The Greatest Risk

by Kristen Ashley

  Her hands lifted to hold either side of his face, she dropped her forehead to his and she whispered urgently, “Stop, baby. Just stop.”

  He didn’t.

  “Or should I share how I felt about the fact the wife before the last one that my father married was of an age to be my bride? Or how the last one was too young even for me? The woman was four years out of high school, for fuck’s sake.”

  “I think I know how you felt. I saw you in D.C. Meeting with them. Giving him the direct cut,” she admitted, still whispering. “And since I did, I have a good feeling how you felt.”

  His head jerked while she spoke, and he felt his brow snap low and heavy.

  “Sorry?”

  She slid her hands to his neck and lifted her forehead away. “I was in D.C., for a … um, job. I was at that restaurant. I saw you. That’s when I, well … after that happened, I looked into you.”

  “You were there?”

  She nodded.

  Stellan could not believe this.

  “Why the fuck didn’t you say anything?” he demanded.

  “We weren’t exactly super-close when I got back, and it’s not something you slide across a booth at the Honey to say to somebody. I mean how would that go? ‘Hey. How’s it going? Just, you know, wanted you to know that I saw you tell your father to go fuck himself in D.C. Well done with that.’”

  She was being amusing.

  He did not laugh.

  “Not now. Then. In D.C. Why didn’t you come to me?”

  “I was going to get your attention, but you looked pretty ticked.”

  “After repeated communications to him never to get in touch with me for any reason, as usual, when he heard I was in D.C. for business, and he was there for the same, my father ignored that and called me to meet him for lunch so that he could introduce me to his fiancée and ask me to be his best man, again. Something I’d refused two times before. Of course I was ticked.”

  “Obviously, I figured that out when I looked into you,” she muttered.

  “Jesus Christ, Simone. You knew how to get in touch with me. All you needed to do was call Aryas or Leigh, and they would have given you my number. We could have met in D.C. Fucked. And now been together for over a year.”

  She stared at him, for the most part, if you could stare at someone and do it repeatedly blinking.

  “You find something in what I said surprising?” he asked drily.

  “Been together for over a year?” she asked back incredulously.

  “Darling, the first time I was inside you, when we were done, you wept. We were meant to connect. We’re just meant to be.”

  She poised to take flight.

  He took her to her back and covered her with his body.

  “Oh no, honey,” he whispered menacingly. “There’s no escape from that, and you know it. You’re in the mood to be real? You’re ready to ride through our issues?”

  “Not so much anymore,” she answered.

  But he wasn’t asking a question.

  So he spoke over her.

  “You’re thirty-three years old, never had a date, never had a man who means something take your mouth, never had a man make love to you, and that’s what we did the first time, sweetheart, in the way people like us do it, and it drove you to tears. You’re big, bad Sixx who could put a man on his ass and survive multiple gunshot wounds, but you submit to me in everything. You’ve moved in with me. You won’t come unless I allow it. You endured a life filled with shit and you forged your way through it for the express purpose to be right where you are right now. I can have any woman I want. But the only one I want is the one that was made for me.”

  “I honest to God don’t want you to get angry, baby, but I need you to see how that’s difficult for me to believe,” she stated earnestly.

  “You’re missing the fact I already see it, Simone. Why do you think your ass is right here and your clothes are in my closet? I’m not missing even a second at having the chance of shoving the answer to that right in your face. I vowed to you I would make that clear. And I’m going to do it. I’ve had you thirty-two hours, and you’re already splitting wide open for me. Can you still doubt where this is going? Can you still doubt me?”

  She pressed her lips together, and her eyes explored her own eyebrows.

  Bloody hell, only she could be that fucking adorable when things were this extreme between them.

  “Simone,” he growled.

  Her gaze snapped to him.

  “Okay, jeez,” she mumbled, then spoke clearly. “The sex is spectacular and you’re awesome and I’m hot and you think I’m pretty and we’re both royally fucked up so we belong together because apparently, if there’s an all-powerful being, he or she means for me to sit like a fat cat in a Phoenician mansion and be spoiled by a hot guy. I give up. You think I’m worth it, it won’t be me anymore trying to talk you out of it.”

  “Stop being amusing,” he ordered.

  “I can’t. That’s me. I’m a badass, a hardass and a smartass. It is what it is and you picked me so get over it.”

  Stellan did not waste time marveling over how she could annoy him, frustrate him, amuse him, delight him, electrify him, rouse him and warm him, all at the same time.

  He just decided to rejoice in it.

  As well as her giving in.

  So he rolled off of her only to roll her to her belly and then roll right back on.

  While he did this, she cried, “Stellan!”

  “Open your legs,” he commanded.

  “Stellan,” she whispered breathlessly.

  “Do it, Simone.”

  She did.

  His hips fell through.

  “Reach up and grasp the edge of the bed,” he ordered.

  “Are you seriously going to fuck me again?” she asked.

  “No. I’m seriously going to fuck you again,” he answered, sliding a hand over her ass, and in.

  Her body stilled.

  Then melted.

  His lovely, irritating, endearing, infuriating, enchanting Simone.

