“May I help you, m’am?”
“Yes,” I breathe, throwing my palms against the counter. “Can you call me a cab to the city?”
12
Maxwell
I step out of the shower with a towel tucked against my hip and another around my shoulders. I intend on bringing Kit back to the city today so I can sit down with her and explain in detail what my intentions are.
And I have many of them. Least of which is giving her an engagement ring with a diamond the size of Manhattan.
I run a hand through my hair and take a look at myself in the mirror before making my way back out to the room. A cold feeling rushes over me where I expected there to be warmth. The room is empty and the energy has shifted. Is it possible for the energy in a room to shift so quickly?
Yeah. I know it’s possible. Last night. It happened at the auction last night. One minute I was watching her from afar and the next my fate had been sealed. My eyes travel along the ceiling as I pinch the bridge of my nose.
This girl turned has me into a softie in one night.
It’s Saturday. On Saturday mornings, Kit has a standing appointment at her father’s spa. Well, that shit’s cancelled effective immediately. I’ll go to massage school if it means I can keep everyone else’s hands off my woman. For the time being, I’ll just do what she says feels good. Lower, higher, harder, deeper. I’ll practice until I get it right.
All I want to do for the rest of my life is protect her. Keep her safe and sweet, innocent and pure. And since I’ll be the only one who lays a hand on her, I’ll get to keep her the way she is. Sweet. Too sweet. I must have racked up some serious karma in a former life to be so lucky in this one to have an angel like her dropped into my lap.
An angel, a handful, a spitfire.
Now where the hell is she?
I walk over to the door and pull it open, half-expecting her to be standing on the other side. Playing around with me, pulling a prank? No clue why she’d think it was funny to be hiding from me, but - she can be an odd duck at times. When she isn’t there, a cool gust of wind enters my bones.
I shut the door and turn around, plowing a hand through my hair. My gaze lands on the table and everything’s there except my car keys. I feel a smile pull at my lips and I quickly pull my pants and shoes on to go investigate.
Taking the steps two-by-two, I spot my car still parked where it was before. When I get to it, puzzlement ping-pongs through me.
“Kit?” I yell, turning around to face the parking lot. My voice lands on asphalt and trees, muffled by the nearby highway. I swallow thickly as panic starts to flare in me.
I shout her name again, putting my hands around my mouth for volume. I lace my hands on the back of my head and scan the area, walking in a circle around the car, and feel something crunch under my shoe. I look down and discover my key fob. Pressing my palms to the driver-side window I see that the glove compartment is open and several photos of Kit are spilling out of an envelope.
I shout her name one more time into the fresh morning air, but I know she’s already gone.
13
Kit
I’m still in my pajamas when I get off the elevator on the floor of my father’s offices. It’s Saturday, but in the city that never sleeps, my father also doesn’t know the meaning of a weekend.
I pull the big glass door to the reception area open and march through, catching Ms. Steele’s gaze as I walk up to her desk.
“Is he in?” I put my arms across my chest. My heart is beating so fast that I can feel it slamming into my forearms. Slamming right through them, in fact. I bite back a sob, knowing that my father’s assistant will take pity on me if she sees me cry.
I don’t want pity. I also didn’t want to discuss this with him over the phone, which is why I came straight up here to his office instead of going to my suite and getting my phone. If it’s even there.
I’m all twisted up right now. On the inside, on the outside. I’m a train wreck in slow motion.
“I’m afraid he isn’t,” she says, rising to her feet to come around her desk. I hold my arms tighter to my chest and turn toward the big, north-facing windows. It’s one of the most beautiful days on record in the history of my entire short twenty years I’ve had so far, and inside I just want to curl up and die. Ms. Steele comes up next to me and tries to put he hand on my shoulder, but I pull away.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, softening next to her. “I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“Is there anything I can help you with, or is this a matter you need to take up with your father directly?”
I walk over to the row of chairs against the wall and perch on the edge of one, trying to figure out what I’m even here for.
“I think it’s something I need to talk to him about directly,” I say, shaking my head from side to side. “I don’t know.
“How was your date with Mr. Armstrong?” she asks, giving me a smile smile and perching next to me.
I know that if I blink, tears will start rolling down my cheeks. So I raise my gaze to the ceiling, but it’s no use. The tears come anyway.
“Honey, what’s the matter?” Ms. Steele slides over to get closer to me, wrapping her arm around her shoulder to comfort me. I let myself sob against her shirt, and I stop short of grabbing the long silk ties hanging around her neck to blot my eyes.
“I don’t even know how to start to answer that,” I reply. I lift my face and she cups my cheeks as she peers into my eyes. I can feel her sympathy in my bones and it start to warm me up. I didn’t want pity, but sympathy I’ll take.
“Kit,” she says as she tucks a hair behind my ear. It just reminds me of how Max did it. I swallow around the lump in my throat. “I think there is something you need to see.”
She stands up slowly and puts her hand out for me to take it. I slip my hand softly into hers and nod before she brings us into my father’s office. She takes a seat behind his desk and I idle near the door, my belly a flurry of nerves.
