The Billionaire's Princess - Ava Ryan Page 0,71
slowly faces the pianist again, waiting.
“I swing between thinking you want me for me and thinking you only want me for my money so you can rescue your precious father if he needs it or yourself if your art doesn’t take off.” I don’t bother to hold back a self-deprecating laugh. “And not giving a damn if it is the money keeping you around. As long as you don’t leave.” I swallow hard, trying to get rid of the knot in my throat. “Like my mother left.”
It feels like there should be more, but I can’t think of it if there is.
“That it?” she asks crisply.
“That’s it.”
“Ask me how many fucks I give about your money,” she says. “Go on. Ask me.”
I open my mouth, but my voice struggles to keep up. Especially now that I’m beginning to feel sheepish.
“How many fucks do you give?” I ask quietly.
She twists again. Stares me in the face. “Zero.”
Swear to God, I could drop to my knees and kiss her feet. That’s how relieved I am by her ferocity.
“You sure about that, princess?”
“Zero.”
Shaky laugh from me. Profound gratitude as I unwind my arm from around her waist and take her left hand in both of mine.
“I was hoping you’d say that,” I tell her, laying her hand flat on my thigh and tracing letters on her palm.
I.
L. O. V. E.
Y. O. U.
My sweet princess laughs. Fails to stop a couple of crystalline tears from trickling down her face.
“I love you too,” she whispers.
“I was hoping you’d say that again.”
I reach into my pocket and find the ring I put there earlier in an abundance of hope, place it in her palm and close her fingers around it.
She gasps and snatches her hand free so she can put the ring on the table and get a good look at it.
I’m no diamond expert. Just a guy who’s got some money to throw around and the smarts to trust the experts at Harry Winston. Evidently, they know what they’re doing, because she gasps at this thing—it’s like a perfectly cut square ice cube—and can’t hand it back to me fast enough.
I laugh.
“Thought you didn’t care about the money,” I say as I slide it on her finger.
“I can still tell you to fuck off if you try to get cheeky with me,” she says, her severe warning look losing most of its teeth when she can’t stop smiling.
“Wouldn’t dream of it, princess.”
The mood quickly shifts when she puts her hands on my face and gives me several hard kisses that make goosebumps race across my skin and tell me she means business.
“Take me upstairs,” she says urgently.
“You got it.”
We can’t move fast enough. Luckily, I had the foresight—and that abundance of hope again—to book a suite earlier. By the time we hurry off the elevator and find our door, she can no longer keep her hands off me.
And thank God for that.
We reach for each other as I kick the door shut behind us, animals unleashed. It doesn’t help that we’ve spent a few lonely nights apart while I came to my senses when normally we make love at least once a day. Our kisses are the deep, wet, frantic kind that lead to nips and bites. She wants to slide my jacket off my shoulders but first needs to wait for me to let go of her tight ass. She kicks off her heels. Reaches under her dress to wiggle her way out of her panties, then tosses them aside. I would dearly love to get rid of the rest of my clothes and, more importantly, her dress, but my dick can’t wait that long.
Neither, it seems, can she.
She’s already at work on my belt, undoing it and unzipping me while also somehow keeping hold of my waistband and tugging me down the hallway after her. Her fiery gaze stays locked on my face the entire time. The fact that she wants me a millionth as much as I want her feels like a miracle to me. If you’d told me a year ago that a woman like this was about to explode into my life, I would’ve laughed in your face.
But she’s here. And she wants to stay.
She backs into the bed, then quickly reverses course and pushes me down on my back. Hey. Whatever works. I shimmy my pants and boxer briefs just far enough down my thighs to be out of our way. There’s no time for anything else. She, meanwhile,