Chapter 13 #3
Ahh…
He signals for the check with a gesture that brooks no argument. As we rise to leave, Drake's gaze snags on something across the restaurant. His expression hardens for a fraction of a second.
“What is it?”
He shakes his head, but I notice the way his jaw tightens and the way his eyes go cold.
My stomach clenches.
And then it's gone. I follow his line of sight but see only the usual crowd of elegant diners. Before I can ask, his hand finds my lower back and he's guiding me toward the exit with an urgency that wasn't there before.
Within minutes we're outside, the cool night air doing nothing to temper the heat burning through my veins.
Drake opens the passenger door and helps me inside, his hand lingering on my lower back a moment longer than necessary.
He rounds the car and slides into the driver's seat, the engine purring to life beneath us.
I expect him to pull into traffic and head back to Redthorne Holdings where our separate bedrooms await.
Instead, he reaches across the console and drags me onto his lap.
I gasp as my knees bracket his hips, my skirt riding up my thighs in a way that should feel indecent. The steering wheel presses against my back. His hands grip my hips with bruising intensity. And then his mouth crushes against mine.
He kisses me like he's drowning and I'm air. Hard. Demanding. His tongue sweeps into my mouth and claims every corner, every secret, every moan I can't contain. I kiss him back with equal ferocity, my fingers tangling in his silver hair and pulling hard enough to make him groan.
His hand finds its way beneath my skirt, shoving my panties aside. I gasp as his fingers sink into me, two at once, stretching and filling while his thumb presses hard against my clit.
"Come for me, my little rose." The command is rough against my ear. "Right here. Right now. Give me your sweetness."
I should be embarrassed. We're in a parked car on a public street. Anyone could walk by. Anyone could see the fogged windows and know exactly what's happening inside.
But I don't care. I can't care. Not when his fingers are curling inside me and his thumb is circling my clit and his mouth is hot against my neck, sucking a mark into my skin that I'll wear tomorrow like a brand.
The orgasm slams into me without warning. I shatter around his fingers, my whole body convulsing as I bite down on his shoulder to keep from screaming. He works me through it, relentless, until I'm shaking and gasping and completely undone.
He withdraws his fingers slowly, and I watch through heavy-lidded eyes as he brings them to his mouth and sucks them clean.
"Perfect," he rasps.
Before I can respond, he's lifting me off his lap and settling me back into the passenger seat. His movements are tender now, careful, like I'm something fragile he's afraid of breaking. He buckles my seatbelt and presses a kiss to my temple before turning his attention to the road.
The drive back to Redthorne is a blur of city lights and lingering tremors. Drake keeps his hand on my thigh the entire time, warm and grounding. I lean my head against the window and try to process what just happened. What keeps happening between us.
When the car pulls into the underground garage, I'm still floating somewhere between satisfied and desperate for more.
Drake rounds the car and opens my door, helping me out on legs that still haven't steadied.
His arm wraps around my waist, anchoring me to his side as he guides me toward the private elevator tucked into the back corner of the garage.
The brushed gold doors slide open at his approach, and he pulls me inside, pressing me against his chest as the car begins to rise.
I melt into him, my cheek against his heart, his chin resting on the top of my head. The steady thump beneath my ear grounds me in a way nothing else has in years. For a moment, everything is perfect. Quiet. Safe.
Then his phone rings.
Drake sighs, the sound rumbling through his chest as he fishes the device from his pocket.
"What?"
The voice on the other end is muffled, but I recognize Luca's cadence even through the tiny speaker.
"Tomorrow," Drake says, his arm tightening around me. "Whatever it is, it can wait."
More muffled words. Urgent this time.
Drake's jaw tightens. "Luca, I don't give a damn about—"
He stops. Listens. I watch his expression shift from irritation to resignation, and disappointment curls through my chest.
