RISK

by Deborah Bladon

  "I saw the way he was looking at you, Ellie. He clearly wants to fuck you."

  She looks up to where I'm standing next to her. There's defeat in her eyes. "Liam is trying to help me get a job. His brother is going to help me."

  "Nick?" I tilt my head. "Nick writes crime novels. What could you possibly do for him?"

  "No. I'm not talking about Nicholas." She pinches the bridge of her nose. "It's Liam's oldest brother. Sebastian. He's a detective. He works for the NYPD. He might be able to help me get a job."

  Shit. She was having lunch with him because of his brother.

  "You want to work for the police department?"

  She nods, vigorously. "I do. I will. I just need a chance to get my foot in the door there."

  I race through my mind trying to determine who I know who holds a high enough rank in the NYPD that they could pull the necessary strings to get Ellie a job. There's no one. It's one of the few organizations in this city that my family has no ties to.

  "Liam will talk to his brother," she goes on, "I'll meet with Sebastian later this week."

  I want that job for her, even if it means I won't see her every day. "I'm sorry I jumped to the wrong conclusion, Ellie. I thought there was something personal between you and Wolf."

  "What if there was?" Her blue eyes flick up to mine. "We had sex, Nolan. We didn't promise each other anything last night."

  She's right. No promises were made, at least not verbally. It's obvious that the actions that we've both taken since then say otherwise. "We can remedy that now."

  Her gaze follows my every movement as I sit in the chair next to her. "Remedy it how?"

  "Clearly I was concerned that your lunch with Liam was going to lead to something more."

  "Clearly," she quips.

  I smile. "It's just as clear that you had some questions about where I went last night after you left my place."

  "I was curious when I saw you come out of the building we'd been in together." She carefully dances around defining the space as the place we fucked. "You said you had something to take care of. I just assumed that meant that you'd be in all night."

  "I want to you to understand something, Ellie." I lean forward, resting my forearms on my knees. "I'm the first to admit that I can be an asshole. I don't play nice in business. I will cut a man off at the knees if he threatens anything that I hold dear, but I will never, ever be like the man who hurt you."

  "What makes you think a man hurt me?" Her arms cross over her chest.

  I want to throat punch the idiot who put her on the defensive like this. "I know a man hurt you. A fucked up bastard named Tad Darling had a ring on your finger when he took half of the women in Vegas to bed."

  She blinks at me as if she's trying to absorb every single syllable of what I just said. She's processing it, just as I was earlier when Kristof gave me the rundown on Tad Fucking Darling and how he treated Ellie. That goddamn son of a bitch.

  "Is there anything you don't know about me, Nolan?"

  I don't know if you're the girl who I saved a decade ago. The beautiful girl with the red hair who didn't want anything from me, but gave me more than I ever deserved. The angel who was face down on the pavement in a pool of her own blood the last time I ever saw her.

  I swallow back the urge to ask if she's Kip or if she recognizes that I'm Rigs. Instead, I say the only thing I can. "Many things, Ellie. There are many things I don't know about you, but I want to learn everything."

  ***

  "I'd like to know things about you too, Nolan."

  Her words aren't unexpected. How could they be? I just told her that I want to know everything about her. I want her to be curious about me. I want to be the only man she thinks about.

  "My favorite color is blue. I hate spiders, and I tried to take piano lessons last year, for the eighth time, but I quit. I fucking quit because my piano teacher was a hard ass."

  "You hate spiders?" She smiles at me. "Or you are afraid of spiders?"

  "Don't rub it in, Ellie." I sigh. "I know you're not scared of anything. You probably wrestle alligators on your days off. I get that you're brave. I am too, but when there's a spider within twenty feet of me all bets are off."

  My phone buzzes in my pocket again. I ignore it. If it's anything important, Eda will knock. She'll disturb me if need be.

  "I want to discuss something." I meet her gaze. "I'd like this to be exclusive, for now. I'd very much like if we could agree not to date other people."

