Текст книги "All of Me"

Автор книги: Kelly Moran

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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 18 страниц)

chapter

seventeen

Alec panicked and cursed when he caught Faith’s retreating form out of the corner of his eye. “Mark, take care of this. I need to deal with something. I want him gone when I get back.”

Trusting his editor to handle his former agent, Alec strode toward the door. He should’ve told Faith the whole story sooner. What must be going through her mind right now? And to hear the truth like that, in such a cold, calculating way . . .

Part of the truth.

Fuck. He was an asshole. Part of him knew he never should’ve brought her here, into this world that he didn’t even want to live in sometimes. But the more time he spent with Faith, the more she pushed the darkness away. She made him want things, to be something he couldn’t. Yet he’d plowed forward and hadn’t even had the balls to inform her of what she was getting tangled in.

He pushed through the lobby doors and stepped outside, alarm seizing his gut when he didn’t see her right away. He scanned the sidewalk, across the busy street. Sweet Faith, alone in this city. The things that could go wrong.

Wait. There.

She stood at the corner of the building, arms wrapped around herself and shivering as if it weren’t eighty degrees. He hesitated, then walked over to her.

Her teary gaze lifted to his and away. “Go back inside, Alec.”

He tried to take her arms but she wrenched away. “Faith. I’m sorry. I need to explain, I know . . .”

“Explain,” she said in a hollow voice. “What more is there to say? You lied to me.”

Panic morphed into desperation. “I should’ve told you everything sooner. I’m sorry.”

She stepped away from him as if he’d slapped her. “Sorry just doesn’t seem to cut it, Alec.” She rubbed her forehead with a shaking hand. “I’m such an idiot.”

“No,” he growled, stepping closer. “I’m the idiot.”

A cab pulled up to the curb and she stepped forward. No way. No way in hell was she going anywhere alone in this city. Not even in the posh Upper West Side.

“Faith, wait.” He rushed over and told the doorman to have his driver pull around, then hurried back. “My car will take you back to my apartment. Here.” He fumbled in his pocket for his keys and took her hand. Forcing her fingers to unclench, he slapped them into her palm. “Go back to my place and wait for me. I can’t leave just yet, but I’ll get out of this as soon as I can. We’ll talk.”

Her jaw trembled as more tears coursed down her pale cheeks, her gaze focused on the street and the passing cars. After a very tense silence, she finally nodded.

He let out a shuddering exhale, only somewhat relieved. “Please, don’t leave the apartment. I’ll meet you there.”

His driver pulled up and walked around the hood to open the back door. Faith wasted no time sliding inside. Her gaze trained down, she twisted her fingers in her lap.

Alec closed the door himself. “Take her back to the apartment. Watch until she gets inside.” He paused. “You know what?” He fished in his pocket and pulled out a hundred-dollar bill. “Walk her to the apartment door and make sure she gets in safely.”

“Will do, sir.”

Jaw clenched, he watched her pull away, staring at the street long after she’d disappeared from view. He was damn close to saying the hell with it and taking a cab right after her, but his publisher had given him quite a bit of leeway with the new series and he owed them. Although he loathed the crowds, it was part of his job and damn unprofessional to walk away.

Turning, he caught Henry Swift hailing a cab.

“You son of a bitch . . .”

Henry’s eyes widened. He dove into the cab and slammed the door.

Alec yelled through the window. “We have a confidentiality agreement. You break it again, I’ll sue you for twice the amount I made you the past ten years. You hear me?”

The cab pulled away, but not before the color drained from Henry’s face and the slimy bastard nodded his understanding. He wasn’t looking so smug and superior now.

Jesus. The damage was already done. Alec should’ve fired him years ago. Why the hell hadn’t he?

Behind him, a few patrons exited the hotel, reminding him he didn’t have time for brooding. The sooner he got the party over with, the sooner he could try to explain Laura to Faith.

He made his way back inside the ballroom and, upon seeing him, his editor quickly walked to the podium to make introductions. Through his brief reading, pats on the back afterward, and subsequent two-hour signing, Alec was ready to tear his hair out. By the fistful. His mind kept straying to what Faith might be doing, thinking. Part of him feared she’d be gone when he returned. She’d been so damn calm. She was always calm. Why didn’t she yell at him? Slap his cheek? Hell, any significant sign of anger would’ve been better than the shell shock.

