Breathe

by Lauren Jameson

  “You can imagine the rest,” she said quietly, willing the pain to fade from memory. “It happened a few more times. He took pictures.”

  “How did you get him to stop?” Elijah’s voice was full of repressed fury. Samantha felt a wave of satisfaction that someone was so angry on her behalf.

  “I took a kitchen knife and caught him with his pants down in the bathroom one afternoon.” Grim pleasure accompanied the recollection. She would never forget the look on his face as she’d held up the butcher knife, determination and desperation in her every muscle.

  “I told him that if he ever touched me again, if he ever even thought about touching Beth, I’d sneak into their room while he was sleeping and cut his cock off. I meant it, too.” She gnashed her teeth just thinking about it. “That afternoon I tried to tell my mom. She denies it now, but I know she believed me. But instead of trying to protect me, she used it to get money out of him. Money and the pictures. He left, and she started drinking more. He’s popped back up now and again—I think because he likes tormenting her. The pictures . . . I didn’t know she’d held on to those. Another bargaining chip, I guess.”

  The whole story out, Samantha fell silent. Instead of terror that Elijah would think less of her, though, she felt relief.

  It was out. She couldn’t control it anymore.

  She squeaked when Elijah rolled her onto her side, facing him. In the blackness she could just make out the stubborn line of his jaw.

  “I think even more of you now that I know this.” Strong fingers traced over her jaw, her lips, and Samantha nuzzled into the touch like a kitten. “You survived, and you made something of yourself. And now you’ve faced your fears. You’re the bravest woman I know.”

  Samantha closed her eyes and said a silent prayer. Yes, she was brave—so brave that she spat out her next words before she could chicken out.

  “So, are we . . . okay?” She trembled as the hand tracing over her cheek stilled. “I’m so sorry I left. So sorry.”

  Elijah was silent for a long moment, less than a minute, but enough for Samantha’s mind to head down a dark, winding path.

  When he wrapped his arm around her waist and drew her in close, her heart began to beat double time.

  “I know you’re sorry, Sammie Cat.” His hand was splayed out over the small of her back, and she arched into the touch. “So this is what we’re going to do.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The last four weeks had been the longest month of Samantha’s life.

  “Three weeks and six days,” she muttered to herself as she parked her new previously owned sedan in front of In Vino Veritas and slid out of the driver’s seat.

  She was there a day early. She couldn’t wait anymore, and she didn’t care what Elijah said about it.

  “Miss Samantha.” Julien grinned at her as she approached the front door, her palms slick with nervous sweat. “You look lovely.”

  “Thanks, Julien.” Samantha looked down at the red miniskirt and bustier that she’d chosen specifically for their color. “Uh . . . is everything set up?”

  “The crate is in the entryway, and I’ve kept him busy for the last hour.” The man’s eyes twinkled with mischief. “You’re sure you’re set on him? Because I’d be more than happy to step into his place.”

  “I’m absolutely sure.” Samantha’s nerves hummed with anticipation. She’d seen the sense in Elijah’s proposal that they spend a month apart, even as she’d protested. Loudly.

  He’d wanted her to take time away from him, away from sex, to make sure this was what she wanted.

  She’d used the time to pack up her things in Mexico and move both herself and Beth to Las Vegas. She and Elijah had spoken, texted, and e-mailed, but it was all a pale substitute for being with him in person.

  “You’re ready?” Julien pulled his phone from his pocket, and Samantha nodded as butterflies began to dance in her stomach. “I’ll text him, then. You go on in.”

  Swallowing past her nerves, Samantha pushed through the heavy front door of Veritas. In the place where she’d once told Elijah that they needed a piece of art stood a wooden crate, the nails pulled out, waiting for the sides to be pulled off.

  The lobby was otherwise empty. She’d asked Julien to discourage people from loitering around there right then.

  Tugging at the hem of her bustier, she walked to the crate, her impossibly high heels echoing on the stone floor. She tugged one of the wooden sides away, letting it fall to the floor with a crash.

