Phantom: Her Ruthless Fiancé: 50 Loving States, Kentucky (Ruthless Triad)

by Theodora Taylor

  I had my own plans. Real and practical. But suddenly, I couldn’t imagine going through with my usual boring Saturday when his “anything but” alternative awaited.

  The “Sure” fell out of my mouth. Easy, if not uncomplicated.

  14

  “So, how was your Thanksgiving weekend?” Eric asked, coming into my office around lunchtime. “And why are you wearing scrubs?”

  “Long story,” I answered.

  A really long story that I wasn’t quite sure how to explain.

  I might not have ended up a Lady Who Lunched, but I always made sure to change into a professional outfit before coming into the clinic. Especially when I had back-to-back appointments like I did today.

  But after spending Saturday and Sunday having marathon sex with the Dragon, I’d been awoken by a 4 am text that my double amputee vet mom had gone into early labor with twins and that I was needed at the hospital for an emergency C-section. Thank goodness I’d taken a shower before climbing into bed to finally get some quality sleep. I’d barely had time to make it to the hospital, much less to squeeze in a special trip to my brownstone in Midtown before work.

  Eric’s other query was just as hard to answer. Usually, I replied to any questions about trips home with a vague, “I survived.”

  But telling Eric what had gone down this weekend would require more than a quick fifteen-minute chat—which was all the time I had to spare if I wanted to get all this paperwork I hadn’t touched over the weekend done before the end of business hours.

  “How was your Thanksgiving?” I asked Eric instead.

  He plopped into one of my guest chairs and said, “Ugh! California was fine. But I invited the hot construction worker out to drinks when I got back on Sunday—you know, to see what he’s like upright. Turns out he’s a flat-Earther! I didn’t think those crazies came in gay. But crazy comes in every color—that’s what Bernice said when I told her that story. Anyway, drinks tonight now that we’re both single?”

  “Um…”

  The messaging app on my desktop dinged before I could answer that question, and I frowned when I saw the text from Garrett.

  GARRETT: This weekend was crazy. Are you really planning to marry him? If so, we need to talk. Can you meet me at the brownstone tonight? There are a few more things I have to get anyway.

  A part of me felt guilty. As horrible as the situation with Leighton was, me showing up with Hak-kan had to have come as a shock. And I was sure Garrett had a lot of questions.

  I began to type that sure we could talk. But then I remembered what Hak-kan told me about exes and how that would make him look.

  And with a weird sense of relief not to have to put in my usual performance as the nice ex, I typed back.

  Already have plans. Will let you know if and when I’m free.

  “Who is that?” Eric demanded when I was done typing.

  “Garrett,” I answered, keeping my tone vague. “He wants to meet and talk.”

  “You know that’s code for meet and try to hook up, right?” Eric asked.

  “No, I didn’t know that,” I admitted. “But I honestly think he just wants to talk.”

  “That’s because you keep failing to appreciate how amazing you are,” Eric insisted. “Please don’t get back together with that cheat just because you can’t see that.”

  Usually, I dismissed Eric when he tried to give me compliments. As my best friend, of course, he was biased.

  But today, with every inch of me sore from what Hak-kan had laid on me, I couldn’t help but believe him.…and feel a little guilty for everything I was omitting when I answered, “You don’t have to worry about me getting back together with Garrett. Trust me, that is over.”

  “Great, so drinks after work?” he asked. “Bernice says she can get somebody to watch O2.”

  “Sure,” I said, figuring that would be as good a time as any to explain everything that had happened over Thanksgiving Weekend.

  Eric left me to my paperwork after that, but less than an hour later, he burst back through the door without knocking. And this time, Bernice was right behind him.

  “Why is there a huge Chinese guy in a suit in our waiting room asking to see you?” she demanded, her eyes wide underneath the butterfly locks she’d gotten installed right before Thanksgiving.

  I knew exactly who she was talking about, but I pushed past my surprise to ask, “Why didn’t you just call me to let me know he was here?”

  “Because this is obviously an in-person discussion!” Eric answered for Bernice. “I saw him, too. The guy has a neck tattoo, Livvy! A neck tattoo! Where did you find him? When did you—oh my God, is this the long story behind you showing up to the office for the first time ever in scrubs?”

  “Um…” That was all I said, but it was enough for Bernice and Eric to explode with their own conclusions.

  “Oh my goodness, no Sunday morning service for Dr. Olivia,” Bernice guessed, shaking her head at me. “She got over Garrett by getting under Mr. Dangerous all night long!”

  “Mr. Dangerous? Bernice, stop being childish,” Eric chastised her.

  But before I could thank him for not taking this conversation down to Bernice’s level, he said, “His office nickname is obviously going to be Thanksgiving Weekend because Olivia’s so grateful. Hello!”

  “Boy…” Bernice flurried a hand at Eric and bent over at the waist. “I bow to you, good sir. I should not even have tried it.”

  “Thank you. You’re welcome,” Eric answered with a royal tip of his head toward Bernice. But then he turned right back to me to demand, “I have to know does he have a gay brother?”

  “Um…” I started to say, embarrassed not just by the question but also by the fact that I didn’t know the answer to it.

