He would certainly be taking a very cold shower. “Of course. It’s back through the main hall. The last door at the end of the hallway.”
Maybe he’d gone too fast. He had no way of knowing if her father had kept his abuse to the physical. God, he wanted to kill the man. It was really too bad the bugger was already dead.
Chelsea stopped and turned back. Without saying a word, she picked up her bag and stopped at the table Simon had been sitting behind. She picked up the pen and quickly signed her name on the bottom line. “You’ve got a deal, Weston.”
He was smiling as he watched her walk away. Yes, he finally had her where he wanted her. He just had to find a way to keep her alive.
Chapter Three
Chelsea couldn’t stop thinking about it. About him. She was thinking about Simon. She wasn’t thinking about his penis. Nope. She wasn’t thinking about his big old man part at all. She wasn’t thinking about how that thing had felt against her backside.
She sighed and stared at the screen. It wasn’t like staring at it would make someone respond faster. Her friends were careful. They were all underground hackers who tried to ensure no one could locate them, so they would all think about what they would and wouldn’t say. There was no surety that they would contact her at all. If they decided it would hurt them, they would stay silent.
Because at the end of the day, they weren’t necessarily really friends. She’d just had such a shitastic life that she believed a loose group of acquaintances—only a few of whom she’d actually met in person—formed her circle of friends. She’d learned that wasn’t true. Real friends became family, and real family bled and died for each other like the McKay-Taggart group did. If she had been relying on them for information she would have had it in seconds. They wouldn’t have left her staring at a screen and praying.
She sighed in frustration. She couldn’t concentrate and it wasn’t about how much anxiety she’d dealt with during the day. It was all about the man lying not ten feet away from her.
After she’d taken her shower, she’d walked out to find him drying his hair from using the guest bath for a shower of his own. He’d been dressed in nothing but a pair of pajama bottoms that somehow managed to cling to his hips right above that place on his body that she was trying hard not to think about. Hard. He looked hard everywhere. From his sculpted shoulders to those abs she wanted to touch because they couldn’t possibly be real. He’d told her to take the left side of his enormous bed and he hadn’t liked it when she argued. She’d narrowly avoided a spanking.
Now he was sleeping and she was…
Why was she waiting? What the hell was she doing? She was twenty-seven freaking years old and if she didn’t do something about it, she was going to die a virgin, and didn’t that just sound pathetic?
Years had passed since that day she’d almost lost her innocence to violence. Years of fear and worry and confusion, and finally a sad acceptance that she wasn’t meant to have that kind of intimacy. Now she wondered if she shouldn’t at least try. Just to say she’d done it.
It wouldn’t work with Simon. Not in the long run, but she did feel safe with him. He might rip her heart out, but he’d be polite about it and there wouldn’t be any awkward run-ins at work and family functions. No, never for the duke’s son. After he was done with her, he would likely try to convince her that he wanted to be her friend. He would never cause a scene. He would smooth everything over and wait the exact right amount of time before introducing a new girlfriend to the group. Chelsea would get to watch him find a girl he could really love and she would be alone but he would never try to push her out of their shared social circle.
Simon moving on would happen one way or another. Would it really be so much easier to watch him with his perfect girl if she’d never slept with him? Or would she always regret not taking the chance?
She glanced over to where his still form lay on the bed.
It wasn’t like she was making love with the dude. She was merely scratching an itch she hadn’t even known she had before Simon Weston showed up in her life. She could get the whole deflowering thing over with and he probably wouldn’t even know if she brazened her way through it.
God, she wanted to talk to Charlotte. She glanced down at her cell but decided against it. It was two o’clock in the morning. She would wake Satan up and he was a surprisingly gossipy demon. He would want to know what was going on and then everyone in the world would know her business.
But she really wanted to ask her sister’s advice.
“You should come to bed, Chelsea. It’s very late and we’ve got a long day ahead of us.” Simon’s deep voice rumbled through the room.
How could just the sound of his voice make her heart pound? This was stupid. She was not going to get up and go to him.
Her feet weren’t listening to her head. She stood up. How to handle this? It was best to just get it over with. She was a “rip the bandage off” kind of girl. It was best to take the hit and get the thing done quickly.
Surely sex wouldn’t be so bad. She’d liked kissing him. She’d kind of loved kissing him right until the moment she’d felt his cock and then she’d shut down, her mind going to all kinds of bad places.
She couldn’t live like that. She had to let it go or she would end up an old lady with a houseful of computers watching cat videos because she couldn’t even bond with a real one. Simon was safe. She could use him to get over her fear and then maybe she could find a more suitable man. A nice nerd who wouldn’t make her exercise. What was that about?
Focus. She needed to be focused.
“Do you need something?” He sat up. The room was dark, lit only by light from his alarm clock and what was streaming out from under the bathroom door. She could still see his chiseled features but maybe he wouldn’t be able to see her scars. Was there any way to have sex without taking her pants off?
“Yes.” She tried her best to sound somewhat seductive. Her hands were shaking. She didn’t want to be afraid anymore. She needed to know that she could do this. She needed to not be such a flipping freak show. Maybe if she fucked Simon, everyone would get off her back about being pathetic. “I think I know what we both need.”
He turned his body so he was facing her, swinging his feet around until they touched the carpet in front of her. “A throat lozenge? You sound a bit hoarse, love. Are you coming down with a cold?”