Rendezvous with the Billionaire: A Billionaire Workplace Romance (13 page)

He stood and walked over to the window. I guess he couldn't talk so close to me. I was practically biting my tongue to keep from asking questions.

"That was three years ago. Nick and I stopped talking before then, we had this huge fight where he said that I didn't care about Amanda and that I was just using her." He let out a breath, "Maybe he was right."

There was something surreal about sitting in the room while the man I was sleeping with told me all about the problems he had in his relationship with his fiancé. If any of my friends had been telling me about this happening to them, I would have thought some really judgmental things. And yet here I was.

He turned to me, "I saw him that night."

"What?" It popped out. "Was that when you were making your phone call?"

Evan actually winced. The cops must have done a number on him. "We just talked, I would have never hurt him. I wouldn't kill anyone."

"Why are you telling me all this?" The man was acting like I could give him absolution, and I had no idea why he wanted it from me. And if he knew what was hanging over my head, the choice I had to make, he would keep his mouth shut.

He took his time replying. He even began speaking and cut himself off before speaking slowly. "When Amanda and I first decided to get married, I didn't think it would be a big deal. My parents split up when I was a kid, her parents maintain separate estates. As far as I was concerned, the fact that we could maintain a civil conversation and stay in each other's company for more than an hour was everything I needed."

I was scared that I knew where this was going, but I didn't want to cut him off.

"Romance, relationships, that's never mattered to me. But now I..." He ran out of steam and recollected himself. "I'm not going to marry Amanda. I can't do that to her, or to me. We both deserve someone that we can trust, that we like."

The point hung in the room between us. My stomach dropped like a stone and I couldn't respond.

He came back to sit by me. "Anyway, I just needed to talk to someone."

I found my words, "I'm here. If you need me."

I should have gone home. After Evan's confession I should have walked out the door and rejected whatever he wanted from me. But he sat down by me and turned on the TV. It seemed rude to leave before finishing my drink. And then I decided to stay through the end of the show he'd put on. After that I didn't argue when he put in a movie.

And when the movie came to an end, the credits rolling to the swelling sound of a brass band, I knew I was kidding myself if I thought I was leaving anytime soon. A few times I almost got up the courage to tell him exactly what was going on, to tell him that I needed more help than Andrea could provide. But he'd say something sweet, or hug me close and I didn't want to ruin the moment.

I was being selfish and I needed to stop.

But Evan didn't even let me get started.

His finger started idly circling my shoulder. I only noticed it when I shivered. He took advantage of the motion and slid his fingers under the collar of my shirt. I arched my neck, giving him better access and letting him pet me. "I should go," I nearly whispered it.

He leaned close and pressed his lips to my ear. "Stay." He pulled back and stood up, offering me a hand. I knew I should go, but I took his hand anyway and let him lead me to his bedroom.

The anticipation of his hands on me started the buildup and by the time we'd made it through the long hall I could feel my nipples pressing against the soft fabric of my t-shirt. Each step was a little torturous pleasure. And we had only just begun.

The trip to the bedroom was a blur of lips and fingers. Kissing, caressing, anything just to feel each other. We stumbled, collapsing into the wall, my arms around his neck and one leg arched up to bring him closer to the core of me. I needed him now, but there were far too many layers of clothing in the way.

He tugged me away from the wall, one stuttering step at a time until we were in his room, lit dimly by a bedside lamp. All I could see, all I cared about, was the bed and him. And while he was close, we still had far too many feet between us and the inviting softness. Evan seemed to read my mind. He scooped me up and carried me the rest of the way across the room, laying me gently on the bed. I expected him to join me, but he knelt with his knees between my legs and looked down at me.

The light hit his face just so, casting his eyes in shadow and illuminating his lips. I swallowed and licked my own. God, this was ridiculous. A smile broke out on my face that I didn't even try to hide.

"What?" He asked.

I didn't know what to say. I was half terrified that I would say something utterly ridiculous or revealing, but laughter was bubbling in my throat and the smile wouldn't fade. I curled up, grabbing onto his shoulders and pulling his head close to mine. Still smiling, I kissed him, feeling his lips curve against mine. His lips felt softer now, more playful, and a part of me just wanted to spend all night kissing him. Another far more insistent part of me cried out for more.

Evan pulled away and sat back up. I tried to follow him, but he placed a hand on my stomach and encouraged me to stay laying down. I could have fought him, he wasn't really restraining me, but I stayed where I was. What was he up to?

"I've been thinking about fucking you all day," he confessed.

It sent a hot and wet thrill through me. "Tell me."

