Читать книгу The Scandalous Collection - Кейт Хьюит, Пенни Джордан - Страница 62

BEN glanced up as Natalia approached, trepidation and compassion warring within her. He looked grave and perhaps even grim; was he displeased to see her? Natalia couldn’t tell, yet she could certainly feel the depth of some nameless emotion rising from within him. His hooded gaze seemed to blaze through her senses and as she came to a halt a few metres away they stared at each other for a long moment, neither speaking.

Then Ben gave a strange, cynical little smile and Natalia braced herself for some cutting remark or command to leave. Instead he said, ‘I’ve just been sitting here, thinking what a selfish bastard I am.’

Surprise flashed through her and she came to sit down next to him on the cool, hard sand. ‘That doesn’t sound like much fun.’

‘No,’ Ben agreed, turning back to stare straight ahead again at the darkening sea. ‘It isn’t.’

Natalia stared at the sea for a moment, trying to gather her scattered thoughts. ‘Is it because of Roberto?’ she finally asked.

‘I was working him hard and I should have known better.’

‘Known he would break his leg?’ Natalia said with a lilt of wry disbelief. ‘Because that’s rather a difficult thing to know.’

‘Know that a ten-year-old kid doesn’t need to be a superstar,’ Ben said flatly. ‘Even if you want him to be. Even if you weren’t.’

So this wasn’t just about Roberto. ‘You still couldn’t have known, Ben. It was an accident. And accidents are out of your control.’

He let out a short, bitter laugh. ‘Exactly.’

‘What is that supposed to mean?’

She didn’t think Ben was going to answer her. He remained silent, his gaze still on the sea, and then finally he spoke. ‘I’ve spent my whole life trying to be in control of everything, to feel like I was in control. I told myself I was doing it for everyone’s else sake—my family’s or my mother’s or whoever—but it was really for me.’

‘I told you you were a control freak,’ Natalia said lightly, but Ben didn’t even smile. ‘So did it work?’ she finally asked quietly.

‘Not really. Because I never was. Everything always spins out of control, every time.’

She certainly knew how that felt. ‘You can’t control other people’s actions.’

‘I haven’t even controlled my own.’

Natalia felt her heart freeze for a suspended second. Was Ben talking about his actions with her? Kissing her? Surely not. She swallowed. ‘So. Welcome to the club.’

‘The club?’

‘You don’t think you’re the only one who feels that way, do you?’

Ben let out of a bark of genuine laughter. ‘You’re not going to give me a shred of sympathy, are you?’

‘Poor little princess?’ Natalia reminded him. ‘Nobody loves you? Nobody understands you?’

Ben gave her a sudden hard stare that sent awareness sizzling along her spine. ‘I don’t think that’s true,’ he said slowly, and it took Natalia a stunned moment to consider what he might mean. He understood her? He loved her?

‘Of course it’s not true,’ she said briskly. ‘Just like it’s not true that you’ve ruined everyone’s life including your own because of this obsessive and unhealthy need for control.’

He smiled. ‘Obsessive? Really?’

‘Why are you so concerned about being in control?’ Natalia asked point-blank, without any humour or lightness in her voice to let Ben off the hook and deflect the question. She wanted to know the answer too much.

‘Because I never felt like I had it,’ he replied, his tone turning bleak. ‘Everything about my life—my childhood at least—has been so up and down. So crazy. My mother divorced my father—twice. We moved from house to flat, one minute we were riding high and the next everything seemed a mess. My father was in the Premier League—’

‘Like you wanted to be?’ Natalia asked before she could stop herself, and Ben stared at her for a second.

‘Yes.’

‘You come alive on the football pitch like I’ve never seen before. You seem … happy.’

‘I am,’ Ben said quietly. ‘At least, I was. I’ve always loved football. I was good at it—’

‘And it was a way to feel in control.’

He shot her a wry glance. ‘Yes.’

‘So what happened?’

‘I blew out my knee when I was seventeen. Lost any chance of playing professionally. My father was incredibly disappointed.’

How telling, she thought, that he talked about his dad’s disappointment rather than his own. Natalia suspected Ben’s ambition and need for control had been less for himself and more for his family and the stability of his many younger siblings.

