Bought And Paid For (Part Three)

by Paige North

  Bought And Paid For (Part Three)

  Paige North

  Favor Ford Publishing

  Copyright © 2019 by Favor Ford Publishing

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Want To Be In The Know?

  Bought And Paid For (Part Three) by Paige North

  1. Grayson

  2. Harlow

  3. Grayson

  4. Harlow

  5. Grayson

  Want To Be In The Know?

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  Bought And Paid For (Part Three) by Paige North

  Grayson

  “Just ignore all the attention,” I murmur to Harlow as we sit in the corner of the exclusive French brasserie where we’re eating lunch between the tours Jayne has arranged.

  With a knowing look in her eyes, Harlow smiles and drinks her red burgundy wine, acting like a good fake girlfriend, even in the midst of all the prying gazes.

  The place seats about twenty people, and we have a view of the Four Point Channel waterfront and gardens. Around us, brass trimmings and a massive fish tank offer a serene atmosphere, and the clientele is dressed in conservative clothing, as if they just came straight from salons where they talk about the literary books they’ve been reading in their old-money mansions. Even though I am new-money, they know exactly who I am, thanks to gossip columns and society pages. As far as they are concerned, I appeared out of nowhere to dwell amongst their ranks, and they would turn their noses up at me even more if they knew that I built their office buildings and the restaurants they eat in when I was just a kid from an impoverished family, breaking my back on my way to the top.

  As they check out Harlow and me and turn up their noses, I try not to scowl back. Every one of them might as well be on the board of Colossus conspiring to oust me because of my reputation.

  They can all fuck themselves.

  Harlow sits up in her chair, trying to seem as if she isn’t ill at ease. I don’t think she is on guard just because of the people who keep perusing her though. She was also a bit tense while we took our first personal tour of the day on the Freedom Trail where our guide walked us past graveyards and historical sites like the Paul Revere House. All day we have been acting like a couple, purposely brushing arms, holding hands, pretending not to notice when people take sly pictures of us.

  There is something more to Harlow’s tension than even the scrutiny, and it has everything to do with what happened in my bedroom.

  I didn’t intend to hold her all night, but somehow I did. And, when I woke up to find her innocently exploring me with the light touch of her fingertips, that was all I could stand. Fortunately I was able to restrain myself from doing what I really wanted to do — fuck her, see her face flush while she went to that special little world she always goes to when she orgasms for me. Afterward, I held her in my arms again for a while, telling myself that I have everything under control, which I do. Then I got out of bed, phoned Jayne to have her arrange some tours as Harlow requested, and then contacted Rick to tell him I wouldn’t be in the office today.

  Things couldn’t be running any smoother with The Great Intimacy Charade because the sex is hot, and this electricity between Harlow and me will go a long way in making people believe that we are genuinely in to each other.

  Everything will work out as long as my rules are followed.

  As our server comes by to clear our Pan-Seared Foie Gras appetizer and replace those plates with our entrées, Harlow sends him a beaming smile. He smiles right back, totally under her spell. Something gets perilously warm in my chest. I am getting territorial — a perfectly normal, basic response because of my male pride. After all, I am sitting right here, and Harlow is supposed to be my serious girlfriend.

  I level a back-off gaze at our waiter, and he lowers his head and asks if there is anything else he can get for us. When I tell him everything is satisfactory, he retreats.

  Harlow stares at me a moment too long with her big blue eyes. My pulse races as I linger on her: her delicate features, her lovely lips, the curly golden hair she has pinned back from her face. She is dressed in a conservative Michael Kors jacket and pants that Jayne picked out for her, and she shouldn’t look sexy at all. But she does.

  God help me she does.

  My phone dings on the table next to me, and I am only too glad to pick it up and look at the text.

  “It’s Rick,” I murmur, keeping my voice down so the other tables won’t be privy to our business. “He says that our pictures are already online.” I show Harlow my screen, where Rick has forwarded a social media photo of us in front of the Old State House. We are listening intently to our elderly guide who is dressed in a Pilgrim hat, and my arm is draped around my fake girlfriend. Things couldn’t look more couple-y than this.

  Harlow checks out the picture and then nods. “I imagine Rick will be showing that to Jake Foreman.” Then, as prim as you please, she starts cutting into her Chicken Coq-au-Vin.

  She might as well be cutting into the remaining tension between us with that knife.

  My phone dings again with another text. I straighten in my chair. “Rick says that he scheduled the dinner with Jake Foreman and the big wigs at Avilus, Inc. It’s going to be this weekend.”

  Harlow puts down her cutlery. “That’s only a few days away.”

  I send her a confident smile. “We’ll be ready for them. We’re spending the rest of today touring Salem, and we’ll be out and about as much as we can be until that dinner. With every passing hour, there’ll be more pictures posted — more evidence that we’re...”

  “Together.”