“Come,” Ms. Steele says when she notices my hesitation. “Please, Kit. I need to show you something.”
I suck in a sharp breath and walk toward the desk, taking a seat at one of the big, tufted leather chairs facing the windows. I watch as Ms. Steele punches in the combination for the safe under my father’s desk. She withdraws two thick manilla folders and clutches them to her chest, her heels clicking softly as she makes her way toward me. Sitting down on the couch across from me, she places both folders on the coffee table.
“Katherine, your father hired Mr. Armstrong six months ago.” I feel my brows furrow and my lips pop open in disbelief, the words washing over me. Ms. Steele opens the folders, and from one, she pulls out a signed contract and the blank check Max threw at her last night. From the other, she pulls out a stack of papers, neatly clipped in the corner.
I take the papers from her with caution when she nudges them toward me. I start to flip through and I shake my head every time I get to something new. There’s my high school yearbook portrait in here. My browser history, complete with print-outs of maps of my favorite neighborhoods. Whoever has access to my phone knows that I like to research different neighborhoods and then try to get away from my guards to go explore them.
My class schedule is in here, my tutoring schedule, my volunteer schedule.
I bring my fingers to my lips when I place the stack of papers back on the table and take the other folder into my lap.
“A contract,” I say, gliding my finger along the edge of the folder. “For my…protection?”
“Yes,” Ms. Steele says, her eyes dancing between mine. “Max has been following you as your secondary security for the last six months.”
I swallow around the lump in my throat. I knew my dad had my phone and laptop monitored and I stopped being annoyed about it two years ago. The thing I could never stop being annoyed at, though, was having eyes on me all the time.
I just wanted to feel the sun against my skin and have it be the only
thing touching me. No eyes, no men, I just wanted to feel the breeze against my thighs in my little short skirts and the wind tangle through my hair and pretend I was the only person in the world.
And I did that - sometimes. When I broke away from my guards. But it turns out there was someone even more important than them watching me, too.
The man I fell in love with last night.
“Ms. Steele,” I say, rising to my feet, “I’ve made a terrible mistake. Can you please get my father on the phone?”
“Certainly, Kit,” she says. She doesn’t go out to her own desk in the reception area. Instead, she sits at my father’s desk and punches in his number. She puts her hand over the receiver and looks my way. “It’s ringing.”
14
Maxwell
The elevator doors open and I step out, clutching the envelope to my chest. I never thought this assignment would end. I never envisioned Kit not needing me anymore. There was no logical end point to me following her, and I think I could have followed her forever.
But now, there’s no going back to how it was before. There’s no more following Kit around to make sure she stays safe and out of trouble. I did this to myself, I put myself in this situation, this is a prison of my own making.
I swipe my keycard and push the door to the executive offices open and I’m met with Mr. Kensington’s assistant like I always am.
“I know I’m early, but is he available now?” I ask, stopping at Ms. Steele’s desk. She eyes the envelope in my hands with knowledge and nods, standing up to escort me to Mr. Kensington’s office. She gives me a reluctant smile and her heels click on the dark hardwood floor as I follow her down the hallway.
I’ve been here many times, once a week for the past six months, to have a meeting with Kit’s father on her movements. I thought I was protecting her for the past six months, but I wasn’t doing that.
I was falling for her. God, who am I kidding? I fell in love with her the moment I saw her picture, the moment her father told me that she was wild and when, in that same moment, I knew she was really just a sweet girl with a big heart who I couldn’t stop thinking about and dreaming about. I could see through the photo and into her. I couldn’t have explained it at the time and I certainly cannot explain it now, but it’s what happened.
I called her and left her a voicemail on my way back to the city. I told her that I wanted to talk to her and that I would take her silence as a sign that she doesn’t want to see me again. I could certainly understand it.
I haven’t received a call back. I’ll wait for her forever, but not from here. I have to wait from far away, which is why I’m doing what I’m doing today.
When we get to the end of the hallway, Ms. Steele gives the door a knock and then pushes it open with a smile, making eye contact with me for a brief moment. She was always a sweet woman. I’ll have to say goodbye to her, too. But first, I need to do what I came here to do.
“You can go in,” Ms. Steele says, cocking her head toward the door. I take a deep breath. I’m not certain that I know what I’m going to say. I might just put the letter on his desk, turn around, and walk out the door, call my pilot and tell him I’m heading back to Flagstaff today.
Or I might tell him I’m deep in love with his daughter.
“Mr. Kensington, thank you for seeing me on such short notice,” I say, taking a step inside and keeping my gaze on the floor. I feel my fist clench up and my jaw tick as I clutch the envelope a little harder.
“Mr. Armstrong,” a soft voice says from across the room.
It’s not Mr. Kensington. It’s Kit.
