Chapter 26
“Can you tell me what happened now?” I ask as I settle her into the seat of my car, but I remain in the parking lot, looking at her. “You said there was no wet floor sign. Melissa said there was.”
“There wasn’t,” she says. She doesn’t seem eager to talk. “But as soon as I took a few steps, I realized the floor was slippery.”
“I’ll check the security camera footage. How are you feeling?”
“Miserable. It wasn’t in my plans to miss a day of work.”
“Shhhh . . . Don’t think about it.”
“I had planned to spend tomorrow with the chef. I was going to teach him how to make brigadeiros and also coffee. I mentioned the dessert, and he said he’s been thinking about changing the dessert menu and would like to try it.
Would you let him know I won’t be able to make it?
Apparently, I’ll be spending the day sulking in the room.
” She stops talking and grabs my arm. “God, I forgot to sign the bills! We need to go back, I’m sorry. I don’t want any surprises later.”
“Bills?”
“From the hospital. I know a simple hospitalization like this can turn into thousands of dollars quickly.”
“Health insurance will cover all expenses. Don’t worry.”
Her expression immediately relaxes, but she tries to hide it. I remember what I found out about her debts with her mother’s medical expenses. I have to take care of that.
“Okay,” she says, sounding a little embarrassed. “Can we go now? I want to go home . . . I mean, to the hotel.”
“Do you need anything from there?”
“I don’t understand.”
“There’s no way I’m letting you spend the night alone after hitting your head.”
“But . . .”
“No. This is not up for discussion. You’ll stay with me.”
The look Joaquín gives me when he sees me coming in with Olívia makes me want to punch him.
“Good evening,” she says formally, looking very shy.
“Good evening,” the jerk replies, though his tone remains suspicious.
“Should I stay in the same room as yesterday, Guillermo?”
She doesn’t look at me, and I want to kick my brother out of the apartment for making her feel so uncomfortable. I remember yesterday. Despite offering her a room, Olívia slept in my arms.
“Yes,” I say. No, I want her in my bed so I can keep her safe all night. “Someone will bring over the suitcase you asked Melissa to prepare shortly. Should I have them come up?”
“Yes, thank you. Excuse me,” she says, and heads for the second floor.
“Why is she here again?”
“Get used to it.”
“What does that mean?”
“Exactly what I said. Get used to Olívia being in my life.” I run my hand over my face because the last thing I need or want is a fight. He’s a suspicious bastard, but he’s also my brother, the same one who dropped everything to be with my daughter today. “How did Nina spend the day?”
“She was fine for most of it, but she was restless at times because of her teeth. Is there anything we can do?”
“The doctor said a chilled teether helps. I was going to get one, but with Dad’s problem yesterday and then Olívia’s fall today . . .”
“Fall?”
“Yes, she slipped and hit her head coming out of my office. Kathleen said there was a wet floor sign, but Olívia is sure there wasn’t. I need to check the footage, but my inclination is to believe Olívia.”
“So is mine,” he says, surprising me. “I don’t like your secretary.”
“You don’t like anyone.”
“Almost anyone,” he corrects. “But that’s not what I’m talking about. There’s something off about that woman.” Joaquín has never really liked Kathleen, but since he’s suspicious of humans in general, I never took it too seriously.
“I transferred her today.”
“Because of what happened to Olívia? Do you think she was responsible for removing the wet floor sign?”
“I still don’t know, but her transfer had nothing to do with Olívia. She was becoming inconvenient.”
“She wants you. Anyone can see that.”
“Perhaps, but lately, she had become more explicit about it.”
“Transferring her was the best thing you could have done then,” he says, starting to walk towards the exit. “Check the footage. If she really removed the sign, intending to hurt Olívia, it was a criminal act and the girl should be careful.”
“Joaquín, do you remember what we talked about today?”
“Yes, no investigating your girlfriend . . . unless she gives me reason to.”
Before I can respond, he’s gone.
She hasn’t come down from her room. I’ve been working from home for the last two days, and she’s just slept, disconnected from everything. It’s like her body took advantage of the forced rest to finally surrender.
