Chapter 57
Fifty-Seven
I felt him before I woke, his presence alerting my dreams that he was about to steal me from them and jerk me back into his world.
The cotton sheet was soft on my cheek as I lay on my front, sprawled in sleep.
I felt him nudge my legs apart and my body responded without my permission, arching into him purely on instinct.
My mind hadn’t caught up yet and it wasn’t until he slid inside me that I came back to the world.
His fucking of me wasn’t a romantic wake up call, it was a proprietary right.
It fell into his category of see, want, take, have .
I didn’t fight it because if I was truly honest with myself, it was the only time I felt right.
Everything else could be so fucking convoluted, but these things he did to me, they always made sense.
I don’t know how long he slowly drove in and out at the most maddening pace before he finally filled me, marking me up in a way I loved but didn’t understand why.
He pulled out gently and I lay there, replete, while he went to the bathroom, returning with a washcloth.
He turned me onto my back and cleaned me as I finally blinked myself awake.
I expected him to be as naked as me but instead I found him in his usual charcoal three piece, sans jacket.
He hadn’t even loosened his tie. I’d been so lost in pleasure that I hadn’t noticed he wasn’t naked like me.
“You’re already dressed? Am I late?” I looked at the clock but I had nearly an hour before we had to leave.
“No, I just had an errand to run while you were asleep.” He sat on the edge of the bed, one hand wrapped around my ankle, his thumb stroking idly.
“Only you would dress in a three piece suit just to run an errand.” I stretched, moaning at the feel of my muscles waking up for the day. I sat up on my elbows and gave him a lazy grin. He returned with his own tight one. He looked stiff, nervous almost.
“What’s wrong? You look all…floopy.” I waved my hand at his general weirdness.
“Floopy isn’t a word, Lola.”
“It’s a state of mind, and you’ve got it.”
“I’m fine. Eat your breakfast.” He gestured to the night stand beside me and I noticed for the first time the chunky blueberry muffin sitting there.
I scooped it up, broke off a piece, and popped it into my mouth, deciding to forget about his mood for now.
His phone rang then and I listened to him work as I ate, brushed my teeth, and did what I could to fix my hair and face.
It didn’t escape my notice that the grey dress Alfie had slipped me out of before I crashed out last night had since been ripped down the middle and was now lying in two dejected pieces.
He hung up the call and began swiping on his phone screen.
I grabbed the bed sheet and wrapped it around myself, sidling up next to him.
I glanced over his shoulder and found him scanning blueprints.
“What are those for?”
“A new build in Milan.” He swiped and the image changed from a blueprint to a 3D graphic of a hotel. To say it was impressive was an understatement.
“Is that where you’re going next?”
“It’s where I’m supposed to be already.” He gave me a small smile and eyed the bed sheet I was wrapped in. “That’s an interesting wardrobe choice.”
“Well, I didn’t bring any spare clothes and since the dress you insisted I wear yesterday is now ripped in two…”
“You need to wear some of the other clothes I bought for you; the clothes you hated?” It wasn’t like I had much of a choice, this was his doing, not mine. He slipped his gaze from mine, returning his attention to his phone. “Unfortunately, I had all of those clothes removed yesterday.”
“Oh. Well. I guess I really will be walking through the lobby in a towel,” I joked but he didn’t respond. I waited a moment more, then my patience ran out and I slapped the phone out of his hand. It landed with a soft thud on the thick carpet. “Okay, what’s going on with you?”
He sighed and ran his hands through his hair. “Lola, you’re about as subtle as a freight train.”
I folded my arms, trying to look serious but failing miserably with his bed sheet wrapped around my shoulders.
“You’re scaring me, Alfie. Whenever you’re like this it’s because you’ve hurt me already and you’re about to hurt me more.
Please tell me what’s going on.” His body was rigid, his shoulders stiff, and I mentally prepared myself for whatever was about to come.
“I’m nervous,” he said eventually. I raised my eyebrows and tried very hard not to smile. That was the last thing I’d expected him to say.
“You’re nervous? You, Alfie Tell, arrogant arse and conqueror of the world, are nervous?”
