Chapter 18 #2
I swirled my wine. No, I couldn’t. But it still bothered me even though I wasn’t angry with her.
I was one of the most powerful men in the business world, and in my personal life, I had no control over my own fate.
Taking a strand of her hair, I wrapped it around my finger.
“I don’t blame you.” She didn’t draw back from my touch, but she didn’t lean into it either.
“What do you want from me, Nolan?”
I could ask her the same question. But I didn’t.
Because part of me wasn’t sure if I wanted to hear the answer.
“I’m not asking you for anything. Just be here with me and leave the rest of the world out there.
Just for tonight.” I tucked the curl behind her ear, trailing a fingertip across her cheek.
“Just for tonight,” she echoed. Her eyes drifted over my face, across my lips, and then settled back on my eyes.
“Are you hungry?” I asked. I couldn’t help how husky it came out.
“Not yet,” she said slowly, thinking something through.
“So,” I said, “what should we do now?”
Val pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. “There’s that hot tub outside…”
Heat roiled to life inside me. “I’ll grab the wine.”
“But I don’t have a bathing suit.”
Grinning, I inclined my head toward the master bedroom. “I took the liberty of having something sent up for us.”
With a puzzled look, she ducked into the room to change while I swapped my suit for black swimming trunks in the hall bathroom, then refilled our wine and headed outside.
Instead of a standard wooden railing, a glass partition surrounded the deck, offering an unimpeded view.
As I sat at the edge of the pool, the snow fell gently around me in a protective hush.
Before I knew it, I was picturing Val in that bikini, and my hands twitched at the thought of how the straps would bite into her supple hips.
Just like my fingers would have that day in my office, if things had escalated…
I groaned, my cock hard at the thought. Val was the most gorgeous woman I’d ever encountered—there was no denying that.
But spending time with her had brought out this whole other side of me.
I was wooing her, courting her. Trying to impress her—not just with fancy dates, but I truly wanted to give her what she needed. I wanted to be what she needed.
The women of my past had only gotten what I was willing to give—which wasn’t much.
For so long, I’d shut down any deeper feelings beyond baseline attraction, solely focused on my career.
Since joining with Cressida, that off-switch had become more permanent.
I’d never have a normal relationship, so it was easier to shut it down and not get attached.
But for Val? I was at her mercy. And it made me want to break all of my carefully crafted rules.
Interrupting my musings, Val stepped outside, swaddled in a cashmere robe. As her gaze wandered over my chest and abs, then dipped to my crotch, I stifled another groan. “Feeling okay?” I asked to distract myself more than anything.
Her face flushed. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
I didn’t bother pointing out her awful attempt at deflecting.
“You don’t have to get in if you don’t want to,” I said as I slid into the steaming water. Heat washed over me and I settled into the corner seat, draping both arms across the tiled sides. “But it does feel damn good. And, this was your idea.” I quirked an eyebrow at her, waiting.
She sat at the edge of the tub and parted the robe around her legs, dipping them in the water. Fuck, those legs. I moved toward her but she held out her foot, stopping me in the chest. “You stay over there. No touching.”
My lips curled in a smirk. “We’re touching right now,” I said and wrapped my hand around the curve of her calf, but she splashed water at me with her foot.
“Back to your corner,” she said.
I returned to my seat. “May I ask why I’m being punished?” I’d picked out that bikini myself and I wanted to see her in it right the fuck now.
Waving a hand between us, she said, “If I’m going to survive an evening alone with you in a romantic cabin, you are not allowed to touch me.”
I showed her my palms in surrender, but my cock stirred at her admission of how much I affected her.
It was the first time she’d alluded to the fact that we were clearly attracted to each other.
Maybe she would be interested in exploring whatever this is between us.
“Fair enough. Will you join me in here, or am I to keep the hot tub to myself?”
Val pursed her lips. Then she stood. As she untied the robe, I stopped breathing, marveling at her tan skin and curvy figure.
The satiny black bra barely contained the swell of her breasts, the bottom accentuating her thighs and riding high on her hips.
I didn’t know if she’d hiked it up that high on purpose, but I could see the outline of her pussy through the tight material.
As my cock shot to attention, I bit back a groan.
“Is it too late to take back the ‘no touching’ rule? Because fuck, Val. I want to rip off that skimpy thing and trace my hands over every inch of you.”
At my brutally honest words, her lips parted.
My girl likes it when I talk dirty. Noted.
“That would be very against the rules,” she said as she slid into the hot water with a hiss, settling in the corner opposite me.
But since it was a small hot tub, our legs bumped together.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she said.
“Like what?”
“Like…like you’re thinking of every dirty thing you want to do to me.”
She surprised a laugh out of me. “So the ‘no touching’ rule applies to my thoughts now too? You drive a hard bargain.”
Flicking water at my face, she said, “Watch it, Mr. Keller.”
