by Christa Wick
His powerful body with its muscled abs, thick biceps sculpted thighs, wasn’t just for show. Blake lifted me, his mouth still devouring me. Images of being laid out on my desk, his cock spearing into me, filled my head. Instead, he carried me toward my office door. Lowering me to my feet, he braced my back against the window. His mouth dropped to my neck.
Feeling the blinds shift against my back, I tried to stop him. “They'll see--”
His lips teasing the sensitive skin along the underside of my chin, I heard Blake murmur, “I know. I want them to.”
The words were like a cold, wet rag to the face. He was getting me all worked up as part of the charade! I pushed against his chest. “What do you mean?”
Blake leaned against my hands, his broad chest pinning me against the window as his hands cupped my face. “It begins now. We need to start selling the fact that we're a couple -- that we have been for months.”
“A small show for your staff, then reservations at Robuchon's for seven.” He glanced down at his watch. “I'll pick you up at six--”
“Robuchon's?” I mentally inventoried my closet, trying to remember what was back from the dry cleaners.
“Don't worry about clothes. I'm sending something over to your brownstone.” He ran his hands over my full hips, an impish grin flashing across his face. “Size sixteen, right?” His hands ran up the sides of my waist to cup my breasts and give them a gentle squeeze before his mouth crushed mine. Leaving me breathless, he broke the kiss and correctly guessed, “Thirty-six B.”
Feeling the heat rise up on my cheeks, I pushed his hands away. “You know, you might be in less trouble if you didn't have that skill.”
The grin re-surfaced before his expression grew serious. “I'll be bringing a ring tonight, it was my great-grandmother's. When this is done...”
He tilted his head at me, gray eyes glittering, and I nodded. “I understand. The ring will stay in your family.”
Blake lifted his chin, his gaze hooded in what felt like predatory speculation as he stared down at me a long second. A slow blink and then he tugged me away from the window. “Exactly, PJ, it stays in my family.”
Opening the blinds, he lightly pinched the tip of my chin before planting a slow kiss on my mouth. There wasn't the same heat as a few minutes before but anyone looking in would know that, despite all the cold facts to the contrary, it wasn't business Blake and I had discussed with the blinds shut.
Standing in the door of my office, I watched him leave. The reality of what I'd just agreed to sank in as I heard the building whispers of my staff.
I felt the brush of knuckles against my elbow. Looking to my left, I saw Kevin -- my dearest friend and second in command at the agency. We'd grown up in the PR business together, starting a year apart at our old firm. When I opened my own agency, he had followed me over with nothing more than the promise of long hours and too little starting pay. He was probably the biggest reason I'd see Blake's deal through to the end. There was no way in hell I could reward that kind of friendship, loyalty and faith with a pink slip.
“Blake Cross, I swear! At least we know why you've been hiding the last few weeks.” A conspiratorial gleam lit his gaze as he ushered me back into my office and closed the door. His hands went to his hips and he shook his head. “I want all the details, this instant, starting with the juicy bits. How big is he?”
“You want some popcorn and soda with that?” I asked as I walked around the desk and settled into my chair. Blake was right -- this could work, people would actually believe the marriage was legitimate. Most would be shocked as all hell, and some of those would be outraged at his choice. I’d probably get death threats from the crazier women.
Whether it would play well with the jury was not my problem.
Kevin waved his hand at my sarcastic offer of refreshments. “You know I'm on a diet, so quit stalling and start spilling! Long, thick, curved -- all of the above?”
Leaning back in the chair, my mouth shaping vague lies of a months' long courtship, I glanced one last time at the door Cross had left through. I'd made a deal with the devil, a dead sexy, notorious playboy who would soon be slipping his great-grandmother's ring on my finger in one of the city's most expensive restaurants.
I should have been worried and reconsidering my options instead of calmly lying to my best friend while my panties slowly soaked through and a steady throb pounded deep inside my pussy.
**********
Suggesting to Kevin that I might have big news in the morning, I went home early. My doorbell rang at five. I answered it with a robe around me, my body dripping water from the shower.
