He thrusts a hand into my hair, growls a warning low in his throat. And then his mouth is on mine and I’m falling into him. Drowning in the strength and sex and power of him.
“You’re so beautiful,” he tells me when we finally come up for air seconds, minutes, hours later. “And this dress…” He skims his lips across my shoulder as he shoves the straps down my arms. Moments later, the gown falls at my feet in a pool of red lace. “I wanted to fuck you the moment I saw you in it.”
For the first time since I saw him parked at the top of my driveway, a frisson of unease works its way down my spine. I ignore it, try not to let his words upset me. The last thing I want right now is to be jerked out of this moment and shoved right back into the panic I was in earlier.
I pull him close again, press hot, openmouthed kisses to his lips, his throat, the stubble on his jaw. I want to lose myself in him, to block out all the ugliness of the last twenty-four hours and think only about him. Only about this.
But he’s still talking, still murmuring sexy things in my ear, against my skin. Things about how much he wants me and how crazy I make him and how he wants to make me feel good. He’s saying all the right things, doing all the right things, but my brain is going now and I can’t help wondering if he’s saying these things to me…or to her.
If I’d been wearing the white dress—my favorite color by my favorite designer—maybe I wouldn’t have these doubts. Maybe I wouldn’t wonder who he was talking to, or about. But considering my mother all but dressed me as the Belladonna tonight, it’s hard not to wonder if it’s really me he wants. Hard to hear Ian call me beautiful when I look like her. Especially considering how much the Belladonna was, if not his actual creation, then at least the muse who sat on his shoulder when he wrote the biggest and bestselling book of his career.
Would it be so strange for him to fall for her? For me, as her?
From the moment he showed up in my life four days ago, I’ve been one incarnation of the Belladonna after another. Vintage suits, ballgowns, even the corset and garter belt I’m wearing right now. Is it so strange then, to wonder again whether it’s her he wants…or me?
I try to cover my insecurities, to bury them once and for all. But Ian senses that something’s wrong—the same way he always senses that something’s wrong—and the moment he does, he steps away from me.
I should be grateful for his concern—and for the reprieve as it gives me a chance to get my head back on straight. But the moment his touch disappears, I’m lost. Bereft.
I want him badly. And I want him to want me the same way. Until it’s a burning in his blood, a craving in his soul. A deep and terrible thirst that can’t be quenched.
Not the Belladonna. Not Veronica Romero. Not Maxim’s sexiest woman alive or whatever other moniker he tried hanging on me at lunch that first day. I want him to want me. Plain, old Veronica, who likes the beach and yoga pants and ridiculously expensive champagne.
Is that really so much to ask?
I work hard to keep this latest freak-out to myself. The last thing I want Ian to see is how fucked up I am, and how right he was to call me fragile earlier. But he’s looking at me, studying me, tilting my chin up so he can see my face, my eyes.
“Do you want me to leave?” he asks, his hand stroking over my jaw in a soothing rhythm.
“No.” I clutch at him, my fingers tangling in his dress shirt as I pull him close. “I’m sorry. I’m just…”
“Exhausted.” He picks up where my voice trailed off. “I pushed you hard last night, then treated you reprehensibly this morning. Is it any wonder you don’t trust me?”
“It’s not that,” I tell him, because I don’t want him blaming himself. My losing it is not his fault. “It’s just…”
“Just what?” He runs his hand through my hair, his fingers playing with the small curls over my ears. As he does, I feel my barrette give way, the clasp popping off my too-thick hair at the first disturbance. “Oh shit, sorry.” He holds the hair clip out to me.
I freeze in horror. Because it’s not my barrette that he’s holding. In fact, it’s not one of my regular hair ornaments at all. It’s a brooch. More specifically, a vintage brooch. Even more specifically, the vintage Cartier brooch that I wore numerous times during the filming of Belladonna. The same vintage Cartier brooch that once belonged to Celeste Warren herself.
I haven’t seen it since filming wrapped, but I would recognize it anywhere. With its delicate gold leaves and alternating clusters of pearls, rubies, and diamonds, it’s one of the most distinctive jewelry pieces I’ve ever seen—and I’ve seen more than my share. The costume director on Belladonna had crowed for weeks when she’d gotten her hands on it.
So what the hell was it doing in my hair? Especially when I know—I know—that I put on a very different barrette right before the party started—a ruby and diamond star that I’d found at an estate sale years ago and that I am inordinately fond of. And now that one is gone and this one has taken its place?