Читать книгу All Work And No Play... - Julie Cohen - Страница 9

JANE asked the cab to stop at the end of the street so she could walk to the restaurant and cool down a little bit.

As she walked Jane plucked at the neckline of her dress, lower than she was used to. She’d bought it for a Pearce Grey cocktail party a year ago, and never worn it because at the last minute she’d decided that a suit would be more professional. But tonight she’d dug it out, on Jonny’s advice.

Jonny’s advice. Her stomach spiralled as she thought about following it. Imagine grabbing Jay and pulling him into a cab, with the full intention of having frantic sex with him as soon as they got to her flat. This beautiful, perfect man.

Her legs swished against each other as she walked in her high heels, arousing her even more. Meeting Jay this afternoon, and then Jonny’s unexpected words on the laptop, had conjured up images in her head that were almost shockingly explicit. She wouldn’t quite have expected it of Jonny, not something so blatantly sexy. But then again, in the past, their online relationship had been a little flirty, but mostly friendly. She’d made it clear she had a fiancé.

For all she knew, Jonathan Cole was a sex god in real life, or at least he had the imagination of one. Maybe he had a steady stream of women who were turned on by computer geniuses in glasses, and he was doing them all up against a variety of walls all over the north of England.

The thought made her smile, and it also made a twinge of jealousy tickle deep in her chest. Because Jonny’s words had struck something in her, had interested her more than just anybody’s sexual fantasy would’ve done.

It was an insight into Jonny she’d never had before … and also an insight into her own desires. Every single thing he had described had sounded exciting and perfect and right, even though she’d never done anything like that before.

And it bothered her a little bit that he might be describing his experience with someone else. Even though she fully intended to experience it with someone else, too.

Jane paused at the door of the wine bar where she’d arranged to meet Jay before dinner, and took a deep breath. It was very difficult to believe she had a date with a male model, and even more difficult to believe that she planned to seduce him, if she could.

She pushed open the door. The bar was crowded, but she spotted him immediately, as if she had been programmed to find him.

He wore a stylish dark suit and a patterned white shirt, open at the collar. His brown hair was short and casually styled. He’d shaved and without a shadow of a beard his jaw was even stronger and more defined, emphasising his cheekbones.

She bit her lip, and then remembered she would ruin her lipstick.

He checked his watch; his expression looked a little anxious, and that gave Jane a boost of confidence. He was waiting for her. When he looked around the room she stepped forward and approached the table.

Jay stood when he saw her and strode to meet her, and his smile took her breath away.

‘You came,’ he said, and his voice sounded almost comically relieved. He kissed her on her cheek, and she could smell the subtle scent of his shaving lotion. His lips were gentle and welcoming and they made a shiver run through her.

He stood back and looked her over, from head to foot. She’d been aroused walking in here, but under his gaze she felt her nipples hardening inside her silk bra, and felt a bolt of warmth between her legs.

‘You look fantastic,’ he said.

‘Thank you.’ With him looking at her like that, she could almost believe it. He was a charmer, she knew, but she could use all the confidence she could get, especially when in the company of a physically perfect male who was wearing a suit that fitted as if it were made for him.

‘You look great,’ she told him, because he really did, though she was also sure he heard that all the time.

She was a little surprised when his cheeks flushed slightly with pleasure. ‘Thanks,’ he said, and took her hand to lead her to the table, where he pulled out a chair for her.

He’d done that twice today, she remembered. She worked with men all the time and they rarely did anything like that. It was a totally unnecessary courtesy, a little bit of gender conditioning that she would normally laugh at, but just this minute it felt nice.

She sat in her chair and crossed her legs, letting her skirt slide up her bare thighs. She saw Jay notice, and saw him swallow.

Thank you, Jonny, she thought.

‘I was worried you wouldn’t show up,’ he said as he sat down. ‘I thought you’d decide I was coming on too strong and run in the opposite direction.’

‘I’m the one who invited you out, remember?’

A waitress appeared. ‘Do you fancy a glass of champagne?’ Jay asked Jane. ‘I feel that we’ve got a lot to celebrate.’

She nodded, and the waitress disappeared. ‘I don’t usually drink champagne,’ Jay said, with a short laugh. ‘Then again, I don’t normally wear suits, either. One of the few perks of the modelling job is that I get to keep some of the clothes, but I don’t get much call to dress up in my day-to-day life.’

‘I’m not really a dress person, either,’ Jane admitted.

