Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 106596 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106596 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
“Well, life’s tough. Better get used to it. How are you doing tonight, Humphry?”
“Great.” She gave me a panicky, what-the-hell-are-you-doing look, cradling her champagne.
Mathias stared at me like he was about to do something he was going to regret, so I entered his personal space with two fluid steps, whispering in his ear, “I could blow up your entire party by telling them you shoved your cock in my fiancée’s mouth while she was in a very compromising position, filling in as your temporary secretary because you had to fire your old one, who’d fucked you long enough to expect more than the average New York salary. But I won’t have to do that tonight, will I, Father? You will step back and get the hell away from Judith Humphry like I asked you to. Because the next time I have to remind you to stay away, I won’t be nice, and she won’t be annoyed. She’ll be scared. For your life.”
I took a step back and watched the color drain from his face. For a second, I thought he was going to have another heart attack. Then he tipped his head goodbye to Judith and scurried away, looking like a ghost of himself. We both watched him join his date. I knew that if I took my time, Lily would approach us, now that Mathias was gone.
“He’s trying to hit on you,” I told Jude, too pissed to look her in the eye without snapping further.
“That’s his business, not yours,” she said evenly, placing her delicate glass of champagne on a table behind her. The spring air was crisp and chilly, and her whole body blossomed into goosebumps under that dress.
“Stop playing nice with him.”
“No, you stop butting into my relationships with other people, Célian. You have no right.”
I suppose it wasn’t a good time to tell her that Phoenix Townley—who’d wandered out on the terrace mere minutes ago, probably to snort a line—was a douchebag who got sent away to the Middle East after he was caught shooting heroin with a crackwhore in his Chelsea apartment.
The last and only other time we’d been in this hotel together, Chucks and I were on much friendlier terms. Frankly, I was fed up with this entire bullshit situation where all we did was fight. We were on the same page. Both our lives were hot messes. And we could make each other forget. I brushed my arm against her shoulder while we people-watched the fancy guests, our colleagues laughing, dancing, and drinking away their long working week.
“Inappropriate physical contact? Me too,” she taunted, but the smile on her lips was pure mischief.
“Miss Humphry, please utter the entire sentence—I do not want you to touch me, so I’ll really have an incentive not to do the things I want to do to you.”
She said nothing, fingering the thin gold necklace resting against her clavicles.
Then she whispered, “Touch me how?”
Can’t stop this, huh? Neither can I.
I smirked. “You’re not very good at following directions, are you? I refuse to land my ass in hot water, even for a good lay.”
“Hot water with your company or with your date?” she snapped.
“My date is fake, but my commitment to my network is real.”
She considered it, chewing on her lip. “It won’t get you in trouble.”
“That won’t hold up in court. Say it explicitly. Use your words. I. Want. It.”
“I don’t know what it means.”
I shook my head, taking a side-step away from her.
She weighed the situation, still playing with her necklace. I caught a glimpse of Kate talking to Lily, and knew she would never initiate a conversation with Lily in a million years. She’d done it for me.
A forty-six-year-old lesbian who thought white, upper-class men were Satan was my wingman. I think I wanted that on my fucking tombstone.
Jude swallowed. “I want you to do it to me…no matter what it means. So, what do you want to do to me?”
“Well, Humphry, I really want to finger your ass,” I said conversationally, smiling to a colleague when he saluted my way and nodding at him courteously as I smoothed my ironed dress shirt. “While eating your pussy until every drop of your cum is on my tongue.”
I could see her throat bobbing in my peripheral vision, and damn if it didn’t make my cock twitch. I needed to get out of here before it became very apparent that I was talking dirty to my employee, while sporting a hard-on that could very well tear through my briefs and tux, and at this rate, perhaps even bend solid steel.
“You have a fiancée,” she murmured.
“A fake fiancée. Don’t pretend you don’t know that. Our relationship is a joke, and we only half-bother to hide it.”
Jude and I were still pretending to talk shop casually when I slipped my hand back to touch hers on the table she had braced herself against. The tip of my little finger curled against hers. I’d forgotten how good she felt, and that infuriated me, because not many things felt good these days.