He reached for the button of my jeans and undid them, slowly pulling the zipper down and exposing my underwear. I was glad now that I'd worn the lacy red ones. "I've wanted you in my bed for weeks, all spread out in front of me. Just like this." I had to hitch my hips up for him to slide my jeans down far enough for any fun. "Take off your top," he commanded.

"Bossy, bossy." I reached for the hem but stopped myself. "You're wearing far too many clothes. Don't put me at a disadvantage."

With one hand he whipped off his shirt, grabbing the collar behind his neck and throwing the shirt in an arc across the room. He raised an eyebrow and smiled, waiting for me to reciprocate.

I took it slow. I sort of had to since I was laying down. Inch by inch I pulled up my shirt, exposing my stomach to Evan's hungry eyes. I felt powerful, in command of his complete attention even though I was the one spread out before him. I had barely exposed my bra when he took over, grabbing the shirt and pulling it the rest of the way up with an impassioned fury. I loved it.

He still had more clothes on than me, his jeans not hiding his erection. And I was there in just my bra and panties, my own jeans half off and stuck around my knees. He took a moment to take them off the rest of the way, leaving me nearly naked.

"Now you have me in your bed," I said, "What are you going to do with me?"

His smile sent even more heat coursing through me. This man was going to kill me with this fire. "It's not me." He said.

"Oh?" The man gets me nearly naked, what else was I supposed to expect?

He crawled up, his jeans scraping against the sensitive flesh of my inner thighs. Unconsciously I closed my legs around him and bucked my hips. He leaned down right next to me and planted a kiss on my neck before saying, "I want to watch you pleasure yourself in my bed."

I took advantage, kissing him while he was so close, pressing myself down the hard length of him. I rode the coarse jeans, hooking one leg over his hip. Despite his desire, he didn't seem to mind the distraction. One of his hands found my breast, teasing the nipple to a stiff peak with his fingers while our tongues ran wild.

He pulled back after a long while. "You haven't distracted me, you know."

"How do you expect me to get off without a little inspiration?" I swiped my hand across my chest, cupping my breast for a moment before dropping it. "I didn't come all the way over here to come like I could at home."

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath at those words. I could almost see him imagining it. "We'll save your bed for another time. How would you like to be inspired?"

"Usually I'd like something sexy to look at. Do you have anything that will do the trick?"

He put a hand to his heart, "You wound me."

I laughed. "I think we can make do. But as nice as you look, this," I gestured to his kneeling form, "Isn't going to get me going."

He placed a hand on my damp panties, swirling a finger against me. "Are you sure?"

I didn't moan, but it was close. "You're cheating."

He moved his hand back and used it to undo the button of his jeans. "Were you thinking something like this?" He exposed his boxers as he carefully undid the zipper of his pants. And with one movement he pulled them both down, baring his hardness for me.

My mouth watered. "Something like that."

Fully exposed before me, he didn't move. He only spoke, his words making me even hotter. "Just the thought of you gets me like this. Every night, I don't even try and I'm hard for you. And every night I've thought of you touching yourself," his voice took on a ragged tone, "And I wanted to know that you did it while thinking of me."

His words stunned me. To think that Evan Daringer thought of me, wanted me to want him that much. Well damn, if anything was going to do it that sure as hell would. I caught his eye, made sure I was the sole focus of his vision, and slowly grabbed my own breast. His eyes lit up and he licked his lips when I rolled the nipple around between my fingers. My own breath came out faster and I felt a thrill in my pussy.

I wanted his hands on me, no matter how good my own felt. But putting on this show for him made me feel powerful. I was some pagan goddess in control of this one man, the only one that I wanted to control.

I hitched my legs open, my other hand delving between my wet folds, massaging the bud to a hard peak. I let out something between a whimper and a moan, my hips bucking from the steady rhythm I was making. For one instant my eyes closed, forced shut from the pleasure, but I snapped them back open to watch Evan watch me. This was some torture for the both of us. I saw him palm his cock, giving it a swift caress before letting go. Pleasure rippled through me, taking me to the edge of orgasm from the sight.

God, I wanted to touch him. But we were playing by his rules right now. "Faster," I panted. Evan looked confused so I clarified. "Stroke yourself faster." It was a labor to get out the words, but I was swiftly rewarded.

He took himself in to hand and worked up and down, his own hand matching the speed of my fingers. After another minute I felt the telltale convulsion of orgasm and cried out. He captured my cry with his lips. He grabbed for the night table beside the bed and ripped open the condom wrapper blind. He must have stopped stroking his cock, but I was too engulfed in the kiss to care.

