He's not going to say anything until I've told him the whole truth.
"I never imagined that any of you… or really anyone… would actually read them. If I did, I probably would've written them differently."
"Is that right?" His voice is angry, shaking. It's the first time I realize that he's barely holding onto his temper, and I am in so much fucking trouble.
Is he going to take me to his brothers like this? Naked, ready to punish me? Is he going to take a video, and record what I have to tell him? I will die if his brothers see me like this.
I have to admit, I'm already dying a little just standing in front of him alone.
I nod my head vehemently. "Yes. Definitely would’ve written them differently."
"How so?"
“I probably wouldn’t have made you all superheroes,” I blurt out.
He scowls. “Really? That’s all that you’d change?”
“Well, no. I probably would've changed the setting a little more. It's just, I’ll admit… I love it here. It's gorgeous. Every time I've come to visit my friends I feel as if I'm in a little retreat. I mean, people would die to come to a place like this, and the books that I write are escapism. I like that they can have a little bit of a holiday in every book."
"What about the details about the Clans? Have you made that up? Or are those based in reality too?"
I swallow. "Both."
"Which other Clans have you been in touch with?"
"Well… in a roundabout way, the Aitkens Clan. The Welsh. The McCarthys. I know people, I’ve got spies everywhere. I may have sort of asked questions in a roundabout way and used the details of what people have told me to do my own research."
He groans and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Do you have any idea what you've done? Do you have any idea what they would do to you if they found out?"
They who? I’m already standing half-naked in front of my childhood crush. It could get worse?
I shake my head. I really don't bloody know. And maybe I should.
"Do you have anything else to tell me?"
“Um. Is there anything else I could tell you that would help me get out of the trouble that I’m in?”
“Probably not,” he says. “But at least you’ve told me the truth, and that’s something.”
I pause, standing in front of him wearing my knickers and a bra, and he watches me hungrily. Maybe it’s my romance writer brain. Maybe it’s something else. But I know that it’s more than my imagination when he clears his throat and swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing.
“Take it all off.” His voice has dropped to a lower register, and the deep vibration of the sound sends shivers over my skin. I hold his gaze as I drag my knickers over my arse, and my bra follows.
I’ve imagined being naked with him before, the overactive romance writer brain and all that. But it was nothing like this.
It was sexier. It was consensual. I wasn’t completely at his mercy.
“Get up on the bed. I want your good hand in front of you. Get on your knees. Give me that beautiful arse.”
Wait, what?
Did he say beautiful? My mind is stuck on that word, when I know he also gave me some fairly troubling suggestions as well.
Maybe hearing Tate Cowen call me beautiful was worth whatever trouble I’m in.
Maybe not.
But I do what he says. I want to know what’s going to happen. And I want to put this behind us.
