The Billionaire's Intern: Logan Black (Forbidden Book 1) Page 16

  “I have to get up,” she said.

  He moved away from her and she adjusted her position, peeling her bare back off the floor. She turned away from him, looking for her clothes.

  “Addison,” he said, his tone harsh, fingertips pressed against her shoulder blades.

  “What?” she asked.

  “You’re bleeding.”

  She put her hand over the place his hand had just been and pressed down hard before pulling it away, a bare hint of red on her fingers. “Oh. Not much,” she said.

  “Not much? You shouldn’t be bleeding at all.”

  She stuck her finger in her mouth, the metallic tang of blood making her tongue tingle. “It doesn’t bother me. Maybe we’re both animals.”

  He grabbed her arm and pulled her backward. “Don’t play it off,” he said. “That was too rough.”

  “For who?” she asked. “I felt it. And after the past few weeks…I’m happy to feel, Logan. Even when it hurts. I hurt anyway. All the time. At least with you there’s a payoff.”

  “Why do you want this from me?” he asked, looking truly shocked. Truly mystified. And angry. Logan was always so angry.

  Underneath it all, no matter how relaxed he seemed, how despairing, how anxious, he was always angry.

  “Why do you want this from me? I hurt you.”

  Yes, he did, but the sweet pain he gave helped take the pain inside her and twist it into something beautiful. Like showing her the glittering loveliness of the broken glass buried deep in her chest. It was already there. He wasn’t adding to it. He just revealed another facet to it. Showed the close relation it held—for her at least—to pleasure. To freedom.

  “You didn’t…not like you’re making it sound. Anyway, I liked it,” she said.

  “That makes no sense, baby.”

  “So what? Nothing in my life makes sense. And I…look.” She held her hand out for him to see. “I’m real. I’m a person. I’m not…someone’s doll. Not someone’s trophy. You make me feel a part of things, connected to my body in a way I never have been. To everything it can do. Everything it can feel. Everything I can want. I like it like this. I feel like I’m finally me. No control. No prettiness. Maybe a little bit dirty.”

  “That’s twisted,” he said, shaking his head.

  She was so tired of this. So tired of people telling her what to want.

  “Good. I’m okay with that. I’ve spent way too much time trying to be normal. For what? No one is here. No one is here but us, and this isn’t for anyone else. It doesn’t matter if it looks good, if someone else would approve. All that matters is whether or not we like it.” There was something freeing in that. “Like you said,” she continued. “Normal is a lie. It’s a construct. Either you believe it or you don’t.”

  “I told you, I have to be something else. For them.”

  “Not in the bedroom, I wouldn’t think. So let’s do normal out there, and do what we want in here.”

  She stood up, leaving her clothes where he’d thrown them. “Admit it,” she said, turning her back to him, her skin burning, from her should blades down to her lower back. “You like this. You like that you marked me. Because you left everything civilized about yourself at the bottom of the ocean, and everything else is just fake. You’re hiding. Just like I was. So stop it. Stop it now. Lose control with me. Be what you really are with me.”

  He wrapped his arm around her waist, his hand hot and hard on her stomach. He drew her back against him hard, his lips nearly touching her ear. “You’re playing a dangerous game here, Addison. And I’m not sure it can go on like this.”

  She looked at Logan hard, at his eyes, and she saw fear there. “Why are you doing this? Why are you pushing me away now?”

  “You’re making me forget,” he said, his tone tortured now.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can’t…you’re making me forget the wreck. The island…the…this is taking over. I can’t hold on to it and to you. I can’t let go of it.”

  “Why?” she asked, her throat tightening, pain lancing her chest.

  “You want things from me…I can’t…there are reasons I left certain things behind,” he said, his voice rough.

