As my breath starts to return, I push up so we roll over and I’m on top. His eyes are laced with heat, his sculpted cheekbones slashed with dark colour, and I know his own orgasm is close at hand. With my body on his, I begin to rock on my haunches, pushing up and easing myself down, slowly, tormenting him in a way that’s seriously unkind given how quickly he just got me off.
But the power of this is addictive and I love that he doesn’t fight me, I love that he submits to my brand of torment, letting me take control even when I suspect he wants to grab my hips and hold me down. I lean forward so my breasts brush his chest and he growls my name in the back of his throat so it reverberates from his body to mine. Ashaahh. I love the way he says that, deep and guttural. It’s so primal.
I keep moving my hips, rocking back and forth, the pressure of his cock inside me and his body against mine making my temperature skyrocket. Pleasure builds again so I know I’m going to come once more, and hard. I’m trembling all over, an orgasm on the periphery of my awareness, and then he’s kissing my lips. His hands grab my hips and he moves me in time with his own thrusts, so he’s buried deep inside of me again and again until finally he explodes just as I tip over the edge of the earth. Our bodies fall apart in unison, our voices mingled as pleasure wraps around us both, fervently demanding our surrender. And we give it willingly, urgently, the speed of this coming together unusual for us, but nothing I’m going to complain about.
Sure, I prefer the nights when we have hours and hours to kiss and taste and explore—I’m already itching to go down on him, to take his cock in my mouth and drive him to the point of insanity with the things I can do to him, but there’s no time. My body is still on top of his, he’s deep inside me, when my doorbell buzzes and the faintest hint of a male voice comes to us.
‘Shit.’ I push up onto my elbows, casting a glance at the diamond-encrusted wristwatch I always wear. ‘He’s early.’
Beneath me, Theo’s expression is laconic. He’s the cat that got the cream, but there’s no time for post-coital bliss. I roll off him and pick up my dress, my knees a little wobbly as I stand and pull the fabric over my head.
My brother’s voice comes through the door again. ‘Shit,’ I mutter. Then, louder, ‘Just a second.’
I turn to Theo, who’s watching me with a curious look. ‘You have to hide.’
He bursts out laughing. ‘Hide?’
‘Yeah. Hide.’ I reach for him, grabbing his hand at the same time I bend down and scoop his clothes off the floor. I thrust them at his chest, a warning look on my face. ‘In there.’
He shoots a look over his shoulder in the direction I’ve pointed, then shakes his head. ‘I’m not hiding in your closet.’
‘My brother’s here.’
‘So? Aren’t you going to introduce me?’ He’s teasing but I instantly reject the suggestion, even when it’s not a suggestion made in earnest.
‘Er...sure. “Hey, big brother! Here’s the guy who’s been fucking my brains out the last six months.”’
‘You could just use my name.’
‘And say what? That you’re my very convenient fuck buddy?’ I draw my brows together. ‘Just—stay in here.’ The words hold a warning. ‘Shit! Where’s my—?’
He’s holding my thong on the tip of his finger. His look is pure molten seduction. Damn it, I want him again and he knows it. I snatch the thong and pull it on a little awkwardly, then run my fingers through my hair.
‘How do I look?’
‘Like a woman who’s just been ravished.’
Great, I was afraid of that. ‘Just...don’t make a sound. Shut the door behind you when you leave.’ I press a harsh kiss to his lips and move to my bedroom door but, before I walk through it, I rush back to him. ‘Thanks. You were great.’ I wink and squeeze his butt before turning and leaving.
Joshua, dressed in a tux, looks exactly like our father. ‘Hey.’ His eyes scan me and show the exact opposite reaction to the one I saw on Theo’s face fifteen minutes ago. I don’t mean I’d expect my brother to look at me like he wanted to rip my clothes off, but where Theo looks at me like I’m the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen, Joshua’s expression always shows a hint of disapproval. He strides past me, presses a perfunctory kiss to my forehead, then moves into the kitchen.
Which is seven paces closer to my bedroom.
