Masked Read Free Page A

it was now shorter and pure white.
    Lena was all about blending in nowadays.
    It suited her, but then I’d probably think Lena looked good no matter what style she chose to wear her hair in. No matter what she chose to wear at all.
    I glanced down at her fitted black pants and body hugging black t-shirt. Moisture glistened tantalisingly on her upper chest, above the low lying neckline. My fingers itched to reach out and touch her, right there, above her breasts. But I forced myself to be a gentleman as I sat down on the oversized pillows Lena had thrown around our small slice of heaven. I leaned back against the palm’s pot next to her, and stared off into the distance.
    Somewhere out there was a nation with fighter jets, their leaders perusing reconnaissance photos of our city-state.
    “It might not mean anything,” I said, aware the words were lies as soon as I spoke them. “Curiosity,” I added, because we all know when I open my mouth I tend to put my foot in it.
    “Six weeks,” she said softly. A different kind of “softly” than the tone she’d used with Alan. This one went straight to my heart and tore it apart. “After one week, I thought perhaps no other nations had noticed. After two,” she added quietly, “I was sure no one was close enough to care.”
    Oh, babe. When did you become so naive? So trusting?
    “After four,” she said, her voice cracking. “I stopped thinking about it so much. I stopped looking over my shoulder or searching the Net.”
    She didn’t look at me, just pulled her legs up close to her chest, wrapping her arms around them, and resting her chin on her knees. Her eyes stared blindly at the horizon. A horizon we knew without a shadow of doubt led to somewhere else.
    “I hadn’t thought about it once this week,” she whispered, hands fisting at her sides, nails cutting into skin, at a guess.
    Lena was angry all right. Angry at herself.
    I wasn’t sure what to say. Lena never came across as anything other than well put-together. Contained. Controlled. In charge of her world, even when it was falling apart around her. This was new territory. For both of us. Not just her emotions, but the fact that she was letting someone see them.
    Lena only ever opened up to me.
    “It would have been nice,” I said, matching the pitch of my words to her low volume, “if we’d had a little longer.”
    Silence, and then a small sound that could have been a chuckle.
    “I mean,” I pressed on, because hearing Lena laugh has always been a siren call to my soul, “there’s still so much more I want to do to you in bed.”
    Yes, definitely a snort. At least, the type of noise an Elite makes when amused and trying not to show it.
    “And you promised me one month in bed,” I added, sounding incredulous - not a hard ask - as I really fell into the swing of things. “And we only managed three days before you bought this fucking penthouse floor and had me build rooftop gardens with rain covers and raised decks and fuck knows what else. It’s all quite a blur.”
    She shifted her head, resting her cheek on her knees so she could look at me.
    “And we haven’t even christened it yet!” I added for good measure. “The least they could have done was wait another six weeks.”
    Silence.
    Fuck. Stuffed it up, yet again.
    “It’s really happening, isn’t it?” Lena asked, and she sounded like a little girl. Like the young daughter her father had left behind in the monster’s lair.
    “Baby,” I said, reaching for her, wrapping an arm around her body and pulling her face into the curve of my neck.
    She came without resistance, as if she’d been waiting for me to wrap her up in my embrace. As if she needed me as much as I needed her.
    Her lips met the sensitive skin on the side of my neck, hot breath over heated flesh. My cock shot rock hard in an instant.
    I struggled to be what she needed me to be.
    I fought with my body.
    I made myself cradle her head gently, fingers massaging her scalp,