"Fine. Ten minutes." He ends the call and looks down at me, something like regret softening his features. "The shipping manifests I reviewed this morning. Luca left them on my desk for signature, but they have to go out tonight or we will lose the window."
I settle my hands on his chest, the feel of his taut pec beneath my palm only serves to keep the live wires of my libido cranked. "It's okay." I try to mean it. "Business doesn't stop because we..."
I trail off, not sure how to finish that sentence.
"Because I made you come in my car?" His voice drops to a growl that makes my thighs clench. He tips my chin up and pushes my glasses into place with a gentle push.
"Business can go to hell. But this particular contract has a midnight deadline, and Luca will never let me hear the end of it if I miss it."
The elevator stops and the doors slide open onto the executive floor. Drake keeps his hand on my lower back as we walk through the darkened hallways, the building empty and silent around us. Our footsteps echo against the marble floors, and every shadow seems to hold its breath as we pass.
His office is exactly as we left it an hour ago. Our empty food containers are still on the desk. Drake crosses to the desk and flips through the stack of papers Luca left, his pen scratching across the signature lines with efficient strokes.
"Wait here," he says, gathering the documents. "I'll take these to Luca's office. Two minutes."
He disappears through the door, and I'm left alone in the dim glow of the city lights.
I catch my reflection in the dark windows and wince. My hair is a disaster, tangled and wild from his fingers. My lipstick is smeared across my chin. My skirt is wrinkled beyond saving. I look like a woman who was just thoroughly ravished in the front seat of a car, which I suppose I am.
I try to smooth my hair into something presentable. Wipe the lipstick from my face with the back of my hand. Tug my skirt back into place and straighten my blouse where it's come untucked.
I'm still fussing with my collar when the door opens behind me.
Drake's footsteps cross the room. Before I can turn, his hands close around my shoulders and spin me to face him.
"I told you to wait." His voice is low, dangerous. "Not fix yourself like you're ashamed of what we did."
"I wasn't—"
His mouth captures mine, swallowing my protest. The kiss is hard, demanding, a claim staked with lips and teeth and tongue. His hands fist in my hair, tilting my head back to give him better access. I grip his lapels and hold on as he kisses me like he's trying to consume me whole.
We don't make it to the penthouse.
He pushes me against his desk, clearing it with a swipe of his arm. The cold surface bites into my back through my thin blouse. His mouth finds my neck, my collarbone, the swell of my breasts above the silk. His hands are everywhere at once, tracing paths of fire across my skin.
I want him. God, I want him more than I've ever wanted anything.
But.
My virginity is the one thing I've protected through five years of Victor's threats and Jonah's manipulation.
The one piece of myself that hasn't been bargained away or stripped from me by circumstance.
Jonah called me frigid when I refused him.
Told me I was broken, that no man would ever want a woman so cold.
I believed him for a while. Hated myself for it.
But I wasn't cold. I wasn't broken. I just refused to give something so precious to someone who made me feel like I owed it to him.
Drake makes me feel wanted. Cherished. Like my body is a gift he's desperate to unwrap rather than a debt I need to pay.
And that terrifies me more than Jonah's cruelty ever did.
Because if I give myself to Drake now, while his name is still on the contract that owns my debt, how will I ever know if I chose him freely? How will I ever know if this is real?
I need to come to him on my own terms. Not because he bought me. Not because I owe him. Because I want him and only him, with no shadows of obligation hanging between us.
"Wait." My voice quavers on the word.
The word comes out choked, barely a whisper, but Drake hears it. He stops immediately, stepping back so fast I nearly stumble. His chest heaves with ragged breaths and his eyes burn with desire, but he doesn't touch me.
He stopped. The moment I asked.
"We can’t do this. Not here. Drake, I'm not ready." The words scrape against my throat, raw with frustration and shame. "I want to be. God, you have no idea how much I want to be. But I can't."
"Tell me why." His voice is gentle despite the obvious strain. "Help me understand."
