Page 18 of Indecent Demands

Chapter8

Ariana

My entire body flooded with adrenaline as Seth spoke to me.

I trembled. I was sure he could feel it. I kept trying to make it stop but I couldn’t manage it. My face was flushing—stop it! He didn’t know it was me!

Or did he? His gaze was so intense…

Heat slid down between my legs. What was wrong with me? The man was as good as accusing me of theft. He could take me to jail right the fuck now if he wanted to. And I was getting wet from how he talked about it?

“Thoughts on what that punishment should be, Ariana?” Seth murmured.

His leg pressed hard against mine and moved around to the other side, then pushed, spreading my legs—exposing me beneath the table. I swallowed. His other foot came up and I felt it rest against the edge of my chair between my legs.

I could practically hear him ordering me to grind on the top of his shoe… he could order me to do anything right now to save myself from prison, and I’d have to do it. The thought of him ordering me around and making me orgasm from it had me so unexpectedly turned on I nearly shoved my hand between my legs to relieve the pressure.

Okay, so it looked like I was discovering some kinks I didn’t know about before now. Fine time to figure that out.

“Well. It depends, I suppose, on what this person is doing with the money,” I managed to say.

He tipped his head to the side. “Why do you say that?”

“The fact that you’re even asking me how they should be punished as opposed to simply calling the police suggests that there’s something unusual going on here,” I replied in a shockingly calm tone. “Something that’s not just a case of simple theft. You want my opinion on what to do with this person—isn’t the obvious conclusion to call law enforcement? So, what’s going on that makes you hesitate? Why do you want my thoughts on it?”

Maybe he didn’t know it was me, but on the chance that he did, I called his bluff. Maybe he really did want my opinion, and the rest of this was him upping the flirtation between us. I had been teasing him—with this dress, with my breasts, with my leg against his—there was no reason for me to give myself away when he probably thought this was all just fun sex.

I had to maintain my cover as long as I could and not balk.

Seth leaned back in his chair as the waiter arrived, his foot disappearing from where it had rested on the chair between my legs. We ordered, I smiled at the waiter, we got our waters refilled and our wine delivered, and then it was just the two of us alone again.

Seth sighed. “You want to know what’s going on?”

“You can’t let me in halfway,” I pointed out. “If you want my advice, you have to tell me everything.”

Seth eyed me, almost methodically. I shivered, feeling pinned under the weight and intensity of his gaze.

“This person seems to be stealing to help others,” Seth said evenly, still giving nothing away. “They’re not stealing for themselves. Or, they might be, but at least not entirely. I found the program they set up to skim from the company and it’s all going to pay off people’s medical debts. They’re also getting cash in hand through that same account, and I don’t know if they’re using it for personal gain or for another altruistic reason, but I’d like to find out. Why they’re using it could determine what I choose to do about them.”

Fuck. Fuck, fuck,fuck.

It took everything in me not to show my terror. He knew about the account and the program—how? How had he found it? I had wiped everything from the program. He knew about the people I had helped and now he might tell Harcourt, who could send lawyers after them and demand the money back—and send me to prison for a good long while.

The people I’d helped didn’t even know where the money had come from! It was just a gift to them. To ask them to give it back because it had been illegally gained,by me… that would be heartbreaking and unconscionable.

“I don’t want to punish innocent people who needed that money and had no idea where it was coming from,” Seth continued, as if reading my frantic thoughts. “Crypto is still very valuable even though it’s fluctuating. A hundred of a percent of a single bitcoin can translate into hundreds of American dollars, and it feels wrong to punish the thousands of people who’ve been helped and were unaware these were stolen goods.”

“If you tell Harcourt,” I pointed out, “he’ll want that money back. Or his lawyers will.”

Seth shrugged. “He could be generous.”

It took all my self-control not to burst out into sardonic laughter. I managed to hold it in, but my mouth still twisted and my jaw clenched. “In my experience,” I said, struggling to keep my tone neutral, “filthy rich people like Damien Harcourt don’t care. They care about morality in a vacuum, and when it works to their favor. He’ll want the money back because he’s a greedy son of a bitch. He and his lawyers will talk on and on about the principle of the situation and what’s ‘technically right’ and how they have to follow the law, and in the end those people will suffer.”

He arched a brow. “You seem passionate about this.”

“I’m always passionate about helping people,” I said, a little too heatedly.

“In what ways?” Seth asked, his tone softer now, and dare I say . . .compassionate?

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