Take Me

by Anna Zaires, Pepper Winters, Skye Warren, Lynda Chance, Pam Godwin, Amber Lin

  Marco wasn’t around but she found a note in the same place she’d left one for him the night before, next to the coffeemaker. Help yourself to whatever you need. We’ll talk tonight.

  That didn’t sound too terribly ominous, did it?

  She immediately went in search of a shower and any toiletries she might find.

  * * *

  Later that night, Marco walked into the penthouse to the smell of something delicious coming from the kitchen. He didn’t usually eat this early in the evening, but the smells immediately began doing a number on his appetite. He walked through to the kitchen and found Natalie turning from the sink to face him.

  He felt his heartbeat speed up, and when he realized she looked even more beautiful than yesterday, he focused on her until the reason for it hit him.

  She looked fresh and rested and her face was made-up—and there was no obvious fear in sight.

  The difference was subtle, yet at the same time, it made a dramatic change. She had high cheekbones, long lashes and full lips. The cosmetics she wore enhanced those features and all at once he realized she was more than really pretty, she was agonizingly beautiful. He’d already figured out she was damn sexy. His cock had been telling him that since the collision yesterday, but now, in the light of a different day, and without the stress and panic from the collision stressing her features, he was finding an added dimension to her face.

  He placed his palms on the doorframe and leaned into them, and tried to control the strong and immediate sexual need he felt every time he saw her. Even though her tension wasn’t as pronounced as it had been the day before, she pushed her hair behind her ear with fingers that trembled until finally, she quit fidgeting and dropped her hands in front of her. She was watching him hesitantly, and the tension he was feeling churning through his guts and sliding insidiously down to his groin didn’t permit him to offer her a smile. But he tried to lighten the atmosphere with humor to put her at ease. “Honey, I’m home.” The words came out flat and from the tiny jerk she gave, he knew his effort to soothe her had failed.

  She gripped the counter with hands that had gone white and her mouth curved upwards in an attempt at a smile that lacked conviction. “Hi.”

  He pushed away from the doorframe and walked to the range. “Something smells good. You really can cook?”

  “Some. Not everything.” She came to stand beside him and lifted the lid from the pot. Inside was a pot roast and green beans that looked and smelled remarkably appetizing.

  What was it about her apparent domestic abilities that was sending pleasure coursing through him? He’d damn sure never cared if Tanya had been able to cook or not. In fact, it had irritated him beyond belief whenever she would prepare a meal and expect him to sit at her table and compliment her on it. It had always reeked of a masquerade, a deception she was hoping would induce a reaction much as he was having now, with Natalie in his kitchen.

  As he looked at the meal she had prepared, the question of where she’d gotten the food in the first place puzzled him. “Did you go shopping?”

  “No. The roast was in the freezer and I found the can of beans in the pantry. But that’s about all there was.”

  “Damn. Smells good. Let me grab a quick shower and we’ll eat.” He turned away and walked from the room, suddenly anxious to have a home cooked meal and knowing the exact reason why.

  * * *

  After Marco turned to go, Natalie began setting the table. He was gone less than ten minutes, and he came back barefoot, in jeans and a t-shirt. She swallowed hard and served the meal as she surreptitiously observed him for the first time in casual clothes. The impact he made was no less intense than the suits she’d seen him in.

  They ate in silence, broken only by him complimenting the food a couple of times. She was nervous, and he kept watching her between bites. It wasn’t something she was used to, and she was worried about the talk that his note had said they were going to have.

  And the talk came too soon.

  Natalie had already straightened the kitchen as she cooked, so the clean-up was minimal. When she was finished, she followed him to his study at his request.

  He didn’t sit at his desk, but sank down in one of two armchairs that faced each other over a small table and indicated she take the other. “Sit down.”

  She did, and put her hands in her lap and waited as calmly as she could.

  “I got the estimate on my car.” Marco gave her a moment to absorb that information. She began fidgeting again, her fingers plucking at a small tear in the knee of her jeans, only making it worse. Her clothes looked clean and wrinkle-free, and he wondered if she’d washed them—and what the hell she’d worn while they’d been in the wash. He pushed the thought from his mind with effort.