As his driver guided them through the busy streets, acid ate away at his gut. Aside from Jake, he’d never talked about Laura with anyone. Not when it happened and not after. By process of elimination and through the grapevine, his parents and former agent knew the details. But their prompts to try and get Alec to discuss the accident fell on deaf ears. What happened was off-limits.

Until now.

A thousand explanations tore through his mind, but none of them measured up. There was no sugarcoating this story. Once Faith knew the whole of it, she would walk away from this relationship before it had even begun. He was sure of it.

And why did that bother him so much? It wasn’t as if he could put a ring on her finger and promise her forever. Even if he wanted to—which, Christ, did he?—there was no future beyond August.

He rubbed at his tired eyes, not recognizing this sensation that had been swirling in his chest since he first saw Faith on the beach weeks ago. It was a warning he should’ve heeded. Laura had never, not once, made him feel like this. Like he needed to see her to breathe freely, to touch her to prove she was real. To crawl inside her mind to find all the clever, quirky little thoughts within. The need to claim her, have her begging and chanting his name while he drove into her, had the blood roaring through his veins.

Falling for Faith would be selfish. Inevitable, it seemed, but selfish nonetheless.

Alec waved off the driver when he pulled to the curb outside the apartment and started to get out to open the door for him. He gave the man a hefty tip for his trouble and opened the door himself.

Alec paused before exiting. “The lady, how was she when you drove her back?”

The driver turned in his seat and regarded Alec with sympathetic eyes. “She cried quietly the entire way, sir. Never said a word. I went with her up to your penthouse and made sure she went inside.”

Alec nodded and thanked the man. Nausea churned in his stomach until a cold sweat broke out on his forehead and his palms grew clammy.

He’d made her cry. Faith had enough in her life to cause that—she didn’t need him adding more reasons.

The lobby attendant stopped him before he hit the bank of elevators. “Mr. Winston. I have your keys, sir.”

His keys. Right. He’d given them to Faith. His heart puttered behind his ribs, just wanting to get to her. “Did she leave?”

“Not that I saw, Mr. Winston. She handed them to me and said to make sure you could get back inside.”

He shook his head. Damn her to heaven and back. How could she be so considerate after what he’d done? Hell, any other woman would have trashed his place and left fifty screeching voice mails on his phone. With every given right.

Alec took the keys and rode the elevator to the penthouse, hoping to God she hadn’t left. Where would she go? The airport? A hotel? He’d find her, regardless.

The apartment was dark and quiet. Too quiet. His anxiety upped ten notches. He strode through the living room and to his bedroom where a bedside lamp cast a soft glow into the hall. He stopped short.

Not only had she not left, she hadn’t even changed clothes. The elegant black dress still adorned her thin frame, but her heels were placed neatly by the closet door and her hair was out of the twist. Soft brown strands fell around her shoulders. She stood by the bay window with her back to him and her arms crossed.

At a loss, he just stood there.

“I hate this place.” Her mermaid voice wafted over to him.

He understood. Most of the time, he hated the city, too. He wondered if he stayed to punish himself. For someone like Faith, New York would be overstimulation. Too many people, too much noise, just . . . too much everything. Strangely, he could relate.

Taking a hesitant few steps into the room, he sighed. “Faith, I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for lying to me or sorry I found out?”

How very little she thought of him. Not that he could blame her. “I’m sorry I lied and I’m sorry you had to find out like that. I had every intention of telling you, but the words just never came.”

She turned, and the red of her eyes had his chest tightening. “Two words, Alec. Just two words. I’m. Engaged.”

When she put it like that . . .

“How have you kept this a secret? I mean, you’ve got a woman on your arm in nearly every tabloid. There’s not many people alive who don’t know your name, even in passing.”

He swiped a hand down his face and allowed the hurt to rise up. He had to explain to Faith in a manner she could somehow find a way to understand. He needed her to understand. Making his way to the corner, he sat in a chair to give her room and himself time to stall. He tossed his suit coat over the arm. Best to start at the beginning, he supposed.

“When I moved to the city, I’d just signed my first book deal and was living in this shitty apartment in the Lower East Side. Laura was a struggling artist who lived across the hall.” He picked at the skin around his thumbnail with his index finger. “We struck up a friendship of sorts that quickly turned into more. Neither of us expected anything other than what it was. Sex. We were young and stupid with too many dreams and not enough money.”

