by Alisha Rai
The door closed behind her. “Apologies.” He spoke stiffly. “My place isn’t fit for company.”
He walked past her and scooped up the mail sitting in a huge stack on the third step. He hesitated, his head turning this way and that, looking for a place to put it.
Oh. Oh dear.
He was embarrassed. He hadn’t been ill at ease at the thought of her walking in on his nonexistent orgy. He’d been worried she would judge his home.
Her heart tugged. She transferred the plate to one hand, barely conscious that she was using what Leena called her waitress hold, and cocked her hip. “Any of that mine?” She nodded at the stack of mail in his hand.
The corner of his mouth kicked up. Was…was that a smile? Had she, by chance, amused him?
It was close, but she was going to hang in there for the real deal.
He dropped the mail back on the stairs. His shirt rode up as he bent, revealing a strip of smooth brown skin. “I told you, I merely looked at your mail. I didn’t touch it.”
“That’s what all the mail bandits say.” She started toward the kitchen. “Shall we eat?”
“Right. Yes.”
Since baking calmed her and she spent a decent amount of time in her kitchen, Rana had put some money into updating hers. Micah’s landlord had…not. A yellowish fridge sat in the corner, next to an older model stove. The wooden table and pair of chairs looked similarly rundown. However, a shiny microwave sat on the chipped Formica table, new and out of place amongst the dated fixtures.
“I was intending to buy furnishings before I had guests.”
The defensiveness in his voice made her heart twinge. “Babbleposh, Jeeves.”
“Babble—?”
“It sounds like something you Brits would say.”
“Someday, I’d love to hear what you imagine my people are like.”
“Stiff. Formal. Everyone’s a time traveler, a wizard, or works for MI6.” She placed her plate on the table, pretending not to notice the legs wobbling a little at the weight.
“That’s not quite right. Only some of us are wizards. The rest are Muggles.”
Ack. She shot him a narrow look, inwardly delighted. “Okay, we’re going to put a pin in this convo for right now, but later you and I are going to have a lengthy Harry Potter discussion.”
She went to the counter. The first cupboard held a set of plates, and she grabbed two and brought them back to the table.
“I apologize for the mismatched plates.”
Yeah, that formal part of her assessment was spot-on, huh? His accent had grown more clipped. “Stop worrying. Our underpants no-no areas have bumped, and you told me you’d like a repeat. I’m hardly a guest.”
He was silent for a second. “Are you always so…?”
She arranged a bun on each plate carefully, as if the gooey lopsided treats needed to be plated properly. “So…what?” She sat down, and then kicked the other seat out from the table, looking up at him expectantly.
He came to sit slowly, lowering into the chair. The cheap wood protested as he settled his bulk in it, making her wonder if he had even purchased the few furnishings in this house for himself.
“Provocative?”
She liked the way his full lips shaped the word. Provocative. It was a better word than what other people had labeled her with at an early age. Like “outrageous” or “drama queen” or “attention whore”. “Sometimes. But I’m never really trying to provoke anything.” She grimaced. “Sorry. I’m usually just saying whatever’s in my head.”
“Don’t apologize,” he rumbled. “It’s rather refreshing not to wonder what a person is thinking.” He sounded as surprised by that admission as she was.
After a beat, she gave him a small smile. He might say it was refreshing, but everyone, including the people who loved her, eventually grew exasperated with her lack of filter. “Right.” She picked up her cinnamon roll and pulled off the outer ring. “Well? Go ahead. Try my buns.”
“Are you going to keep this play on words going for a while, or…”
“Yes. Because I’m emotionally twelve, and I giggle every time I say the word buns.” She widened her eyes. “Guess what happens when I meet a man named Richard? Oh, man. So many dick jokes.”
He looked down at his plate. “This was nice of you.”
She peeled off the second layer of the roll, discarding it. “I’m not the chef in my family, but I am a good cook. Especially when it comes to baking.”
“I believe you.” But he made no move to pick up his roll, only watched her as she took a bite of hers.
She closed her eyes, letting the cinnamon and sugar melt over her tongue. Damn, but she had a sweet tooth. If her slowing metabolism would allow it, she’d eat nothing but dessert for every meal.
Her eyes popped open when Micah shifted across from her. She finished her roll in a couple of bites and snagged another one, unraveling this one as well.
“Why do you do that?”
“I only like the center.” She ate the stripped roll in a few bites. “It’s the best part. The part with the ooey-gooey cinnamon.”
“Then why not make only centers?”
She cast him a chiding look. “That would be cheating. I like to work a little for my pleasures.”
“Ah.”
He still hadn’t touched his roll.
“Are you…allergic to something? Gluten-free?”
He shook his head. “I don’t care for sweets overly much.”
She considered that, and then quickly swapped plates with him, giving him her leftovers. “There. I’ll handle the sweetest part. You can eat the parts I don’t like, how’s that?”
His mouth kicked up. “I don’t eat much in the mornings, also.”
She surveyed his huge form skeptically. “In my experience, men who look like you are always hungry.”
“Men who look like me?”
