Tempted by Fate (The Fate Trilogy Book Two) (6 page)

“You’re not going to come before I say so,
are you Dove?”

It was difficult to stay on top of my
impending orgasm, but I wanted to so badly that I managed. I felt my breath
heavy as I tried to speak. “No, Sir,” I managed.

One of his hands traced its way from my
collarbone to my nipple, lazily circling around before pinching it between
thumb and finger. The slight bit of pain registered as he kept pumping slowly
and brought memories of our evenings in his bedroom. I sank my nails into the
muscles around his neck as his skin grew ever more slick and hot. When I
brought my hand up to the side of his neck, I felt his heart pumping, bringing
to mind the pulse I suddenly could not avoid feeling in my own chest.

“I’ve shown you that good things come to
those that wait, haven’t I?”

“Yes, Sir,” I moaned.

I brought my hands down to his arms to feel
the muscles there as he moved his hand away from my nipple down my torso,
teasing me with the lightness of his touch. Every nerve I had was on end and
begging for release. Every millimeter of my skin was waiting for the next
sensation he would give me.

He pinned my arms over my head as his pace
finally began to increase. One hand kept my arms in place while his other
settled with fingers splayed and his thumb just over my clit. Each thrust was a
new battle not to lose control. I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth. My
breath became shallow and quick as I fought to keep down the orgasm that was
begging to come to the surface.

“Are you ready, Dove?”

I hadn’t realized it was possible for him to
fuck me more deeply than he had been before, but he began to do it now. I began
to quiver around him, my skin burning. I nodded.

“I can’t hear you,” he said quietly as he
began to thrust faster. He kissed my ear quickly then brought his face back up
over mine, his breath inches from my lips.

I tried with three successive breaths to say
“Yes,” but each time I sucked it in to fight down my orgasm. I was going to
fail this time. Tears formed in my eyes.

He stopped, buried deep inside me, and
touched his thumb down to my swollen clit.

“Come.”

Fireworks went off in the back of my head as
I was overwhelmed with the flood of pleasure that erupted in my body. I felt an
explosion of heat between my legs that traveled through the pit of my stomach
and overpowered my senses. Each convulsion was a new wall broken through, a new
angle of the same explosion. I screamed; I couldn’t help it and I didn’t care
who heard. My legs thrashed around either side of Victor’s body, my hands
gripping the leather seat beneath me, then grabbing at his shirt, his perfect
ass, at nothing until I tossed myself back, shattered and confused.

As I regained awareness of my surroundings, I
realized Victor had pulled out of me after he had come, the warm liquid easing
down my thigh. He was kissing my neck lightly. I became aware of the sweat on
both our bodies, and gripped the arm he had draped down and around my torso as
best I could, moving up and down from his shoulder to his elbow.

The sweat in his hair smelled so beautifully
masculine that I sighed, dancing my fingers through it down to the back of his
neck. I held him there for a moment until he propped himself up. His blue eyes
were gazing at my face and a smile was on his lips. He bent his head down to me
and gave me a deep, passionate kiss, then picked me up and turned me around,
leaning backward so that my back was nestled comfortably against his torso, my
head resting on his chest.

He kissed me once more on my forehead and held me tight.

Lying against Victor’s chest felt warm and
comforting. His hand played with my hair idly as he took several deep breaths.
I reached back and felt his elbow, running my hand up his chiseled arm. Was he
acting nervous?

“I think I’ve told you before that my mother
abandoned me when I was six.”

“You mentioned it briefly,” I conceded. It
was such a delicate topic; I didn’t want to press him on the matter, but I
couldn’t pass up the opportunity to hear him finally open up. “What happened?”

He sighed and stared ahead, seeming to
register nothing of what passed outside the window. “The men in my family are
cursed, it seems,” he finally said.

Cursed?
What a strange choice in words. Was he setting me up for some sort of fairy
tale story?

“We fall madly in love with a woman only to
have her turn our entire world upside down and eventually break our hearts. It
first started when my grandfather cheated on my grandmother and left her for
someone younger. Nobody in the house ever forgot the scene she made as she
left. She told him he would never be happy as long as he lived, nor would
anyone close to him. A year later, his new wife suddenly got sick and passed
away. Not long after that, he passed away in an accident.

“And then there was my father. He and my
mother seemed like the happiest couple in the world. I think my father even
believed it. One day I did very well on a test and I wanted to show my mother
my grade. I searched all around the house for her, and even outside in the barn
where she would sometimes be with the horses. She was nowhere to be found.
Eventually I found my father in his office and asked him if he had seen her. It
was the first time I’d seen him drunk. He had a half empty bottle of whiskey in
his hand and told me I would probably never see my mother again.”

He took a deep breath. I couldn’t face him as
he opened up to me, it was too intense. All I could do was run my hand up and
down his leg.

After a moment he continued. “She told my
father that she didn’t love us anymore. Still doesn’t make sense to me to this
day.” He shook his head. “I try to only remember the good times I had with her,
but it’s almost impossible. The abandonment always creeps in.”

“So you shut it up in a box and lock it?”

I felt Victor’s jaw harden against my head as
he squeezed my arm. Should I have let that moment with Evelyn drop? It was too
late now. Thoughts raced through my mind as I wondered whether I had touched a
nerve too sensitive.

After another deep breath, he spoke. “You
can’t quite do that though, can you? If it’s important to you, it will always
creep up. You can’t run away from it forever.”

