Southern Comfort - Natasha Madison Page 0,61
behind me while Casey walks around the truck and gets in. He sits down and fixes his cuffs, and for the first time, I see that he’s wearing black and gold cuff links.
He looks over at me, and I see his hair is falling a bit onto his forehead and my hand reaches out and pushes it away from his face. He reaches out and pulls me into his side, putting one arm around me. The driver gets into the car, and the whole ride there, I sit here next to him living in the moment. Not knowing that somewhere not too far away, someone just decided that the stakes have just been upped, and they will stop at nothing to get what they want from me.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Casey
My heart pounds so hard in my chest I can’t even talk. Walking into the bedroom and seeing her all dressed up knocked me on my ass. Beautiful isn’t a good enough word to describe her. Now here I am mingling with her on my arm as she charms every person she meets. What makes her even more out of my league is that she doesn’t even know that she has this aura about her.
“How long do we have to be here?” She smiles and leans over, and if you didn’t know better, you would think she just told me a joke. When she takes another sip of her champagne, and she giggles, I have to just smile. Her cheeks are pink from the champagne.
“Not much longer,” I say, taking a sip of the whiskey in my hand. We’ve been at this gala for the past two hours. My main goal was to go in and see if the company was viable and if I wanted to take it over.
“I’m starving,” she says, still smiling, and I have to laugh. “Why are you laughing?”
I put my arm around her waist and bring her to me. “You just ate.”
“I did not just eat. Did you see the portions?” She leans up, and I lean down to kiss her, something that I’ve been doing more and more tonight. “It’s for birds.”
“You’ve been eating my mother’s portions,” I joke with her, and she smiles.
“Casey.” I hear my name and turn around to see the CEO coming straight for me. He’s hitting sixty-five and just wants to travel the world. With no kids to pass the torch to, he opted to sell it. “I hope that you're having a great time.”
“We are.” I nod at him, and he looks over at Olivia and smiles, and I don’t know why, but I want to throat punch him suddenly. “Aren’t we, darlin’?”
“It’s been a wonderful evening,” she says, giving him her megawatt smile. “I was just telling Casey how great the team is and how in sync everyone is with each other.” I almost laugh at her lying. “It would be a great company to work for.”
He puts his hands in his pockets, and I could swear his chest is puffing out to please her. “If you are ever looking for a job …”
She throws her head back and laughs. “Oh, no, I’ll stick with designing.” She looks at me and then at him. “But thank you for the offer.”
His hand comes out now and he rubs her arm. “If you ever change your mind.”
I want to snap at him that she won't. “Tonight was great,” I say. “But we have another engagement to attend.”
“Of course.” He smiles. “Let me know if you have any questions.” He nods and then smiles at Olivia. “It was great meeting you, Olivia,” he says, putting out his hand.
“The pleasure was all mine,” she says, shaking his hand, and if he pulls her in for a kiss on the cheek, I’m yanking her right back.
He doesn’t, and when he walks away, she looks up at me and just laughs. “What?”
“If he touched you one more time, I was going to throat punch him,” I say, and she laughs.
“Relax there, cowboy,” she says, putting her hand on my chest. “I have eyes for one man and one man only.”
“That so, darlin’?” I ask her, and I have the sudden need to throw her over my shoulder and take her back to the hotel and have my way with her.
“That is so, cowboy,” she says and then she turns in my arms and wraps her arms around my shoulders. “Now can we please leave?”
“Let’s go,” I say, putting my drink down on an empty table