"No," he rumbled in my ear. "I have to fuck you. Now."
"Why? Are you marking your territory?" I'd only been half serious with the comment, but he pulled back and the look in his eyes said that was exactly what he was doing.
I wriggled out of his gr...
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Awareness of movement in the room woke me the next morning. I opened my eyes and saw Shawn adjusting his tie in front of the dresser mirror, his back to me. He had yet to put on his jacket so I had a full view of his tight behind. God, that man could wear a suit. He could wear nothing as easily. I wasn’t choosy.
He met my eyes in the mirror and a slight smile graced his lips. “Good morning.”
“Morning. I’m enjoying the view.”
“So am I.”
I blushed and pulled the sheet up over my naked body. The room seemed awfully light for as early as it had to be. “What time is it?” I glanced around for a clock and found none.
“Almost eleven.” He finished with his tie—a silver patterned one that brought out his eyes—and opened a drawer, retrieving a pair of dress socks.
Eleven? Shawn was usually at work before eight. “Why are you still here? Shouldn’t you have made half a million dollars by now?”
“Half a billion,” he said, straight-faced, as he sat on the bed next to me. “But they don’t need me for that. I canceled my morning.”
“When did you do that?” I was mesmerized with watching him put on his socks. It shouldn’t be so sexy to watch a man get dressed, yet my belly tightened and my girl parts started humming.
“Last night. Before you got here.”
“Smart thinking.” His invitation to spend the night in his penthouse had come at the beginning of my shift at The Sky Launch. I’d obsessed about it the entire evening, but being at work, there was nothing I could do to prepare for it. I didn’t even have a change of clothing or a toothbrush. It hadn’t occurred to me that Shawn would have used the time to get ready for my arrival. But of course he did. He was a very organized man, a planner with a fine attention to detail.
And since two rounds of lovemaking had transpired, we hadn’t gone to sleep until nearly six in the morning. Canceling his morning was good planning indeed.
I yawned and stretched my arms over my head, the sheet falling below my breasts as I did.
Socks on, Shawn stood and peered down at me, his eyes clouding as he perused my naked body. “Fuck, Beyoncé, you’re making me want to cancel my afternoon, too. And I can’t cancel my afternoon.”
I grinned. “Sorry.” But I wasn’t. Shawn could make me wet from across a crowded room. It was nice to think I had some of the same power over him. “Um, I need to get up. Is that going to be too…distracting?”
He narrowed his eyes at me then turned and disappeared into a closet returning with a cream robe. “Here.”
I took the robe from him, not bothering to put it on until I was standing.
“You’re a wicked, wicked woman,” he said as he watched me pull the garment around myself.
“And you love it.”
Without acknowledging my statement, he nodded toward a closed door. “The bathroom’s there. There should be brand new toothbrushes in one of the drawers. Look around until you find what you need.”
“Thank you.” I crossed to him and gave him a peck on the cheek before making my way to the bathroom to pee.
It hadn’t been a cuddly afterglow morning like we’d spent together at Mabel Shores, his family’s summerhouse in the Hamptons. But this was Shawn—aloof and compartmentalized. He was focused on getting to work, and, to his credit, he’d been pretty hospitable considering.
I found the toothbrush easily; as he’d said, there was a drawer full of them. While I brushed, I wondered about that. What was with the surplus? Did he simply want to always be prepared, in case he needed a new one? Maybe he believed toothbrushes should be disposable. He certainly could afford that attitude.
Or did he have them for overnight guests? Female overnight guests, to be precise.
I might have decided I was being paranoid, except it wasn’t only the toothbrushes. Now that I looked around, there was floral scented deodorant by one of the sinks with a bottle of women’s face cream and another bottle of moisturizer next to it.
And the robe—the woman’s robe that I was wearing at that very moment —where had that come from?
A chill ran down my spine. I tightened the sash around myself, despite my growing concern that I was wearing clothing that belonged to someone else. To another woman. Another woman in Shawn’s life.
Okay, okay. No need to panic. Maybe there had been other women before me at the penthouse. That was fine. Not wonderful, but fine. I just wished he hadn’t lied about it. And why had he lied about it?
I opened the moisturizer and brought the bottle to my nose. It smelled fresh and familiar—was that the scent Maria wore?
Now I was being ridiculous. Paranoid, even. Knowing that didn’t change the sick, angry emotion rooting through my gut. It was a feeling I’d once been very intimate with. The driving force of most of the unhealthy behaviors I’d acted upon in the past. Behaviors I did not want to relive.
