Temptation: a billionaire erotic romance (23 page)

She shrugged, lowering her gaze.  “You already did so much for me.  Finding Harry, getting him here to trade for, even risking your life.  What I did was nothing compared to all that.”

“No, stop.  Don’t pretend like what you did wasn’t amazing,” Val ordered.  “I wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for you.”

“You wouldn’t have been there if it wasn’t for me,” Serena pointed out.

“Oh please, I’d just be dead sooner if it wasn’t for you.  If you hadn’t been around me, watching over me, Jacques would have been able to kill me in a second.  And I would have trusted him the whole way through.”  He frowned.  “I don’t think you realize just how important you are, Serena.  Or how brave.”

Serena stayed silent, keeping her eyes down.  Val looked so vulnerable in his bed, wiped out from all that had happened.  It would break Ellen’s heart to see him so weak.  It was breaking her heart right now.

“I think we should get this done, then,” said Val, stretching his bruised arms.  Serena winced at the sight of them.  His shirt was loose and she could see down it to the gash in his chest, still sore and red but starting to scar over.  It nearly made her flashback to that night, but she fought it off.  This, here, right now, was more important.

“As you know,” said Val, “your three months ended last Friday.  Which means our contract is up.  Though I would have ended it anyway, considering everything that happened.”

Serena began to say something, but Val held his hand up. 

“No,” he said, “don’t worry.  This doesn’t change anything.  I’m still going to fulfill my end of the deal, and you are going to be considered totally free of anything you would have owed me.  Your part of the deal has been fulfilled ten times over.”

Val reached over to the bedside table and pulled out a small notebook.  He began flipping through it, and with a pen he pulled from the same table, he scribbled down a few notes.

“Ellen will deliver you your money,” said Val, stretching his arms.  “It will be a check, if that’s alright with you.  You should have your money by Friday of next week, after which your contract will be considered fulfilled.  I can find you and your brother a driver, a good one, who can take you wherever you wish to go.  You will no longer have to contact me, and you can consider your side of the contract fulfilled.”

Serena stood stony silent and still, watching him with wide eyes.  She felt as if her world was falling down around her.  Was that it?  This was the end?  She would never see him again?

“Is that it?” she asked, barely able to get the words out.

“Of course, if that’s alright with you.”  Val clicked his pen and tore out the paper, something with a note to Ellen about delivering the money.  Serena saw her whole future passing in front of her, flying away like smoke, and it nearly destroyed her.

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head.

Val frowned.  He tapped his pen against the notepad, studying her, his face mired in a mask of confusion. 

“Is check not good, Serena?” he asked.  “I can offer other payment.  Electronic may be the fastest.”

“No, I mean—”

“Or I can offer you a different form of travel?  Plane tickets, maybe?  Or you can use one of my jets.”  He frowned.  “Whatever you wish, we can arrange it for you.”

“No.  That’s not what I mean.  I mean I want to see you again.”  She crossed her arms.  “I don’t want to go.”

This time it was Val’s turn to be silent.  He stared up at her, unable to gather his thoughts into words.  Serena stood firmly, her hands clasped, unable to move or speak.

“You can’t be serious,” he said finally.  “Serena, you
cannot
be serious.”

“Why?” she breathed.  “Why don’t you want me still?”

“What?” he asked, distraught.

“Why don’t you want me?” she asked, becoming furious.  “After all we’ve been through?  After everything we’ve done?  Why do you want to send me away after all that?”

“Serena … of course I….”

“No you don’t,” she said, tears reaching her eyes.  “I should have known this was just business to you.  I mean nothing to you.  I can’t believe I was such an idiot to let myself think there was something more.”

Val’s eyes flamed, and he sat up like a bolt, suddenly just as furious.  “What the hell?  Is that what you think?”

“Of course it is,” Serena yelled, unable to stop herself.  “I thought we had something, and yet you want to send me away like we were nothing.  I don’t understand.”

“No,” said Val furiously, “you don’t.  You don’t understand at all, Serena.  I’m not sending you away, I’m fulfilling our contract.  You were to serve me for three months, and then it would be up.  Isn’t that what we agreed to?”

“Yes, but—”

“But nothing!” Val yelled, throwing his blankets to the said and pulling himself up.  He was surprisingly strong for a man who had been bedridden for the last three weeks.  “God, why do you make this hard for me?”

“So you don’t care about me?”

Val turned to her furious.  “Of course I care about you!  I can’t stop thinking about you!  Every single part of me belongs to you, Serena.  You own me.  Which is why you need to go.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Serena, I let myself get too close to you,” he said, rubbing his temples.  “I don’t think you understand quite how much I care for you, how much I lo—how much I think about you.”

“So?”

“So this isn’t far to you.  I can’t keep you around just because my selfish ass let myself get too attached.  Your contract was clear, and I can’t keep you any longer.  You’re free.”

“This because you think I want to leave?” she asked.

“Why wouldn’t you?” said Val bitterly.  “This is what my life is, Serena.  Danger, deception, death.  Who would want that?”

Serena looked into his eyes.  “I would.”

“What?” he said, looking at her incredulously.

“I want to stay with you.”

The room was so silent you could have heard a pin drop.  Val stared at her, unable to speak.  Serena stayed in her spot, unwilling to move.  They were at an impasse.

“You want to stay with me,” Val echoed, dumbstruck.

“Of course,” Serena whispered.

“Serena….”  Val turned away from her, his voice suddenly choked.  “Serena, you can’t do this.  This isn’t right and you know it.  You’re in too much danger.”

“I don’t understand,” she cried.

“How can you not after all that!  Serena, Harlow isn’t my only enemy.  I have many, many more, many of them more powerful and more dangerous than Harlow could ever be.  Every second you stay with me, you’re endangering your life.  How can you not realize that!  I’m not safe for you, Serena.  You cannot stay with me if you want to keep living.”

