As her breathing becomes faster, I reach my hand down between her legs again and move my finger over her clit. I’m on a hair trigger here and I need her to come.
After only a couple seconds, she arches her back and presses into me and she’s gasping through her orgasm. Watching her and feeling her spasming around me, tips me over the edge and I jerk inside of her as wave after wave of pleasure spike through me. We’re coming together.
**********
After we’ve cleaned up and changed, we finish our dinner. It tastes even better now after our mini workout. Evie even allows me to use a fork.
We pick up our picnic and then I move to the couch and switch on the t.v. I feel satiated and happy and some mindless television sounds good.
Evie goes over to the Mac and turns it on, sitting down at the dining room table. "Checking it out? Ever used a Mac?" I ask, looking over my shoulder.
"No, but I've always been pretty good with computers. I'll probably get the hang of it pretty quickly."
I get involved in the show, some real crime news show about a woman who disappeared and –
The sound of Evie’s computer snapping down jolts me out of the story and I look over at Evie, whose face has gone pale. I stand up immediately.
"What's wrong, baby?" I ask. Shit, what happened?
She ignores me, walking to the door and starting to put her shoes on.
What the hell? "Evie! What happened? Why are you leaving?" My heart starts pounding.
"That woman in your hotel room was Gwen, wasn't it, Jake?"
"What?" I’m thrown. Where did this come from? My mind reaches back for the lie I told Evie after Lauren answered my phone. "No. Of course it wasn't. Do you think I would invite Gwen to my hotel room for drinks after the way she treated you?"
"Well, I wasn't exactly thinking you brought her to your hotel room for drinks, Jake. All I know is that you sure did look cozy whispering in her ear in the pictures from the benefit you were at Tuesday night."
It takes only seconds for me to connect the dots. Ah, God, she Googled me and saw that damn picture of Gwen and me at the dinner in San Diego. Fucking Google. I hadn’t thought of that picture once since it was snapped. I run my hand through my hair. How is it that Gwen of all people keeps coming between Evie and me? It’s so ludicrous, I would laugh if Evie wasn’t wearing that wounded expression.
"Evie, that was a company benefit. Gwen was there with her father. She tried to talk to me several times and I wouldn't have much to do with her. When she cornered me in front of a photographer, I leaned in and told her she was lucky that I wasn't the type to want to air my dislike for someone on film. She laughed as if I was joking, which I wasn't. That was that. I didn't talk to her again all evening."
She just keeps looking at me, searching my face. Finally, she takes a deep breath. "I want to believe you, Jake, I just… I don't want to… "
"Evie, listen, God, if you only knew… " I laugh a humorless laugh.
"If I only knew what?"
"If you only knew how ridiculous it is for you to think that I would ever betray you, much less with Gwen. Really, if you could get inside my brain, you'd be laughing too."
"Jake–"
"Please, just trust me. Please don't go."
She continues to search my face, finally giving a very small nod of her head. I release my breath and lead her away from the door, throwing her coat back on the bench in my foyer.
CHAPTER 21
Evie works a catering job the next night and tells me she’s going to get a ride home afterwards. I want her to come home to me, but I’m trying to balance making her feel comfortable in our "new" relationship. This is the hard part for me because I’m so far beyond her emotionally, I think, but sometimes I see a look on her face that tells me her feelings for me are more intense than would make sense for a new relationship. I wonder if she finds it strange. I wonder if she’s been questioning it at all. Then again, she doesn’t have a lot of experience with relationships, so maybe she’s not.
After a meeting at work that day, Preston takes me aside, a look of concern on his face.
"What’s up? Everything okay?" I ask.
"Well, yeah, but I think you should know that Lauren has been making calls to the board. She’s been asking to set up a meeting but she won’t say why."
Ah, shit.
I pause for a minute, considering what she could want with the board and wondering if this is simply because I kicked her out of my hotel room a few nights ago. Is this her new tactic to get at me? I hold the majority of shares, so realistically, there’s not much she’d be able to do. But because I’m the director of the board, I won’t be part of the meeting and I won’t know what she wants until after she’s met with them.
"Okay, well thanks for letting me know, Preston. I’m sorry that family drama is affecting the company."
"It’s doing no such thing. The company is doing great. It’s you I’m worried about."
He pauses for a minute, looking at me, seeming to consider whether to go on.
"You know, I worked very closely with your father. When I visited him in the hospital after his heart attack, he obviously didn’t know that you would be taking over the company as soon as you did, but he made it very, very clear to me that when that time came, he didn’t want Lauren to have anything to do with this company. He asked that if there came a time when I was still here but he wasn’t, that I look out for you. I hope that doesn’t sound condescending. He didn’t mean it that way. I just think that he felt like he had failed you in some way and he wanted to make sure that you knew you had someone on your side under any future circumstances."