Total pages in book: 36
Estimated words: 33396 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 167(@200wpm)___ 134(@250wpm)___ 111(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 33396 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 167(@200wpm)___ 134(@250wpm)___ 111(@300wpm)
The sudden change in the relationship had come with a few … problems of their own. The first one simply being that negotiations had to change tactic. He owned the Goodwin empire, but her father and brother still remained in positions. Rather than making any decisions, they consulted him and he made the final ones. So far, it had worked, but it had only been three months, and it took awhile for some changes to be accepted. He wasn’t sure if her father or brother were happy, but he knew her uncle wasn’t.
Luca had discovered the uncle’s area in the business was draining money faster than it was making, and it had something to do with his technological approach. After much discussion and multiple presentations, it had been agreed his budget would be removed, the staff placed elsewhere, and the uncle let go. He’d so far been the only loss of staff, and from what Luca could see, the biggest cause of the whole company’s problems.
Now, his other little problem was his rather confusing wife. Well, Tillie wasn’t confusing. She was the same Tillie, only now she belonged to him, and, well, he didn’t know what to do with a wife. After finding out she was a virgin, he’d kept his distance.
He only allowed himself to look at her on the security cameras he had placed around his home.
Tillie was once again in the kitchen. It was late, a little after seven, but there she was, hair pinned back, apron on, and cooking or baking something. From the information he’d gathered from her brother and father, Tillie was a homemaker. She didn’t like the limelight or the cameras. She had a rather scary interaction with the press, and since that day, she had steered clear of them. He didn’t know exactly what it was that caused her fear, but he could imagine to a young person—which is what she’d been at the time—it could be rather frightening.
Luca didn’t understand her. He didn’t have a clue what made her tick, and how on earth did a twenty-five-year-old woman remain a damn virgin? Their wedding night had been a disaster, and he’d given her a break, allowed her to get used to the idea of being married to him.
He’d kept his distance, but his needs were starting to reignite. From the moment he had seen Tillie, he’d felt this overwhelming attraction to her that he couldn’t deny. The camera angle was all wrong, but he knew hidden behind that counter was a body he craved. Full, ripe tits with nice, large nipples, and they were more than a handful; he knew because he’d tested the weight of them himself. She did have a small waist, which flared out to wide hips, full thighs, and a curvy ass. One designed to constantly have his hand touching it. She’d pulled her long brown hair back into a messy bun to keep it out of the way. Behind the apron, he saw one of the many white V-neck shirts he knew she owned.
Tillie wore anything and everything. He’d seen her in jeans, pants, sweats, skirts, dresses, and she didn’t have a problem wearing the same things either. Again, he didn’t understand his wife.
Running a hand down his face, he had meant to be cruel when he offered her a marriage contract, but instead she’d taken the deal and now he had no choice but to follow through. There was so much that could be saved at her father’s company.
Luca watched as she dolloped mounds of what appeared to be cookie dough onto baking sheets.
What the fuck had this woman done to him? He’d never been so obsessed with a woman before in his life. They were a means to an end, and yet here he was, getting no work done, and instead watching a woman through the security cameras he’d set up when he married her.
****
The scent of chocolate chip cookies never failed to make Tillie feel comforted. The whole process of preparing, making, and then baking, filled her with a warmth so deep it was like being back in her grandmother’s kitchen all over again.
Unlike Andrew, her brother, who was more interested in the family business, Tillie had gravitated toward her grandmother. She hadn’t been close to her mother, who’d wanted to do the whole beauty pageant thing that Tillie never wanted to attend. It had taken her grandparents and father pulling rank over her mother to stop her from going.
She should have known it would cause some trouble with her mother, though, and since then, they’d never been close. Not even on her wedding day. Her mother had said how proud she was, and she’d smiled and done all the cheering and looking the doting mother, but Tillie had known it was an act. All she wished was that her grandmother had been there.