Just go up there, get him, and bring him down. Isabelle told me to do. And with a broad smile as wide as it was when she told me Rory had proposed to her. There was also a mischievous look in her eye when she urged me to take my roommate away from work or whatever he was doing to join us. And that told me she had been hiding something from me right there, and I was about to have the shock of my life.
And I will if it's Callum Harrison in my room.
I meant it when I told Isabelle I'd never talk to her again if it was my boss sharing a room with me. But it also hurt me to tell her that. Because I could never stop talking to her, she's always been there for me whenever I needed her. So I don't think I'd never stop talking to her. But I would be pissed at her, and I'm not afraid to let her know my disgust for what she did.
Please don't be Callum. Please don't be Callum... I repeatedly whispered while the elevator moved to the top floor.
Don't worry; I won't be emailing or sending you any work to do this week. — Callum
There will be no working for Wish Upon A Star at all this week. — Callum
And you will. Just when you finally see him face to face, be easy on him. — Lilah
I think you should allow him to explain himself. That's all. — Lilah
Punch him in the face the next time you see him. — Amanda
I swear if Callum is who I'm sharing a room with, I will scream. The last person I want to deal with this week is him, and him accompanying me around Hawaii, telling everyone I'm his. I don't know why this didn't come to mind sooner. Especially after the last couple of weeks and the things that have been said. But now everything is making sense.
When I entered the room, and the scents of vanilla and musk hit my senses, a familiar scent I smelled the other night; my eyes and ears went on full alert, and my hands instantly clenched into fists. The asshole made sure to make the room smell like him—to arouse me—vanilla, an aphrodisiac to seduce and increase arousal because vanilla is seductive, playful, and sweet. And then there's the musk—an animalic, attractive, primal, and sophisticated scent to help attract the prey they seek.
I may not see him, but I smell the asshole, so he's somewhere in the room, or he left—just missing each other. Then, just as I turned around to leave the room to see if he may be at the bar nearby, I heard a loud annoying sound coming from around the corner—like an elephant blowing his trunk.
Since it sounded like he was blowing his nose from my bedroom, I sauntered to the room to see if he made himself at home—in my bed. But instead of finding him on the bed, I found him showering. And the sight of his wet, perfectly fit body—and ahem—package, sent my belly and pussy into a frenzy.
Stop it, Eloise... look away...
Instead of looking away, I stomped over to the shower and swung the glass door open so fast I thought it would fly into the air and crash into a million pieces when it hit the floor. Then I made him jump when I screamed, "What the fuck are you doing here?!"
He slowly turned around, and when I saw his gorgeous face, luscious creamy brown eyes, and cocky smile, my head twitched in shock, and then I jumped backward. His glorious body looks like Thor's, like Cal's... what the fuck? "Cal—lum?"
Cal= Callum—bosshole—heartless prick—motherfucker!
He shut off the water, reached for a towel, wiped his face, and stepped out, saying, "Ellie... fancy meeting you here." Instead of covering the lower part of his body with the towel, he dropped it to the ground and grinned when he reached for me. "Finally, we officially meet."
My hands snapped into the air, and I stepped back, avoiding Callum's touch, hissing, "Don't fucking touch me!" Then, I turned around, covering my eyes and yelling, "Wrap that fucking towel around you!"
He chuckled. "Why should I? It's nothing you haven't seen before... Ellie—I mean, Eloise."
I felt phlegm filling my mouth and swallowed hard. "I can't believe this. I can't fucking believe this!" I screamed, stomping my foot. "What kind of sick joke are you and my friends playing on me?"
His hands gripped my shoulders, and I shook them off. "I said, don't fucking touch me!"
"Eloise," he desperately pleaded my name. "Please don't be pissed at me. I did nothing wrong. This was all Rory's and Isabelle's doing. And I only figured this out last weekend. I swear."
Suddenly, I started to sweat and became numb, lightheaded, and nauseous. My heart rate picked up, and I started trembling. I think I'm about to have a panic or a heart attack. I wasn't sure which one I was about to have. But something was happening, and now I feel like I'm about to lose it—and lose everything I just ate and drank.
Callum's hands gripped my shoulders, and I shook them off again. "What part of don't touch me do you not understand? You fucking tricked me! For four months, you've been fucking with me! Cal? What the fuck? How could I be so fucking stupid?"