A delivery man from a plus-size boutique I recognized stood at the threshold, a box almost as tall as me tucked under his arm. “Where would you like this?”
I pointed down the hall to my bedroom. He disappeared, emerging a few seconds later to quietly retreat. I waited until I heard his car engine turn over before I locked the door and raced into the bedroom.
I approached the box with trepidation. Not only was the store wildly expensive, but its management seemed to live by the motto of “flaunt it if you got it.”
I certainly didn’t have “it.” Great hair, yes. Near flawless skin, ditto. But I was no Christina Hendricks or Charlotte Coyle.
Heart hammering in my chest, I lifted the lid to the box. My eyes about popped out of my head. A dark silver-sequined tube dress that would just make it to the top of my knees was encased in a pewter-colored wrap of brushed silk that would fall to my ankles, except for the high split up the front left side where the waist knotted.
The tube’s bodice had a boned inset that would push my smaller breasts up to an attention grabbing height, while the plunging neckline of the wrap would do nothing to hide them. Pewter mesh panties were tucked among the folds of the dress and silver chain sandals and a silver clutch were nestled at the bottom of the box.
It was gorgeous -- in the box. On me, I had the uneasy suspicion I’d look like a drag queen.
Frowning, I picked up the purse. I felt a bulge and looked inside to discover a small jewelry box. The box held a spinel-beaded platinum necklace, matching earrings and a bracelet. Stunned, I took a step back.
The boutique was at the far side of the city. Even if he’d spent all of five minutes selecting the outfit -- highly doubtful -- there still wasn’t enough time for Blake to have reached the store and the driver to have delivered the box by five. That meant that the bounty in front of me wasn't from a last minute shopping trip. Blake had picked this out in advance of our meeting this afternoon. He'd been certain I would accept. Whether that was because he thought me completely desperate or viewed himself as so damn persuasive, I didn't know. Nor did I know whether I should be ticked off by his audacity or secretly thrilled.
The warm flush heating my body had me leaning toward thrilled, but I had to be careful with Cross. He wasn’t the first man seeking aid in my arms after some beautiful, razor thin woman had done him wrong. Those men had sought to rebuild their ego, to use as they had been used, to reject as they had been rejected. I’d learned my lesson. I wasn’t about to lose my heart to Blake over something he viewed as nothing more than a business deal. Marrying me was part of his litigation strategy.
Want isn't part of the equation.
Those had been his exact words. They'd stung at the time -- still did. I pushed the thought to the back of my head, close enough to remind me this was a business deal without it spoiling my performance at Robuchon’s.
Returning to the bathroom, I dried my hair and put on a fresh layer of makeup. I must have dropped every brush twice and the tube of lipstick almost landed in the toilet. I was struggling to get the necklace on when the doorbell rang again.
I glanced at the clock. It was exactly six. Carrying the clutch and jewelry with me, I answered the door. Blake stood on my front step, resplendent in a black dinner jacket as his appraising gaze swept over me. Beyond him, taking up two spaces at the curb, was a limo.
/> Blake stepped inside, taking the jewelry from me as he dipped his head, his lips gracing mine with a soft, fleeting kiss. Reaching behind him, he shut the door. “You looking stunning, Pippa.”
I arched a brow in his direction. “In an outfit that costs as much as a car -- who wouldn’t?”
“Baby, that’s not how it works.” Taking my hand, he fastened the bracelet and then moved around me. I’d left my hair loose and straight. He draped it over one shoulder and then lifted the necklace over my head, stepping in close as he fastened it around my neck. “When, in future, I say you look stunning, you smile at me and melt like I mean it.”
Finished with the necklace, his hands gripped my shoulders. His mouth trailed along the side of my throat that was bare, starting at its bottom curve and running up to my ear. “Because I do.”
“Blake, we're all alone.”
