Page 71 of Game of Love
My nerves scattered when he took my hand, lifted it up to his lips and kissed my knuckles.
“You had me at the part where you said she wasn’t you. You’re right. She’s not you.” He released my hand. “Can’t get you out of my head.”
My lips parted with the surprise that took me. “Do you want to?”
“No. I like having you there.”
My breath hitched, constricting my breathing.
The smile receded from his face, replaced with a seriousness I’d never seen before. He backed away from me and continued to where he’d come from. The admiring eyes followed him. I watched until he went through the automatic doors and I couldn’t see him anymore.
The last thing I wanted to do was fall for a man I knew I couldn’t have. And not with so much going on.
But, just like everything else that was easier said than done.
Chapter 18
Xander
It seemedlike every damn day was destined to be harder than the last.
Actually… scratch that, it wasn’t just the days. It had sped up to hours.
It was getting harder to speak to Jia and not want to touch her. How could I not want to touch her after last night?
Just now I’d wanted nothing more than to take her again. Just drag her off to one of the rooms in the hotel and show her she had nothing to be jealous over.
Make her mine the way I had last night.
As it stood I’d left it vague. Completely vague. A repeat of last night wouldn’t be in my best interest. It wasn’t fair and the part of me that still had a conscience told me I needed to back the fuck off out of her life because it would be so much worse if she found out who I was. As well as blow my mission, but damn it I just didn’t want to add to the list of things that would break her.
The last thing she needed was lies.
So in my head, last night was last night and past and couldn’t happen again.
I had to focus on the mission.
I’d gotten here a while ago, ready to talk to Giovanni but he wasn’t here yet. Frankie told me he’d gone to see Jia.
Then minutes before I saw her I got a message from the man himself, asking to see me. It was a lot easier when the people you wanted to speak to requested to see you, it broke the ice.
I got to his office and the door was open. I’d only been in there once before and that was to pick up my pass and access codes. Both stuff I’d be using in the ways I wasn’t authorized for over the next few days. I wanted to check out what was in the vaults down in the Castle.
Giovanni had his glasses on when I went into the office. He took them off and set them down on the table near a stack of papers and straightened up against his chair to look at me.
“Come in and close the door,” he instructed.
I did and moved over to sit down in the leatherback chair in front of him.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
He narrowed his eyes at me. “That’s interesting to hear. No one ever asks me how I am.”
I raised my shoulders into a shrug and smirked. “Well, where I come from that’s the sort of thing you’d ask after a night like last night.”
He nodded. “Of course, and I suppose the answer after a night like last night is that I am not okay.”
I was surprised he’d share that. “Well did the guys find anything out?”
