Sullivan usually noted and considered unforeseen circumstances as vast as his love and pleasure for control was. But Anna made him lax in a way he hadn't felt in years. His unhealthy attraction towards her perhaps.
Anna tried getting closer, wondering why he appeared so shocked but the man held his hand towards her shoulder, keeping her at arms length.
Sullivan moved the cup and licked at his lower lips. His usually amber colored eyes were now a dark shade glinting with the slightest specks of red in them as the moon shifted and streamed in through the open gap in the window.
Anna stepped back from his cold touch, rubbing the skin his palm had been as Sullivan placed the cup on the shelf above his head. A place where she couldn't reach.
She squinted suspiciously. "Why are you hiding that?Are you drinking something good and you don't want to share?"
She tried moving forward again but his hands automatically found her waist to prevent her from moving. His palms glided down the smoothness of the silk, resting just above her hip bone.
Anna's heart race picked the slightest. While Sullivan's attention turned to the softness beneath his palms.
Finally, he spoke. The lie forcing it's way out. "It's alcohol." As he spoke, his hands moved from her hip to form practiced ease by his sides. They both fell quiet, eyes clashing to feel words that could be heard without being spoken.
"Oh…okay." She looked around the dark library faint guilt replacing the warmth in her heart. Was he hiding here so she wouldn't feel left out given that she was recovering and couldn't take alcohol?
"Do you need something?" He casually asked, placing his hands in his pocket.
Anna showed him the black card in her hand as he pushed the window open to give the room some light. She saw him clearly now. Blocking the moonlight in his rich muscular glory. A soft angeli glare behind him.
Yet, the man looked every bit of the devil he is.
She let her eyes trail down across his legs imagining the chord of hard muscles that made the flesh.
In that moment, Anna realised Sullivan has always been clothed. Never was he caught shirtless in public. And it made her curious as to what he looked like without clothes.
When he is raw and as naked as the day he was born. If he had tattoos, if his cock was lined with such veins as the obvious one on his arms. If his cock was half as thick as the size of his…
"Anna?" He called when she remained quiet, furious blues creeping towrads her neck and face.
What happened to the boundaries she talked about yesterday?
"Yes….I…what about this?"
"A black card?"
"Yes. Why are you giving it to me?"
He tilted his head a bit, trying to read her expression. "Why not?"
"Mr Sullivan…" How was she to explain that she still had some sense of self and shame in her body? Living in his house, using his moneybfir snacks and transport, there had to be a line somewhere. "...I can't take this."
"Why?" He sounded confused.
"I can't spend your money like this." She said.
"I don't see why you can't." He argued.
"Because…well you are already helping me enough by letting me stay here and I can't…"
"Do you have any money Annabelle?" She pouts and half glared at him. "We both know you won't take from your mother." She had too much pride to do that even if her mother's family was extremely well to do on their own.
"But I still can't…"
"Shhh…" Sullivan placed his index finger to her lips taking her back to the first night they had met as he leaned closer, his eyes on the same level as hers. "I have more than enough anyways." He shrugged like it wasn't a big deal. "And who else will spend it if not you?"
Butterflies. Warm fluttering butterflies in her stomach.
God! The man innocently knew how to say things that tugged at heartstrings. She kept quiet for some seconds, giving her heart the time to adjust to the erratic beating of it while Sullivan smiled as his gaze moved to the veins on her neck, the one that was pumping blood faster than normal.
"Don't regret it later." She finally said and he breathed her in, the scent that was entirely hers. The one he could pick apart in a crowd. "I spend a lot."
He patted her head. "I know."
Anna left the study letting the man have his alcohol moment while she went back to bed dosing off minutes after laying in.
The following morning, she woke up early, ate and asked Sullivan if he could drop her off at the Foundation.
A sigh escaped him as she sat next to him in the car while he parked outside the foundation. He couldn't convince her to not volunteer. She wasn't that type of woman and he wasn't a man that would retain her from work. But he was the type of man who would refrain her from working here.
Soon enough.
"Be careful." He told her.
Anna stuck her tongue out at him. "Your dislike for people in general is just extending to the poor man." She left the car and waved at him, watching as everyone stared at them.
His car was specially numbered so anyone could definitely tell it apart. She was yet to go online but she was sure gossip was circulating about them.
