Page 85 of Brassy Bigwig

“I don’t need a redo. Nothing tells me you care about me more than everything you’re doing to keep me safe.”

“I would lay my life down to make sure nothing happens to you. Swim to the—”

“Bottom of the deep blue sea,” she smiles, finishing the promise I’ve made to her numerous times over the past two weeks.

“If it meant you were safe.” I return her smile.

Standing up from the ground, I grab her hand and whisk her into my office. Unable to control myself one moment longer, I shut my doors, press her up against the hardwood, and kiss her like it’s the first time all over again.

* * *

“Is this the last of it?”

I grab one of two Michael Kors suitcases from Chloe as she wheels them out of her building to my waiting limo. I’m loading them up while Ivan grabs some lunch from a street vendor around the corner. There are three suitcases already inside, and I’m trying to make room for more.

“No, there is one more up there.”

“I may as well hire a moving company to come get the rest of your things at this rate. We can make this more of a permanent arrangement.”

Before she gets a chance to protest, and before I actually follow through with it, I pull her in for a kiss. She wraps her arms around my neck as I comb my fingers through her wavy hair. She smells so fucking good, and the feeling of her tongue on mine makes my dick twitch.

I run my other hand down her side, stopping when I get to her denim clad ass. Grabbing a palmful of her perfectly round cheek, I allow both my hands and lips to linger a while longer.

“I’ll go up and grab it for you,” I offer, finally breaking our kiss.

“It’s okay. I promised Shelby I would go back up one more time to say goodbye. She told me she wouldn’t come down here to see me off. I think she’s half joking, but it’s her way of showing her disapproval toward our plan.”

Chloe rolls her eyes and shakes her head gently at her best friend’s behavior.

“She’ll come around,” I promise her, but I honestly don’t care if she does or not. Of course, I don’t want to cause a rift between the two of them, but if Shelby can’t see that this is our best option to keep that maniac away from Chloe, then that’s her problem. I know she’s going to miss her friend, but it’s not like they won’t ever see one another again.

“You know, it may not be under the most desirable circumstances, but I’m ridiculously happy that you’ll be under the same roof as me for the foreseeable future.”

Chloe giggles and whispers another kiss to my cheek.

“I’ll be back down in a minute.”

As I watch her walk back into the building, I can’t help but feel like everything is coming together. I’ll call Emilia sometime this week to try and get that situation under control.

I make a firm, silent promise to Chloe that I will come clean tonight, and tell her everything I’ve been too afraid to say.

“Still fucking your staff members, I see. I guess it’s true what they say. That old habits die hard.”

As if Satan took over as the universe’s puppeteer, my blood runs cold when the icy shrill I’ve grown to loathe over the past ten years fills my ears.

Emilia.

It takes me a moment to realize I’m not imagining this. She’s here. Emilia is in New York City. At Chloe’s fucking house.

Fuck.

“You sure do like them young, Dimitri. Once a predator, always a predator, I suppose. Is that child whore the reason you won’t return my calls?”

She’s always insisted on calling me Dimitri. No one, not even my parents, has ever called me that. She thought she was special, like she gave me an exotic nickname only she was good enough to use.

I fucking abhor it.

But my blood boils more from her referring to Chloe as a whore. The last thing I want to do is turn around and acknowledge her presence, but I know she won’t leave without getting to speak with me first.

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