by Ashlee Price
That has me frowning. “What do you mean?”
“I’m not living here without paying you for the privilege,” she retorts.
“Who said anything about you moving out?” I ask, astonishment lacing my tone.
“You made it pretty clear, Marshall. What with the new apartment and the bedroom!” She pulls away from me, striding over to the window to peer out onto the street.
“It’s there in case you need to nap, dammit. You’re not moving anywhere.” I stalk toward her, spin her around, and haul her against my chest. Pressing my mouth to hers, I take what’s mine and state, “You’re staying with me, where you belong.”
“I don’t belong anywhere.” She makes the statement out of a need to commit rebellion, but there’s an emptiness to her tone that tells a tale of its own.
She really means that; she feels she doesn’t belong anywhere.
“You belong with me.”
That has her shaking her head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I’m not. It’s the truth, and no matter what you feel, you can’t deny it.” When she opens her mouth and starts to speak, I wait, intent on hearing her argument. But she stays quiet, her lips pursing as though she can’t find the words to disagree. Satisfaction floods me. “You see, you feel it too.”
“I don’t know what I feel,” she whispers, then does the damnedest thing—presses her forehead against my chest. The act is so weary, so tired, it makes my heart melt.
“We don’t need to know what we feel to know we feel something. The presence of anything at all means this is more important than half the relationships we’ve ever had.” I press a kiss to her hair. “This is a gift from me to you. I want you to enjoy it, but it was never intended as a prompt for you to move out.”
She gulps, then peers up at me. “You swear?”
“Hand on heart.”
As she nibbles her lip, I long to tug the morsel free from her teeth. A single nod has my breath whooshing from me in relief. “Thank you, Marshall.”
I lower my head and claim her mouth as my own. She passively accepts my tongue, letting me stroke hers, letting me fan the flames but not fighting back as she usually does. I cup her cheeks, tilt her head back so she can take all of me. “I need you, Grazia. I need you very much.”
They aren’t words of love, but I’m not capable of giving them yet. Maybe with time, I’ll find it easier. All I know is I’ve never needed anyone, not since my grandmother, and that need is more power than I’d like to give to anyone.
Her mouth trembles beneath my own. “I need you too,” she whispers, and a relieved breath gusts from me.
I can’t help myself. I lift her up and rest her butt on the window ledge. I don’t think people can see, nor do I care.
Utterly grateful she’s wearing a skirt, I let my hands settle at the hem as I take her mouth again. Fucking her with my tongue, letting her know she’s mine, I lift her skirt and drag it up, high enough to free her legs.
The instant she can move, she spreads them and I settle between her thighs. Her hands come to my fly and she pulls my dick free, not caring that my belt is still on or that both of us are fully dressed. She makes a quick detour to my pocket, where the ever-ready condoms are waiting, and opens one.
She grabs my shaft, covers me, pulls her panties aside, and sets me at her gate. As I start to notch the tip inside her, both of us moan. Slowly thrusting inside her, I release her mouth to nibble at her chin and jaw, ducking my head to nip at her throat.
As I work my way inside her, her head falls back against the cold pane of glass. The window rattles as I start to take her, marking her as mine.
I don’t know where we’ll be five months from now, I don’t know where we’ll be five years from now, but what I do know is that for this moment, this woman is mine. And I intend on that being so for a very long time.
Just because I don’t know the future doesn’t mean I can’t read between the lines.
We’ve only known each other for five short months. They’ve been months loaded with upheaval, with devastated loss and heavy hours and hectic work schedules. Neither of us trust easily, and there is no greater act of trust than giving another person your heart.
If there is anyone I could give it to, though, I know it’s Grazia, and strangely enough, I know she feels the same way about me.
For the moment, I’m content with her needing me, but eventually, I know I’ll want more, and I’m sure she’ll be the same. We’re intrinsically similar when it comes to things like this, and I look forward to the battles that will happen between us as we strive for more.
Because more is always what I’ll want from this woman.
And as I take her harder, deeper, faster, both of so close to exploding with a pleasure only we can give each other, I realize that where she’s concerned, I’ll never accept anything less.
~The End~
Served
A Bad Boy Billionaire Romance
Complete Series
By Ashlee Price
Served Part 1: Serve
By: Ashlee Price
Prologue
Jesse Olson has a full plate. When her father dies suddenly of an aneurism, her whole world seems to come to a stop. But with a bistro to run by herself and one of her special coffee blends getting a lot of attention in the city, Jesse is busier than ever. She doesn’t have time to do much of anything except work and sleep, and she isn’t thinking about anything else – until she meets a rude businessman with flashing dark eyes and a wicked tongue.
Scott comes to the bistro for one reason, but changes his mind when he meets the young owner and decides that he can find something else that he wants there. When Jesse is quick to put him in his place, it leaves Scott baffled. It also leaves him wanting more. He’s used to being listened to, and Jesse hasn’t given him the time of day. Instead of discouraging Scott, though, this just makes him want to get to know the fiery redhead more. He has a feeling that he’s going to be needing a lot of coffee.