I had to get calm, handle the situation constructively. I forced myself to count to ten. In between each number I repeated the mantra I’d learned in counseling: when in doubt, talk it out. One, when in doubt, talk it out. Two, when in doubt, talk it out.
Yeah, easier said than done.
By the time I reached four, the mantra had turned into when in fucking doubt and still I was very much doubting.
But that was my tendency, my go-to in all of my relationships. I jumped to conclusions—conclusions that very often were way off-base and unfounded. Late nights at work meant another girlfriend. Mysterious phone calls meant cheating. With my previous boyfriends, I never asked. I assumed. I accused.
Not this time. This time I would be different. Even though the evidence suggested that Shawn had lied to me, I couldn’t accept that as fact. I would have to ask him about it.
I scrubbed my face clean with the facial cream, hoping that stalling before I talked to Shawn would relieve the simmer of fury. After patting my face dry with a hand towel, I convinced myself that I was together enough to address him and started out of the bathroom, grabbing the cream and moisturizer to take with me as evidence.
So, maybe collecting evidence was more of an attack than a discussion tactic. As long as I didn’t end up throwing them, I considered it an improvement on my past.
Shawn wasn’t in the bedroom when I came out, so I made my way out through the apartment until I found him in the kitchen. He’d donned his suit jacket now, and he stood at the kitchen table, reading the paper as he drank from a mug.
He looked up when I appeared. “I made you some—”
“Why do you have all this stuff?” Though I’d cut him off, I was pretty sure my question sounded more curious than accusatory. Hopefully.
“What stuff?”
“This stuff.” I set the bottles on the table in front of him. All right, maybe it was closer to a slam. “And you have a plethora of toothbrushes and this woman’s robe. Why do you have a woman’s robe?”
His eyes narrowed and he took a sip from his beverage before answering. “I have more than the robe. I have several pieces of women’s clothing in the extra closet in my bedroom.”
“That’s not helping.” The panic I thought I had smothered deep inside worked its way up my throat, tightening my voice. “You told me you never had a woman here before.”
“Do I detect a hint of jealousy?”
The gleam in his eye unleashed me. “You detect more than a fucking hint. Also, a whole lot of suspicion. Come on, Shawn, this isn’t any way to start a relationship. If you’ve had a woman here—if this is someone else’s clothing I’m wearing—I need to know.” My eyes burned, but I managed to keep them pinned on him.
Shawn set his mug down and turned his whole body toward me.
I kept my hand on the table, bracing myself for whatever excuse he’d give. What he said—if he chose to speak the truth, if I chose to believe him—it could make or break us.
“They’re yours, Beyoncé.”
“What?” That, I wasn’t expecting.
“I purchased them for you. Except the toothbrushes. My housekeeper buys me those so I have plenty for when I travel. The clothing and cosmetics are yours.”
Mine?
No, it wasn’t possible.
I swallowed. “When did you get them?” Had he been planning for me to be there before he invited me? Or was this part of the scam we’d tried to pull on his mother, a piece of proof that we were a couple should anyone look in his closet?
“Last night after I left the club.”
Last night. “But that was almost eight.” He’d left me at the start of my shift. That couldn’t have possibly been enough time to arrange anything. “How did—”
“I understand what it looks like,” he cut me off. “There’s likely still a tag on the robe if you…” He reached his hand inside my collar and tugged. “Yes, see?” He held up a tag, the price—an extravagant price for a robe—listed boldly under the size.
I glanced over at the cosmetic bottles again. They were completely full, seemingly unused. I hadn’t realized that in my heated emotion. But, still, I had questions. “Why? How...?”
“Why? Because I knew you’d have nothing to wear today and I didn’t want you to have to do the so-called walk of shame through my lobby. Plus I figured you’d want to wash that club makeup off your face and freshen up a bit. As for how…I have people.”
I ran my hands through my hair. “You have people.” The tension in my shoulders relaxed slightly as I processed what he’d said. He’d left me at work and then he’d prepared. As he always prepared. He’d canceled his morning. He’d arranged to have clothing for me. Even at that late hour, Shawn managed to make arrangements. Because he had people.
“Kelly?” I asked. Shawn’s sister, Kelly, owned her own boutique. She knew my size, knew what I’d look good in.
“Yes.” He cocked his head. “And others.”
Others like the same people he had launder and deliver my undies within a couple of hours when I’d left them at his office one time. Like Jordan who was always available to drive me to and fro at the drop of a hat. I’d known he had others.
