His Every Desire (Contemporary Romance Box Set)

by Alexis Winter

  “What the fuck, Callan?” she squeals, pulling away from me.

  I shoot up into an upright position, darting out of bed. Her eyes take me in, in nothing but my boxers.

  Her eyes grow wide as she shakes her head. “No. No, no, no, no, no.” She looks down to find herself in nothing but a t-shirt.

  Suddenly, I’m panicked. My head is shaking, and my hands are waving back and forth. “No, Val. Nothing happened. Fuck no,” I tell her.

  She freezes. “No-nothing happened?” she asks, eyes filled with fear.

  I fall onto the bed in a sitting position. “If you call getting slipped the date rape drug and being taken out to an alley nothing, then yeah. Nothing happened.”

  “What?” she asks, confused.

  “What do you remember about last night?” I ask her.

  She thinks for a moment. “I remember going to the club, seeing you, hanging out with Decon. We got a little too close in the club, and I remember going outside. But that’s it.”

  “You don’t remember me stopping you from getting fucked in an alley?”

  Her head falls forward, and her shoulders slump. “No,” she admits.

  “You don’t remember puking all over your dress and my shoes?”

  She shakes her head. “How did I get in this shirt, anyway?”

  “I put it on you.”

  “You what?” she yells, pulling the blanket up over her shoulders.

  “Don’t worry. I didn’t see anything. I was a complete gentleman.”

  She snorts. “I find that hard to believe.”

  “Me too, but I was. I swear. I know we both hate each other, but you’re my best friend’s sister. I don’t want to see you hurt, okay?”

  She offers up a small smile and nods. “God, my fucking head hurts.” She massages her temples.

  “Yeah, I’ve heard drugs do that to you. You should probably take a test to see what exactly you were spiked with.”

  She lays back down. “Do you care if I just sleep it off a little while?”

  I stand. “Sure. I’ll call Bennet and let him know that you’re here.” I head for the door.

  She shoots up. “No, Callan, please don’t tell him.”

  “What am I supposed to tell him then? How can I explain you staying the night? I’d rather have him thinking that I rescued you than slept with you.”

  One of her brows lifts. “Okay, just, let him know that I’m fine. I’ll deal with him later.”

  She lays back down, and I leave the room, ready to shower and maybe catch another couple hours of sleep.

  “Hello?” Bennet answers.

  “Hey, man,” I say, pouring a glass of water.

  “What’s up?”

  “I just wanted to give you a call and fill you in on the recent turn of events.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, I, ugh…went to the club last night and ran into your sister. She was with some asshole, and I think he slipped her something. I caught him in the alley with her, and she doesn’t remember any of it. She got really sick, so I brought her back to my place. She’s fine, but she’s not feeling well, and she’s sleeping it off. I just didn’t want you or your mom to worry.”

  He lets out a deep breath. “Fuck,” he breathes out. “Thanks, Cal. I owe you one.”

  “Yeah, you do,” I agree. “A new pair of shoes, preferably like the ones she puked on.”

  “Seriously, I don’t know what my mom would do if anything happened to her. She’s the baby, you know?”

  I nod. “Yeah, well, she’s fine. You know she drives me crazy, but I’d never turn my back on her, or you.”

  “Should I come get her?” he asks.

  “Nah, she’s asleep. Just let her sleep it off, and I’ll take her home later.”

  “Alright. Thanks again.”

  “No problem,” I say, hanging up the phone and tossing it onto the empty bed.

  I take a nap, shower, dress, and head downstairs to try and find a late lunch. I make a big sandwich with ham, turkey, cheese, lettuce, tomato, and mustard. I grab a bag of chips and a jar of pickles before heading back to the dining room table. I’ve just taken a bite out of the sandwich when Val walks into the room. She looks rough as hell. Her hair is a tangled mess, she has dark circles under her eyes, and her skin is pale. She collapses into the chair next to me.

  “Feeling okay?” I ask, picking up half the sandwich and sliding the plate her way.