I’ve checked on her several times. I was tempted to set up the extra baby monitor I have for emergencies to make sure everything is okay, but I don’t have the right to invade her privacy.
So every two hours, I quickly go in and check if she’s breathing.
Then I quickly back away because the urge to cuddle up behind her in bed is too strong.
I know she’s eaten because the sandwiches and juices I left on the bedside table have been consumed, so maybe she just needs to relax.
Her last year hasn’t been easy. In fact, the last few years.
She received the suitcase brought by the security guard because I heard the door to the room open and close again on the first night she arrived here, but since then, there has been absolute silence.
The twenty-four-hour monitoring period the doctor mentioned has passed, but I’m still trying to be a nice guy and give her space to rest. However, my mind is with her.
It’s already early morning. I took a quick shower, and after giving Nina her last bottle—that she took while still asleep—I came to my room, convincing myself that I shouldn’t go check on Olívia one more time.
If I go and she’s awake, I know how the night will end, and I can’t get closer until everything is clarified. She has the right to know the truth.
That’s my logical side talking. The one that has always been in control of my life.
The problem is that at this moment, there’s nothing rational about me.
No matter how we started or what led me to seek her out, the truth is that from the moment I laid eyes on Olívia, it stopped being about uncovering Layla’s secrets and became solely about a man wildly attracted to a woman.
As if all the confusion between us wasn’t enough, there’s also the fact that she’s a virgin.
Would it be fair to initiate her? She spent the last few years taking care of her sick mother, without any chance of experiencing life.
Olívia said she no longer knows what it’s like to go out, laugh, and chat.
I know nobody would believe it, but neither do I.
Of course, I didn’t spend my college years as a monk. I went to some parties, dated, had a lot of sex, but I never had fun. I never knew what it was like to relax, because even then, I had already started dedicating myself to the hotels, even before my father had the first stroke.
My intention was, once I graduated, to take a year off to travel.
Sure, I’d already seen the whole world. Mom taught us to fend for ourselves, experience life away from home, with or without them by our side, but my plan was to get away from everything and relax.
Do something different from what I had experienced up to that point.
Put a backpack on and travel to New Zealand, for example.
Go out without worry, date, and maybe find someone real for a walk together in the future.
But fate had different plans for me. Just a few weeks before finishing my postgraduate studies, when I was already packed, Dad had the stroke.
Since then, it’s been a succession of worries: keeping the companies on top, making sure my brothers had everything they needed, and supporting my mother.
I didn’t have time or desire, to be honest, to dedicate myself to anyone. Layla was just one of many random liaisons I had, and I’m sure the feeling was mutual, but then Valentina came along and the game of life was changed once again.
I wanted my daughter to have everything, not only in terms of finances but also in terms of love.
That’s why, upon discovering Olívia’s existence, I decided to try to get close to her.
I could have simply found a way to get the money—which I believe she’s entitled to—into her hands, but I believe in family.
I remember that from the moment I saw Olívia’s photo for the first time, I had this intuition that she was special. It was a recent photo, although there were several others, from different stages of childhood and adolescence, on Layla’s computer.
In this particular photograph, she had her hair tied up in a ponytail, and at first, I didn’t think it was possible for her and my late wife to be related. Not only because of her appearance but also because of the sweetness that, even through a photograph, I could see there.
The blue eyes captivated me, as did the disarming smile, with teeth as small as a child’s. The long, full hair, the dimple on the left cheek, which I now know only becomes visible when she smiles . . . All of this shook me in a way I wasn’t prepared for.
But being a rational guy, the last thing on my mind when I went to meet her was an involvement between us. However, the attraction I felt knocked me out. The woman I found beautiful in a picture personally made my blood boil.
If someone had pointed Olívia out to me on the street, I would have said she wasn’t my type.
Restless, with serious motor coordination problems—if I’m to consider her tendency to knock things over or, more recently, the fall she had—besides being very open with strangers.
The problem is that from the moment I saw her delicious body swaying to the music in the café, all bets were off. Overwhelming physical attraction pulled me towards her.
I have no restrictions on touching or being touched.
I give a lot of hugs to everyone in my family, but Olívia takes my need for contact to another level.
I want to feel her all the time, be with her, be in her.
