Sweet Possession (Carson-Fox Resorts #2)

Chapter 7

Fox

W hen Nash told me how he felt the first time he laid eyes onSavannah, I didn’t understand it. How could he fall so hard and fast for someonejustby looking at them?

Nash couldn’t explain it either, simply statingthathe knew she wasthe one for him, and one day, I’d know what he was talking about.

I didn’t believe him.

Until Cora.

I’d spent the entire night gawking at her, unable to tear my eyes awayevery time her face lit up with a breathtaking smile.

With every present she opened, Cora became more overwhelmed,and I wondered if I’d given her too much, too soon. I couldn’t help myself though. Once I started buying presents for her, I couldn’t stop. I wanted her to have everything.Not because I was trying to buy her trust. Okay, maybethatwas a little part of the reason, but because Cora deserved the world .

She’d been through so much shit in her eighteen years, and I suspected I’d only heard the tip of the iceberg when it came to the way Freddy treated his daughter.

So sue me if I wanted to give her everything she’d missed out on.

By the time she got to the last present, a brand-new laptop completewith a subscription to a YouTube cooking channel, her eyes had turned watery, and every time she spoke, her voice cracked with emotion.

After she confessedthatshe didn’t have the first clue as to how touse the laptop, and I promised to teach her, she thanked us over and over,before quietly admittingthatshe couldn’t remember a time when she’d been given presents.

It took everything in me not to scoop her up and promiseherthatnot only would she have presents on every future birthday, Christmas, and any other damn holiday, but I’d also make up for the times she went without.

Soon after she’d opened her presents, she asked if she could go tobed, and thanked us again for throwing her the party. When she went off to her room, I was left feeling bereft.

It was selfish of me, but I wanted to spend every single minute withher.

Christ, I was fucked for that girl.

But it was probably a good job she went to bed when she did. Notless than ten minutes later while we were clearing up, I received wordthateverything was in place for later tonight.

With Savannah promising methatshe’d stay at the house until wereturned, Nash and I headed to the last place I wanted to go; the Dukes warehouse of hell.

Before we’d set off, I’d questioned Nash as to whether he should begetting involved in the kind of shit we were about to do, giventhathe now had a kid on the way.

But my best friend was loyal to a fault .

He’d given me a lookthatsaid I was out of my mind forevenaskingthe question before stomping off to his jeep. We’d opted to take his SUV over my Challenger, the trunk was bigger, and we were going to need all the space we could get.

The drive to the dark, deserted street we were currently parked onwas a tense one. Notjustbecause Nash was throwing a paddy over me asking whether it was sensible he came along, but because I was more than eager to get my hands on the fucker who’d hurt my girl.

It was thanks to Nash’s driver, Brian, and his connections to anorganization, who were far from law-abiding citizens,thatI’d been able to get the raid to happen tonight. As soon as the man behind Apollo heardthatthe Dukes were selling young girls, he’d ensured the resources would be available to shut their operation down.

After a lengthy discussion, it was agreed the Dukes would be turnedover to Las Vegas PD, along with all the evidence of their crimes. With the amount of girls the Dukes had trafficked, they were looking at spending the rest of their lives in prison.

The same couldn’t be said for Dwayne.

Nash and I weren’t taking part in the raid, fuck no. We were businessmen, not fucking ex-soldiers with military training.No, we were leaving the professionals to do what they needed to do, and once they had control of the building and the people inside,thenNash and I were going to take Dwayne on a one-way trip to meet his maker while the mercenaries called in the LVPD.

Our names would be nowhere near the destruction of the humantrafficking ring, which was exactly how we wanted it to go.

But the call to saythatthe mercs had secured the building was takinga fucking age, and I was growing impatient with the need to end Dwayne’s life .

He didn’t deserve to live another minute.

My hands tapped against the dash despite Nash’s constant huffing,agitation running through me. But I had no fucks to give if my restlessness was irritating him.

“If you don’t stopthat, I’m going to lock the windows and doors andlet off the stinkiest fart I can produce,”Nash grumbled.

