by Nicole Snow
“But she’s gone to Hawaii, hasn’t she?”
“People talk. If that shit got put in a museum, she’d know about it, and it could destroy her.” I look down, my hands balled into fists, feeling a fury that’s only under control because I’ve got this beautiful woman’s hands stroking me. “Believe me, I’ll do anything to keep it from seeing the light of day. Especially that stupid model yacht. A murder-negligence case might be the one thing to sour Winthrope on a deal. We’ve come too far for that.”
She shifts her hand, twining her fingers through mine.
“But not just that, right? It’s about more than the deal.”
Guilty.
I don’t want to dwell on it, though. I’ll sound like one of those homesick grunts I made fun of back in the day, but something in my chest cavity flutters when she asks me that.
Is she asking what I think she’s asking?
I close any space between us, cup her face with my hand, and lean in for a kiss. My tongue chases hers like a lion.
She matches my pressure, my vigor, my need to drink her in.
Her delicate hands come to my face, lightly stroking both of my cheeks.
I break away with a gasp. “Enough nightmares for today. Ready to go home?”
She nods. “But, Ward, are you okay?”
I answer with another kiss that feels like a mortal sin. “I’m a whole lot better than I’d be if I had to go through this crap with anyone else.”
We walk back to the car, arm in arm, and once we’re inside, I cradle her to me. She gazes up, her emerald eyes in a dreamy haze that makes me smile.
I love how she looks at me.
Hell, I could swim in that bright-green wonderlust all day long.
“You two look intense. What happened?” Reese’s worried eyes peer back in the mirror.
Paige’s chin juts out like she’s about to say something.
I shake my head at her and hold her closer to me.
“We’re fine, Reese,” I say.
No part of me hides the way I’m clinging to Paige. When we get home, I want long, slow kisses, but I don’t want to kiss her in the car again.
It makes no sense. We only made out here a few days ago, but something’s changed.
Our next kiss has to be private, intimate, a sweltering secret only for us.
I can’t bear to share her with anyone else.
The Lincoln stops in front of my building a little while later.
“I’ve never seen you two so quiet. Hope everything’s okay with the company,” Reese says, peering over her shoulder at us as she puts the car into park.
I open the door and help Paige out.
“We’re fine, and Brandt Ideas has never been better.” My words are clipped. “Take the night off.”
The only thing wrong is having Paige too far away.
I wrap an arm around her waist, closing the distance between us. She’s tucked under my shoulder. We move in synchronized steps until we’re at the elevator.
Of course I stab the button to shut the door, shove her against the wall, and make her lips mine.
Of course I don’t tear myself away until we’re on my floor.
“Thanks for listening back there. I usually don’t talk about my past,” I say once we’re back in my place, closing the door behind us and bolting it.
“That was no way to grow up, Ward, and I’m sorry you had to endure it.”
“A lot of people lived a lot worse.” I glance away. “We didn’t grow up starving or being swapped around by sick pukes.”
She nods, teeth teasing her bottom lip and drawing my eye. “Maybe, but that doesn’t make what you went through easier. Everyone has problems.”
I grin. “Even a Wardhole?”
“I guess.” She gives an exaggerated sigh that turns into a grin.
“I have a problem right now.”
“What?” Her smile disappears and her eyes twinkle.
“You’re too far away.”
“C’mon. There are like two steps between us!” She takes another step into the living room, coming closer.
“Two steps too many.” I throw my arms around her from behind, pushing against her ass so she can feel how hard I am.
Her laughter rolls out of her like Christmas morning.
Turning her slowly, I pepper her head with kisses before I stop to stare into those big green eyes.
“What are you doing?” She whispers.
“Taking you to my room.”
“Straight to the point, huh, Lucky?” She pulls at my tie.
“No. I just—” I pause.
How do you tell a woman you’re bristling with agony every second her skin isn’t on yours?
A minute later, I lay her down on my bed and sprawl out beside her. Sliding an arm under her, I close my other arm around her. She’s pressed to me, this blond bundle I want to savor.
We’re tangled together like no tomorrow as our mouths go to work.
“This.” I kiss her forehead again, letting my lips linger. “This is all I need.”
I move my hand up her back and thread my fingers through gold silk, twining her hair in my fist. She gives me a boiling look when I pull, gently at first.
Her face goes rosy when she smiles up at me.
“Ward, this is nice. I feel safe with you.”
My grip tightens. I’m squeezing her closer to me, rumbling like thunder in her ear.
“You are, sweetheart. I’ll never let anything hurt you.”
Her lips find mine with a sweetness like a strawberry love potion.
The kiss is long, slow, infused with emotion I’ve never known. It’s so fucking intense I can’t help but squeeze her even closer, then worry my arms are too tight around her. But when I loosen my grip, she hugs me like she’ll die if I let go.
This is a woman like none I’ve known, and I don’t deserve her. The sympathetic ear, the comfort, it was never part of the bargain.
I deepen our kiss as my cock throbs with a fever, howling to be inside her. I’m gasping for air when I break away.
“Need to take my shirt off,” I grind out, eager to be free from my clothes.