  "You mean you want me to agree not to date Liam and River."

  Of course, I mean I want her to stay away from those two clowns. They're both circling her waiting for a chance to pounce. I want a barrier in place that they can't cross. I need to explore this without the added anxiety that their presence will bring.

  "I mean any man who wants you."

  "I just got out of a serious relationship a few months ago." She takes a deep breath. "Jumping into something exclusive might not be the best thing for me right now."

  "My cock is the best thing for you right now." I square my shoulders. "The rest of me too, but you have to admit, the sex was stellar last night."

  "That ego, Nolan." She waves her finger in the air at me. "You need to tame that down."

  I laugh. "I'm just telling it like it is, Ellie."

  She chuckles softly, her hand smoothing back her hair. "So you want us to date only each other for now?"

  "Yes, that's exactly what I want," I tell her without a beat of hesitation.

  "When was your last serious relationship?" She glances toward my office door. "Was it with Shelby?"

  "Shelby? That wasn't a relationship. That was a mistake that never qualified as anything."

  "So it was before her. When did your last serious relationship end, Nolan?"

  I scrub my hand over the back of my neck. I've never been ashamed to admit this. We all have strengths, each of us owns a weakness or two. Mine happens to be relationships. "I've never been in a serious relationship, Ellie. I've only ever had two girlfriends in my life and both of those were when I was fifteen-years-old. When they found out they were both my girlfriend at the same time, I stopped having girlfriends."

  She doesn't laugh. There's no rush to scold me for teasing with her. Instead, she purses her lips.

  "Why make this exclusive? We can date each other without labeling it."

  No, we can't. That leaves the door open for any other man to come strolling into her life and that's a complication I don't want. "I have no interest in dating other women right now. I'd like to date only you with the understanding that you're not seeing other men."

  There's a long pause. A fucking long pause as she stares right at me, into me. "I'll agree to date only you, Nolan if you agree to date only me. I can't promise how long I can do that for, but for now, I'd like to try."

  Great. Good. Ellie Madden is dating me. She's only fucking me.

  She stands and I follow. I reach for her, wanting a kiss, a touch, anything before I open my mouth again to tell her the one thing about me that defines who I am.

  I cup her delicate face in my hands. I lean down and kiss her. It's soft at first and then urgency rushes over the connection and before I realize what I'm doing, my hand is on the back of her neck, insistent, coaxing, pushing her lips into mine. My body wants to seal the deal and cement her to me before she learns the truth. I want this and I want what I have at home. I want it all. I need it all.

  She circles my waist with her hands, her fingers crawling under my suit jacket to clench the fabric of my shirt. I'm erect, hard and wanting. I want too much. I need to stop. I have to fucking stop.

  "Ellie." I pull back from the kiss, but only enough that my lips skim over her lips when I say her name. "You have to know. I need to tell you."

  "Tell me what?" She pops up to her tiptoes to claim my mouth again.

  I give in because the need to taste her lips is stronger than my resistance. I run my hands down her back to cup her firm ass. I squee
ze it, pulling her against me so she can feel what she's doing to me.

  "You're hard." She smiles against my mouth. "You're right. The sex was stellar. Your cock is too. I admit it."

  "Wait until you taste it." I tug her even closer, the hard ridge of my erection pressing against her. "I want to see these lips around it."

  My pulse races when her hand drifts lower and then lower still. She grazes her fingers over the front of my pants, the touch electric. My dick throbs from the promise of her touch. "Now, Nolan?"

  Yes, now. Get on your knees and take it down your throat. All of it, until your eyes water and your pussy is on fire from sheer need.

  I want to say it, but I stop. I fucking stop and step back, my hands firmly rooted to her shoulders.

  "We can't," I breathe. "Ellie, we can't."

  "Why not?" she whines. She whines like she wants it as much as her next breath.

  "I need to tell you something." I cover my mouth with my hand. These words aren't easy. I don't say them often. Only a few scant people in my life know what I'm about to tell her.

