8. Callum
CALLUM
This is wrong.
So damn wrong.
And I should get the hell away from her before I touch her again, take her again.
I should be far, far away from the irresistible Ivy Carmichael.
Because once was not enough.
That did not sate me.
But it would be more wrong to leave.
Besides, I know what she needs now, and I want her to feel good, to fully, completely relax. I pull up my pants, grab a tissue, and clean her back, then lift her into my arms. “Come here, beautiful. Let’s run you a bath.”
“Mmm,” she murmurs against my chest, as I carry her from her office across the plush sapphire-blue carpeting to the massive bathroom in her penthouse suite—a bathroom that’s bigger than some homes.
I set her on the edge of the spacious tub, and she’s still blissed-out, sex-drunk and happy. God, it’s a great look, and I’d love to put it on her face again and again.
That’s the trouble.
I reach for the tap, turning it on.
“This is perfect,” she says, murmuring.
“I thought you might enjoy it.”
She draws a deep breath, sighing happily. “But I think I could also fall asleep right now.”
“Do you want me to turn this off?”
She shakes her head. “I never turn down a bath.”
I grin, then try to hide it. I should not enjoy knowing these things about her so much.
I should not be delighting in all the little details my brain is privy to about the hotel heiress.
Like how she likes to unwind at the end of the day.
How she likes her cocktails and a little music.
How she wants a massage or a bath. How she likes warm, fuzzy socks when she gets into bed at night.
And how so much of that comes from her mom. “She always said take care of everyone else, but at the end of the day, take care of yourself so you can replenish for the next day,” Ivy told me once, quoting her mother.
Yes, Ivy comes from ridiculous wealth.
From absolute privilege.
But she also has a good heart, comes from a good family. She’s tried to do good with what she has, to give back, giving so much of her money away to help others—to charities benefiting children and animals, and to scientific research.
Those are all part and parcel of why she’s so damn attractive.
Everything about her lures me to her.
Including this gorgeous, sinful body.
Which is why I should leave.
But I desperately want to stay.
I want to stay the whole damn night, and into the next day, and the next.
I clench my teeth, like I can fight off my longing for her with grit and brute strength.
“Are you okay?” she asks, perhaps sensing the tension in me. She lifts a hand, touching my jaw. “You look wound up.”
“I’m okay,” I say.
Her brow furrows. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” I try to stick to simple answers, because anything more might lead to me cracking open my heart to her, and that won’t do at all.
“Okay.” Her expression goes a little sheepish. “Do you mind popping out for a second? I have to pee.”
I laugh at the request.
“Hey! Peeing is normal,” she says.
“I’m well aware,” I say, standing.
“Especially after epic sex,” she adds.
I groan, half wishing she didn’t just remind me of how utterly amazing that was.
I make my way to the door. “I can just go.”
Her expression turns to steel. “No. Come back in a minute.”
I leave, shutting the door behind me, scrubbing a hand over my jaw. I pace through her suite, stopping at the floor-to-ceiling windows that look out over the Strip.
It’s barely nine.
Night is only now beginning.
Across the way, the fountains at the Bellagio sway in their nighttime dance, arcing over the lake in front of the hotel.
The sleek Cosmopolitan glitters nearby.
And in here, I’m surrounded by all this soft sensuality, by beauty, by jewels.
One man, alone at the top of a luxury hotel owned by the woman he just slept with. A woman he should not have touched.
I can’t possess the fountains. I can’t have the lights on the Strip, and I damn well can’t keep Ivy Carmichael as mine.
I close my eyes, resting my forehead against the cool glass. I want to go to my father and ask him what the hell I should do. Turn to him for advice, as I’ve always done when I’ve needed an anchor, a guide. He’d open the door, let me in, offer me a beer.
Then tell me to listen to my head.
But I don’t have to ask him, because I know the answer he’d give me.
There is only one answer.
Do your job, son.
Guilt claws at me, scratching at my chest.
I don’t have a clear head around Ivy, and I need clarity to do my job. To take care of her.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I force myself to recall the emailed letters from her stalker. Your parents asked me to look out for you. Your father needed me to, since he wouldn’t be here to care for his family anymore. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I watch you.
They were all lies based on information assembled from public records, from details anyone could glean about one of the city’s best-known families.
The man who followed her one night, right up to the elevator bank as she was about to step inside a lift, could have been anyone.
That’s what I have to remember.
He was anyone, and he got too near to her.
And I have to make sure no one gets that close to her again.
