Hard to Resist

by Lauren Landish

  “You two alright?” I hear a man say from behind us, but my eyes don’t break away from Nathan’s. It’s the cops. So close. So close to knowing everything that just happened only minutes ago.

  Nathan’s the first to break. He lets go of my forearm and turns his back to me, leaving the chill of the night to turn the thin sheen of sweat on my skin to ice. I wrap my arms around my chest and as I do, I see a small bit of blood on my arm and then more. Just a large scrape I think, but I’m quick to hide it. As fast as I can, I pull the thin sleeves of my sweater down my arms. It’s evidence.

  “We’re fine,” Nathan says, although I almost don’t hear him. My heart beats harder and faster; I’m desperate to escape as I stand on legs that quiver, legs too afraid to do anything.

  “And you, miss?” the cop says as a bright light flashes in front of me. The sudden light causes me to wince and then look up at him. The dark blue of his uniform looks black in the low light. The man is older with salt and pepper hair, and looks experienced and wise enough to know a lie. I don’t trust my voice, so I simply nod and almost cross my arms again, but then I remember the blood and my fingers grip the hem of my sweater to keep my arms at my sides.

  “You two look a little young to be out here,” the cop says, his eyes flickering from mine to Nathan’s.

  We’re in high school. Nathan’s a year older than me and a senior this year.

  “Are you from around here?” the cop asks and I’m not sure who he’s talking to, but Nathan answers for us both.

  His thin Henley pulls tight over his broad shoulders as he points his thumb behind him. “She’s from the Hills and I’m down here.”

  The cop’s jaw goes tense, his eyes burning into me but I don’t look back at him.

  I’m not supposed to be here. I hear it before the words even come from his mouth.

  I ignore everything that the cop says; I’m not interested in being told where I belong. The only thing I can concentrate on is my ability to breathe. I feel like I’m being suffocated. If I had just listened, none of this would have happened. I already know it’s true and that makes the guilt so much worse.

  “Can you take her home?” I hear Nathan ask and it’s as if that’s what they were waiting for. How could he? After what just happened, I’m shaking and fear is still raw and coursing through my blood. How could he leave me after that? Tears prick my eyes as I will him to justify it.

  But I already know the answer; it’s my fault. I should have stuck to my usual routine and not taken the wrong way home. The way that leads to nothing but trouble.

  I don’t care though. I’m scared. I can’t leave him; I can’t be by myself. I try to scream out, I try to grip his arm, but he whips around before I can do a damn thing and the heat in his eyes is something I never expected to see.

  The anger. So much anger.

  “I didn’t mean it,” I whimper out of instinct and then pray the cops didn’t hear. Please. He has to know I never wanted this. I never knew it would come to this. Please. Please, God, let me take it back. “I’m sorry.” The words crack as I say them.

  “I already told you we were over,” Nathan says in such a deep voice, rough and riddled with accusations. The guilt pounds through my veins, heating my blood and sending a shame through me that makes me sick.

  “We have to …” I start to tell him we need to confess. We have to tell the cops what happened.

  “We don’t have to do a damn thing and you better not say shit,” Nathan says with a thinly-veiled threat. “Get in that car,” Nathan says with certainty and conviction, and I lose all sense of composure.

  “Don’t ever come back, Hally,” Nathan says as I cover my mouth and keep the sobs from coming up. “I won’t tell you again,” he says beneath his breath, ignoring how my world is shattered and my body just wants to collapse and give in to the pain.

  I didn’t mean for this to happen. If I could just go back in time.

  The night is disturbed by the slam of the police car door and a second officer gets out of the car, stopping Nathan as he tries to leave. I can barely hear what they’re saying and I try to go to him. I will my legs to move, but the first officer is quick to grab my arm. I rip it away from him and stumble back, tripping over my feet and nearly falling as I look up at him, bewildered.

  “It’s alright,” the cop says easily, just now realizing how startled I am and I can’t help but notice the look he gives Nathan as if he’s to blame. He has no idea.

  “I need you to come with me,” the officer says with a stern voice, no negotiation apparent in his tone. As if he already knows the truth.

  Nathan turns to look back at me, but his jaw is clenched and the other officer is quick to get his attention again. Speaking low, in whispers, so I can’t hear. I can only see Nathan shake his head.

  I stare at Nathan as the officer talks, willing him to look at me as I’m pulled away from the street. I can’t hear a word, not from the officer leading me away and not from the officer speaking to Nathan. My shoes click on the sidewalk, the cold night air making each breath hurt more and more.

  It’s almost like everything’s happening in slow motion. It seems to last an eternity. Each detail captured clearly.

  With every second that passed, I could have said something. With every second I could have apologized.

  But before I knew it, he was walking away, and I was being driven in the opposite direction.

  I stare out of the window, tears burning my eyes as he disappears from view. The dark night only illuminated by a street light and the bright neon glow of a bar. I keep my eyes on the cracked concrete sidewalk rather than look up at the people leaning against the brick wall of the building as we slowly come to a stop at a red light.

  “Are you alright, miss?” the cop asks me again, turning in his seat to face me, but I don’t have the decency to look him in the eyes as I lie.

