He was far more cynical and not used to making an effort now, and if the only weapon he had in his holster was goading her, there wasn’t going to be anything remotely like a kiss happening. Ironic. Jiao had been gone eighteen months now. She was enjoying the business in Shenzhen, and she wasn’t coming back. Much as he missed her, he could only wish her well. He hadn’t had the heart to replace her with a younger model. None of the other Golden Flower girls appealed. And while Pete assured him there was a queue of expat women panting for his attention, he couldn’t think of anything worse than opening up to gold diggers and fortune hunters.
He was best alone. Alone was his fighting weight.
But now there was this woman. Not part of the program, but here she was, getting under his skin with her natural beauty and her clever brain. She had no idea what she was getting into, but then neither did he anymore. He’d fucked this up by not backing off around the time the food was delivered.
“So Lois, if it’s not bringing down sneaky bastards like Parker, what do you dream about?”
“The next headline.”
“What, no picket fence? No patter of little feet?”
“No.” She shifted back and pulled her hands free. “Does that shock you?” She stepped away, awkward now with their closeness. She made a show of tidying her hair. “I’m supposed to play to type aren’t I? Want the husband and the two point five kids.”
She broke away entirely now, but stopped worrying about what she said or what he thought. She threw the words out like garbage. “I don’t. There are plenty of people out there willing to be parents. It’s not like there’s a shortage.”
“Frightened they’d cramp your style?”
She was acres away, across the room now. She’d gone through challenged and uncomfortable, strayed into annoyed, and now gave off early warning signs of anger. “Maybe I’m frightened I’d cramp theirs.”
It was beyond him not to stroke that emotion to see if it ignited. “That’s a cop-out.”
“So you’re a father, you have a valid opinion on this?”
“I have a valid opinion. It’s got nothing to do with whether I’m a parent or not.”
She pulled a chair out from the table, turned it to face him and sat. She gave off nonchalant, but her crossed leg swung, small, intense kicks. “I suppose you’re going to tell me about it.”
He let her keep her distance, her space from him, from what they were doing to each other. “Yep. You’re goddamn beautiful, you’re educated, you have a career and money. You’re healthy. You live in a First World country, with all the rights and privileges that brings. What makes you think you can’t do a better job than most with a kid?”
“What makes you think I can?”
He kept his voice level, hammered the sentiment out of it. “Because my mother was an alcoholic who abandoned me, and I turned out just fucking fine.”
She shifted in the chair, a slight shrink, but her words didn’t run from the fray. “Maybe you’re not so fine. That collection of scars. You put your own brother in hospital. Maybe there’s a reason you aren’t married and you get detained.”
Bingo.
There was the fire lit. It blazed in her skin and raged in her contained sarcasm.
“Don’t make this about me. This is about you. Feeling you need an excuse not to conform to type, to make an apology for being a career whore. To justify your choices.”
She was on her feet, chin thrust up, eyes searing, limbs tense. He wanted her to look like that when his hands were on her. “I’m not apologising for who I am.”
“What is it you want?”
“I want to be the best at what I do. I don’t want to be judged for being a daughter or a sister or a mother.”
“What else?”
“I want to right wrongs. To out people who hurt others. To change things that need changing.”
He laughed. “You want to be a superhero. Who makes you God to decide what’s right?”
“Men like you.”
“Like me, how?”
“Arrogant. Controlling. Rich enough to buy anything you want and screw the consequences.”
He let a silence fall, softened his voice to disguise his intention. “Can I buy you?”
She hissed, “Never,” aiming her contempt squarely at him.
“You owe me a dare, Lois. Show me I can’t buy you. Prove you don’t need to justify your choices.”
“How?” she scoffed, as if there was nothing he had she wanted. She shouldn’t have scoffed. It was like an invitation to rumble.
“Admit what you’re feeling, right now. No apologies. Kiss me.”
Her weight went to her back foot. She leant away as though he was contagious. “You’re insane.”
“Am I? It’s what you want isn’t it? You believe in the moment. It’s why you danced with me. We’re strangers. We’re free to be exactly who we are, to ask for exactly what we want. No history, no future, no expectations. Why not the truth?”
She was breathing hard. She could be in the corridor shouting rape in two strides. Excitement rippled through his body like before a brawl, when anything could happen, when everything could be lost in the speed of a flinch or a door opening and a voice raised in fear.
Her eyes fixed on his, she held her ground. She was a brawler too. He braced, his own breath forced out sharp, loud in his ears. She took two strides towards him. “This is madness.”
“It stops the minute you don’t want it.”
“What if I want it?”
“Take it.”
“No apologies. No explanations.”
“Show me who you are.”
She crashed into him and he caught her tight, crushing her close, bent to her. She took what she wanted; her lips hot and full, her mouth opening under his, her groan juddering through his chest. She was liquid silk on his tongue. She was speed of desire, slippery descent into sin. Her kiss was a pistol loaded with risk and fired with menace. It left a hole in his heart, where blood rushed to seal her in like pain, like fear, like life. Her hands on his face, in his hair, the sting of a bite, the soothe of a lick. He was solvent at her touch. All the independent parts of him concentrated on the feel of her; hands, body, wet mouth. The whimpers in her throat made his soul roar with rising need, testing sweet limits he’d forgotten existed.
