“Making love,” he corrected quickly. As long as he had waited to get Headley into his bed, having sex was the last thing on his mind. He wanted to make love all night long and early into the morning.
“Same difference,” she uttered with a wave of her hand.
“No, there’s a big difference, darling.” Troy replied standing up.
He moved around his desk and back towards Headley, stopping mere inches from her body.
“Greedy men have sex because they want to satisfy their own need. I’m not a greedy man. I’m going to make love to you because I want to enjoy every perfect inch of your body. From those plump lips that I want to suck, down to those amazing legs that will be wrapped around my waist while I erupted inside your welcoming body.”
He watched as all the anger disappeared from Headley’s body as his words settled in and a small smile of wonder touched her lips. She was totally unaware of the breathtaking picture she made when she smiled at him.
“You’re very confident in your abilities when it comes to me,” she mused. “This could be all talk for all I know.”
“Give me a few minutes to get things settled here, and I’ll take you back to my place. I’ll prove everything I just told you,” he promised in a low voice.
“It’s not going to happen. I’m going to see Tommy about my job and if that doesn’t work, I’ve got one last ace up my sleeve. I still have two weeks to get your money to you.”
Tommy wasn’t going to give Headley her job back. Just like he had made sure, no one else in town would give her one. He had made sure all the cards were stacked in his favor. Still, this ace thing had him worried.
“Headley, don’t do anything you can’t get out of, just to beat me.”
“A bet is a bet and I’m in it to win it. I’ve one last person in mind to ask for the rest of the money. I know he can help me.”
His teeth clenched in anger. He was furious! Headley was eager to run to another man in order to beat him, but he wasn’t good enough for her. It was like the past all over again. She still thought she was too good for him. He swallowed hard, trying not to reveal his anger.
“You aren’t going to use another man’s money to pay off your father’s debt to me. The only way you’re going to get out of this is by marrying me.”
Headley glowered at him. “You aren’t making any sense. I was going to give you money from Tommy. So, what difference does it make it if get it from a man you don’t know?”
“I won’t take money from one of your lovers in New York. Don’t even think about contacting him,” Troy snapped as jealousy ate him up.
“This may be news to you, Troy, but a man and woman can be friends without sleeping together. Avant has money and he’ll loan it to me. I can pay him back over time.”
Headley was desperately trying to find a way out of this mess. She was such an idiot for making the bet in the first damn place. She should have just asked for a payment plan and Troy might have agreed. No…she had to go and challenge him with a bet, of all things.
Troy’s competitive side was one of the things she found so sexy about him.
At every picnic or outdoor activity, he always played to win. She would pretend not to watch him when she was younger, but the way the sun shined off his dark hair made her stomach clench.
Back then, he had only been in his twenties, but he already had the body of man. A flat washboard stomach and muscles that bulged in places she had never seen before.
All she thought about was kissing him, or better yet, having him crawl through her window at night and make love to her. However, none of her fantasies ever came true.
She was living in such a dream world that the night she had left town, she had imagined seeing Troy hiding in the shadows looking at her. But of course that hadn’t been real. Troy was mature beyond his years back then, and never paid her a second glance until the day her mother died.
Troy’s reaction to her borrowing the money from Avant surprised her. She would think he would be overjoyed about getting his money back and her out of his life.
The quicker he got the money deposited into her account, the sooner she could be back on a plane headed back home.
“I know that, but I don’t believe there’s a man out there who only wants to be friends with you. If by some slim chance there is, he has to be crazy or gay.”
“Avant isn’t crazy or gay. We went out on a few dates, but things didn’t work out. We decided to be friends instead.”
“Darling, there’s something wrong with him if he doesn’t want you. Maybe he just doesn’t know it yet,” Troy’s warm voice replied.
His tone both aroused and infuriated her. Why did she have to be attracted to the one man on the planet who only wanted sex from her and nothing else?
Troy’s marriage proposal had no merit behind it. He would never go through with it. She was furious at her weakness for him.
“Stop that,” she whispered.
“Stop what?” Troy said the words quietly, but his voice held a sexual undertone to it. “Can’t I tell a beautiful woman that I want and need her? I thought you would be used to it by now.”
“Listen, I’m not going down this road with you. I can’t stand here and listen to this. I need to visit my father at the hospital and see what I can do about finding another job,” Headley replied, stepping back from Troy.
“Do you want me to come to the hospital with you?”
Headley didn’t know what shocked her more, Troy’s offer or the urge to say yes. He was getting under her skin. She had to put some distance between them.
“No, I can go by myself, but thanks for the offer.” She turned to leave but Troy’s voice stopped her.
“Headley wait,” he uttered. “I can go with you. I know it must be hard for you to see your father like that. Can’t we just put our differences to the side for an hour and let me be there for you?”
Glancing over her shoulder, she was about to tell Troy no again until she saw the sincerity on his face. He honestly looked like he wanted to be there for her. It touched a place in her heart that she wanted to keep hidden from the handsome man behind her.
“Okay…I would like for you to come,” she finally agreed.
