Page 109 of Railing the Billionaire

I was better than okay. I needed him just like this. I needed more.

“Stop and I’ll kill you,” I whispered.

The corner of his lips quirked up to the side. I turned my head back and squeezed onto the top of the sofa, bracing for it.

He thrust in again, causing stars to form in my eyes. My breath caught in my throat. My whole body felt hot and tingly and alive.

I took each deep stroke, fast and hard and boundary-smashing, until I came so hard I swear there was no chance I could ever walk again. He persisted, working my clit with one hand, my breast with the other, prolonging my ecstasy.

Finally, I felt him tense with me, and he stopped, still inside me, still pinning me to the back of the sofa. And for a moment, I wondered why he wasn’t letting me go so I could curl up on the sofa and drift off to contented dream land.

“You’re beautiful, Layana,” he whispered against my neck. “If I’m not careful, I’m going to fall in love with you.”

If that wasn’t ice on my hot-as-bananas pleasure parade, I didn’t know what was.

I gritted my teeth. “Why would you say that to me?”

He slowly pulled out and took a step back, discarding the condom in the trash can.

“Because it’s true.”

Hewas beautiful. And so wrong for me.

“You can’t say that to me when I work for you and we have trouble even pretending to be friends.” Yes, we’d gotten along well today. And also in the mountains. But those were small moments. They weren’t who we are.

He was Mr. Order, having his life exactly the way he wanted it, everything in its place. I was a tornado of spontaneity, and not even sure what I was going to eat for breakfast in the morning, let alone what my ten-year plan would be.

I said, “This thing between us is too complicated to define. If it leaves the gray bubble it’s floating in…it’ll burst.”

He flattened his lips into a line, gathered his clothes, and refused to meet my eyes.

“Tell me you understand,” I said. “We have an expiration date for our fake friendship. This isn’t real. We have to be on the same page here.”

As flat as humanly possible, he said, “I understand. Good night, Layana.”

With that, he left.

And even though I’d been sure we both knew what we were doing—that we were just pretending—I worried that maybe we were both lost.

TWENTY-EIGHT

GABRIEL

Jasper stretched out across my living room sofa, watching me pace.

“The gala’s going to be fine,” he said. “All that you’re supposed to do is step up on stage, read the speech that your speech people prepared for you, and smile while people shake your hand and glob on the praise.”

I was grateful he was here, that he was coming tonight. At least if Layana didn’t show, I’d still have an ally.

It had been five days since we’d had sex. Five days since she got mad at me for having feelings, for not being the robot everyone believed I was.

Every morning since, when Layana woke, she texted me a photograph of a penis. Every morning, my heart skipped a beat, hoping she’d say we should get together for another social photography session.

She hadn’t. Not once.

When I asked yesterday if she wanted to come over for one last session, she made up an excuse to stay away from me.

It was fine that she needed space and time to think things out. I needed to focus on my work throughout the week. Except I couldn’t force my brain to focus on anything at all. Now thatSaturday had finally come, I worried that Layana would back out of her final commitment.

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