by Aurora Rey
That seemed to push her wide-awake and alert button. She opened her eyes and looked around. “What time is it?”
Cam chuckled. “Early still. Barely six. I need to be at work early today.”
Lauren rolled to her side. “Wow. I hardly ever sleep that late.”
“And the truth comes out.” Cam hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but apparently her guard was down.
Lauren propped herself on an elbow and gave Cam a curious look. “What does that mean?”
Hopefully, Lauren would take it as a compliment. “You always seem to be bursting with energy. I think I was surprised to wake up before you.”
Lauren trained a finger down her arm. “Well, someone did a pretty bang-up job of tiring me out last night.”
Or that. That was good, too. “I see. So multiple orgasms is the way to get you to relax?”
Lauren considered for a moment, making Cam wonder if she’d overstepped. But then, with a perfectly serious expression on her face, she nodded. “Yes.”
“Good to know.” Cam kissed her again, this time on the mouth. “I’m rather sorry now that I have to get up.”
“Don’t be. I do, too.” She sat up and the sleepy, sexy Lauren disappeared. All-business Lauren was back in full force.
“Would you like to take a shower here? You’re welcome to.”
She was already out of bed and pulling on clothes. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m good. Since I didn’t bring clothes, it’ll be easier at my place.”
Cam didn’t have time for a shared shower that might lead to more, but it didn’t prevent a small pang of disappointment. “Of course.”
Now fully dressed, with the exception of the shirt she’d taken off in the kitchen, Lauren came and stood at the edge of the bed. She leaned down, kissing Cam just long enough to make her departure seem unhurried. “I had a really great time last night.”
Understatement of the century. “Same.”
“Does that mean we get to do it again?”
As much as she’d bristled at Lauren’s directness at first, Cam had to acknowledge it came with some perks. “I think that’s a fine idea.”
“I’ll see you this afternoon, though, right? To go over the mock-ups for your campaign.”
Cam had to fight the urge to pull her back into bed. Not good, given that she was the one who’d declared she needed to get up. “Yes. I’ll be there around one.”
“Perfect.”
And with that, she was gone. Cam sat in bed for a moment, uneasy, but unsure why. She shook it off and got up, heading right to the shower. Where she didn’t wonder what it would be like to have Lauren wet and soapy and in her arms. She got dressed and headed to work. Where she didn’t think about seeing Lauren in a few hours.
When noon finally rolled around, Cam decided to have lunch at the pub. She hadn’t seen Charlotte in a few days and wanted to catch up. She’d not yet decided whether to tell Charlotte about sleeping with Lauren, but she could sort that out later. The walk was drizzly, but she didn’t mind. The temperatures had been holding steady, and it still managed to feel like early summer. Early summer in England, at least.
She took her usual stool at the bar, ordered a sandwich and a pint. A small flurry of customers came in shortly after, and it wasn’t until she’d finished eating that Charlotte was free enough to exchange more than pleasantries. It didn’t bother Cam. They’d been friends long enough that simply sharing space counted for something. When she finally made her way over, she looked Cam up and down and narrowed her eyes.
“What?” Cam asked.
“You slept with her, didn’t you?” Charlotte didn’t seem bothered or even surprised by the idea, but it did come out as more of a statement than a question.
“What makes you say that?” She wasn’t being coy, but she wanted to know if this was one of those cases of Charlotte’s crazy intuition or if Lauren had told her. She hoped it was the former. Not that she wanted to keep it a secret, but she didn’t need everyone in town knowing her business, especially if she’d started mixing business with pleasure.
“You have this look about you.”
To hide her relief, Cam folded her arms and gave Charlotte an exasperated look. “What does that even mean?”
Charlotte mimicked the gesture. “It means I know you. Some days I think I know you better than you know yourself. And there’s something different about you. A little softer around the edges maybe.”
