Brock gave me a sideways glace. “Right. I’m not that old yet, thank you.”
I gave him a sympathetic look. “It’s okay to be your age. Just use joint medication and consider your retirement planning.”
He laughed. “You’re a brat.”
I gave him a wide grin.
His eyes drifted to my mouth and I licked my bottom lip.
Without hesitating he leaned in and ran his tongue lightly against my lip then pressed his full lips against me. He sucked at my bottom lip, his tongue seeking entrance to my mouth.
My eyes started to close when he jerked back and gave me an alarmed look.
“If Drew was a baby then that would make you twenty?”
Shit. I shouldn’t have told him my age.
His fingers pressed into my wrist again.
I rolled my eyes and looked at him again. “Twenty-two.”
“Fuck,” he muttered. “You’re a baby. What the hell am I doing?”
He let go of my wrist and ran a hand down his face.
“How the hell—,” he started to say, then shook his head. He opened his mouth to say something several times then stopped. Then growled and tried to say something again.
I watched several emotions place across his face until he finally stopped whatever train of thought was on his mind and stared down at me.
He ran his hand down my jaw and moved some hair away from my face.
“Okay,” he nodded and let out a huge breath. “I’m going to make us something to eat for lunch. Then we can talk about what I would like you to help me with. I feel like I should be giving you some milk and letting you watch cartoons or something. Jesus.”
I don’t know what possessed me in that moment. Maybe my brain was still on Brock kissing overload. He had felt so good. Perhaps it was inexperience with men, but in the back of my mind I didn’t think a kiss was going too far with him.
I lifted my hand to his face and he stiffened. His jaw was smooth against my fingertips.
“I’m not a child. Drew doesn’t even watch cartoons anymore. I grew up a long time ago.”
A look of concern came over his face. “What does that mean?”
I just shook my head but didn’t answer.
“Andi—”
I lifted up and kissed him, pressing my lips against his mouth. After a moment, he cupped the back of my head with his hand and took over. He growled and swept his tongue against me.
I opened my mouth to him and he dove in. Licking and sucking at me.
His lips were wet against mine and I mimicked him by sucking at his bottom lip. He tilted his head and almost violently started to possess my mouth.
My body started tingling and coming alive from it.
He growled again and pulled back suddenly.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he said and stood up. “Andi, you’re going to drive me insane.”
Adjusting himself, he stalked off toward one of the hallways with a hand rubbing the back of his neck and muttering the entire way.
I frowned after him and watched his ass. He filled out a pair of jeans like he was built for sex. I was just trying to distract him more than anything. The fact that he was a good kisser was a bonus.
I smacked my forehead. “Ugh. What am I doing?”
He momentarily distracted me from getting out of this stupid place. I needed him to lose interest not gain interest with kissing. Maybe the split in age would work to my advantage and he would be so turned off by it that he would stop with the questions and the digging. Maybe he would leave me alone.
That kiss though. Wow. Mind blowing and now I had this awful restless energy deep in my belly. It was his fault that I couldn’t concentrate.
“Focus on the objective. Not his lips, butt or body. Pretend he doesn’t have any of those,” I whispered to myself.
An image of him kissing me beside my ear passed through my head and I let out a loud huff. Clearly trying to convince my hormones that he needed to be left alone wasn’t working.
Brock walked back in, eyeing me cautiously. He looked more composed and came over with the remote to the TV, a folder and several books in hand. He placed them neatly beside me and gave me a heated look.
I bat my eyes at him and gave him a smile. “Thanks, you make an excellent servant. Can I have peeled grapes next?”
“Stuff to do,” he growled. “Read over what’s in the folder and we’ll talk about it.”
He walked toward the kitchen before I could reply.
I moved my ankle around a little. It was getting numb from the cold. The bag slipped off and I caught it before it hit the floor. Placing it gently on the ground I swung up into a sitting position and continued to flex my ankle. It felt a lot better.
Opening the folder, I found several sheets with names and pictures inside. The job titles were ranging but they all worked for his tech company.
I heard Brock in the kitchen moving around and making some phone calls. I was nearly done when he came back in and stood looking down at me with a frown.
Glancing up at him questioningly, I asked, “Are you mad at me? I was just joking about the grey hair.”
He shook his head and sighed, “No, just practicing some patience. Find anything?”
“Uhm, no, there aren’t very many people listed in the folder and their job descriptions are a little confusing but I think I got it. What do you need?”
He came over and took the file from my hands, placing it on the couch. Then he swept me up into his arms. My hands flew to his neck as he started carrying me to the dining room.
When we entered I noticed that one whole wall of the room was made of glass and there was a door leading out to a small square pool. It had two lounge chairs beside it and looked out over the country that surrounded the hotel.
He set me down at the table and left, then returned with a chicken salad, various fruits and a cheese plate. He left and returned with some bread and his own plate. Then did the same again and brought back two glasses of wine.
