AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She sank into wounded silence, while berating herself for allowing this man, who meant nothing to her, to once again hurt her dumb, sensitive feelings.
The awkward silence remained unbroken for a good few minutes before the man across from her sighed softly.
“Do you have a dog of your own at home to console you after your inevitable breakup with Luna?”
The unexpected question was silly and whimsical but Iris recognized—and appreciated—it for the attempted olive branch that it was.
“No. I’ve never had a dog. I’ve always wanted one but my dad is allergic to animal dander. So, no pets at all.”
“Your dad? Stanford Carter?”
“How do you know my father’s name?” she asked, stunned. They didn’t share a last name—obviously—and the only people who really knew of her familial relationship with the notorious Stanford Carter were her family, and Evan.
“One phone call to my security team, some half-assed Internet searches, and I knew everything I needed to know about you.”
“Everything except the fact that your manager arranged for me to be here.”
He ignored that. “Your father was a first-class bastard. He destroyed marriages, careers, lives without blinking. All for the almighty buck. And you wonder why the fuck I would never consent to an interview with you? Even if Quinny had for some fucked-up, brain fart of a reason arranged this, I would never have agreed to it. Not with your sleazy pedigree.”
“My father was a great man… he was a wonderful journalist”—TDH scoffed at the word—“who enriched lives and kept the masses informed.”
“He shoveled through shit to find the most sordid details about people’s lives and laid them bare for public consumption. A real prince. Is that why you don’t use his last name? Because you know nobody with any self-respect would ever agree to be interviewed by someone with such close ties to that bottom-feeding piece of filth?”
“I don’t have to sit here and listen to this unprovoked defamation of both my character, and my father’s,” Iris said, her voice vibrating with indignation and humiliation. In truth, she was more affronted by his assassination of her character than she was by anything he’d said about her biological father.
Stanford Carter hadn’t been a saint—he’d been ruthless in his pursuit of a story. To the exclusion of all else. He’d often neglected to show up for weekends, or visits, with Iris when he was on the trail of some scandalous story or the other. And Iris could understand why Trystan would feel that way about him. In fact, when Iris had seen those truly awful, invasive images of Trish Nesbitt and Trystan after their accident, it had struck her as something her father would have done. And that certainty had revolted her.
Despite her defense of him—which had been a knee-jerk reaction to Trystan’s contempt—Iris had never truly aspired to emulate the man who’d fathered her by following exactly in his footsteps. She was seeking legitimacy, and if she did follow this path she wanted to be perceived as a journalist with ethics and integrity.
She pushed to her feet, but her heel skidded on the slick surface of the spa bottom and she lost her balance.
He went from sitting to standing in a second, his strong arms closing around her from behind before she even registered how close she’d come to falling and possibly striking her head on the side of the small heated pool.
His lightning-fast reflexes saved her and—while her brain played catch-up with what could have happened—her body reacted to all that sexy, hot, naked flesh pressed up against her back.
Her breath stuttered in her chest, and her already hard nipples contracted even more, while heat and moisture pooled between her legs. She instinctively clenched her thighs and arched closer to his hard heat.
But when her common sense finally caught up with her shameless body, a mere second later, she gasped in humiliation and attempted to extract herself from his tight hold. Hoping against hope he hadn’t noticed her embarrassing reaction to his nearness.
He didn’t let her go, though. His strong arms remained clamped around her upper body, pinning her own arms to her side, his chest plastered against her back, his groin pushed up against the small of her back.
He was panting in her ear, harsh, gasping breaths, as if he’d overexerted himself, which made no sense, since he’d gone completely still after the short, rapid burst of movement to catch her.
“Let go of me,” she gritted out from between clenched teeth, but he remained silent while his hoarse breathing finally leveled out, becoming more even and quieter.
He relaxed his hold, releasing her arms, one large, capable hand drifting down to spread over her torso, while the other dropped to her waist.
“You okay?” he asked, his breath fluttering against the curls at her temple.
“I will be when you let me go.” Her voice was husky, unconvincing, and she barely suppressed a moan when the hand at her torso stroked soothing circles over her sensitive flesh.
He was still pressed intimately close to her, so it was impossible to miss the stirring against the small of her back. Was he… getting hard?
Before she could figure it out, he released his grip and stepped away from her. She turned quickly, but he was already seated, and watching her with that focused, intent expression back on his face.
“Sit down.”
Folding her arms defensively over her stupidly achy nipples, Iris refused to comply and glared down at him with a defiant tilt of her jaw.
