Manwhore +1

Rumors about entering a bidding war for Edge have sent the stock plummeting even further . . .

Sources say M4 Chief Executive Officer Malcolm Saint’s head is just not in the right place after his involvement with columnist Rachel Livingston, who exposed the universally loved magnate only recently in an article for a local magazine . . .

I click the links and stare at the pictures. We’re out having dinner together, in one. In another, he’s getting into his car. In another, he’s standing in a sea of men, looking detached and somehow . . . alone. Thoughtful.

I swear. In all the articles about him online, few of them tell you how Saint is actually generous. How come no one writes about that? Or writes about the bad side of his fame? What it might be like for a person so exposed to the world, someone continually judged—even by his girlfriend. Someone who can’t help but see skewed mirrors of himself thrust up by the media. Does he see himself as the media sees him? Or what other people see?

The Malcolm Saint you hear about in the news is reckless and intense—he doesn’t save a close friend’s business. The Saint in the media wouldn’t buy a mural to support a cause that I believed in, he wouldn’t come to my campout. The Saint in the media wouldn’t offer me a job regardless of what happened between us, just to keep me away from someone he knows could do me harm.

The Saint in the media is a powerful legend, but my boyfriend is a mysterious, thrilling man who I want to peel open and then kiss all the way inside to whatever wounds made him.

I think of his father. How frustrated Saint has been, trying to get me out of Edge and into M4. Suddenly I understand his position.

Would I want my boyfriend in harm’s way? No. Just knowing M4 is taking a hit because of some allegedly bad business calls—partly because of me—I want to comfort Saint. I want to take my measly thousand-dollar savings and go buy the three shares in M4 I could afford, just to show him I believe in him.

I just want to hear him reassure me that he won’t throw his hard-earned money on a lost cause, on revenge on his father, on revenge for me, on saving all my colleagues.

He’s a man who’s been asked for many things by people who want to use him. I want him to know all I want is his support and his love. He doesn’t have to save everybody to prove himself to me. He doesn’t have to prove anything to his dad anymore. He is Malcolm Kyle Preston Logan Saint, intense, relentless and ambitious, ten times more powerful than any other man in Chicago, capable of building a thousand Edges from scratch, and his father can go straight to hell.

When Malcolm arrives at my apartment late, I charge over to him, take his hand while Gina keeps watching TV, and lead him to my room.

“I saw him today. Noel,” I say, knowing by instinct he’ll want every detail of our encounter.

When his green eyes flash protectively, his eyebrows slant over his eyes, and he opens his mouth, I lift my fingers and press them to his lips.

“He stepped off the elevator before I could go in. He said you won’t win, and then I rode upstairs. That was all. From what I’ve seen of him, he’s big on insults but that’s all the game he’s got.”

Still frowning, he takes my wrist and lowers my hand. His voice is low and deadly. “He went to Edge.”

I nod and lace my fingers through his, somehow wanting to calm him. “Probably meeting with the Clarks.”

“Funny,” he says with perfectly moderated anger, “because the Clarks are kissing my feet right now for starting the price war.”

“But they need that second buyer for the price to rise, don’t they?” I say.

He shrugs off his jacket and walks over to the corner chair, tossing it over the armrest before he unknots and pulls off his tie. “Even without any assurance of you staying, my father’s ego won’t stand backing down to me. Like he said, he doesn’t want me to win.” His lips curl as if he’s savoring the fight.

He shoves the tie into his jacket pocket and stands there, in that white men’s shirt, looking at me as if making sure that I’m all right, and my heart is quivering when I add, “You’re bidding on Edge.”

“M4 is.”

“M4 is you, Saint. You’re bidding on Edge? Why?”

“I’m not bidding on Edge. I’m bidding on you.”

My entire body resonates with shock and emotion at his words, the violently tender expression on his face. I drop my gaze. “It hurts to think that you’re doing this for me.”

“Don’t say that. You have no idea what you’ve done for me.”

He holds my face in one hand as the other gently cups the back of my neck. His eyes are like daggers of heat and truth, ruthlessness and loyalty as he peers down at me, his lashes halfway over his eyes.

“Do you know what I’d do for you?” A huskiness enters his voice as he circles my chin with his thumb. “You’re the only heaven I will ever know, Rachel”—he looks into my eyes—“and if you were a hell, I’d sin my whole life just to stay with you.” His eyes are intense one second, and the next, they’re smiling down at me as he scans my face and adds, “I would kill for this one . . . ear.” He takes it between his thumb and forefinger and tugs it playfully, and when I finally smile, his expression becomes sober again, his voice low and smooth as steel. “My father won’t touch you, Rachel. He won’t play with you, threaten you, so much as breathe on you.”

“Saint,” I protest, “I don’t want him to touch you.”

As if that’s inconsequential, he kicks his shoes off, settles down on my bed in his shirt and slacks, and opens his arms. I go there. And he asks, very plainly, “Do you want me to buy you Edge?”

“What?”

Ohmigod. Saint did not just ask me this!

But he did. He did.

“You said . . .” I clear my throat, shaking the daze off. “You once said you didn’t see your money going there. You don’t believe in Edge.”

“But I believe in you.” He watches me. “I’m not bidding on it for myself. I’m either giving you your magazine back, or draining the demon who spawned me of every last drop for daring to attempt to toy with you.” A ruthless gleam appears in his eyes, his voice dropping. “If you want it, I won’t back down until I break him and Edge is yours. Yours to do what you want with, your platform.” He studies me in both silence and appreciation, his eyes missing no detail. “Is Edge what you want?”