Chapter 11
NOLAN
After barricading myself in my office, I prepared to endure an endless day of meetings. I’d canceled the morning’s ski session with Val—because I was busy, not because I was avoiding her or because of my…issue with ski lifts. When my first meeting ended, my father called me on a private line.
“Nolan,” Cyrus said in greeting. On the video chat, he brushed a hand over his perfectly styled salt-and-pepper hair. “Been seeing a lot of you in work meetings recently. Are you not taking your grandfather’s assignment seriously?”
I clutched my computer mouse in a fist, hoping it didn’t explode, and ignored his taunt. “I can’t disappear from all meetings and then show up in six months with a radical proposal and expect the board to back me on it. Especially if word gets out that I’m out here playing in the snow with Val.”
“Arthur will be very interested to hear you’re not holding up your end of the bargain.”
“Yet another bargain you’ve forced me into.”
He glowered at my jab about my arranged marriage.
I’d had an inkling that he’d been the one to put this ridiculous idea of exiling me to Hale’s Peak into Arthur’s head, and it looked like I was right.
Cyrus wanted me sequestered where I couldn’t interfere with whatever competing offers he was fielding from prospective buyers.
“I’ll be keeping a close watch on you, Nolan. ”
Without another word, he ended the call.
I rubbed my face with a sigh. Regular Cyrus check-ins. Another fucking problem to add to my list.
A few days had passed since I’d spoken to Phil, and he needed at least a week before he could get me anything. Things weren’t moving fast enough. I had no leads on who had sent the letters, and now the only other lead I did have, I had to wait around for it to come through.
The truth was, if I cared to admit it to myself, I had thrown myself into work to avoid thoughts of Val.
Of what her mere presence did to me. Of that fucking kiss.
When that fire of rebellion had flared in her eyes as she told me off, it lit up every instinct to claim her.
And when she doubled down? I’d plunged over the edge, dragging her with me.
The feel of her tongue against mine, of how responsive she’d been—I had been so close to letting her hands continue their exploration, consequences be damned.
My phone pinged with a message, interrupting my thoughts. It was from Val. Cooking lesson at The Gilded Fern tonight at 6! See you then :)
We hadn’t spoken much since the kiss and I didn’t know how she felt about it.
But a smiley face had to be a good thing, right?
Or was she just giving me the accommodating facade she showed to everyone else?
Jesus, I thought, catching myself. Now I was mooning over a text like a sappy idiot?
Get ahold of yourself, Keller. After firing off a quick reply, I shoved the offending brick into my pocket.
My attraction to Val was a risk I didn’t need.
If she talked to the press about our kiss, or to anyone, for that matter, it would destroy the alliance between the Kellers and the Sharpes and result in a hell of a media shitstorm.
This engagement was Cressida’s only protection from her vindictive parents, and I would not abandon her.
And if the engagement fell apart, so would my career.
It would be the end of my dream to make this company into something my mother could be proud of.
Kissing Val had been brash, and it couldn’t happen again.
But fuck, I wanted it to.
Fulfilling the bare minimum of my grandfather’s request was the only way I was going to make it through this winter without tearing Val’s clothes off.
If she kept prancing around with Snowboarder Dude in front of me, though, it was going to make things a lot more difficult.
I couldn’t even stand watching Vipul’s hands on her, and his touch hadn’t been sexual.
Clenching my teeth, I dialed in for my next call. I had to refocus on what was important: get the board to approve the sale and show my father that I was the better businessman—and the better man.
A few hours later, I returned home, done with work for the day. I hung up my jacket and went into the kitchen for a glass of scotch. Hugh had sent over a bottle for me—he was quickly winnowing his way into my good graces.
I had two hours before I needed to meet Val for our cooking lesson.
Apparently it was a highly coveted class with Chef Rocco Gaccione, a Michelin-starred celebrity chef and, somehow, a personal friend of Val’s.
Hale’s Peak didn’t have the budget to keep a chef like that on staff, but he owed her a favor.
My main concern, though, was figuring out how to get through the evening without cornering Val in the pantry and finishing what we started in my office.
I slung the scotch down my throat, then slammed the glass on the counter just as Cressida padded barefoot into the kitchen, clad in a fluffy white robe. “Bad day at the office?” she asked, sliding into one of the barstools tucked under the center island.
“I’m meeting Val soon.” I pressed my palms atop the counter as if I could stop the world from turning by sheer force of will.
“Ah. I thought that might be the problem,” she said, leaning forward to pour herself a tot of scotch into my cup.
As she did, her robe drifted away from her body and I caught a peek of what she wore underneath.
Lust flooded through me, but not lust for Cressida.
No, I wanted to see Val in that strappy black thing, wanted to hear the sounds she’d make as I tasted her skin and played with her.
