With His Consent (For His Pleasure, Book 13) (6 page)

“Depends who you ask these days.”

She didn’t have a chance to follow up on his comment, because their waiter approached. He was tall and boyish, but quite nice. He asked them if they wanted to start with a bottle of wine.

Bryson again looked to Scarlett, but when she hesitated, he just turned back to the waiter. “Yes, we’d like to start with a bottle of your finest red.”

The waiter smiled widely. “Absolutely, sir.”

When he was gone, Scarlett blinked in confusion. “Should we be drinking before our big meeting tomorrow?”

Bryson laughed. “I don’t know about you, but I want to relax a little. The last couple of weeks has been almost criminally intense and I haven’t taken the time to enjoy this ride.”

“Well, that makes sense.”

“Besides, sitting here with you right now,” he said, “I just feel like celebrating the moment.”

She felt her cheeks flush.

This isn’t turning into a date, is it?
she asked herself, frightened but also hoping that maybe it was.

“We definitely should celebrate the fact that we both still have jobs,” she said.

“I’ll drink to that.”

“And obviously you should take the time to appreciate all of the success you’ve experienced recently.”

“Exactly.” He nodded his approval. “That’s the spirit.”

The waiter returned with the wine and poured a small amount as a sample.

Bryson took a sip. “Wonderful.”

Two full glasses were poured and then the bottle was placed front and center.

Bryson ordered a medium rare prime rib, and Scarlett got the chicken breast and risotto.

As she drank her wine, Scarlett felt the tension slowly drain from her shoulders and legs. The room was growing warmer and somehow duller, but in a luxurious way, as though her senses were more attuned to the little sphere that only she and Bryson inhabited at that moment.

“This is good,” she admitted, sipping yet again.

“We can always get another bottle.”

“Careful there, Killer,” she joked. “Let’s just see how we do with this one.”

“This reminds me of dinners with my family, growing up,” Bryson said, swishing the red liquid around in his glass. “After my dad won a big case, he’d take all of us out to this Italian restaurant and we’d have a huge meal, and the wine would flow.”

“Your father was a lawyer?” Scarlett asked, surprised. Somehow Bryson hadn’t struck her as the type to come from a serious, intellectual family. Actually, she hadn’t really ever thought about what kind of family Bryson had come from. The thought was foreign to her – that Bryson was a person who had a family, a father, a mother, possibly sisters and brothers. But now that the idea had occurred to her, she was surprised to find that she wanted to know as much about him as she could.

“It always takes people by surprise who haven’t known me very long.” His blue eyes landed on her and his red lips hooked into a slight smile. “Actually, I come from a long line of lawyers, including my grandfathers on both sides. Both of my siblings are currently practicing at big firms.”

Scarlett sat back. “Wow. And you didn’t take up the family business?”

His eyes grew distant. “No.”

“Sorry,” Scarlett said, worried that her questions might have caused him to clam up. “I didn’t intend to pry.”

He picked up the bottle of wine and poured more for both of them. “No, it’s fine,”

he said. “I’m happy with the choices I’ve made—well…most of them, anyway.”

“Did you ever think you might become a lawyer?”

He nodded. “I finished two years of law school. Was at the top of my class when I dropped out.”

Scarlett felt like her eyes might bug out of her head. “You almost graduated law school?”

“I went to Stanford just like my dad.” He laughed and shook his head. “The look on your face right now is priceless, Scarlett.”

“I’m sorry, this—it’s just not what I would have guessed. You strike me more as a football player, a surfer—one of those guys who was always throwing a party in high school and running the frat house in college.”

“Jeez, thanks.” His eyes lit on hers again. “I’m glad to know you think so highly of me.”

“It’s not that.” She blushed. “I just mean—”

“I know what you mean. It’s okay, I get it.” He sighed. “And I was a jock. I played football—captain my junior and senior year. I also carried a solid 4.0 GPA and was Homecoming King. Your typical rich, entitled white boy from California.”

Scarlett shook her head. “I’m still in shock.”

“Yeah, well join the club. So is everyone else in my family. Nobody saw it coming when I dropped out of law school.”