Cam suppressed a chuckle. Soft would not be a word she’d use to describe what she and Lauren had been up to last night. Except, perhaps, to describe the skin of Lauren’s inner thigh, or what it felt like to slip inside her. Cam cleared her throat. “Softer?”
Charlotte’s face went from exasperated to smug in two seconds flat. “You did. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, but now it’s beyond obvious. Subtle you are not, my friend.”
Cam frowned. “I can be subtle.”
“I bet you weren’t subtle with Lauren. She’s a firecracker, isn’t she?”
At that exact moment, Mrs. Lucas emerged from the kitchen with a plate of scones for the guests of the inn around for afternoon tea. She offered Cam a greeting and bustled off in the direction of the library.
“Jesus, Charlotte. Could you be any crasser?”
Charlotte must have thought that was the funniest thing she’d heard in weeks. She laughed and laughed, the kind of laughing that sent tears running down her cheeks. Lauren chose that moment to come into the bar from her office, because that’s the kind of day Cam was having.
“What’s so funny?”
Before Cam could formulate an answer—perhaps one with a trace of subtlety—Charlotte wiped her eyes and said, “The two of you having sex.”
Lauren blanched and it was all Cam could do not to reach across the bar and throttle Charlotte.
“Not that the two of you sleeping together is funny,” Charlotte added quickly. “I was mostly poking fun at Cam for wearing her thoughts on her chest like a badge. I knew the second she walked in what you two had been up to last night.”
Lauren bit her lip and Cam thought she might literally melt into the floor. Or perhaps that was merely wishful thinking on her part. But then Lauren smiled. “I’m glad it was you who gave it up instead of me.”
That sent Charlotte into another fit of laughter and left Cam—what? She couldn’t decide whether to be relieved or mortified, and the whole thing left her unsettled. Not that being unsettled was anything new when it came to Lauren.
“Poor Cam. I don’t mean to tease.” Charlotte looked at her with what appeared to be genuine sympathy.
Cam pinched the bridge of her nose. She didn’t like being teased. Something about having four sisters. But that wasn’t the point. What was the point again? She had a hard time holding a clear thought in her brain with Lauren only a few feet away.
“No more teasing.” Lauren crossed the room to where she stood. In heels, she was almost exactly the same height as Cam. “Could we talk for a minute? Maybe in my office?”
Cam nodded and followed her. Charlotte made a show of being very attentive to something behind the bar. Once they were in her office, Lauren closed the door. Cam took a deep breath. “Sorry about that.”
Lauren angled her head slightly. “Sorry for what, exactly?”
“For having no poker face, apparently. For inadvertently telling Charlotte what happened between us. For making it seem like something to laugh about.”
“Do you think it’s something to laugh about?”
Cam shook her head. “Of course not.”
“Do you regret going to bed with me?”
It might have been the dumbest decision she ever made, but Cam couldn’t bring herself to regret it. “No.”
“Then I think we’re okay.” Lauren smiled. It wasn’t amused or sympathetic. Encouraging, maybe. And definitely sexy.
“Good.”
Given the conversation, she shouldn’t have this overwhelming desire to kiss Lauren. But there it wa
s. Apparently, she couldn’t be within arm’s reach of Lauren and not want to kiss her. It was going to prove very problematic if they continued working together, which they’d agreed to do. She was just going to have to find a way to keep herself in check and not act like some horny teenager.
Without a word, Lauren took Cam’s face in her hands and brought their lips together. The first kiss felt like a statement, a brief declaration that everything between them was okay. The second was more meandering, hot but unhurried. Nothing funny or subtle about it.
Once the surprise of being kissed by Lauren in her office subsided, desire quickly took over. The play of Lauren’s mouth over hers conjured every erotic detail of the night before. The planes of Lauren’s body, the sounds she made when she came.
When Lauren pulled away, Cam realized how close she was to setting Lauren on the desk and having her way with her. The intensity of it left her shaky. Unsettled might turn out to be a colossal understatement.
