“I just want to... I’m trying to...” He ran his hand over his forearm, a move she remembered when he was stressed. He stilled and gripped it hard. “I’m trying to reach you, Sofia. I’m trying to get you to hate me a little less.”
Hijo de puta. Anger roared through her. After what he’d done to her.
She put her hands on her desk and leaned toward him. “That will never happen. You can fool the interns and the public and the press, but I know the truth about you. When push comes to shove, you don’t care about anyone but yourself. The rest of the world can call you a down-on-his-luck rock star, but I know you are the most selfish, self-involved man-child I have ever met.” Aish has thrown himself into the vineyard labor, they said. He’s been getting nothing in return but a cold shoulder. “You have turned me, my winery, and my efforts into a farce for your own benefit. You’ll destroy a kingdom so you can record another album of pop ditties.”
His stood and dropped his hands on her desk, too. “You won’t listen to Young Son so you don’t know what I’m recording,” he said, his powerful jaw flexing. “And you’ve got me all wrong, I am trying to help. If you would just start working with me instead of against me...”
Let him playact caring for the cameras. Let him touch and stroke her when it felt like being raked over coals.
“Follow my rules and—”
“They’re not working.”
“If you would stop going off script then we could—”
He laughed, harsh and cynical. “The script? Sofia!” He shook his head and she wanted to launch herself across the desk and claw his face. “You already hate me, so I can say what no one else will. You’re boring. You’re stiff and wooden. The interns are falling asleep out there. You look even less interested in entertaining them than fucking me. It’s not fair what people were saying about you before the launch, but trading in the party girl for the automaton isn’t working either. It’s like you unscrewed the real Sofia’s light and stuffed it in a drawer.”
Sofia slammed her palms against the desk. “The ‘real Sofia?’” Fury tinged her vision red. “You think the real Sofia is that girl who scraped and begged for your attention. That girl hasn’t existed in ten years and good riddance. Especially when the real Aish is this man-child who cowers behind his manager and hides in his house for a year.”
“Stop calling me a man-child,” he said, his black eyes flashing.
The rage washing over her was cleansing and glorious. “You’re not one? Only a man-child needs a crew of people to dress him every morning. Or needs special arrangements so he doesn’t catch piojillos from the interns. Or needs a constant companion. With John gone, you’re turning your manager into your new lap dog?”
“Fuck you, Sofia.”
“You’re the princess here. The pretty California boy faces one storm in his entire sunny life and dissolves into a puddle.”
He shoved his face, harsh and gorgeous, toward her. “Better a puddle than a fucking ice queen. You think this act is going to make people forget that you made out with that married soccer player or danced naked in that fountain or...how many people were at your orgy in St. Moritz?”
His checklist paused her anger. Yes, an orgy had broken out at her ski chateau. But Sofia hadn’t been there; she’d been in Madrid, consulting for her chemical’s manufacturer, who’d been opening their third processing plant.
The words escaped her mouth without her permission. “You said it wasn’t anyone’s business what I did.”
“It’s not!” He stopped and swallowed. “That doesn’t mean I don’t care.”
“Why?”
“Because I never stopped caring.”
All the anger whooshed out of Sofia’s system. “What?”
The muscles in Aish’s jaw did a jig. “I should have picked up the phone ten years ago.” Then his black-eyed stare became resolute. “I should have said I was sorry for—”
“No,” she said. Pain sluiced through her.
“Sofia—”
“No! Roman!” Her brother immediately put his hand on the door handle.
Moving quick with his surfer’s grace, Aish came around her desk toward her, his hand reaching out. “Sofia, please, there’s things I need to—”
She scrambled to the other side and grabbed an empty wine bottle by the neck. She lifted and waved it at him. “I swear if you say another word I’ll—”
Instead of coming in to thrash him, Roman spoke to someone outside the glass. Sofia froze. And saw intern Amelia Hill staring in at them with huge eyes.
