Wicked Dirty Games (Dirty Billionaire Series Book 1)

by Gemma Berlanti

  She was flabbergasted that he could think so low of her or even think like that at all. But moreover, her palm twitched to slap him hard across the face.

  She started to turn away, but he grabbed her hand and pulled her back. She whirled around and raised her hand, brought it down against his jaw hard. She realized what she had done on impulse, and she wasn’t sure who was more shocked, her or him as he scanned the guests to see if anyone had seen. The slap probably hurt her more than it did him.

  “Don’t touch me.”

  His eyes went completely cold, and his jaw ticked. She was equally mad, and she knew her expression mirrored his.

  “I’m sorry,” he said gruffly, his eyes narrowed. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Why? You were thinking it.”

  “How much longer will you run away?”

  She was pissed, and the next words that came out of her mouth were evidence of her anger escalating. “Until you get lost!”

  This seemed to take him by surprise, and his expression turned blank. She turned and left him speechless. Thankfully, as she approached the elevator, someone was exiting, so she slipped in. As the doors closed, the last thing she saw was Killean’s face.

  ***

  She’d slapped him across the face. It left him infuriated, and it also brought him back to a point in his life where he had to suffer physical abuse and had no power to do anything about it. At the same time, it turned him on too. That dark place inside Killean wanted to grab her and make an example of her. But he knew he had to keep himself in check or he would hurt her or, worse, frighten her away. He had fucked up big time tonight.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “How was last night?” India asked as she joined Lila for breakfast.

  “You mean the party from hell? Killean spoiled my mood, but other than that, it was interesting.”

  “What did he do?”

  She was still angry at his nasty comment. But maybe she shouldn’t be angry because she’d set herself up for him to think she was a common whore. She’d fallen in his arms, mesmerized. He used women and they made it easy, so he thought little of them.

  “He must have touched one of your hot buttons.”

  The sound of the doorbell made her curse an expletive. India stopped chewing her granola and looked at Lila. It was a delivery man with an extravagantly large bouquet of white roses. Immediately Lila knew who they were from. She wanted to tell the delivery man to take them back to the sender and tell him to shove them up his firm ass. Don’t kill the messenger. She sighed and signed the paper. She placed the vase on the high table at the door of the entrance hall.

  “Those are beautiful. Are they from Killean?” India asked.

  Lila glanced at the tag and saw his name. On the inside, it read in his neat cursive handwriting:

  You’re still in my thoughts. I hope you think about their meaning. They remind me of you in a lot of ways. Please forgive me for my indiscretions. It was never my intention to degrade you.

  Killean.

  Lila threw the card and the flowers into the metal trash can.

  “Don’t throw them away!” India shrieked, jumping from her seat to fetch them. “Did he say something derogatory?”

  She charged past Lila and took them out of the bin with the card as well.

  “Yes. I may be no more than a prick tease slut,” Lila snapped.

  “He said that to you? I never took him for that type.” India placed the flowers back on the high table.

  Lila strode away to the kitchen.

  “Yeah, unfortunately that may be the way he thinks of every woman who he can’t get in his bed easily.”

  “What an ass! Have you seen the papers this morning?”

  She gestured to them on the breakfast bar. It was already opened to the society pages. There it was, a picture from the alumni ball the other night. The photo had been taken while she and Killean were standing on the dance floor facing each other. They were staring at each other, Lila’s expression was harder to read, but Killean’s was a giveaway. He drank her in with long lustful stares.

  Next to that photo was the party from last night. The caption read:

  Killean’s new mystery lady…

  Lila’s eyes scanned the rest of the page. There were more photos of him at an exclusive party and as usual surrounded by women. But this time the one on his arm was not Katherine. Maybe she was on probation. The thought made Lila laugh. She didn’t recognize this one, but she looked older than he was by a few years, and he had his hand curved around her thigh. They weren’t looking at the camera either, just at each other laughing; both their heads were bend forward, almost touching. The caption read:

  CEO Killean Knight of Knight Industries and friend Sabrina Colely.

  She closed the paper immediately.

  “That was my reaction too,” India said, breaking through her distraction. “He’s a playboy, Lila. You should steer clear of him. He’s rich, hot, and brutally handsome, and every week he’s out with another one. You could be just another conquest to warm his bed. I watched him for the entire night, and I saw how he is. He’s hard to resist. He seems like one of those guys who plays with women, wants no commitment, and then discards them.”

  India’s suspicions rang true with Claudia’s words.

  Lila knew Killean was up to no good anyway. And somewhere deep down, she knew she was just collateral damage. She’d been fooled for a few seconds while with him, but she guessed that was one of the few powers he processed to claw his way into your head and get you into his bed.

  “But all seriousness aside, I’m glad that you’re being chased by a hot twenty-something gazillionaire.”

  ***

  There were about seven missed calls from Killean in half an hour alone. It made Lila feel like an angry girlfriend ignoring her boyfriend’s calls.