“Yeah. You know.” She puffed up her cheeks and straightened, putting her arms out at her side to simulate his bigness. “Tall and jacked? All massive muscle? You must need like ten thousand calories a day.”
His mouth edged up a little more. A few more jokes and maybe she would get a smile out of him. “I drink a lot of protein shakes.”
“Ew.” Rana wrinkled her nose. “Protein shakes? You’re making me hurt.” She nodded at the plate. “Try it.”
He paused for a beat and then picked up one of the pieces she had shredded. He shoved it into his mouth with no reverence for the treat. His face changed as he chewed, his jaw slowing before he swallowed. “This is good.”
“Don’t sound so surprised. I’m fairly competent.”
“I never said you weren’t.” His hand hovered over his plate. After a second’s hesitation, he picked up another piece and ate it in a single bite.
“Better than a protein shake?”
“I don’t usually think about what things taste like. But yes,” he continued, before she could flinch from that sad remark. “This is better than a protein shake.”
She touched the tips of her sticky fingers together and glanced at the empty counter. “Do you have any napki—?”
A big hand wrapped around her wrist and extended her arm over the table. His head dipped, and his lips closed over her thumb. Her abs clenched when he drew the finger inside his mouth, rasping his rough tongue over it.
He cleaned off each of her fingers, sucking her pinky for a second before releasing it. Her chest felt too tight. She could tug her hand away from his grip, but she wouldn’t.
“I Googled you.”
The words fell in the silence with the weight of an atomic bomb. His face shuttered, and he drew back, releasing her. “Did you, now.” His voice was soft. “And what did you find?”
“I found your Wikipedia page. Read that. I know you were raised in London, and you have no siblings. You got your first big break when you were nineteen. You were considered a prodigy. By the time you hit thirty, you were pretty much famous and rich. It was a brief
page.”
“My mother considers it her life goal now to keep it brief and pleasant,” he said. “Editing Wikipedia may be one of the few technologically savvy things she is capable of. What else did you see?”
She swallowed. “There were lots of gallery showings you did, plus some hits on people selling your art on the private market. For a lot, by the way. I mean, I thought your stuff at the gallery here was priced high, but that’s nothing compared to the stuff on, like, auction sites.”
“It’s my early work.” His voice was even flatter, if possible, his dark eyes piercing. “The paintings at the gallery were purposefully marked lower than anything I’ve done in ten years. The manager realized the resale potential is not there.”
“Why not?”
He didn’t answer her question, but asked one of his own. “What else?”
“News articles. Lots of news articles.”
He closed his eyes briefly and then opened them again. “There it is.”
She swallowed. “I didn’t click on them,” she murmured. “Not the articles.”
His chest lifted. “Why not?”
The headlines flashed in front of her eyes. Artist Attacked in his Studio. Artist Left for Dead. Attempted Murder in the Docklands. Jealous Lover Attempts Murder, Takes Girlfriend Hostage.
She gave a halfhearted shrug, unable to articulate all the ways she’d been disturbed by the thought of reading the gory details. It felt far more voyeuristic then watching him in his studio. “I don’t know. Maybe ’cause we’d just talked about not crossing any more weird boundaries with each other?”
“Clicking on the articles would have crossed a line but Googling me didn’t?”
She eyed him as if he had sprouted two heads. “Um, honey, Googling is normal. I feel bad for people who don’t Google. It’s healthy.”
Another lip twitch.
Since she was being so honest, she continued. “I did read the headlines before I clicked away.”
His face was like granite. “They were sensational, if I remember correctly.”
“Yeah.” She poked at the roll on her plate. “Sounds like you went through a rough time.”
“It was years ago. I’m over it. So if you’re only here because you feel sorry for me—”
“Would you kick me out if I was only here because I feel sorry for you?” she interrupted.
His jaw clenched, and she held her breath, gambling over the fact she probably wouldn’t kick this man out of her life even if he did come to her out of pity.
This was all his fault. All of it. Rana might have pined over him a bit, but she’d been moving on. The memories of their night together would have faded eventually. Then this beautiful asshole had come waltzing back into her life, offering her the sweetest of things, the things she craved.
Lust. Excitement. Desire. Attention.
She could have them. Extend their affair. Get everything she needed from him. Because, God, she needed.
And then she would walk away. There was no other choice.
“No.” He responded to her question quietly. “I would not kick you out. I don’t think I could.”
She closed her hands into fists to hide the trembling. “I don’t feel sorry for you, by the way, so relax. I won’t pry into what happened. If you want to tell me, that’s fine. If you don’t feel comfortable, that’s fine too.”
His eye twitched. “Good.”
“I’ll pose for you.”
He jerked. She hadn’t realized how tightly controlled he’d been, until he looked at her like this. Like he wanted to throw her down and bite into her the way she had those cinnamon buns.
Maybe she wasn’t the only one with a craving.
He opened his mouth, but she raised her hand. “I have some conditions.”
He subsided, his shoulders tensing imperceptibly, but he gave a nod.
“Like you said, it can’t interfere with my job. We’re rolling out a second location right now, and I’ve been doing a lot of the legwork. Plus, there’s my regular shifts at the restaurant. I don’t know how long this will take, but I’m not going to check out on my sisters.”
