Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 78076 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78076 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Her eyes lifted to mine, her fingers still on her glass. “My uncle died.”
I gave a slow nod. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She took a drink. “It’s his own fault.”
“Drunk driving?”
“Being a crony of my father’s.”
Now I gave another nod. “I see.” Another reason she wanted nothing to do with that life, and now I wondered how this conversation would end. Would it be another reminder that sleeping with me was a bad idea? I hoped not—even though she was right on the money. “Were you close to him?”
“I used to be.”
“Have you spoken to him since you left?”
“Called me on my birthday every year. We never talked about anything real, just the weather and French cuisine…shit like that.”
I loved the way she sounded when she cursed. Like she didn’t give a damn about anything or anyone. “He was your father’s brother?”
“Yes. Losing his wife wasn’t enough…”
“And his daughter.”
She grabbed her glass and took a drink. “I’ve decided to go to the funeral. I’m leaving tomorrow.”
I was a master at keeping a straight face, and that ability didn’t fail me now, so she had no idea that my stomach just dropped. Their estrangement made her useless to me, but if they stopped being estranged…it might get messy. “Why?”
“My uncle deserves to have someone there who actually cared about him.”
“And what will you do about your father?” A funeral was already a miserable affair. Throw in an uncomfortable reunion and that place would turn into a furnace of tension.
She took a long drink of her wine. “No idea.”
“Was he the one who called you?”
“Yes.”
“And how was that?”
“Brief. Cold. Blah.” She drank her wine again, and now her glass was empty. “But enough about that. That’s not what you came here for.”
Not at all. But now, it was all I could think about. How could a man have a daughter like her and let her walk away? How could he not bust his ass every day to make it right? How could he have let anything happen to her in the first place? I wasn’t one to judge, but he should have put his family before his work, and the fact that he didn’t told me everything I needed to know about his character. “I’ll come with you.”
She pulled the tie cinched at her waist so the robe slightly came apart, opening across her chest to reveal more of those perky tits. Succulent skin. Unblemished by my aggressive kiss. If it opened just a little more, her nipples would be exposed. “Come with me where?” She ran her fingers through her thick hair next, pulling it from her face and exposing more of her neck.
“Florence.”
She stilled when she understood the offer. “What?”
“You could use the company. I have business there anyway.”
“What business?”
I took a drink of my wine. When the silence continued, the realization sank into her bones—that I wouldn’t answer.
“I don’t want you near my family.”
I did my best not to smirk at the irony. “I didn’t invite myself to the funeral, just your bed. We could stay at my place in Florence. You do your business, and I do mine. And if you need a shoulder to cry on…you can have mine.”
“This is supposed to be a clandestine affair…and now we’re taking trips together?”
“Not how I would describe it.” My eyes remained on her face, but they were tempted to look down, to pray that the robe would slip a little more…and a little more. I hadn’t tit-fucked a woman since I was a teenager, but I could definitely see myself sliding between those plump tits. “We could take my plane. Private is the only way to travel.”
“And you aren’t going to tell me what you’re doing there?”
“Do you really want to know, sweetheart?” There were nights when I left her at the hotel and went straight to the docks to execute traitors and stuff them in oil barrels before they were dumped by cargo ships somewhere in the Atlantic on their way to their next destination. She didn’t need to know about my barbarism.
She seemed to agree because she dropped the subject. “Alright.” Her fingers slid down the sides of her robe before she pulled it off, letting the silk material leave her petite shoulders and crumple in the chair behind her. Silky-smooth skin was exposed, her nipples immediately hardening once they felt the cold air directly.
I’d considered myself to be an ass man, but not anymore.
She rose from the chair and walked right past me toward the bedroom. In nothing but a tiny little thong that hardly covered anything, she moved across the room, all woman with those sexy hips and those toned thighs, that nectarine ass I could see myself fucking at some point.
As if I were paralyzed, all I could do was watch her enter the bedroom and hook her thumbs into her panties. Then she bent over, pushing the panties down to her ankles, enticing me with a very provocative view.