‘That must have been hard,’ she said quietly, and he just shrugged.

‘No one likes to lose a dream.’

‘So then you went into business?’

He gave her the ghost of a smile. ‘I had to do something, didn’t I?’

Something to stay in control. Or at least feel like he was. Was that why he hated the press? she wondered. He couldn’t control them. And yet she had chosen the opposite path … courting the newspapers and acting like she loved the attention because at least then she felt in control.

Yet all of it—any kind of control—was surely an illusion. She certainly wasn’t in control when it came to Ben and her body’s—as well as her heart’s—elemental and overwhelming response to him. She stretched her toes out towards the water, now no more than a sound in the darkness. Night had fallen, soft and suggestive around them. Suddenly Natalia was very conscious that they were alone on a secluded beach, with only the stars to see them. She heard Ben’s steady breathing, felt the heat and strength of his presence just inches from her.

‘What about you, Princess?’ Ben asked, his voice seeming almost disembodied in the darkness. ‘What was your dream?’

Natalia tensed. She hadn’t expected this to get personal … at least not about her. ‘I don’t know if I ever had one,’ she said after a pause. ‘Or at least I haven’t, for a long time.’

‘What did it used to be then?’

She took a breath, let it out slowly. He’d told her so much about himself, surely it was only fair she gave away a few of her secrets. She reached down and cupped a handful of cool, silky sand, letting it trickle between her fingers. ‘I suppose it’s rather predictable, something of the happily-ever-after variety.’

‘Ah. So that’s why you don’t believe in true love.’

She smiled, remembering her disdainful remark. ‘I’ve learned better.’

‘What happened?’

‘You can read all about it in the papers.’ She felt rather than saw him tense.

‘What do you mean?’

‘That torrid affair. You mentioned it yourself. It was big news about six years ago.’ Right before Carlotta had fallen pregnant and trumped Natalia’s own shame.

He didn’t speak for a moment, and Natalia could almost imagine the wheels turning in his mind, the click of the cogs. ‘The French guy?’

‘Jean, yes. He was a count’s son, I believe. He spent the summer on the island.’

‘And what happened? He broke your heart?’

‘It felt like it at the time.’ She shrugged, not wanting to rake up old memories, old hurts. ‘I thought I was in love and I did a lot of stupid things and he told them all to the tabloids. Gave them photos.’ She closed her eyes briefly, remembered the scorching shame of seeing what she’d thought had been a wonderful and private romance laid bare in all of its humiliating detail. ‘He got a lot of money for it anyway,’ she finished lightly. ‘It was an exclusive.’

‘I’ll bet.’ Ben shook his head. ‘So that wasn’t your choice.’

‘No.’

‘The papers made it seem like it was.’

She shrugged as if it didn’t matter. ‘That’s what papers do.’

Ben gave her a hard look. ‘And so after that you decided you’d be the one calling the shots. You’d go to them before they could get you.’

He’d summed it up so perfectly, yet she thought she heard a thread of judgement in his voice. ‘Something like that.’

He let out a huff of breath. ‘And I did the opposite.’ Was he implying that’s what she should have done? And maybe she should have. Lived life quietly, above reproach, like Carlotta had. Like Ben had. Surely it was too late now for regrets. But was it too late to change? To want to change?

‘When I was young,’ Ben said slowly, ‘about four or five, the papers printed a photograph of me. I was crying. I’m not sure if it had to do with my parents’ divorce or not. Maybe I’d just skinned my knee and some photographer got the shot. In any case, that blasted photo was in every newspaper from here to Los Angeles. My mother hated it, made her feel like her privacy had been invaded, like the world was watching the breakdown of her marriage and its effect on her children. I hated it because what boy wants the world to see him crying?’

Natalia gave him a glimmer of a smile. ‘No boy that I can think of.’

‘And there were others. It seemed like every unguarded moment of my childhood was captured on film and tied to my parents’ marriage. All I had to do was look a little glum and the papers were screaming about how my mother’s heart was broken.’

‘That must have been hard for her.’

‘It was.’

‘And you.’ He shrugged, and she continued quietly, ‘And when you injured your knee? They must have had a field day.’

‘You saw those photos?’

