“Hmm,” she moans, as though full sentences are beyond her. “I couldn’t help myself.”
“Just like you won’t be able to help yourself when I finally claim you,” I growl. “You think you’re going to be nervous. You think you won’t know what to do. But when your fantasy becomes a reality, you won’t be able to stop.”
Her eyes flicker with warring emotions, as though part of her wants to believe me but part of her can’t risk it.
I sit back with a smirk, nodding. “You’ll see, my perfect virgin. You’ll see.”
She bites her lip for a moment, and then lets it go, glancing out her side of the window as the city passes us by. It’s still busy despite the time, the sidewalks packed, the traffic moving in sporadic movements.
“Miller.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you think it’s possible my aunt had a part to play in our meeting?”
I reach over and touch her shoulder softly, my chest tightening at the heavy emotion in her voice. “What do you mean?”
She reaches up and clasps onto my hand. “On her deathbed, she said she wanted me to find a man, a man who’d…”
Who’d love me, she was going to say, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe if I blurted that out now, she’d withdraw.
I can’t risk it, not when we’re finally on the same path.
“She wanted me to find somebody,” she goes on firmly. “But I told her I doubted that would ever happen. So she said she’d wish for it as she passed, her final wish. I know it sounds silly.”
“No,” I growl, with hot certainty in my voice. “Or maybe it does. It should. But it doesn’t to me. Not even a little bit. You’ve unlocked doors inside of me, Macie, doors I didn’t even know existed.”
She turns to me with the most heart-touching smile I’ve ever seen, as though she’s been waiting all her life for this moment, and for a terrifying second I think tears are going to spring to my eyes. It’s the suddenness of the emotion, the closeness, the unexpectedness that a man like me could ever feel something so deeply.
I lean in and softly kiss her cheek, stunned at how quickly we can go from banter to lust to love, to fucking love.
Because that’s what this is.
Even if saying it this soon could be a mistake.
Chapter Seventeen
Macie
“This place is amazing,” I murmur, as Miller pulls out my chair for me.
Our table is on the upper balcony, a private area separated from the rest of the restaurant by a curtain, half-pulled right now so the waiters can come and take our order. Beneath us, the ballroom-style restaurant expands massively, with chandeliers glittering from the ceilings and a large stage where a jazz band plays soft ambient music.
“It used to be a theater,” Miller says as he walks around to his chair.
He looks dashing and powerful in his dark suit, his shirt open at the top to reveal a preview of his sculpted flesh. My body is still hot from all the craziness in the car, the banter and the emotion and the magic of it all, but it gets even hotter when he unbuttons his suit jacket, revealing the way his shirt clings onto his rocky abs.
“Yeah, I can tell,” I say, forcing my attention back to our conversation so I’m not just ogling him. “It’s really beautiful.”
He smirks, and I know what he’s going to say before he says it.
“Nah uh.” I giggle. “No cheesy lines, thank you very much.”
“What?” he says, laughing.
“You were going to say not as beautiful as you, right?”
I can’t believe I can summon the confidence to make this sort of assertion, to tell him that he was going to call me beautiful. I expect him to laugh at me, to call me deranged, to tell me I need to stop letting a few compliments flood my mind with confidence.
But instead, he chuckles and nods. “I told you, Macie. You can read me like a book.”
“Sir, madam,” the waiter says, appearing at the edge of our table like he freaking teleported.
He has a British accent and stands stiff-backed, proper in the extreme.
“Would you like to start with some drinks?”
“Sure.” Miller nods. “I’ll take an orange soda.”
The waiter turns to me. “And for the madam?”
“I’ll have the same,” I tell him.
“And we’ll need some time with the menus.”
“Of course, sir.”
The waiter bows and retreats.
“You could’ve ordered something stronger if you want to,” I tell Miller, once we’re alone again.
“I’ve never been much of a drinker.” He shrugs. “And anyway, you could’ve ordered something too. You’re twenty-one.”
“Yeah, but I’ve never been much of a drinker either. My aunt… well, I don’t want to speak ill of the dead. But the fact is she had a bit of a drinking problem. I guess a lot of people do in her socialite circle. She used to have a big glass of whiskey at two in the afternoon sometimes. I’m not judging her for it. But…”
“But you don’t want to be the same,” he says quietly, with understanding heavy in his voice.
“Exactly.”
“You don’t have to be ashamed of that,” he says. “You can still love a person, miss them, even if you didn’t like everything they did when they were alive.”
I smile, and then my smile grows wider and it’s like I’m going crazy.
My man – my man – chuckles. “What?” he asks.
“It’s just you, Miller. You’ve got this habit of describing exactly what I’m thinking. It’s scary. But scary-good.”
“Oh, really? I was looking forward to being scary-bad.”
I giggle and then the waiter brings our drinks, placing down the cleanest glasses I’ve ever seen, so they sparkle more than the chandeliers.
I turn to the menu, my eyes scanning the cuisine.
And then my belly rumbles.
