Illusion (Billionaire in Disguise 2)

I watched Sam, eyeing her arm in its sling as she sat down in a chair beside me.

“How’s your arm?”

“I’ve gone through worse,” Sam said. “And it’ll only be a little scar. Much smaller than some of the ones I have on my body.”

“I haven’t seen many scars,” I said.

“Then you haven’t been paying attention. Another reason why something like that would never work with us.”

I stared at her hard for a while, taking in the parts of her skin I could see. Was she serious? Were there really scars like that on her body that I had missed? I wracked my brain, trying to remember them during the encounters I’d had with her. In the shower. In the hotel room. In the elevator.

Fuck. I couldn’t remember any of her scars.

I couldn’t even remember feeling them.

“I still feel guilty,” I said as I turned my face back toward the television.

“For what?” Sam asked.

“For you almost dying. I should’ve shoved you out of the way of that damn bullet.”

“It’s my job, Derek. You don’t owe me anything.”

“I owe you my life with how many times you’ve saved it.”

“All you owe me is my paycheck,” she said.

The television was running in the background, filling the corners of the room with mindless noise. I heard Sam grunt lightly as she reached for the remote control, and then the television was shut down. She sighed and leaned back in her chair, allowing her body to spread out as she closed her eyes.

I raked my eyes up and down her form, taking her in while I could.

“The last few weeks have shown me a lot,” I said.

I watched as Sam opened her eyes and found mine.

“Like what?” she asked.

“Like how empty of a life I’ve been living in a lot of ways.”

“Sounds like a personal revelation.”

“It is. I’ve allowed myself to become closed off. I’ve allowed myself to cope with the loneliness I feel. I’ve kept everyone at arm’s length except Jacob. And with this betrayal, with

all this shit that’s gone down with him, I figured I would’ve recoiled deeper, laughed at a point being proven and washed my hands of anything having to do with a personal life.”

“Don’t do that. It doesn’t bode well,” Sam said.

“I take it you know from experience?”

My eyes connected with hers, and I found her studying me, allowing her eyes to trail over my body as she mindlessly turned herself toward me. The air in the room thickened again like it had in my hotel room that night and like it had in the shower when I first laid my hands on her.

Like it had in the elevator when neither of us could stand it any longer.

“Something like that,” Sam said, murmuring.

“I’m not falling into that trap like you think,” I said. “I’m not going to allow myself to recede deeper into my reclusive depths, which means I’m not going to deny the attraction I feel toward you.”

Sam snickered and shook her head like she was trying to rid her ears of the words I had spoken.