  He put his lips to her ear as he glided a light caress over her clit, and she started trembling.

  “We’re going to celebrate your capitulation, darling.”

  “I’m down with that,” she murmured huskily.

  “Excellent,” he replied, then nipped her earlobe. Her body jolted before her hips pushed up into his. “Hold onto the edge of the bed and don’t let go,” he repeated.

  She did as told, asking, “Are we done talking?”

  “If you’d like to share more of your mysteries while I fuck you, be my guest. But as for me, yes. I’m done talking.”

  He slid his hand back over her ass, her hip, and went in at the front just as he slid his cock in from behind.

  And apparently, except for emitting a delicious sigh when she accepted his cock that heralded other such noises as she took her fucking, Simone was done talking too.

  * * *

  “Pardon?” Simone asked in his ear through the phone as Stellan walked down the hall to his office an hour and a half later.

  “Dinner,” he started to repeat what he’d inquired about ten seconds earlier. “What are we doing?”

  “Uh…”

  “Would you like to go out?” he asked.

  “Can we talk about this later?’

  “Is there something claiming your attention now?”

  “Yes, I’m doing my hair.”

  He stopped dead outside Susan’s office.

  “I beg your pardon?” he queried.

  “You called while I was doing my hair,” she reiterated then asked, “Couldn’t we have talked about this before you left?”

  “You were in the shower when I left when you should have been in the shower with me, but I allowed you not to be since you passed out for a power nap after I gave you your third orgasm of the morning.”

  A member of his staff walked by him, a man who now had wide eyes, eyes that were trained on him but moved away immedia
tely when he caught the look Stellan leveled at him.

  “So no,” he kept talking and again walking, “we couldn’t, so now we are, and I’m curious to know why you doing your hair precludes us from making dinner plans.”

  “You put product in your hair,” she stated.

  “Yes,” he agreed, smiling and tipping up his chin to Susan as he walked by her desk, heading to his office.

  “You put it in your hands, whisk it through your hair, and the miracle that is the gloriousness of Stellan Lange takes over and it looks perfect. I was awake for that, so I watched. It was admittedly difficult because you did it standing in the bathroom wearing nothing but a towel, and your chest is hefty competition in the attention stakes, and normally, it would win out to you running your fingers through your hair, but not by much. I’m not so lucky. My situation requires product, roller brushes, hair dryers, more product, a lot of fiddling, a skilled hand at wielding hairspray, and concentration to make it look windswept and blow away and adorably fuckable.”

  Standing by his chair, he turned to face his desk, changing hands on his phone as he shrugged off his jacket, and he did all this smiling and replying, “We’ll go out. I’ll ask Susan to make a booking.”

  “Susan?”

  “My assistant.”

  She sounded suspicious when she queried, “Does she look like a Victoria’s Secret model?”

  “She’s lovely, married, one child down who I’m godfather to, one child on the way, and her father’s a prick, so I danced the father-daughter dance with her at her wedding.”

  Simone said nothing.

  “Darling?” he called.

  Her voice was soft when she demanded, “Tell me when and where and what to wear and I’ll be there.”

  “You’ll be at home. We’re going together.”

  “Tell me when and what to wear and I’ll be home to get ready to go together,” she amended.

  He laughed quietly.

  “Are you done distracting me from killer hair?” she asked.

  After throwing his jacket around the back of his chair, Stellan sat in it but did it with his eyes on Susan, who had planted herself standing across from him at his desk with her arms crossed on her chest.

  “Yes.”

  “Catch ya later, hot stuff.”

  “See you tonight, sweetheart.”

  He rang off and put his phone on his desk.

  “So?” Susan demanded.

  He grinned at her.

  “You grinning like a lion lounging on the remains of his kill does not answer my question, Stellan,” she pointed out.

  “I’m thinking it actually does,” he retorted.

  “Stellan,” she said warningly.

  “Would you care to use more words to form your question?” he requested.

  “You had your new girl who sends flowers and wears leather at your house for a big party with your sex friends, and I’d like to know how that went.”

  He often reconsidered the amount of sharing he did with his assistant.

  And then he always shared with his assistant.

  “She moved in over the weekend.”

  Her face grew pale.

  Then she nearly screamed, “Say what?”

  “It’s fine,” he noted calmly.

  She slowly adjusted her body to stand in front of then aim her ass at the chair before his desk, landing with a plop on it.

  Then she asked, “Have you lost your mind?”

  “No,” he answered.

  “Stellan…” She drew in a breath. “Okay. No offense. You know. Okay? So, you know. You’re the most intelligent man I know. By far. And don’t ever tell Harry I said that. If you do, I’ll deny it all the way to my grave. But you know. You know that about yourself, and you know I think that about you. So you also know you’re a whale. A mark. Every female con artist’s dream come true.”

  He sat back in his chair, rested his elbows on the arms, and linked his fingers together at his chest as he replied, “She’s not that person, Susie, and I understand why you’d be concerned, but that’s not Simone.”

  “You had one date, and she’s moved in.”

  “Yes,” he confirmed.

  “Just saying, honey, no woman in her right mind would do that unless she’s messed up, she wants something or she’s up to something.”

