X: Command Me through Alexander's Eyes - Geneva Lee Page 0,1
stares at me fixedly, no doubt trying to grasp who she’d discovered. Then her eyebrows knit together in concentration.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to smoke here,” she says loftily—a pretense to appear in control of the situation. She seems like the type who likes to play it safe. Her body, which keeps angling towards me as though intent on betraying her, appears to have other ideas. I resist the urge to curl my finger and beckon her closer.
I don’t need to see if she’ll come. I know she will.
“My apologies.” I try to bite back a smirk and fail. There are other things I’m not supposed to do here, and I find myself considering doing them all to her. “Are you going to report me for conduct unbecoming?”
I step back onto the terrace to appease her and hope she’ll follow.
She’s flustered by the gesture, her lashes fluttering. “I wouldn’t want you to get into trouble.”
“We wouldn’t want that.” Wicked thoughts pour through me and carve a smile across my face. I want to get her into trouble.
Her cheeks flush pink like she knows what I’m thinking—or maybe she’s thinking the same. Except that this girl doesn’t know what to think. I can tell from how she keeps looking me over. She’d like me to take her to bed. I already know that. But I’m not interested in sex. I want to fuck her. I want to own her. I want to do things to her that will turn more of her soft white skin red.
Her teeth sink into her lower lip, and I glimpse what her face will look like while she’s riding my cock. I arch an eyebrow. It’s half invitation and half question.
Does she know what her body is asking for?
“I think that I should warn you of the dangers of smoking,” she says quickly.
I’ve gotten to her. Good. It will make this more interesting.
“Poppet, you would not be the first.” I flick the cigarette into the rubbish bin without looking at it. I want to tell her that I don’t smoke. I want to reassure her almost as much as I want to touch her. There’s no reason I should care what she thinks of me. So why do I?
“Have we met before?”
It’s the last thing I expect her to say, and then I realize what’s caught my attention about her. This woman didn’t seek me out. She isn’t lingering to try her hand at scoring a prince. She has no idea who I am.
I’m just a man in a room that she can’t seem to walk away from, and suddenly, I don’t want her to walk away.
“I think I would remember you. It’s more likely that my reputation has preceded me,” I say, falling back on charm, but the truth of the moment burns through me. She’s drawn to me. Whatever she’s glimpsed is what’s keeping her here, not my family or my title.
No one sees past those things. Even I see it in the mirror each morning.
“A ladies’ man then?” she asks, looking neither surprised nor excited by that prospect.
“Something like that,” I say, wondering what she wants me to be. “What’s an American girl doing in this snobby old place?”
Her answering smile is forced. I’ve struck a nerve. “I’m a British citizen, actually. Although I grew up in the States. Mom’s American. She met my dad when he was studying at Berkeley.”
Is that why she doesn’t know who you are?
“And a California girl, too. I can’t imagine why you’d trade the beach for rainy old London.”
“I like the fog.” Her voice is soft, and my head turns on the sound, instinctively straining to catch every word.
I want to ask her if she likes the dark? But I already know the answer. She’s full of light. There’s no place for her in my world.
She holds out her hand, and I stare at it for a moment. “I’m Clara Bishop, by the way.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Clara Bishop.” I take it and lift it to my lips, wanting to taste her—just once. But the moment my mouth touches her skin, I feel it. It’s electric, a lightning bolt to my groin that splinters up and finds purchase in my chest.
But it doesn’t satisfy me. My eyes land on her lips, wondering if that would, at the same moment that a familiar, and unwelcome, blonde comes around the corner.
Clara pulls her hand away, but I don’t think. Catching her arm, I yank her to me. I’m