“Unless you have amnesia,” I said, trying to
make a joke at my own expense to lighten the mood.

He chuckled. “I had never considered the
amnesia angle until I met you.”

I was glad he wasn’t going to clam up again.
“It’s not great,” I said. “So you weren’t exactly good at dealing with your
feelings about your mother growing up then?”

He nodded. “Neither was my father. He
remained cold and distant throughout my childhood and up until his death. I
thought I had moved on. Hell, I was an adult; why would I still dwell on
something that happened more than twenty years ago?”

He sighed. “And then Evelyn came along. She
was in the same class as me in college. I couldn’t take my eyes off of her. We
fell in love and married four months later, traveled across the world, made
love wherever we could, and even considered having children. But then major
changes started to happen in my company after my father died, and I was away
from home with work constantly. I came home one day after a two week conference
in Alaska only to find her in tears. She had two suitcases in tow and told me
that she was fed up with me, that she had met someone else and was leaving me.
I hadn’t seen her until that night in Paris.”

It explained why he was so agitated when he
saw Evelyn. But something still gnawed at me. “So am I just the latest in a
succession of pretty young things since Evelyn? For you to take out frustration
on when a memory of her creeps up?” Tears formed in my eyes as I said the words
that had been stuck in my throat since that night in the elevator.

Victor said nothing for a moment. He brushed
a lock of hair away from my face and kissed my head. “No. You’re more than
that.” He paused to punch the intercom button. “Oscar,” he called, “take us
home please.”

The moment was gone. “Certainly, sir,” Oscar
said.

After a moment of silence, Victor spoke
again. “I know you’re upset at the way I pulled you away from Pedro, and I feel
like I should explain. The contract you signed stated that you would be under
my protection. I cannot fail at that duty, and having you out of my sight with
no way to contact you—or have you contact me—made me realize that was a
possibility.” He reached into his inner coat pocket and took out a small phone
not unlike his own. “I should’ve given this to you earlier. My phone number is
already programmed in it. If I’m not around and you’re lost or need my help,
I’m just a phone call away.” He placed the device in my hands.

I looked down at the small contraption
.
Are you afraid of losing me, too?
The thought brought a smile to my lips.
“So you weren’t jealous?” I asked, in what I hoped was a teasing voice.

He pulled my chin back so I was looking up at
him and kissed me probingly on my mouth. “Me, jealous?” he said lightly. “Of
course not.”

Yeah, right
. Still, there was no sense in continuing on that topic.
“I’m happy where I am,” I told him, nestling under one of his arms. “I enjoy
being with you.”

“I’m happy with you here too, Dove.” He held
me close to his chest in silence until we got the mansion.

At dinner that evening Victor seemed more or
less his old self. He sat at the end of the large, wooden dining room table as
I sat next to him on the adjacent corner. We were eating a meal Betty had
prepared that consisted of succulent grilled chicken topped with freshly picked
strawberries from Victor’s garden topped with a sort of balsamic syrup. The
presentation rivaled that of a fancy restaurant, and I admired the showmanship
for a moment before taking my first bite.

“I scheduled a doctor’s appointment for you,”
Victor suddenly said.

I swallowed a piece of chicken. “A doctor’s
appointment?”

He raised his hand. “Yes. I’ve been searching
around for good doctors who might be able to help you with your memory loss. I
found a specialist who comes highly recommended at a hospital in the city.”

I let the words sink in for a moment.  A
doctor who can help me regain my memories? Did I even want to know what went on
in my life before I found myself disoriented and without a home? I always
considered that something horrific had happened, that perhaps
I
was the
one who did something horrific, and that I had blocked it all out of my memory
on purpose.

Did I really want to face whatever it was
that lay dormant inside me?

The doctor’s visit ended up being
anti-climactic. Dr. Mark was nice, and he asked me some basic questions about
my memory loss, showing particular interest in my memory of art history just as
Victor had. After an MRI and some blood work, he sent me on my way and told me
he would call when the results had been analyzed. The whole thing took less
than an hour and felt like a bit of a waste; the whole thing resolved nothing.

During the weeks that followed, I was busy in
my art room creating paintings on the canvases Victor supplied for me. Some of
my subjects were no more than the people living in the mansion. Oscar, Karen,
and Betty all took turns sitting in a chair in front of my easel and patiently
waited as I painted their portraits.

I was happy with all of my work, but my
favorite piece was my painting of Victor. It used the largest canvas I had and
took several sittings for me to get right: his stylishly messy hair, his stark
blue eyes, and his stern, yet gentle mouth. Instead of portraying him in his
usual fitted suit and tie, I had him dressed in slacks and a t-shirt to convey
the less severe side of him that I was slowly coming to know. It took a few
sleepless nights to complete the painting, but the end result was worth it.

When I grew tired of drawing people, I
ventured outside. The days were starting to get longer and warmer, so I would
use that opportunity to set up my art supplies in the shade of the front yard.
From there I had the spectacular view of the emerald green pastures and
Victor’s horses grazing and frolicking in the sunshine. Sometimes, however, I
would drop everything to run over to the barn and ride Victor’s mare,
Butterscotch, in the pastures under the sunny, spring sky.

When the night of the Lotus Art Gallery
opening arrived, Victor allowed Karen and me to drive into town to pick out an
outfit to wear.