“Don’t laugh at me.” He scowled, his tone like venom. I drew back, shocked at his reaction to my poking a little fun.
“I’m not. I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I’m just surprised.” He eyed me for one long moment and I scoured his face, trying to figure out what had soured his mood overnight. He stood, running a hand through his hair before he turned to face me again.
“I know that you think I dismiss everything you say, but in truth, you have no idea how your words reach me, how they cut. You swarm my mind, O’Connell, ravaging my rules, confusing what I think I know with your new world view.
” He paused, his steel greys running over my sheet-clad body.
“Last night, I couldn’t sleep. I sat right there,” he pointed to the chaise-lounge, “holding that wretched dress, and I watched you as you slept. Everything that we’d fought about, everything you’d said to me, played over and over?—”
“Alfie, we already mended all of that,” I cut in but he just glossed straight over me.
“I kept thinking about yesterday morning, how unhappy you looked as you put on that dress and how you didn’t have anything else to wear today and would have to wear it again.”
“So you tore it up?” I asked, trying to figure out his logic.
“I don’t ever want to see you look like that again,” he said, his gaze dark.
“Like what?”
“Like me.” Pain flashed in his eyes as he spoke, pain at showing weakness, at admitting fault. I wanted to comfort him, to tell him he was being melodramatic, but he wasn’t.
He gave a decisive sigh and looked away from me. “There’s something for you in the walk-in.” He sounded like a man resigned to his fate and just that tone alone made me afraid of whatever was in that closet.
I pulled the bed sheet closer around me and, with a nerve I didn’t feel, I crossed the room and opened the closet doors.
As he’d said, all of my clothes were gone.
Every stark, crisp item, every catwalk-worthy shoe, erased as if they’d never been.
Alfie’s were still there, his costumes hanging in perfect precision along the rack, but my side was empty.
I scanned the room and landed on the chest of drawers at the end of the closet, and the black box and matching bag next to it.
Harrods was written in gold cursive along the lid and a black silk bow sealed the box shut.
I fingered the delicate material, my heart pounding in my chest. I turned.
He was standing in the doorway as if he was too afraid to cross the threshold.
“You went to Harrods this morning? All the way to London?”
“I had them open early for me.”
Of course he did .
“Alfie, I really appreciate the sentiment but if this is just another dress picked out by your personal shopper?—”
“I didn’t use her.” He lifted his chin, as if daring me to laugh at him. Is that what this was about? He was nervous because he’d bought me a gift?
I opened the bag first, and pulled out the two smaller silk bags inside. In one I found bright red ballet pumps and in the other, sunglasses in a matching colour.
My bottom lip trembled as I figured out what he’d done.
“Alfie, what is this?”
“This is me endeavouring to do better.” He watched me intently, his gaze so penetrative I could practically feel it through my skin.
I moved to the box and, with shaking hands, I untied it and lifted the lid, my eyes filling with tears as I discovered what was inside.
The simple dress was the brightest red I’d ever seen in my life and made from soft, relaxed cotton. I held it up, my heart feeling like it was about to burst.
“Say something, O’Connell.” He looked like a man poised on the edge of a cliff and it staggered me how huge this was for him. It broke my heart how terrified he was that he’d gotten it wrong and I had to wonder if he had done this before, if he had given gifts and had them thrown back in his face.
I turned and held the dress out to him.
“Dress me,” I whispered. His eyes flashed, the tension leaving his body, replaced by a different kind of energy.
He took the dress from my hands, carefully placing it back in the box.
He pulled the bed sheet from my body and I let it drop and pool at my feet, shivering as his gaze grazed over me, proprietary.
How many times had we stood like this—he fully dressed in his suit and I in nothing but my skin?
More times than I could count and the metaphor was never lost on me.
He reached around me and pulled an underwear set from a drawer.
My breath hitched as he knelt. He lifted each foot, slipping the cream lace underwear on and guiding them up my legs, following their path with a trail of kisses.
His hands explored me in a way that wasn’t sexual, but worshipping.
