Chapter 9
9
He was the most gorgeous man in the world. And he loved her ass.
Bethany suppressed an insanely elated giggle and looked up to find him watching her over the candle-lit dinner table. They were on their own private terrace high enough up to provide the utmost privacy. Paris twinkled below them, a carpet of lights and moving cars. Over Zach’s shoulder, the brilliantly lit iconic Eiffel Tower looked almost close enough to touch.
But it was the man who captivated her.
He wore black jeans and an indigo T-shirt that did amazing things to his eyes. His hair, still slightly damp from the shower, gleamed in the low light, and she had to stop herself from reaching out to smooth back the thick swathe that caressed his forehead.
She’d learned very quickly that touching Zach hampered clear thinking. She’d barely made it into one of the short, white, off-the-sleeve sundresses she’d packed after casually caressing his chest as he’d walked past her in the bedroom.
He’d imprisoned her against the bedpost and proceeded to devour her mouth. The only thing that had saved her from another marathon sex session had been the loud growling of her ravenous stomach.
Zach had ordered an oyster starter for them, followed by steaks with fries and salad for himself, and a pasta carbonara for her. The accompanying Chardonnay had been heavenly, but it was the man sitting across from her who continued to make her insides zing every time she looked at him.
“What are you thinking?” she blurted, then kicked herself. She’d read in a magazine once that asking a man what he was thinking was asking to be hurt. She’d known him barely two days, but she already knew Zachary Savage had the power to hurt her. Even more than Chris had managed to hurt her with his gender-preference bullshit.
“I’m thinking about a lot of things, but mostly, I’m thinking… thirty minutes.”
“Thirty minutes?”
“Yep. That’s all that could’ve prevented this from happening.” He gestured between them, his gaze never leaving her face. “I don’t believe in coincidence or karma or any of that crap. But I can’t help thinking I was there, in New York, for a reason. Because now this has happened, I can’t imagine how the rest of my life would have been without this experience.”
Just like that, he’d floored her. Tears sprang to her eyes and she hurriedly blinked them away.
She swallowed. Then swallowed again, but the lump in her throat refused to move.
She spoke around it. “For a guy who doesn’t believe in karma, that’s a lot of responsibility to lay at the feet of coincidence.”
“I have a feeling I’d have met you again at some point. Sooner or later.”
“And how do you figure that?”
He shrugged. “You work in events organizing. I have several companies that use New York organizers.”
“That’s still a stretch.”
“So you think this was destiny?”
What had happened between them—and was happening—felt too powerful to be anything casual. And to be honest, it scared the hell out of her. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Whatever it is, I’m glad it happened now.”
“Why?”
“You prefer that we would’ve met when I was ninety and couldn’t fuck more than once a week?”
She laughed. “I guess not.” She took another bite of her food and chewed, supremely conscious that he was still staring at her. Bethany wondered if she’d ever get used to Zach’s unashamedly invasive stare whenever they were in the same room. It was almost as if he wanted to burrow under her skin and learn her every secret.
The weird thing was that a part of her wanted to hand him that freedom.
“So thirty minutes, and you would have been headed where exactly?” she asked.
He sipped his wine before answering. “San Francisco. That’s where I’m based. I have a house in the Palisades. We stopped in Newark to refuel.”
“Why San Francisco? Is that where you grew up?”
“No.” His eyelids descended, veiling the look in his eyes. When he raised them again, his expression was carefully neutral. “I grew up in Louisiana.”
His voice cautioned her not to probe any further. Despite the keen curiosity that assailed her, she heeded it. There was a reason Zachary Savage guarded his privacy so rabidly. Out of this world sex didn’t give her the right to know his every secret or vice versa. Although there was one thing she was curious about.
“Why indigo?” she asked. “Is that your favorite color?”
One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile that was off-the-scale sexy. Her insides clenched harder. “Partly. Indigo is my middle name.”
