Chapter 131

Tyler didn’t think that he could ruin her the way she’d done to him, but he could ruin this. Because they fit together like a dream, and this kiss was already better than whole nights he’d spent with other women, none of whom he could ever remember too clearly. Not when there was Lexi. And he’d done his best all these years to get by without her, but he didn’t have to now. Not now. Not tonight. Not for as long as she stayed here in Olkfield, hiding from her real life.

He could ruin her this way. He could teach her what proper was, and the truth was, he felt as if he’d been practicing his whole life for this opportunity. To worship this woman in every last way he knew, turn her inside out as many times as possible, and let her spend the rest of her life fantasizing about this. The same way he would be doing. He pulled away again and liked it when she moaned out a protest.

“Come on,” he said. “I’m going to feed you.”

Her eyes were a bit fuzzy, which made his cock pulse. “Feed me? Is that a code for something debaucherous? Please say yes.”

His hands were still in her hair, and he kept them there, because it felt good to have control of her. To hold her like this. To have her right where he wanted her.

Another subject they were going to have to cover, but he’d get there.

“That depends how you eat.” He tilted his head a bit as he gazed down at her. “Are you feeling gluttonous?”

Her gaze sharpened at last, but she was looking at his mouth. “Yes. I believe that’s the perfect word.”

“We need to make sure you can keep up your strength,” he said. Then he reached down and helped himself to her hand, threading her fingers through his.

She stared down at their hands, clasped together like that. “You’re holding my hand,” she said, with a certain reverence. Or more of that awe, or wonder, that was one more way she was going to kill him.

“Tyler Connelly is holding my hand.”

He opened his mouth to say something wicked, or offhanded. Something to dispel the tension a bit. But she gazed up at him and the words died on his tongue, unsaid. Because even their hands fit together perfectly, and her taste was still flooding through him, and she wasn’t being silly. If anything, he would have said that look on her face was sacred.

And for once, he didn’t have to pretend.

For once, he could meet that gaze of hers with his own, and acknowledge this thing that was between them. This thing that had been in him, and a part of him, and a defining characteristic of his, for so long now he didn’t know who he was without it. And it was only holding her hand. But it felt like the world. It felt right. A key into a lock. Coming home at last.

Tyler could have stood there for another lifetime, but she wasn’t here for his feelings. She was here to fuck. And he had every intention of living up to his promises. So he made himself look away, gripped her hand harder and led her away from that dark railing and the bright crowd at the Opera Bar.

He led her around the quay, climbing up into the narrow, cobbled laneways that rose up opposite the opera house, and comprised the oldest part of Olkfield.

“Are we really stopping for food?” she asked as they climbed a set of stairs between two buildings. “Do I get a vote?”

He slanted to gaze down at her. “No.”

“Just…no. No explanation. Just straight up, no debate, no.”

“I don’t think I stuttered, did I?”

Lexi was laughing as he escorted her toward a deceptively old-looking building that was only accessible down a long, cobbled alleyway. The door was painted a bright red, and that was its only distinguishing facet. That and the keypad next to the door. Tyler punched in the code, and the door clicked open, instantly giving away the fact that the building had been gutted and refurbished inside, though it looked quietly historic from without.

“What is this place?” Lexi breathed. Her eyes sparkled as she looked up at him, her fingers still wrapped up tight in his. “Is this some kind of secret club? For sex?”

“I don’t need a secret club for sex.” He shook his head at her. “Sex is a group sport for some, sure. More power to them. I’m more of a singles player, myself.”

He ushered her inside. Then he led her down a set of stairs, lit up with a buttery golden light. At the bottom was a discreet welcome desk staffed by a smiling attendant.

“Good evening, Mr. Connelly,” the man said in a plummy accent. “Will you be dining with us tonight?”

“A table with a view,” Tyler replied. “And we’ll make our own way up.”

“Very good, sir,” the man said, and typed something into the tablet in front of him.

Tyler led Lexi farther into the building, making his way through the various lounges, bars and nooks and crannies alike that made up this particular club.

“It is a club,” Lexi said, as if she’d caught him out. “I’ve always wanted to spend time in an illicit sex club, populated entirely by deviance.”

“I hate to ruin the fantasy, but this club is more for business connections, entrepreneurial fantasies and high profile meetings that need to remain strictly private. There are deviant sex clubs out there, and there’s sex here, too, but not of the public variety. The club provides rooms for weary travelers, and doesn’t much care who fills them.”

“That’s a lot less fun.”

“The truth about highflyers is that most of them are boring,” Tyler said, “Because the reason they’re highflyers is that they work themselves half to death.”

“And here I thought the point of making shedloads of cash was to fling it about indiscriminately, laughing all the while.”

And years ago, Tyler would have let that go. This morning, even. But everything was different now.

“The difference is whether or not you’ve worked for said shedloads.”

He expected Lexi to stiffen, but her expression only turned rueful.

“Unlike me, you mean.”

“Not everyone is born rich.”