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  After a few more steps, the lock disengaged, and the door swung open. However, it wasn’t Paul greeting me from inside the apartment. It was a boy, a teenage punk in a school uniform with the same insignia as Blair’s.

  Chapter 5

  Justice

  The little fucker had a cocky smirk on his pretty boy face, but it fell away the minute he clocked my expression. I imagined it looked as deadly as I felt.

  “Uh, can I help you?” he stammered, though he tried to sound confident.

  I ignored him and pushed inside. “Blair?” I called. Her apartment almost mirrored mine—though mine had a second floor—so I easily navigated straight to the kitchen. I almost fell to my knees at the vision in front of me. Blair’s white-blonde hair was piled on top of her head, and she was wearing a white T-shirt and jean shorts that went to just above her knees. Thank fuck, I didn’t think I could have handled anything else without my head exploding. She had on a frilly pink apron and her feet were bare, showing off her cute, pink-tipped toes.

  Something bubbled on the stove, and she stirred it until I rasped her name again. She jumped, clearly noticing me for the first time. Her cheeks bloomed with that pretty blush I loved so much.

  “Where’s your dad?” My tone was harsher than I meant for it to be from trying to control myself, and she took a step back. Fuck fuck fuck. I hated that I scared her. When I spoke again, I adopted a softer tone. “Is your dad here, bunny?”

  I hadn’t meant to let the nickname slip, but I enjoyed the slight widening of her eyes and the way the flush of her skin spread.

  “He’s in his office,” she answered quietly.

  I turned around and trained my gaze on the little shithead hovering behind me. “Leave.” My tone brooked no argument, but the kid clearly had a death wish.

  He puffed up his scrawny chest and gave me what I was sure was supposed to be a defiant glare, but just made him look like a pouting toddler. “Blair and I are working on a project.”

  “Out,” I snapped.

  He began to protest again but when I took a few menacing steps in his direction, backing him up into the living room, his mouth opened and closed like a fish. Then he caved and yelled, “I need to get going, Blair. We can work at my house next time.”

  I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose, willing myself to stay calm. I needed to remember that I couldn’t take care of Blair from prison.

  I stayed in that position until the front door clicked shut.

  “Justice,” I heard Blair snap from behind me. I spun around and almost smiled at how adorable she was. Her hands were on her hips, her face was scrunched in indignation, and her blue eyes were lit with fire. My bunny had more mettle than I thought. Why did that make me want her even more? “Our project is a huge portion of my grade, and I have a hard enough time getting him to work on it when we’re together.”

  My eyes narrowed, and my hands clenched into fists. “What are you doing when you’re supposed to be working?” Her answer was bound to piss me the fuck off, but I had to know.

  Blair blushed and dug the toes of one foot into the thick carpet. “He mostly tries to convince me to go out with him,” she sighed.

  At that moment, I was more grateful than ever that Blair was an open book to me. She was trying not to be negative, but I could see the annoyance in the downturn of her mouth.

  “So, the birth control pills aren’t for him?” I blurted. Well shit. Nice going Justice.

  Blair’s eyes became so big they almost swallowed her face, and she blushed so hard her skin was practically tomato red. “How did you…?”

  “Answer the question,” I cut her off; needing an answer.

  Her eyes darted away, and she bit her bottom lip as she fidgeted, twisting her fingers around each other. “No.”

  “Who?” I prompted sternly.

  “Nobody, I mean it was just in case…”

  My gaze bored into hers, and she looked back at me with uncertainty. “In case?” I queried.

  “I’m going to be eighteen at the end of the month,” she explained hesitantly. “I thought maybe…” She was studying my face intently and for the first time, I couldn’t discern what she was thinking from her expression or stance. It was unsettling, and I hated it. “Never mind,” she said, her shoulders slumping.