  No. I’m not okay. I’ll never be okay.

  But no one can know.

  It was ten years ago and although that night should have traumatized me for an entirely different reason, the fact that I listened to Nathan and didn’t come forward is what haunts me.

  It’s a funny thing, fate. Life goes on day after day and I didn’t notice how all the pieces were lining up like dominoes. I tried to smile as the weeks turned into months and months turned into years, thinking I’d left my past behind me. I thought I knew what was going on around me. I thought I’d survived and had a new life, with the truth of that night being buried ten feet under.

  But fate put me where I’m standing right now.

  Fate’s the reason the dominoes are falling, crashing into my reality and leaving me shattered.

  It’s so easy to blame fate. But I don’t have any other explanation.

  Nathan didn’t plan this, and neither did I.

  It’s a funny thing, fate. It loves to fuck you over.

  Second Chance is available now FREE in Kindle Unlimited!

  Sneak Peek at Filthy Riches

  A pretend relationship.

  A deadly game.

  One misstep, and it could mean both of our lives.

  I’m just a girl, with dreams too big and hopes verging on hopeless.

  I never planned to become his.

  Nathan Stone. Fiercely handsome. Powerful.

  The pull between us borders on primal.

  I need to be careful. He’s a dangerous man with even more dangerous enemies.

  He took a big gamble, lying to protect me.

  Now his future is on the line as much as mine, and we have to keep up this charade.

  Make it look convincing.

  But when his lips touch mine, I taste only truth.

  When he pulls me into his arms, it feels like forever.

  It can’t just be the ruse and the danger of getting caught.

  My heart says this is real . . .

  And I’ll follow him to the ends of the Earth to prove it.

  From USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and
Washington Post Bestselling Author Lauren Landish comes Filthy Riches, an epic tale of love, danger, adventure, and a hard-won forever.

  Prologue

  Nathan

  She shouldn’t be here.

  This has to end.

  Now.

  Pain blossoms in my chest at the thought as my hand curls into a fist. I knew letting someone close to me could lead to this. My downfall. My end. Yet, I did it anyway.

  Fucking fool.

  The damning words thunder in my mind as my shoes tap against the polished marble stairs.

  My dark thoughts continue as I reach the second floor and fling open the ornate double doors, revealing an opulent master bedroom bathed in gray and white.

  “You have to go . . . now.”

  The words die on my lips at the sight before me, and my cock instantly hardens in my slacks.

  Fuck, she’s so beautiful. Enchanting. Bewitching.

  And I am definitely under her spell.

  She’s lying on my king-sized bed, garbed in black lingerie that graces over her lush curves, highlighting every hill and valley, stark against the creamy white satin of my sheets. Her lips are parted in a sensual O as she looks at me, her eyes brimming with a vulnerability that reaches across the space between us, squeezing my heart in her iron fist and giving me hopes for something other than the future I am destined for.

  “Nathan,” she moans, her voice filled with a desperate need that pulls me to her like a magnet. She knows she has this power over me. She must know, and she has to know how much I both hate and love every tug she gives, her tendrils slithering through the distance to entwine her magic around my groin and my heart at her whim.

  She arches her back, her breasts pressing against the flimsy fabric, her nipples pebbling beneath the sheer fabric. “Please, I need you. Now.”

  Lust rages through my blood, even as my mind screams for me to deny her, to tell her no, that this can’t happen. Not now, not again.

  I open my mouth but the words won’t come, my body forcing my brain to let the traitorous thought go.

  It’s then that I see little sparkly fireflies of light surrounding her body, and I realize that she’s lying on the gifts I gave her earlier, the light from the chandelier causing them to shine and glitter.

  Diamonds.

  My heart rages inside my chest like a caged animal as I make my way to the bed. To her.

  With each step, my heart pounds harder, faster, with every beat a drum reinforcing that she has to go. I have to tell her to go.

  But as I reach the bed, my hand reaches out without my consent, tracing a line from her ankle up to her thigh. Her skin is satin warmth, and I want to drown in her, bury my face in her lush center as I sip from her.

  The reverberation in my mind changes, no longer saying go, go, go, but instead repeating mine, mine, mine.

  She is mine, and as I fall onto her, covering her body with my own, I know that she always will be.

  Chapter 1

  Nathan - Six Weeks Prior

  “Here are your damn diamonds,” my brother Caleb announces as he bursts through my door, a snide hint subtly cached in the crass words.

  I turn from the window of my office, leaving behind the idyllic view of some of the most breathtaking scenery this side of the Mississippi to take in his appearance with a barely repressed sigh.

  He’s in baggy jeans and a tank top, his hair mussed in a way intended to look careless but which takes him numerous products to achieve.

  It’s a cultivated casual look that I suspect he adopted mostly to annoy our more formal father when he was alive.

  And now, he continues it as a rebellion to differentiate himself from me, the older brother whose shadow he both loathes and relishes in equal measure.

  Though Caleb has come in on his own, Grant stands in the doorway, ever a bastion of propriety as he needlessly announces, “Sir, Mr. Stone wishes to see you.”

