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“You can’t be serious?” I ask obtusely.
Surely I heard him wrong. He barely knows me. I didn’t think he even knew my name. But then why was he at Tease tonight in the first place? Was he looking for me? No. That’s absurd. He doesn’t seem like the type to follow a girl to a club like that, never mind rip her off stage, almost vibrating with jealousy. My skin heats at the memory of his possessiveness as he dragged me out of the strip club and into his car, demanding answers as if I owed him any.
The recollection has me shivering in my seat, and he mistakes my sudden chill for being cold, turning on the heat so I’m roasting.
“What did you say? Because I’m positive I must be hearing things.”
“You heard me just fine, Layla.”
I swear his lips tilt in a teasing smile before it quickly disappears. The whiplash from his shouts to the calm, sure way he’s watching me leaves me blinking in astonishment. He leans forward into the light, allowing me to see his face clearer. Those bright blue eyes mesmerize me as always, but tonight they lack their usual icy stare. The heat filling their depths has my heart flipping in my chest, his gaze a silent plea.
“Marry me,” he repeats in that smoky voice of his that has my insides quivering.
“You can’t be serious.” I laugh, turning away. “This is a joke, a cruel joke to play on a girl who’s at her wit’s end with all the shit she has in her life.”
“I’m deadly serious,” he promises, his voice hard, leaving no room for compromise. When I look back at him, I see his eyes are the same, his face set in concentration.
He really means it. He wants me to marry him.
“Why?” I blurt, beyond confused.
I thought he didn’t even like me, and now he wants to marry me? It’s absurd. There has to be some logical reason as to why. Is it because he feels sorry for me? Well, if that’s the case, then I don’t need his pity, but even as I’m about to decline his offer right here and now, Zoey’s face comes to mind. She’s the only thing that pulls me from my own depressing thoughts and back to the moment.
To the lack of space between us.
I can feel the heat radiating from his body, his big hands inches away as he leans closer, consuming my vision. He’s lethal, that’s for sure—not just to my racing heart, but to my future.
“I’m very serious. You need the money, and I have money. I will give you all that you need for Zoey’s surgery and more, but these are my terms. You will marry me, live with me, and be my wife in all ways. That is, if you’ll have me,” he states, his hard tone softening at the end as he gives me the option.
I stare silently in shock. A half hour ago, I was shaking my ass on the pole. Even now I can smell my own sweat and the customers’ desperation, and I can feel the glitter sticking to my skin. I feel disgusting, like a sore thumb in this car which is worth more than my apartment and savings combined—okay, so that wouldn’t be hard, but still. Who is this man?
He waits for my answer patiently, watching the cogs turn in my head.
It comes down to this: could I really marry this man, this stranger, to save my sister’s life? To stop my sister’s pain? Isn’t that just another way of selling myself? Only this time I’m selling myself to a blue-eyed, unknown man who claims to be my savior, coming to rescue me from my troubles and make it all better.
But no one is that perfect, that good. He must get something from it, but what? It can’t just be me. I’m not much of a prize. With one look at him, I can see that a man like him could have any woman he wants. So why me? Why now?
My mind goes back to that one phrase—selling myself. Isn’t that what I’ve been doing for the past few days? I’ve made three thousand dollars from allowing men to put their hands on me as their sneering, lustful eyes follow my every move. I’ve let them absorb every inch of my skin like they own me while I dance for their pleasure, wishing I were anywhere else but there. And now I’m here, being given everything I could ever want, but this time I won’t flinch when he puts his hands on me. I’ll want him to, since I’ve been fantasizing about him doing just that for longer than I care to admit. It still feels like a trap, though. I just need to decide if it’s a snare I’m willing to walk into.
The truth is, I don’t know this man. I don’t even know his name. I know nothing more than how he likes to drink coffee and how he enjoys watching me with those bright eyes of his while I work, ensuring I go home with wet panties. For the first time in years, I dream of being under a man and letting him do very bad things to me. He makes me feel alive, vulnerable, and needy, and I hate that. I hate that he makes me feel weak with just a flicker of those cold eyes that only seem to warm for me, especially right now. I see his hands tighten into fists. Impatience or nerves?
“We don’t know each other. Aside from you coming in for a cup of coffee at my workplace, you’re still a stranger to me,” I murmur, and he flinches, leaning back, but I surge ahead, knowing I’m walking the line. I could fall into madness by saying yes, but if I don’t, what will I regret more? Not only would I save my sister, but I would get a chance to peel back the layers of the mysterious stranger I’ve been obsessing over. “I don’t even know your name.”
“Alaric,” he growls. “My name is Alaric.”
I nod, swallowing. “Alaric,” I repeat, licking my lips. I swear I hear a groan as he shifts in the leather seat. “I-I don’t know.”
Can I really marry him? This stranger?
I always thought that if I married someone one day, it would be for love, and if I accept Alaric’s offer, in a way, it will be. The love I hold for my sister is the driving force behind even considering such an offer. But can I actually do it, though, knowing nothing about this gorgeous man sitting beside me?
The truth is, I don’t know.
“You need time to think. Let me take you home. I expect an answer tomorrow,” he tells me. I nod, reaching for the handle, but he stops me, stretching his arm across my body to stop me from getting out of the car. The thick, corded muscle of his forearm slides across my breasts, making my nipples pebble to the point of pain, and my clit throbs in time with my heartbeat as I squeeze my thighs to ignore it.
“I promise to protect you, to give you everything you could ever have imagined if you say yes,” he vows, those eyes melting me to the seat until I’m a puddle of mush.
When he slowly pulls his arm back, I breathe in a deep breath and stumble from the car, needing to escape his strong magnetism and the plea in his eyes for me to say yes.
