The Devil's CrownPart Two - Monica James Page 0,76
find Serg and deliver him the fate he so deserved. Denying her would not only be hypocritical, but it would also be wrong.
Grappling with my mixed emotions, I sigh. “Ella, I understand, I really do, but this is beyond dangerous. I don’t have a plan. The only thing I cared about is getting you to safety, and then I would have worked out the rest.”
“So that’s a no?” she questions, angered and also let down.
After us both realizing if only we trusted one another from the very beginning, none of this would have happened, this is a kick in the teeth.
“No.” I shake my head. “This is a let me think about it. I won’t knowingly send you into danger. Unless there is a rock-solid plan, the answer is no. But I won’t deny you your vengeance.”
She folds her arms across her chest, appearing pleased with the compromise. “Good. So what happens now?”
With so much doom and gloom surrounding us, we’ve forgotten we’re surrounded by blue seas and nothing else. “Now, you’re going to eat.”
When she looks like she’s about to argue, I hold up a finger, warning her this isn’t negotiable. “And then I might take a swim.”
“A swim?” she asks, a flicker of a smile lighting up her face. How I’ve missed seeing her smile.
“Yes. It’s a lovely day. Seems a shame to let it go to waste.”
“Okay,” she agrees, which pleases me.
I’ve hated this hostility between us. I can only hope we’ve turned a corner.
When she walks toward me, indicating she wants to come inside, I stand firm, needing a moment to admire her. Her wounds are her battle scars, and although I wish I could have taken the beating for her, those scars show the world she was stronger than whatever tried to beat her.
I have underestimated her strength because her self-sacrifice saved us all. If she didn’t make that deal with Santo, we’d all be in a very different situation. For starters, I’d be dead.
She stands before me, nervously adjusting the strap on her swimsuit. It’s a modest piece, but the way it clings to her torso, her breasts, it amps up my desperation tenfold. I want her as I’ve never wanted anyone before.
I can barely function because I’m not a patient man. And denying myself her is like denying my lungs air to breathe. But this doesn’t change anything. She still sees me as nothing but the past. Just because we’ve uncovered a revelation doesn’t change the fact she intends to get on with her life once this is done.
But the hunter in me won’t shift. It provokes her to challenge me.
“Red’s your color,” I say with a smirk, unable to stop myself from visually eating her alive.
“Well, being a sleazy old perv is yours,” she rebukes with sass.
Her comment only feeds my deprivation.
“Old?” I fake heartache as I place a hand over my chest.
She smiles once again as I move out of her way so she can enter.
She walks past me, her scent almost folding me in half. I don’t recognize this perfume. It must be new. Whatever it is, I like it. I like her. And it’s evident how much I actually like her when she places a strawberry into her mouth and my cock twitches at the simple action of her eating a piece of fruit.
The juice of the strawberry trickles down her chin, and when she wipes it away with an innocent flick of her tongue, I quickly excuse myself before I come in my pants like a pubescent teen.
I enter the bedroom and change into my swimming trunks, refusing to think about Ella upstairs in nothing but a swimsuit, eating strawberries. Goddammit. How can the simple act of eating be such a turn-on?
I suppose she simply needs to exist and that’s enough to get me hard, well, harder.
Adjusting myself, I hobble up toward the upper deck and kill the motor. This is just as good as any spot to swim. I then walk down the stairs, toward the back of the yacht where the swim platform is.
This luxury yacht was a package deal with the house. Denka Orlov didn’t need it anymore. So the realtor threw it in for an extra twenty grand. It troubles me that Santo might be able to track me somehow because the realtor was his associate, but I hope the yacht’s name change will steer him off course.
I named it Yali, after the fallen sister who died too young.