I look down the corridor betrayingly, and note the outline of Theo’s body through the crack of the door. He’s pulled his boxers on, at least, but if Joshua happened to look down the hall he’d see a half-naked billionaire smiling smugly back at him.
‘Shouldn’t we be going?’
‘We’ve got a few minutes if you want to fix your hair, Charlotte.’
I bite back a pithy retort. My hair is fine, though probably a little wild after Theo’s ministrations.
‘Fine, help yourself to a drink.’ I wave my hand towards the kitchen then clip back towards my bedroom, tempted to give Theo a piece of my mind. But when I walk in he’s nowhere to be seen. I click the door shut, my eyes scanning the room. Where is he? I stride into the en suite bathroom and reach for my hairbrush, gliding it over the soft waves a few times before Theo comes up behind me, pressing his body to mine. The touch sets off a thousand and one fireworks in my bloodstream.
But that’s nothing to when he catches the hem of my dress with his fingertips, pushing it up so his fingers can brush my sex, his palm cupping me and pulling me back against him. I swallow a moan, my eyes locking to his in the mirror.
‘No time,’ I mutter, dropping the brush into the sink with a clatter.
‘Wanna bet?’
Oh, help me. Theo loves a challenge. I know this about him, and I love this about him, but in this moment... ‘It’s my stepmother’s birthday,’ I murmur, making no effort to move away. ‘I can’t be late.’
His eyes flare with amusement. ‘You won’t be.’ His hand moves faster; a finger pushes inside of me. I buck backwards and moan. He laughs, spinning me around and kissing me, swallowing the sound. Pleasure ricochets through me, volcanic and urgent. A beautiful, hot delight that lashes my core and makes me tremble. I brace myself on the vanity as pleasure sears me, red-hot and fierce.
‘Charlotte?’ he murmurs into my mouth, his thumb padding my sex.
‘Long story.’ I find his lips. ‘You started this. Don’t you dare stop.’
‘Charlotte? Are you done?’ My brother’s voice is a very unwelcome intrusion. I rip my head away from Theo, but his grin is my undoing. I hold Theo’s eyes, lifting a hand to his shoulder, and shout towards the door, ‘Just a sec. I’m coming.’
And I am. Seconds later, I’m spiralling completely out of control, his mouth swallowing my frantic cries, his hand holding me together and driving me apart at the same time. My fingers are in his hair, tangled in its length, and then, almost as soon as I’ve crested over that tsunami of sensation, he’s pulling away, rearranging my dress around my thighs. ‘It’s good to know we can add quickies to our repertoire.’
My breath is rushed. ‘For sure. Next time you have five minutes between meetings, call me.’
‘Will do. Charlotte,’ he adds as an afterthought, a teasing smile on his face. But there’s something in his eyes, a seriousness, a question I don’t want to answer. A question he doesn’t really want to ask—because we don’t do that. We don’t really talk about anything other than how much we want each other, and that suits us both.
‘Only my brother calls me that.’ I poke my tongue out. ‘See you soon.’
I feel his eyes on me as I slip from the room and knowing he’s watching me brings a huge smile to my face, just like always.
* * *
I look around the en suite bathroom with curiosity. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. Toiletries, make-up, and a lingering scent of her that makes me want to go out into her kitchen and announce to her brother that actually she
won’t be coming with him at all because she and I aren’t done yet.
We didn’t plan to keep seeing each other for so long. She’s busy, I’m busy, and sometimes our schedules are such that we can’t manage to catch up as often as we’d like. But that’s the best part of this no-strings situation. It’s no big deal. There’s never any drama with Asha. We agreed to that from the start, and for the last six months it’s been working perfectly. In fact, I’d have to say I think I’ve cracked the code for the perfect relationship. Keep it physical and keep it light.
That’s it.
Et voilà.
I wonder whether, if my dad had worked this out, he might not have married every woman he slept with. Briefly, my chest tightens, as it always does when I think of my father. No, that’s not right. He’s the man who gave my mother sperm but he was never really much of a dad. Not to me, not to Jagger, and definitely not to Holden. Darkness descends for a moment and I close my eyes, the hatred I feel for him rushing through me.