  He unfolded a piece of paper and laid it on the low table between them. Her eyes shot down but she didn’t reach for it right away. She looked back at him slowly, as if the paper were poisoned or contaminated. “Look at it, Natalie.”

  Slowly, she reached out and picked up the estimate. Her eyes scanned it quickly and landed at the figure in bold print at the bottom of the page. Her face lost all color and she licked her lips. “I don’t understand. This is over twenty thousand dollars. That’s as much as a new car would cost.”

  “Not an Audi, sweetheart. And my car in particular cost five times as much.” Marco attempted to keep his voice gentle, something he’d never bothered doing with anyone else he could remember, and for now, didn’t try to analyze why.

  She lifted a hand to her brow and pushed against it as she expelled a pained breath. “That’s more—more than I can contemplate.” Her eyes were liquid-filled as they lifted to his. “Truthfully, I was expecting fifteen-hundred or so.”

  “I can have another estimate done—but the numbers will be close and I don’t think it’s necessary.”

  “I don’t know what to say. It’ll take me a lifetime to pay back that kind of money.” Her agitation was palpable as her fingers pushed and pulled at the hole in her jeans, worrying the material and widening the opening. His eyes dropped to the skin of her leg, where her fingers continued to rip at the material, and at his silence, she asked, “Are you going to sue me?”

  Marco pulled his eyes away from the pale skin of her thigh and lifted them to her face with effort. “I don’t want to sue you.” Bringing a lawsuit against her didn’t play into his plans for her at all. He didn’t quite know exactly what he wanted from her yet, except for the obvious, and that was an admission that was inducing a river of guilt to run through his veins and combine with the arousal beating uncomfortably in his blood. Arousal and guilt—the two emotions didn’t mix well.

  She looked from the hole in her jeans to the piece of paper in front of her, but not into his eyes. He felt the loss of connection and it dismayed him. “I don’t want you to sue me.” Her voice was soft, but he could hear the frog in her throat.

  He leaned back farther in his seat, crossed his ankle over his knee, and put his face in his hand as he continued to study her.

  Natalie’s pulse was beating so forcefully she could feel it ringing through her ears. She felt more than depressed, she felt beaten down, as if she had no power or control over her life. She felt a sudden sense of being totally at his mercy. And truthfully, she was.

  And on top of that, she couldn’t believe how austere he was. But he had called her ‘sweetheart’ a couple of times, and each time he did, a small kernel of heat slid through her system. It didn’t go with what she knew of him and it confused her even more. His eyes were dark and his face was swarthy, filled with an emotion that was hidden from her. His hair was thick and a deep brown, almost black, and it was cut severely around his skull. From his name and his dark good looks, she imagined he was Italian, and she had to get a grip on her runaway emotions and force herself not to think of every mobster movie she’d ever seen.

  He didn’t look as if he intended to hurt her.

  That, at least, was a good thing.

>   “You’ve been in Houston less than a week?” he asked.

  His voice when he spoke was sudden, and it snapped Natalie out of the spell she was in. “Yeah, just a few days.”

  “Leave the small town to experience big city lights?” His voice was low with an almost teasing quality.

  “Not exactly.”

  “Why, then?” He steepled his hands in front of his mouth and his tone dropped just enough to tell Natalie that he meant business. The teasing was over and now he wanted answers.

  What could she tell him? Her family’s private business was private, as well as a bit unsavory. She didn’t want to think about it, much less talk about it with a virtual stranger. “It was time, I guess. I’ve never lived away from home, but now—”

  “Now what?”

  “N-nothing. I just wanted to find a better job, so I came to Houston.”

  “Any particular reason you need the income?”

  What the heck did he expect her to say to that? That she had a fairy godmother somewhere, ready to dole out cash as needed? What planet was he from exactly? “I like to eat, wear clothes, have a roof over my head.” Natalie looked somewhere to the right of his face, and tried with all her might not to sound sarcastic.

