Enthralled and Entangled

Chapter 8

Wife? I almost thought I had heard it wrong.

Braydan was really being ridiculous now. It was hard to believe that he would ask a woman, whom he only had a one-night stand with, for her hand in marriage.

I was a little overwhelmed by his question and stammered, “Mr. Braydan… You must have misunderstood me. There’s no other reason behind my rejection, I only feel that we won’t be a good match for each other.”

The moment I finished speaking, I felt something soft pressing against my lips.

Braydan had brought his head closer to mine and captured my lips with his.

My eyes widened in shock. I stared at him, feeling as though time had stood still. By the time I came back to my senses, his tongue had already invaded my mouth. The warm tip of his tongue explored every corner in my moist cavern. The tingling sensation spread throughout my body. His kiss left me breathless and I felt like I was floating in the clouds.

He cupped my face and deepened the kiss even more. Our tongues intertwined passionately, like sweet lovers who could not get enough of each other.

I was lost in the kiss for a moment before I regained my senses.

No, I must not get carried away!

“NO!” I squeezed the word out past the kiss and put my hands on his chest. I pushed as hard as I could, trying to break the kiss.

Unfortunately, Braydan was stronger than I imagined. He was pinning me down like a heavy boulder. I struggled to no avail, he would not budge an inch.

My resistance seemed to upset him. He wrapped his hands around my waist, turning the gentle kiss into a rough one. My lips were completely sealed by his and he was sucking my breath away.

It seemed like he got mad at me.

I struggled even harder and desperately pulled at his suit coat with all my might. The fabric of his coat was cold to my touch and too tough for me to pull. I had no choice but move my hands down and started hammering on his chest with my fists. His muscular chest was firm and hard, and all that hammering did not seem to affect him the slightest.

It was at this moment, I finally realized that it was futile to struggle against him.

Braydan lifted me up in his arms without breaking the kiss and carried me to the huge floor-to-ceiling window. My back was now pressed against the cold glass as he continued ravaging my lips mercilessly, like a frenzied starving beast that was feeding on the warmth of my lips.

A faint taste of blood bloomed on the tip of my tongue. My head was spinning. I clutched the collar of his shirt tightly, messing up his necktie.

I came to understand that he was doing this to vent his anger. A punishment for me because I rejected his courtship.

He was truly a ferocious wolf, like the one I saw in my dream.

His punishment did not stop with just a kiss. I did not expect that he would be in the mood when he was this mad. While kissing me, his right hand that was on my waist slowly inched toward the waistline of my dress pants.

The white dress pants I wore to work today had two silver metal buttons at the front.

Braydan’s hand fumbled with the buttons, trying to undo them. When his cold fingertips brushed against my belly, I suddenly remembered my C-section scar. When we were in the conference room, he did not notice the scar because my long blouse was long enough to keep it hidden. If Braydan managed to pull my pants down this time, the evidence of child birth would be clearly visible before his eyes.

Panic and fear took over me again. My body tensed up and I started trembling uncontrollably.

It was over. Everything was over. If Braydan saw the scar, he would definitely know that I had given birth to a child. I would not be able to keep Sofia a secret.

I was extremely nervous, yet I was too powerful to fight against him. I was already picturing the moment when Sofia would be taken away from me in my mind.

She would definitely cling to me tightly and grabbed the hem of my blouse with her chubby hands while screaming, “Mommy! I don’t want to leave Mommy!”

The unwilling look on her adorable face stabbed my heart like a sharp knife, and it pained me greatly.

What should I do? How do I make him stop?

My mind drew a blank. I could not think of a way to stop him. Hot tears started spilling out of my eyes uncontrollably.

The salty droplets rolled down my cheeks and slid all the way down to our lips.

Braydan suddenly stopped. He slowly released my lips and pulled away a little to silently gaze at me with his deep blue eyes.

His rough kiss left me a little oxygen deprived and dizzy. I turned a little and looked out of the window behind me. My legs almost gave way when I saw that the ground was a hundred meters below us.

“Mr. Braydan, please let go of me,” I begged him for mercy.

Instead of letting me go, Braydan did something that surprised me greatly. He cupped my face, then gently wiped my tear-stained cheeks with his thumbs.

“Don’t cry, my Luna…” he said softly. I never heard him speak in such a gentle way before.

He lowered his head and kissed my tears away, like I was his most precious treasure. His trail of kisses ended on my eyelid.

The tip of his tongue licked the tears between my eyelashes, like a gentle big dog trying his best to comfort me.

Fear still lingered in my heart as I looked at him in surprise.

I never expected that someone as brutal as Braydan would have such a gentle side to him.

I seized the chance and broke free from his arms. While smoothing out my clothes, I moved backward toward the door and spoke to him in a sharp tone, “Mr. Braydan, I won’t agree to be your wife no matter what you do. Please unlock the door right now and let me resume my work.”

Braydan straightened his body, then turned his head around to look at me. The gentleness from earlier had completely faded from his face, leaving only the usual harshness on it. “I’m not in a hurry to get your approval, but you must remember to continue performing your duties well as my personal assistant.”

He specifically emphasized the last two words. I knew he was giving me both a command and a warning.

“Don’t even think of leaving the company or my side.”

