Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 23382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 94(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 23382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 94(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
“You think I don’t?”
“I think your heart and dick are two separate entities that can’t agree on anything.”
He lowers his attention to my chest and the expanse of skin there, and his aqua eyes deepen. “My dick wants to use that dress for what it was designed for.”
He’s dangling subject-changing bait, and I can’t help but take it. “As the designer, I’ll need an example.”
“Two slides of that material, and I’d have your tits in my hands. Have you ever had a man’s cock between them?”
I gasp, indignant. “I put my heart and soul into this dress, and that’s all you have to say about it?”
“I’m a man with eyes, princess, and a cock that aches for you to the point of distraction.” His voice rises, sending me into retreat mode, but he follows with a predatory gait. “I want to invade every part of you.”
He wants my virginity—on both counts. But that’s all he wants, and the reminder renews the searing ache in my chest.
“So I get your cock, but she gets your heart?”
“It’s not a total loss,” he says with a sneer. “You get Liam’s. Everybody fucking wins.”
“We’re done here.” I whirl, intending to make my escape through the door, but his hand stops me, electric fingers gripping my arm.
“We’ll never be done, princess.”
I glare at him over my shoulder and toss his words from over a week ago into his face. “I got what I came for.”
Confirmation.
Heartache.
And the need to have a talk with my brother about my future.
Chapter Thirteen
Lilith Astor swept into the tower long enough to destroy and conquer, then she disappeared just as suddenly. Three days before I’m scheduled to move into the House of Cancer, I find Landon alone in his home office.
“Where’s Elise?” I ask.
“She’s exhausted from all the wedding planning.” The tap-tap-tap of fingers on his keyboard signals his distraction. “She went to lie down for a while.”
I step in and shut the door behind me. “I wanted to talk to you alone.”
My serious tone grabs his attention. He looks up from the laptop and removes his reading glasses. I never realized until now that he wears a pair. My brother, the studious ambassador.
“What’s on your mind?”
“It’s about Lilith.”
Leaning back, he runs a hand through his dark hair. The length has grown longer in the last month. “Why don’t you take a seat.” He gestures to a chair tucked against the wall.
I pull it to the front of his desk and settle in for what I expect will be an uncomfortable conversation. “Why didn’t you tell me you have a twin sister?”
“Technically, you and I both have a sister.”
I give him a pointed look. “A sister I knew nothing about until Liam told me who she was.”
Landon winces. “I should have told you, but things are complicated with Lilith. She’s…difficult to handle.”
I got a firsthand taste of her difficult nature, but I don’t tell him that.
“Is she coming back?”
He shrugs. “It’s hard to know what Lilith will do.”
I gather my courage for my next question. “What’s the deal with her and Sebastian?”
Slowly he nods, understanding coming to light. “You want to know if they’re still involved.”
“Yes.”
Because as much as I hate it, Lilith Astor is an intolerable wall standing between any real union with Sebastian, and though marriage to a man in this tower isn’t something I’d chose for myself, I want it to be real.
I want it to be reciprocated.
“It’s an obsolete question, Novalee. He’s going to marry you.”
“Not by choice.”
Landon frowns. “Is that what he told you?”
“Not in so many words. But I’m not as gullible as you might believe. He wants Lilith.”
“Sebastian doesn’t know what he wants.” He shakes his head. “And you’ve got the wrong idea about him and Lilith.”
“That may be so, but I think it’s only fair you change this marriage scheme of yours.” Not that I pretend to know how he plans to make it happen. “I want Liam to be an option.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Give me a logical reason why.”
“I don’t trust him.”
“He’s always been kind, and he looks out for my best interests.”
“Or he’s looking out for his own.”
I narrow my eyes. “Whatever you’re holding back…” I wave a hand around his workspace. “Now’s the time, Landon. I’m leaving in three days.”
A lengthy beat passes as he studies me. “Perhaps you’re right.”
My shoulders relax as I watch him stride to the wall opposite the tall mullion windows. He slips his hand underneath a shelf on a bookcase filled with volumes of what appear to be reference books. Three seconds later, a landscape portrait of the ocean slides to the left, revealing a safe. After the security panel scans his fingerprints, the gears shift and the door opens.
My eyes are wide by the time he returns to the desk. With an air of significance, he sets an envelope on the surface between us.