by Mason, V. F.
A dark lock falls over his face, and I hold back the need to move it away, wanting to feel it under my fingers. Instead, I exhale and place my hand on my chest. “You scared me.”
“Did I?” Callum leans forward, resting his hand above me on the shelf, once again trapping me. My brows furrow when I notice he has a different shirt on this time, even though it’s only been a couple hours since we saw each other last.
Which reminds me. “What are you doing here?” He opens his mouth to reply, but I shake my head. “You know what? I don’t care. Just please leave me alone,” I say without much heat, but really, what the hell is this guy’s problem? “Stop stalking me.”
He chuckles, and the sound sends shivers down my spine, so foreign, because it misses the usual mocking. “Giselle, this is a public library, you know.”
“So?”
He leans closer, his breath fanning my lips when he replies, whispering so no one can hear us, “So… I can come here for no reason.”
“While I’m here?”
“Especially when you’re here.”
“You are such an—” Whatever I want to say transforms into a loud yelp when the book slips from my fingers and lands on my toes, pain instantly traveling through me.
Callum curses under his breath and kneels in front of me, lifting my foot onto his thigh.
“Ouch.” I wince when his thumb brushes over my nail, which is quickly going purple. “It hurts.” Even to me, my voice sounds whiny, but he continues to inspect it, lightly pressing on the skin around it.
“You’ll have a bruise, but it’s nothing serious.” A dull ache replaces the pain, and his fingers skim over the skin of my calf, and only then our position registers in my hazy brain.
“Flawless,” he murmurs, his breath skirting over my legs as he slowly puts my foot back on the carpet and rises, making sure to brush our chests together. I don’t even breathe for fear of destroying this moment.
He flashes a book in front of my eyes. “The flowers on the cover are flawless,” he murmurs, and I narrow my eyes, fuming inside.
Jerk.
I snatch the book away from him, opening it to page seventy, and show him the picture of certain roses. “It’s one of the rarest flowers in the world.”
“Expensive one too,” he adds, crossing his arms.
“Exactly. Lachlan has one, a real one,” I emphasize, “in his garden.”
He shrugs. “So?”
“So… it’s awesome!” I hiss, quickly glancing to the side, but no one pays attention to us, since we’re so far away. “You know how rare it is to see something like that in real life?”
“I own a botanic company. I see all that a lot,” he says.
Some excitement dims inside me, reminding me of all the times when I had some crazy ideas and Grandfather would step all over them. “Yeah, of course.” I muster a smile. “I’m going back to researching, and you can… do whatever you came here for.” I move to dart to my table, when his strong hand blocks my exit and brings me back, pressing me against the shelves, making them rattle. “What are you doing?” I ask, when he shifts closer and his scent surrounds me.
“Lachlan bought this flower for his… woman.” I don’t miss the strange tone at that. “He found the name fitting for her.” Callum tips my chin up. “Don’t give me fake smiles anymore.”
“How do you know it’s fake?”
“Because I do. I’m not sorry-ass Kevin who had his eyes on someone else.” He almost spits his name, and I’m taken aback by the jealousy coating his words.
I hadn’t even met him until two days ago. Why does he care what I did and with who?
“Lachlan’s woman is lucky.” He frowns, so I elaborate, “She has a rare flower.”
“Is that what you want?”
A humorless laugh echoes between us as I run my fingers through my hair and say with frustration, “What I want is for you to stop following me around and popping up out of nowhere.” I shake the book. “This is my job, and thank you for helping me get it. And until six o’clock hits, I’m at work. But please stop acting like this.”
“It’s six-oh-one,” he replies, wrapping his hand around my waist and pulling us together, my hands stuck between us since I’m still holding on to the damn book.
“What are—” His mouth covers mine, and he swallows my surprised gasp, his hips pushing into me.
Even though his touch sends desire swirling through me, I don’t want to surrender. Then he bites on my lower lip, tugging it gently before slipping his tongue inside and finding mine, and all the breath whooshes from me.
Leaving me alone in the world he created for both of us.
His tongue plays with mine, sweeping my mouth while he kisses me deeply, possessively, all consumingly, and his hand laces in my hair, angling my head for deeper access.
A moan slips past me, and the book drops once again to the floor as my hands fist his shirt, bringing him closer, because any distance between us seems like an offense.
My lungs are burning from lack of oxygen, but I don’t want to stop while his scent and power dust over me like a shield from everyone else.
Even if on some level I despise him for it.
He unlocks our mouths, shifting his lips to my neck, where he sucks on the skin while his hand hikes up my leg over his hip, his hard-on digging into my core. “You are burning in my arms, my wild orchid,” he whispers over my skin before biting it, stinging it, and then soothing it with a soft lick. “Is your pussy soaked, my love?” he asks, and although my cheeks heat, I find his mouth again and kiss him hard, giving in to the passionate embrace.
