The mention of my mother and my life with my family makes him frown.
Shit. Trust me to go ruin the mood. I look at him from under my lashes. “You nearly came home to me naked but for one of your ties knotted around my neck.”
His eyes gleam. “What stopped you?”
“Couldn’t find the right tie,” I joke.
He sighs. It is clear that he is preoccupied with something else. “Yes, I’ll take you on a date, Liliana Eden.”
“Thank you,” I say to him and I want to kiss him so badly, but it doesn’t seem right. He seems sad somehow. Perhaps his meetings didn’t go well. All my life I have never seen my father look sad. No matter what happens at work, he always has a smile full of sunshine for my mum.
Brand drags his gaze away from mine and towards his door. “What is it?”
“Phone call, boss,” the guard standing outside the door says.
Brand turns back to me. “Have you eaten?”
I nod.
“Go upstairs then,” he says softly.
I jump up with a bright smile. “Okay.” I hurry up the stairs, my heart pounding hard. I asked him out on a date and he said yes! I lean against the wall, a stupid grin on my face. Alright what am I to do now? He said go upstairs but that can mean either my room or his. I know I want to be with him tonight. I look at the two doors and summon up the courage to go into his room.
The worst he can do is kick me out.
As I sit on his bed, the thought occurs to me that kicking me out might be a little harder to do if I am already asleep. So I strip, pulling off my khaki shorts and t-shirt till I am dressed only in my underwear. I take off my bra for double effect and slide underneath the covers. Then I shut my eyes and practice controlling my breathing to a steady rhythm. About half an hour later when I am almost truly asleep I hear him come into the room.
It brings me instantly awake and I quickly control my breathing to pull off my pretense of being asleep. If he is anything like my father as I suspect, faking sleep is not something that I can even dream of getting away with. I hear him stop for a little bit and wonder whether he will think I am taking liberties and ask me to leave, but he only heads towards the bathroom. A few minutes later he returns and the mattress next to me compresses.
He lies next to me, but he doesn’t try to pull me to him and curl up against me. My real acting begins then. I wait a little while, then keeping my eyes shut, I combine a little provocative moaning sound with a little maneuvering and some light flailing of my arms. Suddenly, I am right next to him. This is enough. I’m close enough that I can feel his warmth. Anymore and it will be too obvious.
“You are a little minx, aren’t you?” Brand says in the dark.
My heart almost stops. I consider pretending I don’t know what he is talking about, but what’s the point? “I missed you all day,” I whisper.
“So did I, Liliana. So did I,” he says as he pulls me into his arms. He makes love to me in a way he has never done. There is something desperate about the silent, vicious thrusts. As if this is our last time, or as if he just can’t get enough of me.
Chapter Forty-One
Liliana
I fall asleep with him inside me, and wake up still spooned against Brand. His head is resting in the cradle of my neck. One of his arms is wrapped around my chest, while the other is under my pillow.
His breathing is steady and I know that he is still asleep. When I try to move, Brand pulls me even closer. For the next few minutes I just lay there savoring the unbeatable feeling of being in his arms. I know the moment he comes awake. Without a word he lets go of me, rises to his feet, and gets out of bed. I turn to see him leave, dressed in only a pair of dark briefs and instantly I go after him.
A few seconds later I follow him and find him leaning against the counter, his head lowered and eyes shut. I lean against the door and watch him curiously. My hair is long enough to cover my breasts, so I don’t feel too self-conscious standing before him naked.
The movement alerts him to my presence and he glances at me through the mirror.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
He straightens and nods. “Yeah.” Then he retrieves a can of shaving cream and rubs it over his lower face. Taking a deep breath, I head towards him and stop behind his broad, strong back. I am quite short compared to Brand I realize with some surprise. I barely reach his shoulders. Sliding my arm around his waist, I press my chest to his back and start to trace patterns down his skin as I speak.
“I want to shave you today,” I whisper.
He goes very still. The seconds go by without any reaction from him. Then he catches my wrists and begins to pull my arms away from his waist. I feel the tears of disappointment sting my eyes. It’s always one step forward and two back with him. To my surprise, though, he turns around lifts me up and places me on the counter. I gaze up at him with a mixture of adoration and surprise as he positions himself between my legs and hands me the razor.
“Be careful,” he says to me, and shuts his eyes.
His lashes are long, very long, I realize. The luxuriously thick hairs brush his cheeks. His jaw is strong, and his hair is slicked away from his face. Damn he is handsome. I want to kiss him, but his face is already covered in shaving cream so I lean down and begin to press kisses along his shoulders.
It makes him laugh. He leans slightly away from me. “I thought you wanted to shave me,” he says.
I want him so much I can barely speak. “You should have fucked me before you got out of bed,” I say quietly, “now I think my hands are too shaky to do a good job.”
His shining eyes darken with desire as his head lowers to take my breasts in his mouth. He sucks on the mounds, his hand giving me a caress sweet enough to melt stone. He traces kisses down my skin, and then down my belly towards my sex. Before he can go all the way down I pull him back up. “I don’t want shaving cream all the way there, look what you’ve done already.” We both glance down at the trails of white suds he has left down my body. His smile makes it hard to breathe.
