by Wood, Joss
‘That makes it easier, because there are a couple of things we need to sort out before we go.’
‘Like?’
‘Like the lawyers for the magazine would like you to sign an indemnity form, and they’d also like you to go for a full medical—just to cover their legal asses.’
Callie wrinkled her nose. ‘What a pain.’
‘I use the same travel clinic all the time. I’ll make an appointment for you.’ Finn rested his beer bottle on his flat stomach. ‘You’ll need clothes that are suitable for five and six-star resorts—’
Callie looked down at her designer sundress and lifted her eyebrows. ‘Finn, I am a fashion buyer—I think I have the clothes covered.’
‘Glad you do,’ Finn grumbled, looking frustrated and miserable. ‘Because I sure don’t. I keep thinking that I have to get my act together and I keep putting it off. I hate clothes-shopping.’
‘You always looked okay to me.’ Better than okay—mighty fine, in fact. And his clothes were nice, too. ‘So, does your ineptitude with home decoration extend to your wardrobe?’
Finn tipped his bottle up to lips. ‘Yep. In spring and autumn Liz would drag my ass to the shops. She’d choose and I’d pay.’
Callie’s lips quirked. Shopping was something she could help him with. After taking a big sip of wine, she stood up and jerked her head, indicating that he should get up too. ‘Let’s go.’
‘Where?’
‘Up to your bedroom.’
When she saw his eyes widen and a gleam appear, she rolled her eyes and thought that she should explain—quickly.
‘Since you’re giving me an all-expenses-paid holiday, the least I can do is to help you out with your wardrobe. I’ll go through your clothes, pick out what’s suitable, and then we’ll go shopping for what you need.’
Finn looked suddenly and momentarily panicked, but she put it down to the fact that no man—especially one as masculine as Finn—wanted to spend any part of his evening discussing clothes.
‘Trust me … it’ll be painless.’
‘I don’t think that having you in my bedroom is a very good idea,’ Finn stated as he followed her through the house and up the stairs.
‘We’re taking it slow, one day at a time, and today is not that day, Banning,’ Callie told him as they hit the top floor. ‘Where’s your bedroom?”
Finn gestured wordlessly to the closed door on their right. Callie opened it and walked into a white-on-cream, endlessly pale bedroom. Placing her hands on her hips, she lifted her eyebrows as she took in the cream and white striped walls, the deep beige curtains and the neutrally shaded pillows piled high on the floor.
She felt as if she’d stepped into a dairy.
‘Wow …’ she murmured.
‘I hate this room,’ Finn muttered, standing at the door, glaring.
‘It’s not that bad … it just needs some colour,’ Callie said, forcing herself to sound cheerful. She gestured to the bed—a white wood canopied monstrosity that dominated the room. ‘You must also have hated the mattress.’
‘What?’ Finn barked.
‘The mattress—it’s gone.’
Finn shoved both hands into his hair and dropped his head, for a brief instant looking like a little boy who’d been slapped. Then his face changed and turned hard and determined.
‘You know what? Let’s not worry about checking what I have that I can take. I’ll just buy a whole new wardrobe.’
Callie started to argue, but stopped when she saw the misery underneath the fury. ‘That’s an expensive exercise,’ she said carefully, knowing that there was something fundamental that she was missing.
‘I can afford it,’ Finn said and gestured for her to leave the room.
Callie knew that it wasn’t the right time to argue with him, to try and push his buttons. He wanted her out for some deeply private reason, so she left the bedroom and headed for the stairs. She waited until they were halfway down before speaking again.
‘Still want me to help you shop for clothes?’
Finn’s tension seemed to fade as he closed the door behind him. His white teeth flashed. ‘Hell, yes. I might come back with one of those khaki vests with a hundred pockets and pants that unzip at the knees to become shorts.’
Callie shuddered at the thought, not entirely convinced he was joking. ‘You definitely need help.’
