Читать книгу The Dare Collection December 2019 - Clare Connelly - Страница 25

December 21st, the Christmas Gala,

Billionaires’ Clubrooms, Manhattan

IT’S FINALLY TIME.

I stand in the middle of the ballroom and look around, taking it all in. The formalities are over, the auction concluded—we’ve raised twice what I’d hoped. The millions of dollars from ticket sales added to the auction revenue means I’ll be able to fast-track the shelter I’ve had designed in Phoenix.

A lump forms in my throat, pride in what I’ve done, hope for the future of children making me feel, understandably, a little emotional. But it’s more than that. It’s the knowledge that this is my last night with Nicholas. That come what may, at the end of this evening, it will be the end for us.

A month ago, that made sense, but now, it feels a thousand shades of wrong. Everything inside me rails against the idea. I don’t want tonight to be the last time I see him, but what other option is there? He has to go back to England. And if it were just a matter of work, maybe we could try a long-distance thing. I’ve been wanting to expand Chance to Europe—a London base would be a good start. Maybe I could get over my worries about what the membership will think if news breaks that I’m dating someone from within its ranks. Maybe I could make it work. But Nicholas is going home to find some aristocratic heiress and make a suitable match. There were a dozen reasons we gave our dating deal a time limit of one month, and none of those reasons has gone away.

Except I don’t want it to end.

‘Hey.’ His voice behind me is the cherry on top.

I try my hardest to school my face into a mask of professional inquiry, but the second I turn around and see Nicholas Rothsmore in a tuxedo, my pulse shoots into overdrive and I feel as though I’m being driven at high speed around a hairpin bend.

I don’t want this to end.

I want…what? What do I want?

‘Nic…’ I breathe his name into the room, needing nothing more than to crush my body to his and kiss him, hard, kiss him slow, kiss him all over.

‘Quite the shindig.’ His eyes probe mine and I have a feeling he’s fighting a similar urge to mine; that he wants to pull me to him and kiss me.

My eyes drift to his watch. It will be at least an hour before I can leave. Emily, my assistant, will take care of everything after that; she is amazing.

‘You having fun?’ I murmur.

‘I’ll have more fun if you dance with me.’

I shake my head a little. ‘I feel like that could be a giveaway.’

‘I’ve seen you dance with at least five guys tonight.’

My heart turns over in my chest. ‘Jealous, my lord?’ I’m teasing him, a light-hearted joke, but his eyes narrow and he nods.

‘Beyond belief.’

Blood fills my heart too fast; my chest hurts. What do I want from him? How can this night be the last one we spend together? ‘That’s work.’

‘So? I’m work too. I’m your new internship partner, remember?’

Remember? I’ve thought of very little else since our lawyers rushed through the paperwork so this year’s ballot of kids wouldn’t miss their selections.

‘You raise an excellent point.’ And temptation makes me foolish. ‘One dance.’

He holds his hands out, and I step into them, taking a position that would pass, if anyone cared to look carefully, as purely businesslike.

‘I have been watching you,’ he says slowly, the words brushing low against my ear, so no one else can hear. ‘And trying to work out if this dress has a zip hidden somewhere.’

‘Pre-emptive planning?’ I prompt, my eyes running over his face.

‘Yes. I intend to remove it from you just as soon as we get back to my apartment.’

My pulse races faster; my chest still hurts, as if it’s being cracked wide apart. I don’t want this to end.

Ever.

The realisation slices through me like the sharpest blade of a knife.

‘I want to strip the dress from you and carry you to the hot tub, pull you into the water and onto my cock. I want to fuck you there, first.’

I swallow, his imagery insanely erotic, but even that isn’t enough to push my realisation from my mind.

I don’t want Nicholas to go. I don’t want ‘us’ to be over. And there is an ‘us’. Despite our insistence that this is pretend dating, like an education for me and nothing more, I have done perhaps the most stupid thing in my life.

I’ve fallen in love with him.

I fell in love with a man. It was a trap. When we started this, I thought he was the opposite of everything I wanted. He’s rich—he’s going to be a lord, for Christ’s sake—and he’s shallow. He’s meant to be, anyway, but he isn’t. He’s caring and sweet and compassionate and intelligent and fascinating and—Oh, my God.

I stop dancing for a second.

His eyes are skipping over my face. He’s going to work out something’s wrong.

‘What else?’ I start to dance again, lifting my lips into an approximation of a smile.

‘There’s a lid for every pot. You can’t fight it when you find what fits.’

Meemaw used to say it about Pa, when she was frustrated by him, but always with a smile. As if he drove her crazy but she loved him completely.

‘I want to spend some time saying goodbye to your beautiful breasts,’ he groans, his voice a whisper that sends darts down my spine. But the words cause my heart to splinter into a billion pieces, because he’s talking about saying goodbye as though he’s totally fine with this.

My eyes sweep shut, and I know, in that moment, if anyone cared to look they’d see the face of a woman whose heart is being completely shattered.

