by K. Bromberg
A nice sentiment, but still just part of his game. But hell if that player isn’t swoon worthy at times.
“THERE’S MY GIRL,” ZANE SAYS before pulling on my waist so I fall on top of his lap without warning.
I yelp in surprise and then stiffen when I feel the full heat of his body against mine. “What are you—”
“Just keeping up pretexts,” he murmurs in my ear as his arms wrap around me.
Son of a bitch.
He’s right though. The two hundred or so attendees who arrived early to our event and are milling about waiting to win some of the free prizes will eat it up when they see the cute couple on the chair. They’ll buy the notion that love really exists.
But for me? All I can feel are his arms around my waist and his breath hitting my ear, and his lips pressing a soft kiss to my lips.
“You’re not playing fair, Phillips.”
“Maybe not, but I suggest you don’t squirm right now like you’re doing or else it’s going to make it hard for both of us to stand up . . . considering your self-professed habit of not wearing panties and all.”
“That was two days ago,” I say.
“Forty-eight hours and a lot of fantasies about what I’d find if I lifted up that skirt of yours.”
“Keep dreaming, dear.” I say and scrape a fingernail up his thigh as I smile softly to those walking by, who seem to recognize us as the people in the ad campaign. “Anyway, I thought nothing fazed you.”
“Just keeping up pretexts,” he murmurs through a chuckle.
And he’s right. All of his interaction with me—the extra touches, the knowing glances, the accidental brushes against my breasts—has been when we are in public and doing our jobs.
The minute we get back to the coach or are alone, he doesn’t touch or even look my way even when I’ve given him more than ample opportunity to. It’s like there’s this imaginary line down the middle of the bed. He makes sure he’s nowhere near the bedroom when I’m changing, taking a shower, or even going to bed. He’s up before me despite being a self-proclaimed non-morning person. It’s almost as if he’s not even there.
I can’t figure out if this whole turn of events makes me relieved that the pressure is off or conflicted that he seems to not be interested.
Do I want to sleep with him again? Yes. Yes. Oh, and yes. But at the cost of proving him right? That’s a hard one.
But . . . but if I make him call Uncle first . . . won’t I be getting both—a win to prove him wrong and some incredible sex to celebrate it?
So what do I do? I wiggle my ass as discretely as possible and earn a groan from him.
I suffer as well in the process, feeling his dick harden beneath me and hit right in the spot where I’d lower myself onto it.
“Oopsie. I didn’t mean to do that,” I say in a taunting voice.
“Zane Phillips.” We both flash our eyes up like little kids caught doing something they weren’t supposed to. The sudden tensing of our bodies in awareness only serves for me to feel how hard he is.
“Kostas? What the hell are you doing here?” Zane asks, complete shock woven in his tone.
When I look up, there is a man bearing down on us. His hair is longish but pulled back in a slick man bun. His coloring is fascinating: olive skin, the clearest gray eyes that almost look translucent, dark hair. His clothes are expensive and his swagger is prominent as he reaches us.
He’s handsome in a European, sophisticated type of way. I can’t put my finger on how I know it, but he comes from money. And privilege. You can spot it a mile away.
When the two men shake hands, I go to stand, but Zane holds me tight with his free hand so the only place I can move is sideways on his lap.
“I was stopping through for some meetings and have been following your new . . . uh, venture,” he says in an accented voice with humor in his eyes.
“If you’ve been following it then that means it’s getting the publicity it deserves. Jealous Kos—” Zane abruptly stops when Kostas turns his gaze on me. Within a mere second I’ve been measured and assessed and objectified. For a woman accustomed to using her body to sell products, there’s something about Kostas’s stare that unnerves me.
It’s almost as if he wants to eat me alive.
“And who might you be?”
“Harlow Nicks,” Zane says over me.
“She can speak for herself,” Kostas says with a lift of his eyebrow at Zane. “Isn’t that her job?”
And in that one exchange, my anger over Zane stepping on my toes turns to appreciation. He’s protecting me. I’m just not sure from what.
“Harlow Nicks,” I say for myself and this time when I go to stand, Zane releases me. He stands as well so we’re all on even footing.
“It’s a pleasure,” he says and then lifts my hand to his lips.
Uncomfortable with the testosterone riddled vibe, I pull my hand back and take a step closer to Zane. “And how do you two know each other?” I ask.
“We’re old friends,” Zane says and Kostas smiles. “We went to college together and Kostas is here to try and stick his fingers in my pie. I love him to death, but I also know he can’t stand when someone else is doing better than him at certain things.”
A look exchanged between the two that tells me there is obviously more going on here than meets the eye.
“There’s still plenty of time left. Leave that ego at the door, mate,” Kostas says with a laugh, but I can tell Zane calling him on the carpet about whatever they are talking about bugs him. Kostas turns his attention back to me. “What Zane is really worried about is that you’re going to get one look at me and realize you’re missing out on this while being with him.”
A smile spreads on my lips and I just shake my head, uncertain if Kostas is serious or joking. “I’m perfectly happy with how things are.”
“Then I guess asking you out to dinner would be out of the question.”
“You assumed correct,” I say, more than happy to stand my ground.
