“What?”
Acting coy, I shrug, and then glance at my bare breasts. “You owe me a shirt.”
His gaze drops to my breasts. He smiles. “I’ll take you shopping.”
“I doubt you could afford it.”
His smile widens. His hands follow the direction of his gaze, and he cups my breasts, running his thumbs back and forth over my exquisitely sensitive nipples. He watches as I bite my lip.
He whispers, “You like that?”
“Yes.”
I can tell he’s pleased by how quickly I answered. And that I didn’t try to lie, or hide. He gently pinches both my nipples. When my lips part in pleasure, he pinches a little harder, and I moan, enjoying the feel of his big, rough hands.
“You like that, too.”
It isn’t a question. He’s talking to himself, watching me as he continues to fondle my breasts, alternating between stroking his thumbs over my nipples, pinching them, and squeezing the fullness of the globes. Inside me, he’s still rock-hard. A tiny contraction in my core makes him pull in a quick breath.
He sits up and wraps his arms around me, which drives his stiff cock even deeper inside.
“And that,” I whisper, slowly rocking my pelvis. He drops his head and sucks one of my nipples into his mouth. I close my eyes.
When he sucks harder, using his teeth, I arch and shudder. He pushes my torn blouse over my shoulders and off my arms, breaks away briefly to pull his own shirt over his head and toss it aside, and then quickly goes back to lavishing my breasts with attention.
“And your skin,” I breathe, running my open hands over the muscles in his back, shoulders and arms. His skin is like silk, flawlessly smooth and hairless. I’m losing myself again, drowning in the pleasure of him. Of us, the way we fit together.
I change the motion of my hips from a rocking one to a slow up-and-down slide. Parker groans against my breast.
“Ride that cock, baby,” he says roughly, his tongue flicking my nipple. “It’s yours. Ride it.”
It’s mine. It’s mine. Yes, yes, it’s all mine.
I don’t realize I’ve spoken aloud until he agrees via a grunt of approval.
I push him down so he’s flat on his back. Then I run my hands all over his chest and stomach, admiring the sculpted muscles. I reach down behind us and circle his cock with my fingers, squeezing and stroking as I take him in and out, my own wetness slipping between my fingers.
With steady pressure, Parker strokes my clit with his thumb as I ride him. He wraps the other hand around my hip. He watches me all the while, his look intense and unwavering, his eyes taking in everything on my face.
And I’m giving him everything. I’m letting him see exactly what I’m feeling, how good he feels, how much I like it, everything. I’m past caring. Past caution.
I never want this to end.
Suddenly he grabs both my hips, rolls out from under me, flips me onto my stomach, hikes my ass in the air, braces one arm against the mattress, wraps the other around my waist, and plunges deep inside me from behind.
I cry out. He starts to fuck me hard, holding me in place with that arm around my waist, his breath hot and rough at my ear.
“Are you mine, Victoria?”
My face half buried in a pillow, I moan.
“Say it.”
Thinking I know what he wants, I whisper, “My pussy’s yours.”
“Not your pussy, baby. You. Say it.”
I don’t. I won’t. This is one line I will never, ever cross. If he wants dirty talk, he can have it. If he wants my body, obviously he can have that, too.
But he can never have me. Not for real.
Not again.
I turn my face to the pillow. Parker slows, runs a hand up my back, fists that hand in my hair. He gently pulls my head back until I’m looking at him, my neck craned to the side.
“Say you’re mine.”
He whispers it, his gaze locked to mine. I shake my head, my lips pressed together.
He falls still. In the quiet of the room, our heavy breaths are loud as thunder.
“What are you afraid of?”
I swallow. I know I must tell him some shade of the truth or he’ll know I’m lying, so I say, “You. This. Everything.”
He releases my hair, leans back on his heels—taking me with him by holding me around the waist—and then gathers me against his chest, and buries his face in my neck. Against my skin, he vows, “You’re safe with me. I promise you. You’re safe.”