Amelia was a wine blogger and a voice Sofia desperately wanted on her side. As one of the few black female master sommeliers, she was a writer who championed innovation over tired traditions. But she’d been skeptical of Sofia’s efforts so far. This morning, Amelia had sharply questioned the wisdom of putting a state-of-the-art winemaking facility in the bones of a medieval monastery. And she always looked embarrassed when Sofia tried to banter with Aish.
Was she the one talking to the press? She’d certainly have a story to share now. It looked like Sofia was about to brain Aish Salinger with a wine bottle.
This was why Sofia wanted rules and scripts. Yes, to manage their interactions. Yes, to control him.
But mostly to control herself.
Because left to her own devices, abandoned to her needy impulses and unruly emotions, Sofia destroyed her world better than Aish Salinger ever could. Proof was here, right now, as she gaped impotently at the wine blogger, quivering in anger and terror, so overcome with emotion, she could do nothing to save her kingdom’s imploding future.
Long arms surrounded her, pulled her arms down and against her body, dragged her close against taut, warm muscles, and tugged her head down so she could hide her face against his chest. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said against her temple as he held her close, surrounded her in darkness and heat as the bottle dropped from her nerveless fingers. Her glasses pressed into his chest. “I’m sorry, shit, I didn’t want to...” He muttered against her hair, words meant only for her as he rocked her. “Things keep getting fucked up with you and I’m sorry.” It was dark here, overwhelming with the smell of him, shocking with the lean hot familiarity of his body wrapped all around her. “No, no, don’t pull away,” he said, rubbing her back. His hands always felt Atlas-size against her body. “She’s...okay, she’s looking away.”
The rocking, Jesucristo, she’d forgotten about that, the soothing dance to the constant rhythm in his head. He tucked his head close to her ear. “Let me help you.” His breath tickled her pulse. “I can help you. I’m an entertainer, Sofia, I know how to entertain. You gotta let me loose from some of these rules. You gotta...” She was shaking her head no, rolling her glasses against his hard pecs as she resisted that voice formed to compel her. “Yes, just show them more of who you are. Who you really are. Show me.” She shook her head harder, inhaling the sun-soaked scent of him, and he captured her neck, calluses against her skin. “Okay, okay,” he soothed. “Then...” That scratchy voice licked directly into her ear. “I’ll do what I can and if you’ve got to punish me, you punish me. But I’m not trying to hurt you, Sofia. I never want to hurt you again.”
Light doused her like ice water as Roman ripped Aish off her and shoved him back against her desk.
Roman turned her to face him. “You okay?” he asked, glancing at Aish like he was waiting for an excuse to tear him apart.
Devonte pulled Aish upright and behind him.
“I’m fine,” Sofia said. Strengthened her voice. “It’s fine. It was only for show.” A show. A play. Aish’s unbelievable one act. “What did Amelia say?”
Namrita sounded shaken. “She was flustered. She apologized for intruding.”
Sofia breathed an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Well, that’s good. Another crisis narrowly avoided.” She glared at Aish over her brother’s shoulder.
“This is why we’re going to avoid any impromptu conversations.” Then she caught everyone’s eyes. “And this is why I don’t want to be left alone with him.”
She grabbed Henry’s arm and forced him to walk with her, her head held high.
She’d almost escaped when Aish called to her. “I mean it, Sofia. I’m going to help any way I can. You do what you have to do.”
She plastered on a smile for employees and interns and shooed Henry away at her suite door. She slumped back against it once it was closed.
When Aish Salinger had wrapped around her, surrounded her in the smell and strength and heat of him, it felt like being able to breathe after slowly suffocating for ten years. At that moment, she realized that it wasn’t Aish she despised.
