The loud questions and directions to look a certain way are overwhelming.

“X! X! Who’s your lady?”

“Exton, look this way!”

“Has this one seen your sex tape?”

Some of the questions are shouted at me.

“What’s it like being with Triple X?”

“Who are you?”

“Look this way!”

Stopping near the door, Exton holds me close. Leaning into me he puts his mouth next to my ear. Under his breath he says, “Smile and let them have their pictures for the next minute. Then we can go in.””

Lifting his head he starts talking to the photographers. “Alright everyone, calm down. I’m here tonight to support Laz’s opening and I want to focus on that.”

They continue with their questions but he completely ignores them. It’s like what I would imagine walking the gauntlet would be like, and I’m thrilled when he turns and guides me so that we walk into the restaurant.

Blinking away the flashes that I’m still seeing even though no more cameras are going off, I lean into Exton for support when I see all the people in the room. There’s most of the cast of the cooking show that Laz was on, all of the Renegade Saints, the entire Hart family are all here, and there are several well-known actors and a bunch of reality TV stars.

Sliding his hand down to mine, Exton links our fingers together and then gently gives mine a squeeze. It’s the littlest thing, but it makes me feel not so overwhelmed. Mentally shaking off my nerves, I squeeze back.

I can do this.

AFTER ABOUT HALF AN hour of circulating and meeting people, I’m significantly less nervous. Exton’s been working the room and making sure to greet everyone, but now that’s finished and he’s in deep conversation with Gavin Wilde from the Renegade Saints about being the musical advisor for the show that Exton is writing.

I don’t want to be the annoying kind of woman that hangs onto a man like he’s a human life raft, so I start to pull my hand out of Exton’s grip so that I can walk away and leave them to talk business. Instead of letting go, he holds on tighter. Looking at me, he shakes his head once in the negative before turning back to Gavin.

“I’ll shoot you an email this week and we’ll meet up to discuss it in more depth,” he tells Gavin. If you’ll excuse us, I need to go check in with Laz.”

After Gavin walks away, Exton turns to me. “Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine, I was just going to give you some breathing room. You shouldn’t feel like you need to babysit me—”

Without a word, Exton starts walking us through the crowd. People say things and try to engage him, but he just smiles and keeps right on going until we enter the kitchen, which he strolls through until we reach another set of kitchen doors. When he walks us through, we’re in a darkened hallway of what looks like the restaurant’s office space. Turning right, he walks us down the hall before opening a door and bringing me into what is obviously Laz’s office.

Once he shuts the door he positions me so that my back is against it. Setting a hand on either side of me, he glares down at me. “What the fuck was that about?” he asks briskly.

Licking my lips nervously, I look down. “I don’t want to be a—”

“Stop,” he commands firmly. “Whatever the hell you were about to say, just don’t do it. I brought you here tonight because I want to be with you. I always want to be with you, but you continuously keep finding imaginary roadblocks. You’re fucking mine and I want you next to me, Beautiful. Stop with the running.”

I hate myself for feeling all shivery inside at his pronouncement that I’m his. Possessive Exton is hotter than ever and I am appalled by how turned on I am by his Alpha tendencies. What am I, a fifties housewife? Hell no! I need to put a stop to this right now before I make an even bigger fool out of myself.

Lifting my arms up, I cross them over my chest and glare at him. “You make it sound like I’m a puppy or some kind of property and that’s disgusting. You aren’t my owner, Exton!”

Placing a hand on either side of my waist he holds me still as he leans forward so that he’s right up against me.

“Don’t give me some bullshit about being property, because I never said that. What I said was the straight truth—you’re mine. For the record, I’m just as much yours and you won’t ever find me complaining about that.”

I don’t know what to say to that and the way it makes me feel is scary. I don’t want to hope for things that aren’t really possible. He’s mine for right now, while it suits him, but I don’t really believe that anything serious will come of it.

“The way that you twist things inside your head fucking kills me,” he growls. “You have no reason to doubt anything about what’s happening here, but I can tell just from the look on your face that you’re grinding your gears and working overtime to make yourself believe that this is going to go bad. Stop putting so much energy into a false negative and focus on what’s really happening.”

He’s right; I do look for the negative. I hate that I’m like this, but I’m scared. Blowing out a sigh of surrender, I nod my head. “I’ll try harder.”

“Good, because I’m not fucking going anywhere.”

He gives me no chance to respond to that. I barely have time to process what he’s said before he’s kissing me. The kiss is hard and possessive, and I instinctively understand that he’s dominating me and staking his claim. Gripping his shoulders, I kiss him back just as aggressively. The little growl that he lets out as he thrusts against me causes me to tear my mouth from his in order to let out a gasp.

Sliding his hands into my hair, he pushes it back as he tilts my head to the side. He starts ever so gently kissing my neck before trailing little love bites from just under my ear down to my collarbone. I let out a strangled sound of pure arousal when he sucks at a particularly tender spot, and I clench my inner muscles so hard that I just about come.

Lifting his head, he looks down into my eyes and lets out a groan. “You’re so fucking sexy, Arden. How can you be so oblivious about what you do to me?”

Instead of waiting for me to answer—not that I’ve got anything coherent to say, mind you—he begins straightening my hair and my dress. When he’s satisfied that I’m okay, he drops one last soft kiss on my lips before taking my hand and leading us back to the party.

The rest of the evening has been phenomenal. Everyone loved Laz’s food and the atmosphere is really enjoyable. It’s kind of funny that I was so nervous about coming when it’s turned out to be much less intimidating than I had imagined. Now the night’s drawing to a close and Exton is just waiting for a text from the valet alerting him that his car is at the front.

I’m not looking forward to going through the groups of photographers again, but there are worse things to have to deal with.

“Car’s ready, baby. Let’s go.”

After saying our final goodbyes we head for Exton’s car hand in hand. The second the door to the restaurant swings open for us to step out, the camera flashes start going off and questions are shouted.

“Exton! Exton! Look over here!”

“Tell us who you’re with!”

“Who are you?”

“Look this way!”

Coming to a halt, Exton squeezes my hand as he faces the photographers.

“Come on guys,” he laughs affably. “No need to yell at my girlfriend—”

The very instant the word girlfriend leaves his lips, they go from just interested to rabidly obsessed with getting details. If I thought the flashes and questions were overwhelming before, I had no clue. Now they’re all yelling over each other and all I can really hear is “Girlfriend,” over and over again.