by Sam Crescent
“I am about most things.”
“I don’t hate you.”
“I figured.”
Her mouth was dry, and licking her lips, she tilted her head back to look at him. “Do you … do you want me?”
“Always.” He pushed some of her hair back and smiled down at her. “You think I don’t want you?”
“You left last night.”
“Grace, it’s not lost on me how innocent you are. I don’t expect you to be ready for everything I want to do to you, but make no mistake, I want to fuck you. I want to dirty you up so damn bad. My cock is always hard around you.” He stroked her cheek. “But I don’t want to hurt you or overwhelm you.”
“I thought you were supposed to be a beast.”
“Betray me and you’ll meet him.”
She had no intention of betraying this man. Closing her eyes, she rested her head against him.
****
“No.”
“Come on, Caleb, don’t be a pain in the ass. It doesn’t suit you,” Grace said.
Caleb looked up from his paperwork at the woman who shouldn’t look cute. Not with her body, but here she was with James in front of her. They were both dressed for winter and for the snowfall that had occurred last night. Around her neck, she wore the camera he’d given her.
He’d found her taking pictures of James and when he’d let her, himself. He wondered if she took any of herself, but he hadn’t bothered to ask.
“I said no.”
“Please, Uncle Caleb. It’s snow and I want to play,” James said.
“It’s cold.”
“And that’s why we have sweaters, scarves, hats, and gloves.” She waved her hands at him. “Come on, why don’t you join us? I bet you’d love it.”
“I don’t do snow.”
“Maybe that’s your problem. Come on, please?” she asked.
He put his paperwork down and looked at her. “What do I get out of it?”
“You get to come and play.” She winked at him. “It’ll be fun. Come on. For half an hour, be someone fun. Not a spoilsport. You’ll love it.”
He stared at her.
Playing in the snow was something he’d never done, but what he often saw other kids do, even now. He never allowed himself the luxury of play. Grace made it hard for him to want to deny her.
“Ten minutes,” he said. “If I don’t laugh, then you both come in.”
James jumped up and down.
“I’ll be right back.” Grace disappeared from his office, leaving him with James, who still glowed with happiness.
He needed to fix Christmas so his nephew had some presents. His sister would have made sure her son loved this time of year. She always told him that her son would love Christmas.
“How are you, son?” he asked.
“I’m good. Grace and I baked more cookies.”
“You’re spoiling my men.”
James giggled. He didn’t get a chance to ask more as Grace returned with a large jacket. “Come on. Stand up.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes.” She rushed to his side. Rather than wait for him, she pulled him to his feet and made him stand as she helped him into a large, ugly jacket, and then continued to wrap a scarf around his neck, tug a hat on his head, and even put gloves on his hands. “There. You’re going to be warm and cozy.” She hugged him and pulled him down for a hug and a kiss.
He wondered if she even realized what she was doing. He didn’t point it out and followed her outside with James.
Caleb hated that just the action of putting on a coat nearly made him smile.
James and Grace dived in, going to their knees and starting to mound up a ball of snow.
Grace laughed as they both kept adding more snow. James joined her and the two were utterly infectious.
Time was ticking and he was freezing his balls off.
“You really are a stick in the mud,” Grace said, taking his hand. “It’s going to involve you actually doing something. Come on. You’re going to love it.”
He joined in, going to his knees and ruining his expensive, hand-sewn Italian suit. It was just typical.
Grace wouldn’t be discouraged, and before too long, he realized, against his will, that he was having a lot of fun. They built a snowman and halfway through, Grace started to sing a Christmas song, really badly and out of tune.
James kept on laughing. Grace rushed to James and tried to pick him up, but her shoulder stopped her.
Seeing a woman in need, he went to his nephew, lifted him, and began to play airplanes with Grace following. If anyone could see him now, his reputation would be ruined, but he didn’t stop. Not once.
James begged to be put down and as he did, they all began to make planes. Ten minutes had long since passed and Grace, well, she’d done it. She made him forget who he was for a short time.
When the first snowball hit, he looked toward the culprit and found Grace laughing. The next one came from James. Bending down, he gathered up some snow and threw it toward Grace. She screamed, turned on her heel, and tried to make her escape, but she didn’t get far. His snowball hit her on the ass. James burst out laughing, and all of a sudden, they were having to hide from each other as they threw snowballs across the yard. Caleb couldn’t recall ever having so much fun.
The laughter surrounded him and at that moment, he also felt a sharp hit of pain as this was what his sister had wanted him to do, but he’d refused. She’d always been trying to get him to have a little fun, to love life. To take a moment from his work to embrace what they finally had.
He didn’t allow the pain to stop his fun, but after nearly three hours out in the cold, it was time to head on in.
Grace gave him James to change out of his wet clothes while she got some hot chocolate together.
“Uncle Caleb?” James asked as he changed out of his wet clothes.
He’d already found him some warm ones to change into. “Yes, champ?”
“Do you think Mommy is happy?” he asked.
Caleb stopped. “I think she would be happy if you were. Are you happy?”
