Leah smiles.
"By the way, how's your dad?"
Leah's smile fades. "Not great."
"Sorry to hear that," I say, and I don't like seeing her sad like this. "What's going on?"
"He's at Jersey General. It was supposed to be an easily treatable form of cancer, but the chemo hasn't worked so far. I don't know what's going to happen."
I nod. "Let me know if I can be of service," I say. "Or if you want to talk about it." For some crazy reason, I feel like her sadness is my sadness. I want to do whatever I can to help her.
"Thanks," she says. "I will."
"You know Leah," I say, changing the topic, "One thing that intrigues me about you is that you really do make your own way."
She shrugs, and her hair flutters down her cheek. She's got a beautiful face, and—I'm starting to realize—an equally beautiful heart.
"It's just the way I was raised," she says. "I don't mind that you have money. But I'll never let it become a thing between us."
I grin. "Thinking that far into the future?" I refrain from mentioning to her that I'm thinking just as far into the future myself.
She pauses for a second. She's so cute when she's embarrassed. "That's not what I meant," she says, but I chuckle and shush her.
I extend my hand across the table, and she puts hers in mine. It sends a rush through my stomach every time I touch her.
I stroke her palm with my thumb, and she moves her fingertips against my palm as well. "This feels good," I say.
She smiles shyly. "It does."
Squeezing her hand, I look deep into her eyes. "I want you," I say, letting my fingernails dig lightly into her skin. I lean in toward her, and she does the same. Our faces are only about ten or twelve inches apart, like they were back when she came over to get her notebook out of my limo.
Her smell intoxicates me. It's like vanilla, and ocean spray, and spices. But I don't even think she's wearing perfume. I think it's all her, just her natural smell, and it turns me on like fucking crazy.
She lowers her voice. "Tell me more," she whispers to me. "Tell me what you want from me."
"Leah," I growl, "I want to uncover all your secrets. I want to learn everything there is to know about your body, and I want to taste every fucking inch of it. I've never wanted someone as much as I want you."
Her breathing quickens, and she squeezes my hand harder. She has so much sexual energy inside her, and I can't wait to experience it first-hand. But at the same time, I still detect that there's something she's not telling me. She seems stiff, uptight, as if she's hiding a secret from me.
"Is that all you want?" she asks.
"No," I growl. "I don't just want your body, I want your mind, too. And your heart."
She stares into my eyes, and I think I could get lost in her baby blues right now. I can't keep my eyes off her lips. They look perfect, and almost remind me of peaches. I bet they'd taste that way, too.
I decide that I can't wait any longer to find out. Or at least, I don't want to.
"I'm going to kiss you now," I say.
Her hand feels hot in mine, and she doesn't resist my advance. I lean across the table, closing the gap between us, and I place my lips on hers, getting the taste of chocolate frosting in my mouth. Our tongues press together, our lips hungrily searching out one another, and attraction surges through my body like thunder.
When our lips finally part, I'm breathing hard, and so is Leah.
"Damn," I say.
"That was… something," says Leah, blinking and staring into my eyes.
"Yeah it was," I respond. I stand up and grab her hand. "Come on. Let's get out of here."
9
Leah
My feet clang against the metal steps of the stairwell in Luke's office building. I look around nervously at the maze of pipes and fire control systems that line the walls.
"I don't think we're supposed to be here," I say. My voice echoes over the concrete and metal, and it creeps me out. It's almost midnight, and Luke is leading me up to the roof of the Diamond House Tower. The elevators don't go up this far, so we had to take the stairs.
He laughs and tugs on my hand. "Did you already forget? I'm the CEO. Nothing in this building is off-limits to me."
When we get to the very top of the stairs, there's a ladder against the wall that goes straight up to a hatch in the ceiling.
"That's how we get up there," says Luke, grinning. We're both out of breath, and he wipes his forehead off on his shirt sleeve.
"Really?" I say.
"Really. I'll help you up."
