Chapter 2
Geneva
Ididn’t know what it was I expected when I went to the club that night, but it sure wasn’t to meet a man who did two things exceedingly well—intrigue me and scare me.
I tried not to be a cliché, the dumb little girl, the slut, the jaded vixen with Daddy issues, the prima donna, or the sullen malcontent. I thought of myself as just a regular girl, someone who, like all my other friends, was looking for that indefinable something that we couldn’t quite put our finger on… but that we knew was missing from our lives, nonetheless.
I think if I’d realized what that man truly was to me when I’d seen him across that smoky dance floor, the lasers dazzling my eyes so much that he looked almost like a shimmering ghost, I think I’d have walked right out of that club that night. After all, when one encounters a person who is the embodiment of their nemesis, the personification of that moth-to-a-flame metaphor, one is always better off going in the opposite direction. Aren’t they?
Unfortunately, I wasn’t known for making the best decisions when it came to myself. How many twenty-one-year-olds were?
Still, when I laid my eyes on him, interested was a massive understatement. He was tall and lean, but not so much so that it appeared he spent too much time in the gym. Instead, it was as if he were a thing of pure nature, his mouthwatering form cut from something hard and unyielding—and mean.
Like steel—or bad intentions.
In his case it was probably both. In any other situation seeing a man crook his finger at me as if I was some stupid little girl would have had me either flipping him off, or going over and letting him know in no uncertain terms that whatever it was he thought he was doing, it was a very bad idea indeed.
But instead, I’d just… done as I was told. What did that mean? What did that say about me that a man I had never met before—hell, a man I’d never even seen before, was ordering me around as if he… controlled me?
Owned me.
Doesn’t say anything good about you, that’s for sure.
Even with that knowledge, I thrilled at watching him watch me, my legs seeming to take me toward him of their own volition, whether or not my head or my heart had any objection to such an outlandish thing.
And I found myself standing right next to him, silent, waiting for him to say something, anything, to break the tension that had ratcheted higher and higher with each step that brought me closer to him.
“What’s your name, girl?” I should have been irritated at his use of the diminution ‘girl,’ but I recognized it for what it was, a subtle gauge of my attitude. I’d seen it before.
He glanced away, but it wasn’t at all out of nervousness or timidity. Instead, it was loud and clear I-don’t-give-a-shit energy. And yet, that he was focused intently on me was something I knew. I didn’t quite know how, but instinctively, I was certain of it.
“You first,” I said, letting a bored drawl slip into my tone.
“Rick. Now, answer my question—and don’t answer mine with another question.”
I grunted, feigning irritation, but watching closely for his reaction. “Geneva.”
“Like the city?”
“Maybe.” I considered whether it was a good idea to tell him, as I still hadn’t nailed down the control freak vs. psycho assessment of the man. “I usually just go by Genie though.”
“Why?”
“So people don’t ask me if it’s like the city.” It was a lie, but needling him was surprisingly enjoyable.
He grimaced but said nothing. His thumbs tapped at his screen, and he dropped the phone to the table. His long fingers waved toward my friends. “Do they get to call you Genie?”
“Sure—but you don’t. Not yet, anyway.”
You’re veering awfully close to cunt-y. Dial it back, idiot.
I gave him a quick, flirty smile, hoping to throw him off balance a little.
“What are you doing with them?” He didn’t even bother to meet my gaze, instead staring at his phone once again, the screen bright in his huge right hand, looking almost like a credit card laying there in his palm.
I’d never seen a man with hands that big. I hadn’t so much as noticed a man’s hands before—until his.
“With who? My friends?”
He nodded, maddeningly still not looking at me, as if my attention upon him would be assumed, as if the very notion that I wouldn’t hang on his every word was patently absurd.
He’s not wrong, you know.
For a long, pregnant moment, he seemed engrossed in the words upon the screen of his phone, and then finally he looked up at me. I tried not to let him see me swallow, knowing that a man with his keen attention would pick up on just what that meant.
I didn’t want him discovering how nervous he made me. For any man who could make me nervous was either a scary man or an irresistible one. Like so much else about Rick, as I was soon to learn, it was a combination of both.
“Why are you here tonight?” He was utterly still as he watched me.
