His Ransom 4(3)

My heart returned to normal after a couple of minutes, and I felt a chill in the air as he lifted his arm from across my body.

He kissed me softly and then arched his head back, looking at the painting. I looked with him. The black line had been almost completely smudged over. Heck, most of the painting had been completely smudged over.

There were two handprints—one Jake’s, where he had braced himself. One mine, where I had clawed down during my orgasm. And my hair had dragged down a huge smear of red from the top.

“It’s ruined, isn’t it?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Jake said, tilting his head again, this time the other way. “I think I like it with the smears like that.”

“Really?”

“Really,” he said, looking down at me with a grin. “And I think we should definitely have a celebration orgasm for you.”

“A celebration what?”

His hands began to move, stirring the heat inside me, and I wriggled under his grasp. I could feel myself getting ready for more.

“To celebrate another finished painting.”

His mouth came down on me again, and I let myself fall into his embrace.





Chapter Two

It was Jake’s going away dinner, and I was trying to keep myself from getting too nervous. He was inviting a few of his closest friends. And I had invited Steph. After all, she was half-responsible for the mixup that had landed me in Jake’s apartment in the first place. Her brother Andy was coming too, and Rachel, a close friend of ours who was visiting from the New Jersey ranch she lived on.

I thought both of them would drool over Jake and his super-hot, successful friends. And I admit I was excited to show him off. Me, dating a sexy billionaire? Heck yeah!

Well, maybe dating. We hadn’t really talked about our relationship. And Jake had never introduced me to anyone as his girlfriend. I was curious to see if he would say that word tonight. I mean, I’d been staying with him at his apartment for nearly a month. And yet…

The dining room table was all laid out with the silver and china I’d found in the bottom cabinets. Jake was no help with any of the preparations. When I’d found the silverware and asked if we could use it for tonight, he’d only shrugged with a look that told me he didn’t even know he owned silverware.

Jake had insisted on having a chef there to prepare the main dinner. “I don’t want to spend my last dinner with you slaving away in the kitchen,” he’d said. I gave in, but I wanted to show him that I could cook if I needed to.

So I was making the appetizers, and Steph was bringing dessert. As I finished up the first bruschetta plates, Jake came in. He held up his cell phone.

“Guess who just called?”

“Who?” I asked. I half-hoped it would be his business partners calling off his trip.

Jake was leaving tomorrow night for a week to Paris. Some business deal that needed his help with negotiating a contract. It was a magazine conglomerate, and I could just imagine all of the supermodels and sexy businesswomen who’d be working at the place Jake would be going to.

I didn’t want to seem clingy, but I hated the idea of sleeping here in this lavish penthouse apartment without Jake there to warm the place up.

I had to get over these silly emotions. We’d only been together a few weeks, and it would be good to prove to him that I was capable of living independently. I thought of how my parents prided themselves on being independent on their farm.

Jake smiled. His beaming grin wiped all of my anxious feelings away.

“It was a client,” he said.

“A client? For your contract negotiations?” I frowned.

“No, silly,” he said, putting an arm around my hip and kissing the top of my head. “For one of your paintings.”

“Oh. Oh!” I said, realization dawning. “Which painting? What did they offer? Did you say yes?”

“Easy now,” he said, laughing and lifting his hand in mock surrender.

“No! I’m excited!”

“It’s someone who came by the gallery last week. He said he really liked your style. He wanted to stop by again and meet with the artist to pick out a painting. He’ll be by tomorrow.”

“”Meet—wait, meet with me?”

“You’re the artist,” Jake said. He picked up his glass of wine and clinked it against mine that was sitting on the counter, untouched. “Congratulations.”

“I haven’t—I haven’t sold anything yet,” I mumbled. My fingers gripped the kitchen counter. The bruschetta was forgotten.

After a week had passed, Jake had to assure me that the world of art moved slowly. Then two weeks passed, and I became convinced that my art wasn’t worth the canvases it was painted on. Day after day went by, and I was less and less sure that I would ever sell anything. This was an exciting event—a bidder! And he wanted to see me!