Page 18 of Taken By the Dark Billionaires

She dressed in her usual neat black knee-length skirt, white shirt, and black high-heeled pumps.

She tried to cover up the bruise on her cheek with some of her makeup but couldn’t do a good enough job with what she had. If anyone asked, she would just say she had rather clumsily walked into the side of a door. Her sister had used that excuse many times, and people seemed to buy it.

After applying a thin layer of gloss to her lips and a lashing of mascara to her eyelashes, she quickly dried her hair and then twisted it into a tight bun.

She skipped breakfast since the thought of food turned her stomach, but she was sure by lunchtime she would be starving, so she made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and grabbed an apple as well before she left her apartment.

Her plan had been to get to work extremely early, slip into her tiny office, and leave as late as possible. That way, she ensured she wasn’t going to be running into anyone she shouldn’t. Not that that had ever happened before.

The one time she had seen them, it had been a freak accident. She hadn’t seen them again since then.

For the next three months, until her contract expired, that was all she needed to do. Be invisible. Do her job. Get paid. Take care of her sister and her nieces and nephews. Easy for her, since she was able to blend with the furniture; a childhood trick when her parents were going off on each other.

The last place they would look would be their very offices if they had any intention of finding her at all. She was the lowest of low of their employees. There, but basically nonexistent in their eyes.

Hopefully, by now, the right girl had shown up, and they would forget all about her. The urge to search online for rituals about the Basilisk Empire remained strong. But she couldn’t afford to leave even a hint of a trail, so her curiosity was going to have to die along with everything else they had done to her. She didn’t know what to do with the robe just yet, so she hid it in a small safe in her closet.

Still, she consoled herself with the fact that they would never, in a million years, discover it was her. Again, she was a speck of dust on their shoes. Nothing more.

Not wasting any more time, she climbed into her car and drove to work. Her stomach remained in knots throughout the drive and worsened by the time she got to her office.

She started working immediately, pushing everything aside because if she kept thinking about it, she was bound to slip up and give herself away.

During her morning break, she checked on Tammy, who was returning to work the next day, and then she called her sister and spoke to her nieces and nephews. Laura was fine but looked a little bored.

When Sutton went home for the weekend, she needed to convince Laura to enroll in some course or something like that. Soon, all her kids would be in school, and she would have enough time for herself.

With Carl Johnson—also known as Pit Bull to his gang members—Laura’s ex-husband was recently sent to prison for three years. They could sleep peacefully at night, but it was also a chance to start living a normal life.

Not one drenched in constant fear of being killed.

Sutton’s plan was to make enough money and leave the country before he was released from prison because he would never leave them alone.

Everything was going to be fine. This high-paying temp position was going to be the thing that set them back on course. She had to believe that wholeheartedly for it to be true. And she wasn’t going to mess it up because she had walked into something so dark, so ominous and shadowy, cryptic, and arcane that really had nothing to do with her at all.

Feeling much better about things, Sutton even managed a smile when her boss sent her to the third floor to pick up a package from one of the manager’s personal assistants.

But just as she stepped into the elevator, all the blood drained from her body. In an instant, she was red hot, flushed, and trying so hard not to tremble; her shoulders seized up, and she stood frozen to the spot.

Of all the days, out of all the times in the universe, Ezra Collins chose that moment to step into the elevator with her. The rarity of that happening shocked her to her core.

The universe had conspired against her terribly.

But no. If she just allowed herself a tiny breath, she would be able to reclaim her control and then fade into the shadows. Her gaze remained glued to his broad back. His suit was so expensive that she could see the subtle sheen of the midnight black fabric. Tailored so well, it draped over every muscle he had.

But the scent of his cologne permeated the air around her. Her nipple, the one he had bitten, started to ache, and she prayed she wouldn’t start leaking breast milk through her shirt when she had been certain she was empty.

Her pussy pulsed, wetness soaked the fabric of her panties, and her clit became swollen. Her body remembered everything about him. Her core clenched as if she were feeling the series of veins littering his tattooed shaft against the walls of her pussy as he stretched her.

She dared to take a shallow breath, and it sounded like a thunderstorm in her ear. They had just passed the second floor. But that would mean she would have to slip past him when they got to the third floor. Her legs would not be able to carry her.

With his legs braced apart and his hands in his suit pockets, Sutton wondered if maybe he hadn’t even known she was there. He hadn’t looked at her, much less murmured a greeting, which was what normal people did.

Could she just stand there, absolutely rigid, until he stepped off the elevator on the 20thfloor?

Why was this happening to her now? Why did she have to be the only other person in the elevator?

But nothing could have prepared her for when Ezra stopped the elevator, then, with lightning speed, spun around and pinned her to the ice-cold steel walls of the car. He raised her arms above her head and clasped her wrists in one of his hands, forcing her to stretch on the tips of her toes. He forced his thigh between her legs, lifting her skirt so she could feel his heat on her skin and the bulge of his cock against her stomach.

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