Ever since meeting him, she’d been restless. It was as if some part of her had been brought to life. A part of her that now refused to be put back into its box. Her body felt alive, her blood gushed through her, as she hadn’t known possible. Hours after they’d left the swanky restaurant, she felt wide awake. She kicked her legs under the duvet, frustrated and alert, and completely aroused.
She replayed the evening in her mind, and every touch between her and Nate was amplified. Her body thrummed with a deep need; her heart raced. Eventually, Missy gave up even trying to sleep. What she needed was a cup of tea. Yes, she knew the caffeine should keep her awake, but when she’d been at university, a warm drink before bed had been the only thing that helped shut her fact-logged brain down. She silently clicked open the door and crept to the kitchen.
To her surprise, she found Nate, sitting at the dining table, the light from his laptop bathing him in a ghostly glow. He was dressed in just a pair of boxer shorts, and her eroticised frame of mind was not improved by having the living, breathing object of her dream’s desire sitting there with his body on display.
“I’m sorry,” she said jerkily, to get his attention. “I didn’t realise you’d be up.”
He turned around slowly in his seat, his expression hidden by the darkness of the room. “It’s still business hours in the States. I’m working. What’s your excuse?”
Like he couldn’t guess. “Uh.” She cursed her sleep-deprived brain for not being able to come up with something smart. Instead, she played for time. “Would you like a cup of tea?”
“Tea? No, thanks. I’ll take a coffee though, if you’re making.”
“Coffee at this hour? I thought I was bad with my tea habit.”
“I’ve got a few more hours ahead of me yet,” he reasoned.
“It’s after midnight!”
“I don’t need a lot of sleep.”
“That would be right. I’d forgotten you’re superhuman.”
He laughed. “Not at all. Super busy, yes.”
She made their drinks and handed a mug of coffee to him. He took it with a distracted smile. “Sit,” he commanded, pointing to a chair across the table from him, without looking away from the screen.
“I was going to drink mine in my room,” she demurred quietly.
“Sit,” he repeated, this time his black eyes stared right into her face, willing her to disagree.
She did sit, because she didn’t feel like arguing, but her face was scowling. She did not like being ordered about. She sipped her tea and took advantage of his distracted state to watch him work. His angular face was focussed completely on the document he was studying, and her eyes drank in every beautiful feature. His eyes, so dark, and so thickly rimmed by curling lashes, his sensuously full lips, his slashed cheekbones and a dimple in the cleft of his chin. His jaw line was covered in stubble and she remembered what the coarse hair had felt like against her cheek. He looked up, caught her staring, and she quickly averted her eyes.
“Okay, okay. I’m done. Remember, we agreed you wouldn’t look at me like that,” He warned with mock severity, pushing the laptop aside and sipping his coffee. He regarded her thoughtfully. “Did you have a good night?”
“Sure.” Good wasn’t nearly what she felt about the night, but she wasn’t sure she’d be able to pick a better word. Certainly not a word she wanted to share with him.
“Even though Angelique got under your skin?”
Missy ran her finger around the rim of her tea cup. “She didn’t get under my skin...”
“I could tell she had unsettled you. She’s got a snake’s tongue, Missy, and a gut full of poison.”
Missy didn’t look directly at him. “I thought she seemed sort of nice.”
“Nice!” He bit the word out, his face paling beneath his tan. “Angelique is a nasty piece of work, believe me. Someone like you couldn’t even imagine how horrid she is.”
“Maybe she was just hurt by you, and that made her act badly,” Missy suggested.
“With all due respect, Missy, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t know a single thing about my marriage.”
“I know people, though, and I saw how hurt she was.”
For some reason, the softness of her tone, her obvious sympathy for his ex-wife, infuriated Nate. He stood up from the table jerkily. He wanted Missy in his corner, backing his view. Not playing devil’s advocate and trying to champion his bitch of an ex.
