Ben.
She understood the past pain that scarred him and kept him from taking a chance with her. His mother’s abandonment. The loss of his fiancée in the most horrific way. The guilt and remorse he’d buried in the deepest recesses of his soul over the fact that he hadn’t been able to save Kim from an ambush when it had been his job to protect her. And now, he believed that there was nothing left in his heart to give to another woman.
Christine knew differently.
She knew the fears he harbored. That he believed their background and lifestyles made them too incompatible and they’d never mesh for a long term relationship. That he’d never be able to live up to certain expectations, and that he’d never have her mother’s approval.
As if she cared about any of that.
Christine figured she had enough ammunition to blow every single one of his excuses into smithereens. And as soon as they arrived back at her place, she planned to do just that.
The slow song ended, and she stepped out of his embrace. “I need to use the ladies room before we go,” she said, suddenly realizing just how full her bladder was. “I’ll meet you back at the table.”
“Alright.”
He went in one direction, and she headed the opposite way toward the restrooms. By the time she walked back out, her mind was already forming every defense it could to any possible excuse Ben tossed her way. She was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she nearly collided into Jodie, one of the bar waitresses, who was standing in front of her.
“I’m sorry, Jodie,” Christine said, giving the other woman a friendly smile. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.”
“Actually, I was waiting for you.” The other woman returned Christine’s smile with one of her own. “Mr. Crosby said he promised you a bottle of champagne from his private collection for your birthday. He asked me to take you down to the cellar so you can pick out what you’d like.”
Earlier, when she’d been with Craig while cutting her cake, he’d told her he wanted to give her a bottle of champagne to celebrate her birthday. At the time, Christine told him that any kind of gift really wasn’t necessary, even though he’d insisted. But now that she was leaving with Ben and heading back to her place, the thought of having a bottle of champagne to share with him sounded like a nice idea to compliment her planned seduction.
“The cellar is this way,” Jodie said, then led Christine down a private corridor behind the main bar.
They passed a few closed doors then stopped at the very last one at the end of the hallway. Jodie took a ring of keys from her pocket, unlocked the wooden door, and opened it wide. After switching on a light that illuminated the lower portion of the room, she started down the wooden stairs and Christine followed behind.
As they descended into the cellar, Christine shivered and rubbed her bare arms as cold, refrigerated air cascaded over her skin. “Wow, if I’d known how freezing it was down here, I would have worn my sweater.”
Jodie laughed. “I know it’s a bit on the chilly side, but we have to keep the cellar set at about fifty-seven degrees to keep the various wines at their peak.”
The bar waitress strolled across the surprisingly large room, which looked as though it was a basement that had been recently renovated with hardwood floors, and customized ground to ceiling racks that could easily accommodate hundreds of bottles of wine. Most of the cubby holes were filled, and Jodie came to a stop in front of an area that had been sectioned off from the rest of the room.
“Here is Craig’s private collection, and those are the champagnes right over there,” she said, pointing a finger in that direction. “He said for you to help yourself to whatever one you’d like. If you want something really nice, I’d say go for the Krug.”
“Thanks. I’ll take a look and see what he has.” Christine wasn’t interested in picking the most expensive bottle, just something she and Ben would enjoy.
Jodie shifted anxiously on her feet. “I’ve got to get back to my drink orders before they pile up, but you can take your time down here. When you leave, just shut the door behind you. It automatically locks from the outside.”
“Great. Thanks, Jodie.”
Once the other woman was gone, Christine scanned the wooden racks and pulled out a few of the foil topped bottles to read the labels. After a few minutes of perusing Craig’s very expansive collection, and shivering from the cold, she came across a Dom Perignon Rose. Remembering once having that particular champagne at a wedding and liking the taste, she decided to choose that bottle.
Just as she turned around, she heard the cellar door at the top the stairs close with a soft “click”, then slow, steady footsteps coming down the wooden stairs until Craig appeared in the chamber below, looking impeccably dressed in a black suit and crisp white shirt. His hair looked mussed, as though he’d run his fingers through the strands, but it was the eerily calm yet calculated look in his eyes that sparked a sense of unease deep inside her stomach.
“Hey,” she said, forcing a cheerful note to her voice and acting as though nothing was wrong. “I just finished picking a bottle of champagne and was coming back up to thank you.”
With his hands tucked into the front pockets of his dress pants, he slowly, gradually, strolled toward her, a wholly sexual smile curving the corners of his mouth. “You can thank me just as well down here.” His dark gaze raked down the length of her, not bothering to disguise the fact that he wanted her.
His meaning was clear, and for as frantic as her heart was beating beneath her breast, she refused to panic or allow him to get the upper hand in the situation if she could help it. She had to get out of there and away from him, pronto.
“It’s a bit cold in here, and the party is upstairs.” She smiled and visibly shivered for effect. “How about we take this champagne with us and celebrate where it’s nice and warm and my teeth aren’t chattering?”
She moved to the right to go around him and bolt for the stairs, but he countered the move and blocked the way with his body.
His stare turned hot and predatory. “I thought we could have our own private party down here in the cellar, where it’s nice and quiet and we can be all by ourselves.”