James kept his mouth closed but nodded.
He laughed. “Then I don’t think we’ve got anything to worry about. I want you to be happy.”
“Can … can Grace be my new mommy? Mommy would like her and I think she’d like for me to … have her?”
Caleb swallowed past the lump in his throat. Having kids was such a bad idea. James wasn’t like a lot of three-year-old boys. His sister had made sure he was aware of how different James was at such a young age.
Rubbing the boy’s head, he nodded. “I’m going to try and keep Grace for as long as she’ll stay.” Or for as long as she didn’t betray him.
Time would tell with her. He had his doubts.
Lifting James up, he carried him downstairs to the kitchen to find Grace dropping marshmallows into cups.
“I have hot chocolate ready. Who wants a drink?” she asked.
After he sat James at the counter, they settled in and he watched as Grace licked off the top of her cream before taking a small sip.
“It’s hot, be careful.” She stopped James from drinking it up.
This woman, he didn’t know where she’d come from, not really. The paperwork gave him all the details in black and white, but it never told him of actual experiences. This woman was unlike anyone he knew.
She cared so much.
He watched her as she climbed off her chair, grabbed a spoon, and helped James eat his whipped cream. Once she got to the drink, she blew across the surface. Then she tried her own drink and smiled. “It’s good for you to drink now, sweetheart.”
James took a drink and closed his eyes.
Grace giggled. “I’m glad you like.”
James nodded.
The boy already looked sleepy.
After their hot chocolates were finished, he took James to go and nap while Grace prepared food.
James was fast asleep before he got
to his room. Caleb gently placed him into the bed, making sure he was settled. Once he’d grabbed the monitor, he took it down to the kitchen to find Grace there, already preparing food.
“How is he?”
“Fast asleep. You know how to wear out that boy.”
She chuckled. “Not really. My parents would always take me out in the snow. It was always so much. I loved it. Snowball fights were the best, but it gave them peace for a couple of hours while I had a nap.”
“Do you miss your parents?” he asked.
“All the time.”
“I never had parents like yours,” he said. “Mine would rather beat you than take you out into the snow.”
“I’m so sorry, Caleb.”
Staring at her, he didn’t know why he said the next part, but it felt wrong to lie to her. “I didn’t inherit any of this. I earned every single cent to my name. I fought my way to this life, Grace. I’m not a good man.”
“I know.”
“All I’ve known is pain. No one made me hot chocolate. My sister, she tried to get me to see myself for what I was turning into, but I didn’t care.”
Grace stopped cutting the vegetables and moved toward him.
She cupped his cheeks. “Stop. You don’t have to feel guilty for your past, Caleb. What your parents did, they are the ones at fault. Not you.” She raised her lips to his.
“You could never love a man like me,” he said.
She sighed. “Caleb, you don’t know who or what I could love. There is far more to the beast than what meets the eye with you. I’m interested in the man behind all of this. The man who took his nephew in. The man who tries not to show that he’s mourning his sister’s death, but does so on a daily basis. There’s a good man inside you. You’ve just got to trust me enough to let me meet him.”
Chapter Eight
“What is this?” Grace asked.
“Get changed into the swimsuit.”
She looked at the bathing suit that wasn’t a one-piece at all. “This is a bikini.”
Caleb stood in the pool. She didn’t even know if he wore a pair of swimming trunks. “It still needs you to get changed into it.”
“I don’t need to get changed into it.”
“Grace, I don’t like the idea of you being frightened about anything. I’m willing to teach you how to swim.”
“I don’t need to learn how to swim,” she said. However, his naked body was far more tempting than the water.
“You’re being stubborn.”
“Don’t you have a lot more important things to do? Like, I don’t know, dominating the world?”
“My empire is so well-trained it can take on the world without my presence.”
“I bet.”
“Come on, Grace. Your parents never taught you, but one day, James is going to want to swim. Are you going to let him go without?”
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him she wouldn’t be with him for a long term, but that was the last thing she wanted to bring up.
Caleb didn’t come to her bed at night. He gave her space, but her needs, they weren’t fading. She wanted him, and last night, she realized what game he intended to play with her. Sex wasn’t going to be used against her, but he intended to make her see her own needs and desires for what they were. It was sweet, but it also made her have to own up to what she wanted.
This sucked.
Big time.
She’d never asked for anything in her life. The first and only orgasm a man had given her, it had given her a taste, and now all she wanted was to learn more.
“Fine,” she said.
“You don’t have to leave,” he said as she turned her back. “We’re both adults. I’ve seen you naked before and we both know I like what I see very much.”
Her cheeks were on fire, but rather than leave the room, she wriggled out of her clothes. His groan had her freezing for a second before pulling her bikini bottoms up.
“I’ve never worn a bikini,” she said, quickly securing the top in place.
After stepping toward the water, she sat on the edge, wrapping her arms around her waist. She felt exposed. He’d seen her naked, but that didn’t take away her nerves. He’d probably seen hundreds of women, thousands. They threw themselves at him.