Luke holds his hands around my waist as I climb the ladder toward the access hatch, and I love how small my body feels in his hands. I normally spend a lot of time fretting about my curves in the mirror, but when I'm with Luke, he makes me feel like I'm truly small and sexy. And he doesn't just make me feel like it, he makes me believe it, too.
As I move up the ladder, his hands slip down my waist, and he lets his fingertips lightly run over my ass. I can't help clenching my thighs as it happens, and I can't deny to myself that I want his fingers to touch much more of my body. I want to feel them skin-on-skin, not just through the fabric of my dress.
When I get to the top of the ladder, I reach up and wiggle the handle but the hatch doesn't open. I look down at Luke. "A little help?"
He frowns. "Pull on it harder."
I try, but nothing happens. "It's stuck," I say.
Luke climbs up the ladder beneath me, until he's right behind me. His arms encircle me as he grips the ladder from behind me, and his body presses into mine. I feel a hardness in his pants press against my ass, and it's all I can do to not wiggle my ass and press back against him.
He reaches up, his body molding perfectly against mine, and he gives the latch a powerful jerk. It clicks open, and he shoves the access hatch open. Cool night air blows down into the building.
"After you," he says into my ear, and I giggle as I climb up onto the roof.
"This is amazing," I say, crouching down on my knees and looking out at the midnight Manhattan skyline. This roof is maintenance access only, and so there's no railing around the edges, just a short concrete lip. Being near the edge makes me feel dizzy, so I stay down low. But it's still a mesmerizing sight.
Luke stands behind me, putting one leg behind me as a sort of brace. I lean into it and wrap a hand around his shin. He feels so good and so strong.
"I can't remember the last time I had a night this fun," I say, looking at the art deco styling of the Empire State Building in the distance. "A high-speed motorcycle ride to a donut shop, and then sneaking onto the roof of a skyscraper."
Luke reaches down and gently guides me up until I'm standing next to him. Above us, the sky is unusually clear tonight. I point up. "That's Cassiopeia," I say.
He laughs. "How can you tell? I never understood how people identify constellations. I can't even find the Big Dipper."
I giggle. "Come on, Mr. CEO. It's not that hard. I took one astronomy class in college."
He takes my hands in his and looks into my eyes. I feel like I could melt. "You know, Leah, I find it very difficult to believe that you don't have a huge line of men waiting to take you out."
"Uh, I'm flattered, but dating is difficult for us normal people."
"You think it's easy for me?" He laughs out loud.
I cock an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure that you can have any woman you want. I'm not really sure why you're here with me right now, but I'm just trying not to question it too much."
Luke laughs. "Quantity isn't the same thing as quality." He pauses. "Just look at my ex-girlfriend if you don't believe me."
I can't help but wrinkle my nose a little bit when he mentions his ex. I don't like the thought of him with another woman.
"What happened with that?" I ask, not completely sure if I want to hear the answer.
He puts both his arms around my neck and pulls me in closer, so I'm looking right up at his face. He's so i
ncredibly handsome, especially out here in the moonlight. I don't think I've ever seen a man with such perfect bone structure and flawless skin, and his face catches the light at all the perfect angles.
"Well," he says, rubbing my back, "Her name was Nicole. I dated her for a few years in my early 30s. I thought she was my soulmate. But it turned out that she was more interested in living the red-carpet lifestyle than anything else." He pauses and gets a pained expression on his face. "She ended up cheating on me with a famous rock star."
I shake my head. "That's crazy. The same kind of thing happened to me. I only ever had one serious boyfriend. In college. I didn't want to do all of the things that he wanted to do with me, and well… He ended up finding other people to do those things with. Lots of them. And I was too much of a coward to break it off for a long time after that. I finally learned my lesson, though."
Luke shakes his head. "I hate that he did that to you."
"People can be pretty terrible," I say.