Ten Years Earlier
Sofia combed out her long, wet hair in the silence of the girls’ bathroom in the bunkhouse, dripping faucets and her exhausted thoughts her only companions. It had been a rough week. An unusual August cold snap had hit the Russian River Valley, with daytime temperatures only getting up to the high sixties. So on top of all of the regular duties the Laguna Ridge Winery student-workers performed to get ready for the September harvest, they also had to assist the vineyard crew with leaf thinning twenty-five acres so that the pinot noir clusters could get enough sun to fully ripen. The group prayed for more sun so they could get more than a couple hours’ sleep a night.
Sofia liked the hard work, liked the uncomplicated this-equals-that result of her efforts during her waking hours. The vines had needs; she could provide them. She also liked the fact that the workers were spread so thin she never ran into Aish Salinger.
His uncle had taken pity on them tonight and given them a few hours so they could drive into Sebastopol and dance off some steam at a local bar. She’d take advantage of having a bunkhouse free of twenty-nine other people’s smells. And she’d never position herself alone, drinks in her system, with Aish Salinger somewhere in the dark and smoky.
Rumors had run rampant the first couple of days after the incident: “Did they really do it in a...tank?” But Sofia had managed rumors since she was old enough to walk, so her careless shrugs and dismissive looks had quieted much of the noise. The fact that she hadn’t tried to lay claim to Aish also quelled the more malicious rumors. Aish Salinger was free to sleep with whomever he liked. She honestly seemed not to care.
People believed she didn’t care.
It was a tactic she’d learned from her mother. Or rather, learned behaving as the polar opposite of her mother. Queen Valentina would scream at reporters who asked about her latest lover, would organize a photo shoot dressed in virginal white, and then would be caught clawing at a woman in the lap of the lover she originally denied.
At nineteen, Sofia was beginning to understand that life was a series of choices. She could live the bored life of a royal representative of a kingdom. Or she could squash grapes and study why their spoiled juices tasted delicious. She could cry and wail over a man who fucked her under false pretenses. Or she could throw him away as effortlessly as he tossed her.
Did her mother see these options? And if so, why did she always pick the one that was the most destructive?
You like grunt work, which is so hot it kinda hurts.
Cross-legged on the bench in the bathroom, Sofia pulled her brush out of her hair and hit herself in the forehead with it. Stop thinking about it. Stop thinking about him.
She stashed her brush in her shower kit, drank out of the faucet to wash down her birth control pill, and walked out of the bathroom in her oversized black top and wide-legged black pajama pants, vowing to turn off her brain until dawn.
“Hey,” a deep voice called, startling Sofia. There, standing barefoot on the old boards of the bunkhouse, was Aish Salinger in jeans and a black hoodie, his thumbs in his pockets.
Warm honey moved treacherously through her veins.
“I heard you were staying in,” he said.
Her brain did an instant calculation: she was easy tail in a convenient location.
She smirked. “Oh, pobrecito. I’m tired and you’re predictable. I’d rather lie on my mattress than bounce on you. Keep begging and perhaps—”
“No, that’s not—” He took a couple steps forward then stopped, ran his hand through his thick black hair to get it out of his face. The overhead lights bounced off his fascinating combination of strong bones and velvety tanned skin. “That’s not why I’m here. I...”
He jabbed his thumb back over his shoulder and, unable to help herself, Sofia looked. There, on his bed on the boys’ side, was a giant pizza box, a bottle of wine, and a bunch of white daisies in a mason jar.
She’d known exactly where his bed was in the long bunkhouse.
“I heard you weren’t going out, and you need to eat, so I figured...” He crossed his arms over himself and squeezed his left forearm with his right hand. It was a surprisingly boyish gesture on a man so big. “I figured I’d feed you. We’re too tired to go on a real date.”
Mentiras, a voice whispered. Lies. He lied to you. He doesn’t want you. He just wants another go at a princess.
Sofia looked down at the ground, shaking her long, wet hair. “No, I...”
“I’m sorry,” he said urgently. “John can be a prick and he totally was last time and, if it’ll help, I’ll get him to apologize because I’ve been on his ass about it and he feels really bad and...”
