Chapter One
Damian Rule sat in the reception area of the sports-themed hair salon and wondered for the hundredth time why in the hell he continued to come to this place. It was inconvenient, far out of the way of both his condo and his downtown office. Furthermore, the ambiance was intrusive; the lighting was harsh and a continual stream of commentaries about sporting events that he didn't give a shit about blared from several flat-screen televisions scattered around.
As he surveyed the room with set features, he acknowledged that the employees who worked here and the clientele that frequented this establishment weren't the type of people he usually mixed with. But he'd come in one day out of desperation for a haircut when he'd been on this side of town, and he'd been coming back ever since. True, the stylist here did a fairly decent job, but certainly not so amazing that he couldn't do without her.
As the woman in question came to get him for his appointment and immediately started babbling and rummaging through the top drawer in her unit before she began, Damian tuned her out and let his eyes wander around the part of the room that he could observe from the reflection in the mirror.
He didn't see what he was looking for right away, but he continued to watch the mirror. The place was busy; it always was. Several stylists moved around, either standing at their stations tending to cuts, or leading customers to and from the row of sinks. After a few more minutes of patient observation, his diligence was rewarded with a slight motion at the back of the store that caught his attention. Ahhhh. . . there she was.
Her dark head was bent over something she was mixing in a small bowl, and at the sight of her feminine form and downcast eyes, Damian felt the same tightening in his groin that he felt every time he saw her. As he continued to watch her, he acknowledged to himself exactly what it was that kept bringing him back to this particular salon time and time again. He didn't come here for the location, or for the stylist who cut his hair, or for the sporting events that were broadcast during business hours. It was none of those things.
It was the woman he was looking at now. The stylist who held his attention, the one who went by the name of Angie.
Damian rolled the syllables through his head and let the connotation of the name bring an image to his brain. Angie. Angela. Angel.
His mouth twisted into a smirk. Angel. Yeah, right.
The girl didn't resemble an angel in any way, shape or form. Unless, of course, you counted the fact that she could undoubtedly take him to heaven with those full lips of hers.
Fuck.
He needed to get her out of his mind; he knew he did. But how the hell was he supposed to accomplish that when he kept letting his dick lead him back here every time he needed a damn haircut? He'd been coming here, watching her for months. It was absolutely, undeniably, fucking amazing that Damian had been able to sit still and only observe her for this long. She did shit to his insides, that . . . fuck. He took a deep breath and steeled his guts. He didn't want to think about what she did to his insides.
Unable to fight the compulsion, he continued to watch her, as if his eyes were magnets drawn to metal. His cock swelled against his jeans as he studied her. Yeah, an angel, she wasn't. In fact, she was possibly just the opposite. Although she moved with an unconscious grace, the girl certainly wasn't peaches and cream; no, she had the darkly intoxicating look of wickedness about her. She was a feminine, appealing, begging to be fucked little devil.
She was a hot, slender, gothic mess.
She looked to be about medium in height, maybe smaller, but he couldn't really tell because she always wore black platform heels that boosted her height and made the legs beneath the black fishnet stockings look amazing. He had no way of knowing if she always wore short skirts, or if it was just his luck, but every time he saw her, she was in a skirt so short it almost made him come, just from watching her. She was totally amazing, totally fuckable. . . absolutely fuckable enough to keep him coming back here just to get another look at her, over and over again, no matter how much he fought against it.
Each time he walked in here, he expected to find that his mind and his libido had only been playing tricks on him. There was no way she could be as hot as he'd imagined the time before.
But she always was.
She was always hot, but she wasn't always perfect. Sometimes she looked weary, indisputably tired. But when her make-up wasn't impeccable and her smile wasn't firmly in place, those were the times when he wanted to fuck her the most, when she looked almost vulnerable, and he wanted nothing more than to pick her up and wrap her legs around his waist and plow deep inside.
He shouldn't like to see her weary, but he did, because when she was noticeably tired, those were the only times when she'd slip up and actually let herself take a peek at him. Most of the time, she blatantly ignored him.