‘I’m glad you wore it, though.’ His voice was quiet, intense, and Jane wanted to bite her lip and melt into a puddle. Instead, she remembered Jonny’s advice and twisted a strand of her hair loosely around her finger.

He noticed, and moistened his lips with his tongue. ‘Jane, that is really working,’ he said. He reached his hand out as if he were about to touch her, and then the waitress came back with their drinks.

They lifted their glasses, and touched the rims together. ‘Here’s to seeing you,’ Jay said.

‘You too.’ Jane took a sip of champagne, wondering if it would give her a bit more courage. ‘I never thought I’d be out on a date with a male model.’

‘Ah. Well, yes.’ Jay put down his glass, and leaned forward on the table. ‘I want to tell you about that. It’s strictly temporary.’

‘Really?’ She suppressed dismay that he wanted to discuss business. ‘Does this mean you wouldn’t be available for a follow-up Giovanni Franco campaign?’

He raised his hands. ‘I’m—it depends. I wouldn’t leave you in the lurch, Jane. But it’s not the campaign I’m talking about, it’s me. I want to be honest with you and tell you why I’m modelling in the first place. It’s not a career I would’ve ever chosen for myself.’

‘Okay,’ she said, wondering why he was talking about this, and leaning back in her chair with her glass of champagne.

‘Okay,’ he repeated after her. He took a deep breath and laid his hands on the table, gazing at them, and Jane was surprised that his expression was apprehensive, as if he were gearing himself up to say something difficult to her.

He raised his head and looked straight at her. ‘I loved my dad,’ he said.

Jay said the four words with such clarity and vehemence that Jane blinked. ‘All right,’ she said, slowly, wondering why Jay, a near stranger, was telling her this on their first date.

‘He was my hero,’ Jay continued. ‘I thought he was everything a man should be. He seemed so honourable, so upright. He worked hard and he always had time to give me advice, and he adored my mother, I was sure he did. You could tell it by the way he looked at her, how he spoke to her. I thought he never wanted anything but to protect her.’

He met her eyes again, as if testing whether she understood what he was trying to say. Jane nodded, and, although she was still wondering why he was telling her this, his dark blue eyes were so full of sincerity and emotion that she couldn’t question him too much. This was important to Jay, and for some reason it was also important to him that he told her about it.

It was unusual, but it was a kind of trust.

‘I was devastated when he died. Not as much as my mother was. As she is.’

He lapsed into thought for a moment, and then shook his head and ran his hand through his short hair. ‘Anyway, she was in no state to go through his affairs, so I did it for her when I got back. And, Jane—’ he rumpled his hair again, looking at Jane with pain in his features ‘—he’d left nothing. Everything was gone. The business, the property, all of it was mortgaged up to the hilt, and he had debts and loans adding up to thousands and thousands of pounds.’

Jane put down her drink and stared at Jay.

He was being totally sincere. Every word he said told her how hurt he was. She could tell, not only from the content of what he was saying, but also from his expression, how he spoke, the timbre of his voice. This man wasn’t just worried about his parents’ financial situation; he felt betrayed, disillusioned, bitterly disappointed.

‘How did it happen?’ she asked.

‘A combination of things, though I’m not sure of all of it. Some of it was risky investment. Some of it was business losses that he borrowed more money to cover. A lot of it was gambling. Online poker, among other things. He must have been doing it in secret for years.’

She put her hand on his. ‘That’s awful. I’m so sorry.’

Jay nodded. ‘I haven’t told my mother. I couldn’t bear to destroy her image of him. And I know he didn’t mean to leave her in such debt; he’d had heart problems but his death was sudden. But I’ve had to do some scrambling to buy some time to repay the loans, and I need to do everything I possibly can to make money. I’ve done some extra consultancy work, and taken on some extra projects, and then when Thom started bugging me again to do some modelling for him, I said yes, even though it was something I never really wanted to do.’

‘So you’re modelling just to pay your father’s debts.’

‘Yes.’ He let out a long breath, and smiled at her. Not the million-watt model smile, but a dimmer, sadder one. ‘It feels good to tell you about it. Thom doesn’t know. Nobody knows. My mother thinks I’ve suddenly developed a love of having my photograph taken.’

She squeezed his hand. ‘I know what it’s like to keep a secret,’ she said. ‘It shouldn’t be hard, because all you have to do is keep your mouth shut and act normal. But it is.’

She thought about the past few days at work, seeing Gary, knowing what had happened between them, and pretending that everything was all right.

‘It feels better once you’ve told somebody,’ she said, remembering the relief she’d felt typing her problems to Jonny.