  “Do you have a lot of debt?”

  “Why are you asking me these questions?”

  “I’m trying to figure out your situation. See what we can do to resolve the mess you’re in.”

  She took a quivering breath at the reminder. “I don’t have any debt. I don’t have any credit cards. I have four hundred and sixty-eight dollars in my checking account, and about forty-five in my purse. That’s the sum of my financial spreadsheet.”

  “Good. If you’re telling me the truth—”

  She broke in, “Why would I lie to you?”

  The look he turned on her sent her heartbeat into a quivering mess. His eyes were hot and his voice when he spoke was edged with an emotion she couldn’t identify but nevertheless, made the air around them fraught with tension. “Try not to interrupt me, Natalie. It tends to make me want to shut you up—and I’m not real sure you’d care for my method.” His voice was guttural and the muscles of his neck, corded and laced with steel, were a quietly menacing threat. His expression was hard, piercing, and his eyes ran over her from top to bottom, and settled on her mouth.

  Her heart raced and her palms became clammy.

  The thought of the repercussions of defying him rendered her helpless in a wholly feminine way. “Yes, sir,” she agreed softly, without a trace of sarcasm. He’d subdued her completely not so much with his tone but with his hot eyes as they ran over her, and her gaze dropped from his. Yeah, she so didn’t want to be the recipient of his anger, or whatever form of punishment he was intimating, sexual or otherwise—no matter the blood pulsing between her thighs.

  His eyes glittered, but he continued in the same vein as before. “If you’re telling me the truth, and you don’t have debt collectors on your butt, in fact have no debt at all, and you haven’t signed a lease for an apartment—” He looked at her with a question in his eyes and she softly shook her head. “. . . then there’s no reason we can’t work this out between us.”

  He seemed to be waiting on her response, so she nodded her head in agreement, even though she was wondering what the hell she was getting into. “Okay.” If not for that phone call to his assistant, and the woman’s unwavering belief that this man would never hurt her, Natalie would be running for the nearest exit.

  He continued, “Here’s the way I see it playing out. You live here. You take care of my home. You won’t get paid a salary, you’ll be working off the debt you owe me.” As he spoke, he laid out another sheet of paper between them and as she glanced down at it, she could see it was a contract of some kind. His signature was already scrawled across the bottom in a slashing line, next to a blank space where she was obviously supposed to sign, as well.

  “Kind of like an indentured servant,” she mumbled.

  He ignored her comment. “I’ll cover your basic expenses. Your food, clothing, cell phone.”

  She opened her mouth to disagree but the expression he wore effectively silenced her.

  “I’ll make any additional rules as we go. You’ll follow them, no questions asked. There will be times when I might need something other than a housekeeper, and you’ll conform to what I expect.”

  Her eyes widened and her heartbeat became erratic and almost stopped completely. He wasn’t referring to anything sexual, was he? As much as it pained her, she felt the urgent need to clarify. “What—what kind of things?”

  “I couldn’t possibly know that as nothing’s come up yet.”

  “Not—you’re not talking about anything—” She cleared her throat. “Sexual?”

  His eyes became hooded, and the look he pierced her with was unfathomable. “You wouldn’t like that, would you?”

  Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Why the hell hadn’t he just answered the question with a quick ‘no’? Her face blushed a fiery red. She knew it did; she could feel it. “If I owe you money, and we have sex—” she bit her lip and shook her head, “No, I wouldn’t like it,” she whispered.

  He waited a prolonged moment before answering, his eyes searching hers as if debating something and coming to a decision. “Calm down. I’m not talking about sex. I have someone who takes care of that aspect of my life. I don’t anticipate needing anything else from you besides housework. But if it comes up, I’m referring to other types of domestic chores. Shopping, organizing, that type of stuff. You think you’re up to it?”

  She swallowed and licked her dry lips. “Yes, that’s fine.”