  “I don’t think talking is what Dr. Olivia was up to with Thanksgiving Weekend,” Bernice told Eric out the side of her mouth.

  “Of course, he does,” Eric decided for himself. “All of those dangerous-looking guys come from huge broken families with half-brothers littered around the city. I bet you the Christmas on-call shift that one of them is multiracial.”

  “Okay, I should actually go out there,” I said, standing up to end this conversation. “And Neece, you should get back to your post.”

  “One question,” Bernice asked, her tone very serious. “Is he as big everywhere?”

  She circled her finger right above her waist just in case I needed a visual context clue.

  “Of course, he is!” Eric answered as if Bernice were asking something stupid. “I’m about to go take a picture of him and post it on Instagram as a meme: if Big Dick Energy was a person—ooh, maybe we should call him Thanksgiving B.D.E.”

  “I like Thanksgiving Weekend better, but thanks for the compliment,” a new voice answered at my open door.

  Hak-kan walked in without so much as a knock and leveled Eric with a hard look. “And if you post my picture on Instagram, I’m going to find you, and I’m going to hurt you.”

  Oh my gosh, oh my gosh—Hak-kan was here. And he’d heard everything. I wanted to sink into the floor and let the embarrassment eat me alive.

  But Eric just brought out his phone and asked, “When you say hurt...do you mean the kind I like?”

  As Eric would tell you himself, he grew up flaming gay in East Oakland. He had no fear.

  Hak-kan squinted his eyes at him. “By hurt you, I’m saying I do have a gay brother, but you definitely ain’t getting his number if I find any pics of me on The Gram.”

  “Putting the phone away!” Eric repocketed his phone with comical speed.

  Hak-kan just eyed both Eric and Bernice with a stony expression. “You two mind giving me and O some alone time?”

  At least Eric and Bernice had the common sense to slink out without being asked twice.

  “I’m sorry about that,” I said as soon as they closed the door behind them.

  “I’m not,” Hak-kan answered, his black shark eyes shining with amusement. “That c
onvo was very illuminating. I’m not happy about Bernice leaving her post to gossip, though. Anybody could get back here.”

  True. But I had to point out, “In the decade-plus I’ve been working here, someone’s come back here without permission only twice. And both times, it was you.”

  Hak-kan gritted his jaw. “Still, going to post a couple of guys outside the door.”

  I shook my head, “That’s really not necessary.”

  “I’m telling you it is. The Silent Triad’s got enemies on a good day, and right now, we’ve got a video game’s worth of violence about to break out. That’s just one of the shitload of reasons I’m trying to go completely legitimate with this Glendaver purchase.”

  Alarm coursed through me. “You’re in danger? Are you going to be all right?”

  “I’m not the main guy our bitch of an enemy is mad at, so I’ll be fine. But you’ve got to understand that as long as you’re with me, you’re going to have to get used to a certain level of protection.”

  I considered his argument. The truth was my father had been saying I needed to get a security guard for the clinic for years. Millionaires tended to be paranoid about their children being kidnapped—even the thirty-something ones who kept a low profile.

  Quiet as it was kept, Big Alcohol, the people who made the liquid substances at the center of so many accidents and broken relationships also attracted enemies. If Hak-kan could provide a couple of guards without it cutting into the clinic’s budget….

  “Okay fine,” I said with a careful nod. “You can post two guards here.”

  “Good, I’m glad you agreed so easily,” he said. “Wayne’s moving your things into my place as we speak.”

  “Wait, what?” I asked. “I didn’t agree to move in with you.”

  He came forward to plant his fists on top of my desk. “Listen, O, I like you. I like you a lot. Exactly the way you are. This independent doctor shit turns me on, no lie. I’m not looking to change you or any of your worldview. But I do need to protect you. And you do need to accept that.”

  “What if I don’t?” I asked.

  “Then I’ll have to convince you.”

  “Convince me how?”

  He tilted his head to the side, his eyes taking on a new heat.

  And I had that dry swallow choking problem again.

  “We’re in my office,” I warned him.

  He angled his head to the other side. “You think I won’t fuck you in your office?”

  Again, not a challenge. But Hak-kan took it as such. And by the time the Dragon was done presenting his argument, I’d agreed to move in with him, no more talking back. He’d destroyed all of my resistance.

  Which made me wonder…

  What else would this Dragon convince me to do before our fake engagement came to an end?

  15

  PHANTOM

  A month of living with Olivia had made Phantom cocky—in more ways than one.

  So the morning of the surprise baby shower Victor had planned for Dawn, he was pretty confident he could use that big cock of his to convince her not to go.

  He woke her up with morning kisses below the waist to get her primed for giving in, then placed her on top of him for a sleepy ride.

  He usually didn’t like girl on top sex. Too many women thought it was about putting on a show. They’d jut out their chests and fake moan like they were planning to post that shit on OnlyFans.

  But there was nothing like watching Olivia ride him after she’d been properly warmed up in the morning, her eyes hooded as she moved with lazy grace and sunlight shining across her dark skin.

  Now, this was something he’d pay to watch on OnlyFans.

