It was like the flesh between his legs didn’t exist. Only with Dawn.
Victor reached out a hand to touch her, to trail a hand over her alluring skin. He only just managed to catch himself before he did. This was precisely why he had to stay away. He was her owner. She was his prisoner.
But in moments like this, it felt like the other way around.
With an angry grunt, he rose from the bed, determined to remove himself from her spell.
After putting on his clothes, he searched her drawer. He found what he was looking for in her nightstand beside an instrument he could only assume was some kind of vibrator. Another urge flashed through him. To use it on her. To watch her fall apart again and again as he had last night.
But it’s May 26th. Time to return to your world, the voice of reason reminded him.
He swiftly extracted the object he’d been looking for and closed the drawer. Then he wrote out a message on a piece of scratch paper from his notepad and set the item down on top of it.
After that task was done, he looked over at her again. Not because he wanted to, but because he had to. Not looking at her when they were in the same room together was like trying to hold your breath underwater. Four… Six minutes tops. That was all he’d ever been able to manage.
And this time, he couldn’t stop himself from running the back of his hand over her cheek. She let out a contented mew and nuzzled her face into his knuckles.
One murmur from her was all it took for him to become fully hard again. As if the last four times never occurred.
He didn’t climb back into the bed and cover her with his body as he wanted to, however. With one last look at her sleeping form over his shoulder, he forced himself out of the room.
Next year will be better. He promised himself this as he left her prison. Next year, I’ll be able to resist coming to her.
He’d forgotten to plug in his phone, and it had died over the course of the night. The screen filled up with messages as soon as he attached it to the USB cord in his Audi. Most of them were from Han, one of the few people who had this number. But there were also a few from Phantom. And his cousin’s messages particularly stood out.
“Where the fuck are you??? Kuang wants a meeting.”
That message had arrived around 10 PM last night. And there was another one from early in the morning.
“Seriously? You’re not answering? You had better fucking be dead. This isn’t how we do shit.”
No, it wasn’t. He fired off a group text that he’d be home in less than an hour. He needed to shower, and they could all drive down to New York to meet with Kuang.
He didn’t wait for their reply. Just muted the phone and concentrated on driving as fast as he could without catching the attention of any highway cops.
It wasn’t that far of a trek. This was what he hadn’t told Dawn. When they decided to settle in the United States, Phantom, Han, and he had determined that Westerhaven, Rhode Island was as good a place as any to park—both a few million dollars and themselves. The coastal communtity was close enough to the territories they managed but far enough away that their enemies would be required to put in some effort to get to them. Also, the spreads out here weren’t nearly as dense as the ones in New York City. Their gated property sat on five acres. They could both meet with their friend and kill their enemies here in secret.
He made it back to their shingle-style house overlooking the Atlantic Ocean without any further incident. As soon as he drove through the gates, though, he realized that not checking his text messages had been a mistake.
Kuang was here. His contingent of cars, three high-end Nakamura Legends, were parked in a row at the top of their circular driveway.
He wouldn’t call Kuang paranoid—at least not directly to his face. But the 24K Dragon didn’t travel anywhere with less than eight guards.
Victor didn’t bother to check the text messages he had ignored. Two of Kuang’s guards stood stationed outside their front door. It wouldn’t do to have them report back to their boss that Victor had taken his sweet time getting out of the car, even stopped to check his messages.
He slipped his wedding ring into the pocket of his waistcoat and quickly emerged from his Audi.
Han came out just as Victor was approaching the house’s stone steps.
His brother’s expression was impassive, but Victor was sure that wasn’t an accurate reflection of how he felt. He was most likely pissed but too loyal to let it show in front of Kuang’s guards.
