by Amber Bardan
Like the warmth of getting close to someone. Really close. Close enough that it would break me again to lose them. Close like this, where there didn’t seem to be air between us. I could touch him, and I’d be swept away.
But go away with him?
I’d never been away with someone. I’d never been with anyone, period. It was easy to get lost in the magic, but this was real life. One that came with responsibility...
I studied the hand on my thigh. Huge compared to mine. Could swallow mine completely. Yet his thick fingers were still long enough to look nimble.
How was this even happening?
Me on his yacht, him touching me... I knew why I’d come. Sitting across from him, my hand in his, I wasn’t there for an article. But, why’d he go so out of his way to find me?
He could have anyone. Why hunt me down?
“I can’t just leave for two weeks.”
He touched my chin and lifted, until once again, I was cornered by his gaze. The look he gave me was one I doubted anyone ever resisted.
“You can. You’re just afraid to take the risk.”
I breathed deeply, getting a little high on his delicious cologne. Maybe I could. Maybe I could say to hell with everyone else. Say the hell to no. Say the hell to caution. Do one thing, just one thing for me. For two weeks, leave absolutely everything behind and escape. But reality intruded, snapping at my conscience.
“You don’t understand—I have responsibilities.”
His touch moved to my cheek, stroking my skin. I couldn’t resist leaning my face into his warmth.
“I can take care of your responsibilities. Tell me what you need and I’ll make it happen. Someone to fill in at your workplace? Your dry cleaning collected, appointments rescheduled? Write me a list, and it will all be done.”
Warmth spread from where his fingers touched my cheek to deep in my chest. All my life—for so many reasons—I’d always faded into the background. Never felt as if I was a star in my own show. But in that moment, there was no denying I was front and center.
“You’d do all that for me? Just so I’d come with you?”
His hand slid to the base of my skull and tugged me forward. His lips hovered over mine. “You have no idea what I’d do to have you, Angelina.”
My skin prickled, the hairs on my body stood erect and my stomach flipped over. How could he say those things to me? I’d never been wanted like this.
And by a stranger.
Why?
I eased away from his lips, and his fingers trailed away.
“It’s complicated, Haithem.”
“Let me make it uncomplicated.” He looked me in the eye, so directly, so purposefully. “Do you want to come with me?”
I rubbed my palms on my thighs. A yes-or-no question. The air in the cabin seemed to grow thinner.
“Yes.” The word breathed out of me.
Yes.
A simple yes. He smiled. The kind of smile that made my head spin. A satisfied smile, yes, but so warm and beautiful I had to grip my legs to keep from touching him.
“Good,” he said. “Then there’s just one other thing we need to talk about.” He reached for my hand, held it in his. The heat from his fingers enveloped mine, warmed me to the bone. “I’ve been in Melbourne on business.”
I watched his lips move, watched the way he pronounced every word so artfully. My attention pricked. He was going to tell me things.
“It’s very, very important business, Angelina.”
I nodded. Probably not as important as this, though. Probably not as important as what was happening right here. I could feel my cells vibrating in anticipation. Not of the impending revelations, not even of the mad-awesome sex I knew was coming, but in anticipation of doing this one wrong thing, this one selfish thing.
Of being a little bad and loving it.
“It’s important, secret business.” The hand on mine squeezed gently. “Do you understand?”
I slammed down from euphoria. The place in my head that had flicked back and forth between coming for him, and coming here because of him, switched gears.
He had secrets—I knew it.
“Sure, you have important, secret business.” I leaned forward, attempting to sound uninterested, and put my lips closer to his.
He made a gruff sound in his throat and grabbed my chin as though stopping himself from kissing me. “It needs to stay secret.”
My heart sped up. Ha. Let’s not mention articles or exposés.
“Okay,” I whispered.
His thumb slid up and swiped across my lips. My mouth opened, and I tasted him. Tasted the salty clean taste of his thumb.
He dropped his hand and looked down at me through lowered lashes. “That means you can’t tell anyone about me.”
Well, that ruled out my editor and the wider public. That also ruled the whimsy out of his mysteriousness.
“You can’t tell anyone where you are going or how you are going.”
My head spun, and I snapped back against the couch. I glanced at the table with the champagne. I wouldn’t touch it again. The cabin seemed more real. I could smell the wood, the sea, the scent of him. I could see the shadows against the walls and dents in the carpet where someone had moved furniture.
This was real, and suddenly it felt dangerous.
Haithem didn’t waver, didn’t back down. He leaned in after me, and this time his eyes were deadly serious. “I’d need you to sign a confidentiality agreement.”
This wasn’t good. Not for an ulterior motive and most particularly not for me.
If he hadn’t been so close, if his voice didn’t crack with tension, if he didn’t make my heart race in a different, dangerous kind of way, I might have laughed.
Because this was crazy, so crazy. At most, the piece I’d planned to write on him would have been fun and frivolous. About a playboy. A teasing look at the unattainable and why that makes smart girls go crazy. But, who asks for a confidentiality agreement before hooking up with someone?
