AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“The prostitute—”
The creak of a door opening cuts him off. Then a harmonic, cock-thickening voice has him acting like a choirboy. “If I stay in there a second longer, I’ll become a prune.”
Knox waggles his brows at me, slaps my back like a giddy kid on Christmas morning, and then greets the woman causing the hairs on the back of my neck to stand to attention before she fully exits the bathroom. “Sorry, baby cakes. I forgot I asked you to wait for me.”
The reason for my body’s response to the woman’s voice is exposed when she breaks through the thick sheet of steam enough to reveal her gorgeous face and womanly curves.
I found you.
“Nikki, this is Laken,” Knox introduces, pulling Nicole toward my frozen body in the middle of her room. She looked ravishing last night with a sweaty face and misted body, but there’s something entirely different about seeing her drenched head to toe. It has me eager to push harder next time. To make her as saturated as she is now. “Laken, this is—”
“Nicole,” I interrupt, too impatient to wait for a proper introduction.
Finding the rooftop room empty hit me harder than first believed. The relief of seeing her standing in front of me can’t deny that.
“It’s Nikki,” Nicole corrects, her demeanor cool, almost icy. “And you are?”
Unaware we’ve met before, and not dumbfounded by her odd question, Knox answers on my behalf. “Laken. Laken Howell.” Nicole and I recoil in sync when he adds, “Your new bodyguard.”
“What?” Nicole gasps out in a shocked breath. “No!”
Her stern denial already has me on the back foot, so I won’t mention the unpleasant taste that hits my mouth when I notice how Knox is holding her. His hand hasn’t dropped from her waist even with them reaching his desired location, and they stand barely an inch apart when he twists her to face him.
I can’t hear a thing he says to her through my pulse ringing in my ears, but they look cozy.Extremelycozy.
“Laken?”
“Huh?” I reply after shifting my eyes to Knox, my questioner.
He glares at me as if to say,Get your head out of your ass, before continuing. “I was just explaining to Nik how you’ve recently returned from a long placement with the correctional department and that you’re wanting to go private, so I gave you a shot.”
What the fuck is he on about?
Knox drops his hand from Nicole’s waist before circling it around her balled fist and giving it a reassuring squeeze. “I know being the protective detail of a music starlet isn’t what you envisioned when pondering a career in music, but we all have to start somewhere.” His lips hover an inch from Nicole’s temple when he nestles into her. The simplest gesture makes me want to smash his teeth in, but my feet remain rooted to the ground since I have no clue who the bad guy is in this situation.
It isn’t looking good for me right now.
“And who knows?” Knox adds, his tone the loved-up one he uses while schmoozing. “After spending a couple of months in the presence of greatness, you might learn a thing or two about what it takes to be a chart-topping musician.”
When Nicole stiffens at the end of his sentence, I stare at her like she isn’t the woman I messed the sheets with last night while correcting, “I’m not looking for a career in music. I haven’t considered it for a long time. But if it were ever on the table, I’d only want to produce it, not compose it.”
I thought my reply would lower Nicole’s angst, but it seems to have done the opposite. The vein in her neck works overtime as she shoots daggers at me.
I don’t know what has her so worked up. I left her a note saying I’d be back as soon as I could.
It’s more than Knox will ever give her.
He runs before they’re even asleep.
“Composing and producing are practically the same thing,” Knox chuckles out. “Either way, everyone starts at the bottom rung of Knox Records before being given the chance to climb the ranks.”
“Knox Records?” I couldn’t be more shocked if he had slapped me in the face with a fish.
Knox told me I was stupid when I mentioned wanting to go into music production during our final year of high school. That with modern technology, there was no money to be made in producing anymore. He tried to steer me away from it, but since music lives in my veins, I spent the first two years of my incarceration on the rec room computer, honing my craft.
I only stepped back when I realized inmates were paid for work that could be sold outside the prison’s walls. I couldn’t see River, but I could make sure he was well looked after, so I spent the last almost eight years making plates for electric vehicles.
The anger on Nicole’s face softens when the disbelief in my tone can’t be missed. “You own a record label? Mr. There’s No Money to Be Made in Music founded his own label?”
