Chapter 9

She became aware of the room around her, but the downy duvet warmed her in place of Cameron's seething bulk. She blinked herself awake and groped around the bed, but couldn't find him. When she opened her eyes, she spotted him standing by the bed. His arms flexed as he buttoned up his pants.

She put out her hand to him, and he took it. He let her pull him back down on top of her, and their mouths closed in that endless kiss that could go on and on forever. His chest warmed her breasts. He mouthed down her neck to her chest and sucked her nipples erect. He nibbled all over her naked deliciousness until she humped her body against him in craven arousal.

He surprised her by hitching himself up on his elbow and facing her. “I have to go.”

“Go? Go where?”

“I have to be at the airport in a few hours.”

“What? What for?”

“I’m on a four-month speaking tour in Europe. My plane leaves at nine-thirty this morning, and it’s already quarter after four now, so there’s no reason for me to go to sleep.”

“What about me? You’re just going to walk out on me?”

“The limo will take you back to your place. You don’t have to get up and leave until you’re ready, and you’ll find breakfast waiting for you downstairs.”

She stiffened. “So that’s it? You have to go, so see ya later? Did you know all along you were leaving when you asked me to come here with you? You thought you’d have a good time with me and then have your limo drive me home? That’s just great.” She turned her back on him and pulled the duvet around her bare shoulders. All of a sudden, she couldn’t stand the cold.

He cuddled up close to her back. “It’s not like that, Sonya. I’ve been searching for you for weeks. I had no idea I would find you last night, and when I did, I had no idea you would agree to come here or do anything with me. It was just a lucky break, but I can’t back out on this tour. It’s been planned and booked for over three years.”

“Just go and leave me alone. You’re one disaster after another.”

“I don’t want to just go and leave you alone. Do you really think I have nights like last night all the time? You’re one in a million. I wouldn’t leave at all if I could help it.”

She whipped around to confront him. “Do you really expect me to believe that? You’re going to be gone for four months. I’ll probably never see you again.”

“You’ll see me again. I don’t want to let you go.”

“You’re letting me go right now. Go on. Go catch your plane. I’ll get breakfast downstairs and go back to my life as a temp. You never have to think about me again. You’ll find some other tramp in Europe to stick it to.”

“Don’t talk about yourself like that, Sonya. You know I care for you.”

“You obviously don’t care enough to do anything about it.”

“What could I do about it?”

“You already said you can’t cancel the tour, so don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine with my new toys. I don’t need you.”

“You need me, Sonya. You need me just as much as I need you. You wouldn’t be so upset about this if you didn’t.”

“Leave me alone. You’re a prick.”

“Come with me.”

“Blow yourself.”

“I mean it. Come with me to Europe. This doesn’t have to be the end. You always said you enjoyed traveling the world and not being tied down to any one job. Come with me. We can have a good time in between my speaking engagements.”

“We can have a good time editing your speeches. Isn’t that what you mean? I won’t be your EA, so you can forget about that.”

“I don’t want you to be my EA. You’ve gone way beyond that.”

“What would I be—your sex kitten?”

He burst out laughing. “My sex kitten? Is that what you think this is all about?”

“What would I be to you if I came to Europe, then? You’d keep me tied up in your hotel room so you could come back from your speaking engagements and bang me to your heart’s delight. That’s all.”

He leaned in close and kissed her on the nose. “We could have that and so much more. We could see the sights, go out to dinner, take gondola rides in Venice—you name it.”

“You still haven’t answered my question. What would I be? If I’m not your EA and I’m not your sex kitten, what would I be to you?”

“I don’t know what to call it. You would be my...I don’t know…my girlfriend?”

Her eyes popped open, and she guffawed with laughter. “Cut it out. This is serious.”

He pressed his lips together to stop himself smiling. “I am serious, Sonya. I’ve never had a relationship like this before, so I don’t know what to call it. You wouldn’t be any of those things to me and I wouldn’t be any of those things to you. I wouldn’t be a boyfriend like you’ve had in the past, and I wouldn’t be your boy toy or your boss or anything else. I would just be me, and we would be together.”

“Together…as in a relationship?”

“Call it whatever you want to. I don’t want to walk out that door without you. If you don’t come to Europe with me now, I want to know you’re still here, that you didn’t feel like I had my way with you and abandoned you. I want this to continue in whatever form you’re comfortable with. I want you in my life, one way or the other.”

She stared at him. Who was this man? What in the world was he talking about? Europe—could she? This didn’t happen. You didn’t go home with a strange man and whizz off to Europe the next morning, just like that. That sort of thing happened only in books, never in real life.

He shifted around on his elbow. His barn-door chest stood up straight and tall in front of her. “Get up and get dressed, Sonya. We’re going to the airport.”

“You’re serious about this.”

“I was never more serious in my life.”

“What about my job? They’re expecting me to show up in the morning.”

“Call in sick. You’re a temp. You can call in sick and then report to the placement agency that you withdraw from the posting.”

“That doesn’t happen. I’ve committed to finishing the posting.”

“Then quit the agency.”

“I would lose my reference.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t be temping anymore.”

“Are you trying to ruin my life?”

