Read Online In His Wake: His #6 (A Billionaire Domination Serial) by Erika Masten - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Erika Masten
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tapped my way down the corridor of the junior partners’ floor to the elevator, my stiletto heels clacking against the polished wood. The coffee shop was on the ground floor of the same office building, but near the rotating entrance door that allowed a constant stream of cold air to flow through the lobby. After a month of tropical sun, half that being kept nude as Adrian’s sex slave and donning only the lightest of sundresses or cocktail shifts for dinner at the resort, an early East Coast April was a shock to the system.
Waiting for the gleaming metal elevator doors to part for me, I shook the memories of Ilha de Flor out of my head. Time to get back to my life, back to business, without the constant comparison to a fantasy that I no longer lived. How many times, I wondered, had I said that to myself since I’d come back to the city? How many more times would I need to say it before it took? When the doors slid open, I gave the traditional pause, enough time for any occupants in the car who wanted this floor to disembark. But the elevator wasn’t on its way down to the lobby, instead heading upward to the offices for the senior partners.
Linda, the slender, chestnut-haired matron who was the chief administrative assistant and all-around den mother for the juniors at Ferris & Hale, stepped out with her armload of manila folders. Behind her stood an array of well-manicured professionals with faces I might not have recognized but whose manner and dress clearly marked them as counsel. Not an unusual sight in the building. We were specialists, and attorneys with more generalized practices frequently accompanied their clients to meetings in our offices.
Today they circled a client of obvious stature, both social and physical. Six-feet-two-inches of lean runner’s muscle. Sable hair that would’ve looked black if not for the rich brown highlights. Smooth skin lightly tanned but still too dark to go unnoticed amid the pale complexions of office-bound easterners. And those eyes… Moonlight on latte.
My first thought… He came for me . And damn my heart for swelling, my mouth for going dry, and my palms for beginning to sweat. For a waning fantasy flaring to life as I gazed into the perfect curves and chiseled lines of Adrian Knight’s face while the world around me receded and faded to a fuzzy blur.
High cheekbones, lush lips, flawlessly trimmed stubble along his hard, wide jaw, Knight was a testament to just how good my memory was. While I was used to seeing him in cashmere hoodies, cargo pants, and deck shoes, or else in the tuxedos he’d put on for dinner, now he wore the style and quality of business attire I would’ve expected of a man richer than God. The light gray silk tie matched his shirt perfectly, with the vest, jacket, and slacks being just a shade or two darker. The cashmere scarf around his neck and the fine woolen overcoat tossed over his arm were a complementary charcoal gray. Not the usual sea and sand colors I associated with Adrian, to be sure, but damn if it didn’t bring out that silver sheen in those amber brown eyes. My heart, my fists, and my sex seized tight at the sight of him.
Of course, it made no sense to think that Adrian had come for me. Why would he? Ours had been a temporary liaison, a three-month agreement that I would serve him sexually. For me, the goal had been to renew my flagging confidence while teaching myself to enjoy sex the way men did—the way Penn had, the way my father had, without emotional attachment. My careless assumption had been that Knight simply wanted sex from a woman who would cater to his particular tastes. I hadn’t realized at the time that Adrian had his own very specific agenda, far beyond personal pleasure, that being to seduce the woman who had gotten away from his lifelong rival. Regardless of whatever wounds that might have inflicted on the inconsequential target of those advances—me.
In the end, I had lasted hardly more than two weeks before
Waiting for the gleaming metal elevator doors to part for me, I shook the memories of Ilha de Flor out of my head. Time to get back to my life, back to business, without the constant comparison to a fantasy that I no longer lived. How many times, I wondered, had I said that to myself since I’d come back to the city? How many more times would I need to say it before it took? When the doors slid open, I gave the traditional pause, enough time for any occupants in the car who wanted this floor to disembark. But the elevator wasn’t on its way down to the lobby, instead heading upward to the offices for the senior partners.
Linda, the slender, chestnut-haired matron who was the chief administrative assistant and all-around den mother for the juniors at Ferris & Hale, stepped out with her armload of manila folders. Behind her stood an array of well-manicured professionals with faces I might not have recognized but whose manner and dress clearly marked them as counsel. Not an unusual sight in the building. We were specialists, and attorneys with more generalized practices frequently accompanied their clients to meetings in our offices.
Today they circled a client of obvious stature, both social and physical. Six-feet-two-inches of lean runner’s muscle. Sable hair that would’ve looked black if not for the rich brown highlights. Smooth skin lightly tanned but still too dark to go unnoticed amid the pale complexions of office-bound easterners. And those eyes… Moonlight on latte.
My first thought… He came for me . And damn my heart for swelling, my mouth for going dry, and my palms for beginning to sweat. For a waning fantasy flaring to life as I gazed into the perfect curves and chiseled lines of Adrian Knight’s face while the world around me receded and faded to a fuzzy blur.
High cheekbones, lush lips, flawlessly trimmed stubble along his hard, wide jaw, Knight was a testament to just how good my memory was. While I was used to seeing him in cashmere hoodies, cargo pants, and deck shoes, or else in the tuxedos he’d put on for dinner, now he wore the style and quality of business attire I would’ve expected of a man richer than God. The light gray silk tie matched his shirt perfectly, with the vest, jacket, and slacks being just a shade or two darker. The cashmere scarf around his neck and the fine woolen overcoat tossed over his arm were a complementary charcoal gray. Not the usual sea and sand colors I associated with Adrian, to be sure, but damn if it didn’t bring out that silver sheen in those amber brown eyes. My heart, my fists, and my sex seized tight at the sight of him.
Of course, it made no sense to think that Adrian had come for me. Why would he? Ours had been a temporary liaison, a three-month agreement that I would serve him sexually. For me, the goal had been to renew my flagging confidence while teaching myself to enjoy sex the way men did—the way Penn had, the way my father had, without emotional attachment. My careless assumption had been that Knight simply wanted sex from a woman who would cater to his particular tastes. I hadn’t realized at the time that Adrian had his own very specific agenda, far beyond personal pleasure, that being to seduce the woman who had gotten away from his lifelong rival. Regardless of whatever wounds that might have inflicted on the inconsequential target of those advances—me.
In the end, I had lasted hardly more than two weeks before
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