Billionaire Romance Boxed Set 2(121)

We stepped out of the restaurant, a little tipsy, after Asher paid the waiter for our meal. The food was as delicious as I imagined—probably better—but the price!

“Did you really just pay three hundred dollars for our lunch?” I asked him after sneaking a peek at the bill.

Asher shrugged, nonchalant. “They included the tip in the bill,” he said.

He held my arm in his as we walked down the street towards his car. I felt nice then, sophisticated. Asher was a gentleman, if nothing else, and he more than acted the part. His free hand reached across the front of his torso towards where my arm held onto his and he placed his fingers on my hand in a silent gesture.

Safe, it said. You’re safe, don’t worry. Safe and mine. I wanted to think the last part was at least somewhat true, but I knew it couldn’t be. We’d discussed this before leaving.

“We need to stop this,” he had said. “You’re an attractive woman, but I’m married, and—”

Yes. It didn’t really matter what he said, but I understood it. I completely agreed with him no matter how much I didn’t want to.

The bright, noontime sun shone down on us as we turned the corner. People passed us by on the streets, barely giving us a second glance. Did they think we were a couple? I wondered about that. We might look somewhat like it. I eased closer to him, tried to relax and act as if we’d known each other for longer than a couple of days. Relaxed, friendly, intimate, close.

I tilted my head, just a little bit, and rested the side of my forehead on his shoulder. He smiled and looked over at me. If I moved my face up, turned my chin just so, I could have snuck in for a quick kiss.

“Are you alright?” he asked, concerned.

“Yes,” I said. “I’m just a little tired. The sake, maybe.”

I wasn’t tired, not at all. The alcohol was doing some things, but that wasn’t the reason I had my head on his shoulder. It made a wonderful excuse, though.

We stopped in front of a black car with tinted windows. As soon as Asher approached, I heard the click of a door unlocking. Asher reached for the door handle, pulled on it, and swept open the door for me. Reluctantly, I let go of his arm and stepped into the car.

The back seat was bigger than it looked from the outside. I sat on the plush leather and shimmied over to give Asher room to come in, too. Stretching my legs out as far as they could go, I still had a few more inches before my toes would touch the back of the drivers seat. Asher grinned and slipped in beside me.

“Where to, boss?” the man in the driver’s seat asked.

“Home, Jeremy,” Asher said. “To the guest house, though. Jessika and I have private business arrangements to discuss, so I’d rather not go to the main house for now.”

“Sure thing. Not a problem,” Jeremy said.

Asher nodded, the car started, and we were off. That was that, and I expected a typical ride to wherever we were off to, except Asher had other things in mind. Touching a switch on the hand rest next to him, a piece of dark, thick glass rose up from behind the front seats and blocked my view of the road in front of us. Presumably it blocked Jeremy’s view of us, too. Asher confirmed as much.

“I thought you might like the privacy,” he said. “If not I’ll lower it again.”

I shrugged, smiled, nonchalant. “It’s fine.”

“Relax if you want,” Asher added. “Buckle your seat belt? Or not? Shall we live on the wild side?”

“Ooh!” I said with mock enthusiasm. “Dangerous, are we?”

He laughed. “As dangerous as we can be with a chauffeur with an impeccable driving record.”

I decided on not buckling my seat belt, but for other, possibly even more dangerous reasons.

I don’t know what came over me, and I don’t think I would have done this regularly, but my hand crept towards the buttons of my chemise and I undid the top one. Asher took no notice as I did this, instead peering out the window at something or other. I undid the next button, and the next, letting loose a sizable amount of my cleavage. Then another, and one more. As I undid the last button, revealing a thin line of bare flesh from the top of my neck to the curves of my waist, hindered only by my lacy white bra, Asher glanced over at me.

It took him a few seconds to register what I had done and what I was doing, but once he did he merely stared. This wasn’t quite the reaction I wanted, nor did I know what to do next, so I fiddled with the last button and waited for him to speak.

“Jessika…” His voice trailed off.

“I…” I said. What did I want? What was this? “I thought we could start the modeling early?”