by Raven Scott
Sliding out of the booth first, he held out his hand for me, and I followed suit before he gathered the boats to dump them in the trash. His palm was warm and dry, hard against mine, and I lifted it to my cheek to feel the hairs on the back of his hand bristle.
“We should’ve stayed in bed.” The almost unbearable urge to get naked and just cuddle swept through me in powerful waves, and I spoke up as we entered the parking lot. Carlyle wrapped his arm around my neck, pressing his lips to my temple, and I closed my eyes after stepping off the sidewalk and onto the asphalt. “I’m sorry I dampened the date.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Valerie. If you want, we can get a hotel room. We’ll get your phone first, though, alright? I’ll have Jerry work on the security once we know your new number.”
“I’d like that.” Tonight had started feeling like a really nice date, and I just had to ruin it. “Um . . . have you been to this mall before? I haven’t.”
“The Walden Galleria? Not personally. It’ll be an adventure.” Smiling encouragingly, Carlyle pulled his keys out of his pocket, and we paused while he unlocked the car. Shirking off my gloominess, I rubbed my hands up my face and through my hair and heaved a massive sigh.
All I had to do was focus on the man in front of me, and I’d have a great time.
Not the fact that he made comments about assassinating people.
Or that he alluded to some shady business dealings.
Or that I really didn’t care either way.
24
Carlyle
“No . . . no . . . no . . . Agh!” Slumping over the arcade machine, Valerie groaned in frustration, and I rubbed her shoulders as she glared at the stuffed cat she’d been trying to claw for almost twenty minutes now. “I almost had that bastard.”
“Can I try?” I expected her to say ‘no’ again, that she would definitely get it this time, but she surprised me when she nodded in defeat. Sticking a dollar into the machine, I clenched my jaw under brows furrowed in concentration, and she stepped back, but not too far. “I bet you’d be a riot at a carnival, Valerie.”
“I’ll have you know that you’d win that bet.” Hunched over this game, I only guffawed at her grumble, and I wiggled the joystick. This evening hadn’t gone the way I thought it would, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Valerie hadn’t asked me to take her home at the very least.
It was getting harder and harder to keep my damn mouth shut, and I would be damned if Valerie didn’t have some inkling of something vague.
“If you get this on the first try, we’re breaking up.” Surprise rattled my spine, and my head whipped to the side as my thumb bore down on the joystick in an effort to clench a fist. Valerie jumped a little, her breath catching, and alarm glimmered in her eyes, widening as they caught mine. “What? It was a joke.”
“I didn’t know we were together.” Her slender brows nearly flew off her face, and my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. “Valerie . . . ”
“No, no, it was a joke, Carlyle. I mean, how could someone . . . ” My cheek twitched in agitation when she trailed off, and Valerie shook her head as an ugly, black blotch engulfed my heart and lungs. Before I could even really think about alternatives, my mind went straight to the worst, and I grabbed her face to squeeze. Fire scorched my throat, and she gasped as her cheeks went pale above my stretched fingers.
“How could someone like me not be a disconnected, pompous ass, thinking everyone’s beneath me because I have money?” Goosebumps blanketed my entire body from the ice flooding my chest, and Valerie shook her head hastily, her dark hair making her look ghostly, almost. Scowling darkly, I released her to turn on my heel and walk away, but I wasn’t expecting her to follow me.
What the fuck did she think we were doing? If I didn’t want to be around her, I wouldn’t be.
Stuffing my fists into my pockets as my nails dug into my palms, my scowl twisted into a sneer at the thought. If Valerie was just another slut, I wouldn’t have fucked her. I would’ve gotten some head and ignored her any other time. Unless I wanted something.
“Carlyle . . . Carlyle, that’s not . . . ” Frantic hands grabbed my arm, but I didn’t break pace as Valerie practically tripped over herself, trying to keep up. “That’s not what I was going to say, damnit! Stop walking so fast!”
“Then what?” My nasty snarl made her jump away, and my heart squeezed even as I pinned her to a column between stores. I could feel people staring at us, but I ignored them as the tendons in my hands bulged from the tension zinging through me. Valerie lost some of her puff, and my throat tightened around a growl as she so gently set her palm against my chest.
