Beautiful Bitch by Christina Lauren Read Free Book Online

every week. You know Sara. She’s not going to show the world how she feels, but I can tell she’s completely shattered over this.”
    He hummed, considering. “Think she’s finally done? No more taking him back?”
    “Who knows? They’ve been together since she was twenty-one. If she hasn’t left him by now then maybe she’ll stay with him forever.”
    “Wish I’d gone with my gut and knocked him on his ass at the Smith House event last month. What a miserable sleaze.”
    “I’ve tried to talk her into coming to New York but . . . she’s so stubborn.”
    “Stubborn? I can’t possibly see why the two of you are friends,” he deadpanned.
    I threw a cherry tomato at him.

    The rest of the meal was all talk about work, about getting the new office off the ground and all the pieces that still needed to be put into place before that could happen. We’d begun discussing whether his familywould be going back to New York again before the new offices opened when I asked, “When did your dad get back in town?”
    I waited a moment, but when Bennett didn’t answer, I looked up, surprised to see him pushing his food around his plate.
    “Everything okay over there, Ryan?”
    A few seconds of silence passed before he said, “I miss you working for me.”
    I felt my eyes widen. “What?”
    “I know. It doesn’t make any sense to me, either. We were awful to each other, and it was an impossible situation.” Holy crap, what an understatement. The fact that we managed to survive working in the same office together for ten months without bloodshed or some sort of manslaughter stapler incident still surprised me. “But . . . ,” he continued, looking up at me from across the table, “I saw you every day. It was predictable. Consistent. I pushed and you pushed back. It was the most fun I’ve ever had at a job. And I took it for granted.”
    I set my glass down and met his eyes, feeling an overwhelming surge of affection for this man. “That . . . makes sense,” I said, searching for the right words. “I don’t think I appreciated what it meant to see you every day, either. Even if I did want to poison you on no less than twenty-seven separate occasions.”
    “Ditto,” he replied with a smirk. “And sometimes Ifeel guilty for how many times I threw you out the window in my fantasies. But I most certainly plan on making it up to you.” He picked up his glass, took a long drink.
    “Do you now?”
    “Yep. I have a list.”
    I raised an eyebrow in silent question.
    “Well, first I’m going to peel off that skirt.” He bent to glance under the table. “I’d hassle you for wearing that lacy stuff underneath just to torture me, but we both know I’m into that kind of thing.”
    I watched as he straightened and leaned back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head. The weight of his attention brought goose bumps to my skin. Anyone else would have been intimidated—I could still remember a time when I was—but right now all I felt was adrenaline, a thrill that shot through my chest and settled warm and heavy in my stomach.
    “And that sweater,” he began, eyes on my chest now. “I’d like to rip it open, hear the sound of those little buttons as they pop off and scatter across the floor.”
    I crossed my legs, swallowed. He followed the movement, a smile slowly lifting at the corners of his mouth.
    “Then maybe I’d spread you out on this table.” He leaned over, made a show of testing its sturdiness. “Put your legs over my shoulders, suck on you until you’re just begging for my cock.”
    I tried to seem unaffected, tried to break from hisstare. I couldn’t. I cleared my throat, my mouth suddenly dry. “You could have done that last night,” I said, teasing him.
    “No. Last night we were tired and I just wanted to feel you come. Tonight, I want to take my time, undress you, kiss every inch of that body—fuck you. Watch you fuck me.”
    Was it suddenly getting warm in here?
    “Pretty