She fiddled with the napkin in her lap, still torn between wanting to know more about this man and not wanting to scare him away from this line of conversation. “Do you mind me asking why?”

“Why I dropped out?”

She nodded.

He seemed about to answer, but before he could, the waiter came bearing plates of food. He asked if they needed anything else, and Bryson ordered another bottle of red.

When the waiter departed, the moment seemed to have passed, and both of them were quiet as they ate some of their food. Finally, Bryson looked up at her.

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Yeah. What’s your story?”

Scarlett wiped her lips with a napkin. Her thoughts spun with possible answers.

“It’s a very long story,” she told him.

His expression grew quizzical. “We’re not in any rush.”

She thought about just how much she wanted to divulge, and whether she wanted to risk somehow disappointing him or depressing both of them. “Just think about your own life and make everything opposite—and then you’ll know what my childhood was like.”

His brow creased. “You played soccer?”

Scarlett laughed. “Not quite what I meant.”

“I take it you didn’t come from a family of wealthy attorneys.”

“No. Very much not attorneys. I’ve been working since I was fifteen. I was living on my own when I was sixteen.”

He gave a slight nod of understanding, but didn’t say anything. Scarlett appreciated this. On the rare occasions that she talked about her past, people were quick to say they were sorry, or that it must have been rough. And while she appreciated these sentiments, sometimes they didn’t seem genuine, but more like the person saying them was merely reciting a line.

“I don’t even know my father. My mother is remarried and I have two half-sisters that I almost never speak to.” She averted her eyes at this last part, not wanting to see the sympathy in his eyes.

“Now I’m the one who’s surprised,” he said. But there was no trace of judgment in his voice. “I didn’t expect to hear any of that from you.”

“Sorry.” She picked at her risotto. “I guess my story’s not really light reading.”

He leaned forward suddenly and his eyes flashed with quiet intensity. “Hey, I don’t need you to have a happy story.”

Scarlett found that she wanted to cry—could feel her eyes tearing up. It must be the wine, she decided. “Thanks for saying that.”

He reached across the table and took her hand. His skin was surprisingly soft, and his hand was so big that it enveloped hers. Her breath caught in her throat. She wanted him to hold her hand. More than that, she wanted him to hold her body, to tell her it was okay. And if he started to kiss her, and his hands were strong and held her tightly, that would be even better.

But then the distant part of herself reasserted its existence, with an emphatic shock to her system. A jolt of fear went up her spine as she realized how close she was to crossing the line with him.

She pulled her hand back slowly and shook her head. “Sorry,” she said. “You shouldn’t have to be comforting me. It’s not professional of me.”

He leaned back, like he was going to protest. But then he just nodded. “You’re right.” He laughed. “Sorry. I’m the one who should know better. I just pictured you as this fifteen-year-old kid, taking everything on your shoulders and working and having to grow up fast. It made me want to comfort you, somehow.”

And I want you to comfort me. Ask to hold my hand again and I’ll say yes.

“You don’t have to apologize,” she said.

They fell into silence, and finished the meal not long after. Scarlett felt badly about the way it had ended, as if she’d missed an opportunity to truly connect with Bryson.

As they left the dining room, he talked at length about how hopeful he was that they could convince the owner to let them use the hotel in their film.

“I’m going to tell him that it’s a central character in the movie,” Bryson said. “I mean, it’s a stretch, but not that much of a stretch.”

They walked back down the long hallway together. Scarlett couldn’t stop imagining the two of them holding hands, together under different circumstances. Here for a weekend away, laughing and talking and looking forward to going back to the room, where it would be a certainty that they’d soon feel one another’s warm, bare skin and she could almost taste Bryson’s salty lips against her own.

When they arrived at their room on the second floor, Bryson turned to her and asked if she was ready for the big reveal.

“I’ve never been more ready.”

He laughed and inserted his key, opened the door. The room was smaller than expected, with a canopy over the bed, an old looking television set and ancient wallpaper.

It was very intimate, and both of them grew a little uncomfortable as they surveyed the space.