Whatever he was involved in, it wasn’t good. Things you need to hide rarely are.
I looked at the handbag I’d let fall to the floor, leaned forward slowly, then dragged it into my lap. “I’m not much of a liar, Haithem.”
That wasn’t even said for misdirection. If our conversation had gone any other way, I’d have come right out and told him why else I was there and hoped he’d help me out with it.
I stood.
He stood with me.
I slipped my handbag over my shoulder and glanced at the door.
“I’d pay you,” he said.
My gaze flew back to him. “What?”
“I’d pay you to sign it.” He slunk forward, somehow closing the gap I’d created before I could move any farther away. “I’d pay for you to keep my secrets. I’d pay for you to tell whatever lies you need to tell to satisfy whoever it is you’re afraid of lying to.”
Cold snapped the heat still zinging along my skin clear out of my system. I hadn’t heard him right. Surely he hadn’t just offered to pay me?
“I’m not taking money.” I scooted around him, sliding myself closer to the exit. “And honestly, it’s pretty offensive that you think I would.”
“Everything has a price, Angelina—everything.”
A chill crept up my neck, and I took another step.
His gaze tracked my movements. If I’d thought I could sneak toward the door all inconspicuously, I was wrong. He knew what I was doing, and damn him, he looked disappointed.
His mouth turned down at the corners. “I’ve never taken anything I wasn’t prepared to pay for.”
I flinched. What was I, then, something to be acquired? So much for romantic fantasy. But then that whole idea had died right about the sa
me time he’d asked for an agreement.
“Well, you can’t pay for something that isn’t for sale.” I stepped again and swayed. Dammit, too much champagne. “I’m going.”
His expression hardened. He looked intimidating as hell, and I just bet that icy glare of his usually made everyone around him cave in to his demands. Arrogant jackass.
“Don’t run from me again, Angelina.”
The warning in his voice froze me. I shook my head. It was probably a good thing I’d found out he was a bossy, cold-and-dead-on-the-inside asshole now. Especially since he looked, smelled and tasted anything but cold.
He really shouldn’t have let me think there was more to this, that he felt anything special for me. Clearly, he saw this—saw me—as some kind of transaction.
I could think of fifty-one articles I could write about this the instant I left. Unfortunately none of those could be published under the umbrella of “sexiness.”
Disgruntled with malekind, ready to form my own all-female commune—those were not Poise magazine angles.
“I’ll do what I like.” I raised my chin and gave him a glare that dared to be challenged. “Next time you’re trying to get into a girl’s pants, maybe try not treating her like a whore.”
I didn’t wait to gauge his reaction, just turned to the door.
A touch on my arm stopped me. “Don’t run because I hurt your pride. There’s something between us bigger than pettiness.”
I looked at him. His lips pressed tightly. A squint fanned his eyes, almost as though he had emotions. There’s something between us bigger than pettiness...
I don’t know where my fight went, but it ran out on me. Left me alone with Haithem to overtake my senses and do as he pleased.
He kissed me—seared me from the outside to my insides. Brutal, ruthless, possessive. His tongue invaded the cavity of my mouth, took everything I had. Stroked me, inflamed me until I held his shirt just to remain on my feet.
He tasted like life, made me want to dive right in. He seized me up in his arms and surrounded me. My breasts ground against his chest. I wanted more, more friction, more of his tongue in my mouth, more of his hands on me, more of him. I gripped him by the shoulders, tugged the cotton covering him.
Haithem jerked back and stared down at me. We panted. That kiss proved why he really wanted to pay me—he wanted to own me.
“You want this. Behave and we can both have what we want.”
Behave.
I shivered. I had images of doing just that. Behaving for Haithem. Being his paid pet. But the thought spiked a pain deep in my chest.
I had to get away from him.
I pulled back and fled the cabin.
His footsteps thundered behind me. “Stop, Angelina.”
“Just stay away from me.” I turned and faced him, my anger finally catching up with me. “You want to know the truth?” I took a deep breath and let it all rush out. “Yeah, I’m attracted to you, but you’re a massive prick. I’ve got no desire to behave or do anything else for you.”
His jaw hardened.
For an instant a shard of true fear spiked me. Would he possibly stop me from leaving?
No.
That would be crazy. Criminal. Evil. He couldn’t—wouldn’t.
But... The way his eyes narrowed. The way he assessed me. How could that be? Hot one moment, cold the next?
Cold. Suspicious.
Agreements and secret business. There was worse, and more sinister things to him than I’d first seen.
What was he hiding?
Why did Haithem, beautiful, rich, sexy, smooth Haithem, look at me as though I might be something to be studied and broken, shaken until my secrets spilled free?
His posture shifted as if he’d shrugged on a coat of formality. “Fine, if that’s how you feel, I’ll walk you to the dock and have Karim drive you home.”
I backed up, placing my hand on the railing. “You just don’t get it, do you? I don’t want anything from you. I have a phone, and believe it or not, I have access to money. I’ll walk myself out and take a cab.”
He just stared at me, his body so tight my own stiffened at the idea of what he might do. Insist I follow orders, most likely.
