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A soft little sigh slipped past her lips and reached his ears through the speakers. “You know, even though I’m tempted to interrupt you while you’re working, I’m going to be a good girl and behave, even if I’m coming to realize that it is way more fun being bad.” She delivered that with a naughty smile. “By the way, I’m starved and I’m going to make something for dinner, just in case you’re hungry and you want to join me and have some friendly conversation.”
She waited a handful of seconds, staring up at the camera expectantly, as if waiting for him to answer . . . then spoke again. “Hmm. I’ll take it by your silence that’s a no,” she said, her tone light and teasing.
She was so adorable she made him fucking laugh. A genuine chuckle that was rare for him. The speaker wasn’t two-way, so he couldn’t have answered anyway, but just the fact that she was carrying on this ridiculous and amusing one-way conversation with herself had him unable to turn off the monitor or look away. He didn’t want to miss a thing.
Leaving the living room, she sauntered into the kitchen, and as soon as she spied the camera pointed in that direction, she grinned and waved at him. “Hey, it’s you again!” she said gregariously, even though she couldn’t have been one hundred percent certain he was watching her. “So, let’s see what I have to work with for dinner.”
She opened the refrigerator and peered inside. “Since you’re not here to tell me what I can and can’t use, everything is game as far as I’m concerned.”
She pulled out a carton of heavy whipping cream, a flat of fresh mushrooms, an onion, garlic, and butter. Then she started searching through his cupboards, adding a can of chicken broth to those items, a container of flour, and some spices. And then she proceeded to entertain him as she made fresh cream of mushroom soup from scratch, while providing hilarious commentary as she cut the onion and garlic and stirred in all the ingredients.
When the soup thickened and steam rose from the pot, she took a deep breath of the scent, closed her eyes, and moaned in pure pleasure. She glanced up at the camera, smiling. “I know you’re probably a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy, but this is going to be delicious with the garlic toast I’m making and you’re missing out.”
His stomach growled hungrily, echoing Arabella’s sentiment as she ladled the soup into a bowl, retrieved the garlic toast from the oven, and sat down with her meal at the counter, facing the camera. The impulse to join her was overwhelmingly strong . . . not just for the food, but to enjoy her company in person. The past hour of watching her, listening to her joke and tease despite the less-than-ideal circumstances he’d put her in made his respect for her grow exponentially.
He wanted to spend time with her—an anomaly for him when it came to women in general—but he was smart enough to know that sitting beside Arabella while they shared dinner was just as tempting and dangerous as touching her.
But that didn’t stop her from continuing her one-sided conversation with him, or Maddux from listening.
She lifted a spoonful of soup to her pursed lips and blew on the hot liquid before taking the bite, her gaze lifting back up to the camera. “I don’t know how much you know about me. I’m sure a security guy like you can find out anything on anyone at the snap of your fingers, and considering who I am, I’m sure you have a file full of information on me,” she said wryly.
Yes, he did. Right in the desk drawer next to where he was sitting. But somehow, Maddux suspected he was about to get a more intimate insight to Arabella Cole, and all his attention was focused on her.
“But from my personal account, and not from some impersonal private investigator’s perspective, my life in general has been fairly boring, predictable and . . . lonely.” Her voice dropped to a more somber tone as she absently dipped her bread into her soup. “My mother died when I was five, and even though I knew my father cared about me, he mostly showed it in tangible things that didn’t really matter to me. Not when I wanted his attention the most. But I suppose he didn’t really know what to do with a little girl, and I’d like to think he did the best he could, given the circumstances.”
Maddux refused to feel any kind of empathy toward Theodore, but he couldn’t deny the compassion he felt toward Arabella. He knew what it was like to lose a parent, the void it left, and the pain that might have dulled over time but still existed. The fact that they’d shared that same experience, even if their parents’ deaths had been vastly different, softened something inside of him.
“I think it was just easier for him to enroll me in an all-girls boarding school so he didn’t have to worry about me, but I hated feeling so sheltered and confined. And I was scared a lot of the time, too, so I’d go to the school library and find a quiet corner and read for hours after class and on the weekends.” A small smile touched the corner of her mouth as she swallowed a spoonful of soup. “I've always been an introvert, because it was much easier and safer to just stay in my own little bubble. I always had my nose in a book, and I loved all the classics. Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, Nathaniel Hawthorne. The characters in those books were like my best friends.”
