All of that was true, and the fact that he’d said so in the interview made me smile.
But still, I had to wonder how the paparazzi would handle me today. Would they call me a liar? Why not? I was one. Would they say I’d been a good friend to Jackson? Why not? Because I’ve been one. Or would it be a mix of both?
Their job was to get a reaction out of me, so I felt that at the very least, it would be a mix of both. And because of that, I felt nervous as hell.
What am I about to step into?
I didn’t know, but I did know this: when I left my apartment, I had to look my very best, because the photos that were about to be taken of me would go global before I knew it, and Julia was right—each of them would tell their own story about how I truly felt inside. And that was the thing. While I was elated for Jackson, I was scared for myself.
I was searching through my wardrobe for something better to wear today when Harper called at ten.
“How are you?” she asked when I answered.
“Shaken,” I said. “Jackson told me nothing about this. But just so we’re clear, you need to know that I’m not angry with him, because I am the one who pressed for him to come out, and I’m glad that he has. That said, I am concerned that when Austin picks me up this afternoon, you and I both know the paparazzi will go after me. Tell me how to survive that situation—what do I say to them, and thus to the world, particularly since I’ve been living a lie for months, which everyone knows by now—or they’ll know soon enough. After this, I’m not sure how I’ll be met by the paps…or by the masses. I need you to guide me through this, Harper.”
“Mimi and I talked about just that this morning, and believe it or not, we agreed on a strategy.”
“You two actually agreed on something?”
“Let’s just say that today has been peppered with surprises.”
“What did you decide?” I asked.
“When you leave your apartment with Austin and his team at your side, Mimi and I think you need to behave as if you knew this was going to happen and that you are proud that you were able to be there for Jackson and help him feel it was safe to come out. The good news is that this story is going to be less about you and far more about Jackson. His coming out is going to be the story that dominates the media, Sienna, not you—which is a good thing.”
“I’m still attached to it,” I said, “in a major way.”
“You are,” she agreed. “But because of the sensitive way Jackson treated you in the interview, I believe you will come out of this looking like the supportive friend of someone in need. Jackson did right by you, because it’s clear that whatever arrangement he made with People also included protecting you.”
Julia had said the same.
“As for the paparazzi, when you leave your apartment, you have two choices: say nothing, or say something. Since Mimi and I believe you need to own this story, our best advice to you is that you say something. When confronted, say that you did this to help Jackson work through a difficult time in his life. Nobody knows about the contract you signed with him, and nobody will ever know about it, so don’t worry about that biting you in the ass, because it won’t. So, if anyone says anything negative to you, I say you shoot them down by saying how happy you are that Jackson finally did this for himself. That that’s been your intent all along. How does that sound?”
Once again, that was pretty much what Julia had suggested, and because I respected Harper and her so much, I couldn’t ignore that it was good advice.
“Actually, that sounds good,” I said. “But I have another question for you.”
“What’s that?”
“My contract,” I said. “Jackson nullified it with that interview. He and I are no longer a couple. Instead, he and Ash are a couple. What does that mean for me?”
“It means that you’re free,” she said. “It means that the contract is officially over as of today.”
“Seriously?” I said. “I’m out of it?”
“Of course. Mimi and Jackson have already signed off. You’ve met your obligations, and Jackson himself has insisted that despite this not having lasted the full eight months, you nevertheless will be paid the full ten million when you arrive for our meeting this afternoon. But never mind about that now. You need to get ready for Austin and his team to pick you up. They’ll be there in a matter of hours, and you need to be camera-ready for the world. Wear that chic summery suit of yours that I love so much.”
“The Dior one?”
“Yes, the white one. And remember, my darling girl, look beyond happy and thrilled when you leave your apartment. Make everyone believe you have been in on this from the beginning, if only so you could give Jackson time to come to a critical life decision. Can you do that?”
“I totally can do that.”
“Good. Now, go and get ready. Be the Sienna I know you can be. I’ll see you at two.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Later, once I was showered, dressed, and ready for the cameras, I stood before my wardrobe’s mirror and assessed myself. My makeup was light and fresh. The Dior suit Harper wanted me to wear had been a gift from the company when I wore it for them during my modeling days. But since the suit was so formal, I’d decided to soften it by wearing my hair down and flowing down my back in soft waves.
It was a good look. But as time passed, my nerves started getting the better of me.
What’s going to happen when I step outside? What are they going to say to me? Are they going to feed me to the dogs, or will they be kind to me?
Once again, I knew I needed to be prepared for both.
And then there was Austin. I was now officially out of my contract with Jackson. Had anyone told Austin that was the case? Or had he surmised it on his own? And because of that, what was going through his head right now? Was he going to be as eager to see me as I was to see him?
When my buzzer went off at one thirty, I rang David through and took a deep breath to collect myself for all that was to come. But as hard as I tried to convince myself that I was ready for whatever came my way, who the hell was I kidding? I wasn’t prepared for any of it. When the knock came at my door and I opened it, I was almost paralyzed with fear.