My gaze lifts to take her in. She’s standing in front of her father’s desk, warm afternoon sunlight bathing her in gold. She takes a small step forward. I feel my heart slam into my ribs with one hard thump as I look at her.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” I tell her, tearing my gaze away. I feel the door click closed behind me. I chance a look at her. “You haven’t called me back.”
“I have a few things I want to ask you, and it wasn’t a conversation we could have over the phone,” she says cautiously, taking a small step toward me. “I knew that you were coming here today. Obviously. Ms. Steele apprised me of this information.” She’s wearing the same yellow and white dress she was wearing at the dog run that day. This is the dress I always picture her in.
“I fucked up,” I say, tearing my eyes away again. “I’m sorry for not insisting that I tell you the truth before everything happened.
“The lie is not what hurt me the most,” she says calmly, “but it was part of it.”
“You don’t have to worry about me ever lying to you again, Kit,” I tell her, striding toward her. I toss the envelope onto her father’s desk and put my index finger on it. “This is my resignation letter. You never have to see me again if you don’t want to, and I understand why you ran. I get it. Just know that I’m sorry for everything. I’ll never stop fighting for you. For us. And that means I’ll wait forever for you. Forever, Kit. But I just can’t do it if I have to watch you from afar every day.”
“You underestimate me,” she says, the corner of her eye catching mine. “Do you think my father is going to let you continue following me after everything that’s happened?”
“I imagine you are bluffing, Ms. Kensington,” I say. “You would never tell your father what happened. Not after you ran away from me.”
“Like I said,” she replies, folding her arms across her chest with a little smile, “you underestimate me.”
“You told him,” I say slowly, gut-checking myself. “You told him?”
“That’s a small detail,” she replies with a flick of her wrist. “I just need to know a few things from you before I can decide how to proceed. Please, have a seat.”
I lower myself into the chair facing her. Kit leans back, perching lightly on the edge of the old oak desk, the sunlight dancing across her porcelain skin. Then she clears her throat and stands, walking over to the big windows on the other side of the office. Her little pale blue slides click as she moves, showing off her toned, slim calves. I tuck a growl into my chest and feel my fists clench.
“Tell me something,” she says, folding her arms and looking out over the city. “Last week, when I left my blue coat behind at Balthazar. I was so dizzy from running into my favorite actor that the coat completely slipped my mind. There was a private party going on in the room I’d just left, and I don’t like crowds, especially when I don’t know anyone.”
“A little quirk of yours,” I say, a smile pulling at my lips, “especially odd after everything we’ve been through.”
“Yes,” she says, turning her chin over her shoulder. “Please don’t change the subject, Mr. Armstrong. Back to the coat. Was that you?”
“That was me,” I reply. “I went to your table and retrieved the coat, brought it out to the hostess. I told her you’d be back for it shortly.”
“And at the dog run last week,” she says, turning around, fingers gliding softly against the window. “You were there, weren’t you? That was you, with the sunglasses and the newspaper. The man who couldn’t take his eyes off of me.”
My fingers dig into the armrests of the chair. I stand slowly to approach her.
“That’s right, Kit,” I say, taking a careful step forward. Her eyes are glittering and her lips part softly. Her vulnerability is showing. I want to protect it. “That was me. I was watching you, yes.”
“Please don’t ever stay away from me again,” she whispers, a breath breaking in her chest. “Please. I don’t know what I would do without you.”
I take her chin in my fingers and crush my lips to hers in a bruising, consuming kiss. She wraps her arms around my neck and her fingers cruise against my scalp, linking up behind my head. I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her close to me. She opens up for me, compliant, pliant, sweet, and I lick my tongue against hers. She slips a moan against my lips as I deepen the kiss, claiming her mouth. I tear away to tell her
what I’ve wanted to for six months.
“I love you, Kit. I loved you the moment I saw your picture. My biggest mistake wasn’t watching you from afar. It was not walking right up to you and asking for a date. Asking for some time with you.”
“I love you too, Max,” she whispers against my lips. “At least that’s certainly what this feels like.”
“They say never marry the first person you fall in love with,” I tell her. Her expression softens and I kiss her again, taking her round, perfect little ass into my hands and squeezing.
Did I just propose to Kit? Not the proper way, not with a ring. A ring the size of the sun if she wants it, which I know she will. She likes pretty things. Can you blame her?
She pulls away from me. I’m just now noticing that the sun is setting behind her. Every time I think she couldn’t look more perfect, be more perfect, something inside me shifts and I see more of her. A different angle. A different view.
“Then I better not marry you,” she breathes.
“We’ll discuss that later,” I reply, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. I let the glossy strands slip through my fingers. We have all the time in the world now.
But there’s a detail, like she said.
“You’ve already told your father?” I ask. She nods softly and sears her teeth against her lower lip. “How did he take it?”
“Well. He said you betrayed his trust, went against his wishes, and that you’re fired effective immediately,” she says, ticking each point off on her fingers.
“He can’t fire me,” I say, holding her close, “because I quit.”
“You didn’t let me finish. There’s one more thing he said.”
Buy Me, Love (The One and Only Book 1) Page 6