“We shouldn’t fuck on my desk, should we?” Lauren bit her lip. “At least not in the middle of the afternoon.”
That Lauren’s question so closely mirrored her own thoughts made Cam laugh. “Probably not.”
“It’s tempting, though, right? It’s not just me?”
Lauren’s lipstick had vanished and her hair was slightly mussed from where Cam had run her fingers through it. In that moment, it was hard to imagine a sight more alluring. “Not just you.”
“Good. That’s good.” Lauren tucked her hair behind her ears and nodded. “So, work. Shall we get to work?”
“Yes, work.” Something, anything, to put her mind on besides how badly she wanted to kiss Lauren again.
Lauren took another step back, then went behind her desk. She pulled out the large portfolio she’d brought to their first meeting. “Okay. Based on our last conversation, I’ve created mock-ups for a new website, social media ads, and a couple of print pieces. I know you were still on the fence about those because of cost, but I think we might be able to get a few creative placements that will be worth the investment.”
She handed Cam several pieces of paper, each laid out with sketches, images, and blocks of text. Lauren had printed stock photos to give the feel of what she was going for. Cam had no trouble imagining the finished product and she liked it. She liked it a lot. Bold and fresh, but nothing too loud or over the top. It felt distinct from Barrister’s branding, but not wholly unrelated. “This is perfect.”
“You don’t have to say that just because we had sex last night. I can take constructive criticism, and I can keep our personal relationship separate from our professional.”
The firm tone made Cam smile. She appreciated the sentiment, even if it wasn’t called for in this situation. “I’m not trying to get—or is it stay?—on your good side. I really mean it.”
Lauren squared her shoulders and beamed. Cam imagined it was the look she gave anytime she nailed a presentation. And damn it all to hell if it wasn’t as sexy as the looks she gave in bed. When had she started to find ambitious types so attractive?
“Excellent. Because I have another idea I want to pitch you.”
“Should I ask what it is or how much it’s going to cost me?”
“If we play our cards right, it won’t cost you a penny.”
“I like the sound of that.”
“I thought you might.” Lauren gestured to one of the chairs opposite the desk. Cam sat and Lauren took the other instead of sitting at her computer. “I know a guy who writes for Traveler. It’s a trade journal for the hospitality industry. I told him about what I was doing here, pitched him the idea of a story about the pub, but also the distillery.”
It didn’t surprise her, necessarily, that Lauren had those sorts of connections, but it hadn’t occurred to her she might benefit from association. “And he’s going to do it?”
“He is. He does a column called ‘Hidden Destinations.’ It’s about places off the beaten path and how places without a high profile attract visitors and keep local businesses thriving.”
“Wow.”
“It’s not as good as something in a Condé Nast or an airline mag, but it’s got an impressive distribution, including some travel agents and bloggers.”
Cam shook her head. She’d tried to keep her expectations low—for Lauren, for the work she was doing, for everything really. She wasn’t quite ready to think of Lauren as the savior, but the cards were stacking up in her favor. Even if she didn’t long for waves of strangers in town, she couldn’t argue the financial boon that would accompany them. “It sounds pretty perfect for us.”
“Right? I’ve convinced him to come to the grand reopening of the inn and I’m going to give him pick of the images from the photo shoot Anja is doing.” Lauren straightened like she’d just remembered something important. “I told you about scheduling the photo shoot, didn’t I?”
“You did not. I mean, I know we agreed to take photos at some point, but we’d not gotten that far.”
Lauren smiled. “Right. Well, now’s as good a time as any. My friend Anja is a photographer. She did a lot of the shoots for the campaigns I did back in New York. She’s brilliant. I was able to get on her calendar.”
Of course she would also be friends with a photographer. “When is she coming?”
“The week before the relaunch. Oh, we also need to talk about that.”
Cam could keep up with the conversation, but she wasn’t sure how Lauren could keep up with all the balls she had in the air. “When is that?”
