Page 71 of Worth the Risk

CHAPTER NINE

Leonie

‘STAYWITHME.’

I desperately clung to the last of my self-preservation even as I melted beneath the glide of Gideon’s wickedly hot mouth across my shoulders.

‘In case you haven’t noticed, I’m already in your bed.’

His smile branded my skin. ‘I don’t mean this. I mean, take the time off you said you would and spend it with me.’

Tension rippled through me.

It’d been two days since Gemma and Giles left the yacht. Since Gideon revealed the raw, devastating layer of treachery that had shattered his trust. Two days since the revelation that had rocked any notions I’d had that this thing between us had a shelf life after we left the boat.

Regardless of that knowledge, I was falling for him and it scared me shitless enough for me to wish this trip were over while praying it would never end.

‘Nope. This is my busiest season.’

He froze against me. I glanced over my shoulder, saw a mutinous look across his face and hardened myself against it. ‘Besides, don’t you have to get back to London?’

As if on cue, his phone buzzed. The frequency had increased over the last twenty-four hours. The more it rang, the more Gideon ignored it.

‘You should really get that.’

‘I really shouldn’t,’ he countered testily. ‘I’d much rather talk about this.’

‘There’s nothing to talk about.’

‘I beg to differ.’

One large hand slipped around my waist, a precursor to him pinning me close to mount a concentrated campaign.

Self-preservation kicking in harder, I popped out of his hold. ‘I need to check in with my office.’ Just as I needed to remind myself that, had it not been for her miscalculation, Gideon might still be with Penny, despite her betrayal. Hearing his confession had brought home to me like nothing else how stuck he was in the past. How I needed to find the strength to distance myself from falling further under his spell. No matter how agonising it was proving to be.

He flipped over and sat up, sexily dishevelled and growing steadily pissed. But underneath the irritation, there was a wary watchfulness.

Slowly another look slid into his eyes. It was the one I’d been fighting against since he walked into my room two nights ago to apologise. That ferocious possessiveness and a yearning that eroded my defences.

‘What’s going on, Leonora?’

I balled my fists until my nails scored grooves in my palm. Then I let the pain fuel my anger because I knew that would be the only way to protect myself. ‘I don’t like being pressured.’

Myriad expressions chased through his eyes. I dropped my gaze to the sheet I was mangling between my fingers, too terrified to admit that I wanted the man beneath the crumbled facade of the superficial playboy I’d thought him to be. That I desperately craved this man whose integrity, loyalty and steadfast faithfulness to those he cared about burned through his bravado.

Because the thought of losing all of that when he stepped off this boat and walked away was too much to bear. My heart was already on the line, on a collision course guaranteed to be more devastating.

‘Or maybe it’s something else?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘You’ve been strange since I told you about Penny two nights ago. You pushed me to tell you and now what? My baggage is too messy for you to deal with?’ he asked icily.

‘If you’re going to answer your own questions, why bother asking?’

‘Because you get evasive, and you throw your work in my face, just like you’re doing now, right before you disappear. You want me to beg? Is that it?’ Underneath his frustration, Gideon’s voice throbbed with what sounded eerily like entreaty. Need.

That ball of self-preservation threatened to unravel. ‘I don’t want you to beg, no.’

---