Chapter 4: Paid in Full

The kettle was still screaming when I reached behind me and switched off the burner.

The silence was loud.

Ephraim stood between my knees with his hands on the counter on either side of me and his forehead against mine.

"Tell me what you want," he said.

"You," I said. "In my bed. Now."

"I'm twenty-nine years old, and I was sure at the bar."

His breath caught.

He lifted me off the counter.

He carried me to the mattress on the floor.

He laid me down, and for a moment he only looked.

Rain ticked on the window.

The streetlight made a stripe across my sheets.

"You're beautiful," he said, rough, like it hurt.

"Take your jacket off," I said.

He did.

The tie went next, and the shirt, one button at a time, and I watched with my heart slamming.

He was lean and hard through the chest, with a pale scar low on one ribcage.

I wanted my mouth on every inch of him.

I sat up and did.

I kissed the scar.

His hand fisted in my hair, not hard, only to hold on.

"Hallie."

"You told me to ask again," I said, and I pulled him down over me.

He found the zipper at the back of my dress and drew it down slowly, and the cool air touched my spine.

I lifted my arms.

The dress went somewhere across the room.

His hands moved over my hips and my stomach and the soft weight of my breasts.

He touched me like a starving man who couldn't believe the table was real.

"Nobody ever looked at me like this," I whispered.

"Then everybody else was a fool."

He bent and took my nipple in his mouth.

I arched off the mattress and cried out, and my nails dug into his shoulders.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Fated To My Billionaire Call Boy from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.