I stopped tapping, rolling my eyes.“What are you, eight?”

“Justtrying to lighten the mood,”he retorted, exasperation in his tone.

“Yeah, well. Don’t.”

I knew he was trying to help and I was being an ass, but until theDukes were in cuffs, and Dwayne was in the trunk, I wouldn’t breathe easy.

“You know,”Nash started when another few minutes had passed withno news. I’d now taken to clenching and unclenching my knuckles in a bid to do something with my handsthatwouldn’t result in the dickhead sitting next to me letting off a fart bomb.“I hate to tell you so, but I did tell you so.”

He was pushing my buttons. Nash knew me better than I knewmyself, and he knew how to rile me when I was already rattled.

“Told me what?”I huffed, unable to resist biting.

A smug grin tugged at the prick’s mouth.“Thatone day you’d meetthe woman who was destined to be yours. The one who changes everything.”

A heavy sigh left me, the tension draining from my body. I scrubbeda hand down my face, before turning to face my best friend. The only person in the world I could be one hundred percent honest with.

“And what if she doesn’t feel the same way?”I said, finally voicing thefearthathad been lingering in the back of my mind since the minute I saw the picture of her.“What if she decides she doesn’t want to see me again, and moves to the other side of the world? ”

It would bejustmy fucking luckthatI’d meet the woman who Iactually wanted to have a future with, only for her to not return the feelings.

“Why wouldn’t she feel the same?”Nash said, raising a brow.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because her father gave her away to besold in a sex auction, leaving her traumatized and never able to trust another man? Or maybe the man who bought her is a thirty-two, soon-to-be thirty-three-year-old, with a daddy kink, and she’s an eighteen-year-old virgin?”

I glared at Nash who was smirking at me like I’d told a jokeinstead of pouring my biggest concerns out to him.

But this was how we worked. We didn’t have deep and meaningfulheart-to-hearts, we’d speak our fears andthenendure the other one taking the piss until eventually, we would have a semi-meaningful conversation.

Only this time, to my surprise, Nash held back on the piss-takingbefore giving me his honest answer.

“Firstly, dickhead. Age is nothing but a number. Secondly, you make itsound like having a kink is a bad thing.”I opened my mouth to tell him I wasn’t ashamed I had a kink, but it might not be something Cora was into, but he held his hand up, not yet finished with his argument.“And thirdly, you and I both know what it’s like to live through traumatic shit at the hands of people who are supposed to love us, and neither of us turned outthatbad. We had each other to get us through the shit and learn to cope, Cora now has you.”

He trailed off as I stared at my clenched fists. The image of Corasmiling at me popped into my head, and a feeling I’d never felt before swept through me.

It was a feeling I wanted to pin down and hold onto for the rest of mylife .

“Help her, Fox,”Nash continued.“Show herthather cunt of a fatherdoesn’t define her or her life. Show her what it’s like to have someone in her corner who will protect her, no matter what. Show her what true love means, and I promise you,thatgirl won’t be going anywhere.”

I unclenched my fist, squeezing my eyes closed as I admittedsomething I was sure Nash already knew.“I’ve never felt this way before. It fucking terrifies me.”

Nash clapped me on the shoulder.“It scared the shit out of me too,dude. But look at Sav and me now. Give Cora time. Besides, you’d have to be blind to miss the way she was looking at you tonight.”

My head whipped to the side so I was facing him.“How was shelooking at me?”

I’d seen it myself, or at least I thought I had. Cora looked at me thesame way I looked at her, with lust burning in her eyes, and a desperate need to know how she felt when I ran my hands over her body.

How she tasted.

How she screamed my name when she came.

But I hadn’t wanted to believethatthere was a possibility she wasattracted to me,thatwe could build something together.

I dunno. Maybe it was self-preservation kicking in.

I knew all too well what it was like to have someone you loved andcherished, only for them to be ripped away from you. Maybe my brain was protecting itself from ever feelingthatway again.