  His eyes fell to her lips and stayed there a heartbeat too long before he spoke again. “Okay. That part is settled then. I appreciate you cooking supper for me tonight, but it won’t be needed on a daily basis. I’m usually out at night. I’ll let you know beforehand if I’ll be in. I have a service that delivers groceries as needed, and we’ll keep using that, although you can begin placing the orders.”

  “How long—how long will you need me?”

  “How long will your sentence last?” he qualified.

  “Yes.”

  “A year.”

  “A year?”

  “It would take you four or five years at the least if you began paying me in installments. This way you get it taken care of quickly, and I don’t have to worry about you skipping town on me.” The look he gave her was like an arrow hitting its mark. “And Natalie, don’t for one second think about skipping out on me. Trust me, I’ll find you, and you won’t care for the outcome. You do as you’re told, work hard, and you’ll find I’m extremely easygoing.”

  Natalie sat back under the cold precision of his dark eyes. “When can my cousin get his car back?” she asked him softly.

  “Write the address down for me and I’ll have it towed to his house.”

  She shifted restlessly and then said, “I was hoping to have it repaired. I need to drive—”

  “You’re not driving without insurance, and you can’t afford the cost right now. If you need to go somewhere, I’ll arrange a driver to take you wherever you need.” There was absolutely nothing in his tone that implied he might bend on the subject.

  “Where’s it at?” she asked.

  “The car? It’s being stored at a lot.”

  “How much is that costing me?” As she asked the question, he reached across to her and handed her a pen, motioning for her signature. She accepted it from him, took a shuddering breath, and scribbled her name on the contract before she changed her mind.

  He leaned back in his seat and the expression that passed over his face was one of satisfaction that he didn’t seem to try to hide. “I’m covering it. You don’t need to worry about it.”

  He folded the contract in two and then once again before holding it tightly in his hand. Natalie tried to keep her mind on her immediate needs and not on the inexplicable expression on his face and the unrelenting grip he h
ad on the document she had signed. “Do you have access to it?”

  His eyes penetrated hers. “What do you need?”

  “My clothes,” she said simply.

  “You’ll have them in the morning.”

  * * *

  Two weeks later, Natalie had a routine established. Her nerves still fluttered whenever Marco was around, but he wasn’t around often. He rarely ate in, and he came home from work late at night, and looked at her only briefly with hooded eyes before he locked himself in his study. She had only been asked to cook for him twice, and both times, she had retreated to her bedroom after putting his meal on the table. He was unstintingly polite to her at all times and she attempted her best to remain the same.

  The bedroom that he had placed her in on that very first night became hers. She silently wished for the room farthest away from his, but was too afraid to rock the proverbial boat by asking him if she could make the move and she wasn’t brave enough to do it without asking. Except for its location near him, the bedroom she was using was extremely comfortable. It came equipped with a flat screen television, a writing desk, a small sitting area, as well as an en-suite bathroom.

  The day her clothes had shown up, so had a sleek, thin, state of the art laptop. After she’d finished in the kitchen, she found it on her writing desk, out of the box and ready to go. She’d had the opportunity to ask him about it that very same evening. “I think there’s been a mistake. There’s a laptop in my room.”

  “Do you have a computer already?” He had to know she didn’t.

  “No.”

  “Then it’s for your use. There’s wifi in the building.”

  “Thank you. And thank you for the cell phone as well.”

  He nodded his head once and then looked back to his own computer screen, dismissing her altogether.

  And that had been that. He hadn’t bothered to ask if she had a dedicated phone number—so she sent out a mass text message to her contacts informing them of the new number.

  Natalie had also spoken to her mother and assured her of her welfare. She hadn’t told her the complete truth, only that she’d gotten a temporary job as a cleaner. She’d learned from the conversation that her mom still had the live-in boyfriend. Someday, she reminded herself, her mother would see that he was no good. Until that day came, Natalie consoled herself with the thought that he was very likely only a cheater and a loser; he didn’t seem to be a drug user or an abuser of alcohol. He’d never shown any violent tendencies. Hopefully, her mom would come to her senses and Natalie could move back to the small town she loved and the job she knew she’d be welcomed back to at the title company, where she’d worked for the last four years.