“No, Sonya. I’m trying to make it. Are you really happy with these fly-by-night temp jobs? Why don’t you try for something you’re really passionate about or talented at? Why don’t you go for the brass ring?”

“With you, do you mean? Is that what you mean by the brass ring?”

“I have nothing to do with this. This is all about you and what you want. It’s the same thing you went through the first time we had sex in my office, except now we’re talking about your life. What is it you really want? Do you want to work for Liam as a temp, or do you want to grasp your fulfillment with both hands? You could take control of your own destiny and never have to depend on anyone else for your happiness. You wouldn’t have to depend on me for it, either. If you don’t want to go to Europe with me, just say the word, but don’t stay here and languish in some temp agency. You’re life isn’t worth that.”

She sank back on the bed, utterly deflated. What was her life coming to? Did she really have to be told this by some self-styled life coach? She had to have her own sexual malaise shoved in her face along with several dozen high-powered orgasms before she realized she was living someone else’s lie. She took that bitter pill and jumped in with both feet to the deep end of taking care of herself.

Now here he was, Cameron O’Toole, telling her to do the same thing with the rest of her life. She could walk out of this gilded cage and never see him again. She could go back to her solitary apartment and her sex toys, but she could still claim a life for herself, a life beyond agencies and employers and time sheets. She could do more than take dictation and screen executives’ emails and write other people’s blog posts for them.

What exactly did she really want to do with her life? Why did it take Cameron O’Toole asking that question before she ever asked it of herself? No one in her life, least of all a man with whom she was sexually involved, had ever asked her that question in such a way that she couldn’t avoid answering it.

She couldn’t look at him without answering it. She couldn’t look herself in the mirror without answering it. She couldn’t live another day without answering it, at least for herself.

She blinked, and Cameron came back into focus. He regarded her with his direct gaze. He wasn’t going anywhere. He could wait for the next decade for her to answer that question, and whatever answer she came up with, he would accept it. He would be there, either in Europe or when he came back.

Of one thing and one thing only was she certain. She didn’t want to let him walk out of her life. She didn’t want to lose him, either. If she didn’t go with him now, she wanted to know he would be there when he got back. She didn’t want this to end.

Did she want to spend the next four months thinking about what she wanted to do with her life? Did she really want to spend the next four months temping before she did something about it?

She already knew she didn’t want to temp for the rest of her life. So that was another thing of which she was certain. Temping was to work what Liam was to sex, so Cameron was right about that, too. Why did he have to be so God damn right about everything? Didn’t he have any flaws at all?

Of-course he did. He wasn’t some glorified life coach, and he wasn’t a master wizard or a sex god. He was just a man with flaws like every other man, and she would find them out if she had anything much to do with him.

That was okay. She could accept him as a flawed man, even if his body was stinkin’ hot. She could fuck his brains out while she decided what she wanted to be when she grew up. If his flaws proved more than she could stand, she could move on to something more fulfilling.

It all came down to that, didn’t it? Sex, work, relationships—it all came down to fulfillment. Fulfillment, pleasure, and happiness. What was life for if not that? She could accept it from him.

She pushed herself up on her hands. The leather restraints still hugged her wrists, but the dog clip no longer held them together. She wasn’t his bond sex slave anymore—if she ever had been. The chrome D ring clicked when she moved her hands.

She looked up to find him watching her. “All right. I’ll come with you.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

He swung his legs over the bed. “Great. Get dressed. We’ll have breakfast and sleep on the plane.”

She got out of bed and pulled up her skirt. “I guess there’s no time to stop by my apartment.”

“What is it you want from there—your toys?”

“I do have some valuable stuff there. I don’t like walking away from that.”

“I can give you the money to pay the rent until we get back. Your stuff will be safe.”

“I have enough money to pay the rent. I don’t need to accept it from you.”

“I only meant….”

“I have savings. I made good money temping in the last few years, and I put it away.”

He rounded on her. “Listen, Sonya, I don’t want you to think I’m trying to buy you with my money just because I’m paying for this.”

“I don’t think that. I just don’t want you to think I’m mooching off you. I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can. That’s what I respect about you. I wouldn’t offer to pay for things if I thought you were mooching.”

“Good. Well, we got that cleared up.”

“So, are you okay with paying the rent for the next four months?”

“Actually, I don’t really want to. There are just a couple of things in the apartment I would want to keep. The rest of it, I could walk away from.”

“I’ll tell you what. I’ll have my man go around and pack everything up. He’ll put it in storage for you, in case you ever come back.”

“Your man? Is that some kind of servant?”

“Actually, he’s a concierge.”

“Oh. I get it.”

“So is that all right, if he packs up your stuff and stores it somewhere for you?”

“I suppose so.”

“That way, we won’t have to spend time going through your apartment before we go to the airport. Besides, we might not come back to Philly right away.”

“What would we do?”

“I don’t know. It depends on how we feel after the speaking tour. You might decide you want to go somewhere completely different, or we might decide to go somewhere together.”

Sonya brightened up. “That sounds good.”

“Great. Now put your shirt on before you give me a hard-on and I nail you all over again and we miss our plane.”

***

THE END

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