I watch the sunlight slowly creep toward her hand, her slender fingers curled around a coffee mug. Rayne hasn’t noticed me yet. She leans against the kitchen island, staring out through the floor-to-ceiling windows at the gardens beyond.
Her hair falls loose around her shoulders, catching the light. Gold on gold. She’s still in a pair of pajamas slightly bigger than her size—a silk short-sleeved button-down top and shorts. It shouldn’t be provocative. But the casual intimacy of her in my kitchen, comfortable enough to let her guard down when she thinks no one's watching...
I want to memorize this moment.
“Sleep well?” I ask, stepping into the kitchen.
She startles, coffee sloshing dangerously close to the rim of her mug. “Jesus. You scared me. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“You startle so easily. Should I start wearing a bell around my neck to announce my presence?”
A smile tugs at the corner of her mouth. “If you want.”
I cross to the coffee machine, hyperaware of how the air changes when I pass near her. The slight intake of her breath. The way her body tenses, not with fear but anticipation. The widening of her eyes.
So she affects me pretty much the same way I affect her. Good.
“You have quite the place here,” she says, aiming for casual. Failing. Cute. “I explored a little this morning. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Did you go to the basement?”
“No, why?”
“Good, then I wouldn’t have to kill you.”
“What do you—” Realization dawns on her, and she laughs. The sound is so sweet I’d bottle it if I could. “Oh my God, you have such a dark sense of humor. What’s in the basement, huh? A machete, a ski mask?”
I just smirk and shrug. “It’s for me to know and for you to wonder.”
“Sadistic. Also quite on-brand for billionaires, if I’m honest.”
I pour myself coffee, watching her over the rim of my mug. “Did you find anything interesting?”
“The library.” Her eyes light up. “It’s incredible. Three stories of books, and that spiral staircase? I have photos of those in my Pinterest boards.”
I don’t know what the hell a Pinterest board is, but she’ll think me ancient if I ask. “You like books?”
“Yes! I love to read. Though I'm guessing most of your collection is business strategy and investment banking.”
“No.” I move closer, settling against the counter beside her. It seems I find myself wanting to be near her all the time, and I’m drawn to her almost like iron filings to a magnet. “Contemporary fiction.”
She squints at me and tilts her head to the side. “You don’t strike me as a fiction kind of guy.”
“You don’t know me yet.”
Her cheeks flush at the "yet"—the implication that she will, that this weekend is only the beginning. “I suppose not.”
I should back off. Give her space. Keep things polite and casual, at least until she's more comfortable. But being near her makes restraint feel like a foreign concept. Every movement she makes—the nervous tuck of her hair behind her ear, the dart of her tongue across her lower lip—feels designed to test my control.
I’ve always prided myself on my self-control, but that is currently nowhere to be found. I am, after all, still just a man.
“What do you have planned for today?” she asks, her voice slightly higher than normal.
“That depends.”
“On?”
I turn to face her fully. “On what you want, Rayne.”