Her mouth dropped open. “No way. Your name is Zachary Indigo Savage? Were your parents hippies or something?”
The smile disappeared. “Yeah… something like that. Can we change the subject?” Dark grey eyes speared her, one brow raised in a way that said the question mark tagged at the end of the sentence was only a formality. A spurt of anger swirled through her.
“We can, but you need to know upfront. I don’t like secrets. My ex kept a huge secret from me and made me believe we were solid when we weren’t?—”
“I told you he was a fool.”
“Be that as it may, I’d rather not have another bombshell dropped at my feet when I least expect it. If you don’t want me to get to know you better, that’s fine. I like to think my instincts are savvy enough that I’m not sleeping with an axe murderer or a puppy-kicking sadist. But I want some reassurances that nothing we’re doing right now will have any repercussions for my future.”
“I can guarantee you that I’ve never kicked a puppy in my life, and I don’t own an axe, none that I’ve personally wielded anyway. As for the rest, nobody can guarantee that, Peaches. But I can give you certain reassurances.”
“Like what?” she pressed.
“Like exclusivity. And the knowledge that nothing in my past will directly affect you in any harmful way.”
“And indirectly?”
He shrugged. “I try to keep my private life private, but I don’t always succeed. Not with modern technology as pervasive as it is. The media might find out you’re connected to me. Would that bother you?”
“That depends. Do you want me to remain your dirty little secret?”
He took another sip and licked a drop of wine from his lips in a way that made her want to leap over the table and devour every inch of his mouth, then work the rest of his body over well and good until he was as needy as she was.
“Peaches, I want you as dirty as I can get you, soaking wet and often.”
A blush crawled over her face. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
He shrugged. “The tabloids make up stories that can sometimes be hurtful. I’ve grown immune to it to some extent, but you need to be prepared.”
“What exactly do I need to be prepared for?”
“They may try and dig into your background, find out who you are, and use that to define your position in my life.”
“So if they find out I’m just an ordinary girl who grew up in Upstate New York, they might conclude I’m some sort of gold digger trying to sink my claws into you?”
“It may not be that bad. It may be that they conclude I’m taken by a completely extraordinary girl whose body makes my head spin and my cock harder than ever.”
Heat engulfed her, but the anxiety rushing through her stomach didn’t go away. “But most likely it’ll be the former.”
He gave a single serious nod, his eyes narrowing on her face. “Can you handle that?”
She licked her lips and tried to shrug it away. “Maybe I won’t need to. I only agreed to go to Marrakech with you. If we end things after that?—”
“We won’t,” he inserted calmly as he topped up her wine.
Her heart did that stupid bouncy thing in her chest that left her breathless. “What makes you so sure?”
“Peaches, you’re wasting time pursuing the wrong line of argument. We won’t be over after Marrakech. Not by a long shot. That I can promise you. I can also guarantee you privacy there. It’s what happens when we get back to the States that you need to worry about.”
She played with the last mouthful of pasta on her plate. “But you live in San Francisco. I live in New York. How’s that going to work?”
“I can work from anywhere in the world. Plus, I have a very large private plane, several cars and an adequately working cellphone. We’ll work it out.”
Her worry didn’t abate. Slowly, she set her fork down. “Zach… This is going too fast. I don’t know if I…”
He got up and came round to where she sat. Sinking down onto his heels, he grabbed her hips and swiveled her chair to face him.
“Do me a favor. Close your eyes and imagine your life a week from now. Then imagine it a month from now,” he instructed softly, but with enough steel to let her know he was serious. Her heart did another of those stupid somersaults. “Do you want me in it?”
She found herself nodding before he’d even finished speaking. “Yes, I do.”
He kissed her mouth, then kept the pressure until she opened for him. The tip of his tongue touched hers, flicked in erotic exploration before licking its way deeper. At her needy moan, he pulled back.
“Then that’s all that matters.” One hand drifted over her hip to brush against her crotch. It was the lightest of touches, but it still sent her pulse sky high. “This is all that matters.”