I press my palms against his desk and force myself to meet his eyes. "When I was with Jonah, I never told him about Victor. About the money. Because I didn't want him to think I was only there for what he could give me. I didn't want to become a transaction."
Understanding flickers across his features.
"You bought my debt." I swallow hard against the tightness in my throat. "You own it now. If I sleep with you, I become..." I trail off, unable to finish the sentence.
"A live-in escort." Drake's voice carries no judgment, only comprehension.
"There's no shame in that arrangement. For the women who choose it.
" I force the words out past the embarrassment burning in my cheeks.
"But it's not who I am. It's not who I want to be.
And if I give myself to you now, before I've figured out what this is between us, I won't be able to look at myself in the mirror come morning. "
Drake is quiet for a long moment. Then he cups my face in his hands with a tenderness that makes my eyes sting.
"When you're ready." He presses a kiss to my forehead, soft and reverent. "Not before, little rose."
He takes my hand and leads me out of his office, down the hallway to the private elevator. We ride up to the penthouse in silence, but it's not uncomfortable. His thumb traces circles on the back of my hand, and the simple touch grounds me in ways I didn't know I needed.
At my bedroom door, he stops. Cups my face again. Kisses the tip of my nose with a playfulness that makes me smile despite the ache still throbbing between my thighs.
Then he kisses my lips. Soft. Barely there. A promise rather than a demand.
"Tonight I'm going to lie in my bed," he murmurs against my mouth, "and it will be your name on my lips when I come again. The door between us will be unlocked."
If there was ever a dare issued, that is it.
The words send flames licking through my body, igniting every nerve ending with renewed desire.
"Drake..." His name escapes me like a plea, and I drag him in for another kiss.
This one isn't gentle. It's desperate and hungry and everything I've been trying to deny. He groans into my mouth and lifts me effortlessly, my legs wrapping around his waist as my back hits the wall beside my door.
His cock presses against the thin fabric covering my pussy, hard and thick even through his trousers. The barrier between us makes me furious with want. I can't sleep with my boss. Not yet. Not like this.
But God, I want to. I want to so badly I burn to the very core of my being.
I'm panting hard, grinding against him shamelessly, and then he reaches between us and strokes the pad of his thumb over my throbbing clit through my soaked panties.
I explode.
The orgasm crashes through me like a wave, pulling a cry from my throat that echoes through the empty hallway. I shatter in his arms, trembling and gasping and completely undone.
He lowers me to the floor before I've even stopped shaking, and then he kneels before me like a supplicant at an altar. His fingers hook into the waistband of my panties and pull them to the side, exposing my swollen flesh to the cool air.
"Drake, what are you—"
His tongue drags along the seam of my pussy, gathering my release on his tongue, and the question dies in my throat. He groans at the taste of me, the sound vibrating against my sensitive flesh, and I have to grip his shoulders to keep from collapsing.
One long, slow lick. That's all he takes. A taste. A promise. A preview of what waits for me when I'm ready to claim it.
Then he rises, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and fixes me with those hungry eyes.
"You know where to find me, little rose."
He leaves me in the hallway outside my door, legs trembling, panties ruined, body still humming with the aftershocks of pleasure.
I stumble into my room and close the door behind me, leaning against the wood while I try to remember how to breathe.
He stopped when I asked. Immediately. Without question. Without pressure. Without making me feel guilty for saying no.
Jonah pushed and pouted and made me feel like the villain for having boundaries. Jonah took what he wanted and called me frigid when I didn't give him more.
Drake stopped. And then he knelt before me and tasted my pleasure like it was a gift he didn't deserve.
Maybe this man is different after all.
I press my hand to my chest and feel my heart racing beneath my palm. Want and terror war inside me, each one fighting for dominance.
I want him. I want him so much it scares me.
And for the first time since Victor Kedrov showed up at my door five years ago, I'm starting to believe desire might kill me before any evil in this world has a chance to end me.