She scowled at him. “This isn’t about John.”
He let out a gust of air. “No, I didn’t think it was.” He took a couple of cautious steps toward her. “But to be honest, I’m not sure why you’re so pissed at me.” He put those big hands up when her eyes flared. “I want to know. I want to apologize and make it right. Can you tell me how I fucked up?”
A male had never talked to her like this before. Open, vulnerable. Her father barely acknowledged her, too caught up in his ego and his women and his efforts at whipping her brother into perfect princely compliance. Her brother Mateo was an incredible man and scientist, but he was so distant. He was halfway through his PhD work in America and seldom came home anymore. And she had more honest conversations with the men who made her café con leche in the cafeterías than the boys she slept with.
Out of her element, Sofia shook her head at Aish. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, turning toward her bed.
“It does,” he said, moving closer to her before stopping, leaving a good two meters between them. Sofia realized he was trying not to get to close. This big boy was resisting making her feel forced or pressured. “Sofia, it really does matter. If it’s the sex that’s pissed you off, then I wish we hadn’t done it. I don’t want to do it tonight.”
When Sofia peered at him, Aish stumbled. “I mean, I do want to. I want to every time I think of you, but not if... I mean not every time, but...most times. But...”
Sofia found it harder and harder to resist her smile.
Aish trailed off. “Tell me what I did wrong.” He took another step closer and his black hair stroked his sharp cheekbones.
Sofia looked down to the shower kit in her fists. “I thought you didn’t know who I was.”
“I didn’t. I don’t,” he said, sounding confused. “I mean, I knew you were that princess from Spain, but that’s it.”
“Then you knew about my parents’ affairs and my tattoo and that stuff I did in Prague and...”
“Oh, that.” She was surprised when he scoffed. “Look, in LA, everyone’s got a story. My parents are public figures—they’ve got a story. It’s got nothing to do with who they really are. All my friends whose parents are in the industry—they’re either waaaaay crazier or way more boring than the public knows. I never thought twice about what the media says about you.”
Sofia stared as he effortlessly lifted the weight of her history off her shoulders. “So you weren’t looking to screw a princess
?”
He showed a dimple as he shook his head, his big shoulders shrugging in his worn sweatshirt. “Justin was worried about you. I never thought I was going to run into a fairy I couldn’t keep my hands off of.” Those shoulders slumped. “But if not having sex with you means we could have been hanging out for the last week, then I wish we hadn’t done it. As good as it was, I’d trade it in a second for time with you.”
She could feel her heart growing with the sincerity of his words, like a vine unfurling toward the warmth of the sun. If she was honest, her heart reached for him the instant she saw him standing alone in the middle of the bunkhouse.
“Well,” she said, catching her smile with her teeth. “You could bribe me with pizza now.”
Delight burrowed in his dimple. “Yeah?”
“Sí.” She motioned with her shower kit toward the girls’ side of the bunkhouse. “Let me just...”
He followed her to her bed, and Sofia couldn’t believe he was right behind her, smelling like a boy washed clean with seawater. Sofia was conscious of the warmth of his big body. She was conscious of his eyes on her as her wide-neck lounge shirt exposed her upper back and collarbones and one shoulder.
When she opened her footlocker to stash her shower kit inside, Aish walked around her unmade bed to pick up a book half hidden among the covers.
“Is this in Spanish?” he asked, pointing at “Munduaren euskal historia.” His hands made the hardcover book look small.
“It’s Euskera,” she said, closing her footlocker. She walked toward him and pulled her long, damp hair over her shoulder. “It’s the language of the Basque people in Spain.”
“Is that that area above Portugal? Like...” He screwed up his face. “Like west of where you live?”
“No.” She smiled, looking up at him. He really was very tall. “The Basque Country is below France. Above Portugal is Galicia. They speak Gallego. I speak that, too.”
He looked at her sharply. “How many languages do you speak?”
Hate Crush (Filthy Rich) Page 8