  Pain turned to anger, at life, for stealing so much from him. At him for letting it. For letting his trauma own him this way. “Do you know what I think? I think you like it too much. And that scares you. Because you’re hiding. Behind all this anxiety, and panic. Here in your hotel. You pretend that you’re the big, bad, scary Logan Black. Can’t be bothered to put shoes on. Won’t leave the hotel to meet you, you have to come to him. And it’s all just hiding the fact that you’re still trapped.”

  “I am not trapped.”

  “You are. And I think you want to stay that way. You don’t want to forget.”

  “Because someone has to remember. That is not the same as being trapped.”

  “Then why don’t you have a plan for figuring out how you can give your speech? Why haven’t we worked on that more? You say that you need to do this. You say you need to do it for your mother, for your sister. But you aren’t doing anything. And I think the real problem is that you don’t know how to do this for them and continue punishing yourself.”

  “You think you have all this figured out? I don’t have it figured out I live in my own head.”

  “Are you staying here forever?”

  He growled, forking his fingers through his hair and turning away from her, pacing the length of the room. “I can figure it out. I can figure out how to save the company without having to go out.”

  “So you can stay here forever. Well, I can’t. You talk about how you found freedom out there. But I don’t see it. I don’t see any freedom. I just see a guy who’s too afraid to face his demons.”

  Addison turned away from him and headed toward the door, her chest seizing up.

  “Where are you going?” he asked, his tone deadly.

  She looked at him over her shoulder, and it was all she could do not to go back to him. Instead she took a breath and turned back to the door. “Out.”

  *

  “Bartender, another!” Addison said, setting the tumbler back down on the glossy surface.

  She’d scrambled out of Black Book as quickly as possible after her fight with Logan, ordering the driver to take her somewhere that the press wouldn’t find her. Which was how she’d ended up here, drinking her troubles away in luxury surroundings.

  “Uh…I don’t know, Chanel Number 5, I think you’ve had enough.” The bartender, a woman with a full sleeve tattoo and glossy black hair said, arching a finely penciled eyebrow.

  “Ha!” Addison said, popping a handful of peanuts into her mouth. “That is funny. ‘Cause, like…rich bitch all up in your bar.” Addison had never been drunk before. But she was certainly drunk now. A brand-new experience to add to her list.

  It felt so good. So, so good. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to go to a crowded nightclub or anything, not when she couldn’t face the thought of ending up as a headline. But Logan’s driver had said this place was discreet, and he hadn’t been wrong.

  Everyone was either up in the VIP room or hadn’t come out yet.

  So she didn’t have an audience, but still. She was doing things that she would never normally do, things her father would never have approved of.

  And she didn’t care. Not even a little.

  “Yeah,” the woman said, “rich bitch up in my bar. Usually it’s just rich bastards.”

  “What?” Addison asked, her vision swimming a little.

  “You know, this place is kind of a boys’ club.”

  She eyed the tough-looking woman, who was lovely in her way, but wasn’t exactly the kind of female bartender you imagined working in a boys’ club, as she’d called it.

  “What?” she asked.

  “You don’t look like a Playboy Bunny,” Addison said, tugging the skinny black straw out of her empty glass and gnawing the end.

  “Yeah, not so
much. As it happens, the bar owner is a…uh, benefactor…guardian…older brotherish pain in my ass.”

  “Ah,” Addison said. “I have one of those. He’s my actual brother, though.”

  “Yeah, Jackson is…not. But he might as well be.”

  “Huh. Men.”

  “Yeah. Well, I do what I can to piss him off,” she said, indicating her tattoo, “and he does what he can to keep me in sight. The job.”

  “Right. Well, I’m Addison Treffen.”

  “Treffen?” she asked, her dark eyes widening. “As in…?”

  “Dead father with links to horrible criminal activity? All over the news? Yes. That is me.”

  “I was going to be more tactful than that. Isobel,” she said, sticking out her hand.

  Addison extended her hand and gave Isobel’s an unsteady shake. “Nice to meet you. My life is basically crap right now and I have no friends. So it’s actually a lot nicer to meet you than you can even imagine.”

  “So, what brings you here drinking? I mean, other than the dead pimp father.”