I swallow a silent sob and close my eyes. “You can’t know that. You don’t know what lies ahead.”
His arms around me are crushing. Against my back, his chest heaves. Slowly, enunciating each word, he repeats, “You are safe with me.”
But you’re not safe with me, my lying lover. You’re holding your own destruction in your arms.
After a moment, when I don’t respond, he softly kisses my neck. He takes us down to the mattress, lying on our sides with my back to his front, our bodies still joined. Across the room in the wall of windows, I see our ghostly reflection in the glass, two lovers entwined in an intimate embrace.
Gently, slowly, he starts to move again. His arms stay wrapped around me. His lips rest against the furious pulse in my neck. He drops a hand between my legs and strokes me as only he knows how, drawing moans from my throat, giving me acute pleasure and acute pain as only he can.
Just before I come, I close my eyes to block the vision of that ghostly woman in the glass, her face a mask of misery.
TWENTY
~ Parker ~
I wake up alone.
The clock on the bedside table reads three a.m. I sit up in bed and call out, “Victoria?”
No answer.
Rising, I pull on the jeans I discarded on the floor last night and walk out of the bedroom. My bare feet are silent against the floor. I pass my office door, which is slightly ajar. I frown, pausing outside it.
I know I closed the door yesterday; I always keep the door closed when the housekeeper comes. No one is allowed in my office, not even her. I know I closed it.
Didn’t I?
Silently I push the door open and take a quick look around. Everything looks as it always does: perfectly ordered. I close the door and continue down the hallway toward the living room, which is where I find her.
Victoria stands nude at the window, staring silently out into the night. I stop, admiring the picture she makes, her lovely body silhouetted against the wall of glass, lights softly playing over her skin. She senses me and turns.
“You’re awake,” I say.
She murmurs, “Couldn’t sleep.”
As if magnetized, I draw closer. On my way past the sofa, I grab the cashmere lap blanket folded over the arm. Victoria watches me as I approach, her eyes unreadable in the shadows. When I’m finally standing in front of her, she looks up at me with a small, sad smile.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she says.
I wind the blanket around her body and hug her, pressing a kiss to her temple. “You didn’t.”
“Oh. You’re an insomniac, too?”
I chuckle, enjoying the scent of her hair, the feel of her in my arms. “Just a light sleeper.”
She allows me to nuzzle her for a moment, and then turns her head and stares out into the night. She seems so melancholy. It sends a pang of worry through my chest. I hope she doesn’t regret what happened between us, because I sure as hell don’t.
If I get my way, it will happen every day for the rest of our lives.
“Do you like the view?”
“Mine’s better.”
She says it with such casual disregard, I can’t help but laugh. At least she’s telling the truth. It’s a start.
“I’ll have you know this is the premier unit in this building, Ms. Price.”
“This giant penis of a building, you mean? I’ve never seen anything so phallic. Let me guess: the architect was a man.”
“And what if it was a wom
an? Would it be a tall, ovary-shaped building?”
“Now there’s a frightening thought. Can you imagine a forty-story ovary? Sounds kind of gross.”
I turn her around, gather her in my arms, and press her against my chest. She winds her arms around my waist and tilts her head back, gazing up at me with that faint melancholy smile.
“Why are you sad?” I whisper.
She blinks, and then turns her head, depriving me of her eyes. “I’m not.”
I cup her face. As I’ve had to do many times before—and probably will many times again—I make her look at me. I’m determined not to let her hide. I want no walls between us. “Don’t bother acting tough. I can see you’re sad. Tell me why.”
A long silence follows. Then, instead of answering me directly, she sidesteps, as she does so well. “Why is it that you see me so clearly when no one else does?”
A stray lock of hair is falling into her eyes. I brush it from her forehead. Keeping my voice low, I say, “Why is it that when I’m inside you, I feel like I’m finally home?”
She ducks her head and hides her face in my chest, but not before I see the pain that crosses it.
