Page 23 of Devoted

Cannon keeps his weight on one arm on the desktop as his pondering gaze meets mine. “You keep surprising me.”

“I keep surprising myself.” The admission resonates between us. I let Roman make me feel small when I should’ve been beginning the most empowered years of my life. I had parents who wanted me to spread my wings and learn to fly on my own but they weren’t there to catch me.

Cannon leans into me until our lips are a breath apart. I hold still, hoping he decides to kiss me, but sensing that he needs to be the one to decide. Then his lips touch mine.

He made the first move. I don’t mind making the rest. I’ve been around him for a week. I go to sleep next to him. I wake up in his sheets. I use his soap. I make my mother’s smoothies that London packed for us for breakfast.

None of it includes touching him. But he broke the invisible barrier. I throw my arms around his neck and rise, pressing closer to him.

His strong arms band around me, and I can’t hold back from grinding against him—just a little, to relieve the pressure I’ve been ignoring for days.

The edge of the desk presses into my ass. He twists us around until he can push me onto the desk. The corner of the monitor pokes into my side, and I try to keep from smashing it against the wall.

I open my legs to make room for him to crowd closer. Our tongues are twining, and our breathing is synced. I hook my ankles behind his ass and ignore the flare of pain from my healing sprain.

A buzzing rattles the desktop. We keep kissing.

More buzzing.

He rips away, fury in his intense gaze, but it’s not aimed at me. The damn phone.

He answers with an angry, “Yeah?”

The ire fades from his eyes, and he looks at me with nothing but regret.

Cannon

Goddamn it.

I’ve done everything I can to keep Penelope safe, but this is going to tear her apart worse than getting pummeled by an airbag and getting dragged through Bel Air.

“I should’ve seen this coming.” A small but significant detail I overlooked.

“Roman owns the building,” Jacobi says, “so he’s definitely doing it. Correction: he owns the parent company of the company that owns the building.”

“Motherfucker.” Of course he’d use the studio to control her.

“Yeah.” A year ago, Jacobi wouldn’t have been so understanding. He wouldn’t have cared who Roman or Penelope are. But he knows this is going to devastate her.

“Call you later.” We hang up. I take a deep breath. I can’t bring myself to look at Penelope with her flushed cheeks and her wide, trusting eyes.

I grit out the words. “Roman’s shutting down the studio.”

“What?” She jumps off the desk and doesn’t even flinch when she lands on her injured ankle. “He can’t. There’s no way. We’re paid up on our lease, and we signed on for another three years.”

“He owns the owners. He wants the whole strip mall emptied and torn down.”

She makes a strangled noise. I can picture the same thing she is. Her carefully remodeled studio getting ripped apart into nothing but hunks of wood and broken glass.

Tears gather in her eyes, and she covers her mouth with her hands. A sob escapes. She squeezes her eyes shut and drags in a long breath. “That bastard. When?”

“Yesterday.”

Her eyes grow luminous and her mouth works. “What’s Pierre going to do?”

“I’ll ask Jacobi to check on it.”

“And Juan Pablo? He’s out of competition right now because of me, and now he’s out a coaching job.” A tear streaks down one cheek, then the other, until they’re a steady stream. “All those businesses? All those people who depend on the income? What are they going to do?”

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