Dangerous Liaison 🔞 (Femme Fatale#1)

25

Stay.

Stay with me.

Be mine.

She could hear the words clearly, amidst the fog of lust that consumed her when he made love to her. And it's not as if she was blind to the subtle change of this man's behaviour. She knew the moment his feelings had shifted to something… more. Because she felt exactly the same.

Love.

Yes. She–Akira Jade Moreau–who had sworn off love, finally crumbled in front of this extraordinary man, the man who almost ticked off every checklist she had.

But as much as she would like to surrender to her feelings, she was afraid that this relationship was not meant to be, and besides, their time would end soon enough.

The thought of never seeing him again somehow pierced her heart and made a huge hole in it. Oh she knew she could contact Christina anytime and asked her to call Beau again for her–at the risk of her heart being shattered in pieces. She didn't expect to fall in love with this… handsome, smart, charming, genuine, romantic man. The most important thing was that he knew how to make her laugh with his dry and sarcastic humor–which was rare because she had a very dark sense of humour that not anyone would get. And the way he looked at her… like he was about to devour her alive…

God.

He was near perfect.

Too bad she's far from it.

She was very flawed, and she knew it. Besides, she wasn't sure that she was able to really give herself fully to anyone. Although this man came very close.

She didn't mind his profession, hell she could make him her sugar baby and spoiled him rotten without even making a dent in her fortune.

But he was too good of a man for someone like her.

She knew, she just knew that he was unlike any other men she had met in her life, and yes she wanted him to be hers. She had never felt like this before, after that night–after him.

And just when her thought was flying away into some fantasy land, she heard him whisper her name and kiss her.

"My beautiful Jade." He kissed her hair softly, and it made her shiver from the intensity of his feelings. And she didn't think she could handle it, so she thought of something, anything, to distract the man. To let her make a plan. Yes, she's good at making plans, so she should do it, instead of surrendering to his charm. And she knew how hard that was.

"Tonight, let's have a proper date. You know, dinner, flowers, dancing, wearing clothes…" To end everything in high notes, before they should part ways.

He laughed at her words because, well, they rarely wore proper clothes these four days, only the silk kimonos. Strangely, he grew quite fond of the kimonos, although calling them kimono was such an overstatement because they were just a piece of exquisitely hand-embroidered silk cut so minimalistically they barely covered anything. But they looked fabulous on Jade.

"Well, I don't see any proper clothes anywhere in this yacht, so how could we dress properly?" He pulled her in his arms and twirled and dipped her until she giggled.

He loved to make her smile. It brightened up his cold, grey, and dreary world, and he hoped that she would smile at him… forever.

"I guess we didn't look hard enough." She got pulled back in his arms and they danced very close together for a while, without words.

The silence was comfortable, and they enjoyed these last precious moments before they had to go back to reality tomorrow.

But Gabriel had made up his mind.

Tomorrow he would ask her to go with him to his penthouse, and if she agreed, he would give the penthouse–and everything she ever wanted–to her.

"I'm going to make you an unforgettable dinner then." He kissed her forehead fondly.

"I will go and find us some decent clothes." She smiled and hugged him tight–as if she didn't want to let him go–before reluctantly leaving him.

He understood because he felt the same, but he knew that they would be together after these five days were over.

While she walked back to the room, he walked to the kitchen and looked around for ingredients for tonight's dinner date. He found a couple of A5 wagyu with perfect marbling. He took them off to defrost them and planned to make a fancy red wine sauce reduction with onion and beef jus and handmade ravioli to go with it. He prepared all the ingredients, excited to show off his cooking skill, when he suddenly froze.

And he chuckled.

He was one of the most powerful men in the world, and here he was, cooking for a woman, and became putty in her hands. And since he never cooked for anyone else in his life other than his siblings when they were younger, that should say something about his true feelings toward her.

But it didn't scare him anymore.

In fact, he never felt lighter–or happier–ever since his parents died on the same night when he met the girl who changed his life. That had surely changed him–from a carefree student who had just lost his virginity, to a guardian and an heir who lost his parents–in one night.

Strange how he suddenly remembered her. Again.

He had been thinking about the girl who took his virginity a lot in the past four days, and somehow, Jade reminded him of her. They had the same vivid green eyes that reminded him of the highest quality jade, and the same intensity–although the girl was obviously not as experienced as Jade, and they had different hair color. But it was strange how they somehow blurred into each other in his dreams, and all he could see was this Jade, the one that was with him these four days.

He also thought about his parents' death though, so it's a bittersweet feeling when he remembered her.

He was so lost in his thought, he didn't realize that Jade was observing him from the glass perch in front of her bedroom.

She was sipping a glass of Yamazaki–her prized possession–slowly, after she finished setting up the bedroom, and found the perfect clothes for both of them. She had plans for their last night together, and she wanted to make everything perfect and memorable, before she…left.

She sipped the drink some more.

The man was so handsome–and smart–he defied her expectation of ever finding a true match. And the most important thing was, she was very close to give up and surrendered herself to him.

And that's why she needed to leave soon.