She laughed softly, yet without humour. ‘No. I just know how the press works. They blow everything out of proportion. Use everything they can get.’

He nodded. ‘It was tough.’

She sighed, feeling sad for both of them. Their experiences had been so similar, yet their responses so incredibly different.

‘Your hatred of the press is starting to make sense. Not to mention your control issues.’

‘But both of those things have blinded me.’

‘Blinded you?’

‘To the way things really are.’ He paused, his gaze hard, unyielding, relentless. She could not look away from it. ‘To the way you really are.’

Natalia felt her heart freeze, suspended in her chest, before it seemed to do a free fall. This was what it was to be known. Except Ben didn’t really know her. Not all of her.

Stupid, slow Natalia.

She angled her head away from him. ‘Don’t go overboard on me, Ben,’ she said lightly, although her voice sounded strangled to her own ears. ‘I’m not that different from what I seem.’ Her heart hammered insistently otherwise. Yes, I am, yes, I am. Why was she pushing him away? Was it just fear? If she pushed him away first, he wouldn’t get the chance. Just like with the tabloids, with everyone, even Carlotta. Act-attack-first, and you wouldn’t get hurt.

‘Aren’t you?’ Ben said quietly, and she felt his hand on her jaw, turning her to face him. She opened her mouth to say something, something sharp and cutting, but no words came out. Ben’s eyes blazing into her own, scorched her soul. She was on fire, and no more so than when he leaned forward and kissed her.

This kiss was so different from the others. His lips brushed hers, once, twice, like a greeting. Then slowly, deliberately, he deepened the kiss, his lips parting, the tip of his tongue sweetly demanding her own to part, and a soft sigh of surrender escaped her without her even realising it.

Ben reached up to cradle her cheek with his hand, his thumb brushing her jawbone, the movement so achingly tender tears came to Natalia’s eyes. His mouth moved more surely over hers, taking, demanding, needing, and the sweetness fell away to reveal the hunger underneath.

She heard his breath release in a ragged gasp that matched her own as he eased her back on the sand, one knee nudged between her legs, his hand sliding under her T-shirt, his palm warm on her bared skin.

Her T-shirt … even in her passion-dazed state Natalia realised she was grubby and muddy and wearing PE kit. Not exactly the setting for a seduction. But this wasn’t a seduction. This was need, maybe even love. And it didn’t matter what she wore or looked like, because they were both beyond that.

The realisation of how much this meant to her slammed into her, left him more dazed than ever. Ben must have sensed something of it for he drew back, his dark eyes glittering as he gazed down at her.

‘Natalia …?’ Her name was a question.

‘Yes …’ she whispered, because the thought of stopping now—even if it was sensible, strong, safe—was surely impossible. She needed this too much. She needed Ben.

Ben kissed her again, like a brand or a seal, and then he rose from the beach. ‘We’re doing this properly.’

‘Properly …?’ Natalia repeated uncertainly, for part of her wanted passion, hard and quick, right there on the beach. Anything else—anything more—felt too scary. Too much.

Ben just smiled, and lacing her fingers with his own, he led her back to the beach house, and his bedroom with that huge king-size bed. Natalia stared at the slippery-smooth sheets with a flicker of uncertainty. Doubts crept in.

‘I’m dirty,’ she said, gesturing to her muddy clothes, and he drew her closer, shaking his head.

‘You’re perfect.’

But she wasn’t perfect, Natalia thought. She’d made so many mistakes, had so many problems and weaknesses and flaws. Ben didn’t even know them all. And she couldn’t forget, even now, that he’d pushed her off his lap when he thought someone might see. Had that moment been a real reflection of his feelings—or was this one?

‘Natalia. Look at me.’

She realised she’d been scrunching her eyes shut and she opened them, stared into his face. He looked as calm and steady as ever, and she wanted to trust him. She wanted to love him.

‘Do you want this?’ Wordlessly she nodded. ‘Why are you afraid?’

Her throat felt so tight she could barely speak. ‘Because this is scary.’

Ben gave her the glimmer of a smile. ‘You’ve got that right,’ he said, and he kissed her again, a hard press of his lips against hers that felt like a promise. ‘Perhaps,’ he suggested as his hands slid underneath her T-shirt, ‘we shouldn’t overthink it.’