Oh, God. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her. She hugged the chilled champagne to her chest, her fingers gripping the neck just in case she had to use the bottle as a weapon. It was the only protection she had.
“I really need to go, Craig,” she said, asserting a firm, confident tone to her voice, despite the fear nearly strangling her. “Ben is waiting for me.”
As he moved even closer, he casually ran his finger along a rack holding bottles of wine. “Well, he can wait a bit longer, now can’t he?”
Christine lifted her chin, wishing she was taller. Craig was a big, substantial man, and as he neared, he made her feel too damned small and vulnerable, which she hated. Finally, Craig stopped, leaving only a few feet between the two of them. Behind her was a rack of wines, and in front of her, much too far away, was the stairs leading to her freedom. She knew she had to distract him in order to get there.
“Ben will come looking for me if I don’t get back to him,” she said, knowing it was true.
“He can look for you all he wants, but the cellar door is locked from the outside, and he doesn’t have a key.” He smiled in a way that made her skin crawl. “According to Jodie, nobody knows you’re down here but her, and me, and I made sure she’s much too busy to bother us.”
Then that meant she was on her own, and she figured the direct approach was all she had left in her favor. “But that doesn’t stop me from leaving.”
Curling her fingers even more tightly around the neck of the bottle, she stepped around him and headed for the stairs, but he grabbed her upper arm to stop her. Just as he pulled her back around, she swung the bottle of champagne at his head.
He saw it coming and ducked, then came back up just as she aimed it at his head from the other direction. He caught her wrist before the bottle coul
d connect with the side of his face and squeezed tight, until the crushing pain he exerted was too unbearable and she dropped the champagne. The bottle crashed to the floor, exploding in a spray of bubbly liquid and shards of glass that pricked and cut at her bare legs.
He shoved her against a nearby wall, so hard that her head hit the concrete surface and she swore she saw stars. When her vision came back into focus, she realized that he’d braced his hands on either side of her shoulders and had wedged a thigh between hers to keep her trapped against the wall and his body. His face was right in front of hers, and he looked pissed.
His jaw clenched tight, and anger flashed in his eyes. “That was a very expensive bottle of champagne.”
If he expected her to apologize, he had another thing coming. “Go to hell,” she hissed.
She struggled against him to get away, aiming her nails at his face and eyes, but he was so much stronger than she was, and he managed to subdue her much too easily. He caught both of her hands in one of his, then reached toward a nearby shelf and grabbed a long, thin piece of rope he must have left there earlier. He yanked her arms behind her back and within seconds had the rope wrapped around her wrists and her hands tightly secured.
He was breathing hard by the time he was done, a quiet kind of fury brewing within him. “You really shouldn’t be so rude and unappreciative, Christine.” He pressed her up against the wall once again, then framed her jaw with one of his big hands so that she couldn’t move her head at all, making her all too aware of just how truly helpless she was. “I planned this little surprise birthday party down here just for you and me, and you’re not going anywhere until we’re done celebrating. So, you might as well relax and enjoy yourself.”
She shuddered, and it had nothing to do with the chill in the air, and everything to do with what his words implied. “If you don’t let me go, I’ll scream so loud your eardrums will break.”
He laughed, the sound arrogant. “You go right ahead. It won’t do you much good. Between the cellar being sound proof, and how loud it is upstairs with the band playing, you can scream all you want and no one will hear you.” The pressure of his hand on her face eased as he trailed his fingers down her chest to the slope of her breasts. “In fact, I’m fairly certain that by the time I’m done with you, your throat will be raw from screaming.”
Bile seemed to fill her mouth. “You’re sick.”
Her words didn’t affect him at all. He was too caught up in his own madness to care. “I’ve waited patiently for you to come around. For months, I dealt with your rejections. For weeks, I’ve watched you with Ben, waiting for you to tire of him and come to your senses about me.” His voice rose with anger. “I’m tired of waiting, Christine. I’m tired of you fucking another guy and being a whore when you should be mine.” In his rage, he grabbed one of the thin rhinestone straps holding up her dress and yanked it hard, ripping it off and sending those small crystals bouncing to the floor.
Terror spiked through her. She could see what was coming, knew that if she didn’t keep him talking and distracted that he was going to rape her. Or worse. “Why are you doing this, Craig?” she asked, her calm question belying the fear clawing inside her. “I thought we were friends.”
“Friends?” His voice rose incredulously as he pushed away from her, his expression filled with disgust. “You used me, Christine. I’ve helped you with your business and gave you contacts. I was there for you after your nasty break up with Jason, ready and willing to be the man you needed in your life. But all you did was take and take and take, then discard me like a piece of trash when you no longer needed me.”
His bitter words broadsided her, and she suspected that they stemmed from a whole lot more than just her. She was most likely just the catalyst that had sent him over the edge. “You know that’s not true,” she said, trying to reason with him. “I’ve appreciated everything you’ve done for me.”
He reached out and caressed the backs of his fingers along her cheek, and she tried not to cringe in revulsion at his touch. “Maybe you’d like to show me just how appreciative you are.”