I reached out, running a finger along Cressida’s collarbone—then stopped.
I couldn’t.
Sure, drowning our sorrows in sex was kind of our thing, but something about doing it this time felt…different. Wrong.
Sensing my hesitation, Cressida’s eyes met mine, sure and steady. But her normally perfect eye makeup was smeared as if she’d been crying, and a fierce protective streak raced through me.
“Raife?” I asked. Maybe after a decade of silence, he’d slithered out of the woodwork to cause her more pain. My fists tightened at the thought.
After a shaky inhale, she said, “I need this too, Nolan. So shut up and fuck me.”
Ever since letting loose on Val, my inhibitions were fried, so I released my careful control and allowed my hunger to take over, aiming it in the only direction that was safe. The only direction I could aim it.
In two steps, I was in front of Cressida, pulling her into me and yanking off her robe.
A bodysuit hugged every curve of her body, the thin black straps cupping her supple breasts, her nipples peaked and ready for my mouth.
The strings looped around her hips ending in a tiny thong, baring her whole ass to me.
What I wouldn’t give to see Val like this.
A growl rumbled low in my throat as I asked, “What is this?” I slid a hand under the waistband and snapped it against her skin.
“I thought you could use a distraction,” she said, breaths away from my lips. “And I wanted to feel sexy instead of twelve kinds of fucked up.”
“You’re always sexy, Cress. Even when my asshole of a brother makes you cry.”
“Don’t want to talk about him,” she said as her deft hands slid into my pants.
I couldn’t have Val, but I could have Cressida. We would have to be enough for each other.
As I backed her against the counter, Cressida made fast work of my belt, taking my cock in her hand and stroking me how I liked, while I freed one of her breasts from the confounded contraption.
I pulled and pinched at her nipple until I had her gasping in my ear.
She tore off my shirt and buttons pinged on the floor as she scraped her nails over my torso.
“What do you want?” I asked inches from her face as I continued my assault. Fast and rough was how we always did it, but I wanted to make sure she got what she needed.
She threw back her head and gave my cock a good pump with her hand, and I sighed against her neck. “More,” she whispered.
I didn’t kiss her. We never kissed.
Instead, I took her nipple in my mouth, licking and sucking until she made those satisfying little sounds. It was clockwork at this point; she knew how to please me, and I knew what she liked. We were all each other could afford to have, the risk of other dalliances too high.
I normally didn’t draw out our encounters, but her outfit had turned me on more than I wanted to admit. And, it didn’t help that my cock hadn’t left me alone since I’d kissed Val.
With a hum of satisfaction, I grabbed Cressida’s ass in both hands and lifted her onto the counter.
Dutifully, she spread her legs and I knelt before her.
She deserved more than being used for my fantasy of fucking Val, but that didn’t stop me from pushing her thong aside and stroking her wetness with a fingertip before repeating the motion with my tongue.
But I took solace in knowing that when Cressida fucked me, she was thinking about fucking someone else too.
Hate fucking, from what it seemed like, as her fingernails gouged into my scalp.
Arching into me, her tits bounced as she rode my face and I reached up to grab one, pulling at her hard nipple until she whimpered. I sucked her clit as I thrust two fingers inside her, mimicking the motions of my hand on her breast.
“Oh god,” she moaned, throwing her head back as she came all over my face.
Licking her arousal off my lips, I pulled her off the counter. “On your knees,” I said.
She obeyed, looking up at me with her big blue eyes.
God, she really is a vision.
And I’m an asshole for using her like this.
But any other thought disappeared as she took my cock in her mouth with teasing strokes of her tongue.
I’d had enough of our games though. Knotting my hand in her hair, I thrust fully inside her, groaning as she opened her throat for me.
We’d done this countless times and I knew she could handle all of me.
As I fucked her mouth, her moans sent tantalizing vibrations all the way up my cock.
I pumped faster and faster until I shot my release down her throat with a wordless shout.
She held on, taking everything I gave her.
After, she rose to her feet and wiped her mouth, trailing her nails across my bare chest.
“Maybe now we can both relax,” she said and headed toward her room upstairs, giving me a knowing smile over her shoulder.
I really am fucking lucky to have her. If we loved each other, things would be so different.
So easy. Or even better if we weren’t in this fucking situation at all and she could be free to fuck Raife instead of me—or kill him, or whatever else she wanted to do.
I never asked because after stealing her freedom and her future, it felt intrusive to pry into something she clearly didn’t want to discuss.
Pouring myself more scotch, I went to the master bathroom and blasted the shower on cold to bring me back to my senses. I most certainly did not feel relaxed. Quite the opposite. All because of one vexing woman who had my cock growing hard again at just the barest passing thought.
I’m in a shitload of trouble.