“Let me,” she says.
I can’t say no to those playful eyes.
So I flip back, easing her up by the wrists, and let her go to work.
She doesn’t frantically rip it all off like she has before. Instead, she undoes each button with slow, almost loving precision. I sit up, allowing her to peel the shirt from my arms.
When I drop to the mattress again, I’m on my back, resting one arm on the bed. The other, ready to seize Paige for life.
Her soft face rests on my chest, planting sweet kisses. The bare skin of her arm grazes mine.
Not enough. I need more, dammit.
“Arm.” Paige reaches for my other arm.
I chuckle, rolling to my side again, all so I can cradle this girl the way she wants.
“Trade you an arm for a leg,” I tell her, my mischief reflected back in her eyes.
She giggles but lays her leg over mine.
My turn.
My lips find hers like a hawk. She meets my mouth with intoxicating warmth, delicious pressure, and the sweetest flick of tongue known to mankind.
This woman is a destroyer, and feathery kisses are her chosen weapon.
The only thing that interrupts us is shifting our weight to shed clothes, and we find each other again quickly when we’re happily naked.
Paige lies on top of me, her bare legs hugging my waist.
We’re skin to skin, and she’s so fucking soft and perfect.
My teeth claim her lip—because it’s either that or else whisper something I can’t take back. Whisper something that doesn’t belong in a contract that isn’t made in the flesh.
I roll us over, throwing her gently on her back so she’s finally under me.
My hand strokes down her body, aiming for the heat between her thighs and intent on caressing until she begs for more.
<
br /> But she’s already drenched.
My dick throbs so hard my heart stops.
“Damn, you’re ready,” I growl, smothering her eyes with my gaze.
When she doesn’t deny it, I find her lips again and hook my teeth in.
Hell yes, I bite her.
This wild nip of teeth she gives back, our lips sharing the newfound fury in our blood, the need to go at it so hard we hurt.
And it’s the most beautiful pain I’ve ever known when I slide into her.
She gasps, her eyes flitting shut, teeth bared.
“You okay?” I ask, anchoring myself in to the hilt, loving how her pussy molds to my length.
“No. You need to kiss me. Now, Ward.” The words are breathy, barely there, lust channeled and given voice.
I kiss her brows before our tongues meet again and my hips start moving.
Every thrust comes like a hot gale, slick with a need so intense it’s obscene. My mouth claims her nipple, sucking it between my teeth.
I take my sweet time punishing her tits between lavish strokes.
I lay claim to every maddeningly honey-sweet inch of her.
Mostly, I try not to bust too soon because the way she shakes, jerks, and gasps on my thrusts ignites a fire in my balls like nothing else.
Her first orgasm hits in such a fierce convulsion I’m afraid the ripple around my cock might break me.
This isn’t like the last few times we fucked.
Each thrust gets a languid kiss back.
Her legs fuse to me, but it’s not frantic, even when she goes off in screaming fireworks of clutched limbs and wordless pleas.
She’s just taking me deeper—closer.
Shit, does she feel it too?
The absolute shot of insanity when we’re joined?
The one that pinches my ear and whispers a jealous commandment. Keep her, you fool.
That harsh voice owns me tonight as surely as I own her.
And it’s too much for my sizzling blood.
My hips ram hers like a war piston, and we go careening over the hottest finish of my life together.
“Paige, fuck!” I groan, the only warning before I press deep, grinding her clit, snarling as my spine electrifies.
I’ve never come like this.
Muscles I didn’t know I had flex, intent on spilling every drop of my seed into her like rutting season just started.
We’re fucking mated, and I’m basking in her warmth and her heat and the sharp oblivion of her tight silk robbing my balls.
Yeah, it’s a damn good thing she’s covered with birth control. Because if she wasn’t, there’s no doubt I’d have her knocked up with quadruplets before this ninety days ends.
“Oh, Ward,” she moans, her voice so shrill, so beaten by our pleasure.
I stay balls deep, lingering inside her for the longest time.
“You’re the only man I’ve ever let—umm, finish inside of me, you know,” she whispers. “I always thought I’d save it for the man I’d marry.”
Shredded. She’s determined to leave me in smithereens tonight, isn’t she?
“Close enough,” I growl, before sealing her lips with another fuck-hot kiss.
Ten minutes later, she’s in my arms again and I’m teasing her lips with the same intensity as before.
She breaks away, taking rough breaths, and lays her head on my chest.
“Paige, do you really need the guest suite?”
She raises her head, her green eyes flickering with delight.
“Uh-oh. Is that an invitation to spend every night with you?”
I smile. “This room’s obviously big enough for two, and there’s no use in being lonely.”
Smiling, she bites her lip.
“Oh, Ward.” She kisses me with a new blistering intensity.
And just like that, I’m a dead man.
Rest In Paige.
I meant to ruin her tonight, but it’s the Ward Brandt I used to be who’s fading like a ghost.
She can’t hide anything.
She feels everything I do.
We’re sailing into shark-infested waters now.
The engagement was fake, but this—whatever this is—sure as hell isn’t.