“Oh.” A medley of emotions washed over me as I let the pieces settle into place. I was relieved to find my jealousy was unfounded and delighted to realize how much thought Shawn had put into my arrival at his apartment. I was also touched to know he was serious about wanting our relationship to work, because didn’t this type of preparation show sincerity?
But then I also felt embarrassed. And ashamed. I’d overreacted, and even though I hadn’t gone crazy like I would have in the past, I felt the seed of it inside. It scared me. Scared me to know Shawn saw it too.
I lowered my eyes to my hands where I wrung the sash of the robe anxiously. “It must be nice to have people,” I mumbled. “I want people.” Silly, senseless words, but they were all I had.
Shawn lifted my chin to meet his stare. “I want you.”
The look on his face—he wasn’t upset by my outburst at all. Other men had been scared away by similar unfounded accusations. But Shawn—not only did his expression show an absence of fear, it showed hunger, desire. Almost as though my paranoia was a turn-on.
“You have me,” I whispered.
He took the sash from my hands and pulled the knot free. “I want you right now.” His hand wrapped around my breast, squeezing as his thumb flicked across my nipple.
“Oh, you want me, want me.”
“Uh-huh.” He shifted me so my backside was against the table. Flattening his palm between my breasts, he pushed me down; the surface of the table met hard with my backside and a brief flash of worry about spilling his coffee and breaking the cosmetic bottles entered my mind.
“And I want you now.”
Fuck the coffee. Let it spill.
Shawn nudged me back so that my bottom met up with the edge of the table, scooting the bottles out of the way with his arm as he did. I was laid out before him now, my robe open to expose the most intimate parts of me.
His eyes darkened as he rubbed his hands in long strokes from my belly up to my breasts and back again. Then they went lower, to the center of my desire.
“I could stare at your pussy all day long.” His fingers slid through my folds and circled my hole.
“Don’t you have to be somewhere?” My voice didn’t sound like mine, breathy and needy and desperate.
And what the hell was I doing? I didn’t want him to leave. I didn’t want him to stop. Please, god, don’t let him stop.
“I do have someplace to be. We’ll have to be quick.” His hands left me to work on opening his pants. “But I’m not leaving here without fucking you good morning.”
I may have sighed out loud in anticipation.
Leaning up on my elbows, I watched as Shawn adjusted his pants and briefs enough to free his stiff dick. A sight I’d never tire of. And it was all mine, only mine.
Another random worry crossed my mind. “Your housekeeper isn’t going to walk in on us, is she?”
“She comes on Tuesday and Friday. If I’m not mistaken, it’s Wednesday.” He grabbed my ankles and bent my legs up. “And if she did walk in, would you care?”
He thrust in.
“No,” I gasped. Right then I didn’t care about anything but the man in front of me. The man inside me. The man who wanted me, wanted me in his house, wanted me in his bed. Wanted me in his life despite my shortcomings.
Shawn pulled out and pressed back in, again and again, the sturdy table rocking with the force of his jabs. He adopted a rapid tempo, apparently serious about the have to be quick. At this rate, he’d be there soon.
He adjusted his grip on my ankles and folded my knees into my chest, the new position bringing him deeper inside me. “Touch yourself, precious.” His voice was tight with effort to hold on. “Let’s come together.”
Without hesitation, I moved my hand to rub my clit, swirling the bud at a speed that matched his. I’d done this before—played with myself for his viewing pleasure. It was a turn-on for him, based on how quickly it always brought him to release.
It was a turn on for me, too. To see the pleasure in his face, to feel his drive increase as I writhed and moaned at my own touch—there was nothing hotter. Already, I was tightening, clenching around him.
“That’s it, Beyoncé.” His face contorted. “Fuck, that’s… it…” His voice broke as he came, shoving deeper into me as his climax erupted.
My hand fell to the table, my body numb.
He smiled as he pulled out. “How was that?”
He knew the answer. The perv wanted to hear me say it.
I grinned. “You can fuck me good morning anytime you want.”
“I wouldn’t mind fucking you good morning every morning.” He reached behind him to grab a paper towel off the kitchen counter while I pretended not to read a million things into his statement. I continued to pretend while he cleaned himself up and did up his pants.
He raised his brows and gestured toward me. For a moment I thought he might know what I was thinking—how being with him every morning implied living with him, how that was too soon, how I never thought anything was too soon because I was an obsessive freak who wanted to cling, how I was ultimately unable to handle such a proposition with my history.
