“You can’t tell me no.”
My nose flares, and my eyes roll in the slowest wave. “You can’t be serious?” His glare says he is. “Moffy—”
“Maximoff,” he corrects, which makes me shake my head and almost roll my eyes for the thousandth time. Everyone in his family and security uses his nickname. No one but the media and public stick solely to calling him Maximoff. I assume he’s lumping me in with tabloids to try and piss me off.
He motions to me. “For a guy who has such a great memory, you forget to call me by my full name a hell of a lot.”
“Maximoff,” I say with extra flair, and he flips me off with both hands. I barrel ahead with the real issue. “All security would tell you no if they sensed someone with ill-intent wanting to sleep with you. And I’d tell you be smarter than that.”
He’s a billionaire celebrity. Half the population either wants his money, fame, or dick. Most of the time, all three, and some are willing to cross lines for it. Someone could drug him. I could overhear shit-talk that he doesn’t hear.
The list is endless.
He considers my words for barely half a second. “You have to trust my instincts like Declan did.”
My gum is stale in my mouth. “I’ll trust your instincts until they fail you. How about that?”
“Fine. Because they won’t fail me.” He heads to the door and leaves my room.
5
MAXIMOFF HALE
ONE HAND ON THE WHEEL, I drive towards a grocery store. I raise my phone to my lips with the other and speak into a notes app. “Laundry detergent, eggs, dish soap—”
“Lawndo egg soup,” the automated voice reads back.
Are you fucking kidding me? I glare at my phone.
Farrow’s amusement is palpable in the passenger seat. “Brake.”
“Dammit.” I slam on my brakes before I bulldoze into a white sedan. Two days of Farrow as my bodyguard and I’m already feeling the effects.
Scatterbrained.
Rattled.
Sexually tensed up.
I haven’t had sex in 48 hours. I masturbated in the shower this morning, and I tried so goddamn hard not to imagine him. Hot water pelted my squared shoulders, my head dipped forward while warmth doused my brown hair. My left hand was closed into a white-knuckled fist against the tiled wall. My right hand stroked my throbbing cock that stood at hard attention.
Begging for a release.
One fantasy plays on a loop, no matter how much I say off. Turn off. Farrow enters the shower right behind me. Fog steams the glass doors. Layering the stifling heat.
His commanding, assertive presence pushes up against my muscular back. Then his strong arm extends around my build, and his large palm encases my white-knuckled hand on the tiled wall.
He holds tight. Water cascading over the sharp planes and valleys of his muscles. My gaze travels along his inked skin. His soft lips skim the base of my neck. To my ear.
Where he whispers in the deepest, most gravelly voice he owns.
“Maximoff.” Farrow snaps his fingers at my face—shit.
I yank myself out of a fantasy. Coming to the present where I’m driving. Where I’m gripping my phone way too tightly in one hand. Where Farrow is staring at me like I’ve just flown to an unknown dimension. How did I even fall into that shower scene again?
I was just trying to remind myself to forget it. Forever.
Farrow opens his mouth, and before he asks where I mentally departed, I beat him to the punch.
“I was thinking about Janie.” What the fuck is wrong with me? Jane, really? I restrain the urge to cringe. She may be my best friend, but she’s also my cousin. Swiftly, I add, “You know, I’m on my way to see her.” At the grocery. That part is true. We do almost everything together.
Farrow studies me for an even longer moment, not saying anything. I fix the air conditioning. My muscles constricted, body hot. At least I didn’t sweat through my gray crewneck. At least I didn’t get hard.
He extends his arm towards me.
My brows knot at him.
Farrow leaves his arm on the back of my seat. “Do you need a second?”
“For what?” I go absolutely rigid, but my gaze spends half its time on him and half its time on the road. I think he’s about to make a jerking motion with his hand.
His lips slowly rise, and he scratches his brow where his barbell piercings lie. “You seem distracted,” is all he says.
“I’m fine.” I grip the steering wheel ten times harder, and I keep licking my lips like I’m about to say something else. I have nothing to offer except fuck me.
He’s your bodyguard. Yeah, well when I give him that title, it’s starting to make him more attractive. I didn’t think that’d be possible. But when he’s not following me around, I picture him with me. My brain refuses to detach my bodyguard for a single moment of Farrow-free peace.
“Give it.” Farrow motions to my hand.
My phone? “What?”
“Since you won’t let me drive, I can do the bare minimum and type out your grocery list.”
I should let go of this task, but I hesitate to pass it off to Farrow. I enjoy doing shit myself. “You’re not my assistant.”
“I’m the guy trying to ensure you don’t run us both off the road. You obviously need two hands on the wheel, so…” He waves me to release the phone, and in my silence, he adds, “Or you can pull over and let me drive—”
I drop my phone on his lap.
“You really don’t want me to drive.” He puts his boot on his seat, elbow to his bent knee, and he cups my phone. “The day when I finally drive you around will just be much more gratifying.”
“The day,” I say dryly. “You mean the day that’s never happening? That one?” I spot the roll of his eyes before I point at my phone. “Is it unlocked?”
“I’m already in your notes.” He fixes the spelling errors made by the app.
“Janie texted me stuff she needs.” I switch lanes. Two paparazzi vans trail me now, so I constantly check my rearview mirror. “Her text thread should be the top one.”
He lets out a long whistle. “One hundred unread text messages.” I sense his surprise as he says, “You’re actually breaking your moral code.”
I glare and then go for the phone.
He retracts it out of my reach. “Thou shall not ignore thy family.”
“You think you’re so damn smart.” I effortlessly weave between two pick-up trucks and bypass the paparazzi. “Those texts are just from today, Sherlock.” I flick off my blinker.
“You’re serious?”
“Yep. I’m in twelve group chats with different family members.” I have eleven cousins alone. That’s not including my siblings and my parents. Or my aunts and uncles. We all talk. “If I can’t answer during the day, I go through my texts at night.”
He scrolls through Jane’s thread. “If someone has an emergency, what do you do?”
“I’ll glance at the texts in case someone’s freaking out, but most of the time, they’ll call if it’s serious.” I strangely have an easy time freeing these facts. Ones that I generally keep to myself.
I trust him.