  She looks at the plate and then at me. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

  I shrug and take a bite of my sandwich. “I figure you’ve had enough shit to deal with, and even more coming your way with your mom and brother.”

  She picks up the other half of my sandwich and takes a bite. Her eyes close as her head leans back. “This is so good.”

  “Are you sure you’re feeling good? It’s just a sandwich, nothing special.”

  “My head is still pounding. And I feel weird. It’s like, I keep trying to remember something that I never knew to begin with.”

  “I don’t think you want to remember anything from last night.”

  “That bad? I didn’t flash anyone, right?”

  I laugh and shrug. “No idea what you did before I found you in that alley. Who the fuck was the guy you were with? He needs to be straightened out.”

  “It’s this guy I met working at the art gallery. His name is Decon James. I can’t believe he’d drug me. We’ve known one another for almost a year.”

  “And by known, you mean…?”

  She moves her head from side to side. “We make-out, flirt, hang. We’ve never slept together.”

  “I’d say Decon figured if he couldn’t seal the deal himself, he was going to bring backup.”

  “I feel so stupid,” she breathes out. “And embarrassed.”

  “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. You didn’t take the drug willingly, did you?”

  She frowns at me. “No way. I don’t do drugs. Never have.”

  I nod. “That’s all I needed to know.” Already, I’m picturing tracking this guy down and beating his fucking brains out for pulling that shit. And it’s not just over Val. It’s the fact that he’s probably done this to many girls and has gotten away with it. I can’t wait to run into Decon James again. I can’t help the smile that appears on my face.

  5

  Valerie

  Looking at Callan right now, something feels different. He no longer pisses me off just by looking at me. His voice is suddenly tolerable. He doesn’t even appear the same. That smug, cocky look I usually see when I glance at him is gone. Maybe last night was what we needed to be able to work together. Maybe it’s the start of our friendship.

  We both sit quietly and eat the sandwich and chips. He reaches over and pops the top of the pickle jar. He takes one and shoves the whole spear into his mouth before sliding it to me. I smile, take one, and do the same. His eyes double in size and the corners of his mouth turn up.

  I slide the jar back to him, and he repeats the process, and so do I. We do this back and forth until the entire jar is gone.

  “Thanks for lunch,” I say, standing. “You mind if I shower? I don’t want to give my mom a heart attack walking back in the house looking like this.”

  He lets out a laugh. “No, go ahead. I’ll dig you out some clothes and leave them on the bed for you. I highly doubt you will ever want to wear that dress again.”

  My face scrunches up, and I feel the heat suddenly radiating off it.

  He chuckles. “Are you embarrassed?”

  “Well, yeah! Wouldn’t you be?” I ask as he stands and picks up the plate to put it away.

  He places his hand on my bicep. “At this point, I think you should just be thankful to be alive.” He smiles kindly and walks away, leaving me staring after him.

  On my walk up the stairs, I think about the way he’s suddenly acting toward me. It’s nice and all, but it’s weird, and it makes me leery of when he’s going to go back to the old Callan, the one
that lived to torture me. I brush the thoughts off, telling myself that he’ll probably rear his ugly head first thing Monday morning to welcome me back.

  A part of me wonders if he’s worried about me. He seems that way. Like he’s scared to push my buttons in fear I may break open at any moment. I guess what I’ve gone through is a traumatic experience, but truthfully, I don’t remember any of it. I’m just glad Callan was there to save me. I don’t know what I would’ve done had I woken up in that alley alone this morning, missing my clothing. Just thinking of it makes me shudder.

  I take a long hot shower, and when I get out, I find fresh clothing for me folded up on the bed. I pull on the pair of baggy basketball shorts and the t-shirt. Then I begin to look around for my clutch. Callan taps on the door before opening it.

  “Are you ready for a ride home?”

  I spin around. “Where’s my purse?”

  His mouth opens, but no words come out.

  “Fuck, I lost my purse?”