“We’re never alone, P.J.” His hips brushed against my bottom as his hands dropped to circle my waist. The tip of his tongue curled against my earlobe, a ripple of pleasure running through me. “The chef at Robuchon’s will be insanely jealous -- all that food and all I want to eat is you.”
He gripped my hips, cinching me tight against him while his teeth traced the curve of my ear. I reached for his hands, intent on removing them from my body.
“You have to get used to my touch.” A soft warning growl accompanied his reprimand. “One flash of aversion, love, and the whole show is ruined.”
Love...show. I blinked back tears. Those two words were all it took to expose the small crush I'd thought I was nursing for what it was -- something much bigger. Realizing my true feelings for Blake, I didn't know if I could take even one night of his touching me and calling me love for show and emerge from the deal with my heart intact.
“Shhh, Pippa. You’ll get used to it, baby.” Blake turned me in his arms, his mouth covering mine in a possessive kiss that drew me in. His fingers stroked the back of my shoulders through the silk wrap, taking up a soft and rhythmic pace that lured me deeper.
He was easy to get lost in -- exactly what I was afraid of.
Breaking the kiss, he ran his cheek against mine. “Where are your keys, love?”
I pulled back. “My keys?”
He nodded. When I stared at him instead of immediately fetching them, he frowned. “So I can lock the door when we leave.”
I shook my head. “I'll lock the door when we leave.”
He blinked, his frown deepening. “No, you won't. You've spent the last year helping me define a certain brand, Pippa.” He pulled me to him, his grip on my ass and back unyielding. “That brand is an image of a very proprietary man who gets what he wants. A man who, right now, wants your keys.”
I opened my mouth in protest, but he stopped me with a shake of his head. “You know I'm right. You're mine now. The whole world has to see it that way. No doubt a Post reporter will interrogate your neighbors tomorrow, focusing on the smallest of details.”
I closed my eyes. It was the largest, not smallest, detail I was worried about the Post reporter focusing on -- the flesh of my overgenerous backside that Blake was fondling.
“Look at me, Pippa.”
I obeyed, regretting my compliance immediately. His eyes were like darkened quicksilver, the irises swirling as his pupils pulsed. Mesmerized, I felt myself leaning into him.
“You know I’m right.” Quirking a brow, he smiled at me. “The limo is already attracting attention. The reporters will hear how I locked your door, how I folded you into my limousine, how I got down on bended knee in Robuchon's.”
There was no arguing with his logic. We both knew how the tabloids -- and New York -- worked. Some “citizen journalist” had probably already recognized Blake and was on standby with his or her cellphone for a quick payday.
I nodded and he loosened his grip on me enough that I could reach into the clutch and remove the key. Handing it to him, I hesitated at the last second.
“Trust me, PJ. You're in good hands. I promised I'll protect you and I will, but you have to think before you push back.”
I let go of the key. My head bobbed in something that wasn’t quite acquiescence.
“Good. I'm glad you see it my way.” Placing his hand along the curve of my back, Blake led me outside.
Knowing it would look like a set-up if I scouted the street for anyone with a camera, I kept my gaze focused on Blake. I watched him lock the door, my house key disappearing into his pocket. Waving Carson, his driver, aside, Blake opened the door to the limo. Taking my hand in his, he held me steady as I slid into the back seat. Once Blake was sitting next to me, he directed Carson to take us to the restaurant and then he raised the interior window.
The dark tint of the limo's glass meant we were cut off from the rest of the world. Blake put his arm around my shoulder, shushing me when I tensed. His hand covered my exposed knee. “Relax, love, you can do this.”
I couldn't -- not if he kept calling me love. I looked at him, scolding myself as I felt my eyes grow moist. My panties were already drenched, my body in a state of arousal from the first brush of his lips against my throat when he had fastened the necklace.
I lifted my brows, my gaze and quivering mouth pleading with him to ease up on the act. “Blake...please...”
“Please?” He murmured the question, his thumb caressing the side of my knee. “Please kiss you? It would be my pleasure, PJ.”
My pleasure, too, far more than I wanted to admit.