“I don’t care,” she whispered.

“Fucking hell, how can you not care!”  He slammed his fist against the bed.  “You have a full life ahead of you.  You have a brother to care for.  You have everything.  And you want to throw it away to stay with me?  Why?”

“Because I love you,” she cried, grabbing his shoulders in a bold move she would have never imagined herself doing before.  “Because I cannot live without you, Valentine.  Because there’s no place in the world I can imagine myself other than right here.  God, can’t you see?  I fucking
love
you.”

Val shut his mouth, looking into her eyes.

“You love me?” he said softly.

“Of course I do, you idiot!” she said, climbing into bed with him.  She felt a tear drop down her cheek and realized what a mess she was—crumpled dress, messed hair, her makeup pouring down her face with her tears.  But she didn’t care.  All she cared about was Val, and he was right here, and she could never let him go.  She would die if she had to leave.

She felt another tear drop down her face.  Val’s hand reached up, and he wiped them away from her cheek, still looking into her eyes. 

“Serena, I’m not safe.”

“And I don’t care.”

“Harry isn’t safe.”

“Harry doesn’t care.”

He frowned, putting a hand on her cheek.  It was trembling. 

“Please don’t do this to me if you don’t mean it,” he whispered.  “You don’t understand how much I love you, Serena.  I wouldn’t be able to survive it if you said this and didn’t mean it.  It would kill me.”

Serena leaned forward and placed her head on his shoulder.  Val wrapped his arms around her, and the warmth of them enveloped her.  She buried her face in his neck.

 “I want to stay with you, Val,” she said.  “Forever.”

“Forever?” asked Val, touching her cheek.  “Even with everything that I am?  With everything I do.”

“That’s what makes me love you,” she whispered, kissing his neck.  His arms squeezed tight around her, and once again, she had the strangest feeling that she had finally had a home.

“Are you sure, then?” he asked.  “Forever?”

“Yes, Val.  Forever.”

He leaned down to kiss her, and her lips answered back.  They stayed on the bed kissing for what seemed like an eternity.  It wasn’t the rough kissing they used in the bedroom.  Rather, it was something soft and new, something loving.

Eventually, Val leaned back, and they stayed in an embrace as he fell asleep with her in his arms.

This is what it means to be in love
, thought Serena.

For once, she had really found a home.

*****

Serena looked at her reflection in the mirror.  It had been nearly two months since she had saved her brother and Val, and tonight would be the first time she and Val would spend the night together again.  She wore Val’s favorite, the black lingerie she had worn the first time they had had sex.  She adjusted her bra, noting how it pushed up her breasts just the way Val liked.  Tonight was special.  Every night with Val was special.

His recover had gone much better than they had anticipated, and within the week, he had been up and walking again.  It baffled the doctors how he could recover so quickly, but Ellen just chuckled and patted them on the hand.  “It’s Val,” she said with a shrug.  “What do you expect?  The man eats, sleeps, and dreams business.  If there’s work to do, he’s going to do it, bodily trauma or no bodily trauma.”

Harry and Val had grown irritatingly close, to the point where Serena sometimes joked that Val was going to kick her out in favor of her brother.  But if she was honest with herself, she knew why he liked him so much—Harry was her brother.  He was the reason Serena had taken the job in the first place, and he was the reason that Val and Serena were together now if you got right down to it.  Even Ellen loved him, tending him like a worried mother hen as he recovered in the guest bedroom. 

It was true—Val’s place really felt like home now. 

For both of them.

She heard a knock at the door and was knocked out of her reverie.  Her heartbeat picked up.

“Serena?  Are you finished dressing?”

“Yes, Sir,” she called, clasping her hands.  She took her seat on the bed, as he had commanded her to earlier.  When Val had first called her to his bedroom to tell ask her if she was sure she wanted the sexual part of the relationship to continue, she was shocked that he would even imply she wouldn’t. 

And that was when the real fun started.  His evil grin had come back, and he had begun planning their first night back together, dropping hints to her when she least suspected it.  Serena had been on her toes ever since, knowing that Val could spring on her at any moment.  She had begun to worry that something was wrong as time went on, but then at happened.

When he had slipped her a note at dinner, right there in front of Ellen and Harry where their secret could be found out at any moment, she had wondered what it was.  Her heart leapt when she read the words written in Val’s perfect script:

Be ready tonight.

And here she was.  She could hardly believe it.

The doorknob turned and Val walked in, wearing a loosely tied black silk robe.  Serena bit her lip, wondering what that meant.  Every time before he had been wearing his suits, and it had been part of the eroticism—there were few things sexier than Valentine Marquette in a suit.  But now, knowing that nothing separated them but that thin layer of black silk, she was introduced to a whole new level of Val.   

“Good evening, Serena,” he murmured.

He kept his gaze on her as he walked in, pausing to take in the sight of her.  Then he walked to the BDSM table, studying each of his tools with special care.  Serena watched his hand hover over the whip and was sorely disappointed when he pulled it away.  She couldn’t stand waiting like this.  It was an order, so she couldn’t disobey, but she hated it.  Every moment that he wasn’t fucking her was a moment she was tortured by her need for him.  He had no idea what kind of power he had over her.

“What should we try first, Serena?” he asked, turning to her.  Her eyes widened when she saw the riding crop in his hand.  He had never used that before, and for a moment, she was worried.  Maybe this was another one of his games?

But then she shoved the fear away.  After all, she was a slave.  This wasn’t about her, it was about him taking everything he wanted from her.  She was his slave, helpless before him.

He reached a hand out and touched her cheek, turning her head so he could inspect it.  “God, look at your lips.  They’re so beautiful when they’re wrapped around my cock.  Aren’t they, Serena?”