Tempt Me (Temptation Series Book 1)

by Kally Ash

  He’d thrown Chelsea out of his apartment, telling her to fuck off back to California and to expect to hear from his lawyer. He was immensely satisfied when the smug look she was wearing was wiped off her face as he slammed the door after her.

  The high he’d experienced was short-lived. As soon as the sheen had worn off, Max was back to thinking about Gigi. He should have just let her walk away from him. It would be for the best. He was leaving in a few months. She hadn’t even wanted to continue a sexual relationship with him anyway. But…

  But the thought of not seeing her, not kissing her, not making love to her every night made his whole body ache in a way he’d never experienced before. He’d never been in love before. He thought he had loved Chelsea, but since being with Gigi—no matter how short the time—he knew that’s what it was.

  He loved her.

  And he’d be damned if he didn’t try and get her back.

  Picking up his phone, he called her again. He expected it to go straight to voicemail like it had every time before, so he was ready to just end the call. But then it connected.

  “Max, you bastard,” Gigi said, her words slurring together.

  He frowned. “You’re drunk.”

  “Yup,” she replied, popping the ‘p’ then laughing. The sound was drowned out with a sudden burst of dance music, like a heavy door had opened and closed. “Where are you?”

  Jen’s muffled voice said something in the background. “I’m not telling you,” Gigi sang, laughing again.

  He ground his molars together in frustration. “I need to speak to you.” Talking to her while she was drunk was not ideal, but he would take what he could get.

  “Well, I don’t want to speak to you, Max.”

  He clutched his phone closer to his ear as if it was actually Gigi’s arm and he was trying to pull her to him. “Come to my apartment,” he demanded, his voice changing just slightly. She had reacted to it unconsciously before while they were fucking, and he was hoping his tone would punch through the alcohol haze.

  “Okay,” she replied softly, after a beat. “Let me lose Jen.”

  He hung up the phone and started to pace. He had no idea where she was, or how long it would take her to get to his place but he hoped like hell it wouldn’t be long. His feet ate up the distance across his rug, his eyes constantly returning to the clock hanging on the wall. Ten minutes went by. Then twenty. At the thirty-three minute mark, there was a buzz from the intercom. He pressed the button, not bothering to check who it was; it could only be one person.

  Yanking open the door, Max stood in the entrance, waiting for Gigi to walk towards him from the elevator. When he saw what she was wearing, his eyes slid shut and he wanted to drag her inside, away from prying eyes, for wearing something so revealing out to a nightclub or a bar while he wasn’t there to keep an eye on her.

  She was in a mini skirt and halter neck top that barely covered her beautiful breasts. She wobbled on too-high heels and was wearing makeup a lot heavier than he was used to seeing on her. Her red hair was unrestrained and curled, falling over one shoulder in thick ribbons. She wouldn’t meet his eyes, her gaze on the floor. She weaved on her feet a few steps from him, causing her to stumble forward. He caught her effortlessly, holding her close to him.

  She smelled of tequila. A lot of tequila.

  “You need to drink some water,” he told her, guiding her into his apartment and closing the door behind them.

  “I’m fine,” she replied. “I just need to sit down for a minute.” He lowered her onto the couch and walked into the kitchen to get her the water she thought she didn’t need. He placed the glass on the table in front of her.

  “Drink.”

  Dutifully, she picked up the glass and brought it to her lips. She swallowed greedily, a little water running from the corner of her mouth. It dripped onto her shirt, leaving a dark patch on the fabric.

  He took the glass from her hand, settling it on the table beside him. “Where did you get those clothes?”

  “Jen,” she squeaked, staring at her feet.

  Max pursed his lips. Of course Jen had played dress-up. “Why have you been avoiding my calls all day?”

  She looked up, biting her lip. “I didn’t want to talk to you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I would have given in and forgiven you.” She put her hands over her mouth. “Crap,” she said under her breath.

  She was being so candid, and he was going to ask her all the questions he needed to while she was in such a talkative mood.

  “Why would you have forgiven me?”

  She blinked at him slowly. “I doubted I could resist you if you looked at me like you’re doing right now.”

  He was more than aware of how hungry his expression was. Seeing her barely dressed and pliant even when she was supposed to be angry with him was turning him on. If she had been sober, he wouldn’t have bothered asking her questions; he would have seduced her, knowing she would give in to him.

  But she wasn’t sober.

  She was rolling drunk, and Max would never take advantage of a woman while her mental faculties were compromised. He stood up, holding out his hand to her. He hauled her up off the couch, holding her close to the front of his body. She had to tilt her head back to look him in the eye, the position exposing her long, lean neck to him.

  “Come.”

  “Where?” she whispered, her eyes lingering on his mouth.

  “To bed.”

  Gigi stumbled a little as he tugged her down the hallway to his room. She didn’t resist, and she didn’t voice any objections—all of which he was taking as a good sign. Softly closing the door behind them, he brought his hands to the waistband of her skirt, searching for the zipper in the back.

  As he pulled the slide down, she didn’t take her eyes off his face. “Are you undressing me?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Max replied, letting the skirt pool at her feet. He brought his hands to the hem of that miniscule halter neck. The fabric was stretchy, expanding and hugging each and every one of her curves. He pulled it over her head, her bare nipples tightening in the cool breeze.