  “Uh…my, uh…my lover—wow, that sounds…but I don’t know what else to call him.”

  “Guy you’re banging is definitely not as classy.”

  Addison laughed and took another handful of nuts from the bowl. “No, no, it’s not. I like you. So yeah, I’m going to go with yours. The guy I am.…yeah. He…he has some issues. He’s not dealing with them very well. I’m kind of trying to…make him deal with them.”

  “Like what kind of issues?”

  “He’s… He’s been through some things. Like, bad things. He’s done some things. Things some people would think were bad, but I don’t really think he’s bad.”

  “He isn’t a pimp, is he?”

  Addison laughed. “Uh, no.”

  “Well, that’s something, then.”

  “It is. Definitely. I don’t know if it’s the liquor talking or not, but you are way more fun than those snotty sorority brats I usually hang out.”

  “And you’re a lot more fun than the cranky billionaires I have to deal with all the time.”

  For some reason, talking to Isobel seemed easy. And Addison had to wonder if it was because of the other woman, or if it had something to do with the changes that were taking place in her.

  Or the alcohol.

  “You get lots of cranky billionaires in here?”

  “Jackson and his…friends, associates, whatever. Jackson is probably too grumpy to have friends.”

  “Sounds like Logan,” she said.

  “Now, is that your brother or your lover?”

  “Lover,” Addison said, trying not to giggle. “Though, come to think of it, my brother would have fallen under the header of grumpy billionaire until recently. He’s still a billionaire. He’s just in love and therefore less grumpy.”

  “Heh. In my experience, love doesn’t make things less grumpy,” Isobel said. “At least not on my end. But then that could have something to do with it being one-sided. And I have said too much.”

  “Well, it goes both ways for my brother.”

  “Are you in love? Is that why this is hard?”

  Addison snorted. “I’m not in love. Not even a little. Logan is hot, and he’s built, and he’s great in bed. And handsome. And he’s fascinating. But no, not in love. I barely like him at this point.”

  “Obviously. This is why you’re in a bar drinking. Alone.”

  “Yeah, because of how flipping well adjusted I am.” Her phone rang from somewhere in the depths of her purse. “Hang on,” she said. She bent down and took her phone out of her back and swiped the unlock bar. “Hello?”

  “Where are you?”

  It was Logan, growling as was typical. “What’s it to you? You’re not going to come after me.”

  “Are you drunk?” he asked

  Yes. Very. Her S’s were awfully soft and lazy for someone on the right side of sobriety, but she wasn’t going to admit it.

  “No,” she said. “Beverages have been consumed, certainly, but I don’t think drunk is the appropriate way to characterize my, uh…er…status.”

  “You’re hammered. Where are you?”

  “Place. That I had one of your drivers take me to.”

  “I don’t need your directions, then. I’ll get them from him.”

  The line went dead and she swore. Yeah, that hadn’t been the smartest idea. Of course, Logan couldn’t come get her if he wanted to.

  So there.

  “Can I have another cherry?” she asked

  Isobel gave her a wary look. “I’m not sure you can be trusted with anything more of…anything. If you puke on my bar, I’m handing you a rag and you’re cleaning it up yourself.”

  “I don’t know how to clean up messes,” Addison said. “Which is probably a huge part of my issues. I’m in a massive mess and I have no idea how the hell I’m supposed to clean it up. And he wants me to clean up his. Or rather…I don’t think he wants me to clean up his. I think he wants to…hang out in the mess and I want to clean it up and…and…I don’t even know.”

  Isobel arched an eyebrow and lifted a jar of cherries up from beneath the bar. “Have as many cherries as you want, Chanel.”

  “Addison.”

  “Sure.” Addison reached into the jar and took out a handful of cherries. Isobel blinked and set the jar next to her. “Well, those are yours now, sweetie.”

  “Thanks,” she said, popping one into her mouth. Dimly she had the feeling there was something not quite right about her behavior, but she couldn’t be bothered to care.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  “He’s acting like he’s going to come get me,” she said.

