AllFreeNovel
Share Us
No, he was overreacting to a word that had no bearing on what was going on between him and Reiko.
Obsession had been his father and his grandfather’s disease.
It had been Isadora’s.
He’d left every connotation of it behind in Arizona. The fact that it had popped into his head as he’d kissed Reiko meant nothing. It held no power over him if he didn’t give it room. He sucked in a deep breath.
‘Put me down, Damion. Your bodyguards are watching us. How did they get here so fast anyway?’
He kept on walking, his arms tightening around her. ‘GPS on my phone. They’ve been following us since we came out of the train station.’
The SUV rolled behind them as they strode up the hill.
‘And they’re going to be camped outside my apartment the whole time?’
‘Unless you attack me with a butter knife. In which case I hit the alarm on my watch and they crash in commando-style.’
The smile he’d been looking for didn’t materialise. In fact she grew paler the closer they got to her apartment. She knew the brevity of the next few hours.
So did he.
Her apartment was spacious, light and tastefully decorated. Eastern-influenced rugs decorated the wooden floors and Chinese and Japanese art graced the walls. A huge painting of a cherry-blossom tree took up almost one entire wall. One extra-large sofa dominated the room, behind which stood a very masculine-looking oak screen.
After dropping her bag on a nearby table, she hit a switch.
The opposite wall glowed yellow, then red. The next minute three fat orange holographic goldfish glided past.
He glanced at her. Despite her drawn features, a small smile curved her lips. ‘You didn’t believe me, did you?’
‘I’m interested to see how the feeding part comes into it. It is, after all, the reason you ran away from me.’
She looked him square in the eye. ‘I’ve stopped running.’
The jolt that went through his system threatened to knock him off his feet. When she turned away from him, Damion curbed the strong urge to pull her back. Instead he shoved his restless hands in his pockets and followed her into the kitchen.
‘You’re willing to open yourself up to me?’
She stiffened in the process of pulling open the fridge door. ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Baron. Like my lovely goldfish out there, I’m an acquired taste. I’m pretty sure the minute you find out what’s lurking underneath you’ll run a mile.’ A shadow of pain crossed her face.
His jaw tightened. ‘You’re
making presumptions again, Reiko.’
Her small smile held even more pain. Somewhere in the region of his chest, a dull fire of anger took hold of him.
‘We’ll see. I can make us some lunch. Are you allergic to anything I should know about?’ she asked.
‘Only being prejudged. What happened on the train?’
Her fingers tightened around the bottle of sake she’d pulled out from the fridge.
‘Don’t you want something to eat?’ she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
‘No.’ Food was the last thing on his mind.
When she remained frozen where she stood, he opened cupboards until he located glasses. He took the bottle from her hand, poured and handed one glass to her.
The sake was the vilest he’d ever tasted, but he drank it anyway.