He was adoring me. They mounted the curves of my hips and the bends of my waist with innate focus.
He was a passionate, intense man and at the moment, the entirety of his powers was focused on me.
Yet, I knew he wasn’t going to take me. I don’t know how I knew it, I just did.
Still on his knees, he took the pumps and slipped them onto my feet.
He ran his hands over them, pressing at my toes to make sure they fit.
Satisfied, he stood and, trailing his fingertips along the skin of my thighs, my waist, he retrieved the matching bra from the drawer.
I reached to take it but he just fixed me with a look that had me drawing my hand away immediately.
“Turn around,” he instructed and I did as he asked.
His fingers left a heated trail down my spine and I bit my lip, stifling a moan.
His arms came around me and he slipped the bra on easily.
I held the cups in place as he fastened it with expert fingers.
He took such care of me, paying attention to the minutest of details.
He checked the straps and tightened them a little, then looked me over to ensure it fit properly.
It dawned on me then, as his focus zeroed in on me to the expense of everything else, just how dangerous he had the potential to be.
He would stalk, he would be ruthless, but he would also be protective and loving.
He was entirely two sides of a very precarious coin.
He lifted the dress and I raised my arms. The dress fell over me and the feel of it was just right.
He guided the thin straps over my shoulders and traced his fingers over the heart-shaped neckline encasing my breasts.
He turned me and it didn’t escape me that he never moved, merely manoeuvred me around him.
It was such an arrogant thing to do and yet, I didn’t hate it.
In fact, I was coming to admire him for it.
He fastened the dress, guiding the zip up easily.
His arms came around me to fasten the tie at my waist and I leant into him, baring my neck and sighing as he kissed me there.
When the tie was tied and I was finally dressed, he tilted my chin and claimed my mouth in a soft kiss.
He pressed his forehead to mine and for a long moment, he just held me.
I drew away first and, grabbing the sunglasses, I took his hand and led him to the mirror.
My face split into a smile when I saw myself.
I looked beautiful. I did an experimental spin and giggled as the material tickled my thighs.
Alfie stood behind me, watching on in his grayscale costume.
I grinned at him in the mirror and he gave me a small, almost sad smile.
I turned and pressed a hand to his cheek.
“You did a good thing, you don’t need to look so guilty. I love this so much you have no idea.” I grinned again, practically bouncing on my toes.
“You break my heart, O’Connell. The things I do to you…and it takes so little to make you happy again.”
“You haven’t done anything so bad yet that can’t be mended,” I told him, but I didn’t miss the dark look that flitted across his face. It was gone as quickly as it came and, before I could think more of it, the shrill sound of his phone pierced the air. I was really starting to hate that thing.
I pushed up on my toes and kissed him, before slipping my new sunglasses on and dancing to the door.
I made my way downstairs, his lilting Italian following me as I went.
I grabbed my bag from the foyer table, stopping for a moment to smell the vase of bleeding hearts that always sat there.
It was the last thing you saw on your way out and the first thing you saw on your way in.
I caught Alfie’s eye and gave him a shy smile.
I felt giddy and that only got worse when he slipped his Ray-Bans on and stalked to the lift, still speaking in flawless Italian.
He held the phone away from his ear. “Are you ready?”
“Yeah, just a sec.” I dug around in my bag, searching for my pills and my heart plummeted when I came up empty.
No, no no! I’d put my pills in the little inside pocket three days ago, I was certain of it!
I’d taken one yesterday morning and zipped the pocket back up.
I felt around inside my bag, wondering if there was a hole in the lining the pills could have fallen through.
Nothing. They must have fallen out somehow. Perhaps in my van, or at work maybe…
Why did I have to be such an idiot?
“Problem?” Alfie asked. The lift opened in front of him and he held it.
Gentle, loving Alfie of moments ago was now sharing space with business Alfie, and business Alfie had shit to do.
I closed my bag quickly and shook my head.
After our first night together, he’d gone to very illegal lengths to make sure I got my birth control.
He’d have a fit if he knew I was being so careless.
“No. Not at all.” I smiled and stepped into the lift.
Goddammit, Lola.