Then I realized he was simply asking if I needed the paper towels, too. “I’m jumping in the shower.” Shit, he hadn’t said I could stay. “If that’s okay, I mean.” Was it totally inappropriate for me to ask if I could lounge around his place while he went to work? Because until that very second, that’s exactly what I had planned.
Shawn reached his hand out to help me down from my perch. Reaching around me, he grabbed the ends of my sash and tied it at my waist. “It’s more than okay. I want you to stay. I planned that you would stay.” Which meant I would likely find women’s shampoo and conditioner in the shower, too.
Shawn’s phone buzzed and he pulled it out of his suit pocket to read his text message. “My driver’s here. Seems I used up the time I meant to spend giving you the penthouse tour.”
I shrugged. “Whoops.”
“You’ll have to explore on your own.” He walked to the kitchen sink and washed his hands.
“Are you giving me permission to snoop? Because it sounds like you are and you don’t understand—I’m a snooper.”
He chuckled. “I don’t doubt it. I have nothing to hide. Snoop away. Use the gym. Take a nap. There’s food in the fridge. Do and take whatever you like. You work at eight tonight?”
“Yes.” I’d stopped being surprised by Shawn’s omniscient way of knowing my schedule. It was the sort of thing I’d usually do—memorize a guy’s schedule, find out all the details of his life. It was kind of nice to be on the other side of that for once.
“Good. I’ll make sure I’m home by six.” Home. He said it like it was our place, not his. Another ping of anxiety stabbed at my chest. “We’ll have dinner together before you leave.”
“I hope you aren’t expecting me to cook.” Or to not latch on.
“Don’t be silly. I’ll arrange for the cook to come.”
I nodded, my insides turned into knots by Shawn’s easiness about our relationship.
“Oh, and the books for the library should be here today. There’s an intercom there.” He pointed to the wall by the light switch. “And one in the hallway by the elevators and a third one in the bedroom. When security buzzes up, you can approve the delivery and the guard will let them up.”
“Sure thing.” Trusting me with intercoms and security…this was getting bigger by the minute. “Wait, books?”
“Yes, I ordered a few books. Since you said it was your favorite part of the library.”
“Right.” It had been part of our charade for his mother. She didn’t believe I had ever been to Shawn’s penthouse and, of course, I hadn’t. Meaning to trick me, she’d asked me what my favorite room was. I had said the library. An avid reader, the library was a natural room for me to choose, and I mentioned my love of books to Sophia. Apparently, though, Shawn’s library didn’t have any books.
Not at the time, anyway. “I still feel somehow tricked about that whole thing, by the way. But when did you have a chance to order them?”
The conversation had only taken place on Sunday when we’d been at his parent’s place in the Hamptons. The day I voiced for the first time that I was falling in love. The day before he’d left me alone with his family while he went to try to save one of his companies, Plexis, from being sold.
“I ordered them Monday night from my hotel. After the deal with Plexis.” His voice held the slightest hint of disappointment when he said the name of his company. His disappointment mirrored how I was suddenly feeling. “What is it?”
I considered saying nothing, but the talk it out mantra replayed in my head. “It’s silly, but I’d convinced myself you hadn’t called me or anything because you didn’t have time. But it seems you did.” Shawn had left me without anything but a brief text. He didn’t call or contact me until more than a day later. I had believed we were over then. I’d been devastated and heartbroken. Now I found he was ordering books when he could have been calling me? “Like I said, it’s silly.”
Shawn tugged me into his arms. “I was trying to not be with you at the time, Beyoncé. But I couldn’t sleep that night. Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.” He kissed me on the forehead as I furrowed my brow. “Tell me—what’s going on in there?”
“It’s just…” How could I express the myriad of emotions that I’d been through that morning? Especially this growing fear tugging at my gut—this fear that anything that seemed too good to be true usually was.
I took a shaky breath. “You’ve made a complete one-eighty, Shawn. About you and me. You were so intent to be only sex only half a day ago. And now…who are you?” It scared me. It made me doubt what he felt. It made me wonder if he was playing games with me.
Shawn cupped my face in his hands and pierced me with his deep gray eyes. “Don’t do that. I mean it.”
He widened his eyes, making sure I was with him.
I was.
“I’m the same man, Beyoncé. A man who commits to whichever plan he’s chosen. I had told myself I couldn’t have you. So I didn’t let myself even try.”
“And now you’ve let yourself.” I said it like a statement, but it was really a question. A question that I absolutely needed answered.