He started at the corner of my mouth, his lips lightly gnawing at the edges until my head lulled against the seat cushion. His finger trailed across my cheek to gently pry my lips apart. He took a small lick center top before his teeth captured my bottom lip and sucked it into his mouth. Letting go, Blake allowed me a small moan, and then suffocated me with another kiss that had me trembling and arching against him.
The hand on my knee tightened, his fingertips digging into my flesh as he sought to control one or both of us. He pushed the bottom hem of the tube dress a little higher, his kiss sharpening to sucking bites. I brought my hands up between us, forcing myself not to clutch at the lapels of his exquisitely expensive dinner jacket.
My restraint lasted maybe five seconds and then his fingers drifted up the inside of my thigh. Gasping, I fisted the fabric of his jacket in my hands. “Blake, what are you doing?”
“Relieving some of the tension vibrating through you, PJ.”
My eyes feeling big as saucers, I shook my head at him. “That’s not what I call tension relief.”
“Then you’ve been dating amateurs, baby.” Chuckling, he slid his fingers higher, a wolfish grin splitting across his face before he buried his mouth between the upward thrust of my straining breasts. “A few minutes from now and you’ll be completely—”
The limo slowed to a stop in front of the restaurant. Blake lifted his head, a growl rumbling low in his chest as Carson exited the car and came around to Blake's door.
He looked at me, his fat pupils slowly narrowing to normal. A final kiss, almost chaste, was followed by a promise as the driver opened the door.
“We'll finish this later, love.”
**********
Blake managed to keep his hands off me through dinner. Mostly. Every few minutes, his hand would brush against mine, caressing or capturing it for an instant, never venturing higher than my wrist. Where his hands wouldn't go, his gaze roamed freely. I'd finish a sentence to find his attention focused on my mouth. He'd look up, smile, and then his gaze would drift down to my shoulders before whispering across my breasts and the hard outline of my nipples as they tented both the sequined bodice and silk wrap.
The whole meal felt like one long sex act, his tongue darting out to capture a small morsel, his lips sliding over it. Trying to focus on the conversation while his mouth teased my imagination was pure torture.
Every question he asked was a gentle interrogation -- my work before starting my own agency, my years at college. I had the sense he'd already vet
ted my background and that none of the details I offered were new to him, but he listened as if it was his first time hearing them. Inevitably, he asked me about my parents.
“Really, what's there to say?” I blinked, nose stinging at the thought of my parents. To the outside world, they looked perfectly respectable. A job for each of them -- one blue collar, one pink -- and a small two-bedroom ranch paid in full, at least it had been ten years ago when I'd last spoken to them.
I'd fielded questions and conversations about my folks hundreds of time, a good dozen in casual conversations with Cross. It shouldn't be any different this time. There was no boozing, no drugs, no broken bones. He didn’t need to know about how my mother made me weigh myself naked in front of her three times a day -- before and after school and before bedtime -- once I turned ten. He didn’t need to know how she would take a permanent marker and draw dotted lines around the awkward bulges of my flesh like she was a plastic surgeon. He didn’t need to know about the weekly tape measure sessions, the tennis lessons, the nightly ritual of an hour on the exercise bike for school nights and two hours Friday and Saturday. The Saran Wrap suits.
Shrugging at him, I blinked again, my lashes wet against my cheeks.
Blake slid to the floor, his hand dipping into his pocket to pull out a ring box. He lifted the lid, the giant rose cut spinel flashing its dark secrets like black glitter across the linen table cloth.
I knew the ring's history, had crafted an entire advertising campaign around it that had tripled his stores' sales to women. It was the symbol of the great love and romance of his grandmother Eliza Cross to a soldier who died before they married but not before Blake’s father had been conceived. Symbol, too, of a bastard child, a mother and son outcast and the empire Blake had built in their memory.
The campaign had ended with Blake’s declaration that the ring would one day be worn by his future wife, and only by a woman worthy of the memory of Eliza Cross.