  She didn’t have anything to discuss. As far as she was concerned, they had broken the ties they had made in the past few weeks. She put her phone on silent. When she glanced at it, there were tons of messages from India and Aiden. India wanted to meet for lunch with Aiden, who supposedly had happy news and wanted to meet for lunch. Lila sent a quick rain check text and continued throughout the day.

  By four as she sat at her desk, she could almost see him standing by his windows in his office, looking across the city, forlorn. She didn’t know why she thought he ever did that. Probably because he has a window that gives him aerial view of the city and across the river, that sneering voice of her subconscious said.

  Lila wasn’t surprised to find Ron leaning against a limo as she climbed down the stairs of the university.

  “Good evening, Miss Montgomery,” Ron greeted.

  Lila couldn’t see through the thickly tinted glass of the car.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  He held the door open and took her umbrella.

  “He sent me to fetch you, Miss Montgomery. I am not to return until I have you.”

  “You know he’s using you, right?” Lila deadpanned.

  Ron smiled. “He’s not a very patient man.”

  She didn’t want Ron to endure Killean’s wrath, so she complied. Killean was a smart guy. He knew she would sympathize with the driver. All through the ride downtown to the tower, she kept filling her lungs with air.

  Once Ron escorted her out, he rode the elevator down. The décor from the foyer to the palatial living room wasn’t what she’d expected or imagined. It seemed this man had a fetish of not only leather whips and crops, but glass and steel. The thing that caught her attention was the large black piano that was right next to the windows. She ran her fingers along the keys, and the hypnotic sound echoed through the apartment.

  “You play?” she asked, knowing he was standing behind her.

  “I used to, but mostly it’s there for appearance.”

  She looked up at him, and he moved around the piano with her, studying her with calculating eyes, tapping his fingers on the glossy surface
. He was still wearing his suit, his dark hair slightly tousled.

  “You’re still upset with me.”

  Lila rolled her eyes and continued stroking the keys. “What am I, five?”

  “Did you get my gift?”

  “I threw them out this morning because they’d withered.”

  “Lila—”

  “I don’t want to see you again.”

  She saw the glow in his eyes disappear.

  “You don’t mean that,” he murmured.

  “This is a mistake, me coming here. It changes nothing.”

  “I can see that. I made a mistake, Lila. I’ll make adjustments.”

  “The only mistake I made was meeting you. You’re mysterious and intriguing and complicated.”

  He moved and captured her waist with both hands, pressing her against the piano.

  “Tell me how to fix this,” he growled.

  “I don’t want you to. And I really don’t feel like wasting my time with a man who clearly labeled me as a whore.”

  He flinched and dragged his fingers through his messy hair.

  “You’re not a whore, Lila. You’re kind and genuine and sweet, and I want more because I’m chasing after a woman who isn’t lured by my power and my dominance, a woman who wasn’t afraid to tell me to get lost. I would be damned if I stopped chasing.”

  She tried to move out of his arms, but he was adamant.

  “You accused me of being a womanizer, and I won’t lie and tell you that I’m not one. For the first time in years, I’m actually embarrassed that someone has told me something I already knew and wished to do nothing about.”

  “Good for you. Do I have permission to go now, or you have a speech from A to Z prepared?”

  “I’m sorry, Lila, sincerely. I’m just mad because I can’t have you and you keep rejecting me. I’ve never experienced that before, and perhaps that’s why I thought it polite to vent my anger at you. I sincerely apologize because the option of staying away from you is not one I’m willing to consider.”

  “Why should I care about your comfort? Did you think about mine when you insulted me? I can’t blame you, because maybe I gave you the impression I was easy.

  “I have no malice against you, Killean. But I’m glad somebody like me can make you see the error of your ways. I don’t wish to dangle myself in front of you, giving you the wrong ideas.”

  “Lila—”

  She shrugged. “It’s quite fine, Killean. We don’t owe each other anything. As far as I’m concerned, we’ve reached an impasse.”

  She tried to pull free but was tugged back by him. His mouth claimed hers with fervor. She groaned as his tongue coaxed her lips apart for a harsh, wet kiss. She couldn’t resist the power his mouth had on hers, and she quickly succumbed. She felt his hands making a snare around her waist, pulling her to him. She knew this was wrong, that this was him trying to push back into her heart. She broke the kiss.

  His erection was jabbing against her abdomen.

  “You can’t keep kissing me like that.”

  “I had to,” he murmured gruffly. “Staying away from you isn’t an option.”

  “Why is it so important to you to have me around?”

  “Because you make me feel alive, damn it!” he snapped. “You let me see the world differently, and I know that you are genuine. I don’t have a lot of genuine people in my life, not even some of those I think I know well.”

  She opened her mouth to say something, but she couldn’t think of anything that made sense.

  “Do you understand that?”

  Her throat was constricted, and that wild look in his eyes scared her. The green of his eyes had darkened, and his eyes were red-rimmed with frustration.

  “Stay with me tonight, please,” he urged.

  “That’s not a—”

  He kissed the back of her ear, and she trembled. His teeth grazed along her jaw until he reclaimed her mouth. There was something nagging at the back of her mind, though.

  “Is Claudia coming over?”

  He frowned. “Why would she?”