‘And this arse of yours.’

I have no idea how I hold it together. His words are making my body tremble with anticipation, but in the middle of my chest a cavity is being scraped out. I am hollow.

I am in love with a man who is wrong for me in every way. He’s moving to another country. He’s going to marry someone else and, even then, against his will—he would rather be single and continue to do what he’s been doing these last five years.

What kind of an idiot falls in love with an unavailable playboy?

I look at him—I can’t help it—and see a frown on his face. ‘Are you okay?’

Shit. I don’t even feel as if I can lie properly. ‘I’m fine. Just emotional. This event is the culmination of a lot of work.’

He visibly relaxes. ‘I can see that.’

I love Nicholas Rothsmore. I don’t know when I first started to love him, but somewhere along the way, I fell and I fell hard. It’s like being struck by lightning; how does he not feel it?

Does he feel it?

His hand at my back shifts, just a little, closer towards my arse. I blink up at him and drop his hand, stepping backwards.

He doesn’t feel it. He does this kind of thing all the time, and, even if he didn’t, he learned his lesson from the first and last woman he let himself love.

He’s built a wall around his heart that I don’t think I can chip through.

‘Imogen.’ Orla, one of the club’s Australian members, who I really like, catches me as she passes, oblivious to the explosions that are detonating inside my soul. ‘You’ve outdone yourself.’

I zipper over my heart and take a breath, resuming my usual calm, unflappable exterior. ‘You’re having fun?’

‘Oh, yes.’ It’s slightly breathy. Her eyes shift over me for a second and her cheeks flush. ‘Definitely.’ She puts a manicured hand on my wrist, her eyes shining. ‘I’ve got some ideas for the next Sydney gala. I’ll email you.’

I smile. Life goes on. Things move forward. With or without Nicholas, the club will continue, the membership will grow, the charity will survive. But my heart won’t recover. I have never been in love before, but I don’t think you need to have first-hand experience to know that love has transformative powers.

I love Nicholas, and my life will never be the same after he leaves.

I have to tell him.

Orla slinks off, her beautiful dress caressing her frame. I watch her for a second and then turn back to Nicholas. His grin is pure, devilish playboy.

He doesn’t love me, and all telling him will achieve is a premature end to this.

He won’t take me home tonight; it will be over and I need that not to be the case.

One more night, one more night of fun and sex and pretending this is casual when I know it isn’t. At least, not for me.

‘I have to circulate,’ I say softly.

‘I expected as much.’ But then, leaning even closer, ‘You’re sure you don’t want to try out an Intimate Room? I can get some handcuffs…’

And despite my breaking heart, heat blooms through my body. ‘Later.’

He laughs. ‘Count on it.’

His use of the phrase I utter so often pulls at me, because it is this phrase that led him to discover I was Miss Anonymous. Would I take it back if I could? Would I make it so this never happened?

No. Not in a million years. Even as I feel my heart breaking, I know I would never wish we hadn’t shared this. Nicholas has changed me, and I think for the better.

I continue to circulate, brushing past the billionaire property developers Ash Evans and Sebastian Dumont just in time to catch them shaking hands, Ash laughing at something Sebastian’s muttered.

This is what the club promises its members. It’s a safe place to do business, to network and to relax. It’s a safe place but not, as it turns out, for me.

I run my tongue over his tattoo, hating it in that moment, because I don’t want Nicholas to be his own. I want him to be mine. I flick his hair-roughened nipple, enjoying the feeling of his chest lifting, his breath snagging in his lungs as I move lower. His naked body is tanned against the matte black of his sheets. I kiss my way down his body, tasting his flesh, remembering everything I can about this, taking his hard cock into my mouth, absorbing the guttural oath he spills into the room as I move my mouth up and down, my nipples tingling, heat pooling between my legs.

I will never get sick of this. Him, me, naked. I want this to last for ever.

But it is already approaching dawn, and I hate that. Never have I wanted a night to last longer than I do this night.

I taste a hint of his salty pre-cum and then his hands are under my arms, pulling me up his body, his mouth seeking mine, his frame rolling me, so I’m on my back, his arousal hard between my legs. I arch my back and spread my legs wide, wordlessly begging him to take me, to make love to me, needing his body to console mine in the only way he can.

But he breaks the kiss and reaches across me. I hear a drawer and then something metallic. His hands curve around my wrists; he pulls them to the bedframe and then cold metal surrounds me. I pull on my hands. They’re cuffed to the bed.

I stare up at him, my eyes wide, lips parted.

‘Do you trust me?’

My stomach swirls with acid. ‘With all my heart.’

His smile is sensual. A second later, his hands are trailing over my flesh, so light, barely touching me, and I’m crying his name out over and over. His mouth follows them, his tongue flicking my nipples, as he moves lower with his hands, spreading my legs to make way for his mouth.

His tongue is gentle at first, running over my seam, exploring me, rediscovering me. I thrash from side to side, my handcuffed wrists a new form of torture as I ache to touch him or touch myself, to do something to relieve this tidal wave of sensation.