  A long pause stretches between us, and it’s almost as if there’s a large rubber band that connects us, threatening to snap if either one of us should make a false move.

  She looks around the restaurant and puts on another happy girlfriend smile. Several snobs meet her steady gaze, nod and smile, and then return to their meals.

  Interesting. The upper class set seems to approve of Harlow. She’s got them fooled.

  She really is proving to be an asset.

  She brings her attention back to me. “I’m glad Jayne picked Salem for our next tour. By the way, did you know that, during the witch trials, two dogs were given death sentences for working with witches?”

  “No, I wasn’t aware of that.”

  “It’s just one of those screwy, buried facts of history. Everyone usually concentrates on the trials themselves — which are fascinating. Don’t get me wrong. But it’s the little details like this that really make things come alive for me.”

  I nod as I cut into my Duck Leg Confit. Throughout our appetizer course, Harlow has been reciting factoids like, Besides what our guide told us, did you know Paul Revere sometimes moonlighted as a dentist? Did you know he put together the first patriot intelligence outfit that we know of? She’s like a walking Wikipedia, probably because she spent most of the morning looking these things up on the laptop computer I gave her for her entertainment. Her curious mind is also an asset.

  “Didn’t you say you were pursuing a Business Economics degree, not one in History?” I ask.

  She perks up in her seat and picks up her fork and knife again. “If I had my druthers, I would have majored in History, but there’s not as much mone
y in it. But a degree in Business Economics comes with a lot more opportunity, so I’m happy with that too.” She digs in to her food. “I mean, I don’t want to go in to the same kind of big-league business you’re in — I only want to better my family’s lives. I’d like to have a business with all of them someday. I have no idea what we would sell, but that’s why I’m going to school after all.” She sighs.

  I distance myself from everything she just threw at me. “When Jake Foreman asks about your goals, at least now I’ll know.”

  While she chews her food, she quiets down, as if she knows that she was skirting the boundaries of my discomfort with all that information. I watch her mouth and think about how it felt on me, then check myself and go back to my own food.

  If anything, today has made our working relationship easier.

  And the easier it is to fool Jake Foreman into thinking Harlow and I are for real, the better.

  Harlow

  I’ve never known anyone to be so hot and cold.

  Yesterday, the longer I spent with Grayson during our tours and lunch, the more he seemed to loosen up, so...that’s hot, right? Sure, it was still obvious that he didn’t want to know anything serious about my life, plus he revealed next to nothing about himself except for his work at Colossus, but I’m pretty darn sure I saw his guard slip a little. There were some chinks in his walls that weren’t there before, and I guess it’s because he’s more willing than ever to make our mail-order arrangement work. Also hot? The heat I saw whenever I would catch him giving me sweltering gazes that made me tremble while I anticipated what might happen in his bedroom. I even spent the entire limo ride back to his mansion holding my breath.

  But then came the cold.

  It started when he got a phone call from his lab at the end of the day. It continued when he barely acknowledged me after he dropped me off at the mansion. I waited in his bed for hours, startling at every little sound, my heart sparking every time I thought I heard him come up the elevator and walk into the suite. I waited so damned long that I finally just fell asleep, and when I woke up this morning, I found his side of the bed empty and untouched.

  At least he was decent enough to leave a voicemail though. On it, he brusquely told me that he’d spent the night in the lab, finessing a formula. He even invited me to meet him after breakfast so I could take a tour of his offices.

  Back to hot?

  When I got there, Dr. Vangelis greeted me and ended up showing me around, and just as we were on our way to the lab, we met Grayson in the hallway. His expression was stony as he told us that the breakthrough didn’t happen, and they were back to the drawing board.

  And that’s how he stayed when we left for the Red Sox game he promised to take me to.

  Chilly as hell.

  I know he really wanted to be back in that lab, but what we’re doing with this fake girlfriend charade is important too, because if Grayson can’t convince Jake Foreman at the dinner in a couple of nights that we’re a real couple and he has changed, he won’t be working anywhere near Colossus.

  Even hours later, after the baseball game, he’s still in a cold, moody place. In spite of that, he seems determined to carry through with this girlfriend act, because he had Jayne deliver all the fixings for a picnic on Constitution Beach near the airport. Now she’s gone, leaving us with a basket full of gourmet goodies from Chef Lefevre and a blanket that’s spread over a grassy section near the shore. The place is deserted on this overcast day except for the planes that keep flying over our heads.

  I can tell Grayson’s mind is still about as far away as those planes will be going.

  After we eat, I clean up the food and place everything in the basket. I keep looking over at him. His hair is perfectly coiffed, his chiseled face thoughtful, his designer button-down and khaki trousers creased just exactly so. My heart twists, because I want him so badly, but he’s still as cold as the air around us.

