Shameless

by Lisa Renee Jones

  “Remind me to give her a raise tomorrow.”

  She pushes off the door, shuts it and the leans against it. “So, I’m not interrupting?”

  “Come here,” I order, softly.

  She gives me one of her seductive looks that tells me she’s feeling out of control, which means sex is her weapon, her way of getting it back. That’s going to be a problem because in this, I’m not giving it away. She walks toward me, the sway of her hips a seductive, sweet dance, and I don’t remember a woman ever making me this hard and hot this easily, but Faith does. She rounds my desk, and I roll my chair just enough to allow her between me and the desk, my hands settling at her hips.

  Her hands going to my hands, her perfect backside resting on my desk. A fact that I’m certain I will think about many times in the future. “I like you in this office, behind this desk.”

  “Do you?”

  “You’re Tiger here. Powerful. Confident. Sexy.”

  I don’t let her take me to the fuck zone. Not yet. “I’m always Nick to you, Faith. You know that.”

  She inhales, her mood shifting, softening, a tentative quality to her voice as she asks, “Did you get my note?”

  “I got your note and the check. And I still don’t want your money.”

  “You promised to take it.”

  “As you pointed out in the note. And I did promise, therefore, I will take the money. But we are at that place in our relationship where there is more ahead of us, not less. I won’t try to define what that is right now, in this moment, but it’s a hell of a lot more than how badly I want to be inside you right now.”

  “You want to be inside me right now?”

  “I always want to be inside you, Faith. You know that, too. And you know that gives you control. You have a lot of control but I need you to let me be who I am. And who I am is the man who wants to take care of you. I want to handle the bank. And I damn sure want to buy you the outfit you need for court.”

  “I bought something today.”

  “Faith—”

  “You paid my bills at the winery today, Nick. I just couldn’t let you do more today.”

  “I’m not Macom, Faith.”

  “Stop saying his name.” Her hands come down on my shoulders. “I am not thinking about him. Nothing about you feels like him. Nothing about us feels like what I was with him.”

  “Then let me be me.”

  “Then you have to let me be me, too. It will take me time to lean on you, Nick. Because it’s not natural to me.”

  “Because when you leaned on Macom, he abused that trust.”

  “Now who is making him a part of our relationship? But if you’re going to go there, I always on some level felt alone with Macom. So. I’ve always been alone.”

  I stand up and cup her face. “So have I. But we aren’t alone anymore.”

  “I’m going to protect you just like you do me, Nick. You need that, too.”

  “Sweetheart, you can’t protect me by protecting my money. Money’s been saving me my entire life. You are what I need.” I kiss her, my mouth closing down on hers, tongue licking into her mouth, the taste of coffee, and sweetness, her sweetness, exploding on my taste buds. It only makes me hungrier for her, for that certain little sexy thing she does and doesn’t even know she does. And she gives me exactly what I crave. She breathes into the kiss in that way that says, “Now I can breathe.” Now I have what I need and it sets me on fire, burns me inside and out, and I don’t play the control game I’d been ready for when she entered the office. I let myself go, deepening the kiss, letting her taste the hunger in me, the unleashed passion and she seems to feed off of what I feel, molding herself to me.

  I drag her shirt over her head and I don’t stop there. Her bra follows. Her zipper is next and then I set her on the desk, my gaze raking over her breasts, before I reach for her leg, and settle the high heel of her boot on my leg. I unzip it and pull it away. Repeating the process with the other leg before I set her back on the ground, our bodies melding together, lips following, but I want her naked. Need her naked. I drag her jeans down her hips, and since impatience is my virtue right now, her panties with them. I lift her and maneuver her jeans away from her feet. And now, once again, she is naked and I am not.

  Trust.

  The word comes to me, clawing at me, my lies cutting me, the way I fear they will cut her, and I am not a man that feels fear.