Offering to tip him for the service would probably go one of two ways. Sexual suggestions or irritation. I decided not to press my luck but I couldn’t help but smirk.
“Thank you, this looks great,” I smiled at him.
He nodded and began to eat. I did the same and stared through the window to the solitary pool as I chewed.
“Does it feel like a date?” he said and my eyes swung to him.
“No, definitely not a date.”
“Sure you don’t want to skip all this and just go on one?” he smirked.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Positive. Why do you keep asking?”
He looked like he wanted to say something important then changed his mind and asked, “How is the food?”
“Brock? Why the date question? I thought we determined that I was too young for you.”
He took a bite of his salad and gave me a funny blank stare that I imagine he thought looked innocent but just made him look like he was up to something.
“Food?” he smiled.
I huffed and rolled my eyes. Dragging answers out of him wasn’t what I wanted to right at this moment. He complained about my attempts at diverting answers and it looked like he was just as bad.
“Uhm good. So, what did you want to talk about?”
“Right, so I need you to help me find out who the mole is in my company. They stole some data and in turn we saw some stocks of one of the Latimer businesses fluctuate. You know he owns several and if one has a problem then it might spell trouble for others. It’s happened a couple of times so I started trying to figure it out and stumbled onto some transmissions between our firm and a competitor. Are you familiar with Colton Blackwell?”
I shook my head.
“He’s also an entrepreneur looking to make a big name for himself with the same types of businesses. He’s into anything from real estate to restaurants to electronics. Pretty diverse like Aiden. Simply put, we think that someone in our company gave some data to one of his and i
t cost Aiden some money. Their business profited.”
“Okay. I think I understand,” I said and took a bite of some cheese. It all sounded fairly complicated to me and not simple at all. Data, transmissions. I was basically getting that someone stole something at the tech firm Brock worked at and gave it to someone else.
He sighed. “I need you to come to the party tonight and just listen. Mingle. People will be drinking a little and I’m hoping someone will slip up and say something. Look for anything that sounds like negativity toward the company or Aiden. Nothing big.”
“Why would I be there precisely? Housekeepers aren’t exactly needed at those functions.”
“You’re not going as a housekeeper. You’ll be going as a personal assistant.”
“To whom?” I asked.
“To me. I thought about taking you as my girlfriend but they may not buy that.”
I laughed. “Yeah, given your reputation for being a lady’s man I suspect they wouldn’t. Mr. Flirtatious with a girlfriend. That would be funny.”
“Andi, we’re going to talk about that but just not right now. I need to go make some calls and have a dress delivered for you. Can you write down your sizes for me?”
I nodded.
He got up, left for a few minutes, then came back with a small notepad and pen. He slid them across the table to me.
I did as he asked and slid it back to him.
“Good, I’ll have on of Aiden’s assistant pick everything up and have it delivered. The party starts at eight. I’ll call the salon downstairs and have them send someone up for you rather than having you limp your way down to them.”
“Okay, but that’s hours away, what am I supposed to do in the meantime?”
He slid a phone across the table. “Make calls, relax. All your numbers are downloaded to that phone now. You can give it back later.”
“How did you even do that? I have a phone in the apartment Brock.”
“Don’t ask. Just take it. If I remember, I’ll bring your phone back with me. I need to go do some things for a few hours. I’m not sure spending time with you right now is a good idea.”
“Why?” I asked, and took another bite of my salad.
He clenched his jaw. “It’s hard to explain. I want to take you to the bedroom right now and fuck you but I can’t.”
I set my fork on my plate and rolled my eyes. “Well, I don’t want to have sex with you. So, we might as well just stay away from each other. I’ll help you tonight and then I’ll stay clear of you if you’ll do the same for me.”
He looked at me like I was crazy. “I’ll do no such thing. We’re going to be seeing a lot of each other from now on. I just can’t carry you off to the bedroom right now because I need my head clear on the rest of this shit and you are a major distraction. That said, I’m having a clear vision of what you might look like on my bed right now, very hot, naked and wanting.”
My lip poked out for a minute while I thought about that.
More of the kinky talk. I wouldn’t have guessed it at all from him.
He was either supremely confident or just extremely controlling. I needed to get back to work at some point and I wasn’t planning on becoming his pet while he wanted to play.
Eventually he would leave. Or Drew and I would. Which reminded me to look up the directions to his camp. If I needed to, I would go grab him and we would get out of here.
“Anything else you need right now?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No.”
Besides a plan? No.
Chapter Five
I made a couple of calls, including one to Kate, who thought it was extremely funny that I found myself in the current situation. I told her about Brock’s interest, leaving out a few small details.
She had responded by laughing and telling me more about Brock’s semi-stalking antics that had happed with her, Liv and Julia. Phone taps, GPS location, background checks, video surveillance, satellite feeds. It was eye-opening to say the least.
Having only heard a small portion from the girls in the past was one thing, but when laid out in detail it was even more frightening what he could do. Her exact words to me were, “you might as well give up now”.
I counted myself lucky so far that he hadn’t found any more than he had about me.