She pushed her spoon through the remnants of her soup, seemingly lost in thought. “It’s really no surprise that I focused on a degree in English literature in college, then went on to get my master’s in library science. And now, I work at the university library as a digital data analyst and curator. I know it doesn’t sound exciting, but I really love my job . . . I just wish I felt the same way about other aspects of my life,” she said, so quietly he had to strain to hear her.
“But . . . I’m trying to change that,” she said, injecting an upbeat tone to her voice. “I’m asserting myself more instead of letting my father or Gavin dictate what I should do or how I should act, and that feels really good.” She lifted her gaze back up to the camera, an impish grin on her lips. “Believe it or not, I wasn’t always rebellious or stubborn or sassy. But I like the new and improved me . . . and I think you like it, too.”
Yeah, he did, he thought with a smile. He liked it, and her, way too much.
She set her spoon in her empty bowl and rested her arms on the counter, her expression soft and beautiful and honest. “I just want you to know, I have no regrets about what I did last night. Not because I saved my father . . . because I’m starting to believe that I don’t know my father all that well . . . but because you, Maddux Wilder, are the most exciting, thrilling adventure I’ve ever experienced, and I’m not sure I want it to end anytime soon.”
That statement, so genuine and pure, stole his breath and wreaked havoc with Maddux’s goddamn emotions, filling him with feelings he’d thought were dead and buried and impossible to resurrect. He didn’t want to care about Arabella, but he couldn’t deny that she’d cracked something open inside of him and it was already happening. The pull toward her, the growing connection, was undeniable, and it scared the fuck out of him because he didn’t do emotions, and more importantly, they had no chance at a future together. Not once he let her go, and not after he devastated her father’s life.
Then there would only be hatred. Which was why he had to keep his distance.
Chapter 14
The next morning, Arabella woke up in Maddux’s bed alone, and she couldn’t ignore the twist of disappointment at that discovery. But as she glanced over at the empty space beside hers, finding the covers and his pillow still neat and orderly, she realized that he must have slept elsewhere. So yes, she was bummed, but she couldn’t say she was surprised. Not after the way he’d holed himself up in his office all night long in his attempt to ignore her.
Refusing to start the day being mopey over something that was beyond her control, she got out of bed and headed right for the camera mounted in the corner of the bedroom, red light on. He had the ability to spy on her from every angle in the apartment, and she could only assume that he was watching her.
Uncaring that her hair was a tangled mess and she probably looked completely rumpled, she put her hands on her hips and looked up at the lens. “Good morning, Maddux,” she said cheerfully. “You know, you could have slept in your own bed last night. I would have behaved and kept my hands to myself, if that was your concern. I swear I wouldn’t have taken advantage of you or your incredible body. At least, not unless you wanted me to.” She grinned cheekily.
The one thing she’d learned while cooking dinner by herself and talking to Maddux via the security cameras the evening before was that speaking to an inanimate object gave her a sense of freedom to be open and honest without having to worry about couching her words or thoughts, which was why she’d been so candid when talking about her childhood and her life in general last night. Because she wanted Maddux to know the real Arabella Cole, who was more than just Theodore’s daughter. The woman with goals and hopes and dreams. The woman with needs and desires and fantasies she wanted to explore with him. She’d been truthful when she’d confessed that he was the most exciting, thrilling adventure she’d ever experienced.
Speaking to Maddux through the camera meant he wasn’t there in person to turn hot and cold on a dime or give her an annoyed scowl if she said something he didn’t like . . . or walk away when their attraction came to a head. It offered her the ability to break down his barriers, with no argument or dismissive attitude from him.
“So, what is the second hardest thing in the morning?” she asked, just to inject some humor into the beginning of the day and be a little naughty with him. She let a few seconds pass before delivering the punch line. “Getting up!”
She laughed at her own joke and imagined him groaning at the silly pun. “I know that was really cheesy, but it was off the top of my head and spur-of-the-moment and the best I could do. I promise to brush up on my one-liners.”
Leaving him on that note, she walked into the bathroom and shut the door, and at least she had privacy in there as she used the facilities, brushed her teeth,