“Um, probably the same reason you are.” It was stupid, and I cringed as soon as I said it, but it was too late.
His eyes narrowed just the tiniest bit at that, but I thought I detected a smile at the corners of his lips. The man’s mouth was surprisingly full, soft, and… sensual. I never imagined a man who looked as quintessentially masculine, hard, and mean as Rick would be anything resembling that word. But it fit, even if I didn’t yet know why. “I think you need to come with me.”
That was a new line for me, probably because it sounded like something a cop—or a high school principal—might say. I wasn’t exactly inexperienced with lines from men, commands and games and gambits. Schemers and players, man whores and arrogant assholes. I had seen them all, or so I thought until I’d met Rick.
Everything from the set of his shoulders, their great width shown off much too provocatively by the tailored charcoal button-down shirt he wore, to the arrogant jut of his strong chin, to the world weary just-this-side-of-cynical glint in his gaze, spoke of nothing but casual command. A man who was used to getting his way—or hurting whomever he needed to in order to get it.
He seemed to really believe he was God’s gift. And I would have a difficult time arguing that he wasn’t.
What the hell is wrong with you? You encounter a man with a little game and you’re ready to drop your panties at a moment’s notice? He’s your fucking dad’s age!
It should have mattered. Should have been a deal-breaker.
But it only piqued my interest further.
Damn it.
“I don’t think I need to do anything,” I finally said, the DJ starting up a new song with an absolutely thunderous bassline that made the steel railing along the mezzanine buzz with the beat. I sat down on the chair opposite him, laying an elbow on the table trying desperately to look casual, unfazed—in other words anything but the nervous girl pinned in my place by his glittering gaze.
“But you’ll come with me anyway.”
“We’ll see about that…” My mouth was so dry, I almost choked on the last word, but I was desperate to project confidence.
“You know, I watched you over there, how you interacted with them, how alone you seemed with them.” He nodded toward my friends. “You’re not like them, are you? You feel… like there’s something more. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re not just wrong, you’re dead fucking wrong.” It was puffery, blatant bluffing, and I knew he could see it for what it was. “So, unless you’re gonna say something interesting—other than thinking you can tell me what to do—I think I’m gonna go back over and join those friends that you think I don’t belong with. You’re welcome to watch me dance with them, too. Maybe that’s your thing? Is that it? You like to watch, sit there and observe girls dancing and laughing and having fun? Girls that are young enough to be your daughter?”
“Ah, now we get to it. That intrigues you too, doesn’t it?” The muscle at the corner of his jaw flexed just a little. “You’re not used to being attracted to someone my age.”
“Who said I was attracted to you?”
But it was too late to argue it, his tiny wink confirming he’d landed the shot squarely, and was already strutting off in victory.
That my jabs back at him had left him completely unfazed paradoxically left me almost speechless. I sagged in my seat. Suddenly remembering that he was watching my every move, I stiffened my spine, sitting ramrod straight.
Now you look like a simpering girl begging for his attention.
“Look, I… I think you’re way too sure of yourself, dude. You walk in here thinking you’ve seen it all, and done it all—and maybe you have. But you don’t know the first thing about me. Does that intrigue you?”
He said nothing though, laying his phone on the table, screen down, the silver band around his right ring finger catching the light for just a moment. His head tilted slightly to the side, as he adjusted the cuff at his left wrist. His dark shirt was finely tailored, probably worth more than my entire outfit. From his impeccably cut jet-black hair to the five-day stubble along his very square jaw, and even the hint of frost at his temples and chin, the man was meticulously put together. Nothing out of place, nothing overlooked, nothing unintentional.
Control freak, or psycho? That is the question.
But it wasn’t one I was going to stick around any longer to find out. On a whim, I leaned in close, whispering the words in his ear. “I’m not skeered of you.” I stepped back, playing with the silver necklace at the base of my throat. “Like I said earlier, have a nice night. Rick.”
His eyes were a heated weight on my ass as I walked away, the girls laughing and pointing as I put an exaggerated sway in my hips, letting him know that I knew he was looking.
When I reached my friends though, I turned my head to drink in my triumph, to rub it in that he wasn’t going to get his way this time… and I was sorely disappointed.
Well, goddamn.
He was already headed for the exit.