It’s real, it’s lunacy, and it’s not going to stop.
21
Still A Brandt (Paige)
When I open my eyes, the first thing I see is I’m being watched by a bear.
Ward. A million happy bubbles want to burst out of me. It’s been so long since I woke up beside anyone, and I’ve never started my day beside a beast this perfect.
He greets me with a smoldering kiss. “There you are. I wondered if you’d ever wake up. I need to go into the office, but—”
“You waited for me,” I whisper, totally in awe.
This time when he kisses me, his tongue traces the inside of my mouth. “Don’t make a big deal out of it.”
I laugh. “I won’t.”
“I kept you up last night. You can take the morning off if you’re tired—”
“Ward, you can’t treat me differently. People will talk.”
“Anyone who uses your name with shitty intent is done,” he grinds out like a threat. “And that’s not what I meant. I need you at a conference today. No point in having you go to the office, then across town.”
“Ward?”
He plays with my hair. “Yeah?”
“I’m glad I agreed to this craziness.” It’s not what I want to say, but it has to suffice.
I won’t risk saying the dreaded L-word first and nuking my heart.
“Me too, sweetheart,” he says, then he takes my lips.
Eventually, we’re able to peel ourselves off each other to get ready for work. I throw on sweats and head to the kitchen to start coffee.
There, I sit at the aged blackwood table, responding to emails when Ward crosses the room. It’s insane how he looks almost as hot in a suit as he does wearing nothing.
“I made you coffee. It’s on the counter,” I say.
He smiles.
“Thank you, but I’ve got a better pick-me-up.” He moves next to the chair I’m sitting in.
You’d think I’d be used to his presence by now, but some things don’t change. He steals every iota of my breath as he kneels in front of my chair, cups my face with his hand, and brings his mouth to mine.
My arms fall around him.
I have no idea how long we’re marooned in our kiss, only that I’m dizzy when it’s done.
“I’ll see you tonight?”
I laugh.
“Well, I do live here now.”
“And how the hell did I live here before you did?” He stands, stamps another fierce kiss on the top of my head, and leaves.
Yep, I’m slayed.
Somehow, I return to my emails and marking up documents. I like being home in my pj’s but with the way things are moving at the office lately, I’m not falling a whole day behind.
A ringing phone pulls my attention away from the laptop in front of me. I glance over to see Mom’s face flashing across the screen.
“Hi, Mom.”
“Hey, sweetie. How’s your faux-gagement going?”
My nose wrinkles. Could she be more cringe?
“Great, thank you. I think the gazillionaire hotel mogul’s ready to hire the gazillionaire architect who hired me.”
“Woo, finally!” An audible breath fills the phone. “That means you can move on with your life. Thank God.”
I’m silent.
“Mom, I have to stick out the ninety days we agreed on. We can’t give the guy any reason to suspect this was a ploy...” My toes curl, bracing for impact.
“I hardly see how that’s your problem. Paige, I don’t want you in this tangled mess longer than you have to be. I still don’t understand why you couldn’t just let your dad help you out with a studio. You wouldn’t have had to resort to something like—”
“Like what? The biggest success of my life? I n
eed to do things on my own, Mom.”
“By pretending to be some rich man’s girlfriend? Have it your way. You’ll be explaining it for the rest of your life, how you got mixed up with a family with a supermodel fetish and sordid history—”
“That’s Nick.”
“What?”
“Nick, the brother, he has the supermodel fetish. I’m engaged to Ward. He’s as straight-edge as they come.”
“And yet he’s playing at being engaged. You’re pretending, and he’s paying you to lie.”
Way to twist the knife, Mom, I think with a sigh.
This is hard enough without having it pointed out by someone else.
“I hope you haven’t lost your head in this. Brandts aren’t good people, that lovely older woman aside. I’ve seen women they dumped on tabloid covers in checkout lines for ages. They always look like deer caught in headlights, never knowing what just hit them.”
She’s fixated on Victor Brandt’s sins, and I don’t know how to tell her his sons are nothing like him.
“You don’t need to worry. Ward’s nothing like his dad or his brother. I mean, Nick is pretty fun and a little broody, and Ward didn’t know what fun was before I showed up. He’s a serious guy.”
My eyes flick to the time, wondering how long this suffering will go on.
“So serious he’d fake an engagement to my daughter and let her name be dragged through the mud? A charmer, I’m sure.” Mom pauses. I can see her pinching the bridge of her nose like she always does when she’s about to drop a bomb. “Paige, this family doesn’t need more scandal. Your rock star cousin’s misadventures with addiction and strange men—”
“Mom, Milah’s a pop star,” I correct, trying not to laugh.
She only made a fortune and fame around the world with her music, and Mom still can’t nail down the right genre. Her sister, Liv, is a bestselling women’s fiction author.
I made it through art school with a 3.75 average.
Yay me.
“Whatever. She’s so famous, she shines a spotlight everywhere she goes. Milah’s last overdose was all over the news for months. Then that mafia hit with the girls...it was all anyone talked about.”
Let’s be real. It was all over the world. Milah is an international sensation.
