by Lexi Ostrow
He kissed her gently and she felt her body come to life again. But she just wasn’t in the mood for the dominating man he got off on being. She was going to challenge him to let her take the lead one night, just to see if he trusted her enough to let them find pleasure together, without commands and dirty words. Not that there wasn’t a time and a place for them.
He pulled back and she sat up and looked down at him. His eyes still barely relayed anything he was feeling. She missed the expressiveness of Jake’s midnight blue eyes and bit down hard on the inside of her cheek to chase the images away.
“Mmm not now, Nick. You have food to go pick up from down the mountain and I’m sure there’s going to be a million questions setting up for the party tonight.” He playfully wrapped his arms around her and tugged her down to the bed again. She shrieked and pushed his face away with her hand.
“I am not ready to let my fiancé go.” He grinned at her and she stopped smushing his face with her hand.
This moment, if it could keep happening, would be enough to chase away her doubts. They didn’t need to have a million things in common. She’d already known how different they were before finding out how similar she and Jake were and it never bothered her. Fate might have interfered, but she really was trying to her hardest to make herself truly believe that the wonderful, sexy man next to her, was still the only one she wanted.
“No more calling me your assistant then?” She smirked and raised an eye brow as she climbed out of bed and slipped a sweater of his off the desk chair and over her head. She loved the smell of the CK One as it pulled past her nose. It made her feel safe, like he always did in the past when he’d see she got home safely or tell a jerk boyfriend off if he came to the office for lunch.
His grin was stunning and he laughed. “No I think you’ve been upgraded. We will have to discuss the work situation.”
She froze. “I’m not, not working, Nick DeMarco.”
He stood up and walked up with his in front of him in surrender. “Whoa. Not even the plan. You can’t be my assistant and my wife. The board will attack that and so will the media. So I’ll make you the office manager or something. We’ll figure it out. Same pay, no favoritism.”
“But less time together?” Her voice was depressed and she liked that the idea of not having him all to herself was making her bummed again.
“We can find excuses to take long lunches.” He winked and she kissed his cheek.
“So what am I in for with this party? An announcement I assume?”
He nodded. “It will come out. That ring isn’t huge, but if you’re there kissing me at midnight, well it’ll be obvious.”
She froze for a second at the thought of telling the whole world, or at least the friends in the upper echelon of society that would be coming. Tasha would be there tonight as well, many of the client list was invited each year.
“Could we maybe wait until after midnight to announce it? I kind of like the idea of it being the first thing people hear in the new year.” It also meant her New Years Resolution could be to hurt herself every time she let her mind drift to Jake and his lovemaking or Jake and his stubble or Jake and his big laugh.
“I think that would be wonderful. Why don’t you run on and help my mother? Someone never drafted that proposal I asked about.” His face was smiling, but his eyes were as serious as ever when they talked about work.
“Not your assistant anymore, Mr. DeMarco. Guess you’re on your own while I play party set up with caterers and you look sexy.”
“Ugh, that is going to be the death of me. You won’t even stick around till I find your replacement?”
“Not a shot in hell, fiancé.” She grinned and kissed him again. Her stomach fluttering with heat and need from the smallest of actions. If they had this much chemistry everything would work itself out. Or so she chanted to herself as she went to go meet his mother at the main lodge to get things ready for the big party.
It didn’t matter how many deep breaths she took. No amount of calm breathing was going to get her through this party. It wasn’t the attendees. She’d attended more than one function as Nick’s date over the years. Her best was a damn movie star too. It was what was going to happen in forty-seven minutes that was making her skin crawl.
For the thirteenth time during the eleven o’clock hour she’d taken her phone out of her little black clutch and looked at the time.
“Are you really that nervous for the announcement?” Tasha asked as she sipped a mojito.
Leena’s eyes shifted to her best friend’s and she blinked rapidly. Tears were setting in again and there was only so much longer she could convince herself they were tears of joy. “Tasha, I just don’t think-”
Tasha took Leena’s drink and set them both down on the nearest serving tray and grabbed her hands. “Leena, now is not the time to freak out again.” Panic swirled in Tasha’s eyes and Leena knew her best friend was only feel a quarter of what she was.
“What if this is wrong, Tasha?” She’d been unable to shake the dream from last night. All day it had followed her like a ghost. It haunted her because there was no right interpretation. The past could be her old life and moving forward. But then why was Jake the one with her?
All night she’d been forcing herself to let it go, to pretend dreams were just dreams like everyone else. Why did fate pick a time like now to chime in and distract her? She just wanted to believe her initial thoughts were right. That the raptor didn’t represent Nick.
Her eyes trailed across the room and spotted Nick sitting on the arm of an armchair laughing with someone she didn’t know. Her heart flipped at the sight him, his eyes actually matched the smile on his lips for once. His perfect smile gleamed as he laughed and she wanted to just go over to him and tell him to kiss her and make this all go away.
Not the party. The engagement. It wasn’t fair, but maybe she’d said yes just to spite Jake. Maybe she was wearing the wrong brother’s ring, not that Jake had proposed to her.
