Page 31 of Captivated By You
I had to stop myself a dozen times for telling her that contract or not, I was keeping her.
She captivated me. From her classiness to her silliness, every time we explored a part of the island or sat on the beach— talking, because I couldn’t fuck her—she continued pulling me toward her with words and laughter.
Two weeks and unlike any other person in my life, parents and Sophie included, she hadn’t yet annoyed the shit out of me.
“So, are we doing anything today?” she asked, forcing my gaze from my breakfast to her lips. God, I loved her mouth. Her top lip had two perfect points on it, a fuller bottom lip. She hadn’t worn a lot of makeup since we’d been here and she was flawless with pink lips that made me wonder what her nipples looked like when I’d finally get to suck on them.
I groaned and shook my head. “Haven’t thought of anything.”
“Do you have to work?”
“Finished a song earlier. It’ll sound like shit until I get with the band to figure out the accompaniment, though. It’s pretty rough.”
“Can I hear it?”
My brows popped up and my fork full of melon froze halfway to my mouth. In two weeks, she’d never asked to hear my music. I didn’t flaunt it. Perhaps she tried to leave me alone while I did my thing. But I was still beginning to wonder if she evenlikedmy music considering all she blasted was country crap.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Of course. Now?”
Indecision twisted her lips and she looked out the windows behind me. “Or whenever. When will you see the band again?”
“Do you mean when are we headed back to New York?” Anne was on my ass to get back to town and make a damn song that will go platinum, but the longer I was on Anguilla, the more I was appreciating the break from stress and people and noise and deadlines. “To be honest, I haven’t thought about it.”
“But we will go back? Or will we go to L.A.?”
“What’s with the sudden need to have an itinerary?”
She flinched and shook her head. Dumping a few uneaten pieces of fruit into the garbage bin, she then loaded everything into the dishwasher.
“Claudia? What is it?”
“It just feels like I’m hiding. I’ve liked it here, don’t get me wrong,” she said quickly, jerking her head to me. I could see the stress around her eyes, the tightness of her shoulders. “I like being here. I’m just waiting for the other shoe to fall, so to speak. I guess until I know how bad the fallout is going to be, I can’t really relax.”
“So, what? You want to head back? Rip it off like a Band-Aid?” We’d talked about it. Did we leak our relationship slowly? Did we come out as friends first, despite the fact we’d almost always be together? Or did we just act like the couple we were supposed to be—the one I was paying her to be. Fuck, I hated that damn contract.
Despite the way she leaned into me, despite how I knew she was attracted to me physically, and maybe even liked me, I wanted more from her. I wanted something real and with the damn contract hanging around my throat like a noose, I’d never know if she was being genuine or playing me.
“I don’t know, Liam.” Her shoulders fell. Hands mindlessly twisting a rag, I watched her as she stared out the windows over the kitchen sink. She was six feet away from me, but a million miles at the same time.
I couldn’t stand seeing her like that. Since the night we talked about her dad, I’d done everything I could to keep sadness and grief from creeping into her eyes. Pushing off my chair, I walked around the island until I was behind her. My hands settled on the counter just outside her hips. Even though I knew she could see my reflection in the window behind her, she didn’t move. Didn’t react at all to my presence.
And that just wouldn’t do.
I brushed her hair off her shoulder, holding it with one hand so the shorter strands didn’t fall back to her neck.
“What do you want, Claudia?” I leaned forward, my nose at the skin of her neck. I inhaled her sweet scent. She’d started using coconut flavored body wash when we arrived and it was delicious. I’d never be able to look at a coconut again without getting hard. She enraptured me, and I was a man on the edge.
Two weeks of fighting the pull against her and I was exhausted from the constant strain of withholding.
“What do you want me to do?” I asked again, my lips were at her shoulder, bared with only thin straps of a tank top I knew covered her strapless swimsuit. God, she was tempting.
Delicious and mine, even if it was only on paper.
“I don’t know.” She gasped a bit, her voice catching as I did what I’d been fighting against. Tasting her, truly tasting her in any meaningful way. My lips pressed against her shoulder and my tongue flicked her flesh. Salty and sweet, there would never be another taste that compared to this woman. Small and petite, I had to bend down to taste her. Her body was lithe and lean, gentle muscles popped on the backs of her arms as she braced herself. She spent an hour swimming every morning and she’d been in great shape before she arrived. Now, only after being here a short time, there was more definition all over her athletic frame.
My dick urged me forward, to press myself against her backside, to pull her hips back and push her cut off shorts to her feet, followed by the bottoms of her bikini.
“I know what I want to do to you,” I murmured. I was pushing harder than I had yet. But the thought of us leaving here before she gave herself to me? Wasn’t going to happen. “I know what I want to do with you.”
