39

Returning to the kitchen she found Isais with his arms folded over his chest, leaning against the counter his phone in his hand and he was texting furiously.

“Where’s Fred?”

“I told him to go home and go back to bed. I got it from here. My security team is downstairs to take us to my place.”

“I could have gone back to Fred’s, or I can go to Elsie’s or Janka’s.”

“Is there something about my place you don’t like?”

“No,” she turned her nose up at him, “I love your house but it’s yours. I don’t want to impose.”

“It’s not an imposition. I want you there.” He reached out taking her bag from her fingertips. When she started towards the door, he grabbed her and yanked her close to him. “What are you doing?”

“I thought we were leaving.”

“Come here,” he tugged her until she was standing between his thighs. “I haven’t seen you in four, almost five days. You’re not going to kiss me hello?”

She rested her palms against his chest and plucked at the buttons, “a kiss would be nice.”

“Yeah?” his lip lifted in the corner in a partial smile as he lowered his mouth to hers.

The sigh escaping her lips made was whisper soft as his plush lips swept across hers. Her mouth parted and pliant allowed his searching tongue access as he kissed her hungrily. Her hands slid up his chest to find the back of his neck as she held his head tight to hers, her own tongue eagerly slipping to tangle with his and taste what she’d been missing for days. She was breathless when he broke the kiss and their lips were still almost touching, their breath intermixed between them.

“We should go before I have you on the kitchen counter and Trent uses video footage to blackmail us.”

“Very funny,” she grimaced as she pulled away from him.

He waited for her to lock up the apartment before making his way to the elevator at the end of the hall, holding her hand tightly in his. “Can we agree on you staying with me until we get this mess with them sorted out? I still do not understand what Trent’s end game was. There was no way he could have known you’d take an apartment over the weekend so despite Fred’s comment on the video, while I don’t doubt, he did something in your apartment, it’s not why he tried to get me out of the city.”

When they were in the back seat of the Escalade, she had a thought.

“Do you think knowing how much chaos a video caused last weekend, he might have been trying to get you in a compromising situation with the actress?”

“It’s a good guess and one I considered but she wanted to go back to my hotel room, not hers. My hotel room was clean of all recording devices. My team was thorough.”

“Do you think he got into your house here?”

“The only person who was in and out of my house since I left on Saturday morning was a gorgeous brunette who late this afternoon, walked in, put a key and a racy note on my counter, and walked back out.” He hugged her as she shot him a startled glance. “Since I was out of town, I had full security on the entire place. It was watched constantly with live feeds direct to my security team. The entire house is airtight.”

“You said I could go in anytime.”

“And I meant it. My security guy watched you drive right up the driveway.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “I didn’t even notice them.”

“They noticed you,” he winked.

She rested her head on his shoulder. “Thank you for coming tonight. Even if it did turn into a clusterfuck, I’m glad you decided to come cuddle with me.”

“I missed you Liesl.” He lifted her fingers and kissed them. “You’re important to me and when we’re apart I can’t stop thinking of you. Call it what you will, exclusive, dating, committed, any of it, all of it, it’s what we are.”

“I like the sound of this,” she closed her eyes as exhaustion started to hit her. “I can’t believe I’m out in the middle of the night in my nightgown and robe.”

“I can’t believe the asshat tried to get into your bed.”

“He didn’t try, Isaias, he got in it.” She grimaced. “I hadn’t slept well the last couple of nights because I was stressed about how you’d react once I told you I checked your online activities. Talking to you put my mind at ease and I crashed hard. I,” she blushed, “I was dreaming of you. I was somewhere between awake and dreaming and I was being woken up. I could feel the straps of my nightgown sliding down and him kissing my back and I thought, in my half-awake mind, it was you.”

She watched his eyes close as color tinted his cheeks. He was furious.

“I smelled his cologne and then felt his hand on my hip, and I knew it wasn’t you. I bolted so fast out of the bed. He was naked, Isaias. He was naked and telling me to go back to bed with him. He kept saying if we made love, I’d remember how good it was.” She wiped a tear off her cheek as she considered Merl’s earlier words. “He kept going on about how he knew you and I fucked but there was no emotional connection or some bullshit. He said he would let me have my fun but when it was over, he’d be there waiting.”

“What a dick,” Isaias clenched his fist on his lap, bunching his pantleg up. “I want to beat him into next Sunday.”

“He wouldn’t get dressed. He followed me into the kitchen completely naked. I kept telling him to put his damn clothes on and get out, but he wanted to talk, and he wanted to do it nude. I now have an unbelievably detailed memory of the tiles on my floor from avoiding looking at him while he went on and on about how he got blackmailed by my sister to fuck her.”

“Are you okay?” he asked quietly, wrapping his arm around her shoulder, and holding her close. “I know you’ve seen him naked a thousand times, but this was assault, Liesl. What he did was assault. Coming into your bed uninvited, naked, and touching your body was assault.”

“I’m fine. I’m angry more than anything. They made their bed so why can’t they leave me out of it.” She scoffed, “though think I know why Sandy is up my ass.”

“Why’s that?”

“He said he hasn’t had sex with her since Turks and Caicos.”

“Really? Do you believe him?”

“I don’t know. I find it hard to believe anything he says but if it’s the truth, then it explains why she resents me now. She didn’t get what she was wanting.” She rubbed her eyes sleepily, “she texted me this morning when I had the movers and Fred helping me set up my new apartment to tell me she was angry with me because her baby’s nursery is going to be in a condo and not the house of her dreams and I robbed my nephew of a wonderful childhood.”

“You know, she’s crazy, right?”

“Yup. Not sure what happened in her head in utero, but she came out of mom’s womb whacko.”

He chuckled at her words. “Were you ever close with her?”

“Yes. I adored her as a baby. I was two when she was born, and she was my dolly. I was infatuated with her. My mother has videos of me sleeping on the rug beside her bed because I wanted to be right with her.”

“What happened?”

“By the time she was walking and talking, she was also slapping, punching, and kicking. She took everything which was mine. If I built a sandcastle in our sandpit, she would stomp on it. She would dump my paints out. She broke my toys. We started fighting when she started walking. She was a bully from the minute she walked. Dad used to put her in time out and she would scream until she blacked out in pure rage. They took her to pediatricians who simply said she was strong-willed.”

“Well, if she finds out Merlin crawled into your bed naked, she’s going to be livid,” Isaias said bluntly. “She might even kill him.” He made wide suggestive eyes.