Faith walked over to his bed several feet away and sat on the edge of the mattress, her steady gaze holding his. Quiet understanding emanated, urging him to go on.

Closing his eyes, he braced himself for the next bit. The pain from those days washed over him and stole his air. “A couple months later, she got pregnant. Being a southern boy, I did what I thought was right and proposed to her. She wanted to wait to get married until after the baby was born.” They’d merged apartments and household items, but never their hearts. Not that Faith needed to know that part. “Things went from bad to worse. We couldn’t have been any more wrong for each other. We fought constantly. My first book was a month from releasing and I was deep into edits on the second when she called me from the doctor’s office to say she’d miscarried.”

The baby, just a fetus, was still a fresh loss in his mind. He’d barely had time to adjust to the pregnancy, but damn. He’d loved that baby with everything he had. The hot sting of tears threatened as he looked at Faith, his control wavering.

She pressed her fingertips to her lips and looked at the ceiling, blinking rapidly. If possible, her already tense shoulders grew even more rigid. But the anger creasing her brow smoothed away when she returned her amber gaze to his.

She still had yet to say anything, and his fucked-up tale wasn’t over, so he leaned back and drummed his fingers on the chair arm.

He blew out a breath. “Laura blamed me for everything. The miscarriage, not loving her, not making enough money, her art not selling. It got to the point we couldn’t be in the same room without screaming at each other. One night, she yelled it was over and stormed out.”

Alec could still hear her words inside his head, beating like a drum against his temples. He couldn’t muster the courage to look at Faith, so he had no idea if she felt the same contempt for himself that he did.

After several minutes he cleared his raw throat. “When she left the apartment, she got drunk with an old friend and wrapped her car around a utility pole. The friend died and Laura wound up a vegetable on life support. She’s in a nursing facility here in the city.”

Seconds ticked by.

Slowly, Faith rose and walked to the window. She offered him her back and nothing more. Said not a syllable. She looked so damn fragile standing there. Breakable. Then again, weren’t they all?

He rubbed the back of his neck, waiting to find out what she’d do, say. Faith never seemed to react as he expected, so he held some residual strand of hope she wouldn’t clock him and leave.

Nearly ten minutes passed, and nothing. Unable to stand it, he leaned forward. “Say something, Faith. Anything. Tell me you hate my guts. Tell me not to touch you again. Tell me—”

“That my heart hurts for you.”

He jerked straight. “Come again?” he croaked.

She turned around, leaned against the windowsill, and crossed her arms. “You still consider yourself engaged to . . . Laura?”

Hearing Laura’s name from Faith’s lips did something terrible to his insides. “Yes. The accident was nine years ago and there’s no hope of her recovering. The doctors say she’s brain-dead.” He opened his mouth again, but couldn’t finish the thought. Honestly, he was still waiting for Faith to throw her shoe at his head.

“You were going to say more.”

Clever, insightful Faith. “Laura’s parents are very religious. They won’t take her off life support even though she’s not in there anymore. I hit the bestseller list several months later, which is why we were able to hide what happened from the media– the accident preceded the fame. I can afford her care at the facility. They can’t.”

Faith stared at him through those amber eyes. Blinked. “And out of duty, you won’t leave her. Because you view this whole dreadful tragedy as your fault.”

Alec didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at her astute intuition. Whether to shake her or kiss her for her calm understanding. If he wanted, he could leave Laura behind and still pay for her care, but he wouldn’t, because Faith was right. Guilt and remorse would forever bind him to that night nine years ago. He wouldn’t or couldn’t ever let it go. It was his own sick, twisted way of making amends.

Somehow, Faith got that. She’s wrapped her smart, beautiful head around his intentions and didn’t question the decision. Even more impressive was that she didn’t try to tell him it wasn’t his fault, like Jake had tried to do countless times, and she didn’t offer empty condolences because they never eased the pain. If anyone knew that, Faith did.

What in the hell was he going to do with her?

The itch to touch her, to cross the few feet between them and seek comfort, was so fierce that he rose from the chair before he remembered she hadn’t reacted. Her gaze was pinned to the wall over his head, lost, a million miles away.

“Give me some idea where your mind is at, Faith. Should I try to book an earlier flight home? Go sleep on the couch and give you space?”

She straightened from the windowsill and closed the distance to stand in front of him. “You should have told me sooner.”

He breathed in her sweet, sugary scent. “Yeah.”