“So…I don’t think there’s a lot of room to crash on the floor,” he said.

“Oh, that’s…nobody has to sleep on the floor. It’s hardwood. It would be awful.”

“You sure?” he said, looking at her evenly.

She felt her nipples stiffen and her breath catch again in her chest as his gaze seemed to pierce her through and through. “I’m sure.”

He dropped his computer bag and yawned. “Damn, it’s just hitting me how tired I am.”

“Me too,” she lied. In actuality it felt like all of her senses were jumping and alive. She was excited, much too excited for her own good.

“Mind if I use the bathroom first?” he asked her.

“Not at all.”

“Hey, would you mind calling down and seeing if they could bring us up a couple of toothbrushes and toothpaste?”

“Sure.”

She was back to the one-word responses again.

Bryson smiled and went into the bathroom. When the door shut, she exhaled with relief. Every fiber of her was fluttering with aliveness, attraction so intense that it completely undid her. She hadn’t felt this way in a very long time, maybe since the first time she’d laid eyes on Hunter.

But even Hunter hadn’t ever quite had this effect on her. Hunter had been so damaged and miserable when she’d first met him that it had blunted some of his appeal.

Whereas Bryson was growing on her in a way that she’d never anticipated upon first meeting.

He had layers.

And the way he’d looked at her when he’d said that he didn’t need her to have a happy story….

It gave her chills, just remembering it.

She got on the phone to the front desk, and they said someone would be up with the toiletries in a moment.

After hanging up, she sat down on the bed and tried to gather her thoughts. What was she going to wear to sleep in?

She couldn’t wear her clothes to bed, because they’d end up filthy and smelly the next morning. Scarlett wrinkled her nose.

After debating about it, she decided just to wear her bra and panties. She would wait until the light was off before stripping down, and then she’d make sure to wrap the blanket around her so that Bryson couldn’t inadvertently touch her bare skin.

Why don’t you just sleep naked while you’re at it?

The thought had a distinct appeal. Scarlett wished she were drunker, because than all of this would have been so much easier.

Someone knocked at the door not long after that, and she opened it to find an older, round-faced woman bringing the requested toiletries.

Scarlett thanked her and took them, making sure to give her a generous tip before closing the door again.

Then she went to the bathroom door and knocked twice. Seconds later, Bryson opened the door wearing just his boxers.

She tried not to act as surprised as she was. He, on the other hand, seemed totally comfortable with his lack of clothing. “Thanks, Scarlett,” he said, grabbing the things from her stiff hands. “You’re the best,” he winked. Then he spun and she got a distinct look at his sculpted behind and chiseled back as he shut the door behind him.

It closed and she stepped back from the bathroom, the image of his muscular, semi-nude body still vivid in her mind.

She waited, not knowing what to do with herself while he readied for bed in the other room.

Eventually he came out, still clothed only in his shorts, carrying his clothes in his hands and placing them on top of the antique bureau by the window. “Your turn,” he said, gazing outside.

“Huh?” She was still staring at his toned, perfect body. His abs were like something out of a magazine. He was wiry but strong, and she could almost feel his hands on her, caressing, the way his chest would feel pressing down on hers.

He turned from the window and looked at her. It was obvious that she’d been staring at his body.

Scarlett averted her gaze.

“You can use the bathroom now,” he said, smirking.

“Oh, yeah. Thanks.” She went to the bathroom and brushed her teeth, washed her face, and then emerged.

Bryson was in bed, waiting, arms behind his head, watching her. “You’re sleeping in your clothes?”

“Could you turn your light off?” she asked, by way of answering.

He made a nonchalant face. “Sure.” Then he leaned over and turned off the lamp by his bedside.

There was still a lamp on in the corner of the room. Scarlett walked quickly over and turned it off. Now the room was bathed in darkness, but for the moonlight streaming in through the one window.

Scarlett used that light to navigate back to the bed. When she got to her side, she quickly took off her clothes and put them down on a chair nearby. She was in nothing but her bra and panties, and she was anxious that Bryson could see as much.