  She pushes off the desk and reaches for my pants, my zipper. I shrug out of my jacket, and by the time it’s off, her hand is slipping inside my pants, pulling my cock free. I wrap my arm around her and lift her, her legs wrapping my waist just long enough for me to walk us to the sitting area to my right. Ignoring the couch, I stop at an oversized chair, which I sit in, and I pull her on top of me, straddling me.

  “You have on too many clothes,” she whispers, reaching for my tie that I really don’t give a damn about right now.

  I cup her neck under her hair, bringing her closer, breathing with her as I say, “I don’t know if I’ve ever needed inside you as much as I do right now,” before I pull her lips to mine, letting her taste how real those words are, and she sinks into the kiss, into the heat of the moment.

  In the midst of that kiss and the next, I manage to get just what I hunger for. Her sliding down my cock. Her taking all of me, naked, exposed, mine. “The next time I sit in this chair with a client across from me, I’m going to be thinking of this.” I press her backwards, wanting to see her, all of her.

  She catches herself on my knees, arching into me as I thrust—her hips, her back, her breasts high in the air, nipples puckered. We grind together, a slow, hard, melding of bodies, and I wrap my arm around her waist, my free hand cupping her breast. My mouth lowers, tongue lapping at her pink puckered nipple. She pants out my name and I drag her to me again, her lips to my lips, and a frenzy of kissing and swaying follows—slow, fast, hard, fast again. Hard again. Harder now. Faster now. Her arms wrap around my neck, breasts molded to my chest, her body stiffening a moment before she trembles in my arms, and quakes around my cock. I shudder into release with her, and I lose time. There is just how she feels. The way she smells of amber and vanilla. The way her taste lingers on my lips.

  When I finally come back to the present, I am instantly living that clawing guilt from my lies, remembering my own thoughts from earlier. I need her to know how much she means to me. I need to know when the truth is revealed, she can’t just walk away. Because I can’t lose her. “Faith.”

  She leans, back and I rest my hand on her face. “I can’t lose you.”

  “Then you won’t,” she says. “Because if there is one thing I know about you, Nick Rogers, it’s that you don’t lose anything you really want.”

  She’s right. I don’t and I want her. “Move in with me.”

  She blanches. “What?”

  “Move in with me, Faith. We’ll split our time between Sonoma and San Francisco, but wherever we are, we’re together. We’re home.”

  “We’ve only known each other a few weeks, Nick.”

  “And I want to know more. I want you to know more. Find out who I am, Faith. Find out that my money won’t change us or me. The dynamic we’ve shared this week here won’t change. You don’t have to answer now. Think about it. Decide when you’re ready, but expect me to ask again. Expect me to—”

  “I should say no.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it seems smart.”

  “But what feels right, Faith?”

  “You. Us.”

  “Then move in with me.”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes?”

  “Yes.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Faith

  I said yes.

  This is my thought as I fall asleep in Nick’s arms only hours after actually doing so. And I said yes without hesitation, with Sara’s words in my head: What if tomorrow never comes?

  I wake Wednesday morning with a smile and those same words in m
y head: I said yes. I feel lighter in some way with this choice I realize, as Nick kisses me before he heads down the stairs to run while I head to my studio. It’s as if a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. I’m no longer fighting my connection to Nick. No longer letting that fear, I’d inadvertently let rule me, rule me. And as I step to a fresh canvas, preparing to work on my final show piece, I step back to what I call ‘An Eye for an Eye’. I want to finish it. And I do. I finish what I know to be the most daring piece I’ve ever painted. It’s not my trademark black and white and red. It’s not my trademark landscape.

  I love it.

  I love Nick.

  And when I walk back into the bedroom to shower, I spy the card from my father lying on the nightstand, and I realize now that the reasons I don’t want to open it run deeper than I’ve allowed myself to admit. On some level, even after I left Sonoma to chase my dreams, I still needed his approval. I feared never having it. I really don’t need to open a card that tells me I never had it. But one day, when the winery is running magically again and my art is just as magical, maybe I’ll read it to prove to myself that I never needed his approval.