She took what she wanted and she gave back the promise of long summer nights with twisted sheets, satin sweat on velvety skin. She took what she wanted, and he was made a slave for it.
6. Collision Course
“The cautious seldom err.” — Confucius
In Cern, with the Large Hadron Collider, scientists recreated the conditions of the Big Bang by colliding two beams of particles at the speed of light head-on. The scientists Darcy interviewed believed the discovery of the Higgs boson subatomic particle would help explain how the universe came into being.
In Pudong, in a freezing cold, ultra-bright room, Darcy collided with the man from Tara with such unexpected force and blistering energy, she was stunned by the discovery of how much she wanted him, and the belief this was meant to happen.
He was solid and real under her hands. He let her have complete control of the kiss, but he wasn’t passive, not cruel stone she smashed against; he was accepting, accommodating, exciting. She couldn’t stop, didn’t want to stop. If kissing him proved she didn’t need to apologise for who she was, and what she wanted, she’d kiss him like this as long as he’d let her.
He had his hands under the back of the jacket, on her backside, pressing her hips into his. If he let go she might spin out and break into elements of herself and never know how to stick back together again. He tasted of tea and spice and smelt of leather and cloves. He met her touch for stroke, lick for suck. She pawed at him, the roiling feeling inside her growing wilder and wilder the longer she took from him.
This was madness; this was insane. This was her private Big Bang. She lost herself to pulsing, throbbing, grasping until he stopped her, his han
ds on her face.
“Slow down, you’re killing me here.”
She crash-landed. The reality of where she was, and what she was doing hitting her like a cutting laser, opening the way for waves of shame and regret to plough in. They didn’t come. She didn’t see condemnation in his eyes. She saw want, and it made her feel powerful.
He kept hold of her face and kissed her tissue soft. “We’ve got hours. I’m an old man, I need to pace myself.”
“This is…” she hesitated, and his hands fell to her shoulders, “acceptable to you?” If it wasn’t, frustration, not embarrassment, was going to rip her up.
“It’s somehow essential to me. To you too, I think.”
She nodded. How did he know what she felt, this stranger she was impatient to kiss again?
He released her and went to the bathroom doorway, leant in, switched on the light and drew the door closed, leaving it a hand span short of latching. Then he flicked the main light switch off, making Darcy blink against the plunge into darkness. He took her hand and led her to the couch, sat and pulled her down beside him. He was doused in shadow, but there was enough light to see his expression. He was awestruck. It made her want to cry out to be so obviously desired.
“What happens now?” she said, and they both heard the crackle of lust in her voice.
“Whatever you want.”
“What do you want?”
“You. This. I’m on a fantasy trip, where a fucking gorgeous woman who knows nothing about me wants me, and I don’t care to have it interrupted yet.”
“They could at any minute.”
He grinned and went to the door, opened it, did something to the handle and closed it again.
“You locked us in?”
“Is that okay?”
No it wasn’t okay. Anything but okay. She didn’t know this man. She should be wary of him. She didn’t know herself, and that was frightening, but there was a dangerous inevitability to where this was going, and it was too big to ignore. Too extraordinary to pass up.
He read her hesitation as a return to the real world. He reached for the door handle again.
“Leave it.”
He came and stood in front of her. “Tell me what you want.”
“You beside me. I want to kiss you again. I want to touch your skin. I want to hear your breath come short.”
When he sat again, she shifted to straddle his legs. “Do you do this often?”
“Make out with women I’ve just met? Would it matter?”
“No.”
He grinned, wicked in the half-light. Fuelled with daring, with the deep safety of anonymity, she leaned forward and rimmed his lip with the tip of her tongue, felt his smile widen. His hands were on the jacket zip, opening it, opening her up to his touch. They skimmed her ribs, smoothed down the dip of her waist, over the flare of her hip and around to her backside. He pulled her forward so they were hip ground on hip.
“Are you warm enough?”
“Yes.” She was burning up. She was insensible to anything but his nearness, and what he promised to do to her. His hand was at the back of her neck, he was trying to take the band from her hair. “God, you’re beautiful.” She met his fingers with both hands behind her head, and he let go and brought his hands to her breasts. She surged into him as her hair fell about her shoulders and neck. But he held her upright.
“I need to see you.”
She felt like she glittered, that her skin sparkled with radiance. He made her shimmer, and she was proud of what she felt from the authority of his touch. She threw her head back and let him stroke her body, till she undulated in his hands, till she was groaning from need.
“So beautiful.”
And he was so contained. So in control, while she was rapidly losing her sense of self; servant to the demands her body was making. He wasn’t kissing her; he was holding her back, upright, away from him. She could feel the need in him too, but his restraint was frustrating.
“Now you’re killing me, old man.”
