“Did you not hear me when I said you give the best head I’ve ever had?”
I shook my head. “But you’ve had every available woman in Manhattan.”
He laughed. And a piece inside me slowly died. He hadn’t denied it.
“How ‘bout the best cunt I’ve ever tasted.” His flinty gaze leveled me, speechless. He took a swig of his beer. “Besides, you didn’t answer my question.”
What question?My thoughts were fuzzy, and after what he’d said, my breath was only just returning to my lungs.
“What?”
He grinned. “Are you satisfied? Satisfied being a Diamond woman, where you get set up with a man and your life revolves around charity events?”
I puffed out my cheeks, piercing a piece of lobster tail. I poked at it for a while, then dipped it into the cream sauce before putting my fork down.
“Satisfied?” I shrugged. “It’s complicated, Barrett.”
Opening the salads and putting some on my plate, he said, “Try me.”
“Mom’s matchmaking… I don’t like it, but I understand it.”
He raised an eyebrow but stayed silent.
“And I’ve quit trying to edge my way into working. I floated the idea of maybe one day becoming an editor at my debutante ball, and Connor slammed that idea down. I think you may have been there.”
“I was. I remember. So that’s it?”
“No, I’ve mentioned it to Mom and Dad as well over the years.”
“Mentioned it? Maybe you should try harder, Lourde. Life is anything but fair.”
He outstretched his arms, the sun hit his chest and face, lighting him up like a Greek god of sex.
“Easy for you to say.” I ate the next few mouthfuls in silence. How would he know what it was like being a Diamond woman? I swallowed down the food, not caring to chew it. When I looked up, he was staring at me. A pain etched behind his eyes, similar to what I’d seen before.
“Nothing was ever easy for me. My father abused Evelyn and me. He was a violent man. He abused Mom for as long as I could remember. My childhood was anything but easy.”
I blinked. The gravity of what he just said hit me. “Barrett. I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.”
“I don’t need your pity, Lourde. I’m telling you this, so hopefully, you realize if you want something bad enough, grab it by the balls like I did, or life will tear you down. I guarantee it.”
“I understand. Does Connor know all of this?”
“Not about the abuse, no. No one knows this but you.”
I watched the pain hold in his eyes. “I’m not going to tell anyone, Barrett.”
Kids ran past our picnic, and sand kicked up around us.
“Hey, watch it,” Barrett said. And the moment we just shared quickly passed by.
“Thank you for telling me,” I said, dusting off the sand from the edge of the picnic rug.
“Yeah, well, now we have sandy lobster tails.”
“I don’t mind,” I said, smiling at him.
He smiled back. “Well, we have to eat. Otherwise, we won’t have energy for what I want to do to you later.”
Why does he do that?Wreck a beautiful moment by turning it into just sex. Minimizing it, so all we have is between the sheets.
Annoyed, I finished my salad in silence, admiring the beautiful sunset—the scent of the ocean, seaweed, and laughter in the distance. Maybe life wasn’t fair. Maybe I had to go and claim what I was after, or perhaps I could settle for a man Mom wanted me to marry and not work, not use my brain, but the passion to work, if anything, was growing stronger, and I didn’t want my Ivy League education going to waste.
I exhaled, then felt the weight of his stare fall upon me. “You're staring,” I said.
His stare lingered, then darkened. “Let’s go home.”
My body responded, tingling from head to toe. At this moment, I didn’t care if he ignored the previous moment we had. The anticipation inside of me brewed, and I couldn’t wait any longer for his hands to be on me and inside of me.
“Let’s.”
The car ride home was short but not so short his hand couldn’t trail up my leg, push my scrap of lace aside and finger me until I gripped the leather seat and moaned his name. By the time we made it to the house, I was already a tangled mess.
He followed me into my bedroom, watching me slip out of my yellow sundress, my hair dusting the tips of my shoulders. He leaned against the door frame as I stood in my new lingerie—a scarlet-red corset and satin belt with French lace covering half my ass.
“Leave it on.” He stalked over to me, unbuttoning his shirt, and kicked off his shoes.
I stood at the edge of the bed. Slowly, I ran my hand across his muscled, tanned chest. I was too impatient, so I moved his hand, ripping his shirt open. Buttons flew everywhere, landing all over the rug. He widened his eyes, then grinned. “That was my favorite shirt, dollface.”
“I’ll buy you a new one.” I smirked.