  He cupped her breasts, partly to watch her blackberry nipples pucker between the sides of his index finger and his thumb and partly because he like the contrast. Black and cream were quickly becoming his favorite color combination.

  And he watched her, wholly mesmerized until her rolling action got sloppy. A sign that she was getting close.

  Sometimes she forgot how much she liked having her clit stimmied as she fell apart. Lucky for her, Phantom was there to remind her,

  He dropped his hands down to her waist and thrust her forward so that his dick and her love button stayed in direct contact as he guided her roll. That was the special sauce right there. Soon she was calling out his Chinese name and grabbing him around the neck like she sometimes did when the climax was too powerful, and she was afraid she’d lose herself if she didn’t hold on to him.

  Fuck, she felt good around his dick. They’d been doing this for weeks, and he couldn’t get the notion out of his head that she was made for him.

  What other explanation could there be for the way her pussy hugged his cock as she came, strangling it like she was commanding his to come as soon as she did. Hell, sometimes it felt so good, he unleashed at the exact same moment she did.

  But today, he gritted his teeth and thought about every time the Nets had lost to those goddamn Celtics to keep from blowing his load.

  He stayed hard and waited until she flopped down on top of him to say, “You know, I think it’s going to take me a while to get there today. Maybe we should skip that shower.”

  O laughed. “You promised we’d be there, and besides…

  She sat up, still impaled on his hard shaft. “I really need to see the reason you’ve been practicing all of these Justin Bieber moves.”

  “No, you don’t,” he assured her. “If it were up to me, no one would have to see that.”

  “Also, I want to meet the cousin who could convince you to do a Justin Bieber routine.”

  Phantom rolled his eyes. “How about since he’s using lunch in the city with us as an excuse to get her out of the house, we just raincheck with the two of them for another day? We’ve only got 30 minutes tops if we want to shower before we head out anyway, and it's not going down. You really want me walking into that party with a huge boner?”

  She dipped her head and looked to the side.

  Phantom stilled. He could tell when she was feeling insecure and real talk, he didn’t like that shit. “What?”

  “Nothing,” she answered.

  He settled his hands on her hips. “O, we’ve talked about this. We’re not that couple. If you’ve got a problem, we communicate that shit out. Eyes on me. No clamming up.”

  She reluctantly raised her eyes to meet his. “I was just thinking of one way to solve the huge boner problem—one we haven’t tried. But um, I’m not sure if I’m adept at it. I thought I was, but Garrett said….”

  Phantom squinted harder than Clint Eastwood in an 80s cop movie. “What did that prick say to you?”

  “Not directly to me,” she answered, looking away. “To Leighton. He told her she was so much better at….ah going down on him than I was.”

  He was trying… He was trying to turn over a new leaf for Olivia’s sake. No more wet work on Silent Triad enemies. No more ordering hits on anyone who got in his way.

  But like that poor fuck in Airplane said, it looked like he picked the wrong week to quit drinking.

  He had never wanted to end someone the way he wanted to end Garrett for the hit job he’d done on Olivia’s head.

  But he couldn’t disappear her ex. He needed to do this the right way with her. The legitimate way. So he pushed killing Garrett out of his mind and concentrated on the most important part.

  “You want to give me your mouth?” he asked, holding her gaze.

  She clamped her lips and shyly nodded.

  “Then do it quick,” he told her. “Like, right fucking now, or I’m going to bust this nut just thinking about your pretty lips wrapped around my dick.”

  “Alright,” Olivia said—the same way he did when he decided to do a thing.

  He liked that they had inside jokes now. He also liked the light kisses she peppered down his torso.

  Olivia wasn’t on the pill, so they were still using rubbers. But they’d both provided each other with clean
STD tests, so she took the condom he hadn’t used off and set it aside.

  Honestly, he didn’t know what that douchebag was thinking. Just watching her wrap her dark fingers around his dick was enough to make him drip pre-cum.

  And when she thoughtfully licked it up—swirling her tongue around the opening of his cock, then pressing into the tip. He might have lost his load right there if he wasn’t so dedicated to seeing what would happen next.

  He was the Olivia show’s number one fan.

  And she rewarded him for his patient viewership by swallowing him down, the way only a medical practitioner who had a thorough understanding of the gag reflex could.

  Fuck! He didn’t want to go to this baby shower, but damn if he didn’t blow with just a few bobs of her head.

  And this woman…

  She swallowed down every drop.

  Then she was the one giving him a cocky smile as she said, “Okay, let’s get ready.”

  As Dawn was constantly saying out loud since she was every single thing wrong with millennials: Ugh!

  The reaction to him walking into the house he shared with Victor and Han in Rhode Island was even worse than he was expecting.

  At least her people had the courtesy just to glance their way and whisper behind their hands.

  One of their new business partners, Luca Ferraro, the don of the Italian Ferraro Family, was the first to spot them when they came through the door of the seaside mansion Phantom shared with Victor and Han. He openly stared before dropping his head to whisper in his blind wife, Amber’s ear. Probably about how their beloved obstetrician just walked in on Phantom’s arm.

  “Are you shitting me?” Amber said out loud.

  “Ssh!” one of the other guests hissed at her. “You don’t want Dawn to hear us!”