  My phone rings again. The sound is a lure to bide me more time. If I answer, I can think. I can fucking think without a raging hard-on about what I want to say to Ellie.

  "What do you need to tell me?" She holds my gaze for a moment before her eyes drift to my office door. "Did you hear that? Was that a knock? Is someone at the door?"

  I heard it. Eda knows better than to disturb me when I've asked her not to. There's only one situation that would warrant the incessant phone calls and the interruption by my assistant.

  "Eda," I call out, hoping she can hear me. "What is it? Is it her?"

  The double glass doors of my office open in one fell swoop. Crew stands directly behind Eda, his phone in his hand. He ends the call and my phone stops ringing, just as he brushes past Eda to stalk toward me. "Mayday. Now, pal. Let's go."

  Ellie holds Crew's glance for a moment before she turns back to me. "What's going on? What is it, Nolan?"

  As my eyes find hers, I say the words I've never said to a woman before. "It's my daughter. My daughter needs me, Ellie. I'm sorry. I have to go."

  She lowers herself back into the chair in front of my desk as I follow Crew out of my office and sprint to the open doors of the elevator. I didn't want her to find out like this, but now it's out there. She knows. Ellie knows that I'm a father and the most important thing in the world to me is my five-year-old little girl and her broken heart.

  Chapter 28

  Ellie

  A daughter. He has a daughter.

  I didn't bother to ask his assistant any questions after Nolan left his office with Crew. I doubt she would have told me anything. Eda doesn't strike me as the type to gossip about her boss behind his back. Besides, this is something that I need to discuss with Nolan. It's a child. He's a father to a little girl.

  I got up from the chair in Nolan's office after what felt like four hours. It was only a few minutes. I went down to the store and finished my shift. I spent the entire afternoon glancing at my phone, hoping to hear anything from Nolan. Nothing came. Not a text or a call.

  I took a detour on my way home, walking past the building that his driver dropped him off at last night. It's a luxury high-rise that caters to some of Manhattan's elite. You don't secure an address there without a trust fund or a successful business in your portfolio.

  The doorman gave me a curt nod as I passed by. I didn't stop to ask him if I could go up to see Nolan. I haven't been invited. I understand why now.

  "He told you that he's never had a girlfriend and yet he has a daughter?" Adley dips her spoon into the container of cookie dough ice cream she pulled out of our freezer. "This has to be one of those broken condom babies."

  I scowl as I look at her. "It's Nolan's daughter, Ad. Even if she wasn't planned, she's his daughter."

  She quiets, her lips thinning as recognition brightens her eyes. I'm a baby that was the result of a mistake. My mother told me as much before she died. My father said otherwise after we'd buried her. I knew it was my mom telling me the truth. They never lived in the same house. I don’t recall a time the two of them were together in a room, other than at the funeral home when he paid for her service and kissed the dark wood of her coffin as tears streamed down his face.

  "When they talked about Crew's niece they must have been talking about her," I murmur. "That's why he had the hay on his shoulder and the earring on his ear. It was because of her."

  "They seem close enough to be brothers," Adley offers. "Kids are fun, Bean."

  They are fun. Every moment I ever spent with Jayce, Tad's seven-year-old son, was a treasure to me. I didn't think I'd love him when I first met him, but the deep love I developed for him drove me to beg Tad to move his company headquarters to Las Vegas so we could be closer to Jayce after Tad's ex-wife remarried.

  Our visits with him were limited to every Wednesday night and alternating weekends, but I made the most of the time. When Tad dumped me, I lost Jayce too. I never saw him again even though I held tightly to the faint hope that Tad would let me say goodbye to him. That never happened.

  "I know they are." I cover my mouth with my hand. I don't want to say Jayce's name because it hurts so much when I think of him. Adley knows that. She's shied away from talking about him since Tad left me.

  "Your nieces are a blast. You love them like mad."

