by Mel Blue
He kept her there on the plateau, demanding everything, but she didn’t scream. There wasn’t any breath left for her to push one out. When she thought she couldn’t take anymore without dying, he let go of her waist and slid his hand between them.
He pressed his thumb to her clit. She did scream. The sound was a short, relieved sound and borderline whimper, but a scream. The shudder racked through her body until another scream spilled out. Luke clamped his hand on her hip, stilled and his groan sounded just as relieved and was a borderline curse. He pumped three more times and tensed. His expression hardened, but he closed his eyes before relaxing against her.
Seraphina lifted her hand to rip off her mask to wipe away the sweat. Her fingers trembled. No doubt the orgasm had pumped out adrenaline, but the thoughtless gesture wedged reality back in and she couldn’t even enjoy the euphoric haze.
The need to take off the mask only reminded Seraphina she had to get back to her room. She’d left her cellphone behind. She’d trained the staff to handle anything and everything that could crop up during the first night, but her absence would draw suspicion. Whatever glow she could have had slipped away from the cold realization. She fought to hold back the sudden panic and the need to jump up and run from the room.
Forcing herself to relax, she threaded her fingers through his hair. Wet from the sweat, it slicked back. He opened his eyes. He couldn’t see her face fully, but must have recognized the restless emotions in her eyes.
“You gotta go.” He sighed and cupped her chin. “You didn’t have all night.”
In the next breath he took possession of her mouth, long enough she considered staying instead of sneaking out. The kiss built her up again for another round, but apparently it was good-bye for him, because he cut the kiss short.
When he pulled away, he rolled onto his back. She didn’t wait to see if he’d change his mind. Putting on her jacket, she escaped before he got the idea to watch her leave. The hallway was empty.
She let out a relieved breath, though her heart continued to race. Exactly as she’d come, she slipped back into the secret corridor. She put out her hand to brace against the wall. Her thighs trembled. She had, maybe, twenty minutes to pull it together, shower the stench of sex from her skin, and get back to work.
She’d spend the next moments doing her best not to replay every touch, every kiss, every stroke. A quake tightened her sex and she moaned softly. She finally pushed up the mask. She wanted to linger and revel, but she couldn’t. She wanted to turn back around and do it again, this time slower so she could detail everything and commit it to memory.
But she couldn’t.
She tried to remember if he’d told her to come back the next day…No. He hadn’t, but he’d tell Seraphina. Her stomach knotted. She just had to act as if his decision didn’t matter. But first, she had to get back to work. She had play the woman who was professional to a fault, the woman who didn’t scream during sex.
For the first time in three years, she didn’t want to be that woman.
CHAPTER FIVE
Luke leaned against the doorjamb of Seraphina’s office. They’d met in the various private gardens on the grounds for meetings and in his room, but he’d never ventured into her domain.
It looked as though someone had dropped a New Orleans tourist shop in the spacious room. Mardi Gras beads hung on the far wall, decorative masks with feathers covered the opposite side, a miniature replica lamppost with Bourbon Street etched on the sign sat on the edge of her desk. Bubbles danced across the screen of her laptop. She’d placed it exactly in the middle of her desk.
Those things should have felt like personal touches. Yet he didn’t see a single picture of her family or friends from back home. All the pens scattering her desk came from one brand—any one would do. Everything in the room could be replaced.
Except for the woman sitting at the small worktable near the French doors. Closed up tight, no light or winter air could seep through with the shutters and curtains closed. If not for the cushion, the iron patio chair she’d settled into would have looked uncomfortable. She must have pulled it out from the balcony.
She looked the same—bun, buttoned up shirt, slacks, and long-sleeved suit jacket. A smile graced her face. That was new. That released the breath caught in his chest. Her head tilted to the side and the pose exposed the delicate curve of her neck.
Blood rushed to his groin. Curbing the urge to cross the room and bite her right there, he took in another breath. And another. When the wild, hot need subsided he pushed off the doorjamb.
“Seraphina,” he murmured.
She jolted, her eyes widening. “Mr. Moreland.” She pressed a hand to her chest.
The soft, round globes were covered but it didn’t take much to imagine dark pink-tipped nipples.
“Luke,” he corrected and his voice sounded gruff. “My mother is very fond of the name. I think it should be used by the people who know me.”
“Mr. Moreland, I assume you’re here for a reason.” Her makeup didn’t hide the sudden color in her cheeks.
Outside of the blush, she acted and looked as though last night hadn’t happened. As though he hadn’t pounded into her until they were both spent. His dick ached at the memory. If he breathed in deep enough he could remember how the scent of her pussy had mixed with the deep musk of honeysuckle.
He’d spent hours reliving the way her finger had dipped into her wet channel, how she’d closed her eyes and pinched her nipples until they’d blushed a deep rose shade. He bounded between the moments of her letting him watch, letting him plunge deep inside her, to theorizing the reason behind the night’s events.
He’d come to a simple conclusion: Seraphina believed her conditions had fooled him. He’d know that mouth, that walk, her scent, even if someone brained him. He’d named her Séjour, and she felt safe in knowing he’d never guess Seraphina.