“How can someone break up with you after that kiss?” Cutting my hiss off, Valerie’s words rolled off her tongue in a slur, and I tensed when her hand fell from my chest. A little, tiny, sad smile crested her cheeks, and a light extinguished in her eye as my heart palpitated painfully. “Let’s just go back. It’s not that important, I guess.”
“The fuck does that mean, not that important? Of course, it’s important!” What the fuck is happening right now? My elbows gave out on me as the question dug ruts into my brain, and I suddenly found myself nose to nose with her. “Do you think I’m doing all this because I don’t want to be with you? For sex? For a job? What?”
“I hoped you would know what, Carlyle.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I lost my shit at that, and I glared hotly at Valerie as she struggled not to look away. “I invited you out because I wanted to spend time with you. That’s the only God damn reason. Yeah, I went to your apartment because I had a shit day, and I wanted to see you, but I didn’t invite you out as a distraction. Jesus, fuck.”
Pushing myself away roughly, I raked my hands through my hair and down the back of my head, and Valerie crossed her arms over her bust with a sour expression. She didn’t look the least bit scared or uneasy, but she did look nervous, and I scoffed loudly.
“You know what I do know, Valerie? I wasted my fucking time.” All this fucking drama over a stuffed animal. Rolling my eyes, I turned on my heel to storm down the causeway, and I could hear her pattering after me. Valerie just shot the shit out of absolutely nowhere, and I blinked hard as I tried to wrap my head around it. Pulling my phone out of my pocket, my hand shook as I unlocked the screen, and red seeped into the edges of my vision.
I was distracted by her big ass and sharp wit. Obviously, she wasn’t lying when she said painting and sex were all of her personality.
“Carlyle . . . ” Ignoring the call, I dialed Carl’s number, but Valerie rushed around me to hold my phone down. “Stop . . . I . . . ”
“Take your hand off me now.” Hurt rippled across her delicate features, and she tentatively withdrew to hold her hand to her chest as the demanding ground through my teeth. I pulled the phone to my ear only to listen to the ring, and I swore under my breath. I’d let Carl off for the night, and he’d probably left his work cell in the car before heading home.
“Can you . . . can you just . . . hear me out? Please?” It physically hurt to listen to the waver in Valerie’s tone, and I slid my phone back in my pocket to cover my mouth tightly. She took my silence as acceptance, but I really didn’t want to say something I’d later regret as her swimming eyes met mine. “Please, Carlyle. I get it. I shouldn’t have made the joke. I’m sorry, okay?”
“What the fuck is with you tonight, huh?” My lip curled back, and Valerie went a little gaunt as I scratched my jaw and neck in irritation. “Do you need me to fucking spell it out for you or something, Valerie? It’s not about the damn joke. Jesus, it’s . . . why are you trying to pick a fight with me? Answer me that.”
“I wasn’t trying to do that, Carlyle. I just . . . we just . . . got our wires crossed. I didn’t mean to imply in any way that . . . ” I fucking saw that shit— that fraction of a second when she decided to give up, that maybe I wouldn’t believe her, that tiny dim in her eye. “I don’t want to fight with you. I’ll g
o get my phone and call an Uber.”
“Don’t . . . don’t fucking do that. Don’t try to avoid the issue.” Taking her shoulders as gently as my stiff hands allowed, I frowned when she ducked her head. The last half hour sped through my mind’s eye, and I clenched and released my jaw in the ensuing, terse silence. “Did you do this because you’re afraid to get a new phone?”
“No . . . not entirely.” I can’t get a straight answer from you, can I? Valerie was going to set my God damn brain on fire, that’s what she was going to do. Rocking back on my heels, I flopped my head back to exhale a hot breath, and she leaned to rub her crown against my sternum. “Ca-can I be on your plan?”
Surprise rocketed through me, and I lowered my gaze to find her sort of shrinking as she hunched her shoulders. Was she really that upset about that phone call? Then again, Valerie’s mom is involved. That woman would know everything. Birthday, social, everything. It’s a good reason to be scared.
