5
“Not exactly,” Nick responds to my snarky question with amusement. “Despite my misgivings, I’m thinking we’ll do a little experiment with compound interest.”
I groan, mostly because I know he expects me to. As my dad’s friend, his brief attempts to interest me in finance when I was figuring out what I wanted to do with my life after high school were painful for both of us. I get the principle of it but just tell me the result at the end, please?
Of course, that’s how most of the world feels, which is why Nick is wealthy because they pay him to worry about everything in between. And I mostly spent those lessons surreptitiously learning everything about him that I could from his early childhood in the slums of Leningrad to exactly what it takes to make the elusive dimple in his left cheek appear.
“This time will be a little different, Candace. You will be much more personally invested in the day-to-day process, trust me.” The wicked twinkle in his dark eyes is enticing and damn, there’s that dimple. This really is going to be interesting.
“Okay. What’s the experiment then?” I’m still not getting how interest rates intersect with our relationship.
“Your shyness is adorable, little one. But it holds you back and… quite frankly, makes it hard for me to know what you want. You don’t want to tell me your secrets, so… you will have to be brave. If you are, you will be rewarded.”
I frown hard at him. I’m only really shy around him because he’s so… so much. I don’t see how I could ever measure up, and this isn’t inspiring me with confidence so far.
“You have six weeks to accumulate 10,000 points. You get one hundred points for every orgasm you request and receive. Your points will compound weekly at five percent.” He pauses to watch my face. I’m busy scrunching it up trying to work that out.
“Isn’t that like a thousand orgasms?”
“No. It would be a hundred and only if you wait until the last day.” He gives me a disappointed glare for getting the basic math wrong. “Luckily for you, this isn’t a math test, but more of a gauge of your interest. The earlier and more often you ask me to touch you, the more I will believe you have deeper feelings than just a young girl’s crush.”
“It’s not a freaking crush,” I mutter, while twisting my hands nervously. This all sounds… like I’m missing critical pieces. “What are you leaving out?” I squint at him, trying my best to look intimidating, which only makes that damn dimple flash again.
“I don’t know what you mean.” He widens his eyes innocently, and it’s about as convincing as my attempts to look scary.
“So hypothetically, I just walk up to you and say ‘Hey, Mr. Savage, I fancy an orgasm now’ and then you’ll take me to bed and fuck me senseless?” My voice rises in disbelief.
“Err, no. But now that you bring it up, you’ll get an extra five points for the day if you call me Mr. Savage when you make your requests.” He smirks down at me like he knows me well enough to guess that I won’t want to do that now. Except I do because I can tell that he likes having that little verbal nod to his authority. I’ll save that bonus card for later.
“So you just said that wasn’t how it was going to work?” I poke his solid chest with my index finger to bring him back to the conversation.
“Um? No, there will be no mad fucking. This six weeks is all about you, little one.”
I pout. “You mean you won’t…?”
He shakes his head. “No, you must be the one to make the decision about our relationship, my sweet mouse.”
“But only with your rules.”
He nods, a small smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
“Because you don’t really believe I know what I want?”
He nods again, this time his expression has turned to stone.
“What about kisses or hugs, or stuff like that?”
“You must initiate what you desire. But you will sleep naked in my arms every night. That much I require for my sanity. Or possibly my lack of it,” he muses quietly.
I suck in a deep breath. This will require a lot of bravery. “When does this start? Now?”
He chuckles and rubs a hand softly down my back. “In the morning. I think we both need to sleep on this. See if you have more questions or concerns. But the sleeping together starts tonight. So maybe you should go get ready for bed?” He arches an eyebrow at me like it’s a dare, probably waiting for me to cut and run from the whole thing. He’s got some surprises coming.
I trace a single finger down the line of Nick’s stern jaw, feeling his pulse jump. “You’re going down, Mr. Savage,” I say with glee as I hop off his lap. He groans, but his hands still cage me protectively until he sees me steady on my feet. I’m going to have to break through his overprotective streak, or we’ll never get anywhere. But I’m so relieved to have a possible path out of what seemed like a dead end, I feel nothing but determination fill my soul.
I head upstairs, not attempting to look seductive while I do it. I tried all that in New York and Nick was oblivious, or at least I thought so. It certainly didn’t have the desired effect. No, we’ll play this by his rules. Sort of. I know a few things I didn’t know two months ago and I need time to ponder that new knowledge and what it might mean.
Stripping out of my clothes, I brush my teeth quickly and slide under the thin white sheet on my bed. I showered before we went to dinner, so there’s not much left to my bedtime routine. It doesn’t usually involve waiting for a man to join me, though. Okay, never before tonight, but since he’s already told me we’re not doing anything, I’m clueless as to what preparations to make.
It’s warm enough not to need more than a sheet even in the air-conditioned coolness of the house, which since it’s a heat exchange, isn’t as cool up here as the sunken living room but still better than the yard. It’s getting dark outside but there’s still enough light to not bump into furniture, so as I slide over in the bed, leaving most of the space for Nick, I speculate on how long he’ll be.
The soft beep of the car alarm tells me he’s gone out to get his bags, so maybe not quite as long as I thought. He doesn’t say anything as he enters the room and heads to the en suite bathroom. The noise of the shower has my legs shifting restlessly, trying to imagine Nick naked. I mean, I guess I could get up and look, but that might use up the bravery I need for tomorrow. So instead I stare into the darkness, a little tense from the uncertainty of it all, and wait.
The sound of water stops abruptly, and I turn my head towards the bathroom door in the darkness. I don’t know if he’s being thoughtful or what, but Nick shut off the bathroom light before opening the door so I can’t see more than a hulking shadow that’s darker than the surrounding dark. Then the mattress dips precariously and I hold my breath.
“Breathe, little mouse. I’m not going to eat you tonight,” Nick states dryly. The sound of his deep voice in the stillness goes straight to my core.
“I don’t… I… it’s just that…” I mutter defensively.
He chuckles and I feel his large hands land unerringly on my body, turning and shifting me onto my side, facing away from him. “It’s strange and different? I can’t say as I’ve ever found myself in this position either.”
Somehow he’s arranged us so he has one hand on my sternum, carefully not touching my generous breasts although that’s not completely unavoidable and one on the backs of my thighs holding me away from his lower body. Darn it. I smirk into my pillow. Only I know that I’m a sprawler. I don’t know when or how, but somewhere in the night I’ll be dominating this bed. For now, I’m going to let him think he’s in charge.
“Tell me something I don’t already know about you,” I whisper into the dark.
“I have no idea what you do know, Candace. Clearly, I’ve been oblivious when it comes to you.” His thumb sweeps over the skin of my ribcage, not moving his hand but simply touching.
“Then tell me about your childhood.”
He snorts softly. “That’s not the stuff that makes for sweet dreams, little one. Did I tell you the story of how I landed in New York with only five words of English?”
“No. Tell me,” I order sweetly while wrapping my fingers around his hand and snuggling into my pillow. I let his voice wash over me, his accent thickening as he talks of wandering the streets looking for someone that spoke Russian or even Polish which he knew a little of. While sticking to the shadows because he knew he looked scary and didn’t want to attract the attention of either the police or the local mobs. He had nobody to give him a hug. How sad, I think to myself as his words begin to fade away.