Chapter 1 – Jesse Olson
“Jesse, are you coming down?”
I stopped what I was doing and looked at the clock. It was already seven and I was trying to figure out where the time had gone. I was going through my father’s room, and I guess I’d just gotten sidetracked. I’d forgotten that I had a job to do.
“Coming down now. Open the doors and I’ll be down there in just a minute.”
Melissa told me to take my time. She knew that it was a rough month for me, and I was thankful that she didn’t give me too much grief when I was having a day like today. It had only been two weeks since my father died from an aneurysm, and I was still trying to come to terms with it. When I’d woken up at two this morning, all I wanted to do was talk to him, so instead I’d started going through the closet that was jammed with his things.
Pushing the pile that I had in front of me back into the closet, I decided that I was going to come back after the bistro closed in the afternoon and finally go through it all. I wasn’t sure what was in there – I doubted that my father even knew what was all in there – but the things he left behind were all I had left of him. That and all of the memories that I would cherish forever were what was left of my dad, and it just didn’t seem like enough. The bistro was a part of both of us, and when I started down the stairs, it was my dad, Johnson, that I thought about.
The first customer came in and asked for the house blend. It was the most popular thing that we sold, and Melissa already had many to-go cups ready. It wasn’t long before there was a steady stream of customers filing through. Not all bought just the house blend coffee, but most people did. It was what we were known for, a recipe that my father had come up with five years ago when we opened the place. Now it was called Johnson’s Special Blend so that every time someone ordered it they would be reminded of who created it. Hearing his name all of the time seemed to comfort me as well. It was a win-win in my eyes.
By noon I was starting to get tired, but the line was
out the door and had been since about thirty minutes after we opened. I don’t know why, but ever since my father had died, it seemed like everyone couldn’t get enough of the coffee. I don’t know what that meant, but I liked the idea of so many people getting to try something that my father had been passionate about. He loved coffee and he loved to cook. I hadn’t gotten the love for the dark drink that he had, but I did like to cook, and I was more than happy to be in the kitchen making food and pouring drinks. With Mellissa there, it was a two-person job that kept us rather busy from the start of the day until we closed the doors a little after three.
I was thinking about lots of things, mainly my father, when I heard a bit of a disturbance in the front area. I could hear the tone that my friend was taking, and it seemed like someone was causing a problem. When I got up there, I could see that several people were arguing. It had all stemmed from who was next in the queue.
“Are you two really fighting about this?” I know that they were customers, but in reality it was two grown men who couldn’t get along long enough to get through a line. I was sure that they had been waiting for some time, but I couldn’t let chaos rule. My father would have never let it happen, and that was part of the reason that I made sure to get involved. Johnson always figured out a way for everyone to walk away happy. I wasn’t sure how that was supposed to work with the likes of the two of them, but I knew I had to try.
After listening to the problem, I got both of their orders and gave them to them on the house. I had them promise that they would come back with better attitudes. As they left, Melissa told me that I was silly to have let them go the way I did.
“Why would you give them freebies because of the way they were acting?”
“Because it was just an honest mistake and sometimes it’s better to diffuse a situation than to make it worse. There wasn’t much I was going to do that wasn’t going to make it worse. Just seemed easier to get them calmed down and send them on their way.”
She kind of shook her head and warned me that I was going to start a precedent that I didn’t want.
“This isn’t the law we’re talking about, Melissa, it’s just a couple cups of coffee.”
“Okay, Jesse, but remember that I told you it was going to be this way. You’ll see. You know that I like to see the best in people, and even I know that giving out free drinks if they cause a ruckus isn’t going to be good.”
I agreed a little, but that was mostly because I didn’t know what to say. Was it really that bad to let it go just that once to make everyone happy?
***
As the week wore on and the lines got longer, Melissa was proven right. It was becoming a problem. I still didn’t know why in the world the place had gotten so popular, but I didn’t really have time to think about. It seemed like I spent half my day trying to corral and calm the people down. I had to figure something out, because we couldn’t make as much coffee as was needed and serving them in time was almost impossible.
“Are you ready for today?”
I looked up to Melissa and asked if the new girl had showed up. I knew that it was just her second day, but I was afraid the day before had been too much for her. It wasn’t every day that there was a fist fight in a bistro line over a cup of coffee, but it had happened yesterday.
“I haven’t seen her. She isn’t supposed to be here for a little while. Who knows, maybe she’s just running late?”
I looked about as dubious as I felt. I didn’t think that Amanda was coming back, and I didn’t blame her. The Ground Bean was getting out of hand, and it wasn’t the first time that I wished my dad was still around. He would know what to do about all of this.
“Well, I guess you can call that temp agency in a little while when they open. See if they will send me another couple of candidates over here. It isn’t going to get any better until we get some more help in here.”