“You need some of it down there, anyway,” he says, “have you forgotten I’m meant to shave you too?”
My face turns red and it makes him laugh out loud. The sound is boisterous and beautiful. I stare at him.
“You’re so fucking adorable when you blush,” he says.
“I wonder what would make you blush.”
“Killers don’t blush, Princess.”
I sober up instantly and the mood between us changes. I look deep into his eyes. “I don’t care what you did in the past. I am only interested in the present and the future.”
“You think we have a future together, Princess?”
“Yes, I think so. I know I can convince my father. My mother says my father has not said no to me since I was two years old.”
He smiles sadly. “Yeah, I bet he hasn’t. Nobody’s said no to you, have they Princess?”
“You have.”
“No, I fucking haven’t. You’ve got me all twisted around your little finger.”
“Well, you’ve got me all twisted around your big dick.”
He laughs. “Okay. You win. Now, why don’t you shave me first then I’ll do you, and we can finish this off in the shower.”
“Sounds good,” I say to him and with my legs pull him back towards me and pick up the razor.
“Be careful,” he warns.
“Don’t be such a little coward. I’m not going to hurt you.”
“I know,” he says, “but your hand still hurts, doesn't it?”
I look into his eyes, “It does, but not enough for me to slip.” There might be something in Pierre’s advice. With a secret smile at his concern I begin to shave away at his slight stubble.
“You’re surprisingly good at this,” he comments.
“I’m my father’s daughter-“ I immediately stop at the dangerous topic, and just in time to see his gaze drop from mine. He doesn’t urge me to go on, and neither do I. The fear is al
most as intense as the excitement. It seems that neither of us can quite get enough of our new-found harmony, but at the same time it almost seems as though we’re both just waiting for it to break, for whatever miracle that has caused this camaraderie between us to just shatter into a million pieces.
With my hands on his shoulder to keep him in place, I carry on moving the razor up and down his face slowly. As more skin is exposed I can’t help but notice how baby soft and smooth it is.
I ask him about it and his reply is simple. “I have no idea. I just use whatever Lindy puts in my bathroom.”
His casual careless answer makes me smile. Of course, he doesn’t give a shit what cream he puts on his face. Soon I am completely done. I put the shaving stick down. Before I can reach for a towel to wipe his face, he grabs my thighs.
“Put your arms around my neck,” he says, and I immediately do as instructed. He pulls my ass forward and pushes on my chest so I am leaning against the mirror.
Brand spreads my legs apart.
“It might be a bit uncomfortable for you in a few days,” I mumble shyly. “I usually use something else.”
Brand pumps shaving cream unto his hands and begins to slather it all over my sex, his eyes full of concentration. “I'll take you any way I can get you.”
At his words, I am able to relax as he takes the razor gently in and out of my crevices, his hands as steady as I’d expect from a man like him. When he is finished he wipes me clean.
“There. Freshly shaven and ready to be fucked.”
Picking me up he takes me into the shower stall and there, he kisses me so passionately I just plain give up on the notion of standing on my own two feet. I cling to his neck, my eyes gazing into his as he washes me with soap, his fingers teasing between the lips of my sex.
“Are you cleaning me up or trying to get me dirty again?” I gasp.
The corner of his mouth slightly tilts up in a sexy smirk just before he takes my lips. I hold on for dear life, completely lost to the man and the torment of his charm.
Somehow we manage to leave the bathroom after an hour and once again I am sat on the counter as Brand dries me up. My stratagem is simple. A pout and a soft purr of ‘my arm hurts’ and I get taken care of like a baby. How I wish Pierre is still around just so I can give him a big hug for his “advice”. I don’t even dare mention him, lest I trigger Brand. I don’t want to risk my current state of euphoric bliss. Once I am bone dry and feeling like a cat that got the cream I pick up his lotion and begin to rub the light liquid all over his perfect face.
“I'm jealous of your skin,” I say to him, turning to the bottle and reading the fine print. “What is this that Lindy has bought for you? Whoa! Korean snail essence?”
He smiles. “Do you know I couldn’t read or write until I met Lindy.”
I turn to look at him. “You really owe a lot to that woman, don’t you?”
He nods slowly. “Yeah. I don’t know what I would have become without her.”
I take his drier from him and begin to blow dry his hair. Our time together is quiet and we are both still mindful of straying too far into forbidden topics, but it is oh, so wonderful.
I am worried though about the time he has spent with me. “Won’t you be leaving the house today?” I ask as casually as I can.
“Later on,” he says to me and that is a good enough answer.
“I’ll make you breakfast then,” I say to him.
He instantly shuts me down. “No need, I’ll order something in.”
“Oh,” I say and watch as he pulls on his pants. I’m in a towel and about to head to my room to get changed, but just before I pull the door open, I change my mind, and decide to be bold. “I’m making you breakfast, Brand Vaughan,” I say to him. “Nothing in this world beats my blueberry pancakes so you better be damned psyched to try it out.”