Asha’s muffled voice brings me gratefully back to the present. I can hear their voices but not clearly enough to know what they’re saying. Curiosity has me moving closer to the door.
‘I organised the diamond necklace,’ Asha is saying, her eyes sliding to the door so she sees me and I grin. She blanches and jerks her head back to her brother. His back is to me, so I only have the impression of a tall, slim man dressed in a dark tuxedo.
‘She’ll love it. What’s happening with Angel Pie?’
Angel Pie? I frown.
‘We’re just waiting on FDA approval for the mascara. The packaging is almost finalised—we’re down to two box designs. Market testing is showing amazing strengths across the whole product line.’
The brother nods. ‘You’re happy with it?’
‘Are you kidding?’ Asha’s face lights up. My gut punches. She’s so gorgeous. ‘I’ve only been working on this for four years.’
Her brother nods again, slower. ‘Good. I’m proud of you, Char.’
She hesitates for a moment, in a way that has me holding my breath for no reason I can think of. Then she smiles. ‘Let’s go.’
‘I guess we have to.’
‘It won’t be that bad.’
‘Sure it won’t be.’
They share a look that is purely conspiratorial and a twist of longing spears me. I miss Holden. I know I literally just came from his place, but I don’t mean in a physical sense. I mean I miss him as part of our family, as someone who looks at us like brothers and grins. He’s a part of our fabric and I don’t care what any DNA result says. He’s a Hart as much as I am, as much as Jagger is.
The front door clicks open. I move nearer her bedroom door so I catch the moment she pokes her head back in the corridor to meet my eyes. She’s glaring at me but I see amusement in her features and I shrug my shoulders, pulling her bedroom door wide open. Her brother’s out in the communal corridor; there’s no risk of being seen. But nonetheless, she quickly withdraws her head, slamming the door to her apartment behind her.
It’s only the third time I’ve been in her apartment, and it’s the first time without Asha. Charlotte. A small frown smudges my face. My curiosity is natural. We’ve been sleeping together for just over six months but I know hardly anything about her beyond the basic biographical details. That she’s the MD of her family’s luxury cosmetic and lifestyle brand, that she works her beautifully shaped rear end off, which explains why she’s twenty-eight and, up until she and I happened to meet, hadn’t had sex in almost a year. She’s fiercely intelligent and doesn’t take shit from anyone—two things I respect enormously about her.
I’m tempted to snoop. Just a little. Yeah, yeah, it’s kind of a bullshit thing to do but, looking around her apartment, I can’t help but notice little details that I would never have guessed at—details that have previously passed me by because I don’t notice anything except Asha when Asha is around.
Things like the fact she must enjoy cooking, going by the healthy assortment of cookbooks near the kitchen. I pick one up. It’s well thumbed, vegetarian, which she definitely isn’t. I replace it, then do a three sixty. Her taste in furnishing is eclectic and bright, not what you’d expect from a woman who runs a company like Fleurs Sauvages. This is fanciful, frothy, feminine. I smile at a pink cushion shaped like a pair of lips.
I’m so tempted to look around, but I don’t. Not just because it would be weird and creepy, but because no part of this is about getting to know one another. Our cardinal rule was formed a week after our one-night stand: this is just sex. I don’t ask about her life, she doesn’t ask about mine.
I’ve never been in such a perfect relationship.
I whistle as I pull the door shut, already wondering when I can see her again...
CHAPTER TWO
‘ASHA, THIS IS Angus Fienes, the son of a dear friend of ours.’
My stepmother puts her hand in the crook of my arm, drawing me away from the conversation I was in the midst of. I dutifully obey, ignoring the glance of disapproval she gives my hair.
‘Hi.’ I look in his direction, not at all surprised to see a guy who looks like he could have walked off a preppy photoshoot beside her. His teeth are the brightest white I’ve ever seen, his eyes oceanic blue, his skin a buttery tan, with hair that looks soft and golden. ‘My stepdaughter, Asha.’ She doesn’t pause before she says my name, in the way my father does. To Caroline, I’ve only ever been Asha; she didn’t know me as Charlotte, so it’s easier for her to accept my reincarnation.
