The Billionaire's Unwanted Virgin (21 page)

"I've said it before and I'll
say it again. You protest far too much, and you never did give him a chance to
explain. One could say at the first sign of trouble you ran like a frightened
little girl back to mummy's apron strings."

Her mum softened the words with a
kiss on her forehead and a warm smile, but the inherent criticism still stung.

"You know what he accused me of.
How could I stay after that, Mum? Would you?" Alice couldn’t keep the hurt
out her voice.

"I would have demanded an
explanation, Alice. Love is a thing of give and take, never more so than in a
marriage."

"Hah." Alice snorted in
disgust. "If we'd had a marriage then maybe you would have a valid point
there, but he only married me to take control of his father's company, and I
was not going to put up with having his mistress flaunted under my nose. I have
some pride left."

"As well you should, but
sometimes stubborn pride gets in the way of allowing our true feelings to shine
through. Tell me Alice, do you truly believe, hand on heart that he cheated on
you with Selina?"

Alice opened her mouth to say yes,
but she couldn’t. He had been too outraged and too hurt at the accusation, so
she shook her head.

"Maybe he wasn't then, but he is
certainly fucking her now."

"
Alice,
language!"

"Sorry, Mum, but really, they
are always together. He might have needed her for business then, but what
possible reason could he have to keep her around now, truly?" She picked
up the latest
Hello
magazine and
shoved the offending article under her mum's nose. "Look at her. She is
draped all over him. It's disgusting."

Elizabeth just smiled.

"Yes, she is, but tell me this,
Alice. Have you seen him smile in just one of those pictures? Does he give any
indication that he actually wants to be at these parties, or does he look bored
out of his skull in every one of them, and drunk in most of the others? Look at
him, truly look at him. What do you see?"

Alice screwed her eyes shut and shook
her head.

"I can't. I don't want to. I
miss him too much as it is. I don’t want to be reminded of all I've lost."

Elizabeth drew her in for a hug, and
Alice savored the moment.

"Oh, Alice, sweetheart. I tell
you what I see. I see a man in pain. A man on the edge and barely holding it
together. A stubborn and proud man, for sure, but also a man desperately in
love with his absent wife. Why else would he phone me twice a week still to
find out how we are? It’s not for my benefit or even Beth's, is it? No, it's
because he hopes that this time, maybe, you'll speak to him."

Her mum drew away and tucked her hair
behind her ears in a gesture as familiar as time.

"Perhaps next time he rings you
should talk to him. Because if there is any chance that you got this all wrong,
then you owe it to both of you to try to work this out."

Alice didn’t want to hear this, yet
her heart wasn't listening to the rational side of her brain, not at all. No,
her emotional head-over-heels-in-love-with-that-man-part skipped around like an
over eager puppy.

"Why are you telling me all this
now, Mum?" Alice asked.

"Because you weren't ready to
hear it before now, darling."

Lakota frowned at the sight of his
driver appearing without Selina.

"Let me guess she's not
ready?"

"No, Sir, in fact she … err …
well I'm not sure how to put this delicately, Sir, she is
en dishabille,
and to quote her ladyship, 'If he wants me, he has to come and get me.' Sorry,
Sir, I did try."

Lakota grumbled his annoyance and
exited the limo. So, Selina had chosen to be difficult
again.
A lot was
riding on this meeting with the overseas investors, and the bitch damn well
knew that. Too bad that Mr. Hassan had taken a liking to Selina's now bleached
blonde locks, and expected her to attend. Lakota was pretty sure the oil baron
also hoped to get Selina into his bed, and he fervently wished the man would
make his move already, so he would have the perfect excuse to dump her sorry
ass.

She was not taking the fucking hint
that he was not interested in her and never would be, regardless of what
provocative outfit she chose to drape her surgically enhanced curves into.

Sure enough by the time he made it up
to her apartment he found the lights dimmed and jazz music playing in the back
ground. He groaned under his breath and clicked on his phone.

Percy answered on the first ring.

"Please make my apologies to
Hassan and re-arrange for next week. Has the entertainment turned up yet?"

"Yes, Sir, he seems much taken
with the ladies. I'm pretty sure he won't mind your absence at all. May I ask
what the problem is that detains you?"

Lakota sighed and loosened his tie.

"I'm sure you can guess. The
great Selina is proving difficult."

"I see, Sir. With the greatest
respect, perhaps now would be a good time to disassociate from Lady Horsley?
She has served her purpose, after all, and your
affair
has taken the
heat off the situation with Alice."

The mere mention of her name had
Lakota's body tense in need, and he adjusted his hardening cock. He couldn't
muster a physical response to any other woman, but all he had to do was think
of her, and he was instantly hard enough to pound concrete. If he needed any
more proof of what a colossal fuck-up his life had become, this here was it.

"It's long overdue, in fact,
Percy." He smiled at the other man's triumphant "Yes" down the
phone before he disconnected it and pushed the door to Selina's bedroom open.

There on the bed lay Selina. She had
somehow managed to tie herself to the bedposts, and from his vantage point he
had a perfect view of her bare cunt. Rather than excite him the view made bile
rise in his gut.

"There you are and so pleased to
see me, too. Do you like my little surprise? I'm all yours to take. Ravage me,
darling." Selina positively purred, her eyes glued to his rapidly waning
erection, and she licked her lips and thrust her breasts into the air.
Impressive as her tits were, the action left him cold, and she pouted when she
realized his body was not co-operating with her plans.

She smiled up at him and licked her
lips again.