He is startled at my sudden outburst, and for a few moments I am not sure if my move was smart or just plain overbearing so I sheepishly add, “You will be forever changed. I swear it.”
Brand nods, as a small smile plays on his lips.
Trying to control the warmth swelling in my heart, I exit the room and hurry to get changed. Brand unsettles me. I am not sure what Brand’s true personality is. He used to be cruel and sardonic, but now it seems as though he is calmly watching it all, watching me … but for what or why I am not certain.
Chapter Forty-Two
Brand
9 years earlier
For almost two horrendous weeks I was taken to other stately houses for ‘parties’ where other monsters had the same ideas for lubrication.
Then I realized how I could escape.
When Havant came down with his taser he saw me lying prone in bed. He fired his gun at me and saw me jerking around on the bed. When he was certain I was incapacitated he came in. Imagine his shock when I attacked him from behind.
I was hiding behind the door. The person on the bed was a dummy I had made using my clothes and the mattress filling. I had connected it to a piece of wood I had broken off the bed so I could jerk the dummy around from behind the door.
I had waited four hours for the bastard to come down.
Naked and almost blue with cold I was almost out of my mind with fear and rage. I kicked the shit out of that low life. He was a real coward. He pissed and shat himself. Once he was unconscious I got dressed and made my way to the first floor. When I found no one there I ran as far away as I could from his hellhole.
I began to live on the streets. I’d beg at the train station and sleep in the dumpster at night. A couple of times I got robbed and once beaten up by a gang of thugs, but then I found out about this place you could go to for a hot meal. There were a lot of do-gooders there and a lot of unwashed drunks, but that was also where I met Lindy.
Two weeks after moving in with Lindy, a man approached me in the street. He said he needed a runner. Nothing dangerous. Mostly carrying money from one club to another. Someone to do little things. Someone under-aged who the authorities would go easy on.
After a week, he offered to send me to school. He told me to be a criminal I needed to have an appetite for violence. Pain, he said, made a man weak and I had too much pain inside. Long story short, he didn’t think I had it in me.
Shit! I was surprised. He was actually offering me to go straight. I thought of his generous offer, but I decided not to take it. I didn’t want to become another tax paying cog in the machinery.
No, I wanted to be as rich as Jake Eden. I started hanging around with other young, ambitious gangsters, but I had something they didn’t. Raw, undiluted anger. After what those men had done to me I took to violence like a duck takes to water. The need for revenge was like a disease in my blood. I went back to Havant’s house and torched it. The next day Lindy read the newspapers and told me that a man had died in the blaze. I would have dearly loved to pay a visit to some of those sick men who abused me, but I was always taken in the back of vans and did not know how to return to those great houses.
Just once I saw one of them. The creep was with his wife and kid. She was blonde and so up her ass, I wanted to go up to her and tell her what her husband did for kicks when she was not around.
I walked up to him and pretended to spill my cup of coffee on him. He jumped up furiously, cursing and ready to lash out. Then he looked into my eyes and suddenly he went as white as a sheet. He fell back in his chair and mumbled his apologies.
I smiled very slowly.
I got him a job feeding the fishes at the bottom of the Thames. But before that I taught him all about lubrication.
Yeah, well, so goes life. I never saw my father again. He died of a broken heart in prison, but my rise as a gangster was nothing short of meteoric.
Chapter Forty-Three
Liliana
As I sprint down the stairs, I can see him already at the bottom of the stairs on his phone. He has on dark slacks, and a sky-blue jumper and it makes him look so elegantly sexy that I feel a rush
of pride. That’s my man there! As I reach the last rung of the staircase, I spread out my arms and jump straight at him.
To his credit he reacts fast. Catching me while still keeping his phone in his hand. Even so my jump is so sudden and unexpected he staggers a few steps backwards, his back hitting the door. I feel like an overly exuberant sibling in the arms of an incredibly patient brother, but I can see that he has no experience being playful.
He is staring straight into my eyes with an odd expression.
“Straight to the kitchen, young man,” I command in an impervious voice.
Shaking his head at my silliness, he indulges my request. Putting me on my feet he goes to the table and takes another incoming phone call. I head over to the fridge and start gathering all the ingredients I’ll need. When I glance at him, I see him watching me intently as he listens to the speaker on the other end of his phone.
While he takes out a pad and pen and starts scribbling down notes I make a start on the big breakfast I’d planned to impress him with. When Brand rounds up his call, he comes over and takes the can of baked beans I was about to open and starts to do it for me, saying, “You shouldn’t be straining your hand.”
Ah yes, my hand. Pierre wouldn’t approve, but I go behind him and slide my arms around his waist. “Actually, my hand doesn’t hurt anymore.”
“No?”
“No,” I say, reveling in his warmth. I have to admit my interest in cooking has diminished somewhat since I put my cheek on his back.
“Let me see your hand,” he says.
I allow him to raise my wrist and inspect it. “See, it’s all better.”
“Hmmm …While I am here I might as well make myself useful. What do you need help with?”
I look towards the onions with which I plan to make an omlette.
“Want to help me chop those?”
“Onions?” he says with a smile.
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