  The crash muffled the first of Elijah’s footsteps. As soon as she recognized the sound, she whirled, eyes wide, desperate to lay eyes on him again.

  “Sammie Cat.” God, the man looked good. Rather than one of his more laid-back polo and jean ensembles, he was dressed in a fancy custom-tailored suit. The top two buttons of his shirt were undone, and he was missing his tie.

  He looked good enough to eat.

  “Hi.” Of all the things Samantha had expected to feel, shy wasn’t one of them. But after a month of phone calls, she wondered if his feelings had changed, now that she was here in the flesh.

  “Come here to me.” His voice was gruff. He held out his arms as she hesitantly crossed the space between them.

  And then she was enfolded in his powerful strength, the smell of him in her nostrils, and nothing had ever felt more right.

  “Fuck.” Elijah pulled back, looked her in the face, then claimed her lips in a fierce, hot kiss. When he finally released her, she laughed, slightly out of breath.

  “It’s good to see you, too.” Grinning up at him, she tapped her fingers on the side of the wooden crate and waited.

  “Is this . . . ?” Elijah’s worlds trailed off with anticipation as he stepped back to look at the crate. With the one side that Samantha had removed, the wooden box stood open, the sculpture upright and draped in cloth, waiting to be revealed.

  She tensed, suddenly terrified, as Elijah tugged on one end of the cloth. His opinion mattered more than anything.

  “Oh, Samantha.” Elijah’s voice was full of awe. She watched, still nervous, as he raked his fingers through his hair and circled the sculpture to take it in from all sides.

  She looked with him, trying to see it as he did.

  The glass was similar in shape to that first sculpture at his exhibit, the one that had brought them together. That sculpture had been packed up and shipped to Elijah’s home, and was presumably upstairs right then.

  This one was more suited to be displayed at Veritas. It had the same contrast of masculine and feminine, the same burning sensuality.

  But where the first sculpture had been made with Samantha’s unexplored desires in mind, this one . . .

  This one was submission fully realized. A deep, passionate red, the swirls of glass spoke of the beauty of a strong woman giving control to the man who had earned it.

  “It’s called Submission,” Samantha said quietly, her words nonetheless echoing off the high ceilings.

  “Are you absolutely sure?” Elijah turned to her, eyes burning.

  After a month of mental practice, Samantha sank to her knees with far more grace than she once had. Settling on the cold floor, she waited, her eyes on the stone, her palms facing up.

  The gesture said what her words could not.

  “Stand up.” There—there it was, that total dominance. God, how she’d yearned for that over the past few weeks.

  She hurried to obey his order, wobbling only a bit on her heels. The fierceness that she saw on Elijah’s face when she looked up took her breath away.

  “I bought this the day you flew back to Mexico.” Digging in his pocket, Elijah pulled out a braided white gold necklace, the chain as thick as one of her fingers. “I’ve carried it with me ever since, hoping that you would come back.”

  “There was never any doubt.” Samantha stared at the necklace greedily. It was beautiful, and exactly, uniquely her, with the large pendant made of the palest green glass. But it wasn’t the object itself t
hat drew her so much as what she hoped it represented.

  “If I put this on you, it means that you’re mine. In every single way. Is that what you want?”

  Samantha reached surreptitiously for the skin on the inside of her elbow and pinched.

  “Ow.” She rubbed the spot to soothe the sting, then looked up to find Elijah frowning at her. “Sorry. I just wanted to make sure that this was real.”

  Some of the same emotions that she was feeling flickered over Elijah’s face. He dangled the necklace from his fingers, letting the gorgeous metal and glass catch the light.

  “Last chance.” His words were light, but Samantha knew him well enough by now to hear the trace of apprehension behind it.

  Narrowing her eyes, she grabbed for the necklace, scowling when a now grinning Elijah held it out of her reach.

  “Mine.” Samantha put everything she felt into the one word, looking up into the face of the man that she loved.

