Mastered (The Enforcers 1)

He nearly shook his head. Compromise. Not a word in his vocabulary. But when it came to Evangeline, he was fast learning new words and most certainly their definition.

“I love your cooking,” he said. “Best fucking meals I’ve eaten in my life.”

And they were. He might do a lot to keep a woman like Evangeline, but he wasn’t a liar. Not even to make her feel better or to appease her would he lie. She valued self-worth most of all. How hollow would that self-worth be if it was built on lies he’d told her?

Her eyes glowed with pleasure, her entire face lit up with radiance to rival the sun, her cheeks growing rosier by the second. She looked at him as if he’d just saved her from a burning building, for fuck’s sake. It didn’t take much to please this woman at all, and here he’d been throwing tens of thousands of dollars at her when apparently all she truly wanted was . . . him.

He couldn’t comprehend it, but the proof was here, looking him in the eyes. She wanted Drake Donovan the man. Not the wealth, power, status or prestige of being on his arm and under his protection.

His money appalled her. The gifts he gave her horrified her. Silas had informed him that she was less than thrilled to accept the cash and credit cards he’d sent over. She’d been more excited over the fucking Chinese takeout than over a credit card with no spending limit. And he’d bet his entire fortune that she hadn’t even touched the cash, much less counted it.

How did you keep a woman like his angel happy when she didn’t appear to want anything?

She only wants you.

And that he could give her. If that was all it took to make her happy, to keep her happy and to make damn sure she never walked out on him, then he’d give her exactly what she wanted.

“Once a week, same day unless it can’t be avoided, you cook for me. I’ll arrange my schedule so that I’m home no later than six. And when I say unless it can’t be avoided, Angel, I mean that nothing short of death will keep me from being here. Now that’s all I can promise,” he said in a serious voice. “You are my single most important responsibility. You gave me your trust and with that trust, you gave me yourself and you placed your faith in me that I’ll keep you happy. I take my responsibilities very seriously, and therefore I’m going to continue to spoil the hell out of you. You will not lift a finger except those nights you cook for me and you will not be washing the fucking dishes afterward. That’s what I pay a cleaning lady for. And what you can do for me is accept whatever I choose to give you and know that I give it not to take away your sense of self-worth or sharpen the divide between our net worths, but because it makes me happy. And what will make me even happier is if, as I told you the night I took you home with me for the first time, you think of creative ways of expressing your gratitude. Not be thinking of ways to pay me back and certainly not dwell on not being able to pay me back. Because that will seriously piss me the fuck off.”

She surprised him by throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly. She buried her face in his throat, and the soft whisper of her exhalations blew over his skin, setting fire to his every nerve ending.

“I’m sorry,” she said in an emotional voice that was muffled by his throat.

He pried her away from him and glanced sharply down at her.

“For fuck’s sake, what the hell are you sorry for?”

He knew his exasperation was showing, but hell, she was the single most infuriating, complex woman he’d ever known.

“I was—I’ve been an ungrateful bitch,” she said painfully. “And selfish. I never even considered your feelings. I was too wrapped up in my own insecurities and every time another gift showed up my panic increased. You’re right. About all of it, and I’m so very sorry, Drake.”

She lifted her hand to his jaw and caressed his cheek, the sensation like velvet, the contrast between her baby-soft skin and his much harder, life-roughened features heady and addictive. “And,” she added in a husky whisper, “you can be assured I will be very creative in my expressions of gratitude.”

He pressed a finger to her lips and sent her a look of reprimand.

“You will not speak of yourself that way. Ever. I shouldn’t even be having this conversation with you considering Silas had the same exact conversation verbatim with you, and if you don’t think I’ll allow him to turn you over his knee and spank that pretty ass if you say that kind of fucked-up shit about yourself again, then you couldn’t be more wrong.”