His laugh was a sinful rumble in his chest. He pushed the jacket off her shoulders and down to her elbows, pinned her forearms behind her back with one hand and brought himself closer. He trailed his nose along her neck, his breath hot fire against her ear and in her hair. She turned her head to try to capture his mouth, but he pulled away, another rumbled laugh. He nuzzled her check until she dropped her head back, and he sucked on her neck. She didn’t care if he bruised, but he stopped, held, open-mouthed, resting in the nest of her rising anticipation.
It was unfair. He could touch but she could only feel him though double layers of denim. She wanted skin. She tried to pull her hands out of his hold and the tangle of jacket, but he stilled her with a palm to her cheek, then fingers combing through her hair.
“Wait, just wait.”
The sound of his voice close to her ear jolted through her, and he made a low growl of satisfaction from seeing the effect it had on her. She struggled again, how could he arrest her with one hand? If she stood, she’d break his hold immediately, but she wanted more of him, not less, and this play of power over her was the most erotic thing she could remember ever doing.
“You like this?”
He knew. There was nothing to tell him her body hadn’t.
“Tell me.”
She’d rather deny him. “No.”
He stilled, took his hand away from her face. Denial was his weapon. Self-control his greatest asset.
“Yes!” She almost shouted at him. “You bastard—you know it.”
He must’ve thought she’d break away. He brought his free hand to her trapped arms and held her. Her shoulders were back and her breasts thrust out as she arched into his grip. He was nose to nose with her, only his unsteady breath giving his intentions away.
Still no kiss.
“Control freak,” she breathed.
He let go immediately, and after straining against his hands, she fell forward on his chest. “Oh!”
But this was better. She shrugged out of the jacket and let it fall to the floor. Now she could touch him. She fisted his shirt in one hand, a vague attempt to hold him, a determination to get close to him, and pushed the other through his thick wavy hair.
He jerked back from her, hands pressing on her shoulders. “Tell me you liked being restrained.”
“You know I did.”
“Give me your hands.”
She laughed, “No. I want your lips.”
“Give me your hands and I’ll kiss you till you can’t breathe.”
Darcy pressed her weight into his hands braced on her shoulders, till she could touch her lips to his. They were soft but unyielding. He wanted it his way. Suddenly so did she.
She sat back and his hands skimmed off her shoulders and down her arms as she put them behind her back. She thought he’d restrain her but his hands kept moving, up her back, to her head. Then his lips were on hers, nothing slow, no softness, total possession.
She grabbed for him but he pulled away. “No hands.”
She put her hands behind her back again. “You only get off if you’re the boss?”
He shook his head, his expression hard to read in the dim light, but his voice was steady. “This isn’t for me.”
Now he lied.
She laughed. Now, after all the secret truths he spoke and the dare he took. He’d shown her he was a man used to being in control, used to being obeyed. He was delusional if he thought she’d fall for this being for her. She was delusional to let this happen, but he was sucking on her top lip, his tongue flicking at the corners of her mouth. His hands were massaging her breasts, thumbs rolling over her nipples. This was such a fine, fine delusion, any analysis she might have done was pinched off by the thrust of his tongue against the roof of her mouth, by the hand now under her t-shirt.
“I want you naked, woman, but it’s too damn cold.”
Firm, knowing fingers at her back, he opened her bra so her breasts, heavy with want, were pooled in his hot
palms. She gasped and rocked forward, her head dropping back so she looked towards the darkened ceiling, opening her throat to him. He licked a line of wet heat from her collarbone to the semicircle of her ear, then sucked the groan of pleasure out of her mouth.
His hands went inside her sleeves, dragging the bra straps down her arms. Freed of it she felt naked, her sensitised nipples rasped against the cotton of her shirt. It might have been made of sandpaper. She’d have hauled it off but there was no way she was going to break the contact of his mouth, sucking her nipple through the shirt.
Her hands came up to his hair to hold him there.
He stopped, shook free of her and sat back. Cold air swirled around her body where moments ago his heat had swelled. In the shadows his eyes were like two big shiny sewn on buttons. His chest rose and fell with deep breaths, but he was otherwise still, where she was squirming with desire, impatient for his touch, for the rising thrill he stirred in her.
It was his rules or nothing. It was maddening. She should get off his lap, walk away, leave the room. No man got to control how she felt. This man meant to and he fought dirty. He branded her body and he schooled her head, teaching her feelings she’d never expected, making her fall in love with the lesson.
She put her hands behind her back.
He came at her fast and hard, as though he was relieved, as though he’d reached the end of his own rope of reason, lips and hands in a co-ordinated assault on her senses. He pushed her knees wider, pulled her hips closer to let her find friction against him. She braced her hands on his knees and pressed into him, arching her back. His hands went to her splayed thighs and skimmed upward, over her hips, under her shirt, around her ribs, till he was wrapped about her torso and they were velcroed together from hip to lip.
Need built like a sob in her chest and she trembled in his arms. Her breath stuttered and she struggled not to tear at him. Only the fear he would stop touching her, teaching her, kept her hands still. But the attention was too intense, too outside of her own participation. Too uneven.
Detained Page 4