Finn’s broad hand, warm and exciting, encircled her neck as they walked down the stairs. ‘In more ways than one. So, what are we ordering for supper?’
She loved spending other people’s money, Callie thought, holding up two shirts for Finn that she really liked. And it was so much fun shopping for a guy. Finn didn’t think so, but she did. They’d only been at it for a couple of hours and he was starting to wilt—the lightweight.
There was a pile of bags in Finn’s SUV already, and with the clothes now on a low couch in this store she thought he would have everything he might need for the next couple of weeks—possibly years. She’d made him buy belts and shorts, designer tees and shirts, shoes and ties, and she’d had a blast.
‘Anything else, Callie?’
You knew you were a professional shopper when the sales clerks knew you by name, Callie thought. ‘No, I think that’s it, Annie. If you’d like to start ringing that pile up, I’ll take these to Finn so that he can try them on. We’ll meet you at the counter in a few.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ Annie agreed, and Callie left her to gather up the clothes while she walked into the three-cubicle dressing room, the shirts over her arm.
The first two were empty, and she skidded to a halt as she saw Finn’s reflection in the third changing room mirror through a gap in the curtains.
She couldn’t pull her gaze away from the perfection that was his body. He was wearing nothing more than a brief pair of pants, and his body rippled with muscle as he shoved a shirt back onto a hanger. His legs were long and muscled, his tanned shoulders broad, his butt round and tight. His broad chest and rippled stomach made all the saliva in her mouth disappear.
How was she supposed to go on holiday with him, knowing how much she wanted him? This gnawing need to know what he felt like, how he made love, how he would feel as he filled her, completed her, was unusual for her, and it scared her as nothing else ever had. Yes, she needed to explore his body—but she also wanted to dig below his cool, calm and controlled surface to see what was underneath.
That wasn’t good. She always kept her distance from men who made her feel too much, who intrigued her. They were dangerous. They made her want more than sex, more than a brief affair, and nobody had made her want more like Finn did.
It didn’t matter how much she wanted him, she reminded herself. She could want and wish and pray, but the people she needed to stick around never did. Remember?
That cold dose of reality didn’t make her desire for Finn disappear. Her mind might realise that he was dangerous but her body still craved him.
She could never allow herself to risk getting to know him too well. She couldn’t get emotionally attached to him. But she wanted to know his touch, his taste, how it felt to have that powerful body giving and receiving pleasure.
Finn’s eyes met hers in the mirror and he just stared at her, half naked, his desire for her blazing from his face. She watched, fascinated, as his penis grew into an erection from nothing more than looking at her. Finn didn’t try to hide his reaction. Instead he just kept his eyes locked on hers, his hands on his hips.
‘Keeping my hands off you is going to be a problem,’ he said, his voice low and slow. He turned to face her and yanked the curtains open.
Callie licked her lips and shook her head, trying to be sensible.
‘I’m not thinking of my failed engagement or my ex. I promise that I am not thinking of anyone but you,’ Finn growled.
She heard the frustration and the truth in his voice. He wanted her—possibly as much as she did him.
How was he able to look inside her head and see wh
at she was thinking? He seemed to be able to intuit immediately and correctly what she was thinking without her saying a word.
Nobody had ever managed to do that before.
‘Too soon,’ Callie stated, sighing as she felt her panties dampen. ‘It really is, Finn.’
An F-bomb shattered the loaded silence between them and then Finn’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. Yanking her into the cubicle, he jerked the curtains shut and the shirts she held fell to the floor.
Finn took her chin in his hand and tipped her head up. ‘Have you ever stood in front of a fire and wanted to be in the heart of it? Inside the colours … the heat? Yeah, you have—because that’s how you were looking at me just now. Like I was the fire and you wanted to feel my heat. You want me …’
She wanted to deny it but she couldn’t. Of course she wanted him—she’d been fantasising about him for months. But it was just lust and attraction and the fact that she hadn’t had an orgasm in far too long.
Didn’t she deserve to feast on him just a little?