Merge with her and dive into this crazy and unexpected thing that grows stronger every day between us. See where it goes.
I’m different around her. Even with all the concern surrounding my world, Olívia makes me smile, something that only Nina had done before.
If I were to follow my desire alone, I would be loving every inch of her curvy body right now, recording her taste on my tongue, lost in her warmth, but I don’t have the right to do that for now.
I run my hand over my face and check the clock. Two in the morning.
My skin burns as if I have a fever. Despite being tired, there’s an energy dominating me, and I know the chance of me being able to fall asleep is minimal.
I don’t bother to put on a T-shirt as I leave the room.
She shouldn’t be awake at this hour, so I just grab Nina’s baby monitor and head down to the office.
If the night is lost in terms of sleep, all that’s left is to work.
I look up from the screen when I see a silhouette in the doorway.
She’s standing there, wearing a white cotton nightgown that falls a little above her knees.
It’s not the kind of outfit a woman would wear to seduce her man, but Olívia is so hot.
The simple garment molds to her sensual body, especially around her breasts.
My pulse races just looking at her, and the arousal I’ve been fighting against emerges.
“Not sleepy?” she asks.
“I sleep little, usually.”
She smiles. “I love to sleep, but I think I overdid it the past few days, so now I’m restless. Want some company?”
No, my mind says. I want to devour you.
Before I stop to think about what I’m doing, I reach out. She takes hesitant steps, but without averting her gaze. When she’s standing next to my chair, I grab her by the waist and sit her on my desk, facing me. Her womanly scent immediately knocks me out.
“Are you in pain?”
Her response is just shaking her head from side to side. She doesn’t ask why I sat her on the desk, and I can sense her irregular breathing.
“So why can’t you sleep?”
“Because being so close to you gets me all worked up.”
“Worked up how, Olívia?” Heat spreads across my skin, blood warming as if someone has turned on a heater inside my body.
Instead of answering, she takes my hand and places it just below her left breast. “Can you feel my heartbeat? I can’t relax with you within reach.”
With a will of its own, my thumb moves up and lands on the hard nipple, pushing through the fabric of her nightgown. Our eyes are locked, and when I circle my finger around the stiff nub, she bites her lip.
Instead of stopping me, she rests her arms behind her on the desk, offering herself to my hands. “When I’m like this, I usually make myself come before I can sleep.”
I lightly pinch her nipple in response to her provocation. I don’t know if she realizes what she’s doing, if she knows the effect her words have on me, so I decide to push her to see where we stand. “Do you enjoy masturbating alone?”
“It’s not like I have a choice.”
Another light pinch on the nipple, and she arches, letting out a small moan.
“Was it more enjoyable when I made you come? Did you like wetting my mouth and fingers?”
Perhaps unconsciously, her legs spread, and as if drawn by a magnet, my gaze fixates on her soft thighs.
“Did it feel good to have my tongue there?” I glide my finger over the thin fabric of her pink panties, and she shivers, edging a little closer to the edge of the desk.
“Will you do it again?”
Damn!
I let my finger slide inside the fabric and observe her reaction.
Her face is serious, cheeks flushed.
“Do you want to come?”
“Yes.”
I play very lightly with her clit, and she moans loudly.
So sensitive, damn!
I spread her thighs wider, still seated, and pull her towards me.
I nip at her over the fabric, earning a delicious moan in response, while her hips almost lift. I take her hand and place it inside her lingerie. “I want to see.”
After hesitating for only a moment, her fingers move in a lazy caress, and at the first touch, she shudders.
I unbutton her nightgown to taste those delicious breasts.
They’ve driven me crazy from the start. They’re full, with pink areolas.
The nipples are hard, pointed, begging for my tongue.
I take one in my mouth, sucking, hungry.
She squirms, and her hand stops, but I pull back.
“No. You’re going to come like this. At least the first time.”
Holding the two heavy mounds, I alternate between sucking on them, but not being satisfied, I squeeze them together, biting lightly, wanting both in my mouth.
I can’t choose just one piece of her. I need everything.
“Bite,” she pleads.
“You have beautiful breasts.”
“Aren’t they too big?”
“No. They’re perfect for my mouth.”