She nodded, even as her brain buzzed with the feel of his hands on her skin, cool and so assured. So knowing. She didn’t want to think. Thinking meant doubt, uncertainty, fear. She just wanted to feel. ‘Sounds good to me,’ she murmured, and slid her arms around his neck, drawing him closer, pulling his face down to hers so their lips met again in a desperate, demanding kiss. The kind of kiss that would obliterate any thought at all.

Ben stilled, pulled away. ‘I didn’t mean for you to completely shut off your mind,’ he said wryly, and frustration bubbled within her.

‘Is everything with you a lesson?’ she demanded, and he laughed softly.

‘I just want you to know what you’re doing. This is a decision. It’s me you’re making love to, Princess.’

Natalia widened her eyes, gave her voice its familiar mocking edge. ‘What was your name again?’ she asked, but Ben didn’t smile. He looked so serious, so intent.

‘Don’t do that,’ he said quietly. ‘Don’t make this a mockery. Don’t put yourself down. You’re worth more than that, Natalia.’

Tears stung her eyes and she blinked them back furiously, looking away. ‘Am I?’ she asked, the words torn from her raw, aching throat. A tear spilled down her cheek. She hadn’t meant to say that. Feel that. And she certainly hadn’t wanted to reveal it to Ben.

‘Yes,’ he said softly, ‘you are.’ He wiped away her tear with his thumb, his hands cradling her face. ‘And I’m going to show you how much.’

His gaze steady on her, he laid her on the bed, gently yet with purposeful determination. There was no question about who was in charge here. She was most definitely not calling the shots.

And it made her feel more afraid and vulnerable than ever.

‘What are you doing?’ she asked in an unsteady whisper.

‘Loving you.’

Ben slid his T-shirt off and tossed it in the corner. The sight of his bare, sleekly muscled chest left Natalia breathless. When his shorts followed, she felt almost dizzy. He was really a most beautiful man.

Loving you.

Did he really mean that? Was she dreaming? Even now her body tensed, both in expectation and fear. She wanted this, but she was still so afraid. Afraid of being hurt. Of being rejected. Again. Always.

Ben stretched out alongside her, pressing a kiss to her jaw, his stubble rasping her cheek, his hand sliding up under her T-shirt to cup her breast. ‘First of all,’ he murmured, ‘we need to get rid of these clothes.’

Natalia couldn’t agree with him more, yet she still felt exposed when Ben drew them off her himself, his hands sliding all the way down her legs as he took off her shorts, then up her torso and breasts as he divested her of her T-shirt. Now they were both naked.

She’d been naked before with a man. She’d slept with several men, one she’d thought she loved. But it had never felt like this. Not even close. When Ben looked at her, his gaze sweeping slowly over her from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes, she felt as if he were seeing into her soul. Knowing her.

She blushed. All over. ‘I go blotchy when I blush,’ she whispered, and thoughtfully Ben pressed a finger to the rosy stain across her chest.

‘So you do.’ He bent and pressed a kiss to the same spot. ‘Intriguing.’

She squirmed. Why was this so uncomfortable? Even with desire pooling inside her, coursing through her veins, she felt too exposed. Too afraid.

Maybe she didn’t want to be known after all.

Ben lifted his head to gaze all too understandingly at her. ‘You’re thinking.’

‘You didn’t want me to turn off my brain.’

‘Turn it down a notch then, Princess. Stop thinking something bad is going to happen.’

‘I’m not—’ She struggled for words, for breath. ‘I’m not used to this.’

‘I know.’

‘Really?’ She couldn’t keep herself from attacking, even now, when they were naked, their bodies pressed so intimately together, Ben looking at her so tenderly. ‘I’ve been with plenty of men before, you know. The tabloids didn’t get it that wrong.’ She was exaggerating on purpose, to push him away. Even now. Especially now.

Ben gazed at her steadily. ‘This is nothing like that.’

Natalia felt as if he’d stolen the breath right from her lungs. ‘That’s why I’m so scared,’ she whispered.

‘And you think I’m not?’ Ben asked, his voice a raw whisper. ‘I’m scared, and as you pointed out, I’m scared of being scared. I’ve got it double. So I beat you in that department, Princess.’

