“I don’t love you the way I used to, Zara. I’m not saying this to hurt you or to be mean because of the past; I’m simply telling you the truth. My mind is bombarded with Stella lately.” That certainly made Zara scrutinize me in a different light.
“But what you had with Stella was sex. What more is there?”
Was it just sex? It was the greatest sex I’d ever had. Merely thinking about how great the sex was had already got my blood running south…
Stella.
She was a mixture of ethereal beauty and spitfire vivaciousness. Add her extraordinary cunt into the equation and then it was a double-edged sword; any mortal man’s Achilles’ heel.
“Stella’s my wife, that’s what’s more, Zara,” I directed at the woman who used to make me kneel at her feet.
“Wife?” she choked out. “I thought she was just a f**k?” She gripped me harder. “Are you in love with her?”
Zara looked like she was in a great deal of pain. I still loved her, I knew that much, but it wasn’t the same. My body didn’t rattle the way it used to. My heart didn’t beat as wildly as it once had. She used to take my breath away… yet now, I realized that they were memories that could never be rekindled or relived again.
I wanted to be cruel, be that bastard who made her cry and crush her heart the way she had mine, but for some reason, I desired to come clean more. Maybe all this heartache and pain would ease out of my conscience if we freely discussed this now. I suppose, this moment was as good as any other.
So I started with Richard and his plea.
I didn’t dare glance at Zara until I finished speaking. I knew I didn’t owe her anything, however a part of me wanted for her to understand.
“You don’t love her and you still love me… but you want to be with Stella because she makes you feel better?” Zara was staring at me, waiting for a yay or nay reply.
“Better is not the word precisely, but yes, she does have that.” Amongst other things…
“Well, I can be all of that and more. Just give me time. You still love me, Callum. You can’t just brush that off and pretend that you don’t because some virgin made you addicted to her f**king untouched cunt!”
Her tone and the way she was speaking about Stella snapped something in me. “And I bloody love that virgin cunt of hers! It’s one where you can’t f**king compete, Zara. I’m the ONLY man who had a taste of that and I f**king love knowing that no man has ever dwelled in that euphoric place. She’s f**king mine and I won’t stop until she’s back in her place, beneath me, panting and gasping my name until she can’t breathe any longer!” Well, there you have it. My c**k had made the decision before I’d even thought it myself.
It was one thing to be addicted to something; it was another thing entirely when you had become addicted to a woman.
Stella von Berg, I’m coming for you. On you. In you. It didn’t really matter, as long as I was sharing it with her.
Chapter 31
Stella
“What the hell?” I softly muttered under my breath.
It had been over an hour and the guy wearing all black hadn’t stopped staring at me. It was creepy. Freaky even, but it was exciting me at the same time.
My date night with Derek turned out to be a dud. Maybe it was me who was trying too hard to forget Callum or maybe the man’s charisma had just not been working for me anymore. Either way, I had left that date feeling more depressed than when I’d walked in.
So here I was, a couple of nights later, somewhat working on promoting a new flavored vodka in one of Mayfair’s swankiest clubs. It was hectic, lively and I thrived for these moments, but the man kept interrupting my flow.
“Why do you keep glancing at your watch?” Mark asked whilst handing me a drink.
“What’s in it?” I ignored his question and referred to the drink he was handing me instead. I dipped my finger in it then tasted the concoction.
“Lychee.”
“Tastes fantastic!” I grinned, grabbing the drink from his hand. When working, I usually only drank a champagne or two, but tonight, I had decided to push it further, since everyone was pushing me to chill and “loosen up” a bit.
My friends, lovely as they were, kept pushing me to meet a new man and have a one-night stand just so I would know what it was. “You kept saying that your hymen was the reason you couldn’t enjoy singledom to the fullest. Well, here’s your chance. Free the bad girl and shag whoever you fancy!” Luciana had even taken it as her “responsibility” as my best friend to make me look the part.
When Mark had seen me earlier, the first thing he had said was that I looked decadent. Mind you, I thought that was the first compliment the man had ever given me, so obviously, I had to wear what Luciana had for me: an itty-bitty, black silk skirt; designer, five-inch, strappy gladiator heels that went all the way to my knees; and a lace corset top. The whole smoky look went with the part.
“See, you look gorgeous! With your come-fuck-me eyes, no man will be able to keep his hands off you,” Luciana declared, proud of her product.
“Certainly. No man could keep a soft knob when you’re in the vicinity,” Mark added thoughtfully with a goofy grin.
Yes, I certainly looked the part of a vexing dominatrix who ought to get laid. “You two are both mad!”
Luciana winked at me. “Speak for yourself. We are friends, aren’t we?”
So that’s how this whole shebang started. It was my working night-off, if that made sense at all. My thoughts halted when Mark had to excuse himself when Luciana waved to him for help. I was halfway through my drink when the eye-baller/creeper finally approached me. It took him long enough.
He came up next to me, questioning. “Boyfriend of yours?”
American, I noted his accent.
“Friend,” I said as I saucily eyed him from head to foot. Tall, dark, hot and cocky. Not bad, I mused. Brilliant.
“Single?”
“Are you?” I quipped back.
“One hundred percent. And you?”
I was married—technically—but that didn’t count, right? “Umm…” I trailed off, making that wishy-washy, awkward face. “Ninety-nine percent?” Sexy and smooth, Stella, I chided myself for being an absolute idiot.
“And the one percent?”
Oh well, this was my night to have fun. Callum and his dark, beautiful eyes be gone, I thought with a pang of sadness. If only…