by K L Clare
“I’d love to see your office sometime.”
“I don’t think the boss will mind.” His smug wink made me ache for more of him, and he knew it—his hands slipped down to my ass. “I won’t come back until I’ve had a full night with you in my bed, Elle.”
Then he led me inside, where inquiring minds waited.
28
Will and I passed through the center of the room and headed straight for the bar, where he placed a glass of champagne in my hand without letting go of the other. I shifted my weight and squeezed his fingers to ground myself.
“Ease into it, Elle. They’ll adore you.”
“Why must they stare?” God, I was nervous.
“Who wouldn’t? Christ. You’re amazing.”
“Will,” I complained. I needed more than an expression of ego-driven pride.
“It’s a rude society in comparison to your politically correct upbringing. You’ll get used to it.” He took a drink from his glass of Scotch. “They’re curious. You’ve nothing to worry over.” His gaze moved over my shoulder, and he nodded as he pulled me to his side.
James Jackson gestured for my hand with a knowing smile. “Ah, there she is. . . . The lovely lady I’m dying to thank for my job security.” He squeezed my presented hand with affection. “It’s my honor to meet you. Welcome to England.”
“Thank you, James. It’s so nice to meet you.”
He was tall and elegant with light brown skin, warm brown eyes, and a showy grin. His head was shaved bald and his facial hair tightly groomed. His presence was similar to Will’s—intelligence and authoritative charm whirled around him—though his immediate persona was warmer.
Will flashed his marvelous grin. “She may as well sign your checks.”
There was obvious trust and respect and even friendship between the two. James was a principal at the firm—Will’s right arm. He directed the staff and operations under Will’s areas of responsibility and researched ideas for investments and acquisitions. And then some.
Will called out to a client. “David, come have a drink with us.”
The two men shook hands in a manner that exceeded the boundaries of a cordial business greeting. Their professional relationship was new, but they had attended Oxford together. They had partied and chased women together, I would have bet.
“This is my wife, Caroline.”
She extended her hand to Will. “It’s quite nice to finally meet you. David talks about you nonstop.”
Will held her hand for a moment. “Does he? I’d like you both to meet Ellie James.”
Caroline turned to me. “You are lovely, darling. Shall we go have a chat while these men wade into their boring business conversations?”
Thanks to my gran, I could play the elite-class social game as well as anyone. After a quick check of my nerves, I reinforced my already-straight posture and set my glass on the bar, and in the same fashion she’d done to Will, I offered Caroline my hand.
“Champagne?” I asked.
Stunned by my reciprocated presumptuousness, and then delighted, she grasped my fingers and smiled without uttering a word.
Will squeezed my other hand to express approval—and amusement—then kissed it before he allowed me to pull away.
I led Caroline to one of the sofas, calling over my shoulder to Will with a playful smile, “Will, send someone over, please.”
He dragged his stare from my ass and winked, sending the bartender over with nothing more than a jerk of his chin.
Pretty, pretentious Caroline was a stay-at-home mom full of small talk about her girlfriends, great shoes—I gave her bonus points for that—and her three young children. She pushed hard for a story about Will and me. My new friend admitted she’d seen the afternoon tabloids and knew who I was. Still, I offered nothing more than the timeworn story of serendipity.
Those moments of shallow exchange reawakened my longing for Jess’s company. I missed her so much.
“Come on, darling. Give me something. Each of your families has rejected your God-given nobility. Others would kill for it. There must be more to the story.” She had no idea how true her statement was.
Will carried on with an expanding group of men, leading a spirited conversation about a historic referendum that the British would vote on in the coming year. “Aggressive policy development could further boost Britain’s market. We’ll possess one of the world’s strongest economies by the end of next year anyway, despite claims of impending doom,” I heard him say.
I caught his hungered gaze and thought about how he’d be mind-blowing later in bed. Can’t wait, I shot back at him with my eyes, biting my lip.