  He spun her gently, then finally, finally settled the necklace around her throat. The ball of glass settled into her collarbone as if the piece had been made for her—and knowing Elijah, it probably had.

  She trembled as his fingers danced over her bare skin, settling the necklace into place, then securing the clasp. He spun her back around, then traced his fingers down the line of white gold.

  “Mine,” he agreed, and after staring at each other for a long moment, they both broke into grins.

  “Want a drink before we go play?” His fingers skimmed from the necklace down, dancing over the swells of her breasts. Samantha felt her body tighten—she wanted to go play now.

  The last month had taught her that some things were worth the wait, so she smiled and took Elijah’s hand.

  “Know anywhere I can get a decent glass of wine?”

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A big thank-you to the usual suspects for all their help with this book! To my super editor, Kerry Donovan, without whom this book would . . . well . . . suck. To my agent, Deidre Knight, who inspires me daily. To Suzanne Rock, the best critique partner in the world. To Sara Fawkes and Avery Aster, as well as Barbara J. Hancock, D. L. Snow, Juliana Stone, and Amanda Vyne for cheering me on (and listening to me whine). To my husband, Rob, for getting the kidlet out of the house so that I could get some work done. For my parents and the staff at their business for letting me hide out in a back office when the getting-the-kid-out-of-the-house thing didn’t work so well. And finally, thank you to Brenda Novak, who has supported me through my son’s recent diagnosis of type 1 diabetes, and who helped me translate the medical terms into understandable language for this book.

  Lauren Jameson is a writer, yoga newbie, knitting aficionado, and animal lover who lives in the shadows of the great Rocky Mountains of Alberta, Canada. The author of the serial novel Surrender to Temptation, she has published with Avon and Harlequin as Lauren Hawkeye and writes contemporary erotic romance for New American Library.

  CONNECT ONLINE

  www.laurenjameson.com

  www.laurenhawkeye.com

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  Keep reading for a special preview of Lauren Jameson’s

  SURRENDER TO TEMPTATION

  Coming in print in April from New American Library!

  Now available from Intermix wherever e-books are sold.

  All I wanted was to feel sexy.

  Grimacing, I pulled the confection of openwork silk off of my shoulders and down. What had I been thinking? A girl with some curves—namely, me—couldn’t wear ruffles. This whole endeavor was a terrible idea.

  My bangs were sticking to my forehead with sweat as I tugged the lingerie back over my head. I contemplated dropping it to the ground and stomping on it in frustration, but repressed the urge and hung the lingerie back up, nice and neat, on its plastic hanger.

  That was what I always did, after all—shoved my real feelings away, smiling prettily when I wanted to scream.

  Frustrated and close to tears, I eyed the last item that I’d brought with me into the dressing room at Magnifique, the fancy lingerie boutique that I’d passed by on my way to work every single day for the last year. That item was also lace, but instead of being heavily ruffled and made for a woman with the build of Barbie, it was a deep indigo, made of soft silk, and sophisticated instead of cute. It would skim the body and accentuate curves.

  This one had to work. It just had to. How was I ever going to convince my ever so proper boyfriend to make love to me in a position other than missionary if I couldn’t find something to entice him with?

  Inhaling deeply and avoiding the sight of my naked flesh in the mirror, I tugged the slip off of its hanger and over my head. It felt lovely, the material moving in a sensual glide over my skin.

  With my eyes squeezed shut, I turned back toward the mirror, sucked in my tummy, and, after a lengthy internal pep talk, peeked at the reflection staring back at me.

  “Oh.” The woman in the mirror smiled with surprise and pleasure at the same time that I did. Smoothing a hand over the length of my now-messy blond ponytail, I scanned the image nervously, looking for the flaws that I saw every day—the swell of my stomach, the slightly too heavy breasts, the hips that were a hint too wide.