  I do love them. All three of them are unique, even though the two eldest are identical twins. I can tell them apart because I've known them since the moment they were born seven years ago. Megan has a freckle on the tip of her nose that her twin sister, Melrose, doesn't have.

  "I haven't seen them since I've been back," I admit. "I miss them."

  "Queens is a subway ride away." She rests her spoon on the table. "We can go see them this weekend. I'd love to see them again."

  The slight change in subject is helping, but not enough to make me forget that the man I had sex with last night has a child. "Why do you think he didn't tell me about her?"

  She places the lid back on the ice cream container. "Can I get real, Bean?"

  "I guess?" I shrug my shoulders. "Have you not been real up to this point?"

  Her eyes drop to the table before she looks at me straight-on. "I don't think he tells most of the women he's fucking about his daughter. If I had a kid, I don't know if I'd tell a random guy I hooked up with that I was a mom. Actually, I know that I wouldn't. It's private. It just seems to me that it's one of those things you tell a person you know has potential."

  Her words mirror the thoughts that have been playing on a loop in my mind all afternoon. I've tried to reverse the roles and placed myself in Nolan's shoes. I doubt like hell I'd tell a man if I had a child unless I knew it was something he needed to know because our relationship warranted it. I know, without a doubt, that I wouldn't let him meet my child until I knew there was a foundation with some strength between us.

  With Tad it was different. We'd known each other for months before we ever hooked up. I knew about Jayce long before I fell in love with Tad. I sometimes wonder if my love for Jayce skewed my feelings for Tad.

  "What about her mom?" Adley goes on when I don't respond. "Has he said anything at all about who that might be? He has to have a relationship with her, even if it's just a cordial passing off of their daughter during parental visits."

  "No, not a word." I open the ice cream container back up and dip in my spoon. I didn't take Adley up on her offer to indulge when she pulled it out of the freezer. Now, with the added stress of thinking about the mother of Nolan's child, I can't resist the temptation. "He's never mentioned a woman to me other than Shelby."

  "The thief he was having dinner with at Meadow?"

  "That's her." I let the ice cream melt on my tongue before I swallow. "I don't know who he had a child with."

  "You'll find out soon enough." She raises her spoon in the air as if to toast. "Here's to Nolan's baby mama. Let's hope she's everything he never w
ants again."

  I laugh to bite back the anxiety I feel. My parents thought they hated each other for years and yet, my dad died still as in love with my mom as the day I was conceived.

  ***

  "You're sure it's not too late, Ellie?" Nolan takes a deep breath.

  I stand at the doorway to my apartment, dressed in only a pair of shorts and my NYPD T-shirt. The shirt was a gift from Adley when I graduated from college. She knows I hope to replace it with a full uniform one day.

  "I told you it wasn't." I did say that when he called fifteen minutes ago. That was close to midnight. I'd brushed my teeth and gone to bed when my phone started to ring. I answered immediately and was relieved when he said that everything was okay. I agreed to let him come over because I know that all the questions I have for him will keep me wide awake.

  "Where's your roommate?" His eyes scan the interior of the apartment. "Her name is Adley, right?"

  "Yes." I step aside so he can enter. "She works at a vet clinic. She was called in for an emergency."

  "She's a vet?" The cock of his brow doesn't hide his surprise.

  Adley is too often mistaken for a typical blond with big tits. She owns that but only because she's confident in her intelligence. She knows she brings a lot to the table and to any person who spends the time to get to know her. "She will be. She's an assistant right now."

  He nods. He skims his hands over the jeans he's wearing. "Can we sit down and talk?"

  I like to pace when life throws me a curveball. More often than not, I walk. I can put miles on my running shoes in a day if I feel stress. I already did that tonight after I ate too much ice cream.

  I took on the paths of Central Park when the sun was setting. It was filled with people, but with my earbuds in and my favorite songs on repeat, I was able to find my center again. It feels out of reach again now that Nolan has walked through my door.