This time, instead of gripping my shoulders, he wrapped his arms around me when I started marching out of the room to leave. "You're not going anywhere, sweetheart. Not until we talk."
"I'm not talking to you, to Isabelle, or anyone else, for that matter. So you all can go to hell," I snapped, trying to get out of Callum's hold. "And I'm especially not going to talk to you when you're naked."
His arms tightened around me. "Eloise, stop. I need you to listen to what I have to say."
"I don't have to do shit," I hissed. "Especially listening to an asshole lie to me."
"I've never lied to you, Eloise. Please. Let me explain myself. I deserve that much."
I think you should just let him talk and allow him to explain his reasoning on certain things. — Lilah. She's right. I should see what he has to say because there's a lot of explaining he needs to do—especially about the night we spent together in Florida.
"Fine... cover yourself up, then."
I raised my phone to message Isabelle when Callum let me go to cover himself.
Me: I'm so fucking mad at you right now. How could you do this to me? Callum? My one-night stand in Florida? What the fuck, Isabelle???
Isabelle: Don't be mad. Just hear him out, please. Everything has been an enormous misunderstanding. I promise!
Whatever.
Callum's arms returned around me, and my eyes closed when his mouth lowered to my neck, and he started kissing it. His lips on my flesh felt amazingly good, but I was in no mood to be pleasured. "Please don't," I breathed.
"Eloise, I honestly had no idea that was you in Florida," he finally said. "Not until the next day when I read my emails."
How could he not know?
How could I not know?
He continued, "... the next morning, I panicked when I read those emails you sent. If I had known you were my assistant, that night would never have happened."
"How did you not know that was me? When you approached me, and I told you I was working to meet a deadline by midnight, and when I mentioned I was there for my grandmother's funeral, how did you not figure it out? Seriously? How did you not put two and two together? Were you that fucking anxious to get laid that you never thought it could be me? Your assistant?"
He spun me around and held me tight in his arms, asking that I look him in the eye after staring at the ground. "It did cross my mind that I thought everything sounded familiar. However, in my defense, you never said where you were going. In the email you sent me, you stated that you had to take a few days off because there was a death in the family and that you had to go out of town to attend the funeral. You never told me it was your grandmother or said you were heading to Florida."
He's right. I kept the email simple. Because, well, he didn't need to know anything more other than I needed to attend a funeral.
He went on, "... I know it sounds far-fetched, Eloise, but think about it. What are the odds that my assistant was in Florida the same weekend I was there? At the same hotel? So, when you told me what you were doing and why you were there, my first thought was, wow, there are other asshole bosses like me out there. I never suspected it was you. And that's the truth."
My family and I only stayed at that hotel because Isabelle and Rory were supposed to be there. But because he, too, had a death in the family, they remained in Chicago. Callum must have attended the wedding—hence the tux he wore.
"He was at Jace and Tallulah's wedding..." I quietly thought out loud, my eyes focused on the floor.
He responded, "I was."
"I had no idea you were friends with any of them." My eyes refound his. "Had I known, I would have chosen a different hotel," I groaned. "So, you figured out it was me. Yet, apparently, I wasn't allowed to know that was you because you still fucking hid it from me—for four fricken months!"
The mask. The dark hallway. The dark room... Callum did not want me to know he was Cal... I should have fucking known Cal and Callum were the same people. Especially when he told me that night that he was a CEO. That was a dead giveaway, and it flew right over my head like an eagle soaring in the air.
"Tell me how you got my best friend to keep that important piece of information from me?"
"I asked Rory not to say anything when I told him about it. I needed time to figure out how to handle the situation. But then, the night you told me you were at the nightclub down the road from the club, and I went in there, I got another shock of my life when I saw you at the table of my best friend's wives and wife-to-be."
"And you still hid it from me," I retorted, trying to free myself from his firm grip.
"I went to the office twice to talk to you. Coincidently, you were gone both times. Then Isabelle asked me not to tell you the other day, fearing you wouldn't show up at her wedding. And because I didn't want our situation to ruin their happiness, I did as I was asked and remained quiet."
I angrily looked him in the eye, hissing, "The emails... you continued sending me hateful emails after we fucked in Florida."
