Page 41 of Skin Trade

He nodded. “Her death was premature, yes, but inevitable. You cannot take the burden for every death that occurs in your life. It would bring about a torment that would kill you too.”

She studied his face a while, wanted to ask about death, who had died in his life, but it wasn’t her place. Perhaps it wasn’t her fault Josie was dead, and yes, like Seth said, everyone dies, but this one had been on her. It had been her doing. She owed it to Josie to not forget that part. He’d never understand that. “May I go to my room now?”

“You are hungry.”

Right then, as if it was in league with Seth, her stomach gave the loudest of growls it could possibly manage, and she clutched her belly. There was no way she could lie about her hunger now. But she didn’t want to eat with him. She didn’t want to see the dismissive way of his kind. She wasn’t ready for that yet. “Yes,” she said, “if you tell me where to go, I can go to my room, get changed and find it myself. I wouldn’t want to trouble you anymore today.”

“You’re not troubling me,” he said. Then he looked right at her with an expression of sheer sensual intent that ignited her senses. “I want to take you.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Eleven floors of his eyes on her and she fought with herself not to meet his gaze, not to provoke him. All would be lost if she did that because his last words went through her mind. He wanted to take her … to dinner. She could tell herself that if she wanted to, but from the look in his eyes, he hadn’t meant that. Not at all, and if she looked over to him, it would give away all she was feeling. But as the lift stopped on the thirteenth floor, she remembered with sinking realisation that she had to walk through his room to get to her own.

“Is there another way around?” she asked. One without needing to take a trip through the lion’s den, because she wasn’t sure she’d make it through unscathed.

“There is nothing wrong with this way.”

“I know.” But she didn’t want to. Not because she was blaming him, or even that she wanted to get away from him, but that room was too dangerous for her to walk through, full of everything Seth that would threaten to intoxicate her, and she wasn’t anywhere near strong enough to fight it. “I just …” just didn’t know what she wanted. With a sigh, she let it drop and stepped out of the lift and into the corridor. She didn’t stop until she made it to his room, marching her way around, past the painting. She slammed into the door and smacked her shoulder off it.

“It’s locked?”

“It’s locked from the outside.” He pulled a key card from his pocket and waved it across the scanner.

“I thought you didn’t need locks in this place?”

“You don’t need locks in this place, me on the other hand. Well with all these rampant women in here, I need my protection.”

She folded her arms. “Rampant women? Couldn’t they just get through my room to you?”

“They could, but they wouldn’t dare.” He pushed the door open and motioned for her to go on through first, but she stepped back.

“After you,” she said. If vampires were anything, it was old fashioned and stuck in their chivalrous ways. And it annoyed the hell out of them when it was denied. Except Seth, because he shrugged and went in first. He took his shirt off and tossed it onto the end of the bed, but Payton stayed by the door.

“Are you not coming in? I don’t always bite you know. Unless you want me to.”

She shook her head. Her brain screamed at her to get back to the lift, take it all the way down to the ground floor and walk across the foyer to the other side and get the lift that would take her through the more public area. But he’d see that as a game, as running away perhaps. So, she stepped inside. “Is the bathroom door locked too?”

“No,” he said. He started to unfasten the buttons of his trousers. The top one was already undone. Undone by the woman in his office. She hadn’t forgotten about her, about the look of sheer pleasure on her face. She used that image like a shield as Seth stalked towards her, trousers now hanging loosely from his hips.

“What are you doing?” she asked when he was close enough.

“Changing my clothes. That is what you wanted. Come upstairs, change our clothes and then find something to eat.”

“Me. I meant for me to get changed. Me to go and get something to eat. Not you.”

“And now I am going with you.”

“But I don’t need ….” she stopped what she was about to say. What was the point? He would come anyway whether she liked it or not. “Fine,” she said. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

She marched across his room to the bathroom and then into her own room and ignored the fact that his shirt was off, his trousers were open, and all that masculine power was on full display. She ignored his bare chest, his taut muscles, and the way every part of him seemed defined in just the right way. She ignored the way his hip bones were perfectly shaped, the way his abdomen was a smooth hard plane of flesh, right down to …

No.

She didn’t dare look at him. Any resolve she had would soon vanish if she were to look. It would be her undoing.

Safe in her room, she closed her own bathroom door and went to her clothes.

“Shit.” She stopped in the middle of her room, immobilised for a moment because Seth was in her head. She couldn’t get the image of his almost naked body out of her mind.

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