“Great sex is all that matters?” A sliver of hurt cut through her.
“Great sex is an outstanding start. That was the reason you joined The Indigo Lounge trip, wasn’t it?”
“I… Not really. I wanted to see what the experience was all about.”
“So you weren’t looking to connect with anyone?” He grated the words as if they soured his mouth.
“I don’t know. Maybe…”
“Whatever the circumstances, we found each other. The only difference here is you’re having the experience with me instead of some other guy whose face I’m trying very hard not to imagine. And it won’t end once my plane lands back in Newark. Amongst other things, I promised you Bora Bora, remember?”
She nodded slowly. Although she felt somewhat appeased, Bethany couldn’t shake the roller-coaster feeling undulating through her. But then he kissed her again. The effect of Zach Savage’s mouth on her was a lesson in how devastating chemistry could be.
He wiped her out with just one touch of his lips on hers. When he raised his head several minutes later, she was on the edge of her chair, clinging to his shoulders. His body was firmly wedged between hers, her legs curled around his hips.
They both looked down. Her dress had ridden up to reveal her naked thighs, and his visibly erect hard-on was pressed against her damp panties. He rocked his hips and the friction electrified her swollen clit.
“God!”
He laughed. “I think my point is made, don’t you?”
Extracting himself from her hands and legs, he readjusted her clothing, returned to his seat, refilled her almost empty glass and picked up his.
“Tell me about your job. Do you love what you do?”
Right. She was supposed to conduct a coherent conversation while she hovered on the brink of yet another orgasm?
She dragged desperate fingers through her hair. “I… umm… I guess. I have a degree in hospitality, and events organizing seemed the perfect choice when I graduated.”
“Why the perfect choice?” he asked.
“My grandmother owned a B&B in Connecticut when I was young. I spent my summers there when I was a child and loved making up games and activities for the families that came there. It seemed a natural choice when it came to a career.”
“Is Neon your first job?”
She looked up in surprise. “How do you know where I work?”
“You filled in your personal details when you applied to join Indigo.”
“Oh. Yes, I joined as a junior organizer three years ago and was promoted to an account holder last year, before…”
“Before what?”
She thought for a moment and shrugged. There was no harm in letting him know she’d known about him before she joined his trip. “My bosses wanted your business. They asked me to investigate you. Find out if any of your business interests coincided with ours. But the companies you use are in the mega league. When I reported back that I couldn’t find a way in, I stymied my prospects at Neon for a while.”
“Ah, so our meeting wasn’t karmic after all?” He sounded faintly disappointed and the look he gave her was mildly calculating.
“What, you think…? I had no idea you would be in Newark! And my presence on the Indigo trip had nothing to do with work. Besides, considering you had over five thousand applicants to choose from, it would’ve been a huge gamble to take, just on the off chance that I would be chosen.”
“But you were.”
“Would you rather you hadn’t met me?”
“I think we’ve established my feelings on that point. But I’m wondering what you’d have done if the opportunity had arisen…?” he pressed.
She set her glass down. “Zach, I make it a point never to sleep with a client, potential or otherwise.”
“Has the temptation ever arisen?”
“Seventy-five percent of the events I organize are social events—parties, galas, weekend bonding trips. Alcohol-fueled testosterone tends to result in passes being made.”
His hand tightened around his glass, his gaze turning hard as it rested on her. “Has it ever gone beyond making a pass?” he asked silkily.
“Just once. Luckily, my knee-to-crotch reflexes were razor sharp. By the time he sobered up, he’d forgotten the incident.”
He relaxed a little. “So I stymied your chances at a promotion?”
“Sheena, my boss, had a hard-on for getting your business soon after the Indigo Lounge venture kicked off. She’s been dying to expand the company for a while. We submitted a proposal, but it was very thin on the ground due to a lack of info.”
“Most of my companies are listed on the stock market.”