“Show me to the toilet, Ellie,” Caroline said, interrupting our silent conversation.
Kirsty had joined us on the sofa a few minutes earlier and volunteered to go in my place, so I used the opportunity to gain a minute alone with Will. I summoned him with the curl of my finger.
He excused himself and erased the distance between us. “Elle. I’m mad for you,” he said close to my ear as he tugged at his collar.
My hands glided up his arms. “Well, if that’s true, you should take me to bed.” I removed the knot from his tie and slipped it from around his neck.
His throat rumbled as he forced back the idea.
“You’re sweating. Take off your jacket.” After he had, I unfastened the top buttons of his shirt while he worked his cufflinks. I held out my hand before he could put them into his pocket.
He raised a brow but dropped the black diamond cufflinks into my hand.
“I’ll put them in your pocket myself.” I smiled from beneath my lashes while discreetly sliding my whole hand into the front of his trousers. He was already growing hard.
“You don’t play fair, witch.”
I shrugged and rolled up each of his sleeves into neat folds and then dragged my fingers along the inside of his forearms. “Better?”
He stared down at me, his eyes heavy with desire.
“Everyone is watching, you know, waiting to see what we’ll do next.”
“And you know I don’t care.” He lowered his head and brushed his lips over mine. I shivered. “Give me ten minutes to get rid of the last few, and we’ll get out of here.”
I was tired of hearing Caroline recount her nights out with the housewives, so I wandered into the fresh air on the open terrace, near Thomas. I was only half listening to the conversation before me, my mind drifting back to all the things Will had said about the Order, comparing his words to the last nightmare I’d had.
Will appeared abruptly between Thomas and me and smacked a newspaper against his brother’s chest. “What the fuck is this?”
Ethan was between the two of them within seconds. He grabbed the newspaper and examined the front page. “Where did this one come from? Christ,” he said, arching up into Thomas’s face to say something more that only the two of them could hear.
Thomas snapped something back, then he made his way inside but kept one eye pinned on Will.
“Let me see.” I pried the paper from Ethan’s fingers.
I’d seen most of the tabloids earlier that day, but not this one. It featured a close-up of Thomas and me. I knew the exact moment it had been snapped—after he’d pushed me into the alcove to shield me with his body. The deceiving headline about our alleged passionate embrace was ignorant at best.
I turned to Will and placed my hands against his chest. His eyes revealed the same jealousy he’d shown with Josh.
“You know what happened, Will. You know it’s another tabloid lie. It’s nothing.”
He took hold of my wrists. “It’s more than nothing—it’s fucking inexcusable. Don’t expect me to accept it for anything less. Go in and sit.”
Ethan interrupted before I could respond. “Ellie, go on. Let me talk to him for a minute.”
I pulled my wrists free, backed away from Will, and trusted Ethan to handle the situation. I watched Will follow Ethan to the bar as he glared over his shoulder at me and then
across the room at Thomas. Ben joined them, and the two worked without success to settle Will’s thoughts.
I grabbed my sketchpad and doodled nonsense—anything to keep from looking his way.
Ethan startled me when he sat and offered a glass of champagne. “I need your help.”
“How can I handle him if you can’t?” I shook my head at the glass.
“You own more influence than you understand. You must learn to tap into that when he gets out of hand. And never test him—not unless you’re prepared to see him go after someone.”
“Test him?”
Ethan raised both brows and picked up his drink.
My mouth did its thing and blurted a random thought before my brain could catch it. “Did you love her?” I yearned for another connection to my sister.
He paused with his whisky at his lips, frowned, and then threw back what was left in the glass. “We were different. You and Will can have what you both clearly desire. But it was more complicated for us.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You didn’t answer the question.”
“Yes.” He gave me the one word I needed to hear. “Goddammit, don’t cry. As much as I’d like to share this grief with you, you know that’s not going to happen.” He waited until he saw my eyes. “I know you miss her. She loved you more than you know. Talked about you quite a lot.” Ethan paused again. “I should have been there. It’s on me—and I am sorry.”
