Chapter 41 Ella
ELLA
The weight of the mattress shifts beneath me. A body presses against mine. Fingertips skim down my cheekbone. My mind whirrs with worry before a sense of calm settles over me.
“I’ve missed you,” Asher whispers against my skin where a sliver of it peeks out between my silk pajama top and shorts. His lips trace their way up my stomach as he pushes my top up with his rough, calloused hands. My eyes flutter open as the night air brushes across my exposed breasts.
“What are you doing here?” I gasp, taking in Asher’s beautiful, shadowed face.
“I had to see you.”
I hiss as his tongue traces my hardened nipple, and then I groan when he takes it in his mouth.
“Asher,” I whimper, threading my hands through his hair. I can’t believe he’s here. His touch, his scent, his voice, the press of his large body against mine brings a sense of giddy relief. “I missed you, too,” I confess. “Nothing feels right without you.”
“I need you,” he growls, tearing my shirt over my head then stripping my shorts and underwear off in one desperate yank.
Before I can respond, his tongue traces my center, and my hips buck off the bed.
Sparks of pleasure burst through me at the feel of his mouth on me, of the scratch of his five-o’clock shadow grazing the sensitive skin of my inner thighs.
“Fuck, I missed the taste of this pussy.”
He eats me like a starved man, then slides one, then two fingers inside me as he sucks on my clit.
“Yes, oh god,” I moan, reveling in the feel of him.
I wrap my legs around his back as he pumps his fingers in and out of me, hitting that perfect spot.
Tingles race down my spine as Asher, who knows every inch, every secret of my body, works it as if he’s worshipping it.
A second later I cry out as a flood of pleasure, relief, and unadulterated happiness surges through me.
“That’s right, come for me, baby.”
My orgasm has barely subsided when Asher lines up his cock to my entrance and shoves it inside me in a single thrust.
“Ella,” he hisses. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He grits his teeth as we both adjust to our connection, then he starts moving, thrusting in and out of me harder than he ever has before. It’s both pleasure and pain, and so all-consuming that I can’t even think. I can only feel.
Our lips collide and I can taste myself on his tongue. He kisses me like he fucks me, like a crazed, starved man barely hanging onto his sanity.
I meet his hips thrust for thrust and our hands and arms are a frenzied mess of bruising touches as we frantically cling to one another.
“I missed you,” he rasps against my mouth. “I love you. Never leave me again.”
“I didn’t leave you.” I pull my mouth away and kiss my way up the side of his throat. “You sent me away.”
“I had to keep you safe.”
“I’m safe.”
He pulls back, his eyes meeting mine in the dark. “I had to keep you safe.”
I reach up to grasp his cheek with my hand, but he tenses, his whole body turning rigid. He climbs off me, then off the bed and out of sight.
“Asher?” I call out, sitting up. I scramble off the bed behind him, but I can’t see anything in the dark.
Where did he go?
“Asher?” I yell again as I step out onto the indoor/outdoor loft.
A light breeze rustles the leaves of the trees and the sound of insects chirping and buzzing fills the air.
“Asher, where are you?”
I make my way toward the stairs, but trip over something in the middle of the floor. I right myself and look down. As I do, a scream tears from my throat.
It’s the woman. The one from the image Flores showed me.
She lies sprawled and naked on my balcony.
Her dead eyes are somehow still filled with fear and pain.
Her mouth is pulled open, as if stuck in a gasp.
Her beautiful skin is marred and mangled.
Her blood puddles, flowing away from her.
It spills down the stairs with a steady drip, drip, drip.
“No,” I wheeze. “No!”
“I have to keep you safe!” Asher’s voice booms from everywhere and nowhere, all at once.
I jerk awake with another scream.
I pant and sob and my hands shake as they swipe away the tears trailing down my cheeks.
It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real.
She’s not here.
But neither is Asher.
My heart plummets in my chest. I thought it was real. I thought he was here, and everything inside me felt whole again. The echoes of his voice, of his touches, whisper across my skin and my mind—the bliss of it is almost euphoric.
Then the pain at the loss of him carves into me like the edge of a blade.
“Asher,” I whimper, my voice quivering.
How can the pain of losing dream Asher feel as devastating as when I lost the real one weeks ago?
I don’t know, and yet, it does.
I run my hands through my hair. I hug my knees to my chest. I can’t get that dream out of my head. It felt so real—until it turned into a nightmare.