  It’s in that moment, that Nick walks into the bedroom, loose hair dangling around his face, obviously having escaped during his run, his snug t-shirt damp, his body hard. He glances at the card in my hand. “It’s calling to you?”

  “No,” I say. “Actually, it’s not calling to me at all. Nothing that drags me back to the past is calling to me.” I shove it under the mattress, and like the past, I leave it behind me.

  Nick steps to me, his hands settling on my shoulders. “One day it will feel right.”

  In that moment, I think of the shadows I sometimes see in his eyes, the secrets he hasn’t shared, hoping that this new chapter in our relationship will free him to share them with me. I push to my toes and kiss him. “One day,” I say, but I’m not talking about the card.

  He knows. He always seems to know. He inches back, his navy blue eyes meeting mine, and for just a moment, I see what he never allows me to see: Vulnerability. And that is progress. That is one step closer to him being as exposed as he’s made me.

  By the time I reach the gallery, I’m leaning toward including ‘An Eye for an Eye’ in the L.A. show. Excited about my choice, I chitchat with Sara, and then settle into my new office with a cup of coffee beside me. And then I do it. I pull up the forms for my submissions and type in my selections, but I can’t seem to get myself to push send. Sara appears in my office and claims the seat in front of me, setting a photo on the desk. “What do you think of this painting?”

  I study the waterfront beach scene and smirk. “Average.”

  She sighs. “My thoughts, too. The artist is quite lovely, but she just isn’t ready for the big league. I dread telling her we won’t be selecting her work. Anyway. On to brighter topics. Have you thought about painting the office?”

  “Yes. I’m excited to start, but it’s going to have to be next week. I need to take care of the management side of the winery. I’ll be gone Friday to Sunday and back Monday. But can I ask your opinion on something?”

  “Of course.”

  “I made it into the L.A. Art Forum.”

  “Oh wow. That’s a big deal. Congratulations, Faith.”

  “Thank you. I need to pick all my pieces and submit them this week.”

  “And you’re having trouble picking?”

  “Yes and no. See, they picked me after they saw my work at the show you guys set me up with. That show had my classic work. The definition of who I’ve been publicly as an artist. But I want to include something different and daring for me. But should I? Or should I stick to safe over daring?”

  “Safe is average,” Chris says, stepping into the doorway. “Decide if you want to be average, and you have your answer.” He disappears into the hallway.

  Sara lifts a hand. “There you go. Your answer.”

  “Well the thrust is that I’m not feeling like playing it safe or being average. As proof, I’m not only here instead of at the winery, I agreed to move in with Nick.”

  “You did? Wow. Yay! That’s huge.”

  “It is and it was also an easy decision thanks to you.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes. You. You said: What if tomorrow never comes? Those are my new words to live or die by.”

  She smiles and stands up, exiting the office. I pull up the Forum paperwork in my email and fill it all out. I enter ‘An Eye for an Eye’ as my final piece. I then text Nick: I did it. My entry for the Forum is complete.

  He surprises me by texting back a picture of ‘An Eye for an Eye’, I didn’t know he’d taken: Did this masterpiece make the cut?

  I smile and type: Yes. It did and why do you have that picture?

  His reply is instant: Reminding myself to be the same kind of badass you are today.

  I smile, warmed inside and out by this man in ways I didn’t know I could feel warm. As for being a badass, Nick is the ultimate badass, while Macom is the ultimate asshole. I try not to think about how that might look when the two meet. Because they will meet, no matter what painting I place in that show. And they will clash, no matter how I try to stop them. And I’m not sure Nick is capable of war and peace. I’m pretty sure it’s all war to him.

  And Macom aside, God, it’s sexy.

  Our Thursday morning court date has arrived, and I’m a nervous wreck. I can’t paint and I’m done with my show pieces, so I work out with Nick, and even a hard run doesn’t calm me down. Nick’s attempts at distracting me in the shower, are completely effective, but the minute we’re dressed, my nerves are back. He dresses in a navy blue suit and I pick a blue and silver tie to match and then help him knot it. My dress is black, with a tapered waist and flared skirt. My shoes, classic pumps. I have no idea why I picked black when funeral black is the last thing I need to be wearing today, but it’s too late. It’s what I have.