  “She wants you, Killean. I can’t compete with her, and I won’t.”

  She moved out of his arms, and he stalked after her.

  “She told me I was just another one of your sexual conquests this month.” She told him everything Claudia said to her.

  “I’ll deal with Claudia when I see her again. She had no right saying that to you. She knows nothing about my feelings toward you. She’s just protective.”

  “Did you fuck her? She wants you bad.”

  “Claudia is my cousin, if I hadn’t mentioned it before. Sleeping with her would be…bizarre and unfathomable.”

  “Then she’s one creepy cousin if she’s concerned about which woman you’re screwing.”

  He grasped her wrist as she tried to run up the glass stairwell.

  “I want you bad,” he drawled. “And no, I didn’t fuck her.”

  “Killean, if I stay, I’m not going to sleep with you. I have nothing for a slumber party either.”

  “Sleep? We’re not going to sleep, baby.”

  “We need to talk.” He had her pinned against the handrail.

  “Let our bodies do the talking instead.”

  “That’s tempting.”

  “You’re tempting,” he murmured, his lips curving sensually.

  “Why me?”

  “Because you’re not eager and desperate to get my attention, Lila,” he said simply, as though that summed up everything. “Anything you say or do, it’s genuine. That’s new for me, and I love it. Being with you is a thrill.”

  She turned her gaze outside at the beautiful Manhattan skyline. What he said was too good to be true. She bit into her lower lip. This wasn’t a situation she had believed she would have ever been engaged in with Killean Knight.

  “You’re kinda hard to read right now,” he murmured.

  Lila liked the way his breath fanned her cheek. She turned to look at him.

  “I need a drink,” she sighed.

  “No, I need you to think clearly.”

  She smiled teasingly. “Oh, how sweet of you.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “You think I’m sweet?”

  “At least for now.”

  “Oh, the things I do to make you like me,” he breathed, running his hand through his hair. He leaned away and searched her eyes. “What would you like to drink?”

  “Chardonnay. I’ll be taking a tour upstairs.”

  Lila climbed the rest of the stairs and found herself in a master bedroom. She pushed the blinds away to see the view. Killean found her, carrying a bottle of Cadet d’oc Chardonnay and two glasses.

  “Sit.”

  She sat at the far end, hoping he would take the other, but his arm came around her waist and he drew her closer at his side.

  “I like having you close,” he whispered.

  “You’re just fond of me, that’s all.”

  “I am. I kept thinking about you nonstop. You’ve bewitched me.”

  He filled the two glasses and handed one to her.

  “Thank you. Your apartment is very charming.”

  “Thank you.”

  It was quiet after that, then, “I’ve never had sex here before.”

  “I wonder why,” Lila said dryly.

  His eyes narrowed. “I’ve been looking for the right girl to christen it with.” Then he slid his hot gaze over her with a cocked brow.

  “Oh, I see.”

  He moved closer to her. “What do you see?” he asked softly, lifting his hand to trace her lower lip with his thumb. Her breath hitched, and he smiled. He knew he had her where he wanted her, trapped.

  “Are you going to kiss me again?” she asked breathlessly.

  His eyes lit up. “I’m thinking about it.”

  Her grip on the glass tightened, and she placed it down on the table to avoid a bloody disaster.

  “You know, I’ve taken it back. You aren’t a gentleman after all.”

>   The smile that came was deliberately devilish, filled with forbidden dark promises that made places tingle with want.

  “Why, Lila, I’m not. I tell you I want to fuck you hard. Does that sound like a comment a gentleman would say to a lady, hmm?” He ran his fingers through her hair, massaging her scalp.

  Lila knew it was a bad idea coming here. She was weak to his advances. He seemed so calm and calculated.

  “Do you know something?” she asked after a moment. “I’ve managed to avoid all sexual contact with men.” Maybe this would throw him off his game for a moment. Maybe it would make him feel guilty for wanting to deflower the young virgin.

  His eyes darkened and his caressing fingers froze. “What are you implying?”

  She arched a brow at him.

  “You’re a virgin?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

  He was shocked, but he tried to hide it. She saw how his Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed repeatedly.

  “Why do you look so surprised and embarrassed?” she asked with a smirk. Leaning toward him so that their faces were only inches apart, she murmured, “Killean, say something, please.”

  “How—?” He stopped. “Men must have pursued you.”

  “Quite the contrary.” The men who were pursuing weren’t what she was looking for. But what was she looking for? Fire, desire, and lust? Him?

  “Why?”

  “I assume you mean why am I still a virgin? Well, I’ve never met anyone who has evoked anything in me. Well…not until now.”

  She saw him swallow. She finished the rest of her drink and placed the empty glass on the table. Her hands were shaking.

  “I should leave.”

  “What, now? You always surprise me, Lila. You’re no normal female. You just dropped that one on me and think I’m just going to let you run out of here? It’s one more reason to continue my pursuit.”

  And here she was thinking that she’d get him off her ass.

  “I’m wearing skyscraper heels; I can’t run unless I take them off.”

  “You need to stop making me out as this monster after your…virtue. I had no idea you were untouched or I would have went about this another way.”