“It’ll be okay, I think,” I said quietly, embarrassment running through me like lightning as bear caught me with his gaze. “I have to go… I’m meeting some friends later.”
“Oh,” she replied. “Okay, well, call me tomorrow.” She leaned up and gave me a light touch on the shoulder. “Thank you. You have no idea what this means to me.”
“I understand,” I said. I nodded at Bear silently, my body shivering with pleasure as he flashed a nonchalant smile. I grabbed my sweater and my purse and turned and walked away, my legs quivering with every step.
“What did you do to convince her?” I heard Mom ask Bear as I walked away.
“I offered her a job,” he replied lightly.
His words would linger in my ears all night, but his touch buzzed against my skin for days.
Chapter 2
Sometimes, you see the fork. Sometimes, you don’t.
Sometimes, your life takes a turn and you don’t really have a choice.
Every now and then, changes come hurling at you and you don’t even see them coming.
And then, there they are—unavoidable, in your face, ugly, messy—demanding you acknowledge them.
Or, maybe they aren’t so harsh at first. But that’s how they get you, you know?
They’re sly and charming, pulling you in with a smile and maybe a promise of something sweet and then, before you know it, there you are—falling to your knees to do whatever it takes to get another taste of paradise.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. I haven’t fallen to my knees just yet, but we’ll get there, don’t worry.
What I’m trying to tell you is that I didn’t see it coming at first. I didn’t see any of it coming. How could I? I was naive, really.
Sure, I’m a grown-ass woman, but even at twenty-six there are days when I still feel eighteen.
To say that I had led a sheltered and bland existence before that day at the restaurant with Bear would be the understatement of the year.
I’d managed to graduate college without much in the way of experience… I’d had one boyfriend throughout college—the infamous Harlan Lewis, as my friends called him. Our relationship was full of drama. A lot of drama.
He was charming and cocky, at first. He drew me out of my shell by showering me with attention and affection. I’d never had a boyfriend that was so doting before, but he had a few shortcomings. Sex was all about him, and it was over in an instant. I had no time to be excited, much less satisfied.
In the beginning, I told myself that sex didn’t matter. Things would get better.
But they didn’t. They only got worse.
After a year of dating, his attention turned to suffocating possessiveness. Then he accused me of cheating on him.
One night, he slapped me after I came home late from happy hour with my friends.
That’s all it took.
I mean, I should have left a lot sooner, I know, but I wasn’t about to hang around and be someone’s punching bag.
I got over him quicker than it takes for a good Oregon shower to run through town. Six months later, he still texts me trying to get back together.
As if I’d sink so low ever again.
I wanted a lot more from a partner than Harlan could ever provide.
I was ready for all the breathless orgasms I was supposed to be having at my age.
I’d certainly read all about them. In fact, I’d spent hours upon hours haunting the romance section at Powell’s bookstore, walking out with bags full of deliciously trashy novels, hoping nobody on the Max peeked in my bags on the way home.
I couldn’t wait to see what it felt like for my breasts to heave or my stomach to flutter with desire as my lover gazed at me through hooded lids.
I wanted all of that stuff. I’d never even come close to feeling like that with Harlan. I was starting to think I’d never feel it…
I mean, I didn’t see those things in my near future—but I was ready and waiting, just in case.
There were a few things in the way, of course.
My shyness, for one. I wasn’t a flirt, not like my friend Marie. She didn’t hold back, not for a second. When she saw someone she was interested in, she went at them with both guns blazing.
Me? I just turned and ran the other way. The few times I’d gone out on dates in college (outside of what Marie and I now called my ‘Harlan period’) had ended in excruciating awkwardness. When the date was over I’d lay there for hours, staring up at the cracked ceiling of my apartment, wondering—is this it? Is this really all there is?
Sex wasn’t fun. It wasn’t exciting. There were no hooded lids, no heaving breasts anywhere to be found. I would have given anything to even feel a little quiver in my stomach, but nope—no flutters, no butterflies.
I guess you could say I gave up after I broke up with Harlan. Trying to find someone else seemed like so much work. I stopped thinking it would ever happen and I turned myself off to the possibility of ever meeting someone who made my toes curl.
I had my bad boy book boyfriends and that was enough.
I dove into my semester at school, learning everything I could about fashion design and focused all my energy on creating my own line of dresses. School and work became my life.
That’s why I was blindsided today. Sure, maybe I’d put those little red panties on because I had some misguided little fantasy in my head, but I never expected a man like Bear to make that fantasy real… I never expected him to make me feel like that.
There he was—bigger than life, utterly intimidating, his demanding presence so grand and hulking that I was left breathless just by staring up at him. I mean, I felt a quiver in my stomach as soon as he’d closed that door behind us—and that had to mean something, right?
I just didn’t know what.
I didn’t know that this was my fork.
Bear Dalton. Chairman and CEO of Dalton Enterprises, the premier development firm in America, my Mother’s billionaire boss. He was the man who made my toes curl, my breasts heave, and my pussy sing.
How could I have ever said no to that?
Chapter 3
Relentless throbbing pain shot through my brain as the phone next to my head buzzed. I rolled over and looked at the clock, a loud groan escaping from my mouth. It wasn’t even seven yet. I didn’t need to look at my cell to see who was calling, I knew it was my Mother.
‘Early bird catches the worm, Chloe,’—I could still hear her high-pitched mantra singing in my head, even after all these years. She’d woken me up every morning as a child with that stupid saying and it was forever etched onto my brain.
There were times where I was certain I was adopted or switched at birth. Considering she’d raised me alone, you’d think that would have bonded us more, that maybe I’d have adopted some
her characteristics over time, but we couldn’t have been more different or more distant.
Not only was she an early riser compared to me being content to sleep way past noon, but she was so fucking ambitious. She never stopped. She never took a day off. She never took her eye off of the proverbial prize.
I was more of a ‘be here now’ kind of girl. I stopped and smelled every rose in my path, savored every morsel of life that I could. I could sit for hours, letting the day float away and just people watch.
Not my Mother. She was constantly moving, insisting time was money all along the way. It was exhausting. She was exhausting.
And the fact that she was attempting to wake me up way before seven in the morning on a fucking Saturday was exhausting. I threw the phone across my bedroom and shoved a pillow over my head.
I’d call her later. After I’d had time to think.
I’d been so blown away by my experience with Bear last night that I’d come straight home, cancelled my plans with my friends, and sat on my couch getting up close and personal to a cheap red wine. I did my best to make some sense out of what had happened.
It didn’t work.
I was still just as confused as I had been when I’d left. I was also very sore—in the most absolutely delicious way.
My body was still on fire with Bear’s touch and now that I was awake again, thanks to my Mother, I couldn’t ignore the fact that all I wanted was to feel him inside of me again.
“So much for sleeping,” I groaned, throwing the covers off my naked body. I’d fallen asleep with my hands tucked between my legs, desperately trying to quench the fire that Bear had ignited within my body, and now there they were again—furiously rubbing at my clit, hoping to find some magical illusive release that would give me a break from thinking about him, yearning for him, if only for a few minutes.
Dizzy and fuzzy, my brain began replaying the scene from yesterday like a movie in my head. I could still hear his voice, see those deep blue eyes peering into mine as if he was pouring himself into my soul.