Lauren picked up the planner from her desk. “I’ve penciled in August twelfth. It’s ambitious, but I should be able to get the work here done in time. And it would leave a few weeks of summer to squeeze in some reservations. I’m really hoping to bring in some revenue before winter.”
She couldn’t fault the logic or the ambition of the plan. But she’d seen how much there was still to be done in the rooms. Between that and the work she knew went into planning any sort of event, it was enough to make Cam’s head spin. To say nothing of the two marketing campaigns Lauren now had in the works. “You’re going to be busy.”
Lauren smirked. “It’s my favorite way to be.”
Now that she’d given in to the attraction, it was easier to let herself like Lauren. But perhaps more surprising was the idea of respecting her as a person and a professional. She had good ideas, but even more, she wasn’t afraid to work hard. And she seemed to have integrity. That earned a lot of points in Cam’s book. Not that she was keeping score. “What do you need from me?”
The smirk turned into a coy smile. Cam couldn’t know if it was meant to have a calculated effect on her, but it sure as hell did. “I need you to agree to be the face of Carriage House.”
The words registered. The meaning did, too, at least technically. But Cam didn’t follow. “Excuse me?”
“We’re branding a handcrafted product. That plays better if there’s a craftsman as part of the story.”
Cam frowned. “Can’t you accomplish that with the words or something?”
Lauren folded her arms. “Are you reluctant or a hard no?”
For some reason, the choice of words had Cam thinking about limits in the bedroom. She shook off the images her brain conjured. She’d come back to that later. Maybe. “Somewhere in between.”
Still with the coy smile. “I can work with that.”
“I—”
She was spared having to come up with a coherent thought by a knock at the door. Mrs. Lucas poked her head in. “Phone call for you, ma’am. It’s an Alejandro.”
Lauren’s eyes lit up. “That’s the writer. I gave him the main number. I need to take this.”
Cam pounced on the opportunity to escape. “I should get back to work anyway.”
“You can put it through,” Lauren said to Mrs. Lucas. Then, to Cam, “Think about what I said, at least for the article. I’m not saying we have to put your face on the side of a bus.”
Cam nodded and offered a w
ave good-bye. Charlotte wasn’t behind the bar, so she didn’t linger in the pub. On the walk back to the distillery, she couldn’t help but think about seeing her face blown up tenfold and plastered to a bus or a building or any other large, public surface. That was the thing with Lauren. It was impossible sometimes to know if her comments were hyperbolic or if she meant them literally. Cam didn’t like the uncertainty of that, especially since Lauren seemed undaunted to try just about anything.
Chapter Seventeen
They moved the dresser into position. Lauren stepped back to assess its location, and Cam took in the whole of the room. The bed was original, but with a new mattress. One of the chairs she’d helped Lauren refinish sat at the table turned writing desk, replacing an armchair that had remained well past its prime. The whole space had come together quite nicely.
“I think a couple inches to the right, so it’s square under the mirror.” Lauren angled her head in that direction.
“You got it.” She picked up her end and shifted accordingly.
Lauren stepped back again and nodded. Then she stepped forward, pulled out her tape measure and checked that it was centered. Cam found the precision of it endearing. She nodded a second time. “Perfect.”
“Great. What’s next? I’m at your disposal for another hour.” She could stretch that if needed, but she didn’t want to admit—to Lauren or to herself—how readily she’d blow off work to spend the afternoon together.
Lauren crossed her arms and gave Cam a questioning look. “Are you helping me as a thank you for managing your photo shoot, or to try to get me to change my mind about putting you in it?”
Cam frowned. “Neither.”
“So, you’re just trying to get me into bed again.”
Lauren winked, but Cam didn’t like where the conversation was going. “Why do I have to have an ulterior motive?”
“I’m teasing you, not accusing you of something.” Lauren adjusted the pencil behind her ear and clipped her tape measure to the front pocket of her very tight jeans, a gesture that managed to be both sexy and distracting.