  “I…I don’t…I didn’t see a purse.” He walks deeper into the room, eyes full of regret.

  “Can you take me back to the club? Maybe someone turned it in?”

  He nods. “Yeah, okay.”

  We load up into his car, and he parks out front. I look over at him and he looks over at me.

  “Are you going to run in?” he asks.

  “Looking like this?” I motion down my body. “I don’t even have shoes.”

  He lets out a deep breath. “Okay,” he says, climbing out and walking into the building.

  I sit waiting, my legs bouncing the whole time. Finally, he walks out, and I catch a glimpse of my red clutch under his arm. It feels like my heart starts beating again.

  He slides into the car and passes it over. I take it and immediately start looking through it.

  The only things inside are my I.D. and lipstick. “Fuck,” I breathe out, slumping into my seat.

  “What?” he asks, pulling back out into traffic.

  “My phone and money are gone,” I tell him.

  “How much money?”

  I wave it off. “Not enough to worry about. Luckily, I didn’t bring my entire wallet that has my debit card and credit cards. But my phone? I need my phone.”

  “I’ll just swing in someplace. We’ll get you another one, and you can just download everything from the cloud.”

  “I can’t afford a new phone,” I cry out. “I can’t even afford toilet paper.”

  He laughs. “Don’t worry about it, Val. We’ll write it off for work. I like my assistants to have phones so I can bug them anytime I need to.”

  I look over at him. “Thank you, Callan.”

  He waves his hand through the air. “It’s nothing. Thank your brother if you’re going to thank anyone.” He laughs.

  Unfortunately, I have to go into the phone store so I can authorize everything, but an hour later, we’re back in the car with my new phone—a phone much nicer than the one I had. While everything downloads, I look over at him.

  “So, does everything go back to normal on Monday?”

  He glances at me from the corner of his eye. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, when I go into the office on Monday, will I see this Callan or the Callan I’ve known my whole life?”

  He laughs. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”

  I roll my eyes. “Too bad I didn’t get to know this side of you first. We probably could’ve saved each other a lot of headaches.”

  He laughs. “Yeah, but it’s been fun. You can’t deny that. Even when you’re pissing me off, I still like to hear the shit that comes out of your mouth. You always surprise me.” He looks over at me, and the smile he’s wearing is genuine. It’s not the cocky smile he usually has. It’s not the flirty smiles he uses with women. This is the kind of smile I’ve only ever seen him have when he’s enjoying talking with friends, like my brother. It’s nice to be on the receiving end for once.

  He pulls into my mom’s driveway and shifts into park as he looks over at me.

  “Thank you,” I tell him, feeling that the words aren’t enough.

  “Stop saying that, Val. I didn’t do anything special.”

  I nod. “You did, though. I could be laying in a hospital bed right now if it weren’t for you.”

  His hand lands on my bare knee, and he squeezes it playfully. “Let’s not think about what could’ve happened. Let’s just be thankful things went the way they did.”

  I nod, agreeing with him, but I can’t ignore the way my heart started pounding when his hand touched my skin. Unsure of what’s going on, I reach for the handle and open the door. His hand moves back to the steering wheel. He didn’t seem to notice the gesture the way I did, so I don’t mention it.

  “See you on Monday,” I say, stepping out and closing the door behind me. On my walk to the door, I glance over my shoulder, expecting him to be backing down the drive, but he’s still in the same place, watching to make sure I get inside. Just before I step through the front door, I wave and so does he.

  I close the door behind me and lean my back against it. For some reason, I’m breathless. My heart is racing, and my stomach muscles are tightened. I tell myself that I need to relax; it’s probably just the after-effects of whatever I ingested last night.

  “Hey, sweet pea,” Mom says, walking into the living room with a cup of tea. Then she fully takes me in, and her lips part as fear fills her eyes. “What happened to you? Are you okay?”

  I nod and stand upright. “I got a little sick last night, but Callan found me and took me back to his place. He stayed by my side all night to make sure I was okay.”