  “Are you going to make love to me?” Her voice was hopeful, but her eyes were glazed.

  Touching the side of her cheek, he ran his thumb over her bottom lip. “No.”

  Her brow furrowed. “What are you doing then?”

  He stared at her, his eyes roving hungrily over every inch of her flesh. He wanted to press himself against her. He wanted to get reacquainted with her curves even though she’d only walked out on him less than twenty-four hours before. “I’m putting you to bed.”

  Disappointment flittered across her features, lasting only a moment. “Are you coming to bed too?”

  He pulled pack the quilt and motioned for her to get in. Her red hair fanned out on the pillow above her head when she lay down, giving her an almost ethereal look. He arranged the bedding back into place quickly, mainly to stop himself from ogling her perfect body and ignoring the stern pep-talk he’d just given himself. “Soon.” Leaning down, he kissed her forehead and walked from the room.

  When she woke up, she would have a killer headache. Going back to the living room, he picked up her glass and refilled it, then went searching in the cabinet in the bathroom for some Tylenol. He put both on her bedside table, briefly looking down at her; she was fast asleep.

  Max checked on Erin one last time, giving her a bottle and changing her diaper before going to bed himself. Stripping down to his boxers, he slid into the bed beside Gigi, turning on his side with his back facing her. Even though she had asked if they were going to have sex, he didn’t want her waking up in the morning and thinking that something other than sleeping had happened—especially if she was still holding on to some of that anger from before.

  Just before he drifted off to sleep, he felt her arm wrap around his waist, her hand coming to lie over his heart.

  Chapter 26

  Gigi’s mouth felt like every
ounce of moisture had been syphoned out of it. Her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth, and she was pretty sure that when she opened her eyes, her lids would sandpaper her eyeballs.

  Her fingers flexed involuntarily, meeting some unexpected resistance. Some warm, hard resistance.

  Even though she knew it would hurt, she opened her eyes. It was still dark, thankfully, so the sensation of a railroad spike going through her temple wasn’t immediate, nor was it as sharp as she was expecting it to be, but it was still there and her eyes began to water. She did her best to focus on what she was touching. Her sluggish brain wasn’t joining her in the land of consciousness just yet, leaving her to puzzle it out on her own. Maybe I killed too many brain cells with all the tequila I drank last night, she thought miserably as another round of spike-through-temple assaulted her.

  She inhaled sharply, the scent of warm skin and aftershave invading her senses and tickling her memory. She knew that smell. Realization dawned on her quickly, and her fingers flexed once more.

  Max.

  And she was being the Big Spoon.

  Gigi let her eyes drift up, taking in the shock of hair she knew was more black than brown and the broad muscular back she had sunk her nails in to before. She licked her lips and tried not to move, trying to remember what had happened last night. Had she shown up on his doorstep and demand he fuck her? Had he actually done that? With the smallest movements possible, she tried to look under the sheets. She could feel the softness of the cotton against her bare breasts, but that would have been possible because she wasn’t wearing her—Jen’s—halter neck anymore. That was okay. She could deal with that. As long as she still had her underwear on…

  “We just slept.” Max’s sleep-affected voice drifted between them. She knew he wasn’t shouting the words, but to her ears, it sounded as if he was announcing it through a megaphone. She groaned and tried to pull her arm from around his chest. He grabbed her wrist before it could slide free, holding her in place. “Leave it there, just for a little while longer.”

  She couldn’t deny him. He felt amazing against her body, but after the way she’d left him the morning before, she wasn’t so sure about the status of their relationship. Swallowing her embarrassment, she finally asked, “How did I end up here?”

  “I called you last night and you answered.”

  She got a flashback of that phone call, the sketchy jangle of images from the night before coming together slowly, although still not completely. “I called you a bastard,” she said.

  Max chuckled, the vibration running through his chest and into her hand still over his strong heart. “You did.”

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

  “Sure you did. You have every right to call me any number of names. I screwed up.”

  “How did I end up at your apartment? I didn’t just…show up, did I?” Talking about her holey memory from her drinking binge was embarrassing—at least it was easier talking to his back rather than his face while she was doing it.

  “I asked you to come around.”

  “And I just showed up?”

  He laughed again. “You said you were going to lose Jen first.”

  She groaned. “Jen.” Her roommate had made her promise she wouldn’t answer any calls from Max. She had also promised she’d forget about him for the night and try to have fun. Jen’s idea of fun involved tequila and random hook-ups. Gigi was okay with the alcohol, but not with the casual sex. “I’ll have to call her.”

  Max squeezed her hand. “Call her later.”

  She nodded and relaxed against his back. What they were doing was nice, but it couldn’t last. The problem they fought about yesterday still existed. For right now, she would just enjoy the feel of his strong, warm body against hers. Gigi inhaled and let the breath out slowly. “Max?”

  “Hmm?”

  She thought maybe he had drifted off to sleep again. “Tell me about Chelsea.” She felt his whole body stiffen instantly. “Please?”

