Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 96802 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96802 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
I really had no idea what to say to that. I never thought that I’d put Court under my spell. But the way she described it, it felt so certain. I’d seen it as my job to make him a better person. I hadn’t realized that us falling for each other was what would help him all along.
“What does that mean for us for the future?” I finally sputtered out.
Leslie smiled. “I suppose we can find someone else for Court, if you think it’s necessary.” She tilted her head. “I’m starting to expect that it won’t be though.”
* * *
I left Leslie’s office in a daze. I’d been expecting to be put through the wringer, and instead, I’d found that she didn’t even mind that I was dating her son. That was not the Leslie Kensington I had been expecting. Even Lark was shocked. After how Leslie had reacted to Penn dating Natalie, she’d sworn that Leslie would freak out. Though we were both glad she hadn’t.
I skipped going to my apartment to change and went straight to Court’s penthouse instead. He had just come out of the shower when I entered his place and changed into running pants and T-shirt.
Court startled when he saw me. “English, I didn’t know you were coming over.”
“I just talked to your mom.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Margery called her about me quitting. She offered me a job to work as your publicist for the company.”
“That’s great,” he said evenly.
Not the answer I’d been expecting.
“Well, I turned her down,” I said giddily. “I mean, since we’re you know… something. Together.”
“You turned her down?”
“Yeah. Conflict of interest.”
He looked so far away in that moment. As if he couldn’t fathom it.
“Unless… I shouldn’t have done that? I mean, I was already looking at starting my own business. But we both agreed that with the transformation you’ve made, you probably don’t even need a full-time publicist anymore.”
“Oh, good. No more babysitter for me.”
I frowned at his comment as he went to the wet bar and poured himself some whiskey.
“Everything okay at work today?” I asked.
He took a long sip of his drink. “It was fine. Just… draining.”
“Oh, okay. I thought you’d be more excited.”
He downed the rest of the whiskey in one long shot and then set it down heavily. Something shifted in his shoulders. Something eased as if the tension had never been there. And then when he turned back around to face me, it was gone. As if a phantom had passed through his body and out the other side.
“I am excited,” he said with that smile again. “This means you’re all mine, right?”
I bit my lip and nodded. “I suppose that I am.”
He strode back toward me, wrapped an arm tight around my waist, and kissed the breath out of me. It was a needy kiss. As if he were trying to suck my soul right out of my body.
I came away breathless. “That was some kiss.”
His hands traveled over my ass and hoisted me up with my legs around his waist. “You’d better get used to it.”
30
English
“Just come out of the bedroom and show me your damn costume already,” Court all but growled from the living room.
I’d been teasing him all week about the Halloween costume I’d gotten for Katherine’s party. She’d insisted that, this year, we have a group costume, and so all my careful planning had been thrown out the window. I knew the group idea would be better, especially for pictures.
“Katherine is going to be here any minute. I need more than a few minutes with this costume,” he called again.
I giggled a little at his impatience. Yes, I’d been a big cocktease about it, but it was more fun that way. I was just glad that whatever had come over him last week hadn’t returned. He’d been back to being his regular Court self.
Then, with a bit of theatrics, I opened the bedroom door and stepped out to face Court. But it was his costume that made me stop. He was dressed as Don Draper just as I’d thought in the St. Regis all those weeks ago. He wore a sexy gray suit with a little white pocket square, shiny black oxfords, and a fedora.
“Wow,” I swooned.
Court’s eyes rounded. “Wow is right. Holy fuck, English. I don’t think I can let you leave in that.”
I put a hand on my hip. “And who says you control where I go and where I don’t, Draper?”
He laughed. “No one. But I’m considering keeping you inside and fucking you all night if that’s any consolation.”
“Well, achievement unlocked,” I said with a wink.
He twirled his finger in place to ask me to spin, and so I did for him. I let him get a good look at the way my legs looked forever long in my mile-high, strappy black Jimmy Choos. His eyes traveled up to the cheeky black lace underwear with the matching garter and fully blinged-out black push-up bra. My hair was blown out, and I rocked a smoky eye like it was my job. But the best part of the entire thing… was the black fallen angel wings at my back. Alone, I just looked like a dark angel, but when I met up with my girls, we’d look like a collection of Victoria’s Secret Angels preparing for the runway.