She laughed, a bubble of joy rising inside her, relaxing her, and Ben bent his head to her body, his mouth moving over her breasts, sucking, nipping. She threaded her fingers through his hair, so crisp and soft, as sensation took over. She definitely wasn’t overthinking this now.

Yet Ben never let her slide into oblivion. Any time she did, closing her eyes, throwing her head back, forgetting, he brought her back to the present, to him, nudging her eyes open, making her respond not just with her body, but with her mind. Her heart.

She writhed underneath him, resisting, wanting this to be simple. Easy. Safe.

Yet nothing about being with Ben was any of those things. It was frightening and wonderful and far too intense. His mouth moved down her body, lingering in certain places, his tongue tasting her skin, memorising her. Natalia lay there, accepting and strangely humbled, and yet also fighting the tide of desire that threatened to wash right over her, sweep her out to sea. She was afraid of this. Afraid of losing control, of being laid bare, body and heart and mind, before him.

His hair brushed her tummy as he moved lower, and then his mouth was between her legs, right at the centre of her, and Natalia tensed. His hands rested on her thighs, gently forcing her to stay splayed, utterly exposed and vulnerable, everything open to him, and she couldn’t bear it.

Natalia tried to pull away, resisting, afraid and embarrassed, but Ben wouldn’t let her hide herself. His mouth pressed against her and her body jerked in response, pleasure and sensation spiralling upwards inside her as her voice caught on a jagged cry. His tongue flicked against her folds and she cried again, the pleasure so intense it felt painful.

Still she resisted, her hips twisting as she tried to free herself from his hands. ‘Don’t—’ she gasped, and yet when he stopped she felt as if a jagged hole had been cut through her; she was devastated, empty and aching.

‘Don’t fight it, Natalia. Don’t fight me.’

‘I can’t—’ she gasped, because even now the thought of him seeing her like this made her want to cringe and hide.

‘Why?’ Ben asked quietly. She felt his breath feather her heated skin. ‘Why can’t you?’

‘Because …’

His hands rested on her thighs, steady and warm. ‘Do you want me to stop?’

‘No—’ she gasped, because that thought was intolerable. His mouth found her again and this time Natalia couldn’t resist it. She gave herself up to the feeling, to him, and when she cried out, her voice a broken splinter of sound, he slid inside her, consuming her as tears of both emotional and physical release streamed down her face and pleasure like nothing she’d ever known coursed through her, filled her heart to overflowing so the shell around it cracked and broke right open.

Her body clenched around him and she matched him stroke for stroke, tears still streaking down her face, waves of pleasure washing over her in an endless tide. Then she felt Ben find his own release, his body shuddering against hers before he subsided, their hearts beating a desperate rhythm against each other.

She was completely exposed, her body and heart, and there was nothing she could do about it. No way to hide or pretend now. Gently Ben wiped the tears from her face as her body shuddered in the aftermath of the most intense orgasm she’d ever experienced.

Her heart felt like something fragile and fledgling, exposed to the elements, barely able to survive. Even now she wanted to pull away and protect it. Protect herself.

He kissed the corner of her eye where another tear had started to trickle down. ‘Are these good tears?’ he murmured.

‘I don’t know,’ Natalia confessed in a shaky whisper. ‘I don’t know what they are.’ She’d never felt so much. Revealed so much. She felt both empty and full at the same time.

Ben didn’t answer, but as he rolled off her Natalia felt ridiculously bereft, as if he’d just left her. Rejected her. He slipped from the bed and she watched in surprise and then understanding as he moved through the darkness of the bedroom. He turned on the light in the en suite bathroom and a second later he slid back into bed and pulled her towards him. He fit her snugly against him, his chin resting on her shoulder as his thumb continued to trace the silvery track of tears down her cheek.

‘Better?’ he whispered, and she nodded, felt herself slowly start to relax, the tightly held parts of herself loosen. They had been good tears after all. ‘Happy?’ he asked, and she smiled and reached for his hand, threading his fingers with her own.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Happy.’ And safe. In Ben’s arms, she felt safe and vulnerable, which was a mind-blowing combination. She felt known.

And it was wonderful.