A single tear rolled down my cheek.
“Stop it, Ellie. Save the tears for Will.”
I wiped it away and swallowed the knot in my throat. He was right. Will had been gentle and comforting, caring for me with a profound tenderness while I worked through my grief and depression, and he still worked hard to protect me from the resulting anxiety. He was everything to me. It was Will’s shoulder I wanted to cry on. Only his.
“We’ll talk more about her soon. And Lissie. You have my word. You’re family now, and anything I can do to ease your pain, I will. But right now, I need you to get over there and reassure him. Men like my brother . . . Well, let’s just say there’s a bit of self-doubt that comes with the notoriety he possesses. Go on,” Ethan ordered. “I need this settled between my brothers.”
I pushed down the hem of my dress and headed for Will. He drained his glass and watched me approach. Indignation dripped from him. Even so, I couldn’t help but touch him—my hands went to his bared forearms as they always seemed to do.
“What are you doing, Will?”
His hardened eyes challenged mine.
I slipped my fingers higher beneath his folded sleeves and pushed harder for a response. “What are you doing to us?”
His eyes dropped to my hands, then to the floor. “Elle. If I hurt you—”
I snapped at him, interrupting. “I’m not a dog. I do not sit.”
Will jerked his gaze back to mine. Tenderness and self-reproach joined the emotional mess in his eyes. “Forgive me,” he ordered, pushing hair away from my face. “I’ll never speak to you that way again.”
“No, you won’t. Because if you do—” I halted my words, surprised by my own thoughts. I could imagine no scenario where an ultimatum turned out well. Will was the type of man who walked away. His harsh words had stung, yes, but it wasn’t enough for me to push him away. It wasn’t a deal breaker.
“It won’t happen again, baby.” He leaned in and pressed his lips to my temple, his words soft against my skin. “Come out into the corridor with me.”
I stared at him as Ethan’s words danced on my brain, realizing that while Will’s emotions could become volatile, he would never walk away from me. His hand locked around mine, and we exited the lounge.
“Elle, I need to be sure you understand me.” His mood shifted, his expression growing dark again. “Look at me,” he commanded.
I met his stare but with defiance.
He softened his words. “I will destroy any man who touches you or threatens to take you from me—you must never forget that. That’s what I’ve become with you, and there’s no way back from it.”
Between the lines of his words was a warning for me. I needed to take care around other men, because if my own behavior drove another to pursue me, his reaction would be the same. Someone would suffer, though it would never be me. It was a baser instinct I’d taken pleasure in drawing from his depths. I’d had no idea what it was at the time, an instinct—a beast—he could never again enslave. It would need to be reminded often that Will was my only interest.
And Will needed to know that there was no longer a point of return for me either—I was madly in love with him.
He reached for me with his eyes. “Say something.”
I don’t know why but I didn’t. I couldn’t stop myself from pushing him further.
Will ran his fingers through his hair, paced the floor, and cursed. When he found his resolve, he came back to me and curled a finger under my chin, luring my eyes to his. “Do I need to get on my knees and beg you to love me back? Is that it, Elle? Is that what you need from me? Tell me what you need, and it’s yours.”
I gasped. “You did say it,” I whispered.
The muscles in his face relaxed, and his eyes softened more. “I love you. I have from the moment you first looked up at me with those beautiful eyes.”
I knew the moment he said the words that they were the reason I pushed him. I needed him to love me. More than that, I needed him to love me to an absolute extreme.
Tears rolled down my cheeks one at a time as though life were stuck in slow motion. I’d never exchanged a confession of love with another human being, and I didn’t know how to give that to Will. I was held captive by silence.
He jerked me into his arms.
Our mouths collided.
