He steps closer, the manly scent of him filling my lungs. "If you're not here tomorrow, I'll consider our agreement void."
Then he's gone.
Chapter 21
Jax
I force myself to walk away from Cate without looking back, but my stomach is in knots, my thoughts roiling in my brain.
She's so unbelievably fucking sweet … and so dirty, so hot for me that even though she's terrified of getting fired she still can't help herself. She still comes to the meetings and lets me pin her up against the wall and finger-fuck her until she explodes against my fingers.
You're falling for her.
I shove the thought out of my head. Even if it's true.
Especially because it's true.
What I feel for Cate cannot be allowed to cloud my judgment.
At the same time, I can't stop seeing her. Something in me demands it.
That's exactly why we have the arrangement we do.
Thirty minutes.
Four weeks.
Four walls.
An end date with no exceptions.
The second you start making exceptions and ceding power, you're setting yourself up for a fall.
I won't even entertain the thought of makeup meetings for the two she missed while she was in LA. I won't show her that kind of weakness. Not now, not ever.
Now that I've given her a perfectly clear idea of what she'll be missing if she ends this now, before the month is up, there's something else I need to do.
Prove to myself that when this is over, I'll be able to go back to the person I was before. Wining and dining and fucking without a care in the world.
As Peter steers the car through the New York City streets, I ignore the activity on the sidewalks around me and pull out my phone.
Christian lets it ring three times before he answers.
"What the hell, Jax? You never call. This kind of girlish behavior isn't like you."
"We're going out," I shout into the phone, pumping my voice full of enthusiasm that I don't really feel. "I need to forget a girl."
"You've never had trouble with that before." He laughs into the phone.
On an impulse, I throw him a bone. "I'm in over my head with a woman from the magazine I acquired, if you must know, you asshole."
"Say no more."
"Meet me at the club at 9:00. Bring women."
The Purple Swan is, without question, New York City's most exclusive dining club. A membership here costs more than most people who consider themselves to be upper class make in six months. It doesn't make a dent in my net worth.
And the food is goddamn amazing. This isn't one of those places that charges a fortune for admission and then lets the details slip.
Christian brings a Victoria's Secret model for himself. For me, he brings an heiress with auburn hair who could be a model but doesn't have to. Both of them are vivacious and for a moment, when they arrive at the table, each with a hand on one of Christian's elbows, I think this might be the ticket. This could be the woman who helps me get my heart back where it fucking belongs-out of the office, away from Cate.
Christian gives me a wink as he introduces the two women. "This is Charlotte," he says, indicating his flawless date. "You probably saw her walk in this year's VS Fashion Show. She's an angel in real life, too."
Charlotte swats him on the arm and sizes me up. Her blonde hair is either naturally that color or the dye job is the best I've ever seen. She's practically glowing in a skintight black gown that gives new meaning to the black tie dress code.
I stand up and pull out a chair for my date, giving her a smile I know is a winner with virtually every woman. She does not disappoint.
"Vivian," she says in a low, husky, lounge-singer voice that has my cock at attention.
"Hello, Vivian," I say as she slides gracefully into her seat. "I'm so glad you could come." I take my seat next to her, across from Christian.
This is going to be fun.
"Christian said you're a bit of a loner, but I told him not to lie to me." Her dark eyes are teasing.
"What makes you think I need constant company?"
"Let's be honest with each other," she says, smiling impishly. "You and Mr. Colt are always on the gossip sites online."
I don't confirm or deny it, just give her my signature half smile. She bites her lip. "Don't believe everything you read."
"Jax, tone it down-she has to keep her panties on in the club."
"Lying doesn't look good on you, Chris."
We're all laughing when the waiter comes with the first round of cocktails. Christian has picked the perfect women to spend the evening with.
I only have one complaint.
Neither of them are Cate.
By the end of the night, I'm tipsy from I don't know how many drinks. The five-star chefs at the Swan sent plates to our table all night, and as the hours passed they got more inventive. Vivian and Charlotte called it quits long before Chris and I did, and now the food is sitting heavily in my stomach. I hate that feeling, hate how it's a direct result of my own lack of self-control.
She's getting to me.
We're heading out the exit of the club, a small door on a less-traveled side street.
The relatively private exit is one of the selling points for the club's clientele, so the last thing I expect is the flash of cameras in my face the moment we step onto the sidewalk.
"What the fuck?" I say angrily, shielding my eyes with my hands. Why the hell would the few remaining paparazzi in the city be interested in a dinner party on a Thursday night? There are far more interesting people to follow around than me.
One glance at Vivian tells me exactly why they're here.
She doesn't bother to look surprised. She just tightens her grip on my elbow and holds her head high so they can get a clear shot of her face.
Christian shoots me a look over her head that tells me he didn't know about this shit, and I believe him.
Vivian, for all her witty jokes, wanted more time in the gossip spotlight.
I'm not going to give her much.
Keeping my face completely blank, I head for the car and step in, Vivian following close behind me. Peter closes the door and comes around the car at a jog. He's behind the wheel in a matter of seconds.
Once Vivian sees my face, the smile drops from hers.
"What's your address?" I ask bluntly.
She rattles it off.
"Take us there, Peter. We're just dropping off."
Chapter 22
Cate
Jax kissed me so hard, with so much pent-up need, that he bruised my lip. I can't help testing it with my teeth every few minutes for the rest of the evening.
He left me standing in his office, my panties ruined from his attentions, and I stayed there, fingertips against my bottom lip, for longer than I should have.
If you're not here tomorrow, I'll consider our agreement void.
It sounded so serious, the way he said it. But I can't pretend any more. It's true; we didn't sit down and sign some kind of contract. He asked, and I accepted. So far he's kept up his end of the deal.
I'm the one who hasn't.
Why? Why?
Because of your job, I tell myself as rationally as I can. Because of your career. Because there are things in life you need to work to avoid.
That's not even an argument.
I drop my head into my hands.
It's a month. It's only a month. And at some point, I'm going to have to let something else into my life other than work.
I do need this. I do need him.
I'm not going to waste another minute denying myself the raw pleasure of him. That's all I'm ever going to get from Jax. He's made that clear, over and over, and as a grown woman it's unattractive to be so indecisive, so timid about taking what I want.
It shouldn't be this hard, given how the demands of my job have sharpened my usual drive into a cutting point and made it simple for me to power through any work situation, handle any so-called emergency in the office.
I've made up my mind. Tomorrow, I'm going to start taking advantage of the time I have left with Jax. Give myself to him, completely, and leave my feelings out of it.
Tomorrow, I'll be on time.
At my session with Carl I'm on fire.
I tossed and turned the night away, my heart thundering like a jackhammer on speed. I've never wanted to wish my life away, but I wish I could just get through this day, get to 5:00, get to Jax, and set everything straight.
Thank God Carl agreed to meet me on a Friday, after I missed Wednesday and Thursday.
"Jesus, Cate," he says as we step off the mats, sweat running down his face. "What's gotten into you? Did somebody piss you off yesterday at work?"
"In a way," I say. That person was me. I've had enough of being so weak-willed, and I'm done with it.
I might have slightly overdone it during the workout, however, because my heart rate takes much longer than normal to come down. The edges of my vision seem blurred-pressurized, almost-but I'm determined to blink it away.
In the car on the way back to my apartment, I scan through my email.
Nothing there. I answered a lot of messages in my energetic frenzy last night, so the morning should be relatively peaceful. Knock on wood.
On a whim, I open up one of the many social media apps on my phone. I used to be pretty active with posting and sharing photos, but work takes up so much of my mind now that I hardly look at the feeds.