But he knew.
He passed by her and opened the balcony’s door. “I need fresh air,” he said instead of answering her non-question. He pretended he didn’t hear her relieved sigh.
“This is new,” she said. “I’m only forced to see you once a year. Two visits in two days. I’m going to assume last night’s replacement had complications.”
He stuffed his hands in his jeans pockets and didn’t care if she noticed the bulge. “Your office isn’t private enough to talk to you about last night’s replacement.”
She swallowed, but her face was devoid of any emotion. “Oh. I can close the door if you—”
“I know a place. On the grounds.” Last night, after she’d left, he’d come to several other conclusions that kept him from grasping the top of her blouse and ripping it down until every button popped off.
She placed the pen on top of the papers, but her hand shook. “Okay. If you think it’s necessary.”
“It is.” He had a few things to say to her and he wanted no interruptions.
“Okay,” she said again, her voice softer this time.
They left her office. Staff and other guests milled around the lobby, but no one approached them. It could have been the fierce expression he wore or Seraphina. Likely both. By the time they cleared the doors to the atrium, silence became a third companion.
The Beaudelaire estate survived for centuries. Wars, family deaths, and hurricanes had ripped at the buildings, but the gardens thrived throughout it all. Benches were scattered in the copse of trees. Some in the shade, others placed as though a secret rendezvous was expected. During summer vacations in college, Luke had come home with Henri and explored the grounds just to find them.
At the one he chose, the gardeners had taken care of the ivy surrounding the makeshift gates, but the signature oaks guarded all but the entrance. It was a garden you wouldn’t know existed, unless brave enough to squeeze between the fauna. To his surprise, Seraphina didn’t offer up a complaint as she followed him.
In the middle of the afternoon, no sun touched the space, but whatever heat did manag
e to get through insulated the secret garden. Luke plopped on the bench and motioned for Seraphina to do the same. She situated herself next to him, but clasped her hands and pressed them between her knees.
Her brows knitted. He’d have touched her if he thought she’d accept it. He sighed. There was no good place to start. No way to prepare himself or her for what he needed to say.
“I know what my file says about what I want,” he said.
“What does this have to do with your replacement?” Her voice sounded brittle, and her tension was palpable.
He lifted his hand, thought better of comforting her, and placed it on his knee. “I don’t peek through anyone’s windows. I prefer consent. Right there, in your face, let me watch you get off. My file doesn’t say why.”
“It’s none of my business.” Her whiskey-brown eyes clouded with doubt, indecision, and fear.
Luke was either stupid or crazy or both for wanting to share his deepest secrets, but after last night he held one of hers. She’d stripped herself bare in front of him. He understood the reassurance she’d needed with the mask, with the silence, with being his lover for a night during the New Year’s weekend. Once he’d come to the conclusion that she believed he hadn’t known her true identity, he felt compelled to put them back on an even keel.
He pushed and teased her because he knew she could hold her own. They had clear boundaries. She was Henri’s assistant—a woman he couldn’t touch, much less get into bed with. But her showing up at his playroom’s door had ripped away their safety net.
They didn’t have a relationship, but something fragile was growing between them and he wanted to lay the cards down, face up. He needed it.
Luke’s shoulders ached from the tension of squeezing every muscle, because he shouldn’t have cared. She was lying—by omission—but lying nonetheless. He’d rip back this part of himself because he’d lied by omission last night. The moment he’d opened the door, before she touched herself in front of him, he should have confessed. He should have murmured her name when he kissed his way up to her mouth. He was a jackass from time to time, and the night before, he’d wanted her more than he needed the truth. But if he had whispered her name the second he’d opened the door, she’d have turned around and left.
Who was the worse liar?
He shifted and his knee bumped hers. He waited to see if she’d move, but she fixed her focus on him. The cool air had puckered her nipples. He could almost taste her in the back of his throat.
He shrugged out of his jacket and offered it to her. She hesitated before reaching forward. She draped the leather coat over her shoulders. He hoped her scent would cling to the silk lining. He’d have something else to press to his nose while he fisted a hand around his cock to relive their sex.
Fuck, he couldn’t think straight, and they were just sitting on a bench. He had to ease his conscience or he’d go mad. “I didn’t walk in on my parents having sex and then decide to hide and watch them,” he said. “I don’t fit the profile of a true voyeur.”
She nodded. “Your kink is your kink.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “My mother is very down to earth. She grounded me, talked to me. She wasn’t a rich man’s starter wife. She was a mother. She’s the reason I’m only slightly entitled.”
Seraphina pursed her lips for a second. “Sometimes it’s not a parent’s fault for raising a jackass.”
He rubbed at the stubble on his chin and smiled. “No. So, it’s not my mother.”
She unclasped her hands. “I get it. You’re not some pervert. I never thought you were.”
He pushed his hands through his hair. “I know this seems like I’m rambling, but I need to tell you this.”
“This is about your replacement?”
“It has everything to do with her.”
He hated to see her skin pale, but she nodded again. “Then tell me.”