And then I felt paralyzed in other ways, because it wasn’t David who’d come for me. Instead, it was Austin. My lips parted as I took in all six foot six of him in his perfectly fitted black business suit. I saw the intensity in his eyes. I tried to speak, but I was so shocked that he was standing before me that words wouldn’t come.
“May I come inside?” he asked.
I stepped away from the door. He entered my apartment, shut the door behind him, and got straight to it.
“Your contract,” he said. “Have you talked with Harper? Are you officially out of it now?”
“Yes,” I said. “I talked with Harper earlier, and because of Jackson’s interview with People, it’s now considered null and void. Apparently when we meet them at two, I’ll be paid in full, and—”
“That’s all I needed to know,” he said. He came toward me with a heated look of desire in his eyes and took me into his arms, pressing my back against the door.
His lips collided against mine, and I felt his need for me surge through me, feeling faint as I realized it was stronger than I’d ever imagined it would be. What I felt in his kiss was a love that was searing and real, unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. In that kiss was such an overwhelming sense of relief, truth, and hunger that my world fell away as his hands smoothed up my body and caressed me before cupping my breasts.
Gently, he squeezed them and then brushed his thumbs across my taut nipples, causing my head to rear back in ecstasy. With my neck thus exposed to him, he began to kiss it—to the point that I felt certain I was about to come right then and there.
This is happening, I thought. Finally, we can be one again…
With his body pressed hard against mine, I could feel the swell of his erection pulsing against my thigh, and it
made me catch my breath in a mixture of excitement and raw delight.
When I reached down to take him in my hand, I felt his girth and his impossible length, and as I did so, he claimed my lips with his own as I felt his love for me roar through me, shake me, stun me. Impulsively, I jumped up and clasped my legs tightly around his waist. I felt his hands curve around my ass so he could support me, and we kissed for what seemed like an eternity before he started to move toward my bedroom.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Austin, we need to leave.”
“No, we don’t,” he said.
“Look, more than anything I want to make love to you, but Harper, Jackson, and Mimi are expecting us.”
His blue eyes flashed with mischief at me.
“Actually, the meeting’s been pushed back until eight,” he said.
“Come again?”
He laughed when I said that.
“Sienna, you are seriously about to come again…and again and again.”
“No. Well…I mean, yes. Of course I mean yes. But why has our meeting been pushed back until eight?”
“After the People interview, it didn’t take a genius to know that you’d already asked Harper if you were still contractually bound to Jackson. After Jackson told the world that he was in love with Ash, I knew your contract with him had to be dead. Did I know it for sure? No, which is why I asked you when I came in. Still, since it only made sense that it was, I called Harper before I came here and told her that it would be safer for you if the paps believed you weren’t going anywhere today. I told her it would be safer for all involved if we met this evening. She agreed and made the necessary calls, and everyone said it was the right choice for you and Jackson. I told her I’d call you myself and tell you about the changes. So, here I am—telling you that your meeting is now at eight—just as I’m about to make love to you.”
He eased me down onto my bed.
“Being separated from each other is now officially over,” he said as he positioned his body above mine. “And now that I know you’ll receive your full payment from Jackson, we can be together again. But just so you’re clear on this, Sienna, I would have waited for you. That wasn’t bullshit on my part.”
Hearing the conviction in his voice, I knew it wasn’t, and so, as I lay on my back looking up at him, I felt thrilled, elated, happy, and in love as I stroked my fingers through his impossibly thick hair.
“Make love to me, Austin,” I said. “I’ve waited too long for this moment. I need to have you inside me again.”
He glanced down at me.
“As much as I’d like to tear off your clothes right now, it’s probably best if I didn’t, because you’re going to need that suit to be as fresh as it is now before we leave here. So, how about if you get undressed for me while I watch?”
“Will you do the same for me?”
“If you want.”
“Oh, I want,” I said. When I was off the bed and standing before him, I slowly began to remove my suit, finally draping it over a nearby chair.
“Christ, you’re beautiful,” he said when I was naked.
“Even like this?” I asked. “Even with the sunlight pouring through the windows?”
“I can see all of you now,” he said, “in ways I hadn’t been able to see before. I’m the luckiest fucking man on earth.”
I stood in front of him. “Your turn,” I said. “Take off your suit, Austin.”
“I was thinking that maybe you’d help me out of it.”
“Is that what you want?”
“It’s exactly what I want.”
“Then, stand up,” I said.
Wordlessly, he stood in front of me. I stepped so close to him that only a whisper of lust separated us. But for me, it might as well have been a scream, because I was so hot for him right now, that’s exactly what my body felt.
Despite how tall I was, Austin literally towered over me. I was so unnerved that we were going to make love again after being apart for so long that strangely it felt as if this were going to be our first time together.
As I removed his jacket and then started to tug at his black tie, my hands began to tremble in anticipation. When I focused my attention on his shirt, I started at his throat and undid each button, his massive chest—concealed once again by a white T-shirt—slowly revealing itself to me.
“Why are you going so slowly?” he asked in that deep voice of his.
