Page 75 of Forced Vows

He's determined to make a seven-course meal out of my Portland adventure.

But the first course in his office was enough for me. I've already got two new bodyguards. What more can he want?

He's in the living room where I left him, standing by the windows with a view of the bay. But he's too busy doing something on his phone to appreciate it.

He puts the phone away and looks up, his gorgeous face impassive. "That cat thinks she's a dog."

"Pusheen is a superior feline, that's all."

"Pusheen?"

"It means kitten."

Wonder of wonder. Getting the joke, his lips quirk to one side in a nearly there smile.

He offered me the gift of a rescue kitten. That is what Pusheen will forever be to me. My rescue kitten.

Nodding toward a chair, he says, "Sit."

"I'm not a dog." But I am the hostess here, a voice suspiciously like my grandmother's reminds me.

Which means I should have asked him to take a seat.

"Please." I indicate one of the long, pristinely white sofas facing each other across the twelve-foot square Turkish rug.

"After you," he insists.

Grumbling in my brain, I sit in an armchair several feet from either sofa. It makes up half of a seating group, with an occasional table between it and a matching armchair.

Pusheen saunters out of the room and heads up the stairs. Probably searching for her babies.

I feel abandoned though.

Ignoring my offer of a seat on one of the sofas, Miceli settles into the other chair.

My body responds instantly to his nearness. My ovaries have been singing songs by Nicki Minaj since he arrived and now there's a DJ doing a studio mix.

It's so unfair that he turns me on like this. He's the last man I should want. My mom's memory deserves better.

"You'd be more comfortable on the couch." The designer took all the large men in my family into consideration when placing it.

The armchairs are bone white French Provincial inspired wingback chairs made to accommodate shorter legs. Like mine.

His knees sticking up would be amusing on another man, but Miceli spreads his legs like he owns the place.

The bulge pressing against his suit pants makes my mouth water and I swallow.

"I assumed you wouldn't want this discussion overheard." He raises one sardonic brow.

I should have thought of that, but I was too busy trying to get physical distance between us, I ignored even more important issues of self-preservation. Namely, keeping my rebellion from my uncle's ears.

"You're right."

"You have to start thinking like an adult woman in our world and not a naïve student," he criticizes.

Stung, I snap my lips together on a nasty retort. That would only support his offensive claim about my supposed immaturity.

He was so different that night in Portland. Never once did he highlight the age difference between us.

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