I wound my arms tightly around his neck and encouraged him with my tongue to deepen our kiss, to leave me breathless, to love me with all that he had, and to feel how I loved him.
In the next moment, my back hit the floor, and he was on top of me.
“Don’t move,” he shouted into my ringing ears as he covered my body with his.
An explosion had forced us from our feet.
29
Another volatile, rumbling shock wave ripped through the fifth floor of the hotel, followed by the sounds of more splintering glass and wood. The lounge door blasted from its hinges and flew more than fifty feet beyond where we lay.
Will remained on top of me. “Don’t move, Elle,” he repeated, though neither of us could hear much aside from the ringing aftermath of the explosions. He locked his gaze deep into mine and held it steady. “I’ve got you, baby. Breathe out.”
My lungs expelled a shuddering exhale. I was mindless, frozen.
“In. Out again,” Will instructed.
Ethan, Thomas, and the others burst into the corridor. Some of them had visible lacerations caused by flying objects and glass. No one appeared to have life-threatening injuries.
Ethan’s phone was pressed to his ear. He shouted information as he received it from the security command center. “Four is secure. Hotel is locked down. Get her down to the room. No elevator—stairs only. Go now.”
Will brought us to our feet, and we raced to the stairwell exit. Ben flew in front of us and kicked the steel door open, exiting first. The stairwell echoed with pounding feet as everyone else followed.
When we arrived at the entry to the fourth floor, Will shouted back at Ethan, “I won’t take her in there without searching first, goddammit.”
“Thomas and I will do it. The rest of you stay here,” Ethan ordered.
Drops of blood fell onto my arm. It wasn’t mine.
“You’re hurt. Let go, Will. Let me see!”
He released his tight grip but complained as I inspected his body. A piece of the door had hit him on the back of his neck, but it was a superficial laceration.
“Thank God,” I breathed, wiping at the blood with the palm of my hand.
Thomas came back and held the door open. “All
clear. Let’s go.”
Everyone huddled in the center of the corridor on the fourth floor, where there was no obvious impact or damage. Ethan was on his phone again but disconnected within seconds. “No one can get in or out of the hotel. All guests have been ordered to their rooms. I’ve delayed contacting police, but it won’t be long before the neighboring establishments do. Two explosive devices were detonated on the roof. The second one made it to the terrace. There are no serious injuries, and it will stay that way. We don’t have much time to act independently.”
Ethan shifted his eyes to Will, and the two shared a dark, knowing look. Ben and Thomas closed in at my sides when Ethan jerked his head at Will to pull him aside for a separate conversation. I heard only pieces of their exchange when their voices were raised.
“Fucking cowards . . . terrorizing an innocent woman because they’re afraid of her DNA.” Ethan palmed Will’s shoulder. “We need to move now.”
“You know me, Ethan. . . . I’ll find a way. Motherfuckers are dead.”
The reality of what happened—and what was to come—began to sink into my horrified, confused mind. I cried out for Will, and he immediately secured me in his arms.
“You can’t fall apart on me, Elle. We’ll handle this. I swear they’ll not get to you. No one will take you from me.” I felt it—that vibration deep within him. The calm before his storm.
I nodded to demonstrate my trust in him, my trust in the raging emotion that had become my lifeline, the side of my face rubbing against his chest. We’d chosen this path together.
I am strong, I chanted in my head.
“How many?” he asked Ethan.
“Five that we know of. Our guys caught it on the cameras and locked down before they could get inside. I need you, Will. You must trust Thomas or Ben to protect her. She’ll be safe if you and I drive them away from here.”
Will held me tighter. He’d stay if I pleaded. He would choose me.
The truth is sometimes hard to see, but Will’s truth was always clear to me. Every piece of his life was an all-or-nothing decision he’d made. There was no gray, no space in between all or nothing, and his resolve never faltered. That’s why I knew he’d choose me. That’s how I knew he’d destroy the moon for me. I was one of his alls.