“Yes, but she wanted an extra edge.”
He nodded. “Fair enough. I’d do the same in that situation.”
“Yes, so I visited your New York offices and spoke to one of your press officers about Indigo. She revealed nothing beyond what was already in the public domain.”
He grinned unapologetically.
“But she did tell me about the extra guests you allowed on your planes. I told Keely?—”
“Your sexed-up friend,” he inserted dryly.
Bethany laughed. “Yep. She pushed me into signing up, and I guess the rest is history.”
He shook his head. “Not history. We’re only just beginning, baby.” He rose from his chair, discarding his glass with a casual grace that had her insides clenching with impossible lust. He caught her up and brought her close to his body. She was totally unsurprised to find that his erection hadn’t subsided. One hand gripped her hair, exposing her jaw and neck to his soft kisses, as the other clamped around her waist. “What’s Keely’s last name?”
“Why?” she asked after forcing breath into her lungs.
“Because I owe her big for her role in bringing you into my life.” His tongue rimmed her lips. The action had the immediate and damning effect of liquidizing her insides and wetting her sex.
“Even though you suspected I had an ulterior motive just now?”
He pulled back slightly and gazed down at her. “I don’t apologize for double-checking my place in your life, Bethany. A man in my position has to learn to question any and all angles. Besides, I don’t trust easily.”
“I know. I recall a very thorough frisking in your office.”
One corner of his mouth lifted, but his face remained serious. “Only time will prove both our intentions. I hope you’re okay with that?”
She hesitated. What he said did make sense, although an irrational part of her wanted his trust of her to be immediate and unquestioning. Deep down she knew she trusted him on some level, at least enough for her to have made the decision to abandon the Indigo Lounge trip to come to Paris with him.
But then, she’d trusted Chris implicitly. Until he’d dropped his bombshell in her lap.
Caution was good. Caution was essential.
“Yes. I’m okay with that.”
He exhaled, and a look of relief crossed his face before he slid both hands over her ass and squeezed tight.
When she shuddered in response, he groaned, pulled her closer and lifted her up.
“Put your legs around me, baby.”
She complied, bringing her damp center flush against his rock-hard erection. He started to walk back into the suite. Being this close to his warm, gorgeous body made desire burn hotter.
Unable to wait any longer, she caught his face between her hands and took his mouth in a hot, needy kiss.
He stumbled, and she heard his hand slap the glass door to steady himself. Chest heaving, he deepened the kiss, his tongue sliding against hers in an erotic promise of what his cock would do to her in the very near future.
Needing him more than she’d ever needed anything in her life, she rocked her hips against his rigid length.
“Shit. I can’t think straight when you do that.”
“Good, I don’t want you thinking straight. It’s only fair because I can’t think straight either.” She rubbed her breasts against his chest and was rewarded with another pithy curse.
“Hold on, Peaches. Please, just another minute.”
She whimpered, and he squeezed her ass. She heard the door slide open and they stumbled into the living room. Expecting him to tumble her onto the sofa as he had earlier, she jerked in surprise when he continued walking.
“I don’t have any condoms here.”
She gave another pathetic whimper. It would take at least a couple minutes to get to his suite. That was two minutes too long.
“I want you now, Zach! Please… it hurts.”
“I know, sweet baby. I’ll make it better in a minute. I promise. Just hold on.”
Her fingers dug into his shoulders as he increased his stride. Even before he’d fully entered the bedroom, he was ripping away her panties. Her dress followed as soon as he set her down. His hot gaze glided over her as his hand went to his belt and tugged it off.
The moment he was naked, he grabbed her and threw her on the bed. Before she could draw another breath, two fingers slid into her wet heat, sending her already heightened senses spiraling out of control.
“I’ve been dying to fuck this tight little cunt for the last hour,” he murmured just before he closed his mouth over one hard nipple.
Head rolling back, she spread her thighs wider. “Then what are you waiting for?”