  “Let’s go on to Sonoma when we’re done today,” Nick says, leaning on the door frame.

  “I thought we were going to wait until tomorrow? What if something goes wrong today?”

  “It won’t. It’s going to go well. And rather than flying, we’ll drive. It’s not far and we’ll have the BMW when we’re there.”

  “You don’t want to drive my broken down Mercedes?”

  “Nothing against your broken down Mercedes. But I prefer the BMW.”

  I laugh. “Okay then. Let’s pack.”

  “You don’t have to pack. You live here now. But I do, because I live there now, too.”

  “Yes. You do. You need things there. Your things.”

  His lips curve and he says, “You’re my thing. But I’ll take some stuff anyway.”

  “I’ll help you,” I say, and for the next few minutes, I busy myself gathering items for his suitcase, and packing up the few items I want to carry back and forth with me. Once we’re done, we load up the car.

  And then for the first time all week, Nick and I leave in one car, him behind the wheel of the BMW. By the time we get to the courtroom, my palms are sweaty. “Relax, Faith,” Nick says, after opening my car door and helping me to my feet. “I’m an arrogant bastard for a reason. I’m good. Really damn good and we’re going to win today.”

  “But we’ve talked about this. But what if someone is angry you got me out of this nightmare and they lash out at you? What if I’m the reason—”

  “Stop,” he says, his hands on my shoulders. “Don’t start fretting over me. I pack a big punch. Anyone who comes at me is going to feel a hell of a lot of pain and they know it. I got this, sweetheart, and I got you. Okay?”

  “Yes. Yes, okay.” I flatten my hand on his lapel. “You are a bad ass.”

  He rewards me with a curve of his delicious mouth. “You inspire me.”

  I manage a laugh. “I’m not sure that is the way a woman wants to inspire a man.”

  “If a woman doesn’t inspire her man, he’s not her man. Now. Come see me in action.”
>
  Literally thirty minutes later, Nick and I step out of the courtroom, and the bank has approved the buyout, I’ve inherited the winery, and Nick has shut down every attempt my bank made to stop it from happening. “I don’t believe it,” I say, as soon as we’re in the car. “It’s done.”

  “You doubted me?”

  “No. I did not doubt you.”

  “Sounds like you doubted me.” He leans over and kisses me. “And that, I do believe, earns that sweet little ass of yours a spanking.”

  “Hmmm. Promise?”

  “Oh yeah, sweetheart. I promise.” He settles back in his seat. “Let’s go to Sonoma.”

  A few minutes later, we’re on the road, and life is good. Almost too good to be true.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Faith

  “We’re here, sweetheart.”

  I blink and open my eyes. “Nick?”

  “Yes, sweetheart. Nick. You fell asleep. We’re home.”

  I blink again. “Home?”

  “Sonoma.”

  “We are?”

  He strokes my hair. “Yes.” He smiles. “We are.”

  I sit up and look around to find we’re parked in the driveway of my house. And instead of the warmth and happiness “home” should create, there is an instant ball of nerves in my belly made better by only one thing: Nick. “We,” I say, glancing over at him, “because we’re really doing this thing, right?”

  “We’ve been really doing this since the moment we met.”

  He leans over and cups my head in that way he does and kisses my forehead. “Come on. Let’s go inside and get settled. And I vote for taking you out to lunch and a trip to the grocery store or I’ll starve this weekend.” He grabs his jacket from the back seat, where he’d apparently put it during the drive, and then exits the car. I grab my purse from the floorboard, where I’d left it when we’d gone into the courthouse. Slipping it over my shoulder, I exit the car and join Nick at the trunk and the minute I’m beside him, the intimacy between us seems to take on a living, breathing, life of its own. It thickens the air, wraps around us like a warm, soft blanket that I want to snuggle inside of and never leave.