With a shaky laugh, I clean myself up. This seven days might just be hell.
* * *
Outside of the tower room door, Bran and Hunt stand guard. “Go to bed,” I tell them. “I’ll watch her until the morning. Keep the guards at the bottom and turn the elevator off.”
Bran hesitates. “But what about you?”
“If I can’t handle a Vieth orphan, then I don’t deserve to sit behind the desk, do I?” I press my palm against the security sensor and wait for the lock to disengage. Without another word to my men, I go inside. Cora is no longer at the window. Instead, she’s in the eating nook off the side of the living room. A dinner cart with a lone domed plate sits in the corner waiting for her to finish.
She raises a plastic fork when she sees me. “I guess I should feel complimented that you think I’m so dangerous that I can’t be trusted with metal utensils.”
I take a seat across from her and pluck a roasted potato from her plate. “We should’ve gotten you finger food. For all I know you could kill me with the plastic fork.” I pop the potato into my mouth and savor the delicate seasonings. My chef is incredible. Cora watches as I remove the place setting from the dinner cart and set it opposite her at the small table.
Cora frowns.
“Are you unhappy you have company?” I ask, digging into my steak.
“I thought that was my dessert,” she replies.
A laugh from my throat takes us both by surprise. “Some women don’t eat dessert.”
“I’m not some women,” Cora replies tartly. She sounds offended, as if I’ve insulted her, or perhaps it is the notion of dessert she thinks I’m disparaging.
“Certainly not or you wouldn’t be here as Vieth’s parlay.”
Cora makes another face. I set down my fork. “What did I say wrong this time?”
“I’m not my m—Karin Vieth’s property. I’m my own person. I chose to come here.”
“Good.” I resume eating. Everything I do to Cora is welcome then, despite Karin Vieth’s admonition that Cora must return to the Vieth stronghold untouched. Cora is not here by force or coercion. She knew what she was volunteering for when she offered herself up as hostage. In fact, I’m sure she’s here to seduce me—and what a rich and delicious prize she is with her cherry intact. An unsullied maiden is rarer than the Hope Diamond in this world. What a magnificent temptation. I tip an invisible glass toward Vieth and this girl. They’ve set their trap perfectly, but I’m not entirely certain why unless it is just to cover up a killing.
“What’s the name of the girl Poppy hurt?”
“Sarah Bomi,” Cora answers immediately.
“How did he hurt her?”
“Can’t say.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
Cora lifts one shoulder slightly in a dismissive shrug. “They are the same, but in this case, I don’t know, so anything I would say would be only rumors and I won’t share those.”
“Why not?”
“Because they’re rumors and might not be true. Why start a war over rumors?” Her chin juts out, and I can tell she’s done with this topic. I hide a smile.
“Tell me about yourself,” I invite. “How is it that you came to be one of Vieth’s girls?”
“I was born into it.” So she is sticking with the daughter lie.
“I assume that you are here to seduce me, thereby making me renege on my deal with your mother. It would be easy to avoid you for seven days”—Now who’s lying? I couldn’t stay away more than thirty minutes before my feet found their way to the elevator—“but that didn’t seem very sporting of me, so here I am.” I spread out my arms. “Please, do your very worst.”
Cora stares at me, her light brown eyes flicking over my large frame. As her gaze wanders and lingers on my lips, my chest, and my thighs, I feel my chest tighten and my cock thicken. She has a sense of fearlessness that I like. Her earlier timidity has been swallowed by resolve, and the resulting confidence fires my lust like nothing else.
There are plenty of women who would come running to me, I remind myself. I have the money and the power to draw nearly anyone from famous celebrities to a random stranger on the street. There’s no reason for me to break my vows with this one no matter how golden her eyes appear under the chandelier and no matter how pretty her lustrous brown hair would look spread over a snow white pillow. If I wanted a woman, it does not need to be this woman. It cannot be this woman.
You don’t place a gambler to guard a roulette table. I push away from the table and stand.
“Aren’t you going to finish your dinner?”
“I’ve had enough.” We both look at my barely eaten steak. My stomach chooses to growl at this point, and my cock is none too happy either. They both want to be fed. “I’ve things to do. I can’t sit here for seven days and entertain you.”