“Is Laura the reason why you wouldn’t make love to me?”

It didn’t escape his attention that she’d used the phrase making love instead of sex, like they’d done previously when discussing their attraction. Laura had nothing to do with what was between him and Faith. Hell, he’d held off on crossing that line and taking her because, deep down, he knew with Faith it would be making love. And all he’d ever known was sex.

He shook his head and brushed his knuckles down her cheek. “You make me feel more than she ever did. That scares me because my circumstances will never change.”

Her lips parted with a breath, her gaze taking in his face as if trying to reach the truth. “Alec?”

He yielded to her nearness, at her breathy sigh of a voice he couldn’t get out of his head if he tried. “Yes?”

“Will you take my dress off now?”

chapter

eighteen

Faith waited patiently for Alec to connect the dots, watching his face for the moment when he realized she wasn’t angry at him for lying and that she didn’t hate him. It was what he expected, judging by his demeanor. He hated himself enough. He shouldn’t.

What happened to his Laura was a series of terrible incidents, a row of dominoes tumbling down. He was no more at fault for Laura’s decisions than the road on which she crashed. All the anger they harbored for each other was just young infatuation trying to play adult in the real world. And the miscarriage . . . that had to have been the most difficult. To have what might’ve been ripped away by nothing more than a biology mishap and be helpless to stop it.

Alec cared about people. He may have a solitary lifestyle, and he needed his space and room to think, but no one that in tune to the nature of people could be callous. His guilt over Laura was proof enough. To lose a child he never got to hold, and to lose the hope of what that child could bring, would devastate a person like Alec. He was an all-or-nothing guy.

She wished things could be different. Wished she was a woman he could desire long term and not grow weary of. She wished he could forgive and move on, and that Laura’s parents would seek peace and let their daughter go.

But none of those things would happen. So for now, she’d take this borrowed time with him and make the most of it. Part of her wanted to hold back. Think things through. But Laura hadn’t been a part of his life for many years, and Alec said Laura was never coming back. If there had been no car accident, Faith figured he and Laura wouldn’t still be together.

He stared at her through his gray-blue eyes with uncertainty and wonder. “Why aren’t you mad at me?”

She stepped closer, until her breasts touched his chest and her hips were snug against his. “Because you weren’t deliberately keeping the truth from me. You were trying to tell me all along, working your way up to it. You brought me all the way to New York so you could.”

He blinked away his surprise as fast as it appeared and cupped her jaw. “You are the most fascinating creature, Faith.”

She’d wanted him from the moment they’d first met and he’d startled her on the beach. Wanted him still. But she didn’t have the level of experience he was used to with other women and her nerves would get the best of her if he didn’t take control soon.

Swallowing hard, she looked up at him and wrapped her arms around his waist. “I don’t know if I’ll be any good at this.”

“At what? At sex?”

“Yes.”

A low chuckle rose from his throat. “Foolish woman.”

He leaned in and seared her mouth with a kiss, going slow, going deep. One hand threaded in her hair and held her to him while his tongue explored and conquered. His other arm hauled her solidly against the hard wall of his chest, pinned her there with restrained strength. Delicious heat pooled between her legs. She didn’t even know her feet were still on the ground until her knees buckled.

Now there was the earth-shattering kiss he’d threatened weeks ago.

“I’ve got you,” he murmured against her lips. Reaching behind her neck, he untied the knot holding the dress. “I’ve been wanting to do that since you put on the dress.”

“Me, too.”

His grin slipped as he tugged the dress down her torso, over her hips and to her ankles. He looked up at her from where he knelt on the floor and helped her step out of the dress. Molten desire replaced the humor of the moment and had her pulse at dangerous levels. He wrapped his large hands around her calves and slowly slid them up to cup her hips.

“You look good enough to eat,” he said and placed a kiss to her stomach, and another between her breasts when he rose to full height. “Smell good enough to eat, too.”

Her nipples rasped against the yellow lace, begging for his mouth. Instead, he stepped away and she reeled. He opened the nightstand, removed a packet, and set it by the lamp. Then he pulled down the comforter, revealing forest-green sheets.

When he turned back, he just looked at her, as she stood there in the lingerie Lacey had insisted she buy and Faith had envisioned Alec stripping off. His gaze slid up to hers and held while he unbuttoned his shirt and shrugged out of it. A thin scattering of black hair covered his chest and trailed down to the V of his waist, disappearing. The belt was next, followed by the gray slacks and finally the black briefs. Sure, swift movements to rid the barriers between them. He stood before her in all his glory.