Kostas takes us both in before turning his gaze back to Zane. “So you’re a one woman man now?” Zane tenses beside me. “When did this startling development happen? Last time we talked, you were—”
“Kostas.” Everything about Zane’s tone is a warning.
“I mean, if I didn’t see it with my own eyes, I would have been certain that this was some kind of bullshit play—”
“What are you doing?” Zane asks, taking a step forward toward him, his body taut. We are both more than aware that people are listening. “Is it pissing you off that much that the market for your investments fell and you’re having to start all over?”
“I’ll be just fine,” Kostas murmurs.
“If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I need to use the ladies room.”
Zane gives me a kiss on the cheek for good measure before I head the opposite way of them, wondering what in the hell that was all about.
“MIND TELLING ME WHAT THE fuck that was all about, Kos?” I ask the minute the waitress serves our drinks.
“Whatever do you mean?” His laugh rings out in the club around us. It’s dark and swanky with velvet seats, music that’s low and bluesy, and women who are milling around the VIP section where we’re sitting hoping for an invite up. “Don’t be so uptight. Live a little. You’re stuck being a bitch to that investor of yours, you probably need to be blown seven ways from Sunday to relax any.”
“I’m good, thanks,” I say to Kostas from where I look at him across the table, grateful to have him away from the event and Robert’s all-reaching ears.
“I’m sure you are.” His chuckle is irritating, his voice condescending.
“Is it that hard for you to come to grips with the fact that you might not win this?” I throw back, ignoring his innuendo about Harlow. “Does it mean that much to you that you’d come here to try and sabotage my stake in this?”
Privileged fucking rich boy. I love the asshole to death but hate the nasty side that comes out—the
tantrums he throws—when he doesn’t come out on top or get his way. It’s never bothered me before . . . but something about the way he looked at Harlow—like she was up for grabs—rubbed me wrong.
I know how he operates. How he uses and then discards without a thought. And I know when he saw Harlow, he was already figuring how to have her.
Fuck that.
“I told you, Zane. I’ll be fine. The market is on an upswing. I’ll make back what I lost and then some. When have you ever known me to fail?”
“Then why are you here trying to fuck with mine?”
“I’d fuck with her . . . no doubt there. Is Harlow that good that you’re a one-pussy-loving-man now?”
“She’s not available.”
“They’re always available when it comes to me.” His chuckle again. “Look around, Zane. There are twenty women here vying for your attention. They’d love to let you stick your dick in them . . . why are you wasting your time with one woman when you can have one, two, three of them at a time?”
“I love you to death, mate. You’re like a brother to me. But this—SoulM8—and her—Harlow—better stay free of your fingerprints. We’ve known each other way too long for you to pull bullshit like that with me.”
Kostas holds my glare and brings his glass up to his lips without breaking eye contact. He’s not used to this, being challenged. And he sure as hell isn’t used to being told no.
He looks over his shoulder to find the waitress, lifts his finger to signal another round, and then like a man always used to getting what he wants, points to three women on the outside of the ropes and motions for them to sit with us.
He watches them walk our way but speaks to me. “So this is real then? She’s real? It’s not some negotiation tactic to sell your company?”
“Why would you say that?”
The women stand at the foot of the U-shaped couch and wait for Kostas to point them where to sit: one beside him, one between us, and one on the other side of me.
But I don’t look their way. Don’t meet their eyes. I refuse to give them an open invitation to something I don’t want to give.
“Because you’re you. A dog when it comes to getting what you want. Besides, I’ve never seen you like this with a woman.”
“People change,” I murmur and then remove the perfectly manicured hand slowly sliding up my leg and return it to its owner without a glance.
“Only when they are motivated by something.” He turns his face and kisses the woman on his left. “So she somehow has to tie into this. Into you winning. That much I know.” A kiss on the lips of the woman to his right. “Either that or her pussy has to be of the magical variety, and if that’s the case, you’re holding out on me.”
“Not your business,” I say, bringing my glass to my lips and shifting away suddenly when the woman beside me leans in and tries to place a kiss in my cheek. She groans in protest.
Kostas notices and lifts an eyebrow.
In the past I’d have let her walk those fingers right up to my dick. Let her tease me with them. Let her show me how bad she wants it.
But fuck if I’m in the mood right now. Fuck if I’m going to let her touch me when my mind keeps thinking of Harlow. Of the goddamn foreplay we’ve been having to prove to the other we’re not fazed.
She fazes me all right. Grabs me by the balls and makes me want like I’ve never wanted before.
“I can fuck her if you need me to verify she’s worth the confusion on your face and justify the downright travesty of you rejecting our friend here,” Kostas says with a lift of his chin to the woman beside me.
I scoot forward in my seat and put my elbows on my knees. “She’s not my friend. She’s yours. And I love you, Kos, but it’s time that I leave and you go.”
“Worried she’ll want me over you?”
“You’re an arrogant SOB, you know that?”
“Just like you.” He smirks and slides his hand up the thigh of the woman beside him without breaking eye contact with me. “You’ve never been able to stay mad at me for long.”
“Mmm-hmm,” I murmur and down the rest of my drink in one, long swallow.