There was a firm look in his sharp eyes when he said that. He was dead serious about it and meant every word he said.

I neither refused nor promised him anything. I just turned around and pulled the door handle.

This time, the door unlocked with a loud click.

I bolted straight out of Braydan’s office without waiting for him to say anything else.

The quiet corridor was filled with the loud clicks of high heels. The colleagues I passed by stared at me in surprise. No one knew what happened to me. They probably would have never guessed that I nearly became their boss’ wife just now.

I kept my head down as I tried leaving this area as quickly as possible. My hair was still standing on its end and I had yet to recover from my shock.

When I finally returned to my office, my head was a mess. Braydan’s mood was simply too unpredictable. At this point, I was not confident that I could last an entire month working here.

Fortunately, that was the end of my torture today. He did not call me to his office again. After I got off work, I immediately went to a tattoo parlor.

As a precaution, I requested the tattoo artist to put a bunch of red roses to cover up my C-section scar.

By the time it was done, the sky was already dark. It suddenly started pouring heavily and puddles of water began to form in small depressions on the ground.

People started running on the streets, trying to get away from the rain as soon as possible. With all the dark clouds, the sky looked quite depressing without the moon.

I did not have an umbrella with me, so I was forced to walk in the rain. The cold raindrops hit my face, causing a chill to run through me.

What an unlucky day for me. If it was not for the tattoo, I would not have to walk under the rain. Now that I thought about it, my luck had been rolling downhill ever since I met Braydan.

As I walked down the streets, I ran from awning to awning to shelter myself from the rain as much as possible. The rainwater splashed on my pant legs as I ran, the cold and wet fabric clung to my ankles uncomfortably.

I ran under the rain and came to a more crowded area. There, I finally managed to hail a cab.

My hair was wet from the rain, so were my clothes. They clung to my skin, making me feel cold and uncomfortable. When I got into the car, I curled up in my seat and shivered from the cold.

Raindrops pelted on the car window noisily. I raised my head and looked at the people running along the streets. Braydan’s face kept appearing in my mind and I could not put the loneliness I felt into words.

I figured that he must have broken my mind. Otherwise, why would I suddenly think of him at a time like this?

The next morning, I went to work as usual. I continued performing my duties as Braydan’s personal assistant, just like how he wanted.

The workload of a chairman’s personal assistant was heavier than I expected. Aside from organizing documents and information that he required for his meetings, I was also responsible for his well being.

Braydan loved his coffee. So, the first thing I needed to do as soon as I arrived at the office was to prepare him some coffee in the pantry. I also had to make sure to leave it on his desk before he arrived in his office. Then I would start preparing the information he needed for his meetings and arrange his schedule for the day.

When I arrived at the office today, I went to the pantry to make Braydan’s coffee as usual. The entire pantry was filled with the smell of coffee. My hand trembled slightly when I was suddenly reminded of his handsome face when he enjoyed a cup of coffee in front of that floor-to-ceiling window in his office.

After the coffee was done, I turned around to grab the sugar cube container from the fridge. I made sure to put in extra sugar cubes as a petty revenge to get back at him, then happily returned the container to the fridge.

The moment I shut the fridge door, I was stunned by what I saw. Braydan had come into the pantry at some time. He was standing next to the fridge, watching my every move from about half a meter away from me.

I was startled and reflexively took a few steps back with the coffee I freshly prepared in hand. My ass accidentally bumped into the island counter, causing me to lurch forward and nearly spilling the coffee I was holding.

“Mr. Braydan, why are you here?” I asked as I gripped the cup I was holding tightly and steadied myself.

Braydan did not answer my question. He slowly walked over to me, then lowered his head to sniff the coffee in the cup I was holding.

“Riannon, you shouldn’t be distracted while you’re making coffee. There’s too much sugar in this.”

He fixed his calm blue eyes on me. I could not tell what he was thinking and that made it even more frightening. One thing for sure, he looked like he could read my mind.

It seemed like he knew what I was up to. I gritted my teeth and pretended to be calm. “Please wait for a moment, Mr. Braydan. I’ll prepare you another cup.”

After saying that, I turned around and went over to the coffee machine. I was going to empty the content in the cup I was holding and fetch a new cup for him.

A hand suddenly reached out from behind me and took the handle of the cup, brushing the skin of my arm in the process.

My back stiffened and I looked to the side, only to see Braydan taking the cup from my hand.

His firm chest was pressed right against my stiff back. We could feel each other’s body heat through the fabric of our clothes. I could feel the muscle underneath his clothes like I was being held in his arms.

“Mr. Braydan, we’re in the pantry right now.” I turned around and looked up at him, about to express my disapproval of his action.

Braydan merely tasted his coffee leisurely, as if nothing had happened just now. After taking a sip, he commented, “You smell good. Kind of like… the smell of baby milk powder.”

Baby milk powder?! I must have spilled some on me while preparing formula milk for Sofia before coming to work this morning.

Braydan really had a keen nose to be able to pick that smell up. It was so faint that people would not normally be able to notice it.

Was he even human?

I was so surprised that my body tensed up even more. I cautiously moved to the side discreetly, trying to get away from him.

“You better stay right there.”

Braydan’s cold voice interrupted my thoughts. He put down the coffee cup in his hand.