She desperately tried to wrack her brain for some kind of stall tactic. “Not here.”
“We’re not going anywhere else. We’re going to stay right here until I’m done with you.” That depraved light in his gaze shone brighter. “Until I’ve used you the way you’ve used me. Do you know how long I’ve waited to get you alone and have you all to myself like this?”
She shook her head. “How long?”
“Months.” His mouth twisted with rancor. “A few weeks ago I had you alone in my office, half naked in my private bathroom. If it hadn’t been for Ben, you would have been mine then. Then, I tried to get you alone the night of the charity event. God, I was so close, too. You were drugged and you were so willing to do whatever I wanted.”
Thank God Ben had come to her rescue. “What else?” she asked, needing to know everything.
“Those snakes you received in the mail? I sent them to you.” He looked very pleased with himself. “I had it timed for me to arrive when you opened your mail that day. I sat out in my car and watched through the windows of your business as you took the package to your office. I was going to walk inside The Main Event as you opened the box and discovered the snakes.” His expression turned irate. “I was supposed to be the one you ran to for protection. I was the one who was supposed to save you, but Ben was there. Always Ben!”
Christine couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“Nobody appreciates what I do,” Craig ranted angrily as he paced in front of her. “Not you. Not my family. Not even my father! I’m the one who helped Charles Lambert win the election so that my father’s development company could get the contract to rebuild the lower east side. I’m the one who sent those threats to your father to drop out of the race so Lambert and my father would benefit from all the extra income that new development would generate. But nobody appreciated what I tried to do. Especially not my father. Instead, he told me I was an idiot for doing something so stupid.” His rage over his father’s slur was tangible.
Christine had to agree with Jonathan Crosby about his son’s state of mind, but there was one thing that didn’t make sense to her. “But my father didn’t drop out of the race.”
“I know.” Craig shook his head in mock sadness. “And I did warn him that if he didn’t step down that he’d lose what was most precious to him. And here you are now.” His smile was pure evil.
“You don’t want to do this, Craig,” she said, doing and saying whatever it took to change his mind. Because right now, she had no leverage other than her words that could save her.
“I’m so tired of everyone taking and taking and taking from me,” he said spitefully. “Now I’m going to take what I want, and nobody is going to stop me. Not even your precious Ben. Tonight, you’re all mine.”
“I’ll never be yours, Craig,” she said, her voice strong and sure in her conviction. “I love Ben, and nothing you do to me will ever change that.”
“Shut up!” he yelled, then back-handed her across the face, the force of it causing her head to snap to the side. “Shut the fuck up!”
He knotted her hair in his fist, yanked back her head, and brought his mouth down on hers. She fought the kiss, the invasion of his tongue, refusing to give even a small part of herself to him. And that only infuriated him more.
His hands pulled at her dress and groped her, making her physically ill at the thought of what was about to happen down here in this isolated, secluded cellar. With her hands tied behind her back, struggling against him was futile. All she could do was close her eyes, detach herself from the situation, and pray that it was over quickly.
Chapter Seventeen
Ben glanced at his watch for the fifth time in so many minutes. It had been nearly twenty minutes since Christine told him she needed to go to the ladies room, and he was still waiting on her. He shifted restlessly in his seat and glanced back in the direction of
the ladies’ room, but still, nothing.
“You know how women can be when they go to the restroom,” Kevin said, obviously sensing his impatience. “She’s probably fussing with her hair and make-up.”
Primping just wasn’t Christine’s thing. Sure, she always looked like a million bucks, but she wasn’t one to spend a whole lot of time in front of a mirror. Something just wasn’t settling right with him.
“Either that, or one of the guests waylaid her to wish her a happy birthday,” Ronnie suggested.
“Could be.” He knew it was possible that she’d gotten sidetracked, but something was gnawing at those instincts within him, and he wasn’t about to ignore them. “I’m going to go and look for her.”
He strolled back toward the restrooms and glanced around the general area. He circled the dance floor and then into the main bar area to check there, too. Still, there was no sign of Christine, and he blew out a frustrated stream of breath in order to keep his growing anxiety at bay.
One of the bar waitresses passed by him with a tray full of drinks. He recognized the woman as Jodie, who’d delivered cocktails to their table a few times tonight. Pretty much everyone at Envy thought that he was Christine’s boyfriend, and he used that to his advantage now.
He stopped the young woman, who looked up at him with a harried smile. “Hi, Jodie. Have you seen Christine?” he asked hopefully.
“Actually, yes I have,” she replied. “Mr. Crosby had me take her down to the wine cellar to pick out a bottle of Champagne for her birthday. That was a while ago, so I can’t imagine that she’d still be there, though.”
Just the mention of Craig’s name had Ben’s stomach twisting into huge, gigantic knots. “Was Craig with her?”
“Not when I left her there, though I did see Craig go in that direction soon after, probably to help her pick out one of the champagne’s from his private collection.”
It was clear to Ben that Jodie was oblivious to Craig’s nefarious side. “Look, I need you to take me to wherever the wine cellar is.”
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