Of course I’d be worried sick. After all he killed the last woman I cared about.
Over the last few days I hadn’t spoken to Jia, but the little glimpses of her helped. Today though, she wasn’t there and I didn’t know why.
Diverting my focus from where it should have been I decided to make my way to her place just to see her. It was nine, and yes I was making another reckless mistake by even thinking about her but I couldn’t focus properly on anything with her on my mind.
At least before I rushed off to be reckless I spoke to Wes first, just to let him know where I was going. I’d thought it was right to tell him.
Frankie was parked up outside Jia’s house as usual. I went to him first and the minute he saw me he frowned.
He frowned and rolled his eyes at me as he rolled his window down.
“You have some death wish don’t you kid?” he asked. “What part of stay away from the boss’s daughter don’t you get?”
“I just want to see her,” I told him. “She wasn’t at work today.”
“Yeah, because that asshole Armand upset her that’s why.”
“What did he do?”
He shook his head. “She wouldn’t tell me. But do we really need to ask? That guy actually makes me sick. He gets all the opportunities ever, more than any of us because he’s someone’s son, who’s a friend of a friend’s family and he screws around taking all the liberties in the world.”
“I get it,” I agreed.
“If you do you won’t go adding to the problem. Xander, she leaves in a few days. This isn’t healthy. It’s not good for her to keep seeing you. There’s going to have to be a cutoff point somewhere.”
I knew that. I absolutely knew that. I just didn’t want to make the cut.
Not yet.
“Does it have to be tonight?” I asked.
He scowled then chuckled. “You asshole. Fine, make it quick.”
Quick, fast… everything was in haste.
I nodded my thanks and proceeded into the house.
It was so quiet. In the house my footsteps echoed.
I found her in the sitting room.
She jumped and it seemed like she was expecting Armand.
When she saw it was me her face lit up and she flew over to me, straight into my arms.
God help me, I weakened at the feel of her. I weakened and became a shadow of the man I was supposed to be the second I touched her.
When she backed away the effect was like heat leaving my body.
“Please, God no… is this goodbye?” She shook her head and gazed at me, eyes fixed on mine begging me to say no.
It wasn’t goodbye in the sense of me leaving. Realistically though this should be me taking that stand to cut off this connection between us.
“No.” I heard myself say. “I’m just looking in on you.”
The relief in her face was evident. “I’m okay for seeing you, but Xander… I hate this.” She winced.
“I know… Frankie said Armand upset you. What did he do?” I didn’t know why I was asking. It wasn’t like me doing anything would help. It wouldn’t help one bit. It would just make things worse.
She looked down at the ground then back to me with tears in her eyes. “It’s best I don’t say.”
I reached out and touched her cheek. “Tell me.”
“He wants me to sleep with him. I can’t.”
The anger that coursed through my blood was something I never quite expected. Anger was the only emotion I could feel on hearing something like that. It was the only response.
What was I really supposed to do here? Keep watching?
I was well aware that I wasn’t supposed to be in this scenario. However, there had to be some element of right and wrong here that couldn’t be ignored.
How was it right for me to stand by and watch her go through this?
And with the way I felt about her…
Which was what?
There was a reason why I kept coming back, why I couldn’t leave well enough alone, why she was the first person I thought of protecting.
Why I felt like this now.
Like she was mine.
It was her who reached up to touch my cheek now.
“You can’t do anything. You mustn’t.” A little smile pulled at the corners of her beautiful mouth. “Xander…it means a lot that you came tonight. Looking in on me.”
The little touch made my skin tingle. The only response next was to kiss her.
I bent low and pressed my lips to hers.
Within seconds the kiss turned hungry, heated with desire. Mine for her, hers for me.
She moved back out of the kiss and that little smile turned saucy. It reminded me of the nights when we’d created that bubble of passion and lived in it.
“How long do you have?” she asked, running her perfectly manicured fingers over my chest.
“An hour tops.” This was the selfish part of me taking over. It knew I should head over to the park and join the others looking for the blueprints but it was more concerned with her.
That selfish part of me saw her with equal importance to everything else. It also knew there was no way I’d just come to her place to look in on her and not touch her the way I wanted.
“Do you want to go upstairs with me?” she asked. When she tilted her head to the side, her platinum hair drifted over her delicate shoulders giving me a good eyeful of the swell of her breasts pressing against her camisole top.
“Yes,” I replied. That was the only answer. Yes.
As if I could say anything else besides a yes.
She put out her hand to take mine and I took it allowing the beauty to lead me upstairs to her room.
She locked the door and made sure she put the latch on to avoid our previous mistake.
As the door snapped shut it was as if we’d stepped into that bubble again.
The bubble had been created and nothing else mattered.
She pressed her hand against my chest and smiled, ushering me toward her bed, where I sat.
I loved how confident she was with herself, her body, with me.
