The Suspect

-chapter 21-

Tatum's pov:

I'm kissing her.

What the fuck am I doing?

I'm fucking kissing her.

Her lips are so fucking soft, they're like an addiction; I keep wanting more. I squeeze her waist and tighten my grip on her neck, when she squirms and moans into my mouth, running her hands up my neck and through my hair. Oh, fuck. I do it again, bringing another sweet whimper out of her, and I'll be damned if it isn't music to my ears.

I'm so consumed by her, that when the door to the kitchen flings open, I don't want to pull away. She immediately does, and I find myself longing for her touch again.

"What are you doing here?" The other guy growls at us, while our guy looks at us like he's two seconds away from driving a bullet through my brain.

"Oh, I'm sorry we...were just looking for a place to..." she looks at me, her beautiful lips plump and swollen, a look of helplessness in her eyes as she silently pleads for me to continue, but I just look at her.

"Have..."

"Intense lovemaking," I blurt out, keeping my eyes on Willow. Her eyes widen, and her lips twitch as if she's trying to hold back a snort.

"Yup, just that," she nods her head and digs her nails into the back of my neck as a warning. She probably thought that would hurt, but fuck that feels so good.

Jesus, I'm becoming a romantic. This girl has me fucked. Ever since I laid my eyes on her that night, in her beautiful, sexy yellow dress, I knew she would be special. I've wanted to kiss her, ruin her since that one kiss and I know I can't. I shouldn't.

She doesn't know the real me, even though she thinks she does. I can't let her know me that way. I need to stay away and keep my hands off her before I'm too deep into this; which I may already be. She doesn't know I know.

I never anticipated this. I was sure I hated her. Hated looking at her with her friends and her almost perfect life. I'm in deep shit.

The two men next to us pull me out of my thoughts and all I want to do is punch their stupid faces. I also then realize Willow and I are still breathing each other, literally.

"Well, take it somewhere else. This area is restricted to employees only," he grumbles again and we give him a fake, apologetic smile and turn around.

As soon as we're out of their sight, Willow jumps away from me like water on a scalding hot pan and nudges me in the ribs.

"What the fuck was that?" she whispers angrily.

Me kissing you senseless is what that fucking was; it's at the tip of my tongue but I refrain from saying it.

"I just saved your ass, so you're welcome," I whisper back, in the same tone and she just scoffs.

Ungrateful ass.

Her pride is the size of fucking Mount Everest. She doesn't like being told anything nor does she like when someone does anything for her.

We walk back into the main room when we see the staff setting up for the auction. Has it already been that long? I glance at my wristwatch and see that it's almost nine.

I follow Willow and I have no clue what she's doing. I think she's as confused as I am. Catching up, I walk beside her and drop my head to whisper into her ear so that she can hear me.

"Being an agent and all that, I would assume you have a plan, or did you just walk in here with nothing on the agenda?"

Her head snaps to me, and I can see she's clearly offended. Well, good. You need someone to humble you, and surprise, surprise, God sent me to do exactly that.

"Yes, dickwad. I do in fact have a plan," she frowns, "Before you decided to ruin it with that stupid act."

'Stupid act?' What is she, fucking five?

"Enjoyed it that much that you can't even say it," I smirk.

"No, I loathed it. It may as well be equivalent to torture," she murmurs under her breath but I catch it.

Torture? Yeah, well your fucking moans and whimpers said otherwise. Again, on the tip of my tongue.

"I can torture you in many ways you know. I just haven't decided which one I want to begin with first," I taunt—just for fun. Fuck, I love pissing her off. Her jaw gets tight, her eyebrows knit together, and her eyes. God, the heat and anger in those little brown eyes screw me over a hundred times; and I let them.

Her dress isn't helping either. When I first saw her, I was speechless; which is fucked up since my mouth is always on a roll. That dress was made for her; it hugged her curves perfectly, showing off her smooth, lean legs I may or may not have imagined wrapped around my waist.

"Your mere existence tortures me, you don't need to think of a dozen other ways," she shoots back in an instant.

"Touché," I remark cause frankly, by the way, she acts around me: I believe her.

Somewhere deep down, it hurts. I don't know why but it just fucking does. I'm used to people not caring about me, not giving a shit about me. Hell, it's happened all my life. What confuses me the most is why her doing the same affects me the most. 

By the time finish arguing, the auction seems to begin.

One by one, they start shouting prices. Willow stands beside me, her gaze intense on the people surrounding her. She's so fucking in love with her job, it creeps me out. I look back at the objects getting auctioned off. It's jewelry, pretty boring really. Each necklace has a gem in the center, which is probably the piece that makes the price so high. I watch as the auctioneer periodically hits the gavel as necklaces are sold. Once it's sold, women from the back come out one by one—one for each piece—and give it away to the person that won it.

"Oh fuck," I hear Willow mutter.

I turn my head towards her, "What is it?"

She grabs my arm and pulls me in, "Look at the women taking each piece to the person that won it," she instructs.

"Yeah, I already did. What about them?" I shrug, not really knowing why she makes it seem so important.

"Look, closely," she begins and I take a look at them, again.

"Each woman is wearing the dress in the color corresponding to the gem on the necklace they take to the person. They also have the same gem, on them; literally everywhere: their neck, their ankle, their wrists and ears," she points out and she's right.

"Now also take a look at where the women stand after they've given the piece to the winner," she tugs on my arm and makes me look at each one of them.

Each woman stands next to their respective winners.

I must be silent for too long since I hear a scoff at my side.

"Don't you get it? Look at who the winners are," she finally says and that's when it clicks.

They're men. All the winners are fucking men, probably older than the age of forty.

"Holy fuck," I curse and run a hand across my forehead.

"This isn't any normal auction..." she looks at me with a concerned expression.

"They're selling women."

~~

I was way too excited to post this so here you go[and yes his chapters are short for a reason;)]. Let me know what you thought about Tatum's pov and if you want more:)