Marcus’s gaze sharpens, and he puts down his fork. “I know. I trust you.”
“So then why—”
“Because I don’t trust them.”
I blink. “Them?”
His jaw tightens. “Men. Especially desperate ones, like that blond asshole. He would’ve blushed and stuttered, and you would’ve felt bad for him, like for a sad little puppy. He’d worm his way into your good graces, become your friend, and next thing you know, he’s rubbing his fucking hard-on all over you.”
“Marcus!” I can’t believe he’s being so vulgar. “Ian wouldn’t—”
“Oh, yes, he would,” he says grimly. “You just don’t know how men think and how far they’d go to get what I have.”
“What, sex?”
“You.” His gaze burns into me. “You, Emma, are a fucking prize, and you don’t even know it. Each time you smile, some asshole gets hard—and I’m not just talking about me.”
I laugh incredulously. “Yeah, okay, now that’s—”
“Nothing but the truth. You slay them—and me—without even trying. And not just because that sweet ass of yours could launch a thousand ships. It’s you, kitten, everything about you.”
I stop laughing, my breath catching in my chest at the dark intensity in his stare. He means it—these aren’t just empty words—and for the first time, I wonder whether Kendall might be right.
Could the billionaire I love already be in love with me?
Heart hammering madly in my chest, I gather every ounce of my courage and prepare to take the biggest risk of all. “Marcus, I—”
“Excuse me, Mr. Carelli, Ms. Walsh… Are you done with the main course?”
Geoffrey’s appearance is like being rudely woken from a dream. Blinking, I pull back the hand I was about to lay on top of Marcus’s arm and force myself to smile. “Yes. I think we are. In fact, I’m pretty full, so I think I’ll skip dessert.” I glance questioningly at Marcus, and he nods.
“Same here, Geoffrey.” His voice is even as he rises to his feet. “Thank you for the dinner, and we’ll see you tomorrow. For now, we’re heading off to bed.”
And gathering my hand in his big palm, he leads me upstairs, where he demonstrates exactly how hard my smile gets him.
* * *
All weekend long, I try to work up the courage to say the words, but I can never find the right moment. Partially, it’s because Marcus spends a bunch of hours preparing for the Alpha Zone presentation he has to give at eight a.m. on Monday, double- and triple-checking all the facts in the hundred-slide deck his analysts have made. But mostly, it’s because I’m again uncertain, wondering if it might’ve been wishful thinking on my part, if I read too much into what he said at dinner.
He definitely wants me—of that, I have no doubt. Instead of fading, the fire between us burns hotter with each passing day, the sexual chemistry getting more intense with time. Now that we’re living together, it feels like all I have to do to turn Marcus on is breathe—and all he needs to do is look at me. And no matter how many times he takes me, or how hot and kinky our encounters get, it’s never enough. Anal, oral, or straight missionary; rough fucking or tender lovemaking—we do it all, and we still want more of each other.
Could that be what Marcus meant when he called me a prize? Was he referring to this off-the-charts chemistry between us?
By Sunday night, I’ve almost convinced myself to say the words regardless, but at the last moment, I chicken out. Instead, I show Marcus how I feel by worshipping every inch of his body the way he worships mine, and then giving him a massage to de-stress him before tomorrow morning’s presentation.
“How many people will be there?” I ask, spreading coconut oil over the broad, hard-muscled plane of his back. “In general, how big is this Alpha Zone organization?”
“It’s only a few hundred people,” he replies, stretching into my touch like a lazy cat—the big jungle kind, not my fluffy kitties. “But it’ll be broadcast live, and reporters from every major news outlet will be there.”
I knead the heavy muscles of his shoulders. “Is that where you did your famous tire company presentation? The one that destroyed the stock?”
“Yes, a couple of years back.” He yawns. “You know about that?”
“Of course, who doesn’t?” I’d read up on it more in recent days, and apparently, Marcus hadn’t just scoured his target’s public filings and interviewed hundreds of tire dealers; to learn about the manufacturing defects and the company’s use of slave labor, he’d had people undercover at the actual factories in China. His methods had been both brilliant and borderline illegal, his attack on the stock unprecedented in both its scope and ferocity.
The Netflix documentary called his presentation “a torpedo aimed at the very heart of a rotten citadel” and labeled Marcus “a modern-day buccaneer”—a description I found perversely hot, fitting as it does into my most non-PC pirate fantasies.