And he was glory.

Muscular thighs, toned abs, wide shoulders, defined biceps, and an erection that stood at attention. The erection held her gaze. He wasn’t so large that she worried he wouldn’t fit, but he was close. The wide head brushed his navel, the thick shaft emerging from a light patch of black hair. He had the body of a trained runner. He had neither bulging muscles nor a thin, wiry frame—instead he was lean, toned, and tan. Her mouth watered, wanting the weight of his body pinning hers, him relieving the ache between her legs.

She swallowed hard, suddenly nervous again. When he touched her, he took her out of her head and into a dizzying passion. But he wasn’t touching her now, he was looking at her as if he’d never seen a female before. She’d certainly never seen anyone like him, what with the very little practice she had.

Slowly, like a predator, he strode toward her and cupped her cheeks. This time the kiss stole her sanity. The precision with which he slid his hands down to cup her breasts through the bra, the deliberate and meticulous way his fingers grazed her nipples, bespoke of his familiarity with the female form. He knew how to touch, to taste, to drive her out of herself and back with crushing velocity.

She never knew being touched, being kissed, could be like this. Potent. Insistent.

Breaking the connection, he grazed his lips over her jaw, down her throat, and licked her collarbone. “I want you so badly I can’t think.”

His voice alone could make her damp and dreamy. A coarse murmur with need raking it raw. Hadn’t he said something similar, before the party? Yes. “You promised you’d make me forget to think.”

He groaned into her neck, a purely male sound of pleasured frustration. “Consider it done.”

Grabbing the back of her thighs, he spread her legs, lifted her, and spun to deposit them both on the bed. He sprawled over her, hands everywhere, mouth everywhere.

“I knew you’d be good at this,” she breathed. Or tried to breathe.

“It’ll only get better, darlin’.”

His voice was thick with his native southern drawl, something she only noticed when he was frustrated or confused. Or aroused, it seemed. His thick shaft pressed between the apex of her thighs, grinding into her heat, and her neurons splintered.

He unclasped her bra and tossed it over his shoulder. His tongue swept over one nipple, then the other. She arched up to meet him, tangling her fingers in his thick hair, but he was already on the move, kissing his way down her belly.

“God in heaven, Faith. You smell so damn good.”

His fingers dipped into her panties. Tugged them off.

She pried her eyes open and looked down at the top of his head. Her only other lover had never engaged in oral, so she didn’t know what to expect, how to react. Nerves pinged. She reached for him to draw him back up, but he pressed his mouth over the pulsing, aching heat of her core and her body bowed in bliss.

He licked, nipped, and moaned, never allowing her to fall over the edge, but pushing her so, so close. In the throes of the most spectacular frustration, praying for release, she threw her arms over her head and pressed her palms against the headboard. Surely this couldn’t kill her, could it? Death by ecstasy.

“You ready to come, darlin’?”

Was he kidding? All she could do was nod.

Without warning, he climbed up her body and reached for the condom. Foil ripped. His breaths became pants and his weight settled between her thighs. Then his arms were between her and the mattress, cradling her back, lifting her to straddle his hips as he sat back.

His blue-gray eyes bore into hers, heavy with want and desperation. “I want you to come with me. I’ve wanted you for weeks, so we’ll come together.”

With hands secure on her hips, fingers digging into her flesh, he raised her enough to align himself and brought her down around his shaft.

She gasped, holding his shoulders at the full feeling of him deep inside.

Oh. Oh God, yes.

He stilled, breathing heavily into her hair a moment before claiming her mouth and kissing her with long, strong strokes of his tongue. Tension and restraint bunched the muscles under her hands, until he was quivering with need. Or was that her?

Wrapping her arms around his neck, she rolled her hips. The slide of him against her sensitive flesh made her tremble, lose whatever she’d been grasping on to.

His arms came around her back, one around her middle, the other sliding up into her hair. “Let me see your eyes.”

She opened them and met his gaze, so close to the edge of control and yet achingly tender. He drew his hips back as much as the position would allow, keeping her banded in his arms, his eyes never leaving hers. After holding out long enough to make her beg, he finally drove up while urging her down, her body taking him deeper than she thought possible.