“Don’t be obnoxious, it doesn’t suit you,”Nash said, turning to lookout the window again, a smirk playing on his lip.

The two of us fell quiet for a minute as the evening replayed in myhead. Every shy smile Cora had sent my way. Every time our eyes met. Every little breath she let out when I called her baby girl .

“Of course, if all else fails, you can blackmail her,”Nash said,breaking me from my thoughts.“Worked for me.”

I snorted. “I’m not that fucked up.”

Silence once again descended, and I cracked my knuckles to let outsome of the energy bubbling under my skin.

Why hadn’t we heard any news yet?

Had something gone wrong?

As impatience began to build in me again, I took a deep breath tocalm myself when the putrid smell of rotten eggs hit my nostrils.

“Dude, what the fuck is wrong with you?”I growled, scrabbling toopen the window and get some fresh airthatwasn’t contaminated by Nash’s fart, only to find it wouldn’t budge an inch.“Open the fucking window!”

“Sorry, couldn’t help it,”Nash chuckled, lowering my window by onlyan inch with the controls on his door panel.

Fucking cretin.

“Seriously, your inside must be decaying, you fucking stink!”I said,doing my best not to gag at the rancid smell filling the car, and sucking in clean air through the small gapthatNash had permitted.

“I can’t help it, you know what pizza does to me,”Nash said, nowopening his own window wide, his voice starting to choke on the disgusting smell.

DecidingthatI needed more air, I tried the handle, but again, it didn’tbudge. I was about to tell Nash to unlock the fucking doors or I’d make sure he would only ever father the child Savannah was carrying when my phone rang, instantly stilling the two of us.

“Fox,”I barked, ignoring the stench still lingering.

“Mr. Fox. The Duke brothers are secure,”the man on the other endsaid in a no-nonsense tone.

“And Dwayne?”I asked desperately, needing to know they had himtoo .

“Secured and ready for you.”

With the phone still pressed to my ear, I turned to look at Nash whowas watching me intently. I gave him a nod, and a menacing grin spread over his lips, matching mine.

Game on.

Standing in the shower, I watched Dwayne’s blood mix with therunning water and soap as it escaped down the drain.

A restless energy vibrated through me, andeventhough I knewDwayne was no longer alive to hurt Cora or other girls, I didn’t feel sated.

Maybe in the morning when I told Cora she didn’t need toworry about Dwayne or the Dukes I’d feel a bit better.

I didn’t know how long I stood under the stream of hot water,replaying the moment when Dwayne took his last breath, but by the time I got out, my skin was shriveled like a prune.

I dried off and threw on a pair of gray sweatpants, forgoing a shirt. Ineeded to get some sleep, the sun would be rising in less than a few hours, but with the unease coursing through me, I knew sleep wouldn’t come.

Figuring I could start going through the mountain of emails I’d ignoredearlier in favor of arranging Cora’s birthday party, I was about to head to my office when a piercing scream filled the air .

My heart leaped into my throat. The scream had come from acrossthe hall.

Cora’s room.

I bolted across the hallway in a flash, grabbing her door handle andtugging, only to find it was locked. From inside, a deathly silence had taken over which only made my heart pound harder.

“Cora, baby girl. Can you open the door?”I called, trying to level myvoice and keep my panic out.

Silence.

“Cora, please. Ijustwant to make sure you’re okay.”

More silence.

And then...

“Fox?”

She sounded disorientated, and I cursed myself for telling her to lockthe door if it made her feel better.

“Yeah, baby girl, it’s me. I heard you scream. Can you open the door?”I said, stopping myself from tearing down the wooden barrier between us.

There was a short pause, followed by the lock clicking as itdisengaged. Cora pulled the door open, revealing mussed hair and watery eyes.

And Christ.

She’d found another one of my t-shirts and had been sleeping in it.

Just my t-shirt.

Without meaning to, my eyes traveled down her body, finding hererect nipples brushing against the material of the shirt.

No fucking bra.

“Are you okay?”I asked, forcing my gaze back to her face andignoring her tight nipples demanding my attention.