“I looked up to my father. I’d spent four years getting my degree so that one day I could take over the family business.”
“You did.”
“I know, but that year I found out my father had another family. He was divorcing my mother to finally be with them. I grew up believing I was an only child and then one day I found out I had two little bratty sisters.”
Her brows shot up and she opened her mouth and then closed it. “That had to be troubling.”
“It shook my bedrock.” He said it simply and now, for him, the hurt didn’t dig as deep. He couldn’t say the secret hadn’t changed the very fiber of who he was. “I should have been able to see through those big, long speeches he did every year at harvesting. His family, his wife had gotten him there. I should have seen that was all a fucking lie.”
She looked down. “Family hurts you the deepest because you believe they’ll be the last one to break you.”
They were alone; no one could see them so he reached forward and grasped her hand. “I can’t fault Henri for not being there for me back then. I was mean. I was angry. If he did show me kindness, I couldn’t trust it. I cut myself off from everything. For a while I lost myself and I lost my best friend.”
She drew her hand from under his. “So you’re afraid to touch someone before you know it’s real?”
His gut tightened because she’d hit so close to the mark. “I want to know what I’m getting into.” He didn’t want to put his heart out there first, only to find out later he was a kink, a fantasy, a trial run.
“I get wanting that kind of reassurance.” She lowered her chin, looking down but he could see she’d blinked several times.
He held still because her lashes were wet. “The woman you sent me was everything I’ve wanted. She showed me her true self.”
Her head whipped up. “What?”
“I’ll be waiting for Séjour in my room, not my playroom. After we’re done talking that’s where she can find me.”
She brushed her fingertips over his knuckles but then curled her hand into a fist. “That’s not her name.”
He smiled. “It’s the one I gave her since she refuses to talk.”
Confusion drew her brows together. “I had to pull some last-minute strings. I’m just happy she agreed.” She licked her lips and then continued to reaffirm the falsehood they were both telling, “What does the name mean?”
Seraphina wasn’t just lying to him, but to herself. That made her dangerous. A million other things he shouldn’t trust, but if keeping the fiction of her secret identity meant she’d be in his bed again, he’d swallow the truth for another night. “I’ll tell her if she ever asks me.”
Relief softened her features. “I’ll let her know. I don’t know when she can make it, but she’ll be there.”
When she’d moved her hand, she hadn’t brushed his off her knee. It was a telling omission, a change between them. “Seraphina.”
“Ms. Gibson but, yes, Mr. Moreland?”
He scoffed at the ridiculous formality. “Since we’re here, tell me about your day.”
She froze and then laughed. “Were you hoping your life story would soften me?”
Her eyelashes were still wet and he hated it. So he leaned against the bench and spread his arms over the back. “I had hoped.”
“I spent my day sleep-deprived because last night turned into a clusterfuck. I can’t get into details, but there was mayhem on the gold floors.”
So, she’d gone back to work after leaving him. He tried to imagine the amount of energy it took to act like a part of her night had been some fabrication. How it must be to act like anything but the woman who could have raw, honest sex the way she’d had with him. She may not have softened toward him, but he was starting to have a soft spot for her. “No rest for the wicked.”
“Is that all you needed?” She sounded anxious.
No. He needed her astride his lap. “This is work for you, right?”
She glanced down and blew out a breath. “Not anymore. So I should go and call S—Sou—ugh. I can’t pronounce the name, but I’m guessing
it’s French.”
She’d decided to prolong their rendezvous and he’d happily oblige. “I’m fuzzy on the origin since this conversation isn’t work anymore.”
Her gaze swept over his lap. There was no hiding his arousal. “I-I-I have things I need to do.”
He wanted her to know his cock was hard for her and the longer they looked at each other, the more he was certain she did know. “You always do.” His intense need made the words sound gruff.
“I can’t sit here with you to find out if a word is French or not.” Her voice was husky.
“I haven’t tied you to the bench, but the idea is suddenly very appealing.”
She breathed in deeply and glared at him. He added, “I don’t know why you’re so curious.”
She lifted her chin. “Because I must know everything that happens in the hotel.”
He tsked. “I named her, that shouldn’t be a problem you need to solve.”
“But you might talk about her,” she answered with logic, but she’d pressed her knee closer to his. “You might let it slip in a conversation and then if I ever need to use her again, she won’t do it.”
The sudden image of Seraphina touching herself for another man tightened his chest. “Then I definitely should tell someone about her.”
She paled at the joke. “That’s not funny. You don’t know what it took to get her here.”
He hesitated. Pushing her too far too fast would be stupid, but then he remembered the hoarse scream she’d made when she came. The way she squeezed his dick until he came. Where was that woman beneath the suit? “Tell me then.”
She stood and paced away from the bench. “I’ve got to go,” she muttered, but didn’t slip through the trees.
If someone had asked him the day before if Seraphina could make him come from just hearing the sound of her voice, he’d have laughed his ass off. Yes, he guessed there was a depth to her, a fire, but it was another thing to still feel the burn of it hours later and to crave that heat so much he’d ignore his instincts.