A blush shoots up my neck and over my cheeks, my heart hammering with shame.
“I’m so sorry,” I say.
Miller narrows his eyes at me. “That’s it. I’m keeping a tally.”
“What do you mean?”
“Every time you say the s word, you get spanked.”
“What, sorry?”
He grins like a beast. “There’s one.”
“Are you kidding me right now?” I laugh.
“Not even a little bit. You have nothing to apologize for. Goddamn, so you’re belly rumbled. Who cares?”
“It’s not exactly the sort of thing a woman does on a date, is it?”
“I’m not interested in what random women do on dates, Macie. I’m interested in what you do on a date.”
“So you’re saying my rumbling belly turns you on, is that it?”
The sassy remark comes without me having time to think about it, to second-guess it, but right away I can’t believe I just said that.
“Damn right,” Miller says, chuckling.
And then it’s like I remember.
I don’t have to be ashamed. I don’t have to be self-conscious.
With Miller, I can just be.
“So what got your belly rumbling, eh?”
There’s a flurry inside of me when he says this, a whispering voice telling me he’s mocking me, but then I push that aside and I focus on what’s really happening instead.
We’re having fun. He’s teasing me playfully.
This is the sort of thing couples do.
“I was looking at the gourmet burgers,” I admit. “I know you’re supposed to order something super fancy when you come to a place like this, but these look absolutely delicious. I was thinking of ordering the flame-grilled barbecue one.”
“So do it,” Miller says. “In fact, that sounds delicious. I’ll get the same.”
“But then I was thinking…”
“Hmm?” he says when I trail off.
“Well, you don’t exactly want me stuffing a burger into my mouth when we’re on a date.”
> “That’s another spank.”
“What?” I giggle in delight. “But I didn’t say the S-word.”
“Yeah, but you’re making excuses for being you, and in my mind, that’s the same damn thing. I told you before, Macie. I want you to be you. Whatever that means, that’s what I want. Because – and I know this is cheesy, but it’s the goddamn truth – you’re perfect the way you are. So, two burgers?”
I smile as his words whisper over me, making my skin tingle warmly, making every part of me light up with the confident assurances in his tone.
“Yes, that sounds nice.”
Miller gestures for the waiter and makes the order, and then he turns to me with that look he has, that way he has of gazing into me as though nothing else exists, as though a war could break out in the restaurant below and he wouldn’t even care as long as he could still gaze at me.
It makes me feel seen in a way I’ve never experienced before, always drifting through life as the invisible girl.
“Tell me about your book, Macie.”
I shrug. “I’m only a few chapters into it.”
“I don’t care if you’re one word into it. It’s your passion and I want to hear about it.”
I smile. I think I’m starting to get the message now.
Miller wants me for me, but it’s not like I can flick a switch and suddenly accept that. Even so, I have to try and stop these unfair sentiments from swirling through me, caging me inside a prison of self-consciousness.
Maybe with Miller, I can just be, for the first time in my life.
“It’s a fantasy romance about a woman who falls in love with a rare breed of a giant. They’re human-sized, but they still have the features of a giant. And, in this world, giants are used as servants and it’s forbidden for her to be with him. So they have to meet in secret… and I’m also trying to work in a plot about them helping this secret rebel organization, but it’s getting a little messy… what?”
I trail off as his smirk grows wider and wider.
“Nothing,” he says. “It’s just amazing to see how passionate you get when you talk about your work. Have you written much, then? When did you start?”
“I don’t normally talk about myself.”
“I don’t normally decide to make a stranger the woman I’m going to spend the rest of my life with. I don’t normally feel like said stranger is casting a love spell on me. But here we are.”
“A love spell.” I laugh. “Maybe that’s something I should include in my book.”
“Maybe,” he says, his voice suddenly intense. “But the thing is, Macie, I didn’t need a spell to…”
Suddenly something crashes below us, and then a few people cheer and a few others make posh tsk noises.
I peer down to see a waiter has dropped something, his shirt covered in dark red sauce.
I turn back to Miller, desperate for him to finish what he was going to say.
Was he going to say he loves me, the same way I love him?
Even if it’s impossible.
Even if it makes us crazy.
But the moment has passed, and then our food is here.
Chapter Eighteen
Miller
I can’t believe how close I was to saying I love you.
The words were right there, whispering across my lips, roaring out to be spoken as I stared into the eyes of my queen. It was like my seed was surging around my body with vicious speed, telling me to claim her right now, not to worry about her telling me we’re moving too fast.
But then the waiter dropped the food and it was like it was fate, stopping me before I made a mistake, before I ruined what we’re building.
I watch as she takes a bite of her burger, closing her eyes to savor the taste. I love – love, there’s that word again – the way she enjoys her food, fueling her thick curvy body so she’s ready to carry our children into this world.
She opens her eyes and giggles, swallowing, and that gets my beast mind flitting to other times she might swallow. I imagine her on her knees, her gorgeous breasts freed, staring wide-eyed up at me as her throat flutters the same way it is now.
“This is so delicious.”
