Page 83 of Claimed

“You didn’t have to buy me anything, Gage,” she says, but her protest doesn’t last as she slips them on her feet, then turns her dazzling smile on me. “I love them, thank you.”

Unable to resist, I pull her close and use my thumb to tilt her chin up to me as I slowly close the distance between us. I hear her breath catch right before her eyes close. My lips press to hers, gently, as I explore them, nibbling and sucking softly, pulling a series of moans from her.

The sound of the door closing has my eyes opening. I see Hunter is gone and the door is now shut.

“Thanks,” I say to him through the bond.

“Have fun,” he replies, sounding amused. “Enjoy your prize.”

I’d completely forgotten about winning the game. That was put to the back of my mind when the letter from Blaze showed up.

Before I get completely lost to her, I pull back with one last peck as I look down into her beautiful blue eyes.

“As much as I’d like to continue this, I wanted to get your help with something first,” I tell her.

She licks her lips and nods as she takes a small step back from me. “Right, sorry.”

I frown at her and shake my head. “Why are you sorry?”

“I—” her cheeks grow pink, then she laughs. “I don’t know.”

I pull her back in for a hug, tucking her head under my chin as I tell her, “Darling, stop apologizing for being you.”

“Sorry.” I let out a little growl, and she laughs. “Right, I mean, I’ll try.”

“Better,” I say, kissing her head and grabbing her hand as I lead her around the desk to the chair. I sit down and pat my thigh. Without having to say a word, she hops up into my lap as I band an arm around her waist, pulling her against me as I turn us to face the monitor.

“That’s my name,” she says, pointing at the screen.

“I was trying to see if I could find anything about you online. Birth record, family friends, anything to give us a little more insight.”

“Did you find anything?” she asks, leaning back against me.

“No. Unfortunately, Cherry Rosewood is a very popular search term. But I thought I could try searching for your parents instead. What was your dad's first name?”

“Thomas.” I reach my arms around her and type his name in the search bar and hit enter.

“Oh my Goddess, don’t click that!” she gasps, seeing that the first two results are for porn.

I chuckle and kiss the side of her adorable head. “Don’t worry, I won’t. But I’m sure that’s a different Thomas Rosewood. This might take some digging. Do you know what year he was born?”

She thinks for a moment before shaking her head. “No. I assume he was like thirty or thirty-five years older than me, but I’m not sure.”

“That’s okay, his name is a hard one to find. What about your mother? Do you know her maiden name?”

“Yes, Poppy Beaumont.”

That comes back with a few results. I ignore the ones with social media profiles and immediately start digging into older records, guessing her to be anywhere from twenty to forty years older than Cherry.

“Here,” I say, finding a birth certificate for a Poppy Beaumont that would peg her as being thirty-one when Cherry was born. “This could be her.” I skim the info and find Poppy’s parents’ names. “Edwin and Rose Beaumont.”

“Those are my grandparents?” she asks.

“Possibly. Let’s see if we can find a photo of Poppy or Rose.” It’s much harder than it should be. Poppy is basically a ghost. No school records, no place of residency.

“Cherry?”

“Yeah?”