He doesn’t quite smirk, but it’s clear he’s holding it back, and only just barely. “Autonomic physiological response.” He does grin, this time, and it’s wolfish, mischievous. “Then, it was. Right now, not so much.”
I can’t help looking down at his zipper—something is happening, that’s for damn sure. “I haven’t done anything. We haven’t, I mean. I’m not even sure this counts as flirting.”
He nods seriously. “Exactly.” He presses closer, and now my breasts are flattened against the hard anvil of his chest, and his hips bump mine. “That’s the trouble with you, Makayla. You don’t have to do anything to get me hard as a fucking rock. You existing at all, you being within twenty fucking feet of me does it to me.”
I feel my body responding, and I step back from him. Thighs press together. Heat gathers low. Pulse thunders. Nipples harden—and this last one is obvious. And you can be damn sure Paxton sees it.
“I think I have a similar effect on you,” he murmurs, eyes fixed on my all-too-apparent headlights.
Even through the bra and the camisole, my nipples are prominent, and hard. It’s a fact of life for me, and part of the reason I wear sports bras so much—I get tired of the attention, and I can’t help my physiological response to temperature and whatever else makes my nipples hard. Which, to be honest, is a mystery to me. A strong wind blows, and my nipples stick out. See a hot guy on the street, think a dirty thought? Headlights. It’s so annoying. And right now, I’m turned on like crazy, and that’s making my nipples stand as tall and hard as cell towers.
He reaches out, and I flinch, but he only gathers a long curling wisp of flyway hair and twists it around his index finger. “Are you sober, Makayla?”
I stare up at him. At his lips. Wondering what he tastes like. “I…yes. Mostly.”
“Mostly?”
I shrug. “I was a little buzzed at dinner.”
“How buzzed?”
I frown. “I don’t know. A little wobbly. I felt good. It’s wearing off pretty fast.” I notice the hitch in his eyes, a stutter in the heat. “Why?”
He gathers the curl around his finger until it tugs against my scalp, a knuckle brushing my temple. His eyes flick to my lips. Hips nudge mine, chest crushing against mine, and I wonder if he can feel my pulse. “I really want to kiss you.”
I stop breathing. The way he’s looking at my lips, it would be a hell of a lot more than just a kiss. “Paxton…”
He’s closer.
Closer.
His big deep golden eyes are piercing, fiery, raging with need, boiling with conflict. “Makayla…tell me again. How sober are you?”
“I’m not drunk,” I whisper, and it’s the truth. How rational I am right now is up for debate, but I can’t honestly blame the alcohol.
“I really want to believe you,” he whispers.
“Why?”
“Because if you were drunk, I couldn’t do this…”
And his lips meet mine. Soft. Warm. Damp, strong. Seeking. Questing, tasting, testing.
I don’t breathe, don’t move. I can only process, only register the fact that Paxton deBraun is kissing me. That it feels really, really good.
That I like it.
That I want more.
A furious, boiling intensity of heat and need explode through me at the moment his lips touch mine. And it’s just that—
Just a kiss, at first. His lips touching mine, but no more.
And then he pauses for breath, and the sudden rush of cool air between our hot mouths is shocking. And that rush of oxygen is a blast of sanity, in which I pull back and stare up into his eyes, and see the same drowned awe.
A tiny, innocent, ten-second kiss.
But I’m…
I’m not okay.
And neither is he.
I step away, and he lets me.
If I wasn’t sober before, I am now.
Except now, I’m drunk on the kiss, and high on the need to know what more would feel like.
Instead, I push past him and nearly run to my room. Close the door. Lock it.
Lean back against it, heart hammering.
I touch my lips with two fingers, which tremble.
Damn it—I am in so much trouble.
If that’s just a kiss, a short and innocent one at that?
Oh god, oh god.
So much trouble.
15
“Okay, one more look,” Julie says, handing me a set of hangers laden with clothing. “This one’s going to be the most fabulous yet, just you wait.”