“Of course you can.” Wrapping my arms around her, I kissed the top of her head, and Valerie exhaling a shuddering breath that weaved between the buttons of my shirt. “What else is bothering you, Valerie?”
“You don’t kiss girls often. I could tell.” The short answer warmed my cheeks, and I tangled my hand in Valerie’s hair to tug gently. Embarrassment raged across her features, and I made it a point not to hesitate as I captured her thick, beautiful lips. This time, she couldn’t catch me off guard, and she sunk against my chest to slip her arms around my waist. She tasted like the remnants of her ice cream and something so much deeper, and my tongue snuck out to prod the seam of her mouth.
“You’re right, I don’t. Does it bother you? The pressure of knowing that?” Her lips parted at my mumble, and Valerie’s sigh caressed my tongue and the roof of my mouth. “You didn’t have to goad me into a fight, Valerie. You could’ve asked to be on my plan. It’s just Verizon. If you want, I’ll open up a line with a different service for you.”
“It’s not exactly something you ask on the . . . fourth date.” Fourth? As if sensing my confusion, Valerie nodded as she pulled her long, mahogany waves over her shoulder. “I count lunch on Saturday. Basically, any time we get food or snacks or eat anything of any kind. I guess that means I should count that morning at the coffee shop because I had coffee.”
“Alright, I get it.” Kneading her scalp, I shook my head a little, and she cracked a smile even though tension lines formed around her mouth. “Regardless, Valerie, I won’t expect anything. You’ll be an employee of mine at some point. I treat my employees very well. That includes a work cell. Okay, no more stalling. Let’s go.”
25
Valerie
“Hey, Carlyle?” Alone in the car, I couldn’t help but wonder what the fuck was wrong with me! “I’m sorry about earlier. I didn’t think before everything spiraled out of control. I didn’t expect you to think that’s what I was gonna say . . . about you being so successful.”
“It’s fine, Valerie. I can’t imagine the stress you’re under with your mom, not having a job, and no phone, until right now. It’s a lot of time to kill.” Guilt clawed at my throat despite his assurance, and Carlyle reached across the center console to grab my hand. “I apologize, too, for grabbing you like that. I jumped the gun, and we wouldn’t have argued if I let you keep talking.”
“Do people really treat you that way?” He nodded firmly, seemingly unabashed, and my heart dropped as I weaved my fingers around his. “That’s awful.”
“I’ve dealt with it my entire life. For the record, that’s also why I don’t date much. I’m pretty much a walking dollar sign. I got disillusioned with it when I realized the number scale is a thing for a reason.” My brows rose in alarm, and his cheek twitched as he cast me a somewhat playful glance, but not enough to make me think he wasn’t entirely serious. “You break the scale, so you don’t have to worry.”
“You rate a girl’s looks and put a cap on spending? Really?” Today— well, the past three and a half hours— were just so eye-opening, and Carlyle actually chuckled a little condescendingly. “What happened when they ran out of money?”
“It’s not like they didn’t know it was coming. I was a little shit in high school and hadn’t figured out the finesse of a good business transaction. I told her straight up what number I thought she was, and I wasn’t going to spend a single penny more than that number. If I thought she was a six, she’d get six hundred dollars. And personality did count, but it was high school for rich people, so . . . ”
“That’s nuts for too many reasons. What’s the most you ever spent on a girl?” That sounded so wrong without context, and Carlyle flicked on his blinker as we came up on a pretty nice hotel he’d looked up. My own phone sat in its box, in a bag by my feet, and he untangled our fingers to grip the wheel.
“Ah . . . four was the highest. Like I said, I was an asshole in high school. Even if the girls were very good looking, I took personality into account because I knew they didn’t have one. I didn’t do it often. My dad was riding my ass because I was going to start at one of his management companies the summer I turned sixteen. I got promoted once a year, and now here I am.” Turning into the hotel parking lot, Carlyle cast me a cheeky smirk, and my abdomen twisted at how handsome he was. “I bet you thought I was going to say something stupid like eight.”