The corner of his mouth slowly curved upward. "I had to. If I didn't, you would have figured it out. I was only playing the part you expected me to be—the asshole boss—the motherfucker you despised—the heartless prick you thought I was. So I had to keep it going until I figured out what to do with you."
I looked away from Callum and to my phone when it started ringing. "Isabelle."
He held his hand out, asking, "May I talk to her?"
"Why?"
"Because. I can see it on your face that you don't want to talk to Isabelle right now."
He's right. I didn't. So I handed him my phone.
He swiped the answer button and brought my phone to his ear. "Hello," he answered in a tone that annoyingly made my belly flutter. "Yes, she's here; we're okay, just working things out at the moment." He paused. "No. Nobody is killing each other..." He paused again. "Okay, we will be down shortly." He hung up and handed me the phone, saying, "They want us to meet them at the restaurant."
"I'm not hungry," I said, snatching my phone from his hand.
He cleared his throat. "Eloise, please. Let's not upset our friends. Okay?"
"Whatever," I groaned. "Will you let me go, then?"
"Are you going to behave?"
"Probably not," I quickly returned because it was the truth. How can I behave when I got someone who lied to me for four months by my side? How could I behave when my best friend kept from me who the best man was? How could I behave when she stuck me in a room with the man I'd despised for the last six months? I mean, seriously? How can anyone expect me to be on my best behavior tonight? I just had a major bomb drop on me, and they expect me to be okay?
Fuck that.
"Eloise. Those are our friends. Your best friend is getting married in five days. Play nice."
My eyes turned to slits. Then, using his line, I stated, "I don't play nice, Callum. Remember?"
"If you don't play nice, Eloise. You'll force me to make it, so you'll quit being a fucking brat."
I laughed like I was a crazy lunatic. "Do you honestly think I care right now? Not only did you humiliate me a couple of weekends ago, but I was just humiliated again today—by you and who I thought was my best friend. So, if I want to be a brat right now, I will. It's my right. And there's nothing any of you can say about that." I glared at him evilly, seething, "Now let me go." But instead of letting me go, he held me firmer and walked me away from the bathroom and to the bedroom, where we fell onto the bed when my legs hit it. "Get off of me," I growled.
"I'm not getting off of you, and we're not going anywhere until you agree that you'll behave yourself."
God, this man is so annoying... but he's also so fucking hot; I hate myself for thinking that way right now. With Callum's beautiful face and how his dreamy brown eyes are looking into mine—looking as if they're about to melt right into me. And how his cock is digging into my hip is ridiculously making me want to reconsider being pissed off—but I can't.
How can I act like everything is okay when everything isn't?
His eyes darkened. "Eloise. Do I need to spank you to get you to behave?"
Yes, please.
My God. Why did I just think that? "No," I said instead.
"What will it take for you to be a good girl?"
"For one, you can start by getting the fuck off me."
He bit his bottom lip, and the butterflies in my belly alerted me they had awoken. And when he lowered his face, lust and desire in his eyes, the butterflies became more active, thinking he was about to kiss me. Only his mouth dropped to my ear, sending goosebumps to pierce my skin when his lips grazed my ear when he said, "I'll get off you. But I will warn you that if you misbehave around our friends, I'll discipline you when we return to our room."
Maybe I should misbehave, just to see what he'll do?
"I'm not promising you anything."
My eyes closed tight, and my pussy pulsated when he kissed my cheek, saying, "My girl will not disrespect our friends. Got it?"
"Hey, asshole. Newsflash, I'm not your girl."
He chuckled while lifting his head. "That's not what you said the other night," he winked. "You are my girl, and you will behave this week. I knew this would be a surprise to you, so to ensure you'd be happy this week, I swapped rooms." He looked at the luggage I left on the bed, then turned and looked at the closet before returning to me, smirking, "I see you've already claimed the bedroom."
That's right, asshole. This is my bed... "You will be sleeping on the couch."
He chuckled lowly. "We'll see about that." He raised his hand and caressed the side of my face, using the back of his hand. "You'll be begging for my cock to rock your world again—"
"That's what you think," I retorted, cutting him off.
"I don't think. I know..." Callum said with amusement in his tone, the towel blanketing me instead of it covering his lower half when he stood. "I'll be ready in a few minutes."