‘Please,’ I groan, incapable of saying anything else. He keeps my legs pinned wide as he sucks my clit into his mouth and flicks it with his tongue. I am on fire; I am burning up. ‘Please,’ I whimper, needing him, needing more, needing everything.

He pulls away, up my body, his mouth finding my nipples, his hands roaming my skin freely, inquiringly, and I’m so hungry for him I can barely cope. I need to feel him inside me.

‘I want you,’ I beg.

‘I know.’ His smile is tighter now, tension on his face. He pauses, rolling a condom over his length, and hope is a beast inside me.

His eyes hold mine as he pushes his rock-hard arousal into my wet core; my muscles spasm around him and I jerk against the handcuffs, wanting to touch him now, to feel his muscles bunch beneath me as I run my hands over his skin.

His laugh is soft, a caress against my skin. He moves inside me, deeper, and I groan, surrendering to this completely. My body is an instrument and he plays me with perfection.

Dawn is coming. Even in winter, when the sun rises later, nothing staves off morning’s eventual appearance. I watch him sleep, my own eyes heavy, my mind heavier, my heart a dead weight.

I love him, and I have no hope that he loves me back. For me, this has been completely unprecedented. For Nicholas, this is his life, his norm. I have no reason to think anything has changed for him since we started up with this, whereas all the boundaries of my world have shifted.

My eyes run over his beautiful face, disbelief curdling my insides.

This is so much harder than I thought it would be.

I shift in the bed.

A coffee will help.

I step out quietly, drawing one of his shirts from the wardrobe and pulling it over my nakedness as I prowl through to the kitchen.

It’s snowed overnight. When I look down from the windows, I see the pavement is white like chalk, cars covered in a pale, sparkling blanket. I press a button on the coffee machine, cursing as it stirs to life. Even though it’s quiet, it’s not silent, and I look towards his bedroom door in time to see Nicholas shifting in bed. He looks for me and my heart groans, because I’m his first thought on waking.

How can this be the end?

He disappears from view and a second later steps into the lounge area, a pair of grey boxer shorts low on his hips. My eyes find his tattoo on autopilot; acid coats the inside of my mouth.

‘Is it even morning?’ he asks groggily, his face showing bemusement.

‘I have to get going,’ I say, my own voice tight like a wire that’s been pulled too taut.

His eyes focus blearily on his watch. ‘It’s five o’clock.’

‘I know.’ I pull the coffee from the machine and cup it in my hands. I keep my back propped against the kitchen bench. I hope it looks nonchalant. I hope I seem better than I feel.

‘Come back to bed.’

My heart groans. ‘I can’t.’

‘Why?’

I swallow, focussing on the black liquid inside my cup. ‘Because we said this would be the end. And I have to go.’

I don’t think the stilted statements make much sense, and this is confirmed when I lift my attention to his face. ‘Stay.’

‘A few more hours?’

‘No.’ He frowns. ‘I don’t have to be in England until New Year’s Eve. Spend Christmas with me.’

I feel as if I’m being stretched on the rack. ‘What?’

‘A week’s extension on our original deal?’ His tone is teasing.

Something shifts in my chest, something painful. ‘Why?’

He shrugs his shoulders casually. ‘Why not?’

My knees tremble. Fire spits through my veins. It’s so close to what I want, but, now that I understand how I feel, being with Nicholas for another night—let alone seven—would just be too hard.

‘Because, I can’t.’

His expression is sceptical. I draw in a deep breath. ‘I have to get back to my normal life,’ I say emphatically—my normal life is my lifeline. It’s the talisman for who I used to be. ‘I have the Christmas drive for Chance, and the Christmas lunch I do every year.’ I bite down on my lip, looking away from him because I can’t bear to look into his eyes for another moment. ‘I can’t.’

The last word wobbles a little. I sip the coffee to stave off some kind of emotional scene.

‘One more week.’

‘No.’ I am emphatic. I speak as if my life depends on it, and in many ways it does.

He’s quiet a moment. ‘I don’t understand. Last night was…amazing. You’re saying you don’t want more of this?’

‘We said a month,’ I murmur. ‘We were clear about this. The Christmas benefit was to be the end.’

‘And that’s what you want?’

I open my mouth to say something, but what can I say? That yes, I want more. I want too much more. How did this happen? The club and Chance have been my total priority for so long and I would have sworn they always would be, but now there’s something—someone—else who matters just as much, and despite the fact I swore this would be fun and casual and no-strings, despite the fact I initially loved the boundaries we put in place, I want to push against them now. I’m in love with him, and I know he doesn’t love me back, but, God, I can’t ignore how I feel.

‘Damn it, Imogen, it was an arbitrary line in the sand you decided on. Why can’t we shift it by one fucking week?’

His anger sparks my own. I can no longer control my feelings, my rawness. ‘Because a week isn’t nearly enough, Nicholas. I don’t want just one more week with you. I want a lifetime, okay?’