He turned his hand over so he was clasping hers. ‘It feels better now I’ve told you.’

Why me? she was about to ask, and then she looked from their clasped hands to his face. There was warmth in his eyes, gentleness and earnestness in his mouth, and every line was familiar in that unexpected way.

This intimacy had been between them since they’d first seen each other, and although Jane couldn’t explain it, she couldn’t deny it, either.

Instead she bit her lip and nodded.

‘You’re so beautiful, Jane,’ Jay murmured, his dark blue eyes still looking into hers. The air around them thickened, time seemed to slow even though her pulse sped up. He was so close, she was sharing every breath he took.

Jonny’s words swam into her mind. He’d described this moment. And then he’d described what could happen afterwards.

She could have her mouth on this man’s mouth, his hands on her, lifting her up so she could wrap her legs around his waist, pushing her clothing aside so he could enter her. Fast and hard and breathless.

The idea, the imagined feeling, throbbed inside her.

She didn’t know Jay. And she didn’t know if the way he made her feel was just part of his natural charm, a normal reaction of every female to his looks and his behaviour.

But she did know she wanted him. And he appeared to want her, too.

She had been engaged for eight months and had never felt even remotely this turned on. And after the hell of the past few days, after the habit and hard work of the past few years, this seemed too miraculous not to seize with both hands.

Jane lifted her free hand to Jay’s face. She touched his left cheekbone and ran her fingertips down over his skin, over the place where his smile dug grooves in his cheek, close to the side of his mouth. His skin was smooth and almost shockingly warm. He tilted his head slightly, as if to press her fingers closer.

‘I don’t think I want dinner,’ she said, and heard that her voice had become husky.

‘Me neither.’

They stood at the same time, their hands still clasped. Jay dropped a note on the table and they walked out of the bar together, saying nothing. Jane was aware of every part of her body: the way her high heels made her hips sway, the brushing of her bare thighs together under her dress, the soft material of her skirt against her legs, the way her breasts moved slightly as she walked. Her fingers, twined with Jay’s, which were long and strong and sinewy.

She was aware of his body, too. He moved easily but she sensed urgency in his movements. He held her hand tight and kept her close so that her shoulder and hip grazed against him two or three times as they threaded through the tables. She could even sense his breathing, rapid and shallow.

He was about six inches taller than she was, even while she was wearing heels. She would have to stand on her tiptoes to kiss him.

Jay pushed open the bar door and as soon as they were outside on the pavement Jane tugged him to one side, turned, and grabbed the lapel of his suit with her free hand to pull him towards her.

‘Great idea,’ he murmured, and she felt his strong arm curl around her waist and hold her close against him while she was standing up on her tiptoes, reaching with her mouth for his.

It was like no other kiss she had ever had in her life. His lips were warm and fitted against her mouth perfectly and they felt so new, strange and right. For a moment their mouths just pressed together and Jane felt as if she had taken a giant leap forward into a whole different world.

And then it was hunger. Jane tore her hands from his grip and his suit and grasped his head with both hands, burying her fingers in his soft, short hair and pulling him closer. Her mouth moved with his and the kiss changed from static to frantic. He nudged her lips open and she touched the hot, slippery tip of his tongue. She heard herself groan in her throat and that seemed to urge Jay on because he pulled her tighter and kissed her harder.

She slid her hands down his neck and gripped his broad shoulders. Somewhere in the back of her mind she remembered Jonny’s description of kissing on the pavement, touching every bit of flesh that was possible, and she slipped the fingers of one hand between the buttons of his shirt. His chest was smooth and firm and his heartbeat hammered under his ribs and muscle.

It wasn’t enough. With her other hand she pulled at his shirt at the back under his jacket. She tugged it out of his suit waistband and spread her hand against the small of his back, moulding it to his muscle and feeling the strength of his spine.

‘Jane,’ Jay muttered roughly into her mouth, closing his teeth gently on her top lip and then kissing it before he dipped his head to kiss her neck. He still held her up against him with one arm, but the other hand stroked up her back and came round to rest on her throat and collar-bone. The tips of his fingers just edged beneath the neckline of her dress and she felt his chin and mouth underneath her ear, downwards onto the base of her neck. She could feel everywhere that he wasn’t touching, the inches of skin between his hand and where her breast began. His tongue tasted her and she shuddered and let her head fall back to give him better access.