  Before I could say anything else, Paul strode into the room. “What’s for dinner, sweet pea?” He stopped when he saw me and regarded me with confusion. “Justice. Did we have an appointment?” Paul was a great guy, but he was the epitome of the absent-minded professor. He was the dean over the school of music at The Juilliard School, but he came from family money, which was how he and Blair lived like they did. Despite his wealthy upbringing, he freely admitted that he had no clue how to manage his inheritance. I’d been handling his investments, working alongside his money manager, since I bought the building and moved into the penthouse across the hall. I didn’t deal with smaller accounts anymore with only a few exceptions, Paul being one of them. I did it as much for Blair as my friendship with her father.

  “No, Paul. I just needed to have a word with Blair. I wanted to offer my car and driver to get her from school to her internship and home.”

  Blair frowned but didn’t have a chance to say anything before Paul smiled widely and nodded emphatically. “That’s a generous offer, Justice. Normally, I wouldn’t take you up on something bound to inconvenience you, but I do worry about my sweet pea coming home all the way from Wall Street in the evenings.”

  Blair rolled her eyes. “I’ve been getting around this city by myself since I was ten, Daddy. I don’t think—” I cut her a warning look, and she shut her mouth.

  “Still, can’t be too careful.” Paul walked over to Blair and wrapped his arm around her shoulder, then kissed her temple. After a moment, his eyes shifted back in my direction. “You’re welcome to stay for dinner.”

  “I’m sure he’s far too busy,” Blair interjected. My stomach chose that moment to emit another hungry rumble.

  Paul laughed uproariously and beckoned me in their direction before turning towards the dining room. “I’m sure a bachelor like you rarely has a home cooked meal, and my Blair is a whiz in the kitchen. I don’t know how I’d survive without her.”

  I clamped my jaw together to keep from informing him that he would need to solve that mystery by the end of the month or starve.

  “I’ll set another place,” Blair murmured before disappearing into the kitchen.

  There was something I had to do before I could relax and enjoy the meal. I glanced at the kitchen; then gave Paul an innocent smile and cocked my head towards the hallway. “I’m just going to use the restroom.”

  He mirrored the tilt of my lips and waved in the same direction I’d indicated. “I’m sure you know where it is,” he laughed. I nodded and spun on my heel, marching down the hall with purpose. The apartment had three bedrooms, and I guessed right when I pushed open the door to the first one on the right.

  The room was decorated in white and lavender with yellow accents; it was feminine without being overkill. Everything was in its place except the stack of worn paperbacks on the nightstand that had me chuckling. Blair had always been a bookworm. It was one of the few things I remembered about her as a child and something we had in common. A grin sliced across my face when I pictured her reaction to one of the improvements I’d made to my home when I moved in.

  I knew I didn’t have much time before my bathroom excuse became awkward, so I did a quick sweep of the room and decided that the most likely place was the white-washed, antique vanity on the wall by a door that I knew led to an ensuite bathroom. After a thorough examination of the drawers, I came up empty, so I moved on to the washroom.

  Figuring it was the most obvious choice, I opened the mirrored door to the medicine cabinet first. A little, round, blue container caught my attention first, and I took it from the shelf. I opened it to find a packet of white pills and grunted in approval when I didn’t find any o
f them missing. It wasn’t like I would have had her stomach pumped or anything, but I was still happy not to have to worry about even one pill.

  I started popping them out into my palm, one by one. “Justice! What are you doing?” Blair gasped as she rushed into the bathroom and tried to make a grab for the container. I held it above her head, which was easily done considering our height difference, and finished emptying the packet.

  I tossed the container into the trash can and stalked over to the small room that contained the toilet. Glancing in Blair’s direction, I made sure she was watching when I lifted the lid and tossed the offending pills in and flushed.

  She stood in silent shock and just stared at me as I prowled over to her. When I got into her space, she backed up. But I followed, and soon I had her trapped between me and the wall.

  “Why did you do that?” she asked in a raspy tone. Her eyes looked suspiciously watery as they locked with mine, and I wanted nothing more than to kiss her and make it better.