Air whooshed from her lungs. Every nerve inside her came alive. Sparked. Inflamed. The friction of him hitting her nub and the pressure of him filling her so fully had her teetering near oblivion. He pumped inside her in earnest, emitting a groan with every thrust. He chanted her name against the skin below her ear, over and over.

The surprise of her orgasm barely had time to register before it hit full force. Her inner muscles tightened, squeezing him. She arched, cried out, vibrated with the intensity of satisfaction.

He caught her before she tumbled backward, tensing against her as he sought his own release. He pumped twice more and stilled. Panted. His fevered brow burrowed deeper into the crook of her neck, his breath hot against her jaw as he relaxed. He fell back against the mattress, bringing her with him to splay over him like a contented cat.

Content wasn’t even close to the term she’d use to describe what they’d just done, what she felt, but her body was too relaxed and sated to think of something more appropriate.

*   *   *

When they got their breathing under control, Alec lifted his head and pushed the hair away from Faith’s face. Her amber eyes were more honey-colored in the dim lamplight and mischief hinted at the corners.

Would he ever stop being surprised by her? Moreover, had sex ever been like that before? That good, that satisfying, that . . . complete? Not for him, it hadn’t.

A lazy smile lifted her mouth. “This might sound like a terrible cliché, and you might put me in writer jail for saying it, but that was amazing. I’d heard sex could be mind-blowing, but I figured that was just hype. My experience never brought me close to that.”

She used the term experience in its singular form and he had to wonder if that was a slip of the tongue or if she’d only had one lover before him. “My ego says thank you.”

Her smile turned into a grin. “Welcome.” Sighing, she rested her chin on his chest and stared at him. Drew lazy circles in his chest hair. After a beat, the grin slipped and her back tensed beneath his hand. “Do you regret it?”

“No regret.” Not in the way she was figuring. He was just starting to get a tangible thread of what was so . . . unique about the two of them together, and it made his heart pound.

“I don’t believe you,” she said.

“No regret,” he repeated, this time more firmly.

She must’ve read something in his expression, because she shook her head. Shame washed over her face, so quickly he had no time to react. She scooted off the foot of the bed and covered her breasts, searching for her clothes.

Damn her. Damn him.

He pressed his palms to his eyes, hating how she could fucking see right through him. This time she had it all wrong, though, and he didn’t know how to voice the feelings filling his chest. “It’s not . . . Please come back to bed.”

Slipping into her panties—and hell, yellow was his new favorite color—she hopped on one foot before catching her balance. If not for the hurt radiating in her eyes, he’d call her beautiful. Hair wild, skin flushed. She didn’t bother with the bra, but she did fetch a pair of pajamas out of her suitcase by the closet.

He gave her a minute to dress, thinking she needed the barrier, before he got up and slid into a pair of black running shorts. “Are you hungry?”

Hungry? Really, man?

“No, thank you.”

“No, thank you,” he repeated, at a loss. He didn’t know how to do this, the morning-after thing. And he had the sinking suspicion he’d not only hurt her feelings, but insulted her somehow. “Faith . . .”

“It’s late. I’m gonna go sleep on the couch. I’ll see you in the morning.” She looked down at herself and released a sigh of resignation.

He looked at her pajamas for the first time and blinked. The top was a sheer black number and the bottoms a silk boy brief. Very hot, but not her. “I like them.”

“Yeah, well . . . thank Lacey. For all the good they did.”

“What does that mean?”

She turned on her heel and strode out.

He followed and gripped her arm. Soft, soft skin. Focus, Winston. “Answer me.”

Her face turned a shade of adorable red. “Lacey took me shopping before we left.” She waved her hands at herself. “This is the result.”

“If you didn’t like them, why did you buy them?”

She glanced at the ceiling, the wall, the floor. “I thought maybe you’d . . . notice me in them. Lacey picked them, and when she and Mia gang up, they can be pretty persuasive.”

Hold the phone. “What do you mean, you thought I’d notice you?” He’d been doing nothing but noticing her since the day they met. For the life of him, he still couldn’t figure out what it was about her that made her so damn special compared to the rest. Why she made him . . . want. Feel.

Jerking her arm out of his hand, she marched down the hall. “This is humiliating enough, Alec.”

Humiliating? “Swear to God, Faith, one of these days you need to stop walking away from me or you’re going to find yourself handcuffed to me.” He stopped. Huh. Nice thought.