So who could it be?
My thoughts were interrupted as the door at the front of the hall opened.
I scrambled out of my lazy position in the throne and sat up straight, all of my senses alert.
The face that appeared from beyond the door was none other than Mason Vayne’s.
Chapter Nine
His expression turned into an undeniable look of surprise. “Charlie! What are you doing here?” he asked, his voice thick with suspicion.
“Having a moment,” I said defensively. “Why, what are you doing here?”
“What’s it to you?” he asked, raising one of his thick, dark eyebrows.
“It’s just a question,” I said bravely. “Why, are you sniffing around for secrets again?”
I was doing everything I could to distract him. To distract myself from this panging, longing want that was swirling within me. His magnetism was too hard to deny, and now that I had a taste of it, all I wanted was to get more.
The corner of his mouth twitched upward. He must have sensed my desire for him on some level, and he liked that. Even though I was the one sitting on the throne, he was the one with all of the power and he knew it.
“I don’t have to go looking for secrets, they find me,” he said arrogantly, taking a few steps closer to the throne.
There was a stirring in my pants again as he got closer. My vision was clouded out by the memory of his lips on mine. There was a longing within me to tell him everything I knew; to give away Alina’s secret in exchange for more of that… that thing that he’d given me with that kiss.
But I wouldn’t do it.
“You know something,” he declared, watching me with his icy eyes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said flatly.
He laughed, a sound that was more like a purr than anything. “I can always tell when people are lying,” he said, fixing me with those eyes of his. He closed the distance between us and leaned forward, placing both of his hands on the armrests.
His face was inches from mine. Those blue eyes were swirling with something — desire, control, power, and this coldness that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
“Tell me,” he breathed.
His breath was sweet and cold, as if he’d just eaten a breath mint.
All of my senses compelled me to tell him, to give away Alina’s secret. Here was this… this God of a man, promising me things with his body in exchange for one little scrap of information.
The temptation was almost too much to resist, but in my mind’s eye, I saw Alina’s green gaze, pleading with me not to tell anyone. That gave me the resolve I needed, despite my body aching for him. Even though my cock was hard and was pressing with impressive force against my pants, I knew what I had to do.
I leaned a few inches forward so there was only about an inch between our faces.
Mason’s pupils dilated, the pulse of black crowding out the irises.
“Never,” I whispered.
He lingered there for a moment, a beautiful man frozen in time.
I smirked and found my resolve, feeling on some intuitive level that the power had shifted. And it had shifted with such force that Mason was the first to look away.
“Suit yourself,” he said with an aloof look on his face, withdrawing his promise of whatever thing he was about to give me.
I crossed my legs, content in my throne and feeling a thousand feet tall. I’d just gone toe-to-toe with the most notoriously charming ladykiller in Hollywood and I’d walked away unscathed. Though nothing had happened on the surface, I couldn’t shake the smug, confident feeling that I’d won something.
He lazily sat down on the steps next to the throne, and it was like the weird little power struggle never happened.
I couldn’t help but wonder why he was lingering here, having lost. The only conclusion I could come up with was the fact that I still had something he wanted.
It was clear that Mason didn’t care about me at all; what he was interested in was the secret I was keeping from him.
“Why did you come here?” I asked with more confidence in my voice than I felt.
“Bored,” he answered in a flat voice.
“Oh, so you go looking for drama when you’re bored?” I asked, letting the words flow out of my mouth smoothly.
He looked up at me, but now it was different. There was a flash of… something in his eyes, something real underneath the sculpted form of this demigod, but it was gone in a flash. Just like that, he was back to the cocky, arrogant asshole that I’d pegged him for.
“I’m looking for something, and it’s not drama,” he said, fixing me with this magnetic stare.
Silence settled between us as I tightened my grip on the armrest. Something passed between us — this intangible energy that shuddered through the air. I felt like I was about to be ejected out of this chair and straight into his arms.
I settled down as if I could burrow a hole through this chair and escape.
Choose love over fear, Hazel’s words insisted.
I closed my eyes and steeled myself.
“Did Reese tell you about the scene?” I asked, trying hard to keep my cool.
“Which one?” he asked with that Cheshire Cat smile, tilting his head to the side.
“The one with me and you,” I said, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah, he just told me about that,” Mason said nonchalantly.
The way that he sort of shrugged it off like that made me feel a little crestfallen. I wanted to matter to him — I wanted him to feel a fraction of this nervous giddiness that was flowing through my body right now. Just to make it even; to make it fair in some way.
The silence stretched out again, but this time the scales were tipped in his favor. He had all