“Leena, this isn’t a good idea. We had this talk at least four times over the last hour. Sooner rather than later, Nick is going to demand you follow him around the party. You can see it in his eyes, he’s not interested in waiting till midnight, but he is for you. The second that clock strikes twelve it’s coming out of his mouth.”
If Leena didn’t know any better she thought Tasha was jealous of the idea. But that was impossible. Beautiful, successful Tasha could have any man she wanted, she just always turned them down.
She couldn’t seem to cool down, or calm her breathing or do anything but think about Jake. The party had been going on for two hours and she’d done everything in her power to avoid Nick, and the situation.
Her heart felt like it was shattering into pieces. She had everything she’d ever wanted and now she knew the one thing she wanted was Jake. She may truly love Nick, but she wasn’t in love with him in. She was in love with Jake and it took accepting the proposal of the wrong man to speed it all up in her mind and bring it out of the dark.
She blew out a long breath and shook her head, trying to chase the tears away. But that didn’t matter anymore. Jake had left, he’d pushed her at Nick and now she needed to do the right thing and be with Nick.
She hadn’t said anything and the tears spilled over her cheeks without warning. She gasped as the warm liquid shocked her, she’d never been a crying girl but they’d never snuck up on her like this before. Leena swiped her fingers across her eyes and looked at Tasha.
“Oh, oh no, Leena. No stop. Hey let’s go. We can explain all this to Nick later. Get your head wrapped around him properly.”
She wanted to accept Tasha’s offer. They could wait for her driver to return at the main lodge. If they left quickly, Nick would never know they had left until he couldn’t find her at midnight. Until he went to introduce the room to a fiancé that had run away.
“I can’t, Tasha. I can’t do that to him. I said yes. I said yes and he deserves so much more than me runni
ng away because I didn’t know how to listen to the bigger picture. All I wanted to do was piss Jake off for throwing me at Nick when I wasn’t ready to let him go.” Leena bit her lower lip so hard to stop the tears she tasted blood.
The party wasn’t loud, but it was deafening to her.
“Are you sure, Leena? Don’t be with him out of fear of hurting him. You know him better than anyone else. But more importantly, you know you. You love Nick?” She wanted to kill Tasha for shouting so loud, but her friend probably wasn’t and no one had whipped heads in their direction at some juicy gossip.
“I should.” She couldn’t bring herself to go on. That was all that was going to come out.
“Leena.” Tasha’s voice had that annoying nagging tone she used to get in high school when Leena did something that she didn’t like. Back in the day Tasha had been quite the uptight student and Leena had been the wild one. But that tone hadn’t vanished just because some of Tasha’s inhibitions had.
“LEENA!” Nick was off the chair and walking toward them. His smile was so bright it made her heart hurt, for them both.
When he got up to them he leaned down as if to kiss her and pulled back, the announcement wasn’t out and she sucked in a deep breath just as their lips were about to touch and he turned his head and whispered in his ear.
“Pretend like I’m just whispering a trade secret.” But then he did kiss her ear before he pulled back and smiled apologetically at the older man she didn’t know. “Sorry Mr. Rossi, a little secret to share with my assistant before I introduced you. Leena, this is Mr. Rossi senior.”
The name pinged in her mind and she forced a brighter smile onto her face. “How do you do, Mr. Rossi. Your son truly is a star, even if my employer holds a tiny grudge.” She laughed, Nick growled and Mr. Rossi laughed.
Tasha slipped away from them when she was engaged and she wanted to curse her best friend. It didn’t matter how old they were, running away when your friend was in need was not a cool action. She whipped her head trying to find her, but her baby blue cocktail dress had disappeared into the sea of people in the small chalet.
“Leena, might I steal you away? With five minutes until the new year I thought we should say hello to some of the other clients. You don’t mind, do you, Mr. Rossi?” He flashed that smile of his and Leena wished it had the same heart melting affect n her like it used too.
“Not at all, Mr. DeMarco. We had a great chat. Don’t let me keep you from anyone. I meant it, your proposal was sound and I’ll get the boy to look at it without him knowing whose firm it is.” The older man laughed as if he’d told the best joke in the world and Nick chimed in.
He offered her is arm and as she slipped her hand through it she caught the clock on the mantel, 11:58. Leena closed her eyes, took her breath and turned to Nick to start her future.
Chapter 14
Jake pushed open the door to his flat. Nine hours past midnight. Nine hours into the brand New Year and he was ready to up and call it a bad year already. He’d spent the damned holiday in the airport. He hadn’t wanted to ruin the pilot’s plans by calling him last minute. So he’d called and arranged for the man’s family to be on board so they could celebrate, just so long as he got the fuck away from Leena and Nick; the newest DeMarco pair.
So he’d stayed at the lodge on the thirtieth and spent the thirty-first flying over the Atlantic to his boring, lonely, cold, flat.
He threw his suitcase onto the tiny loveseat and kicked the door closed behind him. It didn’t slam shut nearly as effectively as he’d hoped for. In fact, it hardly made a noise. “Can’t even be pissed off right, could I?”
