.
“Callahan,” I breathed, and he smiled as his hands went to my face.
“That’s it. I like my full name on your lips.”
“Wait.” I put my hands on his massive, broad chest. “You can’t tell a soul.”
He rolled his eyes like I was being silly, but when I lifted a brow and nudged him a little, he said, “Fine. That it?”
“I gue—”
I didn’t get to finish the sentence.
He threaded his fingers through my hair fast, gripped the strands, and held me there while he tasted my lips roughly. Without apology. Without reservation. And without any other motive than feeding our desires.
We weren’t meant to want one another. This was bad for each of our families and businesses.
Feeding a purely selfish want was intoxicating. It was something I didn’t do. It was something I shouldn’t do.
As the elevator doors pinged, I yanked myself away from him in case there was someone on the other side and wiped at my mouth. “Security cameras will show us together. We should be more discreet.”
“I’ll have them wiped if you want, Viper,” he said, sounding almost disappointed that I was thinking about it.
Then, I turned toward where the elevator doors opened to a rooftop conservatory—a sprawling glass building filled with exotic midnight blooms and the cold, salt-cracked air of the East Coast. Below us, the city was a grid of lights; above us, the stars twinkled brightly.
“Ready to give me that dance?” he asked, pulling me into the center of the glass structure. “Or do I have to invite you somewhere even more private?”
“You could invite me, but it doesn’t mean I’d accept.”
“What if I told you I’m only here on the East Coast for one night?”
“Don’t live here?”
“I live everywhere. Here when I’m needed. The West Coast if someone needs me there. Back in Paradise Grove in a house I barely use when my family needs me there too.”
“Do what you need to for the family and business, huh?”
“Not if you say you’ll spend the night with me.”
“So you think I’m an easy one-night stand?”
He tilted his head and looked me up and down. The dress I’d worn tonight was actually quite conservative. I’d picked a soft blue A-line because it was easy to move in and didn’t draw much attention. “You’re much too pretty and forbidden to be easy, Jasmina.”
I hummed and walked toward edge of the roof, and he followed until we were looking down at the cars and people below. I moved my brunette hair to one side of my neck as I contemplated the life I was living. “I think I’m easy with some things.” I shrugged. “I’ve been easily molded by my family.”
His hand danced along my shoulder before I felt his lips there, and then I turned to meet his eyes as I let him kiss me again.
He backed me against the cold glass, his body a wall of heat pinning me in place. I let out a broken moan, my fingers tangling in his dark hair, pulling him closer until there wasn’t a breath of air between us.
I pulled back just an inch, my lips swollen, my head spinning. “I concede,” I whispered, my voice wrecked. “I’m an easy one-night stand.”
“Bull.” He pressed his forehead against mine, his breath ragged. “I have a feeling you’re going to be the most difficult obsession of my life.”
I bit my bottom lip, staring into the blue abyss of his eyes. “Should we stop?”
“Do you want to?” he growled, his hand sliding down to the small of my back, pulling my hips flush against his. Jesus, he was big. And I wanted all of him.
I shook my head slowly.
“Yeah, the whole East Coast coming for me couldn’t stop me now, Jas.”
He dropped between my legs and lifted the soft fabric of my skirt. I held onto his hair like my life depended on it while his lips danced over my thighs and his tongue dragged against the blade that was strapped there.
Fuck.
Mentally, I scrambled to maintain a semblance of control and not orgasm right then and there, but Callahan pushed my panties to the side and, as his tongue slid over my center, I knew I was going to lose it.
He owned me right then.
No one else.
His tongue fucked me, his hands held my thighs open, and his growl against me pushed me over the edge. I toppled down into an obsession for him that would change my makeup.
“Damn, you’re pretty when you scream for me.” He smirked up at me, his cobalt eyes twinkling with satisfaction. “Let’s get you to scream one more time.”
He tried to lower his head, but I yanked his hair. “Don’t you dare. We need to leave.”
“Greedy for all of me, then?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Don’t get cocky. Do you have a place?” God, I sounded desperate. “Somewhere private, and a way of getting there that no one would see—”
“I’ll take you anywhere you want to go, Jasmina. Anywhere.”
Callahan
JASMINA RUIZ STOOD THERE in her pretty blue dress and licked her lips before standing tall and cracking her neck like she needed to prepare herself for a night with me.
It was a movement I cataloged because she looked like a divine being sent from the heavens.
Or a demon who’d climbed up from the pits of hell.
I’d decide which one once I was deep enough inside her to stop breathing.
“Call someone to come get us.”
I pushed a few buttons on my watch. “Done.”
“And how should we get out of here?”
I smiled because, damn, she was as bored as I was. She wanted a thrill as much as I did. I could see it in her eyes.
I’d been bored to the point of violence all night until I saw her.
She was a viper in soft fabric, getting handled by that pathetic excuse for a man.
Now, I couldn’t look away even if she was forbidden and a lethal line I shouldn’t cross.
My brother would have a fucking aneurysm if he saw this, but one night off when normally I was fully on wouldn’t kill us.
I yanked her back into the elevator but only took her to the third floor—I always knew the layout of a building before we were in it. We walked through a few hallways, and I saw what I was looking for: a side entrance that led to the metal staircase outside.
Was I going to run down a rusted, skeletal fire escape in a dark New York alley for a girl?
Yeah, I was. And I didn’t give a single flying fuck.
“You good?” I asked her before we stepped onto it. She rolled her eyes, shoving me forward. She didn’t hesitate to follow me either. But once we were halfway down, we perched on the square iron platform, suspended in the dark between the brick walls with the wet pavement below us.
She wrung her small, manicured hands together, the diamonds on her fingers catching the dim amber glow of a distant streetlamp.
I wanted to break that tension. I reached out, winding a stray brunette curl around my finger. “Nervous?” I murmured.