‘It’s just lust. I haven’t felt it for a while,’ she told him.
‘It’s a crazy chemical reaction. But we can handle a little chemistry, can’t we?’
Yes—no. Maybe … What did she know? Her brain had long since shut down.
‘So let’s test the theory. Kiss me, lose yourself in my mouth. Right here, right now. Let me taste all of your heat, your passion.’
How could she say no? A hot, no-holds-barred kiss? She wanted it as much as he did. Just to test the theory, of course. People had sex-based relationships all the time—hell, she’d had sex-based relationships all her adult life. What was so different about Finn? Nothing, she resolutely lied to herself. Yes, he was hot—yes, he set her nerve-endings on fire—yes, he made her lady bits squirm. But she’d had good-looking men before. She’d handled them and she’d handle Finn Banning.
She would—even if it killed her. And this was her chance to prove it.
Then Finn’s mouth covered hers and she realised that she was right to be hesitant, right to be a little scared. Because she’d never been held like this, touched liked this—God, tasted like this.
His arms were strong, his hands tender, one on her hip, the other holding the back of her head, keeping her mouth to his. She could feel the heat of his bare chest as her breasts smashed against it, could feel his erection brushing her stomach, hard and wonderful. But his mouth …
She would never get enough of his taste, of the way he sipped and then suckled and then, to mix it up, swirled his tongue around hers. He gently bit her bottom lip, then soothed the sting away with a swipe of his tongue. And while his mouth was busy decimating hers his hand started to explore her body.
She felt his fingers moving over the bumps of her spine, drifting across her bottom, sneaking under her skirt to feel the backs of her thighs, tracing her thong where it disappeared between her butt cheeks. He skimmed her happy place, and when she wiggled against his hand slid his finger under the cotton to her entrance, slipping through the heat and wet to that tiny bundle of nerves.
Callie felt her knees buckle and Finn instantly tightened his arm around her back, plastering her to him as her legs widened, allowing him deeper access. One finger, then two, and his thumb was brushing her clitoris.
‘You feel so amazing …’ Finn muttered against her mouth, green eyes blazing.
‘We should stop.’
‘Hell, no,’ Finn muttered. ‘Just this once … don’t think … just lose yourself.’
‘We can’t have sex in a changing room cubicle, Finn,’ Callie protested, trying to being sensible.
‘We’re not going to make love. You’re just going to come, and I’m going to watch you fall apart in my arms.’
‘I can’t—’
‘Yeah, you can—and you will,’ Finn told her, hooking a small stool with his foot and dragging it over to them.
Turning Callie around, he placed her hands on the mirror before lifting her right foot up onto the stool. Bunching her skirt in one hand, he lifted it slowly to reveal her lacy thong. He pulled it to one side and stared at her waxed strip, tracing it with one finger before sliding that finger into her folds. Callie watched, turned on, as he started to pleasure her, sliding his finger over her clitoris and into her vagina in a slow, steady, orgasm-building rhythm.
His other hand came up to undo the buttons of her shirt, leaving it to fall open and show a hint of her ivory bra. His tanned hand was dark against her lighter skin—and then it disappeared beneath the cup of her bra to cover her breast. Instantly her nipple swelled into his palm, demanding attention.
His fingers worked in tandem to devastate her control—fingers in her panties and fingers rubbing her nipple—and soon she couldn’t help her harsh breathing as she climbed up and up, reaching for that ultimate release, that burst of concentrated pleasure that she hadn’t experienced in far too long …
‘Look at you … so hot, so close,’ Finn growled in her ear. ‘See how beautiful you are.’
Callie almost didn’t recognise the woman in the mirror—the one standing in Finn’s arms. Her hair was messy, her face flushed, and her eyes were a deep, dark mesmerising blue. She looked wild and out of control.
‘You’re so frickin’ hot I could come just looking at you.’
Finn pushed another finger into her channel and flicked her clit with his thumb. Callie shuddered in his arms.
‘Come for me. Right now.’