The vision of the dead woman flashes across my mind.
I take a deep, steadying breath, but it does nothing to calm my racing heart. A cacophony of thoughts slam into me, confusing the hell out of me. I miss Asher. I want Asher. I’m mad at Asher. I’m terrified of his enemies and what they’re capable of.
The image of the woman is all I see when I blink.
I climb off the bed and open a window, one on the opposite side of the room as the indoor/outdoor balcony. I take in a long, shuddering breath, and force my thundering heartbeat to quiet as I listen to the soft calls of birds and the hum of insects. This place is beautiful. This place is safe.
And now I understand, at least to a degree, why Asher did what he did.
Part of me is still furious. He let his fear rule him, and he made an insane choice to drug me and haul me across the globe without my consent.
The anger I feel from that is valid . . .
but if Asher was under that same threat, if my choices became keeping him safe and keeping him from being one of Volkov’s victims—I would hide him away, too.
I would do questionable things to keep him safe.
I know I would. I can’t lie to myself and say that I wouldn’t.
Because nothing matters more to me than his life.
And I know he feels the same about me.
“You okay?” Flores asks me over a late breakfast the next morning. Her eyes are slightly concerned as they take in my appearance.
I’m sure I look like shit.
“Had trouble sleeping.”
She nods in acknowledgment and nothing more needs to be said. She hasn’t been with me for as long as Jenkins has, but in the time we’ve had together, she’s become good at reading my moods and tells—and I’m sure she’s filled in the blank as to why I had a shit night of sleep last night.
“I’ve just had a message come through,” Jenkins says, coming into the kitchen. “I missed the call, but I got a voicemail from Mr. Langford. He wants you at the memorial for his grandfather tomorrow.”
The fork freezes mid-air toward my mouth. “He does?”
“He said the press is hounding him about your absence, and his family thinks it will be in their best interest to have you there. Your absence will cause such a media circus they’re afraid it will distract from the event.”
“And after the memorial? Am I to come back here? Or will I stay in New York?”
“The message didn’t say anything about that. You’ll probably have to take that up with Mr. Langford after the event.”
Hope blooms inside me. No matter my confused feelings about Asher, one thing is undeniable, and that’s how much I miss him. I want to see him. And I want him to hold me and tell me everything is going to be okay.
After hours of restless thoughts last night, something inside me shifted. Even though I’m still hurt by the situation, I can’t help but want Asher. And I want to know if the visions of our future that I pictured are still possible—because despite everything, I want them to be.
“The Langford jet isn’t able to come get us because it’s en route with Sterling from London,” Jenkins goes on, “but Mr. Langford sent another jet. I’ve done the calculations, and we need to leave within the next two hours to make it to the airport in time.
The jet is set to take off in fifteen hours, since we have such a long travel time to get to the airport, which means, by the time we take off and fly to New York, we’ll be arriving just in time for the memorial.
So, Ella, you’re going to need to pack whatever clothes and makeup and hair stuff you need to be photo ready the minute we land.
We’ll go straight from the airport to the memorial. ”
“Got it.”
I breathe a sigh of relief at the fact that the house came stocked with an entire wardrobe, not that I’ve worn a fraction of it.
How, when, and why Asher had it filled with not only casual clothes (the only things I’ve worn since I’ve been here) but with work-appropriate attire and formal clothes including gowns and dresses, I don’t know—but right now I’m glad for the fact that he’s always thorough with details in everything he does.
I think there’s a black dress that will work perfectly, and I cross my fingers that it fits.
“And, Ms. Hale, as we travel, we’re trusting that you don’t divulge where you’ve been to anyone.”
“How would I do that? I don’t even know where I’m at.”
“I’m sure you’ll pick up some clues along the way, even if you don’t know any definitive locations.”
I snort. “My sense of direction is as hopeless as my cooking. I’d get lost with GPS and a map; you don’t need to worry about me giving up your secrets.”
“Be that as it may, remember, the official story is that you’ve been on a much-needed vacation, and you can leave it at that.”
“Understood. I’ll go get ready and pack.”
The hope inside me grows until it’s a dizzying level of excitement.
After six long, emotionally draining weeks, I finally get to be back with Asher.
I ache to see him, to touch him. My world is just not right when he’s not in it, and the thought of this torture coming to an end is the sweetest kind of relief.
I just hope it’s the kind of relief that lasts.