  I saw none of them. The incredibly sheer lace kissed my curves rather than clinging to them, and this made my waist, my belly, and my hips all look just right. My breasts rose enticingly out of the low neckline, and the hem of the little slip hit midthigh, covering my butt yet hinting at more.

  I looked . . . Well, I looked hot.

  It was a strange sensation.

  Before I could convince myself otherwise, I stripped off the slip and put my office clothes back on. The knee-length skirt, blouse, and cardigan sweater were all solid black—bright colors made me feel fat. The monochromatic look worked just fine for the office, however—Cambridge–Neilson and Sons, the law firm where I was an administrative assistant.

  The law firm where my boyfriend, Tom, was a junior partner. The slip that I was buying was in an effort to please him. No, I corrected myself as I brought it nervously to the front counter, it was about pleasing me. About looking—and feeling, I supposed—sexy enough to entice Tom to be a little more adventurous in the bedroom.

  To possibly, maybe, encourage him to do some of the deliciously naughty things that I thought about nearly all of the time. Dreamed about, too.

  “Your total comes to two hundred dollars and seventy cents.” I’d been playing it cool until that moment, acting like I bought expensive lingerie all the time, but the sum that the tall, slender brunette salesgirl announced very nearly made me choke.

  Two hundred dollars? For that little scrap of lace?

  I couldn’t afford it. I should have just let it be. Did I really want to spend that much in order to please Tom?

  The salesgirl, whose nametag read BERNADETTE in swirling cursive, saw my wistful glance at the swath of midnight blue that she was wrapping in silver tissue. I forgave her the stylish boots and the fresh salon haircut when she gave me a kind smile and said, “It’s expensive, but we’re all worth it, aren’t we?”

  I thought of how I looked in the slip, and then thought of someone looking at me while I wore it. Of his dark eyes taking in the way the blue set off the pale cream of my skin, of the way my nipples flushed through the soft lace.

  Yes. I had to have it.

  “It’s fine. I’ll put it on credit.” Rummaging through my large leather satchel, I finally found my wallet. It caught on a cardboard envelope as I pulled it out, and the print that I had just picked up from the photography place next door slipped out and onto the counter.

  Bernadette glanced over, and I saw her study it for a moment longer than necessary. “He looks familiar.”

  I turned to study the picture, too. It was of Tom and me posing rather seriously at the beach. It had been a rare unplanned moment in our courtship, on a business trip to Los Angeles, when I had begged him to pull the car over so that we could watch the sunset
. Surprisingly, he had agreed. With the sun setting behind us in a riot of glowing shades, and the angle clearly showing that the picture had been taken by one of us with a cell phone camera, it should have been a romantic shot. Instead, we looked so incredibly austere, so at odds with the sunset and the ocean, that the whole thing seemed rather silly.

  Still, it was the best picture that I had of us together. I was going to frame it and keep it on my desk at work. We had been dating for over a year, after all.

  “Hmm.” Before I could reply, Bernadette snapped her fingers, even as she expertly nipped my credit card from my hand and ran it through her point-of-sale machine. “Yesterday! He was in yesterday. Big spender.” When she caught what I’m sure was my surprised expression, she clapped a hand over her mouth and giggled sheepishly. “I probably shouldn’t have said that. Now I’ve ruined whatever surprise he had for you.”

  “Surprise. Right.” Brow furrowed, I took the candy pink–and-cream-striped bag that she handed me, nodding my thanks before walking away.

  I was quite certain that she was mistaken. I would have let it go at that, but the woman’s statement niggled at my mind all the way back to work, and then as I sat at my desk, slowly pecking away at the handwritten letter that one of the lawyers needed typed up.

  Never had Tom bought me expensive lingerie. He’d never bought me candy or flowers, either, for that matter. He just wasn’t that type of guy and, foolishly, early on in our relationship, I had told him that grand gestures weren’t important to me.

  I hadn’t lied—they weren’t important . . . exactly. But a soft inner part of my heart still craved some kind of sweet gesture from time to time—something that told me I was being thought of when I wasn’t there.