Begin Again novel Chapter 136

The five of them crowded around the window and stared at the line of dark luxury cars parked on the curb. Eden counted four, including Liam's.

She couldn't understand why he had to make a dramatic appearance again today and bring his security detail. She was already the talk of the neighbourhood because of his stunt last night. Curious neighbours had stopped by during the day to ask Brenda if they'd had a celebrity guest.

"Does he always travel with so much security?" Lydia asked.

"Well, if you were a billionaire, I don't think you'd want to fly solo. Not when there's a very real chance you could get nabbed at any time and be held for ransom," Cassandra said, saving Eden the trouble of having to explain that her baby's father wasn't a very nice guy and had pissed off a lot of people, including the Ivanov twins and Rock Castle's underworld.

"Do you think he'll come back? He sounded mad as fuck!" Sienna nudged her shoulder and chewed on her thumb, her eyes shining with excitement. Eden knew if it was up to her best friend, she would have already written a huge front-page piece about her very complicated relationship with Liam. She was itching to do an exposé and was waiting for her to give her the green light. Something Eden had told her plenty of times was never going to happen.

"So? Will he?" Her friend pushed her again.

Eden nodded. She had no doubt in her mind that if she didn't heed Liam's warning, he'd be back, and she couldn't have that. Not when he'd seemed curious about Aiden just now. Her son, too, kept trying to sneak to the door as if he knew the man on their doorstep was his father, and they were meant to have a family reunion.

"I'll settle him in for the evening," Brenda offered, reaching out to take Aiden from her arms.

Eden kissed the top of his head and returned her attention to the cars on the street, tempted to carry on with her little standoff. But she knew this wasn't a battle she would win. If Liam came in here—uninvited like last night or otherwise—she'd have a huge mess on her hands.

"God, I hate him!" She groaned as she left the window and grabbed her purse from the kitchen counter.

"Well, that's not what you said when you did the horizontal bop!" Lydia reminded her. "And it's definitely not what you said this morning when you told us all about the smutty things he did to you on that couch last night and how he made you scream his name over and over!"

"Whose side are you on?" Eden asked over her shoulder. "We're all supposed to hate him!"

"You can't go like that!" Sienna was horrified at her boyfriend jeans, white t-shirt, navy blazer, and tan Oxford shoes to top off her casual look.

"This is a business meeting with the founder and CEO of a luxury lifestyle brand at a very fancy restaurant." Lydia added, putting extra emphasis on 'fancy'.

"Well, I would have dressed up if he'd given me time," Eden shrugged and hauled her handbag over her shoulder as she bolted out of the front door.

She expected Liam to lose his shit over her outfit as soon as she jumped in the car beside him. But he surprised her when instead, he pulled her close and kissed her hungrily, and she couldn't help but loath herself for being so weak and giving in to him.

Again.

"What the hell are you wearing?" He demanded as he grabbed her nape, pulling her even closer to him, his scorching lips as devastating as his caresses.

"Well, if you weren't so damn impatient, I would have dressed up a little," she whispered, panting for air. His breath gliding on her skin when he paused on her neck sent an ache so deep and so intense between her thighs she thought she'd go mad from wanting him.

"Enough with all the sass!" Liam warned, his mouth seeking hers again, and for the longest five, maybe eight minutes, she was lost in his kisses and his touch, her fingers fumbling with the buttons on his shirt as she ran her hands all over his chest and abs.

Eden knew she shouldn't find him so attractive, especially when she also found him unreasonable and too damn arrogant at times. But nothing about her feelings for him made sense, and everything about this moment defied logic.

Eden sat back in her seat and crossed her legs, her breathing laboured and her pulse still racing out of control.

Damn Vic Randolph, she thought crossly as she gazed unseeingly outside her window. She already disliked the man, and she hasn't even met him yet. If it wasn't for him and his stupid meeting, she'd be well on her way to being ravished right now.

"We'll stop at Nicci's," Liam instructed his driver, surprising her with his announcement.

Eden gave him a side-long glance, unable to believe he could turn his feelings on and off like a tap. She was still swimming in a pool of desire, the tingling heat in her core a constant reminder of her fiery need. But Liam—his voice was now calm and modulated and his face an impassive mask once more—seemed not in the least affected by their intense encounter just now.

"Why are we stopping at Nicci's?" She croaked, her words faltering in her throat when he raised an eyebrow at her and tapped his chin with his index finger, an unreadable look in his eye.

"You can't expect to meet the founder of a luxury lifestyle brand dressed like that."

Her irritation went from zero to a hundred in a millisecond at his comment, and she balled her hands on her lap, her French manicured nails digging into the soft flesh of her palms.

"If you'd given me time, I would have dressed up, you know." She said, unable to fathom how she could love and hate him all at once. One minute she was ready to let him do all kinds of naughty things to her, and the next, she wanted to stab him in the eye with a pencil.

"And I'm fixing my mistake. What's the problem?" Liam asked.

The problem with his plan was that even the cheapest dress at Nicci's would cost her an entire month's salary. But she didn't tell him this, of course. Instead, she spent the rest of the drive to the boutique stewing in her anger while she scrolled through her phone, mentally calculating how many meals she'd have to forego to pay for a dress she didn't even want.