“Lucky for both of us, I’m not paying you to psychoanalyse my relationships. I suppose your years of waitressing experience make you a great judge of character?” He bit out sarcastically. It was harsher than he’d intended, and a nasty reminder of the footing of their relationship, and he saw that it had hit the mark.
With impressive class and grace given his insult, Missy stood up from the table. “I think I will drink my tea in my room after all. Good night. Sir.” She added with exaggerated deference.
Nate sighed. He felt like he could punch something. He watched her go, her impossibly sexy body looking even more desirable, if that was possible, in threadbare pyjamas. She was driving him crazy. All night sitting across from her, contrasting her to the mad cow that was his ex, made him hunger with lust for his wayward houseguest. Not for the first time, he wondered what the hell he’d been thinking when he put this arrangement in place.
He shouldn’t have snapped at her. She didn’t know the particulars of his marriage breakdown, and he knew first-hand what a good actress Angelique could be. Hell, she’d easily fooled him numerous times during their short marriage. It did Missy credit that she could see good in the other woman. He shook his head. Where Missy was concerned, he just couldn’t think straight. He was renowned for his level temper, and yet he seemed to be fighting with her every time they spoke.
He tapped lightly on Missy’s door. It opened a moment later.
He had only wanted to talk, but the sight of her standing there, green eyes clouded with hurt, bosom lifting and falling in the most seductive rhythm robbed him of any ability to speak.
Before she had caught her breath from the sight of him at her door, his head swooped down and his lips were on hers. She groaned deep in her throat and swayed against him, her hands clutched against his bare chest. Nate deepened the kiss, his tongue clashing with hers. He ran his hand through her hair, pulling her head closer towards him, so their lips clashed. His other hand was against her lower back, pressing her firmly against him.
Missy felt a thousand fires light within her soul. Her skin raged hot with the desire she’d been fighting since that fateful night. She wanted more. She wanted to feel him. On auto-pilot, she slid her hands down his smooth, tanned back and eased them into the waistband of his boxers. His buttocks were incredibly tight, and smooth, and she massaged them hungrily. She felt him shudder at her touch and his obvious pleasure gave her a heady rush of her feminine power. He pulled away from the kiss, his eyes glinting with his need for her. His cheeks were flushed with desire and Missy blushed when she realised the full force of his reaction, hardly contained by the cotton boxers he wore.
“Missy, I want you...” His voice held a warning, and it sent trickles of honey down her over-sensitised nerves.
She shivered.
She wanted him too. Oh, how she wanted him. But the beautiful Angelique’s face came to mind, and Missy suddenly felt doubt cloud over the desire that had waved its web around her only seconds before.
He had hurt that woman. Whatever her faults, and of course there were two sides to every story, he had really hurt her.
Missy chewer her lip, remembering how he had spoken to her after the last time they slept together – the first time she’d slept with anyone. His obvious contempt and scorn had hurt her then. It was madness to go down this path. Madness. But, God, how she needed him. She leant her head against his chest, her breath coming in ragged spurts. She couldn’t believe she was going to do this.
“I can’t, Nate. We shouldn’t. It’s t
oo complicated.”
His voice was quiet. “What is complicated about this? Mutual attraction, sex, that’s not complicated at all.”
You would hurt me, she wanted to say. Like you already have. Like you hurt your ex-wife. Oh, it wasn’t his own fault, he was just too damned attractive for his own good. No one like Nate – handsome, rich, born to a life of wealth and comfort – could understand their appeal, their power to wound. He had all the strength in their relationship, and it scared the life out of her.
“The other night was... a mistake. A wonderful mistake. But a mistake. It shouldn’t have happened. It was so far out of my character, and I’m so far from the type of woman you ordinarily are with... it shouldn’t have happened.”
His face showed no emotion. His eyes were narrowed. His computer-smart brain was calculating, understanding. “Did I hurt you?”
Not physically. She shook her head.
“You enjoyed yourself...” He said quietly, but it almost seemed like a question.