Caleb glided through the water, going to her. His hands went to her ass. She let out a squeal as he moved her into the pool. As she wrapped her arms around his neck, he chuckled.
“You don’t have to be afraid,” he said.
“I’m not.”
She circled his waist with her legs.
“Now this has possibilities.” He moved her down and she became aware of his hardness pressing against her core.
While she stared up into his eyes, it was on the tip of her tongue to beg him, but he moved her away.
“There will be time for that soon,” he said. “I want you to lie flat.”
“Caleb, I don’t—”
“Come on, trust me.”
“I hate you.”
“We’ve already established you don’t. Now, what is there to be afraid of in the water?”
“Sharks.”
He laughed. “There’s no sharks. It’s just me, you, and the water.”
“The ocean is full of sharks. They don’t like that it’s just you and me.”
“It’s a good thing I haven’t thrown you in the ocean then.”
She sighed.
“Come on, Grace. Stop being stubborn.”
“Fine. Fine. Drowning.”
“Very good, but you won’t drown because I’m going to teach you how to handle the water.”
Grace didn’t expect Caleb to be a good teacher, but damn it, he was. He made her tread through the water, taking his time. Each time she nearly dropped beneath the surface, he was there to capture her. He made sure she was safe and that was messing with her head.
The time ticked on by, and after three hours, Caleb called a break. One of his men brought them some lunch of sandwiches, and she got a drink of soda while it looked like he had a coffee.
“I’m not a child,” she said. “I can drink coffee.”
“But you rarely do.”
“How did you find all this information about me?” she asked.
“I have my methods.”
“Illegal?”
“Not entirely, but also not entirely legal either.”
She wasn’t angry. Laughing, she shook her head, then took a bite of her sandwich. Cheese and pickle, again, her favorite. “I’ve never had a man be so interested in making me comfortable.”
“We’re not all like this.”
“You’re special?”
He only smiled.
“You’re not exactly the man I judged when I first arrived here,” she said.
“Good or bad?” he asked.
“Good, most definitely good.”
Her heart raced as she watched him put a grape into his mouth. Need flooded her body and she didn’t know what to do. Before she knew what was really happening, she was on her knees, moving over to him. Caleb didn’t push her away, nor did he stop her.
He finished chewing his grape. She took the coffee from him, straddled his waist, placing her pussy next to his cock.
Again, every sense within her pulsed with need. Staring into his eyes, she didn’t know what to do. This was new territory to her.
Going slow, she wrapped her arms around his neck and placed a chaste kiss across his lips. “Hey,” she said.
His hands went to her back, slowly sliding down to grasp her ass. She moaned.
“You’re the one who took charge here, babe. You’re the one calling the shots.”
“I don’t know what you want me to do.”
“Whatever you came here to do.”
She kissed him, closing her eyes as she traced across his lips with her tongue. He opened up and she plunged inside, dancing with his, tasting the coffee he’d drunk.
One of the hands on her ass slid up into her hair.
>
She rubbed her pussy against him, wanting more of him. Desperate to feel him fill her in every possible way.
She was on fire.
Letting go of his face, she reached for the string of her bikini bra. She let it slide off her body, pressing her tits to his chest.
Caleb groaned. “Grace?”
“I can’t stop thinking about you. About what I felt that night. I … I don’t want to wait anymore, Caleb. I want you to fuck me. I can’t stand waiting anymore, but it’s because I want it. I want you. Please,” she said.
He pushed some of her wet hair out of the way. “You certainly have a way with words.”
She reached between them, grasping his erection, but he captured her wrist, stopping her.
“I’m not going to take you at the edge of the pool. Tonight, I want you to come to my room. Your first time should be in a bed, and I want you to be prepared for me. When I take you, it’s going to hurt. I’m not a small man. You’re going to feel every inch of me.” His hand dipped into her bikini pants, brushing through her curls to find her pussy. He stroked her clit and she closed her eyes, arching her back.
His lips took one of her nipples into his mouth, biting down a little hard, making her cry out. The pain went straight to her clit, and she rocked back and forth across him, hungry for more.
“Damn, I’m going to have to stop.” He pulled his fingers free of her pussy. “You drive me crazy, baby, but tonight, I’ll show you exactly what you’ve been missing.”
She climbed off his lap, and he got up, helping her into her bikini top.
“Until then, let’s get you dried. That’s enough lessons for today. I’ll be waiting for you, Grace. Don’t make me wait too long.” He pressed a kiss to her cheek and then he was gone, leaving her alone at the pool.
No one was around, but she wrapped her body in a towel that magically appeared on one of the chairs, or had been placed there while Caleb had been training her?
Had she just made a big mistake?
****
Caleb didn’t expect Grace to follow through.
He stood in his bedroom in only his robe, waiting patiently. He’d switched his cell phone off to any distractions. While there was a killer intent on taking everyone he loved, he didn’t have time for this, but it was Grace. This was the woman he’d gone out of his way to get. He’d orchestrated her kidnapping, saved her, and now, he was going to finally have her.