‘Asha—’ his smile is one hundred per cent model perfect ‘—I’ve heard a lot about you.’
I look at him blankly, knowing I should insert some kind of platitude, and that I would if I really cared. Nonetheless, Caroline is looking at me expectantly and this is her birthday party, so I placate her by offering the man a tight smile.
‘Angus is a hedge fund manager. Very successful,’ Caroline murmurs, leaning closer towards me. This bothers me on so many levels. I like Caroline. She’s a sweetheart. But she is also, unequivocally, a gold-digger. Twenty-four years younger than my father—who she makes sublimely happy, I’ll admit—she was working as a flight attendant for an airline when they met. Despite the fact she’s got a fortune at her fingertips, and I at mine, she doesn’t seem to realise I don’t place quite the same value on marrying well as she evidently does. Beyond that, I wonder what she’d say if she knew I’d been sleeping with one of the wealthiest men on the planet for the last six months.
Six months! How the hell did that happen? When we began, I swore I’d only let it go on for a month or so. Just to store up some great sex memories before going back to my somewhat monastic commitment to running Fleurs Sauvages. I hadn’t been as sold on the whole ‘just sex’ thing as Theo—not that I’d tell him that. Not because I want more than that with him—only a masochist would try to turn a committed bachelor like Theo into anything more—but because one day I do want an actual relationship. With someone. A husband. Kids. A familiar sense of nostalgia washes over me because that sense of family is something I’ve never known. So maybe, in my mind, I’m making it bigger and better than it really is, but all I know is that the sense of belonging which comes from family is something foreign, something that I really want.
Angus laughs quietly—it’s a nice laugh. ‘It’s easy to be successful in this market.’
I give him a point for modesty but take it away again when I realise how false it is. He’s preening in front of me, waiting for me to make some comment on his genius. I don’t. He’s right; it’s a soft market right now, not hard to be successful.
Caroline falters a little, her smile dropping by degrees. ‘Asha runs the make-up side of things.’
I suppress a familiar flare of irritation. The ‘make-up side of things’ is actually Fleurs Sauvages and the company is worth over sixty-four billion dollars. It’s not just make-up, but
a complex range of luxury brands across all industries—handbags, fragrances, jewellery, footwear, lingerie. While cosmetics are my passion project, I’m responsible for everything that falls under the Fleurs Sauvages umbrella. Or, as my family apparently likes to think of it, I ‘tinker with pretty things’. That used to bother me a lot more than it does now.
When I first took over, the pressure to prove myself was immense. I went to work every day with a nauseated feeling in my gut that I couldn’t shake. I don’t know when that eventually gave way. The company’s first billion-dollar year with me at the helm? When I finally secured an exclusive deal to have only our products used for Barcelona and Lyon fashion weeks? I don’t know. But as I’ve got older and worked harder, I know I have the experience and skills necessary to do the company justice. In any ordinary family, I’d say I have what it takes to make my father proud, but pride isn’t something I’ve ever known from my dad. That doesn’t stop me from wanting it sometimes, though.
‘Impressive.’ Angus is being sincere now and it occurs to me that, given his line of work, he has a fair idea—a better idea at least than Caroline—what being MD of a company like Fleurs actually entails.
‘Thank you.’
‘Would you like a drink?’ He nods towards my empty glass. I stare at it for several seconds, a frown on my face, consternation rolling through me. I feel guilty! Actual guilt! Like I should say no because of Theo. Because I’m fucking him? Jeez, what’s wrong with me? He’s made it abundantly clear that all he will ever be able to give me is a long line of orgasms and I’m fine with that.
Dating each other is absolutely verboten. But other people?
Okay, calm down, Ash. The guy’s asked to get you a champagne from a free bar; it’s not a marriage proposal. I push a smile to my face. ‘Yeah, great. Why not?’ It’s as non-committal as an acceptance can get but my stepmother doesn’t get the memo. She claps her hands approvingly as we walk away.
Burn My Hart Page 2