“You know I did,” she blurted, blushing with embarrassment. “I was overwrought. I was having a terrible day. Something snapped inside me and I should have had more control. I don’t believe in casual sex, Nate. Not with anyone. Not even when there is, as you put it, a mutual attraction.”
He leant against the wall, feeling sucker punched. This was the first time he’d ever been rejected. It was not a feeling he relished.
“No sex,” he said, hoarsely.
“No sex. You were the one who said that would be part of our agreement. I’m just holding you to it.” She touched his arm. “Nate, I know you and I move in vastly different circles. I presume you have very different opinions on that type of thing. I was a twenty four year old virgin until I met you. I’m not going to be prudish, but nor can I pretend that casual sex is a part of my make-up.”
“So no more sex until what... until you find some guy you want to marry?”
She shrugged. “Maybe. Who can say? I wouldn’t have predicted what happened between us. But you and me...” she gestured between the two of them. “I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that there’s no future here, which means the sex would be absolutely meaningless.”
Very still, he queried, “And why, out of curiosity, are you so certain there’s no future for us?”
She choked a little on her breath and she had to cough to clear her windpipe. “Oh,” she whispered. She stepped back from him. “Many reasons.”
“Such as?” He prompted.
This line of questioning had caught her totally off balance and she furrowed her brow. Why did she feel angry? She was, suddenly, blindingly annoyed with him. She turned it back on him, “Are you saying you want a future with me?”
“No,” He denied with such vehemence it hurt. “I’m not. But I don’t see why we can’t have fun and see where it goes.”
“Because I know it would go nowhere. I don’t believe the kind of fun you’re talking about is harmless. Not to someone like me. I think it would end with me getting hurt.” She whispered, feeling like she was baring her soul to him.
He nodded, his face drawn. “Thank you for being so honest,” he said quietly. He placed an unmistakably platonic kiss on her forehead and left the room.
Missy wrapped her arms around her stomach. She was tempted to open her door and call him back. After all, she wanted the fulfilment they’d come so close to sharing, too.
She felt conflicted and uncertain.
Only seconds later, Missy heard the front door click open, and pull closed again. She peeked into the lounge room.
Nate was nowhere to be seen.
Missy lay in bed for hours, tossing and turning, and still couldn’t find sleep. She knew Nate stayed out all night, because she heard him return early the next morning. Nate Anderson did not strike her as someone who would spend the night alone. So who had he been with?
CHAPTER THREE
Two more weeks passed, and they seemed to ease into a routine. Missy did have the days largely to herself, which meant she could explore the city and indulge her love for museums and galleries. London was filled with them, and most were free to enter. She spent hours and hours and hours walking the tiled floors, admiring the various artworks and artefacts. Her favourite spot was the Impressionist wing of the National Gallery. A coffee in hand, and earphones in to block out the chatter of tourists, Missy could sit and admire until time seemed to cease to exist.
Nights were more difficult. There were events almost every evening. Sometimes intimate dinners for four or six, and sometimes larger functions, or full blown charity balls. Without fail, Nate was the perfect gentleman. He showed no predilection for any type of relationship with her at all. It was as if he had flicked a switch and neatly turned off any attraction he might have felt for her. Not so for Missy, who felt her body vibrate with fireworks whenever he was around. And often when he wasn’t.
But Nate had clearly listened when she’d told him there’d be no sex. He kept a polite distance, made chit-chat when necessary, and his unaffected coldness was starting to eat Missy up. When he did touch her, it was as he might touch a grandmother. Lightly, always for the briefest of moments, and always just on the upper arm or lightly on the hand. Nonetheless, every touch made Missy’s pulse race, set her skin on fire.
There were times, when particularly predatorial women abounded, when he made a point of acting as though they were a red-hot couple, but it was always for show, and he was careful to leave Missy in little doubt that was faking it.
She was tortured by dreams of him.