My cock twitched as blood began to rush to it .

She swallowed, her own gaze roaming over my bare chest as a flushcrept over her cheeks. Everywhere her eyes trailed left my skin burning in their wake. When her tongue darted out to wet her bottom lip, I wanted nothing more than to know what it would feel like to have her tongue running up the length of my shaft.

My cock grew harder.

When her eyes landed on my sweatpants, and the obvious bulgegrowing, they quickly snapped up to meet mine, before she looked away, a guilty look on her face.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,”she said, looking over myshoulder.“I had a nightmare.”

“You didn’t wake me, Ijustgot out of the shower,”I replied, hoping itwould explain why I was shirtless.“You want to talk about your nightmare?”

I thought she’d say she didn’t because she took a long few secondsto reply. It was almost as if she was convincing herselfthatshe could open up to me.

“I dreamed Dwayne and those other men came for me,”shesaid, her voice a mere whisper, and her gaze now trained on her bare feet.

I took a step forward and gently tilted her chin.“Baby girl, the Dukeswere arrested a few hours ago. The police found enough evidence to make sure they never see the outside of prison again.”

I dropped her chin as she stared back at me, disbelief etched on herface. I wished she’d been there the moment the police shoved the handcuffed Dukes into the back of their squad cars before driving them away.

“What about Dwayne?”she asked, uncertainty in her voice.

I debated about lying, telling her he’d been arrested too so the truthabout what I was capable of didn’t scare her.

But I’d made a promise to her .

“Remember what I said about asking a question you might not likethe answer to?”

“Yes,”she replied with zero hesitation.

“He’s dead.”

She took a sharp inhale of breath, her eyes growing wide before sheswallowed.“Did you…did you kill him?”

I held her gaze for a few seconds hopingthatmy confession wouldn’tundo all the hard work we’d both put in to reach this point.

I nodded once.

She let out a heavy breath as a tear slid down her face, her beautifulgolden-brown eyes never once leaving mine. Suddenly, she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around mywaist before resting her cheek against my skin.

“Thank you,”she murmured, relief evident in her tone.

I hesitated, but growing a pair of balls, I raised my arms and wrappedthem around her small body, holding her close to me. Sheseemedto nuzzle further against my chest, and contentment swept through me.

This was where she belonged.

In my arms.

Did she feel it too?

Unable to resist, I buried my nose in the top of Cora’s hair and took adeep inhale.

Big fucking mistake.

Her luscious scent filtered through every part of me before headingsouth to my cock. There was no way she wouldn’t be able to feel it throbbing.

And yet, she didn’t move away .

Reminding myselfthatI needed to have more control over my cockand my actions, I pulled back, removing my arms from around Cora’s waist, and doing my best to ignore the disappointed lookthatcrept over her face.

“You should get some more sleep,”I said, needing to put somedistance between us before I did something stupid.

Like picking her up and carrying her to my room to spend the rest ofthe night memorizing every inch of her mouthwatering body.

“Yeah, you’re right,”she replied, her cheeks rosy, and once again sheavoided my eyes.

“Will you be okay?”

“I think so,”she said, giving me a small smile. But she still didn’tmove to go into her room, and I couldn’t stop my gaze from drifting to her rosy lips.

I sucked in a breath.“Goodnight, baby girl,”I said, my voice shaky.Reluctantly, I took a step back.

“Goodnight, Fox,”she replied, following my action of taking a stepback into her room.

She met my gaze, and for a few heated seconds, neither of usdared blink and risk severing the connection before she closedthe door.

I waited a solid five minutes before I went back to my room. Waitingfor her to have another nightmare? Waiting to see if she came out and asked if she could sleep next to me? Waiting to see if she opened the door and threw herself into my arms again?

I didn’t know.

But when I accepted she wasn’t going to open the door again, Ibegrudgingly trudged into my own room and laid down on the bed, my balls aching with a need for release, and the memory of Cora’s intoxicating scent seared into my brain.