  “You don’t need them,” I stated.

  “How would you know?” she snipped. Her attempt to be confident was ruined by the pretty shade of pink suddenly dusting over her cheeks and nose.

  I leaned down until our lips were only a whisper apart. “Because I can smell that innocent little cherry from here, bunny.”

  Her mouth formed a little O, and she sucked in a breath. “Um…well, I was hoping to—um—you know—” she stammered, her blush intensifying as she broke eye contact. “Maybe I don’t want to be a virgin anymore,” she uttered suddenly, then slapped a hand over her mouth.

  Blair’s eyelids dropped, and she looked shyly up at me through her lashes. “I guess I was hoping the guy I want would want me too.” Her voice was soft as a whisper, and her warm breath bathed my lips, making me crave their touch.

  “They don’t want you,” I growled thinking about those pricks who only wanted in her panties and weren’t interested in the real her, in treating her like she deserved.

  Her expression crumbled, and she shrunk into the wall. “Okay. I guess you’re right then. I don’t need the birth control. Clearly, I won’t be having sex if nobody wants me.”

  My head reared back in disbelief. What the fuck? Then it hit me, how what I said could be misconstrued. “I meant those boys only want one thing from you, bunny,” I explained. “They don’t want the real you, all of you.” I didn’t bother to disguise the longing in my voice. “Besides, those little shits wouldn’t know the first thing about pleasuring a woman.”

  “Do you?” Blair asked softly.

  My head dipped, and I closed the distance between our faces again. “Do I what?”

  “Know what to do in—um—bed?”

  A wicked smile curved my lips, and I traced my lips along her cheek, so light they were barely touching, until I reached her ear. “I know how to please my woman.”

  Blair’s breathing picked up, and we were so close that her big tits rubbed against my chest. When I felt her hard nipples, I groaned and dropped my face into the crook of her neck. “Thirty days,” I rumbled.

  “What?” Blair panted.

  I slid my hands to her ass and yanked her forward so she could feel every inch of my hard cock pressing into the heat of her pussy. “Thirty fucking days, bunny.”

  Her hands grasped my biceps, and she gripped them tightly, her nails digging into my skin through my dress shirt. “What’s in thirty days?”

  One of the threads holding me together snapped, and I gave in to a desperate urge. I brought my head back in position and pressed my mouth to hers. Electricity zinged straight to my dick and sparks flew. One second before I lost it, I forced myself to pull away rather than following my instincts and deepening the kiss.

  “In thirty days. You’re mine.”

  Chapter 6

  Justice

  May thirty-first was officially my favorite day of the year. It was the day Blair graced this world with her glowing presence. It was the day my bunny turned eighteen. And, it was the day she would officially be mine. Fina-fucking-ly.

  “You’re quite the contradiction today,” Patti chirped as she traipsed into my office.

  I raised a brow and leaned back in my chair, the fingers of my left hand playing aimlessly with my silver pen. “Contradiction?”

  She nodded and set a stack of folders in front of me. “Sign and return to me,” she instructed. Then she took a seat in one of the deep, leather chairs in front of me. “If you didn’t have that permanent smile plastered on your face, I’d say you were downright grouchy.”

  “I’m confused,” I admitted with a chuckle.

  Patti eyed me for a few moments then relaxed in the chair and crossed one leg over the other. “I’m guessing it’s impatience.” Her tone was calculating, and her probing stare made me squirm in my seat. “Today’s the day, isn’t it?”

  “Pardon?” I watched her warily, wondering what she thought she knew. She couldn’t possibly…right?

  “She turns eighteen today?”

  I gaped at her in silence.

  “When are you boys going to realize that I know everything?” she asked smugly.

  I laughed and shook my head because she was absolutely right. I didn’t know why I deluded myself into thinking she didn’t know what was going on.