With ease he rolled the condom over himself and repositioned us. I lay under him, exposed and waiting. He guided his cock inside, seated himself to the hilt and paused. We looked at each other. This wasn't like the last time. Not at all. At the hotel Evan had been a stranger, someone I thought was hot but that I didn't know. Now there was something between us. It was still young, we were still getting our bearings, but if we let it, it could grow into something amazing.

All of that passed between us in a silent moment. And then he moved. I didn't hold back, urging him on faster. Another orgasm ripped through me, this one even stronger than the last. But Evan was a man determined. He reached between us to stroke my sensitive clit. Sweat beaded on my forehead from the exertion, from the pleasure. He quickened his pace, thrusting harder and harder.

I was gasping out tiny breaths, barely able to breathe, let alone think. And with a shout I came once more, shuddering around him as he joined me. We lay there enjoined for a long moment, unwilling to move, unwilling to part.

The sun was hitting me at the wrong angle. The fact that it was hitting me at all should have tipped me off that I wasn't in my room. Maricela and I had an agreement to keep the shades down and the room as dark as possible any time before noon on the weekends. But there was something pleasant about the early morning sun when we were so high up. I didn't hear car alarms or anyone shouting at street level and there were no strange shadows cast by buildings obscuring the view of the sky. If I ever won the lottery, maybe I'd consider a penthouse of my own.

I rolled over and stretched my arms out, in Evan's huge bed I had more than enough room to do so without hitting him. But he wasn't there, and I couldn't say I was surprised. He didn't strike me as the stay around to make out in the morning type.

There was no clock in sight to tell me the time, though if the sun was any indication it was early yet. Before nine, at least. His room was massive by New York apartment standards. He fit a king sized bed, a loveseat next to the window, a huge, glossy, black chest of drawers and a TV greater than 60 inches with room to spare. I had three doors to choose from to figure out how to get back to the main part of the penthouse. The one close to the window was probably a closet, and then there was another one on that same wall and one perpendicular to it.

Okay, I'd gotten into the room somehow, why couldn't I remember which door I came in? Heat lanced through me at the memory of last night. Right, that explained the confusion, who could be bothered to remember tiny details like that when they were horny out of their mind?

After scooping up Evan's discarded shirt and pulling it on, I tried one of the doors and found the master bathroom. That was even better than finding the hallway. It continued on with the gray and gold theme of the rest of the place. Rough gray stone tiles lined the floor and the walls were painted a light gray. I ran my hand over the marble on the sink, the stone looked dark and shot through with white and gold. He had one of those waterfall showers that I'd wanted to try since I heard of them and then there was the masterpiece of the room. A huge bathtub sat against the wall with steps leading up to it. I was sure there were jets in there and it looked big enough that I could nearly do laps. Damn it paid to be rich.

I took care of business, freshening myself up and using my finger and some toothpaste to clean my teeth. I still looked like I'd just woken up, but was edging into presentable. It looked like Evan didn't own a brush, but careful use of his comb took care of most of the knots in my hair.

Back in the bedroom I heard a buzz that sounded suspiciously like my phone. A quick search around the bed found my pants sticking out from under the bed skirt. The light blinked, indicating a waiting text. I unlocked the screen and nearly dropped the phone back to the floor.

There was that stupid picture that I'd taken the first night Evan and I were together. He wasn't in it, really, there was nothing incriminating at all. But I had no idea how this had been sent to me. I hadn't shown anyone, told anyone, that I took a picture that night. It was just supposed to be a stupid souvenir. I checked to make sure that this was definitely the text message and that I hadn't somehow swiped into my pictures folder, but it didn't look that way. A new text a few seconds later confirmed it.

Time is running out. Do your part.

The blackmailer. Between Evan pouring his heart out to me and then everything that happened after I'd pushed it to the back of my mind. I couldn't forget it, but I'd let myself focus on other things. It looked like I wasn't allowed to do that.

While thoughts were jumbling around in my head I heard the door open, but I didn't look up. What the hell was I going to do? I couldn't turn Evan in, after last night I couldn't make myself. I didn't know the extent of the feelings I had for the guy, but it would make me beyond unforgivable if I did it.

I felt Evan's hand on my cheek as he turned my head to face his. His eyes bore into mine, his brows wrinkled as he looked at me. "What's wrong, Amy?" He spoke it like he was repeating himself, though I could have sworn he hadn't said anything before.

If I told Evan, the blackmailer would release the video. I stood up. "I need to go." My pants were on the bed where I'd left them after grabbing my phone and I struggled into them for a moment before realizing that I wasn't wearing any underwear.

No big deal, I'd go commando. I just needed to get out of there right now.