Fuuuuck… I ran a hand across my mouth. “If you want me to keep my thoughts to myself, you gotta stop calling me that.”
Val’s eyes went wide for a moment, then she rolled her lips, hiding her smile. “Got it—Nolan.”
Steam wafted between us, turning up the heat another notch.
I took a sip of wine to give myself something to do besides stare at her.
Yeah, Cressida’s idea to rent out the house had been perfect.
And now, it was perfect fucking torture.
Here, all alone, so close to what I wanted but unsure if I should take it.
The light snow began to pick up, melting into steam as it hit the deck around us. Val tilted her face back, smiling into the snowflakes, and a bitter pang went through me. Tomorrow, we’d be back to boss and employee. Engaged man and single woman.
Just for tonight, we can be who we are. My earlier words came back to me as the snow encased us in a soft hush, blotting out any other protests.
“Should we play a game?” Val asked, breaking through my thoughts with a sparkle in her eyes.
Loving this unplugged and bolder side of her, I said, “That’s a dangerous question.
” I could have her right now if I wanted.
If she wanted. But Val deserved someone who could offer her everything instead of hiding her away in the shadows.
That thought alone was what held me back from fessing up to my arrangement with Cressida.
But… What if despite all of that, she still wants me anyway?
For now, I decided to test the waters and indulge my baser instincts—at least a little. Especially with her taunting me in such a brazen way.
Lacing my hands behind my head, I asked, “What did you have in mind?”
“A secret for a secret,” she suggested.
“You first.”
“What was your first impression of me? I mean, I know I made an ass of myself at the bar, but since I’m here now, maybe I didn’t do so badly…” She trailed off with a slight smile.
Rubbing a hand across my jaw, I studied her before speaking. The question surprised me because I wasn’t sure what direction her little game was going to take us. Playful? Sexy? Serious? But her expression was nervous, eager. She genuinely wants to know. Okay then.
“The first time I saw you was in a spray of snow at the base of one of the slopes,” I said.
“I remember thinking how joyful and full of life you looked. Even then, I knew I wanted to see you smile like that again. And when I realized who you were at the bar, I was gutted. Because I didn’t know how I was going to survive spending every waking moment at Hale’s Peak with the one woman who could disarm me and strip me bare with the power of her smile alone. Not without making her mine.”
As she absorbed my words, Val sank into the water until it brushed her chin, the blue and teal lights in the hot tub reflecting on her skin, transforming her into a siren sent to drag me to a watery grave. “You want me to be yours?” she asked.
Fuck yes, I do.
But I shook my head. “That’s another secret. You still owe me one.” I paused, pondering my question. Then I had it. “What did you think after I kissed you?”
Caught off guard, she played with one of her curls, her teeth biting into that plush lower lip. It was as if she was torturing me on purpose, but from the conflicted look on her face, I knew she was taking my question seriously.
Finally, she said, “My initial reaction was ‘holy freaking crap, I cannot believe I just kissed another woman’s fiancé and my literal boss,’ and then went off into an anxiety spiral. I’m still not sure what I think about it. It can’t happen again, but…”
“But?” The hope that flared within me was swift and fierce.
When she spoke, her expression was pained. “That kiss set me on fire, Nolan. It’s lived in my head, replayed in my dreams, tormented me every night. It…it makes me wish for things I shouldn’t. You’re promised to someone else, and I will respect that.”
She is way too good for me. Any other women in my social circles would have jumped at the opportunity to hop in bed with me, engaged or not.
The sanctity of marriage wasn’t necessarily honored in the upper echelons of society.
Mistresses and affairs were as commonplace as annoying galas and useless parties.
I was about to throw caution to the fucking wind and admit everything, but before I could, Val pushed out of the water to sit on the edge of the hot tub.
Steam poured off of her body and water ran in rivulets down the valley between her breasts.
My cock jolted and my train of thought came crashing to a halt.
And she noticed me noticing.
“Problem?” she asked.
As she toweled herself off with the robe, I pulled on the back of my neck. “If you’re set on this ‘no touching’ thing, we need to play a different game or change the subject.”
With color high on her cheeks, she leaned forward and I got a killer view of her perfect tits as she said, “I think I’m hungry now.”
Painfully aware of my raging boner, I could only raise an eyebrow in response.
“For dinner,” she clarified, but her voice held a rougher edge that belied her words.
Taking advantage of her closeness, I wrapped my hand around her thigh and felt her pulse jump under my touch. “I’m pretty sure the kind of dinner I want won’t be in Rocco’s gift basket.”
A surprised laugh slipped out as she stood and tied her robe. “I thought we were changing the subject, Nolan. I’ll see you inside.”
I smiled as I gathered my own robe, all the while the thoughts of what our relationship would be like tomorrow, back in the real world and not in this suspended reality where we could be just Val and just Nolan, swirled in the back of my mind like storm clouds.