Page 13 of The Champion
Crossing my arms, I grew irritated. “Why? I have no problem with people knowing that we’re lovers.”
“We’renotlovers!” She gave me a sharp glance. “We kissed, that’s all.”
Unable to resist her beauty, I pulled her close again. “I want more.”
My hungry kisses down her neck made her chuckle. “Stop, Victor.”
I thought about leaving a mark on her neck, but she would never forgive me if I did, and I wanted Freya with every fiber of my body.
“Please let me fuck you,” I begged. “I would make it phenomenal for you. I promise.”
“You have hundreds of women to fuck, Victor. Use one of them.”
“I’m running out of brunettes that look like you.” My admission surprised me and showed that the filters in my brain weren’t working correctly around Freya.
She stiffened and pulled free from me again. “Was that why you were with Yvonne? Because she reminded you of me?”
“I told you that I’ve been fantasizing about you.”
Freya caressed my cheek. “That’s sweet.”
I hated each step she took backward, away from me. When she was by my entrance door, she smiled. “One last thing, Victor.”
“Yes?”
“If anyone asks how I got you to give me the guarantee before we reach the Northlands, the story is that we played speed chess and I won.”
I grinned. “You enjoy making me look stupid, don’t you?”
Freya laughed back at me and then she did something so out of character that I wondered long after she was gone if she had really done it. She blew me a kiss as if she actually liked me.
France – July 2467
A message from Celeste brought me back from my memories of the best kiss of my life. My fellow delegation members were waiting for me at the entrance of our building. Soon we would welcome the Northlanders and Motlanders to the fourteenth summit and this time Freya was staying five weeks extra to work with Shelly Summers and me on an important project.
I was worried that Freya might announce her engagement or marriage, but also determined that if she was still single, I would get more than a kiss from her this time.
CHAPTER 3
TheNightclub
Freya
There were a number of red flags when it came to my feelings for Victor. That I thought about the kiss we shared six months ago or that he popped into my dreams at night wasn’t a new thing. It was the fact that I had changed my outfit five times that worried me.
It shouldn’t matter whether or not Victor found me attractive. It wasn’t as if our kiss had mattered to him or as if we could ever be together. Victor and I were too different and wanted opposite things in life. The sort of committed relationship I was looking for, he could never give me.
It was typical of me to overanalyze everything and right now, my mind was trying to pin-point why I felt anxious about going to the nightclub.
You’re scared that you’ll become as lost in a dance with him as you were in the kiss you shared.
You worry that the dancing might go too far, and that Thor, Mason, or Indiana might see it and get protective of you. They could easily hurt Victor.
The more I thought about my situation, the more unfair my life seemed. It was a cruel fate to have a whole country of men eager to marry me when my heart wanted a stubborn scientist from France who refused to even consider a romantic commitment.
Today was our second day of this year’s summit and already Victor and I were arguing like it was a competition to be in the right.
Zola, my roommate for the week, was taking forever to get ready and it gave me time to go back to some of our most recent correspondence.