"I'm sure I can help you get all
eager again. Let me suck you off. I'm told I'm an expert."

"I'm sure you are, Selina, but I
told you before I'm not interested."

He stalked past her, ignoring her
angry huff, and snatched her bath robe off the back of the door. "Cover
yourself, and have some dignity. We're supposed to be at a meeting with Mr.
Hassan as you well know. We haven't got time for this, even if I wanted to fuck
you, which I don't."

He bend down to untie her, and the
minute he freed one arm she flung it round his neck and tried to pull him down
for a kiss. Her overwhelming perfume clogged his lungs, and he drew in a much
needed gulp of air, allowing her access. She thrust her tongue into his mouth
and rubbed her nipples against his chest, and Lakota almost gagged. He pushed
her away with more force than strictly necessary, causing her to bash her head
against one of the wooden pillars holding up the canopy.

Selina laughed.

"Oh yes, I heard you like it
rough. Need to slap me about a bit to get that cock hard again. Go on. Hit me,
hit me hard. Put your mark on me, my big strong savage."

The air was filled with the musk of
her arousal, and Lakota pulled back in terror when she took his hand and placed
it on her breast.

"Pinch me. Bite me, as hard as
you want to. Make me bleed…" She panted her arousal and grabbed hold of
his dick through the fabric of his trousers. Lakota reacted on instinct and
slapped her ‘round the face, leaving a bright red hand print on her cheek.

Selina screamed and then laughed.

"Yes …yes, hit me again, harder.
Make me come, baby."

The drawbridge of the fortress he
kept his heart in clanged to the ground with an earth shattering kadunk as the
truth hit him square in the gut. The one glaring discrepancy in the damning
newspaper revelations had been the claim that he was sadist. He wasn't, and he
never would be. Miriam had needed pain to get her off, and lots of it. He had
complied with her wishes, but it had taught him a valuable lesson about
himself. He could no more hurt one of his subs on purpose than he could strike
a child.

No, it was Selina who needed that
particular kink. Selina who would have read the signs, and…

He stepped away from her and ripped his
tie clean off. He needed air to breathe. There was no fucking air in this
blasted place.

By the time he'd gotten the window
open and had filled his lungs with the crisp night breeze Selina had managed to
untie herself completely. The look of triumph in her face turned his stomach.

"It was you, wasn't it? You ran
to the fucking papers?"

She shrugged her shoulders and
smiled.

"Oh, it took you this long to
figure that out, my poor dear? Of course it was me. You didn't honestly think
that insipid mouse you married would have the gumption to sell her story, did
you?"

Lakota closed his eyes and
concentrated on his breathing. Anything to stop him from giving into the
impulse to wrap his hands around Selina's scrawny neck and watch her miserable
life ebb away in front of his eyes. He could almost taste her struggle and
panic, the exact moment when he pushed her too far to the point of no return,
her galloping heart beat under his fingertips, until it slowed and stopped,
until she hung under him like a rag doll.

"Alice has more gumption in her
little finger than you'll ever have."

Selina laughed.

"Oh sure, that's why she ran out
on you. The poor little thing. That's why you’re getting a divorce."

"We're not divorced yet, Selina.
So your insane plan is not working. You might as well give up now and walk away
with some of your dignity intact. Act like the lady you're supposed to be for
fuck's sake."

Selina's inhuman screech in answer
chilled him to the bone, as she advanced on him like some sort of madwoman.

"So, tell me, what will your
precious little Alice say when this hits the newsstands?" She turned round
to show him the mark left by his hand and then rammed her head into the mirror
on the wall without any warning.

"Fucking hell."

Glass shattered, and Selina stumbled.
He caught her and picked her up, mindful of the glass on the floor and her bare
feet. The side of her face was bleeding heavily, and in seconds his white shirt
had turned crimson.

He swore again, and Selina's evil
chuckle rang in his ears as he called for an ambulance.

The last thing she said before she
passed out was, "If I can't have you, nobody will."

****

Alice pounded the pavements to the
beat of Bon Jovi in her ears. Nothing beat an early morning run to chase away
the cobwebs. The rush of the air on her sweat soaked skin, the burn in her
muscles as she pushed herself to cover the last mile it would take to return
home.

She smiled to herself. If anyone had
told her a month ago that she would be willingly running, and in the mornings
no less, she would have called them insane, but it was the only thing that
stopped her body's painful state of arousal after yet another night spent in
erotic dreams of the Lakota kind.

This was a different kind of high,
but one she desperately needed to be able to function.

Her smile slipped when she jogged
round the corner and saw the gaggle of reporters lying in wait in front of her
mum's house.

Why the fuck were they back?
 
She slowed to a crawl and tucked her head
into her chest and pulled the baseball cap down further. She'd used it to keep
her hair out of the way, but it would suffice in keeping her face covered
against the flashes hurting her eyes.

"Alice, can we have your
statement?"

"Alice, are you surprised at
this, or is that why you left?"

"Has he ever hit you?"

"Alice."

"Over here, Alice."

She tried her best to ignore them
all, and the icy fist squeezing her chest right now. Something had happened,
and none of it was good. One particularly annoying sleaze-bag would not let her
get past, and she took grim satisfaction of seeing him crumble after a quick
stomp on his instep and an elbow to his solar plexus.

"I said no comment, asshole. Get
the fuck out of my way."
  

The front door opened, and a grim-faced
Elizabeth pulled her through and slammed the door shut on the mayhem outside.

"Finally, what took you so long?
I was getting worried. I wish you’d take your phone when you take off like
that."