He complies with my desire, but then I feel his fingers skimming over my thigh as he raises my skirt up, up, up till he has me exposed in the corner of the library. “It should be a crime to be as desirable as you are, Giselle,” he says, and I rest my head on the shelf, burning from the inside out and needing an outlet for the emotion. Then his fingers reach the edge of my panties, and I gasp when he slips them inside, brushing over my aching center. “Ah, wet indeed.” He glides his fingers over the sensitive skin and the fire inside me intensifies, still aching.
Finally, he pushes them inside, and his mouth lands on mine once again, silencing my moans. He slowly, so agonizingly slowly, moves his finger back and forth, creating a friction that drives me insane yet gives me no satisfaction.
The kiss turns heated, as if he’s staking a claim on me that doesn’t belong there. I want to drown in these sensations and forget everything, because in my life, no one has ever—
The loud sneeze of someone wakes me up from the encounter, and mortification flows over me like cold water.
With a loud whimper, I push him way, and his fingers slip past me while I quickly adjust my dress, my heart beating wildly in my chest.
Oh my God! I let a guy finger me in a public library. How can one man possess such power over me that I lose my damned mind around him and do reckless things I would have never done before? “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God,” I chant, horrified with myself, and then it transforms into anger when Callum laughs.
“That was the plan, but the sneezing kid ruined it.” I kick him, which only earns me a lift of a brow. “This is not funny! If they’d caught us, we’d be on the news.” I could just imagine the headlines too.
Marvin Walker’s daughter caught in a library having sex.
Plus, the cocky smile of his only makes it worse, because it seems our moment was magical only for me.
“I’d pay the media off. Don’t worry, darling. Your good-girl image wouldn’t have been tarnished.” A beat, and then he asks, “What scares you more? The idea that a good girl can sin like that in the library? Or that you want to sin with me?” he says as if it’s supposed to mean something to me.
“Stay away from me, Callum,” I hiss right before I hear several voices closer to us, and with one last glance at him, I pick up my book and go back to my table, not allowing myself to look over my shoulder.
Sitting on the chair, I resist the urge to groan into my hands and instead pretend to search for something on my tablet, all while watching Callum leave the library. Once he does, I exhale in relief, even though my pulse is still beating rapidly.
The guy is a complete jerk to me most of the time, yet my body always betrays me in his presence. Am I so starved for attention that even this will do?
Huffing in frustration, I resume my research, ignoring the tiny voice in my head that screams Callum is not a jerk.
He just showed me what lacked in my relationship with Kevin from the very beginning and why I chose him as husband material.
Passion.
It’s easy to marry or date a man who to you is safe.
What do you do though if you meet a man who destroys the world as you know it and drops you in a sea of desire so strong you fear you can’t function without it?
Run before it destroys you.
Because inevitably, that’s what will happen.
True love never has a happy ending.
Callum
Licking my lips still containing her taste, I breathe in the scarf she left behind and can almost get off on it alone.
My Persephone was irresistible before.
Now though?
She is vitally important.
I can’t wait as I originally planned to court her, making her fall in love with me.
No, my wild orchid needs a wild approach and passion, something she’s lacked her whole life.
Taking out my phone, I type.
Time to claim what always belonged to me and was stolen from me so unfairly.
I thought revenge tasted cold and bitter.
I was wrong.
Revenge tastes like Giselle.
Sweet, and all consuming.
Chapter Ten
Giselle
Flipping through the book, I mark a few points about maze design, and my brows rise at the information there. According to this, the reason they created mazes was to trap intruders who sneaked inside the castle grounds during the Civil War, seeking shelter. The original owner of Lachlan’s property despised strangers and preferred to live secluded, so he had bear traps spread throughout the mazes.
People died out there, and he wouldn’t help them.
A shiver rushes through me, and I shake my head, pushing the book aside. God, I wouldn’t want to live in a place with such history!
But then Lachlan is anything but normal, based on the rumors floating around.
“How was the job?” Isla asks, taking out the ham and bread from the refrigerator. She was dismissed from her case once again, because she wanted to dig deeper when she saw a certain connection to an older case. And whenever that happened, it was sandwich and beer night at her house.
“Pretty creepy and cool. Yours?” I’m watching her reaction and sigh when she closes off, turning away from me and fumbling with the coffee pot.
“Good.”
“Isla….” I’m trying to find the right words in this situation, but everything sounds lame in my head.
“Yeah, my point exactly.” She silently reads my mind. “No evidence will ever be good enough for my chief.”
What she really wants to say though is that she will never find the serial killer who wiped out her entire family during her cousin’s wedding. The priest’s head was hung on the door, greeting the police as they arrived… too late.
Isla is the only surviving victim of the incident; the killer chained her to the wall and made her watch as he, one by one, tortured and killed her family. Then he smeared her cheeks in blood and, with a salute, left. She was locked in the chapel for ten hours with all those bodies until rescue came.
She was fifteen.
The nightmares haunt her to this day; she wakes up screaming in the middle of the night with sweat coating her skin.
“It doesn’t matter,” she whispers, and then takes a bite of her sandwich. “What about Callum?”
Even though I avoid this topic like the plague, I give in to the change of subject, because the former brings her pain. “Nothing. Hopefully we won’t cross again.”