  He was too silent and too still for a long minute. She thought he’d refuse her. But then he said, “I’ll tell you everything you want to know.” Rolling over, he faced her. “But let’s do it over breakfast.”

  “Why—”

  “You’re hungover, and probably severely dehydrated.” Glancing over at the nightstand, he added, “Drink the water. Take the pills. Get dressed then meet me and Erin out in the kitchen.” He leaned forward, kissed her temple and rolled off the bed, taking his phone from the nightstand as he went. She watched him go, studying the muscles as they moved in his back. She would miss him when he was gone. Sitting up, she held the sheets to her body and reached for the glass he’d left and the two Tylenol.

  When she felt able to, she got up, finding her clothes folded up neatly on the back of a large armchair in the corner of the room. Putting on the skirt and top, she looked at herself in the mirror and balked. She had gone out like that last night? Jen had actually picked that particular outfit and thought it looked good? Max must have had a heart attack when she turned up on his doorstep.

  She looked down at the ground, snagging one of Max’s tees from a pile. Holding it to her nose, she inhaled; it smelled of Max’s aftershave and of his skin. Slipping it over her head, she padded out into the kitchen.

  Erin was sitting in her high chair while Max fed her breakfast. The little girl smiled widely at Gigi before opening her mouth for the next mouthful of porridge.

  Max gave her an appraising look. “I just put the coffee on, but I want you to have some more water first.”

  She resisted the urge to roll her eyes and did as he asked. She drank two more glasses of water then tackled the coffee pot. Slumping down onto a chair at the kitchen bench, she announced, “I’m never drinking tequila again.”

  He laughed at her. “I think that’s a good idea. How’s your stomach? Think you can handle some food?”

  She didn’t think putting anything else in her body other than coffee was a good thing, but the idea of bacon was too alluring. “As long as it’s greasy, I think I’ll be all right.”

  He nodded and got busy putting strips of bacon on the griddle. “How do you like your eggs?”

  “Scrambled, please. I don’t think I could handle even the sight of runny yolks this morning.”

  He gave her a brief smile and cracked a couple of eggs into a bowl, then started whisking. Gigi’s eyes were fixed on the way his muscles bunched and relaxed in his exposed shoulders, her thoughts turning sexual. She cleared her throat, ignored the moisture pooling between her thighs, and got Erin out of the high chair when she started to fidget. She placed the little girl on the floor to play then took a seat on the couch.

  “Where do you want to eat?” Max asked from the kitchen.

  “Wherever you want.”

  He brought over her plate, the flatware balancing on the side, and placed her coffee cup on the table. He retreated to the kitchen to get his breakfast, but instead of sitting beside her, he perched on the edge of the coffee table beside her cup. Gigi had another one of the missing pieces flash into her head; he had done exactly the same thing last night.

  “Can I just start by saying I’m sorry,” he said, his bourbon eyes fixed on her face. “I know it all looks really bad, but it’s complicated.”

  She had decided she had to hear him out. Now that Chelsea wasn’t there, it made it easier. She nodded to encourage him to continue.

  “A little over three months ago, I returned home from work at the nightclub to find Chelsea gone. She’d cleared out her wardrobe and left Erin sleeping in her crib.”

  She placed her fork back down. “She just left?”

  He nodded slightly, pushing his eggs around his plate. “I had no idea where she’d gone. I tried calling her, but she’d turned her phone off. Eventually I gave up completely. Honestly, our marriage had been on the rocks before that. Coming home to find her gone wasn’t exactly a shock, but finding that Erin had been left alone was.”

  “Did you ev
er get an explanation from her?”

  “Yesterday morning was the first time I’d seen her since she abandoned Erin.”

  “Did she tell you why?”

  “Yeah,” he replied, setting his plate on the table. “She said she didn’t want to be a mom anymore, that she wanted her old life back—the life where she could hang out with her socialite friends and have champagne breakfasts and go shopping all day.”

  Gigi made a small noise in the back of her throat.

  “What?”

  She looked at him, showing him that what she was about to say had nothing to do with spite; rather it was just an observation. “She doesn’t sound like the kind of woman you’d be interested in.”

  He sighed, his attention fixed on Erin who was playing with some blocks. “Like I said, it’s complicated.” He looked at her. “But I want you to know it all. That way, you have all the facts and if you want to walk away from what we have, then I’d completely understand.”

  “Okay.”

  His chest rose and fell with a deep breath. “Chelsea and I have been together since high school. I was the quarterback every girl wanted to be with. Chelsea was the head cheerleader every guy wanted to have.” He gave her a meaningful look.

  “So you ended up together,” she finished for him. “Of course.”

  He nodded. “I dated her because she was unobtainable to every other guy. We weren’t compatible though. Chelsea was an only child. She was spoiled by her parents and given everything she could ever want. That sense of entitlement became her way of life. I was just a prize she could claim. We stayed together because that was just the way it was. I simply ignored her bad behavior and put up with her narcissism.

  “The end of high school was rolling around, and I couldn’t wait to be free of her. She had no plans to go to college. She thought her parents would continue to bankroll her ever-growing extravagant lifestyle. I, on the other hand, had a football scholarship all lined up…”