I’ve tried on at least thirty different looks at four different stores, each look—or, as I more prosaically call them, outfits—chosen by Julie, the personal shopper and stylist hired by Paxton to give me a style. Julie is Asian—Korean, maybe? I’m not sure—small, petite, beautiful in a sleek, prim, sophisticated way, with an obnoxious tendency to overuse buzzwords like lovely, and fabulous, and gorgeous. She sounds, in an odd way, like an extravagantly gay man stuck in the body of a four-foot-nine Asian woman.
I suppress a sigh, taking the stack of hangers over my forearm and heading into the changing room. This look is a layered one: slim, tight-fitting leggings in a light gray/dark gray camo print, in a thick, almost denim-like textured fabric, with a gauzy, feathery, brilliantly white sleeveless top, over top is an open, knee-length, plum sweater with heavy, chunky wood buttons and an overly wide lapel. Finishing the look is a pair of white TOMS, a medium-sized Gucci handbag, and jewelry and bangles—simple silver bracelets on both wrists, with a black leather cuff on one and a twisted braid of black leather with a copper pendant on the other, and a black leather choker necklace.
When everything is on, I step out of the changing room and face Julie, waiting as she taps her pursed lips with a long, manicured fingernail. She reaches out without saying a word and removes the necklace.
“There, much better. I like the choker, but it’s too much. It overloads the look. You’re best with just the bangles on your wrists. Besides, you have such a lovely neck, it’s almost a shame to distract from it.” She smiles, nodding as she steps back. “Good, good, very lovely. This is a perfect look for a casual sort of day. You could wear this to go shopping and a nice lunch, and even a lovely casual dinner. It’s comfortable and sophisticated, but not too dressy.” She pushes on my shoulder to get me to spin, going so far as to lift the tail of the sweater to check out how the leggings fit around my butt. “The leggings fit you perfectly. You’ll probably want some kind of sweater or something layered that’s long enough to cover this fabulous bottom of yours, because it’s just so gorgeous it’d steal the show, and we want to present ourselves to the world with class, don’t we? We can flaunt our bodies, but overemphasizing our assets detracts from the overall sophistication of a look, you know.”
I physically stop myself from rolling my eyes, but I do love the outfit. As I’ve loved nearly all of them, once we narrowed down a general theme. We’ve discovered that I value comfort over fashion, that I don’t mind showing a bit of skin, and that I like understated pieces rather than anything gaudy or showy or flashy.
Julie flicks her fingers at the changing room. “Okay, back into your unfortunate clothing. We’ll discard them once we’re back at the penthouse.”
She hates my clothes—the jeans are cheap and ill-fitting, she says, and my top is far too plain and doesn’t do my shape any favors. Well, no shit—the jeans were three dollars and the top was one dollar, from a big-box resale store.
I stopped calculating how much is being spent after we passed the first thousand, which included two outfits from the first store. A rough guess would be easily twenty grand just in actual clothing, meaning tops and bottoms. Julie has also picked out brand-name handbags, jewelry, watches, and shoes. The back of the Range Rover is piled high with bags, and I honestly am overwhelmed beyond any capacity to cope with the amount of money being spent on me. I nearly fainted when Julie nonchalantly slipped a pair of shoes on my feet which had a price tag of two thousa
nd dollars, and did get light-headed when she slid a purse onto my shoulder which cost five thousand. Just for starters, Julie said. Simple stuff, first. The basics.
She swipes Paxton’s black credit card like it’s her mission in life to pauperize him via this shopping trip, and genuinely doesn’t seem to grasp my discomfort with the price tags.
When I gawp helplessly at a nine-thousand-dollar price tag on a flimsy silk sundress—which, admittedly, looks absolutely breathtaking on me, but still, nine thousand dollars for a little bit of silk and thread—she just laughs and tells me to stop looking at the price tag.
The camo legging outfit was only the halfway point apparently—after that we moved on to three more stores and at least a dozen looks at each. Julie has me try on a bunch of outfits and then pares them down to about half, sets aside the keep pile, and starts over again, pulling more outfits and trying them on me and cutting some. Each store takes at least an hour; we’ve been shopping since nine in the morning and it's past three in the afternoon, now. We haven’t even stopped for lunch, although we did zip through a Starbucks drive-thru for iced coffees and pastries.
Finally, at the eighth store and an absolutely mind-boggling amount of clothing tried and purchased, I slump into the rear passenger seat and eye Julie with a glare.