Even I can hear bullshit in my words, and Isla snorts, walking toward the couch and dropping next to me. “Yeah, right.”
“I’m serious. This whole thing is bizarre.”
She licks the condiment from her fingers, musing over my words. “Honestly, what’s bizarre about that? It’s called sexual chemistry.”
“With two meetings?” Although I told her about the incident in his office, I kept my mouth shut about the library.
Just remembering his breath on my skin, while his fingers grazed—
Isla clicks her fingers in front of my face. “Earth to Giselle.”
“Sorry.”
“Anyway, he is a good rebound choice.”
I choke on a sip of water. “Rebound?”
“Well, after Kevin broke your… pride. You can have a hot affair with Callum. He is young, single, hot, and available. What’s not to like?” she asks, looking at me while my jaw drops.
“Well, it’s not—”
“What? Good, according to people? Whatever.”
Her other statement registers. “Pride, huh?”
She nods, finishing her sandwich and grabbing a paper napkin. “Let’s face it—you never loved the guy. Why you agreed to marry him is beyond me.” I open my mouth to protest, but she shushes me with her index finger. “You hadn’t even slept with him. And the bastard cheated on you. I think you are allowed to have a wild affair.” She wiggles her brows, and I hit her with a pillow, so she yells, “Hey!”
“If I listened to you, I’d hook up with every available guy.”
But there is some merit in her words. Why do I even resist what Callum wants? I mean I know I haven’t known him that long, but the intensity… it’s there.
Isn’t that enough for a one-night stand or a fling?
My body burns with his touch, demanding him to soothe the inferno he creates, and his sheer presence blocks the outside world away.
Why not explore it?
The ringing of the doorbell snaps me out of my thoughts, and I get up to check who it is.
Peeking through the peephole I see a delivery guy and open it up, smiling. “Hi!” he greets and then looks at his notepad. “I have a delivery for Giselle Walker.”
“That’s me.” He gives me the box and then nods. “Have a nice day.” I blink as he speedily goes to the elevator, and then I shut the door with a kick, studying the box.
“Someone got a present,” Isla murmurs and joins me by the kitchen counter when I snatch a knife from the magnet strip to open it up.
The minute the box falls apart, I gasp and wrap my hands around the brown pot, in awe of the beauty in front of me.
“What’s this?” she asks, leaning toward it, and her nose twitches as she smells it.
“It’s a Shenzhen Nongke Orchid,” I whisper, caressing the yellow petals that surround the white and dark red mixed with purple flower. The sheath is long, tilting a little in my direction, and I can’t stop staring at the thing.
“Judging by your reaction, you got a diamond.”
“They cost a fortune, one of the rarest and most expensive types of orchid,” I reply absently, my gaze still glued to the flower. The price doesn’t matter either; the sheer beauty that nature has created has me in permanent awe. I’ve only seen them in books, and once during university, we had a professor who brought one to class.
“Yeah, that guy’s going all in,” Isla mutters and then points at the card attached to the pot. “You got a message too.”
She slips it under my nose, and I flip it open, reading it quickly, my heart banging in my chest so loudly I’m sure Isla can hear it.
A wild orchid for a wild orchid.
—Callum
Warmth fills my chest at his gift, even though it’s outrageously expensive and shouldn’t be given to me at all … yet it suits me perfectly. For the first time, someone has given me a gif
t that’s all about me, taking into consideration my likes and dislikes. Without thinking I might want it because I’m a Walker… or not getting something for the same reason.
My brows furrow when I notice two more envelopes at the bottom of the box. “I wonder what’s inside them, to top that,” Isla muses, sipping her coffee as I find two invitations to the Dungeon of Burlesque, one of the most prestigious clubs in the city. Access is allowed by invitation only. Lucy begged me to go with her multiple times, but I always refused, feeling out of place in such establishments.
But my life changes with my every action. Shouldn’t I try new things too?
And soon, with the project Callum helped me land, I won’t have to care what Grandfather thinks either, because he won’t have Darius’s well-being dangling over my head. The whole reason I went back to listening to him and playing nice with the family was because his condition was to be a united front of Walkers for Dad’s campaign.
A prisoner in my own family.
The sexy jerk though, who acts like I belong to him, in a way gave me a stepping-stone toward freedom. This knowledge counts more than the flowers itself.
“It’s for both of us,” I say, reading our names. “What do you think?”
Isla wraps her hand around my waist and rests her head on my shoulder. “I think you’re about to have fun.”
Maybe that’s exactly what I need.
A harmless one-night stand with a man who shows up in the most inappropriate places and gifts me the most beautiful things.
Callum
I smile when I see the pure joy on Giselle’s face while she lovingly caresses the petals one more time before going to the guest room, to prepare for the evening I assume.
This time, she can pick the dress herself. She doesn’t know I picked the one she showed up in for Lucy’s engagement. She had to look flawless and exquisite for that stupid thing, so no one would feel sorry for her.
My woman is a queen, and everyone will treat her like it.