In the fortnight following the dinner with Angelique, Nate had also taken to leaving the apartment. They’d returned home the previous night after midnight. He’d seen Missy home and not even followed her instead. Instead, he’d bade her a casual goodnight and disappeared back into the elevator.
And now, they had a cocktail party to attend one bitterly cold winter’s night. It was being hosted in the ground floor of Selfridges, to launch a new range of make-up.
“It seems like an odd thing for you to attend,” Missy remarked, when Nate first brought it up over breakfast.
Without looking up from the broadsheet newspaper he was reading, he said, “Anderson Corp is the parent company to the cosmetic brand. My grandfather invested in it way back in the twenties, when it was just a small time pharmaceutical operation based in Paris. Better luck than anything else, I think, that it’s turned into the most prominent brand in cosmetics globally.”
Missy didn’t believe it. Nothing about Nate Anderson’s success was down to luck. Everything he touched turned to gold, and having been living with him for several weeks now, Missy had seen firsthand what a passionate and dedicated workaholic he was. And brilliant. Nothing escaped his attention.
So attentive to detail was he that, in the early evening, while Missy was beginning to get ready for the cocktail party, a knock at the door disturbed her. She swung it open and was surprised by how pleased she was to see Susanna, the waitress she’d been friendly with at the restaurant downstairs.
“Missy!” Susanna exclaimed happily.
Missy grinned shyly. “Hello, Susanna.” They hugged, and Missy felt a bit awkward, having to explain her presence in the penthouse suite. She gestured around the enormous room, and said hurriedly, “It’s not what you think.”
Susanna held her hands up in a gesture of silent surrender. “I wasn’t thinking anything, Miss, except how great it is to see you again. You practically dropped off the face of the earth. What happened to you?”
“Dean didn’t tell you?” Missy supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised. The manner in which she’d been dismissed had been hugely reprehensible.
“He said you didn’t show up.”
Missy’s mouth opened in shock. “That’s a lie! He fired me.” She grimaced. “It all worked out okay in the end, but I was furious at the time.”
“That weasel! You were one of our best waitresses.”
Missy shrugged, realising she d
idn’t even care about her ignominious dismissal anymore. Her brain was far more pleasantly occupied with her current employer. “Oh well.”
“When did you hook up with Mr Hotty Moneybags?” Susanna asked, her face crinkling in anticipation at the salacious details.
“I didn’t,” Missy denied hotly, shaking her head. She didn’t know how to explain their relationship. After all, Nate did want people to believe that they were genuinely a couple, but she didn’t want to mislead Susanna. She settled for a mix of the truth and fiction. “It’s nothing serious, just a bit of fun while we’re both available.” She tried to sound breezy about the casual nature of their relationship but Susanna was perceptive and her eyes narrowed. And as tempted as she was to push it, she could tell her friend was uncomfortable, and didn’t want to make her more so. “As long as you’re happy.”
“I am,” Missy said, realising that she was. Despite the constant frustration she felt at not getting the sexual release she craved, she realised that she was happy, with even the small bones of time he threw her.
“Here,” Susanna said, as if just remembering something important. She slipped a ticked into Missy’s hand. “I got a call from front desk to bring this to you. Apparently Nate Anderson is going to meet you at the event.”
Susanna sounded so wistful that Missy couldn’t help but laugh. “It’s not that glamorous, I promise.”
“It sure sounds it.”
Missy’s grin went all the way to the centre of her soul. Spontaneously, she said, “Do you have time for a tea?”
“I’d love that,” Susanna agreed readily.
Missy pottered about making their tea while Susanna stood at one of the large windows overlooking Hyde Park. “Not a bad place to live.”
“Yes, it’s lovely. How are you, Susanna?”
The two women spent a pleasant half hour catching up on one another’s news. Missy was her usual circumspect self, but Susanna made up for it, gossiping about all the staff at the restaurant, and some of the less pleasant regulars. Missy hadn’t laughed so hard in a tremendously long time, and she found herself giving her phone number to Susanna, suggesting they catch up again soon.
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