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He swung her chair around and knelt down so that they faced each other. Raina was boiling with rage, but helpless as he took her in his arms and smashed his lips against hers, his hands gripping her ass as he pushed her on the counter and stood between her legs.
The fear coursing through her, knowing how vulnerable she was, made every instinct within her aware of her safety and that the best course of action was to play along until she could get safe.
He was already pushing her skirt up and she didn’t put it past him to try and take her right there on the front desk of the hotel. Damn it, where was everyone in this blasted hotel!?
“Roger … dear…” her voice was honey. She had to get him to back off, even if that meant playing along. “You know how much I’ve been looking forward to our time together … but now is not a good time.…”
His lips were moving down her neck, his stinking breath filling her nostrils, his hands buried in her hair. “You’re mine, Raina. Bought and paid for. Do we have a deal?”
“Yes, yes—it’s a deal, Roger. You can have me, just—not here. Not now …” Even to her own ears, her voice sounded high and squeaky with panic. She tried desperately to cover herself up without making it seem like she was rejecting him.
“Tonight then.” Roger’s voice was loud with triumph. “I get you … and you get that raise you’ve been angling after. Seems like a fair trade, doesn’t it?”
“Sure. Sure Roger, anything you want.” Raina was struggling now, and she would have said anything to get him off of her, unaware that in the shadow of a large palm Christopher was standing and taking in the entire scene.
She looked at the bags under his eyes, the wrinkles on his face and neck. He seemed to believe that she would agree to be his lover or whatever it was he wanted.
Raina shuddered as his lips crushed hers again, but he seemed to take her shivers as a sign of her passion and desire for him.
“Tonight.” He jotted down an address. “I will expect you there.”
Still frozen, Raina accepted the paper passively, trying to keep herself from retching.
Smirking, Roger strode out of the hotel with a self-satisfied swagger, and Raina could only watch in horror as she stared after him.
Think. Think. Think. Come on, Raina. Think. The time had come to ask for more help. She was in deep trouble, and she wasn’t sure she could handle this alone anymore.
Christopher. Her mind turned to him immediately, and her body flooded with relief. Somehow she felt certain he would know what to do.
She needed to find Christopher as fast as possible.
Raina whirled to the hallway just off the lobby and nearly barged headlong into Christopher’s broad chest.
“Christopher?” she said. “Oh, Christopher, thank God! You’ll never—”
But then her eyes met his, and instead of seeing the warmth and care she usually found there, they were cold and unforgiving and unlike the Christopher she knew.
“Are you alright?” she ventured hesitantly.
“What do you think? I thought you were different Raina but I see that you’re like all the others—never satisfied with what you have. That’s the ‘nice chunk of change’ you said you were getting? A nice little promotion? A little of your tit,” he snarled crudely, “for tat?”
Raina was shocked at the vehemence in his voice and the harshness of his words.
“You—you saw?” Raina’s voice trembled as she tried to make sense of what he was saying. “Me—and Roger—you—thought—you think—?”
Christopher shook his head and threw up his hands. “Actually I don’t really care,” he said in a resigned tone. “Just one more time I’ve been an idiot to believe a woman could be interested in something other than money and self-interest.”
“It wasn’t like that Christopher. Hear me out—!”
He was walking away from her, and she was pleading with him, pulling at his sleeve, begging him to stay and listen to what she had to say.
But he pushed past her like she was nothing and walked out, throwing his cap on the ground as he stalked out of the hotel.
“Christopher! Christopher!” she screamed his name, again and again, begging him to hear what she had to say. Surely she could reason with him. Surely he would—surely. He had to believe her. He just had to!
Raina could not believe his reaction. How could he not let her explain? After everything between them? How could he not?
But as she thought back to what he must have seen … as she thought back to what he must have heard … her stomach lurched. She was beginning to see why he might have thought she was a willing participant in Roger’s evil machinations.
