Heartless Hero (Crowne Point 1)

I focused on my ugly cherry, on keeping my fork from shaking. Not his fingers almost grazing me, igniting goose bumps that invaded my core and made my stomach ache and throb. Not how I wanted him to touch me. How I wanted him deeper, satiating what I couldn’t earlier.

Why wouldn’t he just go inside me?

“Abigail!”

Mother rarely took that tone in public. I was about to stand—conditioned like a fucking dog.

Theo’s hand on my thigh tightened. “Don’t move.”

“My mom is calling me,” I said weakly.

His finger plunged inside me. The fork I was holding dropped to my porcelain plate with a clang.

“So answer.”

With him deep inside me?

“Abigail? Are you trying to make me lose my voice?” Mom had a bored, unaffected tone, one I knew meant she was close to losing her patience.

“I…”

Theo pulled out, then pushed back in, deeper, curving his finger at just the right angle. I tried to focus on my breathing and failed.

What was I going to say? The room blurred. He was hitting that perfect, perfect spot I’d dreamed about this morning. His finger was big and thick and—

Fuck.

“Abigail?”

“I spilled champagne on my dress,” I managed weakly.

Theo’s low chuckle raced up my spine and made my teeth tingle.

Mother took a deep breath. I could picture her nostrils flaring.

My thighs fell open for him, begging for more. His ruthless rhythm all I knew. More fingers, more pressure, more pace.

More Theo.

Theo who had one tantalizing, taunting finger inside me—and was focused only on his food. Eating eggs and talking to the person beside him like he wasn’t driving me to the brink.

I was going to come. I was going to come on the hand of my bodyguard, surrounded by my family and my soon-to-be mother-in-law.

My breath shook. The room faded away to nothing.

Salt. Seawater. Sunscreen.

Him.

Him.

I gripped his thigh beneath the table, trying to anchor myself.

The only way I knew he even realized what he’d done to me was the way his voice slightly roughened when my grip tightened on his thigh as I came.

I quickly excused myself to the terrace for air.

Everything was in technicolor. The salt air brittle in my nose and on my tongue. The wind biting. The sun too bright, its heat on my neck fierce.