Dressed as she was, it would seem as if she'd have an attitude, but she didn't. It was incongruent with the way she looked, but she didn't put out vibes, she didn't try to flirt with him, as most women did.
She ignored him as if he didn't exist. It made the hunter inside sit up and take notice, but he always tamped it down and remained in control. But when she was tired and he caught her looking at him from beneath her long eyelashes, his insides would combust with heat and his veins would fuel with lust. His imagination would run rampant and he'd imagine himself stomping across the room and hauling her off her feet, sinking his hands into the soft flesh of her ass and carrying her to the room in the back. He'd strip her until she was butt-assed-naked and then he'd fuck her standing up, he'd come hard inside of her and she'd melt around him, her core hot and wet while she exploded in ecstasy around him.
The fantasy of fucking her screwed with him every time he came in here, and it continued to screw with him every time he left. In his brain, he'd already fucked her every way possible and then some. He'd fucked her standing up, he'd fucked her on all fours, he'd fucked her in his office while restraining her to his desk.
He gritted his teeth and swallowed hard, trying to dispel the image, but he couldn't. He'd had bad, bad thoughts about this girl. Never, ever before in his fucking life had he had thoughts like he'd had about her.
Usually when he thought about fucking, it was only about fucking. It was about relief. But not with this girl. He wanted to restrain her. He wanted control.
He took a deep breath to steady his nerves and let his gaze run up and down her length, almost against his will. He tried to focus on the reality of the situation and attempted to push the fantasies from his brain. But the reality kept intruding; he wanted to fuck her more every time he saw her. And his analytical brain knew the reason why. It was because she was so wrong for him.
She was exactly the opposite of the kind of woman he usually went for. The exact opposite of the kind of woman he needed to eventually marry. One who would take her place by his side and give his home life the type of conservative grounding that he needed, staying in the background while he expanded the family business. Whether he liked to or not, he was forced to entertain on numerous occasions, and those times would only increase the larger and more varied the Rule Corporation became.
He knew what he needed; he needed someone perfectly coiffed, someone who dressed conservatively, someone highly educated who could entertain his guests when the time came. But not the woman his mother had been hinting at lately. Never her. He at least needed to be attracted to the woman he'd eventually marry, and Courtney Powell didn't even make his cock twitch, no matter how sweetly pretty she was. She was nice enough, pleasant even. But he'd known her since she was a small child, and the close relationship their respective mothers had shared had left him with an almost familial feeling toward her.
Although the woman his mother kept pushing at him would never do, he realized that he did need someone from his world, not someone like the gothic witch across the room who wore spiked cuffs on her wrists, chains that hung from her belt, and a skirt so short her ass almost showed. He needed someone polished, not someone who wore black eye shadow and purple lipstick. He needed someone refined, not someone who looked as if she chanted to the dark lord of the underworld and wanted nothing more from him than to drink his blood.
No, the girl he couldn't drag his eyes away from was none of the things he needed in his future, so she might as well be off-limits to him. He ran his hooded gaze up and down her body again in almost painful regret. He needed a wife and she was so fucking unsuitable.
But so perfect for the fucking he wanted to give her.
Angie turned away from delivering the color she had mixed for Rita and practically slammed into a clearly panicked Janice. The woman's face was pale and she held her cell phone clutched to her chest. "I've got to go. Like right now."
A sliver of immediate concern landed in Angie's stomach. "What's wrong?"
"The school called. Bethany's running a high fever and throwing up."
"Oh, poor baby. Okay, no problem; I've got you covered."
"I'll run go get her and then I'll call and cancel my last two appointments from home, but can you take care of him?" Janice's eyes grew even wider as she tipped her head in the direction of the man who Angie had begun thinking of as Damian, the Devil Incarnate.
Her heart skipped a beat as she focused on him. Her stomach tripped up with butterflies, but she pasted a look of bravado on her face that she was far from feeling, so that her friend would be reassured. "Sure. I'll take care of him. You go on. Take care of Bethany."