  The experienced professional face is carefully neutral, but I can see the hint of distaste in his eyes, even from across the room.

  He served my father for decades, and along with the business, I inherited Grant’s employ as a house manager and personal assistant. He cares for both Caleb and me in his distant way, but he decidedly doesn’t care for manners to be glossed over or skipped altogether, so Caleb drives him a bit batty.

  “Would you like me to pour you two a scotch?”

  “No thank you, Grant. That won’t be necessary.” He hears the discreet dismissal and with a nod, closes the door behind him. Despite saying no, I move toward the bar, pouring a generous tumbler for myself and one for Caleb.

  Though Caleb takes the offered drink and trades me for the small bag he’s brought, he’s still surly. “Do you know we almost lost Jake to get you these? What makes them so important anyway? You said you’d explain once we had them in hand, so time’s up. Explain. I don’t think any of our men are worth losing over a fucking rock.”

  I sit at my desk, setting my drink aside to focus on the bag’s contents, which I spread on a velvet mat. Grabbing the magnifying loupe, I hold one up to examine it more closely.

  Under the magnification, I can see every flaw but also appreciate the beauty more fully in the kaleidoscopic lines and prismatic reflections.

  Mindlessly, I answer part of Caleb’s line of questions.

  “I did not know about Jake. Please pass along my appreciation for his dedication. I trust he’s okay, otherwise you would’ve said as much.”

  I hum, turning a second stone and then a third as I appraise each one.

  Caleb scoffs, interrupting my mental checklist. “That’s it? Tell him thanks?” He sighs heavily, and I can hear the eyeroll in the huffed breath.

  He doesn’t have patience for the work we do. Not really, not like I do.

  If you’d told me I’d be in charge of a billion-dollar jewelry company with the world at my fingertips at barely thirty, I’d have laughed at you, believing the very idea that I would ever follow in my father’s footsteps to be as far from possible as pigs sprouting wings and spontaneously taking flight.

  I am not a businessman, or at least I didn’t intend to be. I’m a soldier, a man of action, not a desk percher whose big moves of the day are with a pen.

  No, I’m used to guns, dust, and sand, battles of righteousness, and shows of power with strategy and war.

  It was a good life, full of adrenaline, adventure, sweat, and action. I lived fast, partied hard, and loved long and strong before disappearing on the breeze the next day to do it all again a continent away.

  But then my father died. Or rather, he was killed.

  In a single moment, my whole world tilted on its axis, the things I knew to be true suddenly shown in all their falsehood, and my father’s business, both true and dark, was revealed.

  Still mourning and angry at his murder, I was thrust into being the figurehead of his company, trading Kevlar vests for tailor-made suits, a GPS locator for a Cartier watch, and covert action for long board meetings in stuffy offices surrounded by hot-headed executives.

  While I’d had plenty of training in combat, I had virtually none on how to run a billion-dollar global corporation.

  All of the industry, both inside my company and outside it, laughed at the idiot ‘boy’ with no experience who dared to challenge the status quo.

  They’d been hell-bent on teaching me my place in what is now my own company.

  It hadn’t gone well. For them.

  I might not have been a businessman, but I understand power. I know how to wield it like a weapon, sometimes delicate, and when necessary, bluntly aggressive.

  The lengths some people will go to hoard it, believing it gives them some intrinsic worth that is greater than their fellow man, is the key.

  But my father didn’t get that, and he paid with his life because of it, leaving behind a final, deadly example for me to learn from.

  Caleb doesn’t understand it yet, but I refuse to let him suffer the same fate.

/>   His life is one of missions, even now. He hasn’t evolved to design plans, foresee obstacles, and work toward something greater like I’ve had to do.

  He’s like an excited dog who wants its owner to throw a bone. Merely chase, retrieve, drop it, and wait for the next throw, with an occasional treat thrown in to keep the cycle repeating.

  It’s not a bad thing. I love dogs. It’s actually truly necessary to keep the company rolling. I need worker bees, and my brother, while usually coming off as a joking goof-off, is quite adept at being a high-level pack leader, my second in command, leading others in teams to chase down the bones I throw.

  Like the diamonds in front of me.

  I set down the last gem, giving my brother my full attention as he sits across the desk from me in a tufted leather chair.

  “Yes, Caleb. Tell Jake thank you for a mission completed. Same to you. Thanks. These stones are vital to getting Nikolai’s cooperation. And you know we need that to move forward.”

  Caleb’s reaction is instant and fiery. “That’s what these are for? You said you had a specific request for them. We paid too great a price to use them as a bartering chip for a thug like Nikolai Romanov! I told you this is a shitty course of action to begin with. No, just no, Nathan.”

  He smacks his palm to the desktop, driving his point home as if we haven’t already had this fight.

  But he has a point.

  Nikolai Romanov is a Russian gangster and a monster in the underworld business. But along the journey of my controlling the Stone Corporation, we reached a tenuous truce. It’s an unfortunate side of my work, both as a soldier and as a businessman, playing ball with every big name in the game regardless of personal feelings about them. You simply never know who will come in handy.