Not shy at all and completely in control. She knew her beauty and the effect she had. When she chose to, she didn’t hold back. This was one of those times.
She reached for the hem of her top and pulled it over her head, unveiling her gorgeous breasts. They bobbled as she moved and I took the moment to look at her. Her breasts full and round were ripe, the pink tips already hard and pointed, pleading to be sucked.
Deciding I wouldn’t keep her waiting, I took hold of her tiny waist and pulled her to me.
A hum of pure satisfaction fell from her lips when I closed my mouth over her left nipple and sucked hard. Sucking like I could taste her and enjoying the feel of her soft flesh in my mouth.
I sucked harder, loving that she allowed me to do this to her. Loving that she would allow me to do whatever I wanted to her, completely yielding to my will, giving me control over her body.
Her body that was forbidden to me.
She moaned into each suckle and pressed into me when I started alternating between each breast so I could give her the pleasure I knew she wanted.
I wanted to take her from behind tonight, that was what I wanted.
Her with her perfect ass up, her gorgeous tits bouncing while I pounded into her.
It was the perfect vision. Perfect image in my head to make me take her.
I stripped the rest of her clothes off and set her down naked on the bed.
She watched me with that seductive smile of hers while I shrugged out of my clothes. The need in her eyes clung to mine.
I took hold of her again, setting her on her hands and knees while I positioned myself behind her. Sliding my fingers into her pretty pussy I smiled at how ready she was for me and couldn’t resist a taste. Just one little taste. One taste of her sweet nectar to remember.
I lowered and ran my hand down the curve of her back, right down to her hot, wet passage an
d bent my head low to lick at the hard nub of her clit. She gasped out loud encouraging me to lick harder and suck.
The tortured moan that echoed from her lips hardened my cock and I almost climaxed right there from the sound.
For fear of embarrassing myself in that way I stopped tasting her delicious nectar and grabbed her hips with one hand, then guided the fat head of my cock to her entrance with the other.
Teasing the folds of her pussy lips open, I slid into her with one thrust that made us both cry out. She was always so deliciously tight around me, like a vice of pleasure clamping around my shaft.
Fucking hell, it made me lose control. I lost it and my body took over, pumping into her and pounding as I fucked her the way the inner beast wanted me to.
God damn, I wasn’t going to last.
I’d wanted her too much.
The days of trying to forget her had gotten to me and made me lose it, lose control, lose my mind, lose my grasp on reality.
Reckless… that was what it was. But damn, was it ever a feeling to savor. A release that I wanted badly. As badly as I’d wanted her. Within seconds we were both moaning and groaning as our bodies slapped together in the relentless lock of our greedy indulgence and the tension tightened painfully deep in my balls. It coiled then rose without warning. Ferocious in nature. It made me jack hammer into her, rutting into her with primal need and I blew into her like a hurricane. I gripped on to her hips harder than I should have and she winced. Then we both collapsed against the soft pillow before her and I pulled her into my arms.
She moaned and shuffled around to face me, running her fingers over my chest.
We’d kept on making the same mistake over and over again, even when she knew who I was, and I knew the consequences of being with her. It was madness. Complete madness. Madness neither of us could say no to.
“I don’t know how I’m supposed to say goodbye to you.” She spoke against the drumming of my heart. It pounded in my ears and was almost deafening, but I heard her, her gentle voice against my chest.
I looked down at her and stroked her hair.
“Don’t think about it,” I told her. “I’m… sorry.”
I needed to say that. It was something in the mix of things that had happened over the last few days.
She lifted her head and gazed at me.
“What for?”
“Everything. All of it. I wish I could have met you under different circumstances. I wish I could save you from going to Europe with Armand like I said I would.”
She shook her head. “It’s okay. I’ll remember this and I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me. I think whatever job you’re here to do is more important than us.”
Not to my heart.
She smiled wider. “In my head, in my oh so brilliant imagination, it’s you who takes me to Europe. We go to Paris first and stay there, getting lost in each other.”
Paris…
It was a nice thought. She was the second woman I’d wanted to take there. I’d gone one time with the plan to return.
It wasn’t meant to be though. Just like me and Jia.
Not meant to be.
I could be selfish all I wanted but the truth was, it was better for her to get as far away as possible.
She shouldn’t be with Armand, but she couldn’t be with me either.
Chapter 10
Jia
Anya had talked nonstop since we sat down at Bailey’s Diner.
It was our second favorite place to go to.
They did the best milkshakes and served up the most fattening fries and triple burgers.
We’d discovered how great the place was in our teens.
Great food, but also a great place to escape because it was on the not so busy side of town and didn’t get all the action the other diners saw.
It was also a great place to talk without being seen by too many people.
Frankie was watching me today and allowed me some breathing space.
That was what he’d called it and I was grateful.
It gave me a chance to have a much needed catch up session with Anya for a talk I was hoping not to have.