“It is,” I agree, even if the taste of her hot pussy was so much better, so much more satisfying.
I push the thought away, focusing on our date.
“So, you were going to tell me when you started writing.”
She cocks an eyebrow. “Oh, was I now?”
“Yes,” I smirk. “You were going to give me a comprehensive history. So, tell me, Macie. What made you want to be a writer?”
“It’s a cliché, but it’s the truth. I can’t remember ever not wanting to be a writer. It might have had something to do with my aunt. After my family… when it was just me and my aunt, it wasn’t like she became this mother figure or anything. She was still very much dedicated to her work. So the times we were closest were when she was writing and I was sitting in her study with her.”
Her whole face lights up as she describes this. I’ve heard that phrase countless times before. But it really happens with my woman, her cheeks blooming, her expression blossoming for me.
She looks like there’s light bursting from inside her.
“Would you write in there with her?”
“Not at first,” she says. “I’d take a book and sit in the corner, listening to the sound of her writing as I read. It’s funny… after her death, I actually recorded myself at her typewriter so I could play it back, you know, sort of like ambient relaxing music.”
My chest squeezes at the thought, a vivid feeling moving through me, lighting up parts of me I didn’t even know existed before Macie came into my life.
“That’s beautiful,” I say.
She tilts her head at me, spunkiness coming into her expression. Watching the sassier parts of her personality emerge is going to be one of the greatest joys of my life, I just know it.
“Do you know how strange it is hearing you get all emotional, Miller?”
I chuckle, nodding. “Yeah, I do. Because it feels strange. But it’s beautiful. Just because I’d tear every bastard in here to pieces if they tried to touch you, it doesn’t change that.”
She bites her lip, nodding.
“I started to write for a school project,” she says after a pause. “I’d always wanted to be a writer, but I guess I’ve always been shy. I was nervous. About failing. About starting. I don’t know. But then I got this school project to write a story and my aunt sat me down and made me write every time she did… and do you know what’s funny?”
“What?” I say, enraptured.
“There wasn’t even a school project. My aunt asked my teacher to set me the task just so I’d have a reason to start writing. That’s why I can’t blame her for having a drink every now and then, for traveling the country, and leaving me alone so much. Because she cared, Miller. She really cared.”
I reach across the table and brush a warm tear from her cheek.
She lets out a laugh, shaking her head. “I’m okay. Look at me, crying all over my burger.”
“Thank you for sharing that,” I say. “Really. It means a lot. I want to support you, Macie. I want to help you in any way I can to become the writer I know you can be. Anything you need, no matter how crazy, no matter how expensive, I’m here.”
“Thank you,” she says. “Maybe just let me rant about writing every now and then? That was my aunt’s deal. She’d always let me rant about my characters and stuff until my vocal cords were raw.”
“Deal,” I say. “I can’t wait to see your name in lights.”
“Authors don’t really get their names in lights. Unless they become freakishly huge.”
“Then that’s what we’ll have to do.” I grin widely. “Make you the biggest author in the world.”
She giggles. “I don’t know about that. Just getting a book published would be a massive achievement.”
“How far have you got so far?” I ask.
She glances down at the table in that way of hers, a gorgeous combination of shyness and budding confidence I will never get tired of watching her. The war taking place inside of her is one of the most fascinating things I’ve ever had the honor of being a part of.
I can’t wait for the years to progress, for her natural sassiness to break through her natural shyness.
“Not very,” she says. “The problem is I fall in love with a story and then commit myself to that. I think about it all the time. I obsess about it… and then about a quarter of the way in, I think of a better idea and I abandon the project. I’ve done this with nine books. Nine. So this book – my tenth – I made a promise to myself I’d finish it, no matter what ideas I get along the way.”
“You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself,” I tell her. “Having too many ideas is better than having too few, right?”
“Well, yeah… But I also can’t let those ideas derail me like they have been.”
“Then I’ll make that my mission,” I declare with a savage grin. “I’m going to force you to finish this book, no matter what it takes. Even if I have to chain you to the damn desk.”
She giggles musically, lighting up a thousand different parts of me. “How could I type if I was chained up, huh?”
I chuckle. “Okay, fair point. But I can always find other ways to persuade you.”
Her eyes widen as though she knows what I’m hinting at, as though she knows I’m thinking of sliding my hand down between her legs and rubbing her supersensitive clit every time she reaches a writing milestone, bringing her to a shivering orgasm every five hundred words.
“I think that might be more of a distraction,” she murmurs. “But… yeah, I’d like that.”
“Wait.” I sit up with hot fire moving through me, the food forgotten as I take in the much tastier sight of my woman. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“That I’m ready?”
I nod with primal fury moving through me.
“No, I’m not saying that. I don’t know if I am. But I also know what I’m like. And I don’t think I’m ever going to feel one hundred percent ready. I think maybe I have to trust what you said, that I’m not going to disappoint you even if I’m convinced I am.”
Dr. Good: A Steamy Standalone Instalove Romance Page 9