“Victoria—”
“Please. It’s just a lot. Please, just this once, let it go.”
Her voice is so hollow, so devoid of hope, it makes me fall still. I tighten my arms around her, wanting to comfort her, but for what, I don’t know. She obviously doesn’t want to tell me. I debate a moment, knowing I could get it out of her if I push, but ultimately decide to do as she asks and let it go.
We’ll have plenty of time to work through whatever issues she has. I’m not going anywhere and, if I have any say in this at all, neither is she.
I whisper, “Come back to bed, baby.”
When she nods, I feel a profound sense of relief. At least for now, she’s not running away. I tuck her under my arm and lead her back into the bedroom, and then crawl in bed beside her and gather her in my arms. She’s still wrapped like a little burrito in the cashmere, but I don’t care. She seems to need it, like a security blanket. If it makes her feel safer, she can have it. She can have anything she wants.
Lying beside her in the dark, I listen to the sound of her breathing, feel the gentle rise and fall of her chest. At some point, feeling a contentment I haven’t felt in years, I fall asleep.
When I wake in the morning with the sun streaming through the windows, Victoria is gone.
TWENTY-ONE
~ Victoria ~
When I arrive at my penthouse, Tabitha and Darcy are sitting together at my kitchen table, cackling like a pair of crones over something Tabby’s showing Darcy on her cell phone. Tabby’s wearing a Day-Glo pink tank top with the words “Stop staring at my tits” written across her boobs, paired with a leather miniskirt, an armful of silver bangles, and biker boots. Darcy is wearing a pair of zebra-print stretch pants, a shiny purple top, and gold sparkly sandals with a dangerously tall heel.
“Christ. It looks like there was a sale at the stripper factory outlet in here.”
They look up and see me standing in the doorway.
“Well, well,” says Darcy, eyeing me up and down. “Look what the cat dragged in.”
“I am the cat.”
Darcy snorts. “More like something the cat coughed up.”
“Whose shirt is that?” asks Tabby brightly.
“Whose do you think?” I mutter, pulling out a chair and flinging myself dramatically into it. Darcy and Tabby share a look.
Tabby says, “What happened to the blouse you were wearing when you left last night?”
I scowl at her. “What are you, writing a book?”
She grins at me. I want to curl my hands around her throat.
Darcy says, “You know, it’s not a walk of shame if you stop for brunch on the way home.”
I prop my chin in my fists. “Shut up. And why are you people in my kitchen so early on a Sunday morning?”
“Because your assistant here called me and told me you didn’t come home last night, so I had to come see for myself the state you were in when you finally showed up.” She purses her lips. “And what a state it is.”
I drop my head to the table, rest my forehead on my folded arms, and sigh.
“Uh-oh,” says Tabby.
Darcy asks, “What?”
“I know that sigh. It’s the precursor to some really vile plan. She’s probably going to tell us now about the body she needs us to help her move.”
Darcy says reasonably, “Girl, what are friends for if you can’t count on them to help you move a body?”
“Thank you,” I grumble to the table. “At least I know I can rely on someone around here.”
Tabby rises. I hear her move to the counter, hear the sound of liquid being poured. She returns and sets a steaming mug of coffee in front of me. “Don’t be so quick to judge, Maleficent. You can rely on me. For important stuff, too, like, for instance…finding out about the girl Parker was dating who killed herself.”
I bolt upright and stare at her. “You found out? Tell me, tell me!”
Darcy says, “Whoa—what’s this?”
“Parker told Victoria he was dating a girl who killed herself.”
“Actually, what he said was, ‘I once killed someone,’ which is vastly different, but when pressed he admitted she actually killed herself. He just drove her to it.”
Darcy makes a face like she just ate a piece of rancid sushi. “White folks. Y’all are fucking crazy.”
“Get on with the story, Tabitha! What happened?”
Tabby sits, folds her hands on the tabletop, and looks at me. “What happened is, your boy lied.”
