Chapter 111
Lance
The flash exploded through the windshield again—brief, clinical, the kind of calculated intrusion that made my blood run cold for entirely different reasons than the woman currently pressed against me should have.
Serena jerked back with a sharp intake of breath, her pupils blown wide in the dim light. "Someone's taking pictures!"
I registered the words. Processed the fear threading through her voice. But what hit me first, what consumed every rational thought I should have been having about exposure and consequences, was the visceral fury at seeing that fear on her face.
She'd been flushed and wanting seconds ago, her lips swollen from my kiss, that goddamn crop top riding up to reveal a strip of skin I'd been mapping with my fingers. Now she looked hunted. Vulnerable in a way that made something primal and possessive roar to life in my chest.
My hand moved before my brain caught up, splaying across her lower back in what I told myself was reassurance. But my eyes—my eyes locked onto that distant car where another flash had just fired, and I felt my expression harden into something I recognized from boardroom massacres and hostile takeovers.
Stop.
The command was silent, absolute, projected with every ounce of will I possessed. I stared at that lens like I could reach through the darkness and crush whoever was behind it, and maybe some of that intensity transmitted itself, because the flashing stopped. The camera lowered. The car remained, but the assault ceased.
Good.
I pulled Serena closer, one hand still firm against her spine while the other came up to cup the back of her head, and kissed her again.
This time there was nothing exploratory about it. I claimed her mouth with a deliberate hunger that had nothing to do with performance and everything to do with the fact that she was here, in my arms, and I was done pretending I didn't want her there. My tongue swept past her lips, tasting wine and want and that indefinable quality that was purely Serena—sharp and sweet and utterly intoxicating.
She made a sound somewhere between a gasp and a moan, her fingers tangling in my hair as she arched into me. For three perfect seconds, she kissed me back with the same desperate intensity, her body molding to mine like she couldn't get close enough—
Then she shoved at my chest, breaking the kiss with enough force that I actually released her. "God, Lance!" Her breathing was ragged, chest heaving beneath that ridiculous leather jacket. "We need to leave! Who knows what those paparazzi will do with this!"
I couldn't help it. I laughed.
The sound surprised even me—low and rough, edged with something darker than amusement. Serena's eyes widened, confusion and lingering arousal warring across her features in a way that made me want to pull her back and finish what we'd started, photographers be damned.
"Not paparazzi," I said, settling back into my seat and reaching for the ignition. My hand was steadier than it had any right to be given that my heart was still pounding like I'd just run a marathon. "Felix."
"Felix?" She stared at me like I'd spoken in tongues. "Your cousin Felix? Head of Global Procurement Felix?"
"The very same." I pulled out onto the street, my eyes tracking the car in my rearview mirror as it remained conspicuously stationary. "I'd estimate he's been following me since this morning. Possibly earlier."
Serena twisted in her seat to look back, her profile illuminated by passing streetlights. When she turned to face me again, her expression had shifted from fear to something caught between disbelief and fury. "You knew? This whole time, you knew someone was watching, and you still—" She gestured wildly between us. "You gave them a show! Why would you drive me home alone if you knew—Jesus, Lance, isn't this exactly what he wanted?"
"Probably." I took a left turn with more force than strictly necessary, the car responding smoothly to my irritation. "But you didn't exactly leave me much choice, did you?"
Her mouth fell open. "I didn't leave you—excuse me, but you're the one who kissed me first!"
"After you crashed my date," I pointed out, unable to keep the amusement from creeping back into my voice. The whole situation was absurd. Here I was, potentially handing my enemies ammunition, and all I could focus on was how Serena's eyes flashed when she was angry. "Wearing that outfit. Sitting at the next table like you had every right to be there. Do you have any idea what you do to my self-control?"
She flushed, the color visible even in the dim interior. "That's not—I was just—"
"Jealous," I supplied helpfully, enjoying the way her jaw clenched. "Territorial. Possessive over a man you claim is just a potential one-night stand."
"I was observing," Serena shot back, but her voice lacked conviction. "Making sure you weren't actually interested in her before I—" She cut herself off, lips pressing into a thin line.
"Before you what?" I let my gaze slide to her briefly before returning to the road. "Gave up? Moved on? Found someone else to scratch this particular itch?"
The silence that followed was loaded enough to detonate.
"I wouldn't have given up," she said finally, so quietly I almost missed it. Then, louder, with more of that fire I was coming to crave: "But that's beside the point! The point is, Felix clearly suspected I'd show up. Which means he's been watching both of us, not just you. And now he has proof that we're—" Another pause, this one more uncertain. "That we're whatever this is."
Smart girl. Too smart for her own good, and definitely too smart for mine.