At his command Callie fell apart in his arms, instinctively bucking against his fingers as she milked every last sensation from the experience. From a place far away, where fireworks were exploding inside her brain, she felt Finn stiffen against her, his erection against her back. She heard his low moan and then felt the hand that was on her breast leave her to grab himself, covering his penis as he turned away and came into the palm of his hand.
In a shop’s dressing room. In the middle of the day. Dear God.
His muttered curse bounced off the walls of the dressing room and pulled her back from that happy place.
‘I haven’t done that since I was a horny teenager.’ He sent her a hot, frustrated, embarrassed look. ‘Apparently I have absolutely no control around you.’
Ditto, Callie thought. She rested her head against the mirror as he backed away from her, aftershocks still skittering through her body. The fact that they—two people who’d been around the block, the world—had no ‘off’ button when they touched was a huge warning that they should keep their distance.
She couldn’t handle him—this. This nuclear reaction couldn’t be controlled so it should be contained, and the only way to contain it was not to light the fuse.
She needed control. Control made her feel safe and secure. Control meant that her mind and emotions could stand apart and let her body have its fun. If all three got in on the action, as they had minutes before, then she was toast.
Finn quickly shucked his underwear, giving her a quick peek at a black thatch of hair and his still mostly erect penis. He swore as he used his underwear to clean up. ‘That was not supposed to happen.’
‘I don’t think any of it was,’ Callie said, closing her eyes.
She heard him stepping into his jeans, the rasp of the zip, a long sigh.
‘Are you okay?’
Callie opened her eyes and stepped away from the mirror. She smoothed down her skirt as Finn pulled on his T-shirt.
Finn sent her a long, concerned look as he repeated his question. ‘Callie, talk to me. Are you okay?’
Callie looked up at the ceiling. ‘Yeah. Wow. Yes. But I think that we should get going. They’re going to come looking for us soon.’
On cue, Annie’s hesitant voice drifted from the entrance of the fitting rooms. ‘Callie? Everything all right?’
Callie’s lips twitched as she replied. ‘We’re coming!’
Finn started to grin. and Callie slapped his shoulder in warning. ‘If you say Been there, done that I swear I will slap
you!’
CHAPTER FIVE
FINN STEERED HIS SUV into the empty parking space in front of Callie’s front door and frowned when he saw the tall blond guy sitting on her front step.
‘I thought you said you were single,’ he said to her bent head. He didn’t like the fact that white-hot jealousy speared through him. The thought of any other man having her, being with her, while the delicious scent of her was still on his fingers, the memory of her falling apart in his arms was still so fresh, made him feel ill.
Callie picked up her head and frowned. ‘I am. Why?’
He glared at the man—who just looked at them, waiting for them to leave the car. ‘Pissed off male sitting on your steps.’
Callie looked out through the front windshield and pursed her lips. ‘Older brother.’
Ah. Relief—which was bizarre, because he had no claim to this woman. ‘Can he wait five minutes? We need to talk.’
Callie sat back and nodded. Finn ignored her brother’s thundercloud face and turned in his seat to face her, making sure that the windows were up so no part of this conversation could leak from the car.
He thought about how to start, what exactly he wanted to say. They hadn’t spoken since leaving the shopping mall and he thought that they needed to clear the air before this went any further.
‘So, a little chemistry, huh?’
Callie broke the tense silence, verbalising his thoughts. How did she manage to do that?
‘If you can call that explosion “a little chemistry”,’ Finn muttered, wanting to bang his forehead against the steering wheel. ‘That was crazy. I’ve never …’ Finn swallowed his embarrassment. ‘Never lost it like that before. We had hot sex in a changing room, Callie!’
‘Well, it wasn’t really …’ Callie blew air into her cheeks. ‘Yeah.’
Callie’s tongue touched the centre of her top lip and he held back his groan and cursed the stirring in his pants.
‘This was supposed to be a simple arrangement!’ he muttered, more to himself than to her.