What Grows Dies Here

I’d brought Stella, Zoe and Yasmin here, obviously. For wine weekends. Girls’ getaways. It was a special place I shared with special people.

And I was bringing Karson there on what amounted to our first date. Then again, I’d just let him fuck me in the bathroom of my dive bar, so it’s not like we were strangers.

“You’re impressive, you know that?” he asked quietly.

We were picking at the cheeseboard I’d prepared. That was the one thing I was good—no, great—at in the kitchen.

We were on the patio, curled up on one of the sofas, watching the sunset.

Sickeningly romantic, really. But it felt entirely right. Had it been last week when me and my girlfriends were plotting his and his boss’s demise?

It would be a good idea not to bring that up.

I rolled my eyes at the words he said.

He told me he didn’t like this response by grabbing my chin and turning me to face him.

“You flew us here on a fucking plane, Wren.” His low, gravelly voice warmed me.

“I’m aware, Karson,” I replied, my own voice tight. “And I’m aware that the reason I could do that is because I have the time and money to pay for flight lessons, and used my family’s private jet to fly us here. That is not so impressive.”

His gaze turned stormy. “When you’re with me, you’re not going to do that shit.”

I narrowed my eyes. “Do what shit?”

“Talk down about yourself. I’m not gonna listen to it,” he replied, his grip tightening on my chin. “You do it, I’ll have to punish you.”

My fingertips tingled.

“Yeah,” he murmured. “I see you like the idea of that. But you won’t like it when I put you over my knee, turn your ass red and your pussy wet, making you beg me to finish you.” His hand went to my cheek, holding me casually. “You don’t want to have to beg, do you, sweetheart?”

I hated what his soft tone was doing to me. Hated that I was responding carnally to the picture he was painting in my mind. Hated that I knew he was dead fucking serious.

He held me there in his grasp for a long time, knowing that I couldn’t answer. Wouldn’t answer.

Eventually, he let me go, and I was both relieved and disappointed.

“Do you want to know a secret about me?” I asked, swirling the wine in my glass.

“I want to know every fucking secret you have,” Karson responded, a hunger punctuating his husky tone.

I smiled into my wine glass. “Of course. Because I seem like a woman who may have a lot of interesting secrets, untold depths.”

“I have no doubt that you are full of untold depths.”

I kept that smile on my face, hoping he couldn’t see how fake it was. How terrified I was under his gaze. A gaze that really saw me.

“I do all these crazy things, like date a prince, get held captive by oil barons, get involved in international incidents because that makes me interesting, not because I’m interesting.”

I took a drink, needing courage, desperate for respite from his gaze.

“I’m an adult with a college education bought by my parents. Sure, I occasionally earn my own money, but from businesses my parents’ money helped start. I’ve never known struggle, not true struggle. And I feel like struggle, pain, carves people into who they’re truly meant to be.” I sat back, sighing. “Or maybe that’s just coming from the perspective of an entitled rich girl.”

The birds answered the silence that came after my words. I hadn’t intended to share that much. I never shared such things with anyone. They sounded pathetic in the face of the real problems people contended with every day.

Because I was deep in introspection, I wasn’t prepared for Karson to snatch the glass from my hand, put it on the table, and in one fluid movement, lay me over his knee and push my dress up to expose the naked skin of my ass.

His palm brushed over it with a light touch. “Told you what would happen if you put yourself down again,” he grumbled. “I’m a man of my word.”