"Leah, I'll never make you do anything that you don't want to do. I'll push your limits, and test your boundaries. But I'll always respect it when you say no."
"Thanks," I say. I can't help wondering if he's going to be singing the same tune after he finds out the full truth about me. But I'm not ready to tell him about that yet.
Instead, I slide my hands up his arms, savoring the feeling of his hard, taut arms beneath his silk shirt. I let my hands find their way into his thick, luscious hair, and then I press my lips against his, tasting him. He kisses me back even harder, with an urgency that makes my nipples stiffen beneath my bra.
I'm terrified to admit it, but I think this man really makes me want to do it.
I break the kiss. "Luke," I say, "Why haven't you tried to take me to bed yet? Every guy always tries."
He smirks. "I haven't made any secret of my attraction to you. I'm going to taste every fucking inch of your tight little body. But there's no rush. We have all the time in the world."
My pussy throbs between my legs. When I finally get back to my apartment tonight, I'm going to have a long session with my vibrator. I'll probably have to take it into the shower just to mask the sound so Aya doesn't hear what I'm doing.
Just then, Luke's phone dings in his pocket. He sighs. "That's my work phone. I have to check it."
I step back and compose myself, brushing stray hairs behind my ears. "I understand."
He pulls his phone out and holds it where I can read the screen.
When he taps the "Messages" icon, a text appears from an unknown number. It's a topless selfie of a young, beautiful blonde, with the caption, "Remember this?"
It makes me feel weird. Really weird.
"Uh, awkward," I say, and I turn around and step away from Luke, looking upward, trying to identify more constellations in the night sky.
"Wait a second," he says, walking quickly toward me and jamming his phone back in his pocket. "That's… not what it looks like. Really."
I glance at him and shrug. "Whatever. It's fine. But it's a weird thing to see, especially during a moment like this."
He looks angry, and even though I try to control my thoughts, they start to run away from me. It's always hard to control my emotional reactions when stuff like this happens, especially because it reminds me of how I felt when Edward cheated on me.
It's weird that he's getting angry, though. Why would he react that way? Isn't anger a sign of a guilty conscience?
He sighs. "I know. I get how it looks. But just trust me. I can't explain all the details right now, but this isn't something you need to worry about."
"You don't have to explain yourself," I say, forcing the rational side of my brain to overpower the emotional side. "Just don't lie to me."
Luke looks me dead in the eye. "If there's one thing I won't do to you, Leah, it's lie to you. We both know how that feels, and it's not something I'm going to do to you. Or anyone."
I think for a minute. "Okay. Fair. You haven't given me any reason to doubt what you're saying. Let's just move past this and forget it ever happened."
"Yeah," he says. "This was… someone from work trying to stir up trouble. Don't worry about it."
"Okay," I say. "I'm not."
We stand there in awkward silence for a while, staring at the stars and listening to the sound of late-night Manhattan traffic.
"You know," he says, "I could lose all of this."
I'm taken aback. Why would the CEO of the biggest book publishing company in the world be worried about losing his job and his company? "Is that right?" I ask.
"Diamond House is merging with McMaster. I'm sure you've heard of them."
I nod. "Sure. The other big publisher."
"Yes. And the new board will pick either me or the McMaster CEO to lead the new company."
"A winner and a loser."
"That's right."
I lean over and give him a kiss on the cheek. It's a vote of confidence both for his business troubles, and also for my trust in him. I don't think he's lying to me.
"Come on," I say, tugging at his sleeve. "I have to go home. But I can't wait for more later. And to do more things with you."
I sit upstairs in the Brooklyn Public Library, tap-tap-tapping away on my little AlphaSmart word processor that I got for $20 on eBay. All my author friends use these instead of laptops to write, because there's no Internet or other distractions on them.
I mean, come on. Having the world's supply of cat memes at your fingertips isn't a good thing when you're trying to get serious work done.
I've been cruising along on my next book. But today, I have writer's block. And the reason for that is simple. Two words.
