Becoming The Boss. Zuri Day
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the darkened shadows behind her, she cleared her throat, ‘Lights?’ she said, and hoped she didn’t sound as jittery as she felt.
Bending at the waist, he leaned sideways to press a button on the tall glass nightstand and the opaque ceiling flickered for one, two, three beats of her thundering heart before the night sky shone down upon the room, ablaze with a million twinkling stars.
The sheer magnificence pulled her eyes wide. ‘Seriously?’
He plucked a large red apple from the colourful mound of ripe delicacies toppling from a crystal bowl, then straightened up and raised one of his heart-stopping smiles.
Just like that her unease drifted, melted like a chilled snowflake on a new spring breeze.
Moonlight frosted his body, from the open white linen draping his sides to the wide bronzed strip of naked torso in between, taking his powerful beauty from angelic to supernatural. Otherworldly. Dazzling, magical and utterly surreal.
And she forgot all about not looking at him, suddenly entranced.
He tucked one hand beneath his head, tossed the glistening red fruit up into the air with the other and his honed six-pack flexed and bunched—the sight bringing a mist of perspiration to her skin.
‘So. Come back for more, Miss Scott?’
His sinful rasp shattered the spell he wove so effortlessly and she gave herself a good shake. The man was lethal.
‘I have heard my mouth is highly addictive.’
Serena raised a brow and hoped she looked suitably unimpressed. She had no desire to stroke his ego or any other part of him ever again. ‘Such a…tempting offer, Mr St George, but I think I’ll pass. Your reputation has been highly exaggerated.’
Apple to his lips, he sank his teeth into the crisp flesh with a loud crunch and she dredged the taste of tart flesh from her memory banks, making her mouth water.
‘Ah. Must have been the champagne, then.’
‘What must have been the champagne?’ she murmured, distracted by the rhythmic working of his lean jaw. It truly was not good form to be so sexy even when eating. ‘The champagne, incidentally, that I did not drink.’
‘The weakening of your knees,’ he drawled, with a wicked satisfaction that rolled over her in hot waves before he let loose an irrepressible grin that seared her nerves.
One day… She thought. One day she was going to wipe that smirk off his face once and for all. The thought that today was as good a day as any made her let loose a smile of her very own.
Strangely, he froze mid-bite. As if her smile affected him just as much as his did her. The mere notion that he had the power to make her believe such a thing made her temper spike.
‘Speaking of knees—I’m going to bring you down on yours, pretty boy.’
A curious tension drew the magnificent lines of his body taut, precisely as before, and she racked her brain to figure out the trigger. All she could think was that there was more to this man than met the eye.
In the next instant he relaxed. ‘I do hope that’s a promise, Seraphina. I’d be more than happy to oblige.’
Blowing out a pent-up breath, she deliberated over how long she could ride this roller coaster of emotion with Finn at the helm before she plunged to her doom.
Especially when he licked his lips hungrily and dropped his feral blue eyes to the seam of her jeans, to the zipper leading down to the tight curve of her femininity. From nowhere an image of Finn on his knees before her as she stood bathed in moonlight slammed into her mind’s eye. Oh, God.
Ribbons of heat spun in her veins, moving through her blood in an erotic dance. Her skin was suddenly super-sensitive, and her nipples chafed seductively against the soft fabric of her plain white bra. The shockingly carnal expression on his face made her wonder if he’d visualised the very same.
As if. He’s just trying to distract you again and you’re letting him!
She stiffened her spine and ordered her voice to sweet. ‘Oh, I’m so glad. In that case, let me be the first to tell you the good news.’
Crossing one bare foot over the other, he leaned back with more of the insolence he’d doubtless been born with. ‘Somehow I don’t believe you mean good in the literal sense.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. We could learn a lot from each other, you and I.’
The true meaning of that statement lay between them, gathering momentum with every passing second. It would take time, of course. To get him to talk. To unearth his secrets. To make him crack. Thankfully she had all the time in the world.
Another flash of perfect teeth sinking into white flesh. Another lazy crunch. Another sexy swallow gliding down his throat. ‘I doubt that.’
The lack of innuendo suffused her with pleasure and a heady sense of power. It seemed she was finally getting somewhere.
‘Why don’t you enlighten me, Miss Scott? Your excitement is palpable and I find I can barely stand the suspense.’
She deflected that sarcasm with a breezy flick of her hair off her shoulder. ‘I would love to enlighten you, Mr St. George. Me and you? We’re about to be stuck like glue.’
A shadow of trepidation passed over his face before he cocked an arrogant brow. ‘And the punchline is…?’
Musing that the word babysitter didn’t quite have the right ring to it, she let her impetuous mouth stretch the truth, not really giving a stuff.
‘You’re looking at your new boss.’
FANS DESCENDED ON Monaco in their droves and celebrities flocked to the world’s most glamorous sporting event of the year for the exhilarating rush of lethal speed and intoxicating danger. So it didn’t bode well that Finn stood in the shade of the Scott Lansing garage, his temples thudding with a messy blend of sleep-deprivation and toxic emotional clatter.
He had to get it together. Get that little minx out of his head.
Hauling in air, he rolled his neck, searching for the equilibrium he needed, knowing full well the smallest of errors in these narrow streets were fatal. Overtaking almost impossible… And didn’t that just make him smile? Feel infinitely better as a fuel injection of hazardous adrenaline shot through his bloodstream?
Monaco was hands down his favourite circuit in the world: the greatest challenge on the racing calendar. It never failed to feed his wildness and remind him that life was for living. A master at shutting off fear and anxiety, he was a man who existed in the moment. Life was too short.
Seize the day.
Finn closed his eyes, tried to block the memory those words always evoked. But of late, since he’d touched hell itself, his past refused to stay buried.
Thirteen years old and he’d watched his Glamma—the woman who’d been a second mother to him—die a slow, agonising death. ‘Glamma, because I’m far too young and vivacious to be Gran,’ the award-winning actress would declare.
Even when she’d been sick and he’d sworn his heart was breaking—‘Carpe diem, Finn, seize the day,’ she’d say theatrically, with a glint in her eye that had never failed to make him smile. ‘That’s better. Always remember: frown and you frown alone, smile and the whole world smiles with you.’
Yeah, he remembered. How could he possibly forget a legend who had been far too young and vibrant for her passage to the heavens. Then, when the cancer had seeped into the next generation and his mother’s time had come—spreading more grief and heartache through his family,