Page 75 of The Passion

“You are only being nice because you’re hungry. One day you will work out that I’m actually a nice guy.” She purrs as she rubs on my ankle. “Although as long as you love Felisha then I guess I’ll put up with you being a bitch the rest of the time.” It’s almost like Sassy is human and knows exactly how to play me. She gives me the sweetest face as I pull out her food and start dishing it into her bowl and pour some milk into her bowl next to it.

Give it five minutes after she is finished, and that cute face will be hissing at me and the world will be normal again.

“I can’t believe my life has resorted to lying down in a car at least once a week to hide from the cameras, and it feels almost normal.” Felisha is looking out the window and has been quiet for the last ten minutes of the trip.

We are almost to the farm, and my guess is that she is starting to feel nervous. I want to tell her she has nothing to worry about, but until I show her, the words will mean nothing.

“What made you think of that now?” It’s been over forty minutes since we left the apartment, and she is only just commenting on that now. The windows on my Audi are so darkly tinted that I figured if she was just out of sight for that first part of the trip in the city, once we were on the open road no one isgoing to see us. But I didn’t stop to think how it must feel for her to now be my secret girlfriend.

“I don’t know, no reason really.” And I know that’s not the case, but instead of pushing further, I decide it’s better to change the subject.

“I forgot to ask, but I assume you have a country estate and grew up riding horses?” When she doesn’t answer, I look across at her, and the tortured eyes looking back at me have me worried.

“They’ve all seen me in that video. How can I look them in the eye? We need to turn around.” Her voice is quivering.

“Oh, baby. Stop that right now. I can tell you that none of them have seen you naked in that video because they have more integrity and respect in their little toe than your father has in his whole body. Rem has seen a couple of seconds of it to confirm it was me before he did anything about the threat in the initial email, but not anything of you.” I want to pull over and take her into my arms to reassure her, but there is nowhere to do that right now.

Instead, I reach over with my left hand and take her hand in mine, squeezing it tightly and resting it on the console between us.

“You’re just saying that.” I can hear in her voice that she is putting the walls up that she uses every day in her business life.

“No, don’t do that. These people are my friends, and within ten minutes of us arriving, I’m sure they will be yours too. Don’t bring Lady Kentwall the fierce businesswoman to the table. I want to walk in there with my Felisha on my arm. The woman, beautiful inside and out, that has let me inside the armor and feels able to be her true self. That’s who my friends are dying to meet.” I hope she trusts me enough to believe what I’m telling her.

“I’m trying.” She looks at me, almost pleading for me to make it better and take away the panic for her.

And the only way to do that is to shock her out of her thoughts.

“So, do you think Forrest and Harper have fucked yet?” I smile at the way her jaw instantly drops, and she sits up a little straighter in the seat, having grabbed her full attention.

“Why would you say that? Harper wouldn’t…” She stops and then starts laughing. “Who am I kidding, she totally would.”

“Forrest is a dark horse. I never know what he does in his private life, but he was acting weird this morning, and I don’t know if it has something to do with me or what’s going on with him.” I’m probably putting one and one together and getting three, who knows. “But I’ll bet you, if they haven’t already, then before your birthday they will be sleeping together.”

“And if they don’t, what prize do I get?” And the little twinkle in her eyes is back, just the way I like it.

“Lady’s choice.”

“You have to admit my strawberries with chocolate sauce are better than your cheese toasties.” She looks very pleased with herself.

“Oh, the lady plays hardball. You could have picked any sexual favor you desired, yet you went with that.” I turn down the farm road and know we are getting close. I’m glad that I have managed to distract her so by the time we get there and Tori gets hold of her, any anxiety she is feeling will be gone.

“Because anything I chose to do with sex means you can’t lose either way. I’m not stupid.” She laughs at me as I pretend to pout.

“Stupid is not a word I would ever use to describe you.” I laugh as we turn in through the gate and head down the long driveway that is lined by trees just starting to bud with new green leaves.

“I don’t know, with some of my recent actions, that word would describe me perfectly.”

I squeeze her hand and then lift it to my lips. “We agreed we aren’t talking about any of that.” As much as I wanted to know what was said last night when she was with Fulton Anderson, I was too enraged, and we agreed that we need to move past it.

“Now, welcome to Nic and Tori’s country estate. Hey, you never answered my question before, do you have a family country estate?”

“No, my father sold it when I was young, complaining that it was a waste of money and his money was better spent on other assets. So, my pony that I was waiting until I was old enough to ride was sold with the farm, and there went the dream of learning to ride.” The look of disappointment on her face tells me it hurt her deeply at the time.

“I don’t know, you were riding perfectly last night.” Parking the car, I lean over and kiss the hell out of her before she has time to chastise me for my comment.

I don’t even get two steps out of my car, heading around to open the door for Felisha, before Tori is already at the door waiting for us like an excitable puppy.

Speaking of dogs, Syd, Nic’s black-and-white border collie comes running to greet me. But he will have to wait until I get Felisha out of the car.

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