Page 16 of The Rancher's Second-Choice Wife

The mere thought of doing so already felt like a sin to her, but now it was so much worse, with her entire world suddenly encompassed in his smoldering gaze, and every inch of her body throbbing into life the moment his hands pressed against her cheeks.

Heat as she had never known blazed before through her blood, but as his head inched closer, the scent of his breath hit her, and it gave Poppy the strength to make one last desperate attempt to save both of them from making a mistake.

"Mr. R-Rossfield—-"

"Valerian," the billionaire rasped out. "You can call me that now."

W-what did he just say?

Her lips slowly parted. But instead of a single word slipping out, it was his tongue that entered her mouth.

Aaaaah.

The feel of it was indescribable, but Poppy didn't know if that had more to do with the fact that this was her first kiss or who it was that was kissing her.

Was this really happening?

Valerian's tongue was inside of her mouth, and it was...

It was...

"What do you think you're doing?"

Chapter Eight

Breaking news, tea drinkers! One of our cattiest friends in high places was at some posh pool party earlier when their beautiful host started freaking out. BH has always been known to be a cool customer, but our source says she was acting oddly that day. A green-eyed monster may be involved, along with the hired help from a certain hair salon with lots of A-listers in its clientele.

Posted by @SocietyFlavoredTea

****

My, my, tonight is shaping up to be really exciting, tea drinkers. Catty Friend from our earlier post has an update. Apparently, things have gotten worse for BH and her long-time boyfriend...who may not be a billionaire for long. Now, yours truly won't pretend to know much about high-risk business deals, but what's pretty clear to me is how the loss of $2.8B is no small amount. Can Former Mr. Big Bucks ever recover from this? More importantly, will his beautiful girlfriend choose to stand by him, for better or for worse?

Posted by @SocietyFlavoredTea

VALERIAN STARED AT the numbers on his screen in numb disbelief. After saying goodbye to the last of their guests, he had been about to drive Camelia home when he received a call from his lawyer. He had thought the latter was joking, but now that he and Camelia were in his office, there was no longer any way for him to deny the truth.

---