I turn around, march back to the bathroom, and rap on the open door.
“Come in,” she calls out, her voice a siren song.
Don’t let it affect you, man. Don’t let it affect you at all.
But everything about her affects me. Including, and maybe especially, the way she looks in that tub.
Dear God.
Give me the strength to resist the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.
She’s in the tub, surrounded by bubbles, her blonde curls piled high on her head in a messy bun, her face glowing.
Like she’s just been fucked good, and she has. Oh hell, has she ever.
“Sit,” she says, patting the edge of the tub.
Rubbing a hand across the back of my neck, I cross the distance to her, my shoes echoing against the tiled floor. I do as she asks.
She licks her lips. “We should talk. I can tell you’re stressed.”
I push out a laugh. “That’s what I say to you, Ivy.”
“I can read you too, Callum. I can tell what’s going on behind those eyes.” Her tone is like a caress, kind and caring.
I swallow roughly. “Yeah? You can?”
She nods. “I can.”
“What am I thinking?”
Her expression shifts from soft to deadly serious. “That you regret this.”
I flinch, my voice gruff. “Never. I don’t regret this in the least. Never think that. Because I don’t.”
She arches a brow. “Are you sure, Callum?”
“I am positive. Being with you was incredible. It was everything I dreamed of,” I say, giving her the bare truth.
“Me too.”
“It was a gift,” I add, my throat tight. I drag a hand through my hair, mussing it up. “I don’t regret it,” I say, heaving a sigh. I hate to do this. I hate to say this. But I have to be honest. “But, Ivy, I have to do my job. I have to protect you. I can’t let anything happen to you. Ever. ”
She nods, her lips pressed together, looking so tough, so stoic. And it’s killing me.
“If anything happened to you, do you know what it would do to me?”
“What would it do to you?”
Kill me , I want to say. It’d kill me. “I won’t let it happen,” I say, answering my own question indirectly.
She lifts a hand from the water, stretches toward me, and cups my cheek. “You’ve never let anything happen to me. You’ve protected me every night for the last year,” she says, her wet hand against my face. A tiny smile tugs at her lips. “You have bubbles on you.”
I give her a small smile in return. “Because you are the queen of bubble baths.”
With her free hand, she pretends to splash some water at me. “You should join me.”
I groan, wanting to, desperate to. Instead, I clasp my hand over hers on my face, holding it there. “That guy could have hurt you. He could have seriously injured you. And his jail sentence was only for three months.”
“And he hasn’t been here since. No one has gotten near me. Your team is amazing. You’re amazing. I don’t even get creepy emails.”
“Good. That’s how it should be. That’s how it needs to be.”
She draws a breath, her tone heavy. “You don’t think we should do this again.” She takes a beat. “Do you?”
She looks at me, so vulnerable, so open, and I want to rip off my shirt, shed my pants, get in there with her, and take her in my arms.
Hold her.
But I don’t want to slip.
Mistakes are deadly.
Mistakes cost lives.
My father taught me that. If you can’t do an important job at 100 percent, don’t do it at all. There is too much risk.
He worked in security too. There is always risk in our field.
I bring her hand to my mouth, kissing her knuckles softly and tenderly. “Ivy Carmichael, there is nothing I want more than to have you again. To be with you every damn night. But my mission is to keep you safe. I don’t want to cloud my judgment. I need to focus to do my job.”
She seems to absorb this, her lips quivering for a second, then she nods, fierce and tough. “And we’re friends too. I’ve come to see you as my friend. You know what? I want you as my friend.”
My heart squeezes. I don’t deserve her sweetness. “You’re my friend too.”
“So, tonight was like Stone’s concert. One night only. We won’t let it happen again,” she says.
“Exactly.”
I stay there for a few more minutes on the edge of her tub, making small talk about Stone, laughing about him, talking about music and her sister and this city, and it all feels so natural, like we can slide right back into the way we were.
As if tonight never happened.
But if I don’t leave soon, I never will. I stand. “Do you want a towel?”
“Yes, please.”
I cross over to the towel rack, grab a fluffy one, and return to her. She nibbles on the corner of her lips. “I guess you better turn around.”
Nothing pains me more than looking away when she rises from the tub. Nothing. All I want is to wrap this around her, carry her to bed, and kiss her everywhere.
Then take her again.
I want to make it hurt and then make her feel good.
Instead, I tear myself away. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I leave, and it’s like I’m leaving a piece of myself behind. Because there is no way I’m getting her out of my system.
Ever.