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“You’re far too reckless, Tiffany.” He didn’t appreciate recklessness so why was she like a siren calling to him? If he listened, he would end up wrecked.
“You’re far too uptight, Sebastian.”
“Well, I’ve found being reckless and following an emotional path tends to lead a man into trouble.”
“Sometimes trouble can be fun,” she teased.
“And sometimes it can lead to tragedy.”
She sobered a bit, leaning toward him. Her voice softened. “Yes, but anything can lead to tragedy. You can do absolutely nothing wrong, make all the right moves, and still have things end in tragedy. But real happiness and joy, those don’t tend to come along without some risk. Those things are worth it.”
She was so very young and sheltered. “Did you take a risk with your former boyfriend?”
Her nose wrinkled as if in distaste. “Which one?”
He probably wouldn’t like to know how many there had been. “The one who’s in jail.”
Her eyes strayed away.
Dear god. “The one who’s about to get out. Is there really more than one of them?”
“I’ve had a colorful life,” she replied. “And no, not really. I didn’t take much of a risk on Bobby. I’ve done some crazy things in my life, but some would say that dating Bobby was the most normal. I know Big Tag made him sound like a serial killer, but he was an investment banker. I met him through my sister. Berry met him at a fashion show, which should have told me to run for the hills, but he was funny and seemed nice. Unfortunately, he also had a problem with cocaine, and that led him to getting involved in a pyramid scheme that defrauded a bunch of investors.”
So even when she attempted to be normal it all turned into chaos. “You turned him in?”
“Of course,” she replied. “I couldn’t let him hurt people the way he was.”
One thing he had learned about her was how kind she could be. A bit naïve, but kind. It was one of the things about her that called to him. In the real world, she had likely been taken advantage of many times. It made him wonder. He knew he should let it all go, but he was curious. “Was it hard to turn him in?”
She shook her head. “In some ways. I did care about him. I went to him first and asked him to stop and make reparations. He told me if I went to the cops he would hurt me. He tried to convince me that he could make the cops believe I was in on it.”
“And you weren’t afraid?”
“I’m an artist, not an idiot. He couldn’t prove anything, but I would have gone to the cops anyway,” she explained simply. “He was hurting people and I could stop it. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t.”
And she was incredibly moral. He admired that about her. “So he’s getting out now and he’s sworn revenge?”
She rolled her bratty, beautiful eyes. “He said a bunch of shit. That doesn’t mean he’s really coming after me. The last time he wrote me a letter I wrote him one right back and explained that I worked in a place where all the dudes knew how to kill people, and he would be stupid to come after me. And I’ve heard nothing else. You know what I remember most about him? Besides all the crime stuff? He made really excellent sandwiches. He bought his bread from some gourmet place uptown and I’ve never found anything quite like it. I should buy a loaf and get Macon to deconstruct it for me because it’s seriously expensive. I can’t pay ten dollars for a damn loaf of bread.”
He shook his head because sometimes she talked really fast. She also seemed very good about burying the lead. “He writes you? From prison?”
“Yeah, though he doesn’t send the letters directly to me. From what I can tell, he sends them to a friend of his and then the friend sends them to me. But that was only a few times. Apparently someone has the job of reading all the prison mail, but there’s a ton of it so they really only read the first couple of pages and those are like full of bullshit and then he gets to the ‘I’m going to kill you, bitch’ stuff.” She held up a hand. “But that was all a few years back. The last letter he managed to get out was very apologetic. I have to wonder, though. If I wanted to brutally murder someone, I would probably apologize to them, too. You know, make ’em comfortable so they didn’t shoot me on sight.”
“You are not allowed out of this apartment without an escort.” When the hell had she been planning on mentioning that her ex-boyfriend was still trying to communicate with her? Did her father know? Did anyone at all? “If at any time he attempts to contact you, you will immediately find me and inform me. If you feel threatened, you may call the police first, but I damn straight better be the second person you call, though you shouldn’t have to call me because I don’t know that you’ll be allowed out of my sight. Do you understand how serious this is?”
“Bas, it’s not a big deal. He was a smart man. He’s doing white-collar time and he definitely won’t want to go back. I was joking about him actually killing me. His sister reached out to tell me he really is remorseful. Apparently he’s gone through rehab in prison and he wants to make amends.”
“Or he wants to murder you and this is a good way to get close. And I swear if you call me Bas again, that will be a very long spanking that will not conclude until your ass is so red you won’t sit for a week. Am I clear?”
She hopped off her barstool and walked around the bar, picking up the bottle of wine and refilling his glass. “Yes, Sebastian. I think you might need some more. You find me annoying, don’t you?”
He found her disturbing. “I think your life is a bit more chaotic than what I would prefer.”
She put a hand on his arm, smiling up at him. “It isn’t as bad as you think. I’m mostly boring.”
She was so close and he couldn’t help but think about that contract they’d signed only hours before. It gave him the right to protect her, to comfort her. He’d explained that they could ignore the part that gave him the right to fuck her, to spread her legs and put his mouth on her. To taste her and wrap her scent around himself.
He had the right to lean over and kiss her. Naturally she had the right to say no, but that contract had opened a door he’d meant to keep fully closed and locked with a chair shoved under the handle.