“Suit yourself. Goodbye, Angelina.”
He turned and stormed back into the cabin. The door crashed behind him. The vibration shuddered under my feet.
As quickly as they’d formed the ridiculous suspicions I’d had melted on the salty breeze.
He’d given up. Haithem had given up.
I’d have bet he was incapable of such a thing.
A shameful longing in the area of my rib cage mourned the fact that he wasn’t immune to defeat. I’d let myself fantasize that I was invaluable to him, that he’d fight to have me. That his macho bullshit was a facade. I just didn’t realize how much I’d believed in that fantasy until he walked away.
Now I felt the disappointment to my toes. The wind blew gusts, and air whipped around me, flapping my dress around my thighs and sinking a chill into my skin. I crossed my arms, then shuffled to the stairs and grasped the railing. I shot one last look over my shoulder. Light filled the cabin. He’d closed the curtains, but the silhouette of his shadow stalked back and forth.
I’d agitated him. Gotten under his skin. I let that brazen satisfaction take hold. Haithem was different—larger than life—and I affected him. He tempted me with things I didn’t dare dream of doing. He’d drawn a picture of a seductive fantasy where I did everything I’d never allow myself.
Wrong or right, I wanted to live that fantasy.
I closed my eyes briefly. A blast of wind hit me from behind like a giant hand. I tripped and grasped for the railing, but the yacht dipped suddenly, and I fell forward, propelled across the rails. My body hurtled over the edge. The wind stole the breathless scream from my lips as I plunged through a wave of lights.
Then fell into darkness.
SEVEN
PAIN.
Pain then heat. I twitched my fingers. My body ached, throbbed from my ankles all the way up to my cheeks. Not to mention the bitch of a headache murdering my temples with invisible ice picks.
Hangover—a hangover from the fiery pit of hell.
I tried to sit, but something smothered me. I rolled onto my back and fumbled with the covering. I broke free and—dear god, the light.
Blazing light almost took out my eyeballs. I covered my face, then shielded my eyes. A blue glare pierced my vision. I blinked. The blue divided into a pale sky above and glittering water below.
What the actual fuck?
The world slowed, and I dropped back onto my elbows. I didn’t remember getting home. All I remembered was realizing Haithem was the devil—and apparently I had an appetite for destruction—right before heading to the stairs.
I clutched my head. The freaking stairs... Wind... Dipping bloody boat.
I glanced around, my stomach dropping. The ocean spread on my left, and the white expanse of a superyacht towered over me on the right. I moved around a bit, my feet tangled under a tarp. A lifeboat. I’d fallen through a tarp and into a goddamn lifeboat on the lower deck.
My heart seized, and I looked all the way up to the railing on the narrower top deck. I patted myself down with trembling hands. Somehow I’d landed in one piece, in spite of my splitting headache and aching limbs.
Faaark.
My parents were going to kill me, or, at the very least, ensure I wished for death by the time they finished with me. It was daylight, and I wasn’t home, and I hadn’t called them. All hell would have broken loose, and I would soon be trussed up and ready to be roasted. I disentangled my legs and threw one over the side of the lifeboat, then shimmied onto the floor.
My heels touched the floor, but the world swa
yed. A shout boomed across the deck. I turned in time to see a figure rush toward me, yelling indecipherable words. The man came into focus, then another emerged.
The silver barrel of a handgun flashed. It was trained on me.
My vision narrowed until the gun was all I could see—and instinct kicked in.
I ran, adrenaline spiking through my veins. I fled in the opposite direction, down a hallway. Footsteps closed in behind me. Light broke at the corner, and I strained to reach it. Darkness flashed across the light, and my face slammed into something solid.
Hands clamped over my arms, and I did the only thing I could think to do.
I screamed.
I filled my lungs and let sound boom out of my chest like a siren.
“Angelina?”
The sound of my name wrapped around me like an embrace. I looked up at Haithem, taking in his magnificent features drawn tight and fierce. My blood pounded manically, thudding in my eardrums. I clung to him, buried my hands into his shirt and held on.
“There are men with guns.” I glanced over my shoulder.
The men slowed. The one with the gun held it loosely at his side.
Haithem wound an arm around my waist and pressed my face against his chest. I breathed in the subtle strength of his scent.
He spoke quiet, foreign words, and the men fell back.
“Come with me,” he said, and grasped my arm, leading me around the corner and upstairs.
We glided across the deck, then into his cabin. The walls swam around me. I still felt hot, as if I’d been baked alive under that tarp. Haithem lowered me into a chair. I sank down, then gripped the arms. Things had gone blurry again. I needed water. There were cracks on my tongue. He dragged another chair across the carpet and positioned it in front of me.
Haithem flicked the button of his right shirt sleeve, rolled the material and pushed it above his elbow, then did the same to the other side. His bulky forearms flexed. The raw masculinity of those meaty arms hit me even through the madness flooding my system.
All I could think was Man. Man. Man. Man. My upper lip twitched where moisture cooled the skin. Finally, it made sense. The weirdness. The fogginess.