“What are you doing here?” I clear my throat. “Where’s Jonathan?”
“He decided to take Claire to the Virgin Islands for the weekend, so I’m here to put in bids for him...I don’t know why he even bothers bidding. They always let him see the work days before and let him buy whatever he wants.”
“Very true.” I laugh. “Where are your girlfriends?”
She gives me a faint smile. “You and I both know I don’t have any of those...”
I do know that and I feel like shit for even asking her. I stick to the safe questions—asking her about her Scrabble tournaments, her new position at Statham Industries, and fail to mention the fact that she’s still rubbing my shoulder in a very inappropriate way.
“How have you been?” She slides her hand around my neck and I picture her doing that as I wrap her legs around my waist, as I make her scream my name.
Shit...
“Fine.” I move her hand away. “I’ve been doing fine. I’ll um—it was nice seeing you again, Hayley.”
“You’re leaving?”
“Yeah. I need to get—” The hell away from you... “I need to get back home.”
“Oh.” She looks disappointed, but she forces a smile. “Well, I’ll see you around? Maybe in your office? Tomorrow?”
Okay, I’ve got to be tipsy...There’s no way she’s flirting with me right now...
“Sure.” I slowly walk away and decide that I need to find a way to fuck her out of my mind. Forever.
I walk around the pool and charm up a few of the women I’ve had before, feeding them the same bullshit that’s worked in the past. Low key billionaire. Minimalist. Biker.
That’s it.
That’s all it takes.
I slip my business card into a few of their purses and tell them to call me whenever they’re ready to leave. I’ll open my bed up to whoever calls me first. No preference.
Before I leave, I pull out my tablet and hack into the auctioneer’s database. The picture I meant to bid on has already been sold, but I re-route that money back to bidder and place my name into the slot instead.
I’ll send him my regards...
An hour later, I crash into my bed and hear my phone buzzing. A text. “Hey Corey. Hannah. I’m downtown right now. Be there in thirty.”
Ugh...
I don’t want Hannah to come, but I can’t say no because she’s the first one to hit me up.
I turn my phone off to ignore any other texts that may come later, and go into the kitchen to uncork her favorite wine—Moscato.
I always keep my cellar stuffed with all my regulars’ favorites. They think it’s because I care—because I “remember”, but it’s really because I don’t want to have to leave to go get it. The quicker we can get to the sex, the better.
Thirty minutes pass by and she still hasn’t arrived—her normal M.O. She always takes two hours, no matter how close she claims to be.
I re-program my surveillance system to keep an eye out for her arrival, letting it know that it can unlock the gate for the next car and say “The door is unlocked” once she pulls into the carport.
Frustrated, I fall back onto my mattress and shut my eyes—waiting for the much needed release. I grab my remote and hit the lights, knowing that she’ll wake me up with a mean blow job the second she gets here.
Hurry up...
I shut my eyes and sigh.
I’m slowly drifting into sleep when I feel her finally crawling on top of me.
“Did you get lost?” I feel her kissing my lips.
“Not at all.”
“Do you know what thirty minutes means?”
She laughs and straddles me. “Is that all you have left in you tonight?”
“Funny.” I run my fingers through her hair. “Do you want the lights on?”
“I’m fine.”
I slip my hands down to the hem of her dress and pull it over her head. Before she can lean down and kiss me, I unsnap her bra and palm her breasts in my hands.
“Did you get a boob job?” I ask.
“Seriously? Is this your idea of sex talk?”
“You had C-cups last month...These are clearly Ds...”
She gasps as I take one of her nipples into my mouth and softly bite it. She isn’t normally so responsive to my touch, so I figure she’s drunk.
I guess I need to take this slow...
I pull her head down to mine and press my lips against hers, raising my eyebrow when she seems hesitant, when she barely opens her mouth to let me kiss her.
Maybe we should sleep first...Ugh...
“Do you want to finish this in the morning?” I caress her breasts again. “I think you’re a little too drunk...”
“I’m not drunk.” She leans back, unzips my pants, and pulls out my hardened dick.
“Whatever you say, sweetheart.” I pull her back towards me, trying to kiss her again.
Once again, she’s hesitant—nervous, so I run my hands against her arms to reassure her—stopping once I feel the abrasive lines.
Hannah doesn’t have any cuts and she damn sure didn’t have any scars when I saw her a few hours ago.
The woman on top of me stiffens and I push her off of me and jump out of the bed. Stumbling, I hit the lights to find out who the fuck this woman is.
“Hayley?!” My jaw drops. “What the hell are you doing? And how did you—Why would you....Why the hell are you here?”
She looks stunned. Hurt. “I...”
“Yes?”
“I wanted my first time to be with someone I actually knew.”
“Your first time?”
She nods and covers her breasts with her hands.
Holy shit... “Okay, babe. This is what’s going to happen: You’re going to put your fucking clothes back on, I’m going to drive you home, and the two of us are going to act like this shit never happened. Got it?”
She doesn’t answer.
“Got it?”
“Don’t bother. I can drive myself home.”
“Nice try, but I would never let you drive home alone this late at night. Put your goddamn clothes on. Now.”
She looks away from me and pulls her dress over her head.
I sigh and soften my tone. “You know I would never sleep with you, Hayley...”
“Because of Jonathan?”
“Because of a lot of things.”
She blinks and veers her eyes towards my pants. “You were clearly aroused...”
“I was aroused because I thought you were a slut who wanted to get fucked, but I—I don’t have to explain myself to you. Let’s go.”
**End of excerpt**
Dear Reader,
Get ready for a new type of New Adult :-)
I love you,
Whit’
Acknowledgments
Where do I even begin with this one?
Up until this past summer I had no idea what ARCs, blog tours, and cover reveals were. I didn’t even have an author Facebook page. Seriously. But some type of way, readers found me without them and then I discovered what all those strange things were and gained more readers than I could ever imagine. (I also realized that book bloggers run the world! :-) )
Tamisha Draper and Tiffany Neal, can we PLEASE pretend that I didn’t drive you batshit crazy about this book? Pretty please? No? Is it because I’m already driving you crazy with the next three? Yeah...I am, huh? LOL
Tamisha, thank you for reading this time and time again (print out after print out) and for putting up with the craziness that comes with beta-reading for me: Phone calls, never ending email threads, chapters I decide to change minutes after you’ve read them, having to literally force me to sit down and write a sex scene because I’m “too nervous” to write it LOL, etc. etc...It’s definitely not for the faint of heart and I truly treasure your beautiful friendship and support.