“Wonderful,” he smiled coming towards her. “We can take my car and I’ll bring you back here afterwards.”
Troy escorted her out the door and paused in front of his secretary’s desk. “Heather, I’ll be gone for a couple of hours. If someone needs me, just take a message and I’ll get back to them later.”
“Are you going somewhere with Ms. Rose?” Heather asked, looking at her, then back at Troy.
Headley had the feeling that Heather was a little jealous that Troy was leaving with her.
“Yes….I am,” Troy answered as he led her away towards the elevators.
She stood quietly beside Troy while they waited for the elevators to come. A small part of her wondered if Troy knew how he made women fall for him.
He truly acted like he never saw the jealousy in Heather’s eyes when she looked at them. Or was it a woman scorned by the fact that man who had been involved with her was with another woman?
“I think Heather was upset by the fact that you’re leaving with me.”
Dark blue eyes glanced down at her as the elevator doors opened. Troy waved her in ahead of him and then followed her in. He didn’t say anything until the door closed and he punched the button for the parking lot.
“What are you talking about? Heather doesn’t care if I’m going with you. We don’t have that kind of relationship. She’s my employee and nothing else,” he replied.
“Are you sure that she doesn’t want anything more? You’re an attractive man and she looked at you like she hoped something more would happen.”
“Nothing is going to happen with her. She isn’t my type.”
Men, she thought. They always had a type.
“Aren’t you going to tell me more? What kind of women gets the great Troy Christia
n all hot and bothered?” She would love to hear that he was only looking for one woman and that woman was her, but that was never going to happen.
Sure, she was nice-looking to a certain point. Yet, she was never the type Troy would date.
“I want a woman who can make me laugh, but knows how to stand up for herself when the time calls for it. I don’t need someone who is always at my beck and call. Independence is a good thing, but not to the point where she wants to wear the pants. I’m the man, and I want it to stay that away.”
“Okay…you’ve told me about her personality, but what are you looking for when it comes to looks? Because I thought Heather’s dark brown hair and green eyes would have you doing a double-take.”
The sound of the elevator as it moved from the sixteenth floor down to the basement was the only sound in the area as Troy watched her from the corner of his eye. Headley was getting a little nervous at the silence. Whenever Troy got this quiet, it meant he was up to something.
“It’s hard for me to envision another woman when I have only wanted one woman for most of my life,” he commented, facing her. “She’s drop-dead gorgeous and anytime I try to make her believe I’m serious about her, she blows me off.”
“My woman has Hershey’s kiss chocolate skin and it makes me want to run my fingers all over it. Her soft brown eyes continuously give me the impression that she can see into my soul every time she looks at me. She has the most perfect body, I have ever seen in my life. Her breasts and hips are what dreams are made of,” he continued in a low voice.
“A night doesn’t go by that I don’t dream about her lying in bed next to me, or me waking her up with soft kisses as I work my way down her body. Sometimes I wake up with my cock is so hard that I can’t leave the bed until I relieve the ache over and over. Do you know how unfeeling it is for me to be alone, taking care of my own needs when I would rather be wrapped inside your tight little body?”
Headley took a deep breath and closed her eyes as a pool of moisture soaked her panties. Why did Troy have to say these things to her? Lord…he was trying to make her lose control when it came to him.
Her eyes popped open when she felt a hand slip between her legs and stoke the inside of her thigh. “What are you doing?” she squeaked as she grabbed Troy’s thick wrist.
“Nothing,” Troy whispered as his tongue licked the corner of her mouth. “I just wanted to touch you. Don’t you want me to touch you?” He asked, shaking off her light grip. “We both know that I can make you feel so good.”
There was a maddening hint of arrogance about him that should make her hate Troy, but it only turned her on even more. He was so disturbing to her in every sense of the word.
For years, she had dreamed of being crushed in his embrace and her feelings for him were intensifying.
“God…you know that I do, but we…I can’t,” she moaned, shoving Troy away from her. “It wouldn’t turn out good in the end. We are so incompatible.”
Stepping back, Troy folded his arms across his chest displaying his muscles through his shirt. “We’re a perfect match. All you have to do is open your eyes and see what’s right in front of you.”
The elevator doors opening stopped Headley from answering, and she hurried out with Troy behind her. “Let’s go and see my father. I can’t talk to you about this anymore.”
She sent up a silent prayer for her rescue once again from giving in to her deepest desires. Troy was so close at wearing her down and he didn’t even know it.
“Headley, we aren’t done with this. I’ve waited for too long to give you up now,” Troy uttered behind her, but she kept going as if she never heard him say a word.
Chapter Eight
Relaxing against the wall, Troy blocked out the smell of floor cleaner and day old coffee as he watched Healey at her father’s bedside.
He admired how strong she was trying to be, however he could see that the woman he was in love with was hurting. Why didn’t he just tell her to forget about the money and let her go? It wasn’t doing either of them any good going back and forth like they were.
She was taking so much onto her small shoulders with Douglas’ money problems, trying to find a way to pay him back and now fighting not to fall into his bed at any second. Headley thought she was doing a good job at hiding her feelings for him, but he knew she wanted him.