  “It was my idea, and I had to talk her into it.”

  “I bet you did,” she muttered, her concerned-thus-distracted focus falling to the top of his desk.

  “Sue,” he called.

  She lifted her gaze to his.

  “I know what I’m doing,” he told her.

  “But—”

  “I want you to meet her. You and Harry and eventually Crosby.”

  She closed her mouth.

  “She needs time. A week. Two. Then we’ll set something up,” he continued.

  “This isn’t you,” she whispered.

  She was right.

  Then again, he’d never had Simone.

  “Yesterday, she woke before me,” he shared. “Went to her car and got a sketchpad. I startled her in the middle of drawing. I only saw seconds of it, but what I saw, she was drawing a graphic novel that seemed to feature a female superhero by the name of Sixx, the name she’s given herself that everyone but me knows her as, who wears leather and looks like her, except scarred, facially, and to extremes.”

  “Oh God,” she said softly.

  “She became incredibly agitated and secretive, hiding it from me the minute she noticed I was there, and she used anger to conceal fear when I asked to see it and unwisely did not back off when she refused.”

  “Yes, Stellan, that wasn’t too bright,” she mumbled.

  He smiled softly at her. “I eventually let it go, smoothed things over. But Susie, honey, she’s not using me. She’s terrified of me. And she’s going to try everything she can to drive me away before life how she understands it takes me away or the life she leads takes her away from me.”

  “What if the life she leads takes her away from you?” she asked.

  “It won’t.”

  “What if it does?” she pushed.

  “I won’t allow it.”

  “You’re pretty powerful, Stell, but you’re not omnipotent. You can’t control everything.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  “So … if you lose her?”

  He felt his face get hard, and it came out in his voice. “I won’t.”

  She studied him closely and for some time until, hesitantly, she suggested, “Maybe there’s a reason she protects people from her.”

  “She thinks there is. But I know there’s definitely a reason she needs to stop doing that.”

  “We’re all not broken and set on a course of self-destruction like Silie, honey,” she pointed out gently, and cautiously. “But even if some of us are, if we’re set on that course, no one could save us.”

  “I’m not saving my sister, Susie. I’m falling in love with the only woman I’ve ever met who fits me.”

  Her face turned melancholy. “I hope so.”

  “I know so. Meet her and you’ll know too.”

  “You know I’ll meet her. I’ll be there with bells on, and I’ll be hilarious and protective, and if she’s falling in love with you too, she won’t be able to stop herself from falling in love with me.”

  “She already loves me, Susan. She fell in love with me the minute she met me, probably then thinking I actually am omnipotent and the only person who could withstand the destruction she’s convinced herself she’s had some hand in that’s followed in her wake.” He grinned. “Now she’s doing it because she’s headstrong, smart as hell, and I’m the only person she can’t bulldoze or freeze out with her personality. Not to mention we’re exceptionally sexually compatible.”

  She lifted a hand, palm out his way. “TMI, boss man.”

  Sensing the course of their conversation had shifted, he took advantage.

  “I believe I shocked Frank in the hall wh
en he overheard me speaking to Simone and mentioning the three orgasms I gave her this morning.”

  “Please say it isn’t so,” she begged, clasping her hands to her chest to dramatize the words. “I won’t be able to leave my office for a week. They’ll all want the skinny.”

  He smiled.

  And shrugged.

  Eyes on him, suddenly she straightened in her chair.

  Then she brightened.

  “What?” he asked.

  Finally, her expression calmed.

  “You’re happy,” she declared.

  “I am,” he confirmed.

  “Right. Good. Now I’m all set to meet her.”

  “We’ll do that, but I need a booking tonight for her and me. Try Buck and Rider first.”

  As his cell on his desk rang, she stood, saying, “I’m on it, boss man.”

  He took up his phone, shot her a smile, and looked down at the display as Susan turned and moved to leave.

  He sighed at what he saw on his phone, took the call, and lifted his eyes, watching Susan go while answering.

  “Aryas.”

  “Got home yesterday, drove by your house to have a face-to-face, saw Sixx’s Cayenne there, decided against it. So this has to be on the phone,” he stated as the door closed behind Susan. “I hope you know what the fuck you’re doing.”

  The news had made the rounds.

  Not a surprise.

  “Aryas—”

  “She’d have my balls, she knew I was givin’ this to you, but this isn’t play, brother. Not for her. I want this, for both of you. I rode her ass to do somethin’ about takin’ it there with you. But you gotta know, it’s not play. Not for Sixx. Are you feelin’ me?”

  “If you’ll give me a second to speak, I can assure you I know that.”

  “Does Sixx know that?”

  “Simone knows everything.”

  He heard Aryas pull in a sharp breath, and he knew why considering no one knew who “Simone” was.

  Except Dillinger because he’d investigated her.

  And, he now knew, Aryas.

  Though he wondered if Simone knew that.

  He wasn’t going to ask.

  “She moved in this weekend,” Stellan shared.

  “Oh fuck,” Aryas muttered.

  “She won’t be moving out.”

  “That went fast,” Aryas noted.