His voice vibrated with intensity. “That’s simple enough. We can work around your schedule. As for how long… I’ve had models for a few days to a few weeks. It depends on how quickly I’m able to work, and that varies.”
“Okay. Let’s say a few weeks, to be on the safe side.” And because I want as long with you as possible, she thought guiltily. “You’ll pay me for my time. This is going to be as professional as we can make it. I want you to treat me like a real model.”
To that, he nodded immediately. “I didn’t imagine anything else.”
“I’ll leave the actual compensation to you.” She raised an eyebrow. “But I’ve seen what you sell your paintings for, so don’t cheap out.”
His head dipped. “Understood.”
“I will, however, need you to agree that you can’t use my face. You can paint me from the neck down. Or hide my face some other way. I can’t be easily recognizable.”
At that, he balked. “I love your face.”
Her heart hitched. Dummy. I love your face is different from I love you, as you well know. And you don’t want his love. “Be that as it may, my family won’t be cool with seeing nudes of me, even if it is art. So I want to remain anonymous.”
“This is a hard line?”
The phrase brought to mind sex, of course, but she knew he didn’t intend it that way. She crossed her arms over her chest. “A very hard line.”
His lips compressed. “Fine. But…I often spend part of my early time with a model sketching various parts of them so I can become familiar with their face and body, and I will do that with you.”
Oh, okay, yeah, you can totally get comfortable with my face and body. “That’s fine. I don’t want my face ever put in public, is all.”
He gave a short nod. “Very well.”
“Okay.” She took a deep breath. This was the tricky part. “Now. The sex.”
He looked away from her, intently studying the window. Though the place wasn’t decorated, it was cleaner than her own. Maybe because he didn’t use the kitchen for anything other than mixing protein shakes.
“What about it?”
She pushed her plate out of the way. “I want to have sex with you. Again and again and again.”
He had turned back to her, his eyes darkening while she spoke, his hands gripping the edge of the table. Talk about craving. He looked like he was ready to leap over the thing and tackle her.
She would be okay with that.
“You’re the first man I’ve been with in a year.”
He frowned at her confession.
“Not because I don’t like sex. I love it. But as my mother keeps reminding me, I’m getting too old for hook-ups.”
At that, he frowned harder. “How old are you?”
“Thirty-two.”
“You’re three years younger than me.”
Her mouth twisted. “And if I were a dude, no one would ever hassle me about my age and my reproductive organs. But there you have it. I’m not a dude. Wouldn’t want to be one, really. Penises seem like a lot of work.”
“They have their moments.”
“Where was I?”
“You’re decrepit,” he said dryly.
“Right. Putting aside my age, I feel like it’s time for me to settle down. I want to find love. Maybe get married.” She smiled wryly at the flash of panic in his eyes. “That doesn’t mean I want to have your babies. I’m just saying where my head’s at.”
“But you still want to…”
“Have sex with you. Yes. And that’s my final condition.” Rana took a deep breath. “You can’t fall in love with me.”
Chapter 12
“More importantly, I can’t fall in love with you either.” Rana tucked her hair behind her ear. “Don’t get me wrong. It’s not like I fall in love easily. I’ve had flings. But like I said, my head’s not in the
same place it used to be in. We both walk, no hard feelings, if that becomes a danger, okay?” Rana stared at Micah expectantly, her face open and honest. In her white tank top and yellow skirt, she looked like a fresh daisy plopped into a barren field.
Was he supposed to be annoyed at her implication that he was Mr. Right Now while she searched for Mr. Right? He wasn’t. He would take whatever she gave him, a dog satisfied with scraps.
There was a slight risk he might fall in love with her. A risk because she seemed rather loveable. Slight because he couldn’t even love his family properly anymore. What made him think he could love anyone else?
The reverse, however, was unlikely to happen. Maybe if she’d met him a few years ago, she might have fallen for him. There was no danger of that with the man he was today.
If she did foolishly show any signs of love, he’d end things, no matter how he felt. She deserved far better than him.
“I have two conditions as well,” he said, his voice unexpectedly hoarse.
She motioned for him to continue.
“You don’t date anyone while we’re together.”
“Obviously.”
Her immediate agreement soothed him. Micah swallowed, this issue having occurred to him last night, while he lay alone and sleepless in his bed. “And I don’t want you to stare at my back.”
Her eyes dipped to his lips. To the scar that bisected the upper lip and then traveled over his cheek. He couldn’t hide that one, but it didn’t bother him as much. The cut had been deep, but not as deep as the wounds on his back and side.
“Is it scarred? From the attack?”
Micah inwardly flinched, though he kept his face impassive. Most people tended to call it the incident or the accident—like it was something unpleasant he had simply bumbled into, not something that had been thrust upon him.
The attack.
He could correct Rana, but he didn’t want to. Something about the jarring roughness of the word felt good, like a dash of cold water on his overheated face. “Yes.”
“That’s why you wouldn’t let me turn the light on that night? Why you took your shirt off last?”
It was also why, even when he’d paraded in front of her nude in his studio, he’d been careful to keep his scars out of her line of vision. “Yes.”