  She smiles. “See, I’ve always told you that he was a nice boy. But why did you get sick? I hope you weren’t out binge drinking like all these kids do nowadays.”

  I shake my head as I start walking toward the stairs. “I think it was something I ate. I’m never eating sushi again.”

  When I get downstairs, I collapse onto the couch and turn on the TV while I kick back and try relaxing. My head is still pounding. I think the only thing that will make it ease up is time. My phone rings and I answer it.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, where have you been? I’ve been calling you since last night,” Krista says.

  I don’t even know how to answer that. “Did you not notice me missing?” I ask.

  “I mean…not for a while. I was dancing with Brian. Decon went MIA too, so I just thought you guys were finally following through. You’ve had like, what, a year of foreplay?”

  I shake my head. “He drugged me, Kris. I don’t remember anything, but luckily Callan showed up and saved me from getting raped in the alley.”

  “Don’t be dramatic, Val. We’ve known Decon for a year. He wouldn’t do something like that.”

  “Callan wouldn’t lie about that, Kris. You need to be careful around him. Promise me you won’t go hang out with those guys anymore.”

  “I just left Brian’s house, and everything is fine.”

  “Promise me you won’t be alone with Decon, Kris. I’m serious. Things could’ve ended up a lot worse for me. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  “Alright, I promise. Are you okay?”

  “I lost my phone, ruined my shoes and dress, but yeah, I’m fine. I really owe Callan.”

  “God, I feel so bad. I honestly didn’t think Decon would do something like that,” she says, guilt dripping from her words.

  “Me neither,” I agree with a nod.

  The rest of the weekend is spent laying on the couch, hanging out with my mom, and eating way too much food. Monday morning rolls around, and I’m almost looking forward to getting back into the office, and I don’t know why. I guess a part of me wants to see how Callan acts toward me. It feels like we finally broke the ice on our friendship this weekend, like we just needed one thing to bond over. Too bad that thing was me being taken advantage of.

  I shower and dress in a black skirt, white shirt, and red hee
ls. I leave my hair down but curl it to make it look a little nicer, and I add a small amount of makeup. When I walk into the office, Callan is already behind his desk. His head pops up, and he almost smiles, but then decides against it.

  “There’s a list on your desk of things I need done today,” he says flatly, turning his attention back to his computer.

  “Okay,” I say, taking my seat. As I slide my purse beneath my desk, I look up and study him. It seems his easy-going attitude from this weekend has left his body. And in its place is the Callan that’s spent all his time torturing me.

  For the first half of the day, I sit at my desk, and he sits at his. We each do our jobs, and neither of us says a word. Around noon, he walks over and hands me a piece of paper with his lunch order. I grab my purse and head to the door. I glance down at the paper and see the same order from the other day.

  “No mayo, right?” I ask, pausing, trying any way I can to get him to talk to me.

  He looks up, offers a generic smile, and nods.

  I leave without another word. I step into the elevator and bump into Maddie.

  “Oh, Val. Bennet told me what happened. Are you okay?” she asks, latching onto my arm.

  I nod. “I’m fine. I just…” I let my sentence drift off.

  “What?” she asks.

  “Well, it’s just that after all that happened, Callan was really great. He was friendly, and it felt like we may be becoming friends. But now, he’s downright refusing to acknowledge me.”

  Maddie offers up a small smile. “Don’t take it personally, Val. Who knows what he’s thinking? He’s probably just freaked out in the sudden change in your relationship.”

  “I guess,” I say, stepping off the elevator with her following behind me.

  “Just give it some time. He’ll either go back to how he was before, or this new friendship will take over.”

  “Hopefully the latter,” I say with a laugh.

  6

  Callan

  When I reach out and touch her leg—something I mean to be completely innocent—my heart halts and leaps to my throat. My face feels hot and a little tingly. I quickly think I’m having a heart attack, but then she steps into the house, and my whole body calms down. What the fuck was that? I’ve never in my life felt something so strongly. It couldn’t be because of her, could it?