“Okay, I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thanks, Melissa, I don’t know what I would do without you.”
“You would be very busy, I suppose.”
I kind of laughed and went back to the paperwork that I was supposed to send to the accountant. The numbers didn’t add up, and though the man was magical, there wasn’t going to be any denying that the money just wasn’t there. While the bistro was doing well, it would seem that my father had had a lot of debt, and I was now strapped with it. Even with all of the business we were doing, it didn’t feel like it was ever going to be enough.
Chapter 2 – Cade Scott
“I’m just trying to figure out what it is that I’m supposed to be going there for?”
My assistant wrinkled her nose up and I could feel my eyes darkening. I wasn’t in the mood, never really was, but this day above all others was worse. This was the anniversary of the day long ago that had changed my life forever, and I knew that I wasn’t going to get through it without snapping at everyone. I couldn’t help it and I’d long since given up trying. Kindness was overrated and a surefire way to get run over. I wasn’t worried about that happening anymore.
“It was something that your father insisted on, remember?”
I sighed and sat back down at the desk I’d inherited from the same man who now breathed down my neck from his position on the board. When he had given me Scott Tech, I’d thought that it was his way of making things right. Little did I know that it was really just his way of getting his hooks even deeper into me than before. It wasn’t a way for us to be closer, but for me to do all of the work and for him to still have the final say. Everyone on the board would go with what he wanted. He was still my boss, and although my father was retired, he was still there every single day to watch over me, dictating my every move.
“I don’t care who insisted that I go. I’m the CEO. I want to know why.”
Caroline just shrugged. I watched her dark brown eyes look anywhere else but where I was looking. I was making her nervous, and though I didn’t feel any guilt, I knew somewhere inside that it was wrong to make her want to squirm like that.
“I can call Samuel if you would like me to. I don’t know if I can get a hold of him right now, but I’ll do my best to track him down and patch you through to him. If I knew, I would tell you, but I really have no real idea what is going on.”
I believed her, kind of. She wouldn’t lie to me. But I didn’t quite believe everything that she was saying. If she didn’t know why, she wouldn’t be looking at me as if she did. I felt sure she was feigning ignorance, and after I pressed her for a time, I finally got some sort of an answer.
“The company is very small, but they have a viral coffee brew that your father would like to capitalize on.”
I didn’t get it. What did coffee have to do with new technologies? I asked Caroline the same question, but that was where she really did run out of information. Her blank look told me that she actually didn’t know the answer to all of my questions. The idea of it bothered me, though. I tried not to let it, but it was impossible.
“I’m not sure what you want to know, sir. I’ve told you everything that I know. I’ll put a call in to your father and send it through when I get a hold of him. He can tell you more than I can.”
She was like a robot in her loyalty to my father. I knew that she wasn’t going to tell me anything she wasn’t authorized to. In the end it was a waste of time, and I told her not to worry about calling him. I was going to call him myself and see what he wanted.
When I dialed his cell phone, it took him several minutes to call me back and when he did he was out of breath. I didn’t want to think about what he was doing with a woman who was more than likely half his age. The only solace I got was to think that he would keel over one day and that would be the end of that. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about him pulling the strings from the board. I knew, though, that if there was any way he could pull the strings from the grave he would find it and send some shyster lawyer to enforce it.
“Scott, I thought you would be over at that bistro. I want y
ou to check it out and see if there’s an angle that we can get into.”
“Why do we need an angle?”
“I’m thinking about buying that girl’s recipe. The co-owner was her father, and now that he’s dead there’s a good chance I can get it rather cheap. I hear there’s a bit of a money problem with the business, so it’s time to pounce.”
“And what does that have to do with the tech company?”
“It doesn’t have anything to do with it. It’s just a good opportunity to make some money. You don’t think I made all my money with a few patents, do you? How do you think I bankrolled the first couple of years? That’s why I stay on the board. You have a lot to learn, Scott.”
I wanted to yell at him, but I knew that it would do no good. It would just pull the strings tighter.
“I’ll go down there if you want me to.” I wanted to tell him that I’d been doing every stupid thing that he wanted me to do for some time. Ever since I’d taken the job of CEO of the company, I’d done nothing but compromise to make things run smoother for him.
“Good. You’ll have to make it quick. I hear they had a line most of the day and it closes early in the afternoon. I don’t want you to put it off another day.”
“What is it that you want me to find out that you can’t find out yourself?”
“I want you to see if it’s a good investment. Get a vibe for the place, the customers and the person who’s running it. It’s a young girl, about twenty-four, and I want to know how easily I can bamboozle her with a crappy deal.”
The worst part wasn’t even the words he used; it was that he was preying on a girl’s dead father to make him some money. That was the side of my father that no one really saw. He was good at hiding it, but I knew that he was the metaphorical snake in the grass, and I was going to be his minion.
“I’ll go down there, but if it’s such a small bistro, I don’t see why it’s worth that much to you.”