  “Well, when he picks you up and carries you out, and you puke, aim for his shoes and not the floor,” Isobel said.

  “He won’t come,” she said. “He can’t come.”

  She looked down into her empty cup and sighed. She didn’t want him to come anyway. She really didn’t.

  She popped another cherry into her mouth. She was brooding. And not quietly. She didn’t care. For once she really didn’t freaking care what anyone thought, or what they might see when they looked at her. She wasn’t here to make people feel comfortable. Or to feel welcome.

  She wasn’t here to represent the Treffen name.

  She was here to be her. And everyone else could deal with it.

  Hell, she had as much right to be who she was as anyone had to be who they were. She had a right to take up space and express emotions. Other people did it all the time. Why not her? Why not now? In a bar in Manhattan with a jar of cherries.

  Or in a club. Maybe she would go to a club. And make a scene.

  A cold burst of air rushed in through the front door and she turned to look. And there was Logan, standing there looking dark and imposing in a long black jacket, leather gloves on his hands, a perfectly pressed suit molded to his physique. He was wearing a black tie. And damn. It was as if he’d gone out of his way to transform himself into some hedonistic fantasy of the disapproving, polished billionaire.

  Begging to be unpolished.

  She had to be drunker than she thought. Because this was a hallucination. It had to be. She closed her eyes. Would he really be there when she opened them again? She’d count to three before opening them again. One, two, three…

  *

  Logan Black had a bad habit of turning up when he shouldn’t. He’d all but risen from the grave five years ago, and now he was here, when his social anxiety should make it impossible. The last two times he’d left the hotel had resulted in panic attacks, so of course she’d never imagined he would pursue her here in the outside world.

  Unless he was a figment of her imagination.

  He took a step into the bar, and Addison knew for sure she wasn’t hallucinating.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  “I came to get you,” he said.

  “Damn, girl,” Isobel, the bartender, said. “You’re in trouble.” />
  And Addison wasn’t sure if Isobel meant right this moment, or in a much broader, philosophical sense. Addison feared it was the second one. Well, and the first one too.

  Though somehow the immediate threat seemed…desirable. Which went a long way in showing just how messed up she was in the head.

  But oh well. Owning it. That was her new thing.

  “How did you come to get me?” she asked. “I mean, all things considered.”

  “It’s easier in the dark. Plus…” He looked around the room. “The bar isn’t exactly crowded.”

  “I’m busy, though,” Isobel said.

  Logan ignored her. “And I wasn’t about to leave you out here doing God knows what.”

  “Yeah, I am a loose canon, Logan, I’ll give you that. Given my wild-child past.” She rolled her eyes. At him. At herself.

  “You’re out here drinking,” he said. “Alone.”

  “Are you going to lecture me on how unsafe it is? Because given that I’ve spent weeks holed up in a hotel with you, I don’t think I was much safer before I came out. With or without the alcohol.”

  “Fair point, little girl,” he said, stepping down into the bar area, his hands at his sides. He curled his fingers into his fists and she watched the leather on the gloves stretch tight over his knuckles.

  “I’m going to go to the back and…inventory,” Isobel said, her footsteps indicating a very quick scurry.

  “I’m not a little girl,” Addison said, standing up and starting to walk past him. He reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her, the look on his face one of pure danger.

  “You ran scared like one.”

  “That was your goal, wasn’t it? You pushed me away. You did it on purpose.”

  “Hell yes,” he said, lifting his other hand and dragging his leather-covered fingertip across her cheekbone and down her jaw, “it was my goal.”

  “Then why are you here? And I mean seriously, how the hell did you manage?” She looked at him and, even in her slightly altered state, she could see he was affected by being here.

  He took hold of her jaw, the leather cold against her skin. “Because I decided I didn’t want you to go. Fickle bastard that I am.” He released her, and she felt nothing but disappointment.