Chapter 1
Nicole's POV
This is wrong.
I shouldn’t be sniffing the underwear of someone I love just to get off when we basically stayed under the same roof.
But his scent drove me crazy.
Instead of folding his dirty laundry in the laundry basket, I was sprawled on the ground, hugging it tightly to my face and letting his musk scent override my senses.
All my shame had flown out of the window the moment I started to imagine how this piece of clothing shaped his dick.
His size and the things he could do to me.
“Hmm,” a moan escaped my lips as I tipped my head back and let my hair fall out of the ponytail I’d worn all morning.
Dark strands of shoulder-length hair spread on the ground as my fingers undid my button till the very last one with an urgency that easily rivaled human speed.
I wasn’t usually this horny, but I was ovulating and he hadn’t been around for over a week.
“Oh Xavier,” I moaned his name as my fingers loosened every piece of clothing in its part until it reached the band of my skirt.
Without a second thought, I spread my legs and continued in under the band of my own underwear where my wetness waited to be played with.
“Xavier,” I moaned as I circled my clit with the pad of my fingers while my nose continued to draw in the intoxicating scent of him.
Like a drug, every inhale I drew, got me to a new high. If no interruptions occurred,
I would cum right now, on these cold tiles with his clothes scattered all around me.If…
But as if to test me, the door creaked in the distance and before I could react, the footsteps I would recognize from even my nightmares sounded so close to my head.
I snapped my eyes open, my fingers frozen at the entrance of my opening.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” that voice.
I scrambled up to my feet, but it was already too late to save any piece of dignity I had.
Four years of loving in silence and acting cold and aloof down the drain.
Way to go, Nicole.
This would have been a real-life adaptation of my wet dreams if I wasn’t in the most degrading position.
“Good evening, I…” I managed to scramble to my feet, but I was the definition of a living mess. I bet he could smell my sex from where he stood.
As if to acknowledge my thoughts, he raised the corner of his lips with a smirk, making my greedy ass pussy clench with need.
He could be doing more important things with those lips, those fingers.
“In fact your innocence was an act all along, wasn’t it, Nicole?” I gulped at the mention of my name, clenching my fist around his boxers and squeezing my thighs together for some fraction.
I would detonate from inside out if this incubus with green eyes took another step closer. I closed my eyes to push his image out of my head, but it only made me all too aware of the things I couldn’t see.
Like the feeling of his six foot four height towering over my five foot six. The heat of his body enveloping me and mostly his scent in flesh.
In my attempt to stiffly back a moan threatening to break free, I bit my bottom lip so hard until the metallic taste of blood hit my tongue.
“Is this what you do every time you sneak into my room?” My eyes flashed open in anger but I regret it immediately when they land on the sweat dripping down his chin.
I’m distracted until the moment it falls and soaks his shirt, but by then, it’s already too late for me to react.
First, I have every right to be in his room, we agreed to this four years ago when I was brought into this building and second, I don’t do this every time.
“I swear, it’s my first time,” I said with a croak.
“Oh really?” He tilted his head further, as his eyes roamed my body with a tease that could set me off if it lingered for too long.
Every part of my body his eyes landed on heated up a different way. And soon enough, I was burning up all over.
“It’s the truth,” I cleared my throat and stepped backward.He immediately closed the distance with a stagger and that was when I realised that he was actually drunk.
At this moment, if something happened between us would it be me taking advantage or him.
“Or really?” he leaned in, so close, too close and with my back against the door there was nowhere to run to, so I closed my eyes and held my breath.
My chest was pushed out to accommodate enough oxygen, and his face was mere inches from mine. His pointed nose grazing mine occasionally.
Was he leaning in for a kiss?
“Then explain this,” instead his hand wrapped around mine and I stiffened, immediately becoming one with the wood until we started wrestling for something.
What in the hell was happening? I opened my eyes to see his face contorted in a frown then lowered my gaze and my face reddened as I noticed that I’d been subconsciously fighting over his boxers with him.
“If you want it so much, I can give it to you, but what would you give me in return?” he asked as he let go of the material. I didn’t realise I was still holding. I immediately dropped the clothing to the ground like it burned.
“A kiss?” his lips mumbled against mine and I turned my gaze away only for them to land on a used condom wrapper.
It had fallen out of the boxers.
“There is no need to pretend with me, Nicole, I know you want this. I’m so hard for you right now,” he said and tilted his head to capture my lips once more, but this time I pushed him away with all the strength my anger pulsed through me.
“I don’t want a kiss from you, Mr Wolfe.” My eyes reddened with my gaze strained on the condom wrapper.
This was the reason why I had kept my feelings secret. He had too many women at his beck and call and his libido was high enough to not date a woman for longer than one week.
I could only keep my love in secret for four years because I knew he would never reciprocate it. Not with the sea of blonde women he had flocking at his beck and call.
He nodded his head and stepped back.
“Then look into my eyes and say it. If you can do that, then get out of this room and…”
“I’m not as desperate as those girls you use and dump after a week. We,” I pointed at the spaces between us, “are more than that and I will not compromise,” I said, my defiance surprising me as I immediately turned around.
However, my steps faltered and my feet glued to one spot at the last minute as I hoped for him to call and pull me back.
“Four years together and this is all I get?” his voice is raspy and breathy behind me.
I didn’t know when, but he’d closed the distance between us.
“What do you mean?” I turned around with my question only to come face to face with him again.
So dangerously close I could feel his hot breath on my face.
“I can’t let you go just like that. You turned me on and you should take responsibility,” he said as he held my wrist in a tight grip.