“Yes. And I will commit to this new plan as fiercely as the other. Even more fiercely. Because that plan was a compromise.” He pressed his forehead against mine. “This plan is the one I should have pursued to begin with. It’s the better plan.”
My throat tightened. “The plan with the greater potential of profit.”
“Unfathomable potential.” He parted his lips and bent in for a kiss, sucking gently as he moved his mouth over mine. It was a sweet and tender kiss and it ended too quickly. “I have to go. Save more of that for later.”
“Always.”
I walked with him to the foyer. He retrieved his briefcase from the closet then kissed my forehead once more before stepping into the elevator. We stood, eyes latched until the doors closed.
As soon as he was gone, I fell against the foyer wall. Oh my god, was this really happening? Was I really making myself at home in the penthouse of my billionaire boyfriend? I felt like Cinderella. Or Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. Did Shawn really want me in his life like this or was I completely insane?
I was insane. Insanely happy.
With a squeal, I ran to the living room and threw myself on the sofa. I closed my eyes and replayed the morning in my mind—waking up in Shawn’s bed, the hot sex on the kitchen table. But what I focused on the most were his words.
I’d like to fuck you good morning every morning.
I’ll be home by six.
I couldn’t stop thinking about you.
Unfathomable potential.
After several minutes of grinning so widely my cheeks hurt, the doubts started to creep in again, as they always did. Was it truly possible for Shawn to change so completely, seemingly overnight? Or was I merely a game he was playing? Maybe he wasn’t even conscious of what he was doing and he was manipulating me and my emotions out of habit.
Or maybe, like I, he didn’t know how to do this relationship thing and he was simply acting the way he thought he should, even if that meant rushing.
Possibly it was all completely genuine. I felt those things for him after all. I wanted to be with him every day, all the time. I was ready for that commitment level, even though I wouldn’t have said so two days before.
But I jumped into things, clung too quickly. That was my way.
Maybe it was Shawn’s way too.
I sat up and glanced around the room. I had been serious when I’d said I was a snooper and usually I’d jump right on that. But I didn’t feel the need to at the moment. I did feel the need to get in the shower and clean up. I was still sticky from the evening before, not to mention our morning activities.
I went back to the master bedroom, noting on the way a closed door that most likely led to the library as well as another bedroom. In the master, I stepped into the closet Shawn had retrieved my robe from. It was a walk-in and was mostly empty except for one rack of clothes. There were a few dresses most likely meant for the club, several pairs of shorts, jeans and sweat pants, and a rack of tops. One dresser drawer was partially opened so I pulled it out the rest of the way and found panties and bras. There was also a negligee. I guess I knew what Shawn wanted me to wear to bed that night.
I let out a happy sigh and headed to the bathroom, this time noticing a closed door on my way. I peeked in and discovered it was a second walk-in closet, this one full of Shawn’s clothing. I walked through, running my hands along the rows of suits. Was it ridiculous how much I adored seeing his clothes like this? It felt so personal, so intimate. As if by being in the center of his closet, I was in the center of his life. I twirled around slowly, basking in the metaphor. It felt warm and completely right.
My shower was long and hot. If I’d been in my studio apartment, I’d have run out of hot water long before the time I finally stepped out from the luxuriating pulse of Shawn’s deluxe showerhead. I wrapped a towel around my body and put my hair in a turban, then left the bathroom to pick out some clothes from my closet.
My closet.
But once I was in the bedroom, I heard voices coming from the main part of the apartment and a click of heels on the marble floor in the foyer.
It couldn’t be the housekeeper—not only was she not due in that day, but she would have been alone. And surely she wouldn’t be wearing heels. Maybe Shawn had forgotten to tell me something. Like, that his mother was visiting. God, wouldn’t that just be the way to ruin my day?
I bit my lip. My phone was in my purse, which was still in the living room, so I couldn’t call or text Shawn to ask who could be in his house. I glanced at the intercom. Should I call down to security? But whoever was there had gotten past security without a problem. Whoever it was had a key.
And from the sound of her heels and soprano voice, it was a woman.
Pressing my body tight against the wall, I peered around the doorframe and down the hall. Her back toward me, I saw a woman dressed in a light blue sundress, directing men with boxes toward the library. Her hair, wrapped into a loose yellow bun at her nape, was what gave her away.
It was the woman Shawn grew up with. The woman Shawn had falsely claimed he’d gotten pregnant. The woman Shawn’s mother had wanted him to marry.
