Wicked Grind (Stark World 1)

He pulls out his phone, taps the screen, then looks back at me with a frown. "Nia Hancock. Twenty-seven. Mixed race female. Her agent called yesterday and said he was sending her over."

I lick my lips. "She, um, couldn't come. And since I could use the job, I came in her place."

"You came?" he repeats, and I watch as a series of expressions crosses his face, starting with surprise, then moving into confusion, and settling on something that looks remarkably like anger. "You?" His voice takes on a bland tone that is more than a little disconcerting.

I open my mouth to answer, but he continues before I can get a word in edgewise.

"You expect me to believe that Kelsey Draper wants to be a model. One of these models?" he adds, waving a hand behind him to indicate the three uncovered paintings, larger than life in so many ways.

I lick my lips, then immediately regret the unconscious action. Because I'm not sure. I'm really not sure at all.

Then I remember Griffin. And the money. And the fact that I'm desperate.

And, yes, I think about those scary-but-tantalizing sparks that are zinging around in my bloodstream. I shouldn't want it. In fact, I should hightail it right out that door before everything crashes down on me again.

But I don't. Instead, I glance down at the floor and murmur, "Yes. That's exactly what I want."

He's silent, so I lift my chin, hoping he can see my resolve, but there's nothing warm or welcoming in his expression. On the contrary, what I see on his face is anger. And when he scoffs and says, "What the hell kind of game are you playing this time?" I know that I've made a terrible, horrible, awful mistake.

"I'm not playing a game," I protest, but my voice comes out shaky instead of strong. "It's just that I need--"

"What?" he demands. "What could you possibly need from me?"

The harshness in his voice slices through me, and I cringe. I want to explain myself, but when I feel the tears well in my eyes, I know that there's no way I can hold myself together. "I'm sorry," I whisper as I turn to flee. "I should never have come here at all."

3

I slam through the door to the alley just as my tears start to flow in earnest. And as the steel door clangs shut, I lean against the brick wall and force myself to simply breathe while my blood pounds in my veins, and images of those photographs--and the man who took them--fill my head.

Honestly, this is my own fault. What was I thinking? I should have turned around the moment I realized the audition was for Wyatt. I should have run far and fast and not even thought twice.

Instead, I lingered, craving recognition from a man who clearly wants nothing to do with me.

Which should be just fine with me. After all, if anyone can throw my carefully constructed life out of whack, it's Wyatt. He's temptation personified, and when I'm around him, my self-control vanishes.

And nothing good ever comes from that.

Nothing that lasts, anyway. He made me feel good, that's for sure. So much so that the memory of his touch still fuels my fantasies, as potent now as it was more than a decade ago.

But those touches were forbidden, our moments together stolen. I knew I was breaking the rules, but I didn't care. What good was the threat of punishment against the reality of his kisses? His soft caresses?

He eviscerated my control. Made me forget my objections. Turned my willpower to mush. And though I want to blame him, I know that in reality, it was all on me.

I wanted to be bad--more specifically, I wanted to be bad with Wyatt.

Even then, I knew I'd have to pay. Of course, I would. There's always a price when you break the rules. Hadn't I been raised on that mantra? Hadn't it been drilled deep into my soul?

But until Wyatt, I never really tested it.

Maybe I didn't believe it.

Maybe I thought I could outwit fate.

But Karma is a nosy, invasive bookie, and when you try to cheat her, she takes what she's owed.

I've been scrambling for years to pay that debt. And fifteen thousand will go a long way to repairing the biggest mistake of my life.

Or it could have. But I bolted, and in the process I destroyed my only chance to get that much money in so short a time.