The work was more stressful than the day before and they had to be divided into teams to make it easier. She made quick coffee for some of the shelter people and when it was time to switch with the other team, she sat on the couch at the staff lounge and ate her sandwich.
"Anna right…?" A young lady approached her, gesturing to the empty seat next to her.
"You can take it." She watched the lady smile as she sat. She had seen this lady yesterday and today as well.
She was one of the girls who stood out. Tall, with perfect dentition that reminded Anna of Sullivan with a glow in her eyes when she smiled.
"It's rough today isn't it?" The lady asked. "I am Zara." She extended her hand and Anna took it.
Her hand was cold. "Annabelle."
"I know."
Anna smiled. "Am I famous for being the one who fell from glory?" She joked.
"No. It's Vice Chairman Sullivan actually." She turned her body to Anna and whispered causally. "Some of the staff are saying you are carrying his child."
Anna gasped and touched her belly. "I had no idea." Both ladies laughed. "But really?"
Zara shrugged. "It's the best they could come up with for you being seen fraternizing with the devil."
She laughed at Sullivan's nickname. If only he smiled once in public. "What do you do apart from volunteering?" She asked.
It was easier to converse with her because she could feel that the lady was carefree and had no friends from what she said. Anna found that she was introverted, a financial analyst, and single.
"Now you tell me…" She dragged her leg onto the couch and Anna did the same, both ladies staring at each other like close friends. "Who is Vice Chairman Sullivan to you?"
She cocked her to the side for some seconds before saying. "My sugar daddy?" The girl laughed out loud and slapped her hand against her thigh, eliciting a laugh from Anna as well. "But without the sugar." She said in between her laughter.
Zara raised a brow. "Girllll…."
Really."
"Why not?" With an breathtaking beauty like that, Zara knew it was difficult for women to resist him. And the fact that he didn't mind being seen with Anna in public meant that he was interested in her.
"I am not in a position where I can afford to worry about that." She didn't even have a penny to her name or a real job, how was she to fraternize with a man of his calibre? "Let's just say Mr Sullivan is my benefactor." Someone she hoped to have as a very close friend.
"He is that kind?" She asked, a bit surprised.
"Very." At least to her.
They spoke some more about work and the things they had in common before exchanging contact with the promise to meet outside of the Foundation before the week ends.
Because there had been two teams working that day, Anna was able to leave early. She didn't know what to do so she phoned Sullivan.
"Hi."
"Hi. Are you done?" He asked, light tone, soothing voice and she soon found herself smiling.
What is this weird satisfactory feeling she was getting from such mundane conversation she was having with a man that isn't even hers?
"Yes." Silence. "I am a little bored."
"Do you want to come over?" He asked.
"Will I be a bother if I do?"
Sullivan smiled. "No."
"Okay."
"Should I send you a car?"
Anna chuckled. "Of course not." She was very aware of where the Sullivan building was. After hanging up, she took a taxi and gave the man the address.
Minutes later, Anna was sitting in front of the one place she had destroyed three months ago. The building entrance was busy compared to the quiet one that midnight.
It gave her a sense of melancholy as she stared at the rotating glass door of it and the new decoration the first floor now had. If four months ago someone had told her she would willingly come here, Anna would have argued to the brink.
Walking in, she greeted the receptionist and told her she was here to see Sullivan.
Of course news of them being together was on the internet and it made a lot of women jealous. Women like the receptionist who felt that Anna wasn't good enough to be seen with their Vice Chairman.
"Do you have an appointment?" She asked, her voice standoffish enough to make Anna uncomfortable.
She picked her phone. "Let me just call him again."
The other lady next to her heard what Anna said and quickly stopped her. "No Ma'am." She walked around the desk and ushered her. "You don't have to. I will help you through."
The first receptionist couldn't understand why her colleague was being nice to the lady. On her return, she asked. "Why are you trying to kiss her ass?"
"I just saved your job." The other lady didn't know why her friend can't put two and two together and read the situation. "Have you ever seen our Vice Chairman with any woman?"
"No."
"Yet, he had been seen with her and she came here so they must have spoken beforehand." She carefully explained before slowly adding. "What do you think will happen to you if he finds out you kept his woman waiting?"