I let out a sharp breath.
“You have many other women, you can pick from any one of them. Why me?” I asked as my gaze flickered between his lips and his eyes.
“Because it’s you, don’t you get it?”
“What do you mean?” I wanted to ask when his lips crashed on mine with an urgency that had me participating.
I brought my hands up to push him away, but instead of doing that, I ended up gripping his chest and pulling him close.
It didn’t matter if he was drunk or if he had several used condoms in his bag. I was already shameless before he came in, so I might as well throw away the last of my pride and let myself have this.
8 yaers ago. Flashback volumeLoise’s POVI don’t think I can do this anymore!” I stabbed my pen into the wooden desk of the library to clean my nose bleed.“Shhh!” The librarian warned, but I was too occupied wity rolling the tissue paper into my nose to bother with her.“Are you okay?” Christabel asked woth a worried look, although her fingers did’t stop ntapping into the keyboad of her computer.“I don’t think so,” I replied as i Tilted my head backwards. Howver the it soaked pretty easily this tiem and i removed it adshoved it in theplastuic bag that contiains the sevralo thers ‘d used since we cooped our self up in the library for the researcha eeing how the online materals all seemed to e paid and we’d exhausted even our savings on this exepensive final year research. Before i Could finish rolling another tisue pape, the blood had trinked down my lips. “I can taste blood,” I mutted and licked themetlaic taste off my lips, tryign so hard nt to panivc, but the wetness pooling
Eloise's ObservationsEloise's POVEloise had learned a long time ago that grown ups didn't always tell the truth. Not the way kids lied about eating cookies before dinner or breaking vases, but in bigger, quieter ways. They smiled when they were sad. They said everything was fine when it wasn't. They pretended not to notice things that were right in front of them.That's why Eloise had gotten really good at noticing things herself.Like how Mrs. Patterson, the head housekeeper, always smiled really big when Nicole was around. Her teeth showed and everything, the way Daddy said you should smile when you wanted people to think you were happy. But when Nicole left the room, Mrs. Patterson's smile disappeared so fast it was like turning off a light switch. And then she would whisper to Maria, the other housekeeper, things that made both of them look at Nicole's back with scrunched up faces.Eloise didn't like Mrs. Patterson very much anymore.She was sitting in the breakfast nook now, e
The NecklaceFletcher's POVThe morning after their argument, Fletcher arrived at the office before dawn. He'd barely slept, his mind replaying Nicole's words about her mother, about desperation, about choices that weren't choices at all. The photograph from his desk drawer had kept him company through the sleepless hours, Loise's smile frozen in time, mocking him with everything he'd lost.He'd almost convinced himself he was imagining the similarities. Nicole's voice, her mannerisms, the way she tilted her head when she was thinking deeply about something. Seven years was a long time. People changed. Memory could play tricks, especially when grief was involved.But the necklace. He couldn't dismiss the necklace.Fletcher was reviewing contracts when Nicole arrived at eight thirty, precisely on time as always. She didn't look at him as she passed his open office door, her posture rigid with the kind of dignity people wore when they'd been wounded but refused to show it.He should apo
The Money GrubberFletcher's POVFletcher watched from his office window as Nicole crossed the lobby below, an envelope clutched in her hand. The same kind of envelope Margaret used for petty cash disbursements and overtime payments. The same kind of envelope he'd seen Nicole accept at least three times in the past month.He'd tried to tell himself it was none of his business. She worked hard, stayed late, took on extra projects without complaint. If she needed the overtime pay, that was her right as an employee. But something about the way she handled that envelope, the mixture of relief and shame that crossed her face when she thought no one was watching, made his chest tighten with an emotion he didn't want to name.Or maybe it was something else entirely. Maybe it was the way his mother's words kept echoing in his head from their conversation two nights ago."She took the money, Xavier. Every penny I offered her. Do you know what that tells me about her character?"Fletcher had wa
nicoleThe elevator ride to Fletcher's office felt longer than usual. Nicole checked her reflection in the polished steel doors, adjusting her blazer and smoothing down hair that didn't need smoothing. Three days. She'd been gone for three days, and now she had to walk back into that office and pretend everything was normal.Pretend she hadn't taken money from his mother to disappear.Pretend her own mother wasn't lying in a hospital bed with a fifty-fifty chance of surviving experimental surgery.Pretend her heart didn't ache every time she thought about the little girl who'd called her crying, asking when she was coming home.The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open to reveal the executive floor of Fletcher Industries. Margaret, Fletcher's administrative assistant, looked up from her desk with barely concealed surprise."Nicole," she said, her tone carefully neutral. "Mr. Fletcher didn't mention you'd be returning today.""Last-minute decision," Nicole replied, keeping her voice
Xavier's POV It's difficult to explain this feeling that's deeper than nostalgia. How much she reminds me of Loise, how often the memories of the both of them overlaps. It's so consistent to the extent that uts vexing. Hpw did I not notice this when for 6 years and now that she's been missing for three days, everything suddenly makes sense. I need to find her, bring her back to my side and then question her, because she seems to be the only one that has the answers I am looking for. Maybe she'll, maybe she won't understand why I'm looking for someone who beared her name. Maybe she'll even find it hilarious that I'm asking her questions about a dead woman. Maybe, maybe not. And that probability that she might hold the key to my answers is why I can't stop. "Boss," I got a knock on the front of my office door and jumped to my feet. "Whats the update?" I asked Xavier's POV It's difficult to explain this feeling that's deeper than nostalgia. How much she reminds me of Loise, h