Luke Steele.
I was so mad at him when he appeared outside my apartment. And I couldn't believe how fast we went on his motorcycle. I was legitimately terrified that I was going to fly off and become a pancake on the Brooklyn Bridge.
When I first met him, he seemed like such a stereotypical rich-CEO-type. Big house, fancy restaurants, flashy clothes, fast motorcycle. But the more I'm getting to know him, the more I'm realizing that there's way more to him than that.
He feels good to me. He feels good, tastes good, looks good, and smells good. When I'm not around him, I can't stop thinking about him. And I can't stop myself from checking my phone every fifteen minutes to see if he's texted or called me.
I can't lie. I think I feel something very strong and powerful for him. Something much stronger than I've ever felt before.
Tonight we're going out to Buffalo Wild Wings with Aya, and I'm really hoping that everything goes well and Luke makes a good impression on her. Actually, I know he will. What I'm actually hoping is that Aya thinks Luke and I make a good couple together.
When you're waiting for a text message to come, it feels like it never will. Each passing minute only creates more and more anxiety. And false alarms… those are the worst. I get a couple as I try to focus on writing my book.
First, it's Aya, sending me a selfie from some rooftop bar and inviting me to come out and drink before we get wings tonight. I look at the time: 4:40pm. I have no idea how she finds the time for this stuff. I guess at the startup culture, drinking is a part of normal work duties. Next, it's a delivery notification from Amazon.
Then it happens. My iPhone dings, and my eyes race to the screen. The name is "Luke."
I shove my word processor away from me and scoop up my phone like a kid grabbing handfuls of Halloween candy from an unattended basket on a dark porch. I read the message:
Meet at 8? I can't wait to see you.
I smile to myself.
10
Luke
"Thanks," I say, smiling at the waitress taking our order. "We'll get a 20-piece traditional Wild, a 20-piece Mango Habanero, a side of cheddar cheese curds, and carrots and celery."
"You got it," she says, scribbling on her notepad. "Ranch or blue cheese?"
I glance at Leah and her friend Aya, both of whom sit across from
me at the booth. "Your call, ladies."
"Obviously blue cheese," says Aya, rolling her eyes.
"I wouldn't separate that girl from her blue cheese," says Leah, winking at me. "I can't guarantee what would happen."
I grin. "Blue cheese it is."
The waitress heads off to put in our order. I lean in to the table, feeling out of place. I didn't have time to change after work, and Buffalo Wild Wings isn't exactly a place for a suit and tie.
I still can't fucking believe that bastard Rex LaPrise sent that nude photograph to my phone when he did. It's something from my younger days. He must have gotten it off an old phone of mine or something.
The text that said, "Remember this?" completely gave it away. That girl never would have done such a thing. It was a thinly veiled threat from Rex, and it couldn't have come at a worse time. At least Leah trusted me when I told her that nothing was going on behind her back. If Rex had messed up my relationship with Leah, I might have actually done something stupid.
"Can't even remember the last time I came here," I say. I look around at the yellow and purple decor. "Hasn't changed much."
"It's a very classy establishment," says Leah. "Almost as classy as Dorsia."
Aya's jaw drops and she turns to Leah. "Did you just say 'Dorsia?'"
Leah grins.
"What do you know about Dorsia?"
"Well, Luke may have taken me there for our first date."
Aya looks at me in disbelief, her mouth curling into a smile. She's conventionally pretty, with light brown skin and thick, curly hair, but I really don't notice her when she's sitting next to Leah. My eyes keep flicking off to Leah's face, which is gorgeous in a timeless way that I haven't ever seen before.
"That's incredible. Who are you?"
Leah and I exchange glances. "I'm… an executive in the publishing industry," I say. I assume that Aya's going to Google my name after she goes home tonight and find out exactly who I am. There's probably no avoiding it. But I'm not going to broadcast that I'm a billionaire CEO right now. Nothing good can come of that.
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