I stretched, feeling lingering aches from the last two nights of hard training and the few hours I’d spent sleeping in the armchair before moving to the bed and joining him.
My T-shirt was pushed up, exposing my br**sts to his avid, hungry mouth. A hand pushed beneath the waistband of my sweats and then my panties, finding my cleft and expertly coaxing me to a swift arousal.
“Gideon …” I could feel the need in his touch, the desire that was far more than skin deep.
He took my mouth, hushing me with a kiss. My h*ps arched as his fingers pushed into me, f**king me gently. Eager to answer his silent demand for more, I pushed at my sweats, kicking restlessly until I got them off.
I reached for the button fly of his jeans, yanking it open and shoving the denim and cotton boxer briefs out of the way.
“Put me inside you,” he whispered against my lips.
I circled his thick erection with my fingers, positioning him and then lifting to take the first inch of him inside me.
Burying his face in my neck, he thrust, sinking into me, moaning with pleasure as I closed tight around him. “Christ, Eva. I need you so much.”
My arms and legs caged him, holding him tight.
Time and everything else in the world ceased to matter. Gideon renewed all the promises he’d made to me on the sands of a Caribbean beach, and I tried to heal him, hoping to give him the strength he needed to face another day.
I was putting on my makeup when Gideon joined me in the bathroom, setting a steaming mug of creamy sweet coffee on the marble counter next to me. He wore nothing but pajama pants, so I guessed he wasn’t going into the office or at least not right away.
Eyeing him in the mirror, I searched for signs that he remembered his dreams. I’d never seen him so deeply troubled, as if his heart were breaking.
“Eva,” he said quietly, “we need to talk.”
“I’m on board with that.”
Leaning back against the counter, he held his mug in both hands. He stared down into his coffee for a long minute before asking, “Did you make a sex tape with Brett Kline?”
“What?” I faced him, my hand tightening on the handle of my makeup brush. “No. Fuck no. Why would you ask me that?”
He held my gaze. “When I came back from the hospital the other night, Deanna caught up with me in the lobby. After the situation with Corinne, I knew brushing her off was the wrong approach.”
“I told you that.”
“I know. You were right. So I took her to the bar up the street, bought her a glass of wine, and apologized.”
“You took her out for wine,” I repeated.
“No, I took her out to tell her I’m sorry for how I treated her. I bought her the wine so we had a reason to be sitting in the damn bar,” he said irritably. “I figured you’d prefer a public place over bringing her up to the apartment, which would have been more convenient and private.”
He was right, and I appreciated his thinking of how I’d react and making accommodations for it. But I was still annoyed that Deanna had snagged a pseudo date with him.
Gideon must have known what I was feeling because his lips tilted up on one side. “So possessive, angel. You’re lucky I like it so much.”
“Shut up. What does Deanna have to do with a sex tape? Did she tell you there was one? It’s a lie. She’s lying.”
“She’s not. My apology smoothed things over enough for her to throw me a bone. She told me about the tape and that an auction for it was imminent.”
“I’m telling you, she’s full of shit,” I argued.
“You know a guy named Sam Yimara?”
Everything stopped. Anxiety pooled in the pit of my stomach. “Yes, he was the band’s wannabe videographer.”
“Right.” He took a sip of his coffee, his eyes hard as they looked at me over the rim of his mug. “He apparently set up remote cameras at some of the band’s shows to gather backstage material. He claims to have re-created the ‘Golden’ video with actual explicit footage.”
“Oh my God.” I covered my mouth, feeling sick.