“I don’t know,” I said as I worked my way down toward his bulging crotch. “Maybe because some things shouldn’t be rushed? I’m burning all of this into my memory, because at this moment, finally free to be with the man who owns my heart, I want to remember all of it—right down to my taking off your underwear.” I arched an eyebrow at him. “Provided you are wearing underwear…”
“I kind of went back to that.”
When I leaned down to pull off his pants and saw his tented briefs, I was on my knees, lusting at what was straining against the thin fabric. With a quick, strategic pull of his briefs, I reared back as his weighty cock sprang free in front of me.
Before he could do anything, I took him into my mouth, rolling my tongue along the great expanse of his thick shaft, and this time he allowed me to take all of him down my throat. And when I did, I heard him suck in a surprised rush of air as I cupped his balls in my hand and began to massage them.
But he didn’t give me long to do so.
Before I could finish having my way with him, Austin—ever the alpha male who clearly wanted to run this show to meet my needs—withdrew himself from my mouth and asked me to stand.
Turned on by the need in his voice, I stood before him. We were so close to one another that the tips of my nipples brushed against his bare chest—which nearly made me come undone as a jolt of electricity took hold of me at the very moment he claimed my mouth with his own.
“I’m in love with you,” he said roughly when our lips parted and we stood face-to-face. “I don’t know what it is about us—and frankly, I don’t care. What matters is that what I feel is real. It’s right. And I know in my soul that this is where I want to be for the rest of my life. With you. With me making love to you. With you by my side forever. You and I are going to be in love for the rest of our lives. I can feel it,” he said. “Can you?”
“I can,” I said. And I could.
Swiftly, he scooped me into his muscular arms, laid me down onto my bed, and then skillfully hovered just above me, our bodies not touching save for our lips as he kissed me with a passion that underscored just how deeply in love he was with me, which overwhelmed me.
Out of the blue—and in ways I’d never seen coming this morning—this was really happening to me. Despite all the doubts I’d had when it came to us, Austin was here with me. Somehow we were together again, and I was nothing short of grateful that I was being allowed to experience this kind of love again.
As he lowered his body a notch, my nipples grazed against his skin again, and I felt his cock lower against the tip of my sex. Just as I thought he was about to enter me, we looked into each other eyes for a moment before he slowly began to work his way down my body. He covered my torso with kisses before his mouth pressed against my sex, and his tongue plunged into it.
He thinks he needs to prepare me for him, but this time he doesn’t. I’m already open and ready for him…
Still, I gave myself over to him.
His tongue licked, tasted, and fluttered against my folds before he moved to my clit and swiped the stubble on his chin over it, which nearly did me in. He kissed me there, and then I felt his fingers reach up to tweak my nipples just as his tongue moved deeper inside me in ways that were so sexy that I gasped as waves of ecstasy overcame me. Only when he was certain I was open and wet enough to accept all of him did he enter me.
And when he did—when I felt so full and tight with him inside me—I looked up into the safety of his eyes, and my body naturally relaxed as he began to move in slow, rhythmic strokes that became more inten
se at my nod to him that this was good, this was perfect. When I was ready for more, I encouraged him with thrusts of my own.
“What do you need from me right now?” he asked me.
“I want to come.”
With a fierceness that I’d never before felt, Austin dipped his head to my right nipple, bit down hard on it, and then shoved himself completely inside me, which sent me out of my body and straight into the ether as I cried out in pleasure. I placed my hands against his sweaty, muscular chest as my body shook with my climax, which cascaded through my body in wild ripples.
But Austin didn’t stop there. Instead, he intensified the moment, driving in and out of me, fucking me, kissing me, smoothing his tight body over mine until I came again.
It was too much. This was far beyond what we’d experienced the first time we’d made love. This was something different. This was charged with unrest, lust—and the understanding that we’d fallen in love.
As he rammed into me, I thought about what sex would be like with him going forward. Was this just a primer of what was to come? Was he giving me a mere sampling of what to expect from him?
Convinced it was the latter, I felt in my soul that this man was only beginning to reveal how well he could claim my body. And I responded to all of it as we moved about the bed.
At one point, I found myself straddling him, riding him as he lay on his back with his hands behind his head and watching me with encouraging eyes. Later, when he flipped me onto by side and came up behind me, he thrust tirelessly into me as he kissed the nape of my neck and gently caressed my breasts. And then it occurred to me that Austin himself had yet to come. How was that even possible? Was he supernatural? Or was he just that good?
I didn’t know. And I seriously didn’t care, because when he turned me onto my back, I could see on his face just how much he was enjoying himself.
I reached out my hand and placed it against his right pec, and when I pinched his own nipple, intense waves of pleasure appeared on his face, and his eyes became hooded as he drove into me. I wanted him to come, so I bucked hard against him just as my own orgasm started to build again. Together, we looked into one another’s eyes just as release started to overcome each of us. And as it did, our bodies shuddered as we cried out in ways that underscored our love for one another. It was real. It was undeniable.
Faking It (The Making It Series) Page 23