"I'm sorry," Evan sounded both confused and like he was trying to be soothing. "I thought that you wanted to do this? You were into it last night."

He was giving me an out, even if he didn't know it. All I needed to do was to tell him I hadn't wanted it, that we weren't a thing that was going to happen. But I didn't want to lie, and if there was the smallest chance of us happening, I didn't want to take that away.

It took me a moment to find the right words. "Someone found out that you and I are...seeing each other." Perhaps I shouldn't have used the euphemism. Evan didn't understand. "Someone is blackmailing me. With video of you and I being intimate."

It was like I'd punched him. Evan's head jerked back and he put a hand up to his mouth, covering it with half his fist. "How long?"

"I got the first notice a couple of days ago, when I went home sick. He sent me a clip of that time it was just you and me in your office." I could tell that he knew exactly which time I was talking about. "I have a friend trying to trace it, but no luck yet." And here was the hard part, but if I was going to tell him some, I needed to tell him all. "He, at least I think it's a he, wants me to go to the cops and tell them that I found evidence of you killing Nicholas Bitterman."

His voice took on a mask of utter calm, of menace. "And you didn't to think of telling me this last night before you had sex with me?"

My fear congealed into icy anger. "If it wasn't for you I wouldn't be in this mess in the first place. So I'm sorry if your feelings weren't the first thing I thought of while trying to figure out how to save my reputation without utterly ruining myself as a person. Did you think I was actually going to the police to accuse you?"

He stood, paced once across the room and whipped back towards me. "You said your ass was on the line, why would I assume that you wouldn't throw me to the cops?"

Was he kidding me with this? I stalked towards him and got close enough to poke him in the chest with one finger. "I already lied to the cops for you, I haven't told people about us because you asked me not to. I came here when you asked; I covered with your fiancée for you, twice! What exactly have I done to make you think I'd sell you out?"

He placed his hand on top of mine and held it tight, keeping me from poking him again. "You just said you told your friend about the video, which means you told her about us. And..." He trailed off, his brow furrowing. "You really weren't going to betray me?" He said it like it couldn't be true. How horrible that must have been, to constantly live with the thought that your friends would turn against you at the slightest provocation.

I tried not to think too hard about the fact that I'd considered it. Maybe that made me a bad person, but I couldn't pretend that I lived anywhere but the real world. And in the real world I had to examine every option, no matter how horrible, if I was going to make it on my own.

"No," I took my other hand and covered his, now holding it with both hands. "I'm not." It left me in a very bad place, but that was the choice I was going to live with. "I'll figure something out. The video might cause you some trouble, and it will get bad for me." It would suck, I just needed to kiss my career as it stood goodbye. "Maybe I can find the guy who has the video, I don't know, that's something you can sue somebody for, I think? I'll be alright, just know that it's coming. I mean, you're a guy, so a sex tape shouldn't hurt you that bad."

He crushed me to him, his free arm hugging me close and trapping our hands in between us. Evan planted a kiss on my head. "You're not on your own with this. I will help you, I promise."

I sank into his hold, my face pressing against the soft cotton of his shirt. The comforting scent of him let me relax just a little.

"I'll stop the video from getting out, trust me with it. And if I can't, I will do everything in my power to make sure that you're protected. No one gets to fuck with us, understood?"

I had to squeeze my eyes shut to keep any tears from leaking out. Evan had the one thing that Andrea and I didn't: extensive resources. I nodded my head against him, afraid to speak in case my voice broke with hope. "He gave me 72 hours from last night to turn you in or he releases the video."

Evan let me go and took a step back. I needed a second to keep my cool and he didn't speak until it was obvious that I wasn't going to break down. "I need all the information you have." He tilted my chin up and gave me a quick kiss. "Just go home and don't do anything. I'll tell you what we need to do next after I talk to some people."

"I can't just sit at home while you fix everything, that's not going to work." I had to do something, even if I didn't know what.

His face grew serious. "The turn around on this is quick, and because of that it may not all be above board. There needs to be as much space between you and whatever goes down as possible. Please, just let me do this."

It was clearly important to him in ways that I didn't understand. I knew on some level that it wasn't all to do with keeping me squeaky clean if something nasty came up. Evan wanted to protect me, wanted to prove to himself that he could protect me. And while I balked at the need on some level, another part of me was positively delighted. At least when I didn't focus on the consequences of failure. No, I couldn't do that. I was going to trust him.

But I couldn't let it go completely. "You call me at least every 24 hours until this is solved, okay?"

He smiled, his whole face lighting up. My heart flipped over in my chest and my lips tilted up without any thought. Oh no, I was already in way deeper than I ever meant to be. I was in so much trouble.