“My work is important to me for a number of reasons. But I’ve been doing it for years now and the last couple have felt monotonous. I’ve thought about getting out of my fields and saying fuck it and buying a yacht and sailing, like I told you. But with whom? Where to? I’ve taken my inheritance and I’ve built it up, much higher than my parents ever imagined it could be. But what for? I have no one to share it with and it never dawned on me . . . until I met you.”
His fingers trail up my side, skimming my breast, until he cups my cheek. His eyes bore into mine and it makes my heart beat so fast I think it’s going to explode. I have no idea where he’s going with this and the anticipation, the possibilities, are running away with me.
“But you come along and zap life back into me. I’m laughing for the first time in months about things that aren’t debaucherous. I’m making plans for vacations and to expand certain parts of my business, and all the while, you’re in the back of my brain. I want to work as quickly as I can and go find you. And I think that says it all.”
“I don’t know what to say,” I whisper.
His hand drops from my face, but his gaze doesn’t leave mine. I’m still pinned in place by his steely grey irises.
“You make me want to be better, to take risks. I like myself better when you’re around.”
Fenton dips in, placing a sweet kiss to my lips. “So I don’t know where this is going, and I don’t know how to define it. I just know I want you by my side, and I want to prove to you that I’m worthy of your affection.”
“I don’t think you being worthy is the problem,” I whisper.
“You’d be surprised,” he says, a shadow darkening his features.
“No, no, I wouldn’t. You are more than worthy.” I watch his gaze flicker from mine and settle on something across the room. “It’s my fear that I think will hold us back. I just don’t want to end up being so involved with someone that I get taken advantage of or made a fool of. I don’t want to lose myself in someone else.”
“I won’t do that.”
His eyes blaze with ferocity, with a seriousness I don’t see in them often. The shakiness in my confidence, the little rift in my brain that tells me to not trust, to take it slow, to question everything, settles, and I know one thing—I believe him.
“If this is going to work, you’re going to have to be completely open with me, okay? Grant hid everything from me, and I’m certain I don’t even know the half of it. But I feel silly spending so long with someone and thinking he was one person when, in reality, he was another. Does that make sense?”
He doesn’t flinch and makes no move to answer me. I’m not even sure he heard me.
“Fenton?”
“Yeah,” he says, shaking the cobwebs out of his head.
“Did you hear what I said?”
“Of course.” His features soften and he smiles at me cautiously. “You need transparency from me. I need patience from you.”
“I will give you patience, Fent, if you can be honest. As long as I don’t have to worry about what’s happening, you can take all the time you need to get used to this. I’ll need some time too.”
“I promise you—it will be worth it, rudo.”
I believe him. The swell in my chest makes me trust in what he promises. Everything I know about him makes me believe him and in him.
“I know it will.” Rolling over and pressing him against the mattress, I climb on top of him. Straddling his waist, I watch his face.
His trademark smirk kisses his lips as his cock hardens under my bare pussy. “In the words of my Brynne, we’ve talked. Now we fuck.”
“Brynne! Your phone!”
Fastening my earring, the back not quite wanting to slip on, I dart through the master into the living room. I hear my ringtone buzzing from somewhere, but the house is too big and foreign to me to know where the sound is coming from.
Fenton comes around the corner from his office, my phone in his hand. “This is becoming a habit—me finding your phone.”
I stand on my tiptoes and press a kiss to his cheek. He grabs my ass.
“This is my mother,” I gasp, fear blazing through me. “Hello?”
“Hey, sweetheart. How are you?”
I don’t answer her. “How are you, Mom?”
“I’m a wreck, to be honest. I’ve eaten a half a piece of toast in two days and your father is starting to drive me crazy with his pacing. I’m losing my mind.”
“Is Aunt Donna there?”
“Yes, thank God. She got in last night.” She sniffles. “You know, I look at her and I realize how awful this must be for you. If something happened to my sister, it would kill me. And you’ve lost your brother.”
The phone muffles and I wait for her voice to come back. I watch Fenton stride around the room before finally landing in a chair under a large painting.
“We just heard from Senator Hyland’s office,” she says, returning to the phone. “The chatter from Nekuti has picked up in the last couple of days.”
“Chatter?”
My eyes follow Fenton as he leans forward, his hands steepled in front of him, and rests his chin on top. His eyes are narrow as he listens to my end of the conversation.
“We don’t know if it’s from the video being released or . . . something else.”