The counterfeiter that I had used must have been very good at what he did. Finding him had been difficult. Especially for an eighteen-year-old with no previous experience in such things. But everyone knew someone, that knew someone and I knew a lot of people back then.
The lie I told them was that I needed a license for clubbing and drinking. No one had questioned it, which was sad because I wasn’t the partying type back then. It just went to prove that none of those people knew me at all.
The trail had led to a seedy office in a back alley and to a man known only as “John”. He expected a request for a fake license to get into twenty-one and up clubs. That was his usual gig for people around that age. When I walked in with my eight-year-old brother he had known I was about to ask for something a little different. I could see it pass across his face. But when a lot of cash hit his desk, he was up for the whole new identity package for two. He was also not interested in asking questions. Bribery went a long way with “John”.
And now, no one knew me at all here. Maybe a little, but not who I really was.
I lounged on the couch for a while and kept stretching my foot while I read a book. Bored with Jack London, I finally tossed it to the side and decided to test walking.
I took a few halting steps at first but kept walking around until it felt better. It was still sore but manageable.
The small private pool was way too tempting but I didn’t have my swimsuit. I loved swimming and didn’t get to do it very often. When in a crunch though, I always got inventive.
I wandered back to the penthouse bedroom looking for clothing. When I opened the door I whistled.
“Fucking hell.”
The bed was enormous. Six people could have easily fit in it and it stood on a raised area in the floor on the back wall. A gold and black color theme just seemed to accentuate the magnitude. There was a private balcony and more windows along one wall and after exploring for a minute I discovered two full closets. The entire bedroom suite alone was probably as big as my tiny apartment back in Lakefield.
There was a table in the corner that had looked like it had multiple wires, electronic parts and a couple of new phones in plastic. I wondered if he was always dragged his computer life around with him, even on trips like this.
I found Brock’s clothing hanging in the closet. My hands grazed over the crisp dress shirts and nice polos. I glanced at some of the tags and my eyebrows shot up.
Expensive. With a capital E. As in, five-hundred dollar or more shirts. I recognized a few of them because my father had worn some of the same brands.
Letting out a dark little chuckle, I pulled one off the hanger. Brioni tag, white, long-sleeve. He was going to kill me. It even felt expensive.
I found his boxers next. Again, expensive. Although not as expensive as his boxer briefs. There were designer clothes everywhere. He really was a GQ man.
I stripped out of my clothing and pulled the shirt on. I hated doing it to such a nice shirt but left to my own devices, Brock was going to regret locking me up here. The shirt sleeves rolled up to my elbow and I tied the ends of the front together just under my breasts.
His boxers were an okay fit on me. I wasn’t exactly tiny. A narrow waist and curvy hips fit well into most things though.
There was a slight hint of cologne on the shirt that smelled like Brock. I walked down the hall trying to ignore it but it was definitely distracting. Musky and male.
The clothes against my skin felt a little naughty as it rubbed against me. The fact that it was Brock’s expensive clothing made it a little naughtier.
I found a towel in the bathroom and grabbed the phone before going outside. The heat hit me as I stepped out.
It felt humid and thick.
Setting the towel and cell close to the pool edge I stepped into the sun-warmed water.
Chlorine. I smiled to myself.
Bye-bye expensive shirt. It would probably ruin it. Just to make sure, I went all the way under the water and came up drenched with a smile on my face.
I swam around a little. The pool wasn’t any bigger than about fifteen by fifteen but it was enough to play around in.
After a few minutes, I perched on the edge, my long hair soaked and dripping behind me. The warm concrete against my skin felt good. I closed my eyes and let the sun warm my face.
I heard the door open to the patio and looked up.
Brock was stepping out, obviously distracted by something on his phone because he was tapping away at it. He wasn’t wearing his glasses anymore and looked like he had changed his shirt at some point.
“Hey Andi, the dress is here. It’s on the back of the couch and there are some—”
His eyes had finally left his phone and landed on me. His reaction was immediate.
“Fuck,” he said, and gave me a scorching look from my face all the way down to my legs. He opened his mouth then clamped it shut with a grimace. His jaw flexed furiously.
He turned around immediately and faced the patio door again but didn’t go back inside.
“Damnit, Andi,” he barked over his shoulder.
I smiled, “What? Is it the shirt? I mean, you did say I could go swimming. I borrowed it, hope you don’t mind.”
He growled. “No, it’s not the damn shirt! I can replace the fucking shirt. It’s what’s in the shirt!”
I looked down and my eyes got wide.
Ahh gawd. The white, wet shirt was clinging to my bare breasts in such a way that you could see everything underneath. Not exactly what I had planned.
Irritating him was planned. Not giving him a show of the goods.
I flung myself in the pool again with a splash and moved to the middle so he couldn’t see anything.
“Sorry! You said to go swimming so I’m swimming. I didn’t think you were going to be back for a while.”
Chase (Lakefield Book 4) Page 5