He fought down the urge to wrap her up in his arms, to promise that everything would be okay, but he couldn’t do it. Douglas wasn’t looking too good to him. His breathing was shallow, and before they came in, the nurse told them, he had had a bad night.
Headley wouldn’t be able to handle it if her father died. He remembered how hard she took it when her mother and baby brother died. She put on a strong show at the funerals, but he had seen the tears glistening in her brown eyes.
Right then, he almost told her how he felt, but decided it wasn’t the correct time. She would have been shocked by his confession.
“Daddy, can you hear me? It’s me, Headley. I’m here with you,” she whispered, holding her father’s hand.
His heart clenched in his chest at the sight of her using her free hand to brush away her tears. There was nothing he could do to help Headley with this. Maybe if he had found Douglas sooner, he wouldn’t be in this bed.
Was he really the one to blame for the heart attack? Douglas had lost a lot of his workers because he didn’t have the money to pay them. That was the reason he was out repairing the fence instead of someone else. Could Headley really see him for the man that he was and not the man who had put her father in this room?
“Daddy, I just want you to know that I’m here for you and I’m not going to leave until you get better.”
Troy couldn’t take it anymore. The pain in Headley’s voice was about to break him and make him say something that he shouldn’t. He couldn’t let Headley out of the bet because that was the only way he would get his ring on her finger.
The thought barely crossed his mind before another one followed. He had to get out of here to be alone with his thoughts for a few minutes.
Moving away from his spot, he made his way across the room and leaned down to whisper in Headley’s ear. “Darling, I’m going into the hallway so you can have some private time with your father.”
“Okay,” Headley answered without looking at him.
Troy gave Headley’s shoulder a quick squeeze before he left the room closing the door quietly behind him.
Outside in the hallway, he watched the nurses as they walked past him and checked on other patients.
The harder he tried to ignore the truth, the more it persisted. He was heads over heels in love with Headley. How much longer could he keep doing this before he blurted out the truth?
“I still can’t believe Troy took you to the hospital to see your father,” Fancy said, placing the clean glasses on a shelf. “I thought the two of you weren’t even friends.”
“Troy is a mystery that I can’t figure out,” Headley answered, playing with a peanut on the bar. “I know he was the one who told Tommy to fire me and then he turns around and does something nice. I’m at a total loss when it comes to him.”
“Well… you know what I think,” Fancy said, facing her. “I think he likes you and you’re being blind to it on purpose.”
Headley groaned under her breath. “Don’t start that again. I’m not interested in finding a man, and if I was, Troy Christian isn’t even what I’m looking for.”
“Now…I know you’re just a damn liar. Troy Christian is plain lip-licking magnificent.” Fancy looked around making sure they were alone in the club before she leaned across the bar. “I bet his dick is at least nine inches long. Have you noticed how he walks? Only a man with a big package swaggers like that.”
“FANCY!” She snapped, and then hit her friend on the arm. “You can’t talk about a guy like that.” However, she had noticed the enormous bulge inside Troy’s pants. Hell, it was hard to miss.
“It’s past time you
got a grip and had a little fun. You’re always so serious. Live a little and go after him. I know he wouldn’t turn you down, like some men I know.”
Fancy wasn’t able to let that hang in the air between them. Was there a man her friend wanted and couldn’t get? She wanted details. “Okay, spill it. Who do you have your eye on? Is it Tommy?”
“Tommy, my boss,” Fancy sputtered. “No, I don’t want Tommy. God… I’ve seen him eat glue. I don’t think so.”
Headley shook her head and wondered about Fancy. “Tommy ate glue in the second grade. I don’t think he has done it lately,” she sighed. “He’s nice. I think the two of you would make a very cute couple.”
“Nope, Tommy isn’t the man I want.”
“I’m not going to stop asking until you tell me,” Headley said. “Do I know him?”
Fancy started wiping off the bar’s surface like she hadn’t heard a word that she said, but Headley knew her friend had heard every word. What guy out there didn’t want Fancy? She was almost model perfect, despite being almost four inches too short for the industry. However, her personality and spunk made up for it.
“Answer me.”
“It doesn’t matter because he has turned me down enough times for me to leave it alone,” Fancy sighed.
“I’m not going to leave this alone. You keep getting in my face about Troy and I’m going to return the favor. If I guess right, will you tell me then?” Headley wasn’t about to give up on this. She may not be able to get Troy, but she would help Fancy get her dream man.
As Fancy opened her mouth to answer, the club’s door opened and the towering frame of Maxwell Reed walked in, looking very sexy in a cream colored Stetson, snug blue jeans and a checkered shirt.
Headley noticed how Fancy couldn’t take her off Troy’s friend. She secretly wondered if this the guy Fancy was talking about earlier. Surely not. Maxwell had been a bachelor for as long as she could remember. He had already graduated from college and was working at his father’s business when she left town. Maxwell was even older than Troy.
Dangerous Bet: Troy's Revenge: Tycoon Club Series Page 5