I hear a faint, faraway ringing in my ears. “What?”
Tabby shakes her head, holding my gaze. “No girl Parker ever dated killed herself. I searched everywhere, all the way back to when he was in high school, even cross-referenced morgue records in every place he lived in case I missed something. There’s no one. He lied.”
Slowly I sit back against the chair. “But…Europe. He went to school in England. He lived in France—”
“I searched everywhere, V. When people die, there are records. Medical records, obituaries, death certificates, articles in the newspaper. I mean, his entire dating history is public knowledge; he’s been famous for ten years. You can connect the dots from one to the next, all the way back, but even before that, there’s nothing. I’m certain of it; he lied.”
Because I know how good Tabby is at what she does, I know what she’s telling me is accurate. If there were any scrap of information that would corroborate his story, even a crumb, she’d have found it.
I wonder if I’m going to throw up. “Mother. Fucker.”
Darcy mutters, “Oh, boy. I feel one mutha of a bitch slap comin’ for Captain America.”
“He fucking lied to me? That son of a bitch LIED to me?”
Unable to remain sitting, I jump to my feet and start to pace. I can’t believe it. I can’t believe I fell for his bullshit again.
“OK, now, let’s remain calm,” says Darcy, sounding worried.
“Calm?” I spin on my heel to stare at her. “You want calm? I’ll show you fucking calm! I’m so calm my hands won’t even shake when I chop off his fucking head!”
Tabby says, “Victoria, please don’t chop off my head for saying this, but what did you expect? You know him better than anyone. He’s a liar. It’s what he does.”
And he does it so well.
He actually had me believing he had feelings for me. It all felt so…real.
When really it was just a brilliantly calculated lie to get me to let down my guard so he could fuck me.
Sickened, I sink back into the chair.
Darcy looks back and forth between me and Tabby. “OK, can someone please tell me what exactly the history is with this guy? All I know is you two have a past. How much of a past is it?”
At that moment, my cell phone rings. I left it on the counter by the sink when
I left the night before. The three of us stare at it.
“You going to get that?” asks Darcy as it continues to ring.
“Tabby.”
At my prompt, she leaps to the counter and picks up the phone. “It’s him.”
I make a throat-slicing motion with my hand across my neck. She hits a button and the ringing stops.
Silence reigns in the kitchen until Tabby asks, “So, was there a safe?”
I nod. “A wall safe. Hidden in his office, behind a copy of The Lovers by Magritte.”
Her eyes widen. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope.”
“Dude. Talk about symbolism.”
Darcy sighs. “Translation, please.”
Tabby provides the insight for her. “It’s a famous French painting of two lovers kissing, but both of their heads are wrapped in white veils. The fabric barrier prevents true intimacy between the lovers, transforming an act of passion into one of isolation. It’s generally interpreted to be about frustrated desires, a depiction of the inability to unveil fully the true nature of even our most intimate companions.”
Darcy looks at me. “I’ll ask you later what it’s like to spend your days with a walking encyclopedia, but for the moment, answer me this: what’s in the safe?”
“I don’t know. That’s what I need to find out. It took me a while to find it, so I didn’t want to risk spending more time searching for a key.” My face hardens. “That will have to be next time.”
Tabby glances at Darcy, and then settles her unblinking green gaze on me. “I’m sure the answer is no, but I still have to ask; when you were playing hide-the-sausage and going through his closet to find something to wear and whatnot, you didn’t slip and tell him about the other thing, did you?’
Darcy perks up. “What other thing?”
Furious, my anger clouding my judgment, I snap, “The baby thing.”
Darcy looks at me in utter confusion. “Baby? What baby?”
Shit. Great job, Victoria. I close my eyes. When I open them again, all the anger is gone. All that’s left is a vast, pounding blackness.
“Tabby, cancel whatever I’m scheduled for through Tuesday. And call NetJets. Book me the first flight to Laredo.”
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