My best friend seemed to be on a roll of chatter and I was happy for her. She was talking about a guy who was a hundred times better than Marc her cheating ex.
Tim, the new guy was a vet and had his own practice. Of course he had a dog and the man just happened to look like a Greek god with a soft spot for animals.
Anya had been out with him five times already and was now contemplating whether a breakfast meeting counted as a date.
“It counts. People meet for breakfast all the time as dates.” I giggled.
Anyone who looked at me would think I’d gone crazy and forgotten my current situation, or that I deserved an academy award for best actress.
I personally thought it was both.
I had gone crazy in my situation and this version of myself that sat before my friend was the mask that deserved the award.
I’d gone to see her to prep to say goodbye to her.
Goodbye for now.
I was certain that Pa would make some arrangement for her to see me somehow and hopefully she could come to the wedding.
The wedding…
I shuddered at the thought. I had a wedding that was mine. I was getting married in less than a month to a man I hated and the man I wanted to be with was some kind of secret agent who had come for my father. My father, the monster. The mafia king who was taking away my choice and rights.
I laughed completely off key at the craziness of it.
Anya narrowed her eyes at me because she hadn’t said anything funny and there I was laughing.
“Jia, you okay? I didn’t say anything funny at all.” She giggled a little and the sound reminded me of our silly girly giggle attacks we used to have when we were kids. Ma used to find it funny how we could laugh at nothing in particular and laugh to the point of tears. It annoyed the hell out of Pa something fierce.
“Oh…” was all I could say. That must have sounded odd too.
What would be more strange was what I had to tell her and the fact that we’d sat here for an hour talking about Tim, or rather me listening to her drool over Tim, while I had so much to tell her.
She blinked and looked me over. The expression on her face became more concerned and it was like she just knew I wasn’t okay.
“What’s up my friend?” she asked.
I smiled. It was a fake smile, but without the fake intention. It was as if someone asked me to smile but there was nothing to smile for.
Where did I begin?
“Um…” Well at least that was some start. It was something. It showed I intended to talk about what was going on with me. I did. I had to. If there was more time though I might delay telling her my problems so we could enjoy that she was so happy with Tim.
I was the kind of friend who loved when her friends were happy and I thought it was nice to take the time to be excited together over whatever that thing was, no matter how big or small.
A new dress, a new man, some item of makeup, something to do with hair. Anything.
Tears pulled at my eyes and a wayward one escaped.
“Jia… what’s up, you’re scaring me.” Anya reached across the table and covered my hands with hers.
I blew out a sharp breath, dabbed at the corners of my eyes and stared at her.
“A lot has happened since we last spoke.” I sighed.
“It looks that way. I’m sorry I wasn’t around. I feel bad. It’s like I ditched you.”
“No.” I moved my hands to hers now to give her a gentle squeeze. “No, it’s so good to hear you talk about a guy the way you are. It makes me so happy. It’s what I want for you. I want you to be happy and be with someone who deserves you. It’s been too long with you being with someone who didn’t.” It was years of her and Marc.
She couldn’t cut his cheating ass loose because she’d loved him. I understood that but it didn’t mean I
couldn’t still want the best for her.
“Thank you, Jia. I like Tim. He’s great and we seem to be into each other a lot. It seems promising and I’m excited, but I’m worried about you again. I guess I hoped things would take off for you and Xander.” She gave me a saucy smile. “Especially after that kiss.”
That kiss she’d seen seemed like such a long time ago now.
He’d kissed me at the coffeehouse. She saw and I felt like just maybe things would be okay.
Promising was what they’d been and they were for maybe a handful of days.
That was all we’d had. Days.
I shook my head. “No, it didn’t work out.”
I took a breath. A deep one and then I told her everything.
Usually I held back on some stuff when we talked. This time I told her what was relevant and could be classed as everything to do with me. So I left out the part about Xander being after Pa, but I told her that Pa threatened to have him killed if I kept seeing him.
On this occasion I knew something of weight was needed, to explain why I wasn’t going to fight for the man I wanted to be with.
Truth be told that was the explanation of why. Although there would have been a lot more to factor in with Xander’s secret. By the time I finished both of us were drying our eyes.
“Your father can’t do that Jia, it’s so wrong.” She shook her head.
“I know, but I don’t know what to do other than what I’m told.”
“God… and this is happening on Monday. You’re leaving on Monday?” Her voice came out in a hurried babble.
I nodded.
“Monday. Yes. That’s when I leave.”
Pa had even given Armand our travel details and the other day he told me to do whatever shopping I needed to and see my friends to say my goodbyes.
It was really happening.
“Jia. This is …” She stopped mid-sentence and brought her hands together. “I know how things work in your family and who your father is. Over the years I’ve tried to just be as supportive as I can but it’s been hard. This is the worst. I feel as helpless as I did when your Ma died. Like I can’t do anything to make it right.”
Tease of Spades: Game of Love Series Page 8