People were walking past, they were in the centre of Chelsea, but she didn’t care, because she had never felt this free before. Jane closed her eyes and shut out London. She concentrated on this man, who knew just how to touch her and what she wanted, who seemed more full of passion than any man she had ever met.

Strength and sinew. Her body was pressed full-length against him; his leg between her thighs, his arm wrapped round her. The rigid length of his erection against her belly told her he wanted her as much as she did him.

But beneath his ardent kisses, the clasp of his hands and the rapid pace of his breathing she could sense a tenderness in his embrace. His hands were careful. His lips were gentle even when devouring her. Quite unexpectedly, she thought of the words he had used to describe how his father had treated his mother: he adored her.

She felt sexy, and adored.

Jane opened her eyes, suddenly desperate to look at Jay and see the expression on his face as he kissed her. She straightened her head, and blinked as she realised she was looking straight into the lens of a camera.

Click.

‘Um—we’re being watched,’ she said, her voice unsteady. Jay stopped kissing her and straightened, still holding her tight.

The camera clicked again. It was held by a man dressed in an anorak and shorts, wearing a floppy hat and carrying an orange backpack. Jane took in the street for the first time and noticed a group of people just past them, all carrying identical backpacks and cameras.

Tourists. And it seemed that she and Jay were suddenly a major attraction.

‘Excuse me, mate,’ Jay said, ‘but do you mind?’

The man lowered his camera. ‘You don’t see that in Oklahoma City,’ he said, apparently by way of explanation, and walked off after the rest of his group.

Jane tilted back her head to look at Jay’s face. He was watching the man retreat, incredulity in his features. He glanced down at Jane and then both of them were laughing, holding onto each other, sharing breath again.

‘I’d have thought you were used to cameras by now.’ Jane giggled.

‘I’m a model, not a porn star,’ Jay said, and then he smiled down into her face. ‘You’re incredible, Jane. What next?’

She tucked his shirt back in and smoothed her other hand over the wrinkles she had made in the front of it. ‘I think we need to go somewhere more private,’ she said. ‘Let’s get a cab.’

‘How private?’ His expression became less playful, more serious. ‘It turns out I’m only staying a few streets from here, but if you’d rather go somewhere else—’

‘We don’t need a cab, then.’ Swiftly Jane bent down and removed her high heels. She took his hand, dangling her shoes from the other. ‘Come on, let’s run to your hotel.’

Jay didn’t hesitate. He took off down the pavement, with Jane running beside him as fast as she could. Her bare feet slapped on the asphalt and her hair flew out behind her and she wondered, When was the last time I ran like this?

With Jay’s hand in hers, she flew over the kerbs, ducked between pedestrians, rounded corners like a Formula One racer and heard her breath coming out in sure, rapid pants of laughter.

They were at the door of the hotel almost before she was ready and they spilled through it laughing and gasping for breath. It was a boutique hotel, newly renovated, modern and airy. Jay brought her straight to the lift.

‘I assume you want to go to my room,’ he said, stroking her hair back from her flushed face and combing through its tangled waves with his fingers.

She stood on her toes and whispered into his ear. ‘I can think of some things we can get up to in the lift.’

He raised his eyebrows at her and seemed to be opening his mouth to say something when they were joined by a man in tweed. The door dinged and the man came into the lift with them.

Jane held Jay’s hand and nestled close into his side. Curses, she mouthed at him while the other passenger was pressing his floor button, and she was rewarded with Jay’s sexy smile.

First floor. Second floor. Jane watched the numbers on top of the lift door, felt Jay’s thumb circling the inside of her wrist, and tried not to go insane with anticipation. At the third floor the doors slid open and Jay led her out into the hallway.

‘Not far, I hope,’ she said.

‘Just here.’ He removed a card key from the inside pocket of his suit jacket and opened the door. Without a single iota of hesitation Jane walked into this near-stranger’s hotel room and felt as free and young as she had ten minutes before when she’d been sprinting full-tilt with him down the King’s Road.

The room was high-ceilinged and painted in light colours, furnished in sleek modern pieces. She spotted a pair of jeans over a chair, a laptop on the desk, and a big, smooth bed.

Jay closed the door behind her and she faced him.

Aside from his breathing, the rustle of his suit, and her heartbeat in her ears, the room was absolutely silent. Jane realised, with a twist of her heart, that for the first time she and this man were alone together. Actually acting out the intimacy they’d adopted from the start.

Jay reached out with a hand and pushed a lock of her hair back with his finger. Then, slowly, he dropped his arm to his own side.

‘So, Jane,’ he said quietly, ‘what do you want to do?’