“No more,” I say in a dramatic gasp. “I give. Mercy.”
Julie laughs, a light bell-like tinkle. “Had enough, have you? Fine. We’ll call it a day. At least you have a basic wardrobe to work with now. You still need a few formal looks for business dinners, and I have to get you into some evening gowns for galas, but Mr. deBraun said we have a bit of time before gala season starts.”
“There’s a gala season?” I ask.
Julie smiles widely, giddy. “Oh, yes! Best time of the year. So many fabulous looks, so many gorgeous parties to go to, it’s just the best.” She sighs happily, as if envisioning a parade of clothes floating in front of her face.
I glance back into the trunk at the dozens of bags, at what has to be over a hundred thousand dollars—which she considers just the basics—and my head spins. And I still have to get fitted for evening gowns, which I assume will each cost the equivalent of an entire mortgage for an average family, before shoes and jewelry, not to mention hair and makeup.
Julie says she doesn’t handle that end, and that Mr. deBraun has a whole day planned for me at a spa. Which sounds equal parts incredible and terrifying.
We get back to Paxton’s building, and Liam pulls into the private garage. Julie heads for the elevator, while I round to the back of the car, open the trunk, and start loading up with bags.
Liam and Julie both stop dead in their tracks, staring at me blankly.
“What in the world are you doing, Makayla?” Julie asks, genuinely baffled.
I, equally baffled, speak slowly and clearly, in case she’s actually as stupid as the question is. “I’m unloading the car, Julie.”
Liam narrows his eyes at me, a look that, if given to a man, would mean a fistfight and broken bones. “That’s my job, ma’am.”
I sigh. “Oh. Right. Only poor people unload their own purchases.”
Liam pats my shoulder. “Now you’re getting it.” He grins at me. “It’s just that Mr. deBraun pays me an exorbitant amount of money, and I take my job very, very seriously. This is one of those duties.”
I set the bags on the ground and meet his eyes. “You’re a Marine Recon. You risked your life fighting a war to serve this country. And now you’re unloading bags for rich people?”
“I do a lot more than that,” he says, his voice low and rough. “I protect. I serve.” He gestures at the car. “Driving you around and unloading a few bags is just a fraction of the job, and it’s one I’m honored to have.”
I realize that everywhere we went, he was never far away. His eyes, hidden behind mirrored aviators were watchful, in the way a raptor perched in a tree watching a rodent scurry below is watchful. He was still, and quiet, and calm, but exuded deadly threat and ultimate confidence.
He smiles at me, his voice lighter, now. “What I’m saying is, please let me take care of the bags. Luisa has a light snack prepared for you upstairs.”
Luisa—Paxton’s…everything else that Liam isn’t. Liam is the driver, the bodyguard, the personal assistant, and Luisa is the housekeeper and daily cook. Which, I’m told, is not the same as the personal chef. Luisa takes care of breakfast and lunch and your average dinner, but if Paxton wants a special, fancy dinner he calls Jean-Paul, the chef. Who, of course, lives in the building and is on call twenty-four hours a day.
What an odd life.
I head upstairs with Julie, who makes a beeline for my room and my closet, eagerly waiting for Liam to bring up the first load of bags so she can start removing tags and sorting. Resigned to not having anything to do with any part of the process except wearing the clothes, I head for the kitchen in search of the "light snack" mentioned by Liam.
What I find is a charcuterie board with an assortment of freshly sliced meats and cheeses, assorted nuts, fresh local honey, fruit, olives, crackers, mustard, and jams. There’s enough food on the wooden cutting board to last me at least half a week, longer if I were to stretch it out, and this is a "light snack."
I shake my head in marvel as I sit at the island, picking at the board and sipping Pellegrino.
I hear the door opening and closing as Liam comes and goes with bags, and I hear Julie rattling hangers and sliding them on the bars of the walk-in closet in my room—which is so large I could fit my entire apartment back in Petoskey in it with room to spare. I picture the closet, and then the clothing we purchased today, and realize everything we got will still only fill maybe a third of the closet. Nowhere near even half. And I begin to grasp an inkling of the scope of what Julie meant when she referred to the haul of clothing as “just the basics” and “a decent start.”