  There was nothing that would stop me from fulfilling my plans, but Patti’s opinion did mean a lot to me. It was why I’d hidden my feelings for Blair from her. I was afraid she would tell me that I was too over the top, that my obsession with Blair was unhealthy. That said, it wouldn’t stop me, but her disapproval would sting.

  “Yes, today is her birthday,” I confirmed.

  Patti was quiet for a minute, watching me with an unreadable expression. Then she smirked. “You remind me of Don.” Don was her husband, and it was a huge compliment to be compared to the man she adored. “I never told you how we met, or what our courtship was like because I wasn’t sure how you boys would take it.”

  I almost blanched at the tiny bit of nervousness in her tone. But I managed to keep my expression neutral. She was nervous about our approval? My chest warmed at the thought that she wanted our respect as much as we wanted hers.

  “You’ll have to get Don to tell you his side of the story. I’m sure it’s very different from mine,” she tittered. “My version is that he came, he saw, he kidnapped.”

  Well shit. I was hooked. I stopped playing with my pen and leaned on the desk to listen intently.

  “Don was an intern at my father’s firm. They’re both architects. Anyway, he saw me bring my dad lunch one day and according to him, he fell for me right that moment. He asked my dad about me, and my father thought I was too young for Don. I had just barely turned eighteen, and Don was fifteen years older than me. So Dad wouldn’t give him any information about me or a way to contact me.”

  Patti’s complexion pinkened as she continued, and I was hanging on her every word. “The next time I showed up with lunch, Don was ready. Apparently, he’d been focused on nothing but me for weeks. He caught me at the elevator and dragged me into an empty office.” She cleared her throat and sat up primly in her seat. “We’ll skip over that; it was the boring part of the story anyway.” Her blush and sly smile said otherwise, but I stayed quiet so she would continue. “Fast forward from there and the next thing I knew, I was in Don’s car and we were driving to a house he’d rented on the beach in Connecticut.”

  Patti held out her hand and admired the diamond and gold wedding set on her hand with a soft smile. “He had me running down the aisle less than a week later. Much to my father’s frustration. But, after he saw the way Don loved me, he came around fast.”

  Her point didn’t escape me. “You think Blair’s dad will come around?” I asked. It was something else that had bothered me, but since it wouldn’t change my decision, I hadn’t dwelt on it. Still, I wanted my girl to be happy, and it would be hard if her dad wasn’t supportive of our relationship.

  Patti stood and leaned ac
ross my desk to pinch my cheek. I rolled my eyes but took her hand and kissed the back before she took it back. “Don’t tell Don I did that,” I hurried to say. I may not have known that whole story, but Don’s possessiveness and jealousy when it came to Patti was no secret.

  “I know you, Justice. If you didn’t love this girl with all that you are, you wouldn’t be interested at all.” She straightened back up and padded over to the door, then paused and looked back at me. “Just be you and love her with everything you’ve got. What other people think isn’t important. Blair is the only one that matters. If you love her like she deserves, if you put her first, her dad will come around.”

  She stepped through the door but popped her head back in when I called her name. “Thanks.” She smiled brightly and nodded. “Now, go get your girl and stop being such an ass around here. Two years is long enough to deal with your Oscar the Grouch routine.”

  I laughed heartily as she disappeared then followed her instructions, quickly finishing up with a few emails and signing the documents Patti had given me. I handed them to her as I passed her desk. “Take the rest of the day off,” I told her. “Actually, you might as well take next week off. I doubt I’ll be here.”

  Patti chuckled and waved me off. “If I’m not here, this place would fall apart.” She wasn’t wrong. “But I might leave a little early every day. Now go,” she encouraged with a shooing motion.

  I grinned and gave her a smart salute before striding to the elevator and taking it to the first floor where the daycare was located. The wait was finally over.

  Chapter 7

  Justice

  When I walked into the daycare, Pandora, the manager, was sitting at the front desk doing paperwork. She looked up with a warm smile, but it turned puzzled when she saw me. “Um, Mr. Kendall, is there something I can do for you?”