James Darden.
3
James
Money buys anything these days. Sold-out tickets to concerts. Homes that aren’t for sale. Positions and power and a whole slew of other things. But what it buys me, that I find ridiculously important, is information.
Olivia Castle is a thing of the past. A forgotten craving. An inkling of a desired moment that doesn’t matter anymore.
In her place is Cerys Youngblood.
Those amber eyes haunted me from the moment she closed her door until now. Like a maddening disease, everything I’d learned about her in a few short moments festered and grew and spread inside me. The desperation to learn more was real. A voracious need to cut her life open with a scalpel and take my time removing every vital piece of her world, inspecting each part with careful scrutiny.
This obsession is alarming.
I tend to stalk and follow and cross lines, but this is utterly unidentifiable in my mind.
Something that makes zero sense in my head.
All it took was a walk back to the hotel, emptying my safe, and taking every goddamned hundred-dollar bill I had on me at the moment for the doorman to sing like a motherfucking canary. Turns out, he was a wealth of information. Less than an hour, and I had all I needed to know that I was going to make her mine.
But it was her reply to my text only a few moments ago that sent me over the edge.
Empty threats don’t scare me, Stalker.
Whatever shred of control I’d been holding onto snapped and sent me damn near charging to her apartment door. I’m practically twitching with need as I wait for her to answer.
So trusting, this little girl with the strange name and strange hair and strange clothes.
So trusting and innocent.
Just waiting to be victimized by my expertise in the bedroom.
I want to possess and consume her unlike any woman I’ve ever encountered.
And when I finally have her, I will punish her for this power she has over me. I’ll extract the cries from her body with physical pain mixed with pleasure as she’s been the sadist wreaking havoc in my mind. It’s only fair. Tit for tat.
When she opens the door, I’m not fully prepared for what I see. I expected more bizarre clothing. Mismatched colors and fabrics. Styles from one era that don’t even belong in the same room as styles from another era.
Yet now?
Now she is timeless in her simple black dress.
Somehow a classic beauty transcending every level of time.
I’m struck senseless.
Anger wells up inside of me. How dare she lure me in like this and take me by surprise? How dare she ruin my careful planning and execution? How dare she tempt me into making a goddamn fool of myself because I don’t have a plan?
Her smile catches me off-guard and snuffs out my fury. I find myself stepping closer and closer and closer until I’m peering down at her honey eyes and my fingers are wrapping around her red-and-black locks.
She smells like innocence and flowers.
Like youth and freedom and everything but me.
I want to stain her with reality.
Mark myself on every part of her.
Make her realize the world is much darker than she knows.
“Creeper alert,” she murmurs, her voice flirty and carefree.
“I’m in your home, and you are not afraid,” I growl, inhaling her.
She presses a palm to the center of my chest over my tie and pushes slightly. Not enough to force me away but enough to keep me momentarily from mauling her.
“Slow down, tiger.”
“Trusting strangers is dangerous,” I bite out, my tone harsh and condescending.
She smiles, her honey eyes dancing with interest. “But we’ve already met, Stalker Darden. We’re hardly strangers anymore.”
Something rubs against my leg, and I jerk back to find a black cat staring up at me. I wonder if this beast knows this is a fifty-four-hundred-dollar custom-made Tom Ford suit. He lets out an unimpressed “meow” and continues his relentless rubbing.
“Hank is a texture man,” Cerys explains as if this makes all the sense in the world.
It makes zero sense.
This world of hers she’s drawn me into is like some alternate reality.
Like the Alice and Wonderland Broadway show I saw once. Talking cats and psychedelic drugs. An upside-down world of sorts.
“Why are you dressed like this?” I demand, ignoring her strange words.
She laughs and shakes her head. “I was going out. To the club with my friend, if you must know, Dad.”
I sneer at her mocking words, but my cock lurches in my slacks. “You’re not going anywhere, Alice.”
Her eyebrow arches. “The name is Cerys.”
“I know, Alice. Now call your friend and tell her plans have changed.”
A rosy pink color blooms across her slender throat when I close the door behind me. I turn the lock, nudge the cat away with my Italian leather shoe, and point at the phone in her hand.