So much.
So, so, so much.
I hear the door open again, but this time it’s accompanied by Paxton’s voice—irritated, impatient.
“…I know, Mom. I know. But what I’m telling you is, I don’t care. Send out whatever you want, or don’t send anything at all. This wedding is your shindig, so do what you want. As long as what you send out doesn’t have that bitch’s name on it, I do not give a single sparkly shit…” A pause as he listens to what Camilla is saying, and I hear his footsteps on the marble approaching the kitchen. “Yes, I know you saw it…yeah, well, wouldn’t you like to know….no, I’m not telling you. Familiar, huh? Well, I mean, I’ve seen the photos, and it could be anyone. No, I’m really not telling you who she is. You’ll find out at the wedding. Yes, Mother, I’m absolutely for real.”
He appears in the kitchen, dressed in dark blue jeans that fit just right—tight, but not skinny—over heavy black boots, with a white button-down under a black blazer. A casual but dressy look, somewhere between a suit and tie and his jeans-and-polo look from yesterday. He’s got a leather briefcase in one hand, the leather a rich, deep, polished, aged brown, and his cell phone in the other hand pressed to his ear. He locks the phone between his shoulder and ear, sets the briefcase down, shifts the phone to his left hand, and uses his right to fold a piece of Dubliner cheese inside a roll of prosciutto, shoves it into his mouth and holds the phone away while he chews. He perches on the stool next to me, gives me a quick, friendly wink and grin, and then steals a long swig of my sparkling water. He holds the phone away, rolling his eyes at the volume of his mother’s voice, and then puts it on speaker, sets it on the counter, and puts his finger to his lips.
“—Someone appropriate for your station in life, not to mention suitable for your aspirations in life, Paxton. You cannot simply surprise me on the wedding day with some cross-eyed, silicone-breasted bimbo from some dive bar in Anacostia.”
“Mom, Jesus. For real? The hell is wrong with you?”
“Well, I certainly have no understanding of how you’ve gone about selecting your companions.”
>
“God, you’re horrible,” Paxton mutters under his breath. “You said, and I think I’m quoting you pretty accurately here: you said I could bring Cecily, a Kardashian, or a hooker, you didn’t care, as long as she played the game your way.” His voice ices over. “Well, Mother, I’m playing your game. But I won’t play it your way, and neither will she. We’ll play it our way, and I’m only playing it until I don’t need you anymore.”
A sigh, bitter and furious. “You are so…petulant, Paxton.”
“Learned from the best, Mother.”
“I hope you don’t mean me,” she says, her voice hard and brittle.
“I sure as hell do.”
“I’m nothing so pedestrian as petulant.”
“What you are, they don’t have words for. Cold, calculating, manipulative, and selfish only begin to cut it.”
“I believe you forgot cunning and vindictive,” she says.
A laugh. “True.”
“Let’s not bandy words, Paxton. Who is she?”
“I told you, Mom, I’m not telling. You’ll find out along with the rest of the world.”
“At least tell me you’re taking the requisite precautions?”
“What would those be?” he asks, wrapping salami around a soft white cheddar and dipping it in mustard.
“An iron-clad prenup. I had Marek send you one.”
A devious grin crosses his face as he chews, winking at me again. “A prenup? Nah. I like to live on the edge. Risk a little.”
“You can’t be serious, Paxton.” Raw, stunned disbelief. “That would be absurdly irresponsible, even for you. I won’t allow it.”
“You don’t have a choice.”
“I certainly do, I’m paying for the wedding.”
“A wedding you arranged! A wedding I didn’t want! Your stipulation was that I had to get married—I have to be at the altar, and I have to say I do. You said I could bring whomever I wanted, as long as I got married and cleaned up my image. Well, that’s what I’m doing. I’m bringing a woman to the wedding, and she’s about as far from a hooker as you can get, and that’s all I’m saying. Who I marry is up to me. The details of my marriage will be up to me. If I want a prenup, I’ll get one. If I don’t want one, there won’t be one. You want to cut me out of the will over it, go for it. I don’t need your money. I’m not doing the marriage to stay in the will, and you know it.”
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