And that’s exactly what sexy, handsome, rich and distant Jamie Hawk Fleming can’t give me.
***
His tall shape astride the motorcycle is by now familiar. I haven’t seen him in a couple of weeks, though, and it feels both like yesterday and months since I last met him.
Since I last took in his beautiful face, his strong body that I am so intimate with. In my mind’s eye, I see every ridge of muscle, every drop of ink on his skin.
My own body clenches with desire just from the sight of him waiting, just from the memory. I’m primed for him. It’s an automatic response.
No idea why my heart leaps, too, as if excited. This is a carnal thing, I remind myself. Purely sexual. We’re having fun. I’m learning what turns me on, what makes me come.
He turns me on.
Shaking my head at myself, I walk over to him and his gaze on me sends heat into my cheeks—like every single time.
“God, I missed that blush,” he says, his voice so low it’s practically a growl, and I reach up to touch his face.
His golden stubble is more pronounced. His hair is longer, falling in his eyes.
“So… Mexico, huh?” His stubble is softer now, as it’s turning into a short beard. “Did you find your friend?”
A shadow passes behind his bright eyes. “Nope. But I’ll find him. He’s hiding.”
“Why?”
One of his broad shoulders rolls in a shrug. “Sometimes having money makes life fucking hard. More dangerous.” He’s silent for a moment, regarding me. “I know how this sounds. Being poor is much harder, I know. And dangerous in other, more subtle ways. But money means bullets.”
I frown. “But why?”
I don’t want anything happening to Hawk. A shiver shakes me at the thought.
“The why doesn’t matter.” He leans his cheek into my hand and gives me a puppy look. “I missed you, babe.”
“It’s Layla,” I say, pulling my hand away. Sometimes he acts all sweet and snuggly, and I need to put some distance between us, because I want this.
I want to be like that with him. Like a couple.
But that’s not us, and I love his darker side, I remind myself. I love the hard, hot sex and his floggers and paddles and all the ways he loses control with me.
Hawk isn’t cuddly. He’s not boyfriend material, no matter how much I want to think he is. He’s kept true to his initial promise.
So when he pulls a small box from one of his leather jacket pockets, I don’t know what to think. Surely… Nah.
No.
No way.
And I’m right. Taking the box in my trembling hands, unable to read anything on his handsome, smirking face, I open it to find a fine bracelet inside.
It looks silver, but of course the inscription inside the box
lets me know it’s platinum. It’s made up of several flat, fine chains that shimmer under the street lights.
“Like it?” he asks.
“It looks like…” I wet my lips, glance up at him.
“The strips of my flogger,” he supplies the answer, looking smug.