"You didn't have to warn me," I groaned, trying to pry my eyes away from his large penis, but I couldn't.
"See," he said with humor in his voice, snapping his hips to get his cock to wiggle. "You can't resist my dick," he said, grinning from ear to ear. "Don't worry, hun." He winked. "My dick will get you to come later."
The fuck it will. "Your dick is about as useful as a vibrator without batteries," I snapped, pushing myself off the bed. It was a lie, of course. His dick is perfectly sized, and Callum sure knows how to use it correctly. But I refuse to give him the satisfaction of knowing he can pleasure me with it.
He chuckled at my remark but didn't have a comeback. This means he will most likely make me stew to see how long it will take me to explode.
It didn't take Callum long to get dressed. When he came out, he was wearing a Hawaiian button-up top half-way buttoned—black background with huge beautiful white lilies mixed with hints of blue and pink in them and wearing bluish-grey khaki shorts, my heart skipped a beat, my stomach contracted, my pussy clenched, and my mouth fell.
Callum Harrison looked hot as fuck dressed in casual clothes. Who knew a billionaire could dress... normally?
Not wanting to let Callum see, I found him attractive, and angry with myself for thinking he was, I looked to the ground, sighing, upset that I was allowing my hormones to control my mind.
I looked up after hearing him quietly laughing, and he was looking at me in the mirror while combing his fingers through his hair, acting as if he was trying to ensure he looked delicious to eat.
Of course, my sharp tongue couldn't hold back. "Mirrors can't talk, you know. But lucky for you, they can't laugh, either."
"Good one, Ellie... or shall I say, Eloise..."
I aimed my finger at him. "You are not allowed to call me Ellie."
He spun around, grinning like he had just won something huge. "When we first met, you told me your name was Ellie, not Eloise. And the other night, when I accidentally called you Ellie, you told me that name was reserved for someone else." He cocked his head to the side. "Isn't I who you meant?"
"Nope," I said, looking away from him. It was—but for Cal. Not Callum.
I suddenly felt his presence, and my head snapped forward. He towered over me, his splendiferous cologne scent whirling into my senses. "Ellie. Are you ready?"
"No, not really. But since you couldn't care less about that and forcing me to go, let's go."
"I'm not bringing you to an asylum... yet. We're only going to have dinner," Callum responded, guiding me out the door.
While waiting for the elevator, he leaned to my ear, exciting my tits, the butterflies in my tummy, and my pussy when he said, "You look beautiful, by the way."
I enjoyed the compliment, but since I was pissed at the world, rather than thanking him, my mouth felt like insulting him instead, "Yeah, well, when God rained beauty all over his creations, it looks like you must have been holding an umbrella."
Callum's hand rested on the small of my back when the elevator doors opened, guiding me into it, and when the doors closed and we started moving, he pressed the stop button. "What are you doing?"
My breathing halted when he invaded my space and pinned me against the wall, his hand firmly holding my jaw as his brown eyes glared into mine. "I mean it, Eloise. Behave at dinner. Do not ruin this for Rory and Isabelle just because you're upset."
Like a brat, I said, "Or what?"
His face lowered to mine, and I slowly gulped when the heat of his sweet breath fanned my lips. "If you're that curious to know what'll happen. Misbehave, and you'll find out. I promised Isabelle I'd keep you in line this week. And when I make promises, I keep them," he warned sternly, his hand still firmly holding my jaw. "Remember, I don't play nice. And disciplining is my specialty," he reminded, flashing me a killer smile that sent shockwaves to course through me like wildfire.
His mouth lowered to mine—a deep, hungry, fervent kiss. It was hot and exciting, and he made it so fucking tempting to fuck him in the elevator that when realization set in, reminding me how pissed at him I was, I broke the kiss.
"Be a good girl, Eloise," he quietly warned.
"Like I said, I can't promise anything. I don't, and I won't make promises I know I can't keep."
He nonchalantly shrugged. "That's fine. If you act up, become disruptive, disorderly, and brattish. I'll just fuck you right in front of everyone."
What I've learned of Callum thus far, and his not caring what he does in front of people he knows and doesn't know, I'm pretty sure that is something he would do, too.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter!! 🤞🤞