  I’m saved from my doubts only when my phone dings yet again with another text. I read it and then lean back on the blanket, stretching out my booted legs and watching another plane fly overhead. “I almost wish all those paparazzi pictures hadn’t been published on the society pages this morning. My friends and family are freaking out about my suddenly glamorous and exciting life. They have a million questions about you, and I keep telling them that I’ll answer each one when I see them again. I’m much too busy living this whirlwind of a romance at the moment.”

  “As long as they believe it’s true, I’m happy.”

  But is Grayson happy? I’m not so sure.

  Then he slides me a look that’s so heavy with pent-up desire that he inflames me. God, he confuses me so much.

  Cold...now hot.

  Another plane flies over our heads, echoing the sound and soar of my pulse.

  He wants me to go to him. So I go, nestling between his legs and then leaning back against his wide chest. He wraps us in the huge plaid blanket, warming me up everywhere, making me tingle and long for more.

  My stomach flips as I take in his delicious scent, wishing I could feel his bare skin against me instead. When I speak, my voice shakes, thanks to how the lining of my belly is trembling. “You’d better be careful, Grayson. People are going to see another side of you if you don’t watch out.”

  “Isn’t that the idea? For everyone to see another side of me?”

  His words travel from his chest and right into me, causing a carnal hum to spread through me.

  No one is around — we might as well be the only people left in Boston. When Grayson rests his chin on top of my head and holds me as we watch another plane fly overhead, I can almost believe this is real.

  And real is only going to break my heart, because this won’t last.

  “You’re more quiet than usual,” I say.

  “I’m fine.”

  I tense up at the disappointment in his tone, but then he wraps his arms tighter around me. It’s as close as someone like Grayson probably ever gets to an apology.

  “We haven’t gone over Jayne’s schedule for tomorrow,” he says. “It will be our last day before the weekend.”

  “You mean the last day before the dinner with Jake Foreman.”

  He slides his hand over my waist. The blanket covers everything — my cardigan sweater, my knit wool dress, my fashionable boots. But when Grayson begins to knead my side, I start to think about heat and passion and getting caught messing around with him in public.

  It sends a twist of fear through me.

  It turns me on.

  He whispers hotly in my ear. “Your hair smells so damned good.”

  He slips his hand to the front of my sweater and starts to unbutton it.

  I suck in a breath, and then say, “We’re in public, Grayson.”

  “And no one is around, unless you count the planes flying overhead.”

  “But —”

  “This blanket covers everything. All you have to do is pretend as if we’re watching the planes. Don’t give anything away.”

  Oh, my God.

  He kisses my ear then bites my lobe. Lust spears through me, and I arch away from him a little.

  “Shit,” he whispers against me. “My baby has a fucking responsive erogenous zone there. I want to discover every one of them — maybe not all in one day though.”

  He sucks my earlobe all the way into his mouth, and I squirm again.

  “If someone were to see us out here or, God forbid, take a picture, there goes your image overhaul,” I whisper. “And there goes my reputation. You need my reputation, Grayson.”

  “I just fucking need you.”

  He’s got my sweater unfastened, and now he’s working on the zipper that holds the front of my dress together. The soft buzz of him undoing me travels over my skin, giving me goose bumps. My pussy starts to throb with temptation.

  “We really shouldn’t do this,” I say.

  “Do you know what it does to me when somebody tells me I shouldn’t do something?”

/>   “I think that’s what got you into trouble in the first place with your reputation.” I laugh nervously. “I’m not here to get you into more trouble.”

  “All I want to do right now is get into a lot of trouble with you.”

  His bad-boy confession makes me feel like I’ve stuck my finger into a light socket, and everything inside of me flashes. He only makes it worse when he slides his hand into my gaping dress. He deftly undoes the front of my bra — one of the lacy, sexy ones Jayne had me buy — and then cups my breast. As he strums his thumb over my nipple, I lean back into him, trying not to let my face show how much I’m starting to get off.

  He eases his other hand between my thighs and rubs me, and I press my cheek into his shoulder.

  “Grayson...”

  “Don’t worry, baby.” He softly strokes me through my panties. “Just open up for me a little more. I’m going to make you come right here, fast and hard and without taking off a stitch of clothing. But don’t you dare let your face show what is happening. Can you do that for me?”

  “I don’t know...”

  “Yes, you can. You will.”

  It’s almost as if he’s challenging me, but I think we both know who’s going to win this contest. And as I part my thighs slightly, giving his fingers access to my sweet spot, I forget that we’re in the middle of a beach. I forget the disaster that’s sure to happen if someone is around and a camera captures us “cuddling” under a blanket.

  He rolls my nipple between his thumb and forefinger as he uses his other fingers to press against my clit, circling it and driving me crazy. I can feel how slick I am for him, and I’m almost embarrassed that it didn’t take very long to get me so wet. But, then again, all I have to do is think of him to get this way.