“Not really. That’s a lot of money for me, though— like, it’s a third of my rent right now. I can’t imagine it was a lot for girls like that.” Parking at the valet as I thought on it some more, Carlyle hummed in acknowledgment, and I gnawed on my inner cheek. “Why a four? What’d she expect to be?”
“A four because she was hot but had the second nastiest personality of anyone I’ve ever met, and also she really sucked in bed. She never told me what she expected to be, but by the way she slapped me, it wasn’t even close.” Puffing out my lips in surprise, my brows furrowed at that, and Carlyle shut the car off to lean back in the seat. Tilting to meet my eye, he reached to caress my jaw, and flames crept up my neck at the sincerity blazing from his gaze. “If I had to put a number on you on a scale of one to ten, it’s been thirty-two.”
I couldn’t help but laugh as flames licked my cheeks, and he smirked broadly before unbuckling. Following suit, I wondered where else this conversation would go, but I didn’t push it on the way into the hotel. He passed off the keys and got a ticket, and I gazed up at the glass and steel building stretching into the sky. Lights spilled out of the glass doors lining one side of one corner of the place, but it wasn’t long before I was passing through them and into the lobby.
Most hotels looked the same as the ones on TV, and this was no different. Carlyle spoke to the receptionist, got his keycard, and everything was a blur of normalcy. The urge to actually ask him about all the hints he’d been dropping, and why he dropped them, clawed at the back of my throat. After all, he knew I was avoiding telling him what was really bothering me, and I got sucked into it all in those moments between moments.
“Today was a huge mess. Can we start over in the morning?” The beep of the door release broke my daze, and I turned to Carlyle as he grabbed my hand to tug me through the threshold. “I don’t know how to fix this . . . contention.”
“I’d like that, yeah.” He didn’t bother flicking on a light or anything, but the room seemed to be just that— a bedroom with a little closet and kitchenette in the corner, judging by the silhouettes. Pausing when my knees touched the foot of the bed, I unlaced my leather pants to slide them down my legs. The ruffling of Carlyle’s clothes being shed was almost a relief, not excitement, and goosebumps rose on my skin when he pulled off my tank top.
I hadn’t worn a bra, and my chest warmed as Carlyle wrapped me up in a bear hug and cupped the back of my head. In the dark, all I could do was feel his rigid, toned body, his heart steadily beating against my cheek, and his heat seeping into me. My eyelids fluttered closed, my body deflating in a heavy sigh, and he rested his cheek against my crown as I branded this fe
eling deep into my brain.
“Do you know what I thought when I first saw you at the pizza place, Valerie?” Carlyle’s gruff tone accompanied his arms tightening around me like he was afraid I’d run away before he even got to say what he wanted to say. “I thought you were perfect. I don’t feel a lot of self-doubts, but I can honestly say I worried I wasn’t good enough for you. I have never thought about giving up my role in my own life, but I would, in a heartbeat, for you, and that prospect is terrifying because I don’t know who I am if I’m not the boss.”
“I don’t know whether you surpassed your own standards or just magically heightened mine to match, then.” There was absolutely not a single iota of humor to be found anywhere, and I slid my palms up his bareback as I nuzzled his chest hair. “It’s a good thing my life’s such a mess that I don’t have anything more to give up. I can just fit right into yours. I told my sister there’s just gotta be something devastatingly deal-break-ery about you, Carlyle, but there’s not.”
“Your closet is thirty-five percent pencil skirts. You’ll fit in beautifully.” Ours could’ve been a funny moment if it wasn’t so deeply laden in such serious undertones and silent words. As if Carlyle and I understood each other on such a fundamental level that we didn’t even need to speak. Maybe, I was fooling myself, and he just had a crap sense of humor about the ultimate power of powering the global economy.
Though, I had the sneaking suspicion that he didn’t.
So sweetly, Carlyle tugged the ends of my hair, and I lifted myself onto my toes. His kiss said all the things he didn’t, and I opened my mouth to tangle my tongue around his. The chapped roughness of his lips seared mine, and he reached down to hook his arm under my butt to hoist me up. Even as my thighs clung to him, I only felt the faintest flicker of desire, and his muscles played against my nakedness as he set me on the bed.