“It was good to see you, Zane.”
No, it wasn’t, I think to myself.
“Good luck with your meetings,”
He nods, and just like that, he moves on to the women around him without caring about the ripples he’s just made into waves.
I take the Uber back across town, where the streets of Atlanta are busy and alive, but all I keep thinking about is Harlow.
Since when did I become so defensive when it comes to her?
I’m at the hotel within thirty minutes, entering the lobby toward the ballroom.
“Must be nice to up and leave without even saying a word.” Harlow’s voice is cold and her expression isn’t much better when I turn to find her sitting in a chair off to the left. Her arms are folded across her chest, and those long legs of hers crossed at the knee are bouncing up and down in irritation.
“I told Zoey I was leaving. She was supposed to—”
“She did tell me, but what the hell, Zane? I go to the bathroom and come back to her telling me you’d left.”
“I knew you could handle it just fine.”
“Me being able to handle it doesn’t give you the right to just bail.”
“I didn’t have a choice. I had to get Kostas out of here before he caused a scene.”
“Caused a scene, pissed you off, or you just needed a night out with the boys to feel like a man again because you’ve been stuck sitting on a bus with me?”
I shove my hands in my pockets and look around to see who else is within earshot. “He would have hit on you.”
“Controlling who I see now, are you?” She purses her lips and her eyes narrow at something before turning back to me. “That seems to have escalated quickly. From ‘I don’t want anything to do with you’ to you telling me who I can and can’t talk to? Talk about being a hypocrite.”
“You’re being irrational, Harlow . . .” My sigh fills the room because the minute those words are out of my mouth, I know they are a mistake. The steam all but coming out of her ears paired with her gritted jaw confirms it.
“Is that so?”
Any man who’s heard that tone of voice before knows they are in deep shit.
“Look, you have a right to be mad—”
“You’re damn right I do. You said you had to go deal with Kostas and you up and left.” She rises from her seat and throws her hands up in disgust. “Up and left to do who knows what.”
Tears? There are tears in her eyes?
Fuck.
I sigh only because I have no clue why she’s so upset.
“You don’t know Kostas like I do. I’ve known him for years, and he was in a mood to start some trouble. I was just trying to protect you from it.”
“Protect me or protect you?” Her eyes veer to my shoulder again and then her teeth grit when she meets my gaze again. “Why would he do that? I’ve been trying to figure out why exactly he wouldn’t want you to succeed if he’s such a good friend.”
“He’s complicated.”
“It makes it so much easier when you say that because then you don’t have to explain, right? Was it because God forbid he found me attractive and you were trying to mark some claim on me you don’t have? Was it because there’s something else going on here that—”
“Look, I’m sorry.” The most important words I need to say before I continue because one, she deserves to hear them, and two, fuck if it doesn’t give me a few more seconds to admire how damn sexy she is when she’s angry.
“And I’m sorry I waited around for you to come back. I’m sorry doing whatever you were doing with Kostas took precedence over what we had going. I’m sorry that I had to stand in there tonight and say all of these lovely things about you while inside I was quietly cussing you out for making me cover for you. Oh, Harlow, I’m so excited that you found love on the site. Ms. Nicks, can we ge
t a word with Zane . . . oh, wait? Where is he? Blah. Blah. Blah.”
“You wouldn’t have wanted Kostas there.”
“I couldn’t have cared less if he was here or not, but it was you who should have been. You know I can hold my own with egotistical, self-centered men who think they are God’s gift to women.” Her smile is tight. “Case and point . . . you.”
I hiss at her dig and then lose the battle over fighting back my smile.
“Don’t you smile at me.” She points a finger into my chest. “This isn’t amusing. None of it is. This is me and my job and my . . .” The finger turns into a hand pressed against my chest pushing me away. “Screw this. Screw you. I’m going to bed.”
She strides past me, her heels pounding the floor, and those hips of hers swaying so hard I groan.
EACH STEP ON THE PAVEMENT—the sound of my heels hitting it—only serves to exacerbate my fury.
Just when I start to believe that Zane is the guy I think he is, he up and leaves me in the middle of our job to have a boy’s night out. He comes back acting as if nothing happened except for the dark pink stain of lipstick on his collar that I’m sure he doesn’t even know is there. And I’m supposed to stand there and not be pissed?
Or hurt?
That’s why I needed space. Distance. Anything to figure out why I’m more hurt than pissed. Hurt by the sight of lipstick more than pissed over him leaving me to fend for myself.
He doesn’t matter—it was just sex—so I shouldn’t be hurt.
But the tears still sting. The rejection still remains.
Gah. I hate being a female sometimes. I hate that despite telling myself this doesn’t matter, I still care.
“Harlow.”
I close my eyes as Zane calls out behind me. “Please, just leave me alone.” I hate that the break in my voice betrays me.
“Will you stop a second?”
“No.”
My feet ache. My head hurts. My temper is blazing.
“Sorry I wasn’t there tonight. I made the decision I thought was the best at the time.”
“Whatever.” But I don’t stop walking.
“Whatever?” His disbelieving chuckle grates on my nerves. “Has anyone ever told you that your temper is out of control?”