The apartment was desolate and quiet. The sounds of drunks and partiers outside would have long since died down. He was too high up to hear them anyway. His heat had been off while he was gone because he didn’t have any pets to worry about. He barely felt it. It was colder than Boulder had been, but he’d been so numb since he walked out of the chalet he didn’t process the cold.
Had he done the wrong thing? Pushing her life that? Her eyes had locked onto his and they’d looked so apologetic he assumed it was meant for him and he’d snapped. All he’d thought about the last day was what if he’d read her wrong and fucked everything up?
Jake dropped to the loveseat and closed his eyes. He tipped his head backwards over it and felt the blood rush backwards. “You know what you need. Some Black Label and a few hookers. Some have to be out and about.”
He’d used prostitutes before for some of his friends parties. So he knew some numbers. It was never something he saw himself indulging in and he stopped walking halfway to the little black book he kept in the office.
Because a hooker wasn’t going to do it for him anyway. He wanted Leena. No one else was going to compare to her in any way and maybe he just needed a good old mope around the flat for a few days and then he could get back to being good.
He grabbed the scotch from the cabinet and didn’t bother with a glass. His eyes caught the clock on the microwave and he unscrewed the lid and took a long drink, one that burned his throat and made his eyes water just a little.
Three minutes past midnight in Colorado. “Congratulations to the happy couple. Welcome to the year you all get your Christmas wishes.”
His voice was bitter and he burped, the alcohol on his breath. He tipped the bottle back and kept drinking. He liked the burn, but choked after about twenty seconds and pulled the bottle back as sat on the edge of his bed.
“Yes, this is going to be how we celebrate 2015, and 2016 and every damn year after that because you fucked up, Jakie Boy.”
So he sat there, at nine in the morning on January first and drank to his little brother’s engagement to the woman he loved.
“Mr. DeMarco, there’s someone here to see you. An American. Looks all done up.” Jake’s assistant, Sean, chimed through the phone’s intercom.
He leaned forward and pushed the button to respond. “Sean it’s January second, you’re only here because I called you. Do you really think I have an appointment with anyone, let alone an American today?” Coming into the office had been the only thing he’d thought to do. He woke late last night covered in spilled scotch and disgusted with himself. So he thought getting a little work in could help. Apparently he wasn’t successful enough to win the girl and he intended on changing that – not for the next girl because he wasn’t sure there would be one – but to just beat Nick at something finally. To once and a for all put his little brother in his place.
“Do you want me to tell her to leave, Mr. DeMarco?”
“Yes I do, why did you let on that you speak English, Sean?”
“She came up to me speaking French, sir. Sorry to have bothered you.”
Jake’s eyes flashed briefly outside the window of the office. Sure enough a tall woman was standing there. She had a ridiculous beanie on, clashing with her purple cocktail dress and heels. With a snort and a shake of his head he turned back to his computer. He was trying to find a way to expand the firm, take it outside of Paris and find some clients in other areas, the French Rivera to start.
The knock on the glass window of his office pissed him off. He jerked his head up to tell the lady off and froze. He was eye to eye with a pair of blue eyes he’d never thought he’d see again. He stood up from the desk, but didn’t move, he didn’t need to because she pulled the door open herself.
He couldn’t read her expression, but it looked an awful lot like someone determined. Wonderful, she couldn’t even let him enjoy his escape, now she was coming to demand he take his ass to his little brother’s wedding.
Jake took two steps back from the desk and one toward her as she took three toward him.
“Jake-”
“What do you-”
The both spoke at the same time and both cut off at the same time, trying to let the other one speak. “We’re in my office so I’ll go first.” He shoved his hands in his pockets to stop him from doing anything dumb. “What do you think you’re
doing here?”
His eyes were blazing. Passion and anger swirled in the dark blue depths and she’d never been so happy to see someone wear their heart on their sleeve. But his voice was harsh.
She took another step toward him. He didn’t move, but he didn’t stop her. “You.”
His whole body twitched. “Excuse me?”
“You asked me what I wanted. Jake DeMarco, I want you.”
He looked as if he wanted to grab her and kiss her, but he still didn’t move. “What about Nick?”
She took a deep breath. She’d been practicing this on the flight the entire way up here. Tasha had helped her get the last minute funds together after she’d told she Nick couldn’t marry him with one minute until midnight on New Year’s Eve.
“I don’t love Nick. I think, I think it was a wonderful fantasy and a deeply rooted friendship that could have been something once, but not after you kissed me.” She was thankful her voice wasn’t trembling as bad as her knees were. Any second now and she expected them to give out from under her and pitch her forward toward Jake. And right now, she wasn’t certain he would catch her if she fell.
“You’re going to need to give me a lot more, since the last time I saw you, you were dressed a little better and accepting my brother’s proposal.” He crossed his arms over his chest and her hand snaked up and smacked him before she knew what she’d done.
“Oh, oh no, Jake, I’m sorry.”
He rubbed his cheek and laughed. “Don’t worry. I earned that and you smack a lot softer than the French women I’ve pissed off.” He took a step toward her and reached out with one hand and put in on her forearm but didn’t tug her in. “I’m dying over here, Leena, give me something, anything to make it so I can pull you in and kiss and tell you I’m sorry.” His voice was so quiet but she heard him anyway.