And spoiled rotten, dripping in diamonds, pearls and my come.
Some of the ire fades from her eyes. “Everything is ‘immediately’ with you. Do you ever have to wait for anything?”
“No.” My answer makes her smirk, cross her arms and wait. For the answer to her question, I assume. Can’t you just be the man who shares his umbrella? There is a shard of discomfort in my throat when I answer. “Sharing an umbrella might seem like a small gesture, but it made you expect more from me…emotionally. I have nothing to give in that way.” My jaw is tight enough to shatter. “If you come home with me, however, I have possessions that will make the fact that I’m an asshole seem irrelevant.”
A line forms between her brows. “You think I won’t mind you being mean just because you have nice things, like a fancy limo?”
“Exactly.”
Her smile is tremulous. “You’re wrong.”
I arch an eyebrow. “Prove it. Come with me and stay for a night in my home. I’ll remain my total bastard self while I’m spoiling you silly and we’ll see if you truly want to leave in the morning.”
Visibly mustering her confidence, she sticks out her hand for a shake. “It’s a deal, Alistair.”
My hand slides around hers and static ripples up my arm. And since our deal gives me permission to be my typically ruthless self, I pull her up against me roughly, flattening her sweet little tits against my chest. “You just made a deal with the devil, little girl,” I rasp, stooping down and throwing her over my shoulder. With her sputtering in shock, I turn on a heel and stalk back toward the open limousine door, already envisioning her in my home. In my bed. “No going back now.”
Chapter 3
Shelby
It’s incredible how quickly my plan went out the window once I came face to face with the man I’m supposed to be bartering with. My body for our home. Or rather, it’s my mother’s plan I’m failing to execute. She’s the one who dropped me off less than a mile from our landlord’s gated mansion, advising me to walk the road indefinitely in the hopes that Alistair would stop to offer assistance.
We thought about simply arriving at his home and asking to make the trade, my virginity in exchange for cancelling the eviction, but my mother didn’t think that would work with a man as shrewd as Alistair.
You’ll have to get under his skin first, honey.
Make it impossible for him to say no.
If anyone can do it, it’s you.
Dripping wet on the expensive leather seat of the limousine, I have no idea if I’m succeeding. Alistair watches me from the dark end of the vehicle, his long legs stretched out in front of him, a frown on his harshly attractive face as he considers me, his fingers in a steeple in front of his mouth.
He really is mean. Crude. Demanding. He didn’t even recognize my last name—the last name of the family he’s decided to evict.
But just like always, like every time he’s come to my neighborhood to pick up the rent, I sense there is so much more under the surface. Past all the scar tissue around his heart. Deep down, he’s the kind of man who couldn’t help but hold the umbrella for me.
When will I know if I’m under his skin?
Part of me wants to blurt the truth now—that I’m one of the tenants he’s throwing out. That I came to offer him sex to let my family stay. But what if he says no and my time with him is over as quickly as it started? I’ll lose my one and only chance to reach the man beneath the devilish exterior. I’ll miss my opportunity to find out about him. To spend time in the presence of the man I’ve been dreaming about since the first time I saw him.
Just a little longer. Then I’ll explain.
I’ll give him the truth and accept his decision.
The sound of gravel crunching, followed by a mechanical whir, makes me look out the window, finding the limousine pulling through two tall, wrought iron gates. Then we’re speeding up a long, tree-lined driveway, the largest house I’ve ever seen coming into view around the bend. “That’s where you live?” I whisper, turning in the seat. “All by yourself?”
“God, yes. Blessedly alone.”
“You never get lonely?”
“Never.” His eyes are so intense, landing on every part of me at once, his hand reaching down to adjust his gold belt buckle. “It’s what I’m used to. I don’t know anything else. Being lonely would never occur to me.”
That sounds terribly sad to me, but I keep my sympathy to myself, sensing it wouldn’t be well received. “Sometimes I like being alone, too. I sneak into my mother’s closet to write in my diary.” I stumble over the last word, worried I’ve said something that might reveal me as a tenant. This man doesn’t know the people who live in his buildings, though. All we are is numbers in a ledger to him. He has no idea about the people who live within the walls. “I think nothing can be better than the silence, but then I open the closet door and smell my mother’s roast chicken. And I hear my brothers arguing over the remote and it’s…home.”