‘I don’t think that at all,’ I said. And I meant it.
He cupped my ass, kissed my neck. ‘Sorry, I can’t stop touching you now that you’re here. No matter how terribly I’ve behaved.’
I let him, didn’t even think to stop him. I wanted to feel his touch too badly at this point. Wanted the sensation of his hands on me. His fingers, his body, his mouth. ‘I don’t think you’ve behaved terribly. I’m not your father.’
‘Thank God …’ He chuckled. Then he popped the button of my skirt and pulled down the zipper. His dark eyes found me in the low light of the file room. ‘I apologise,’ he said, not sounding sorry at all. ‘Unless you stop me, I have to.’
He dropped small kisses along the length of my throat and I tossed my head back, baring my neck to him. Too lost in the feel of him to question his intentions – or mine. He began to unbutton my blouse and my nipples grew tight and sensitive in response. I had a brief fantasy of him sucking one into his mouth through the thin cotton of my shirt and the silk of my bra. Instead, he parted the unbuttoned sections and pushed down my bra cup. His mouth surrounded that tender flesh and my pussy grew wetter than it already was. My body was so eager for his that it robbed my mind of all of the words I might have said. I was reduced to sounds.
Dorian gripped my waist tighter, sucked my nipple more firmly, then captured it in his teeth. He made a noise deep in his throat that sent a shivering line of goose bumps from the nape of my neck up over my scalp.
‘The pictures …’ I said, holding his head as he pulled my shirt open and licked me from breast to navel. My belly muscles rippled and when he again hooked his fingertips into my waistband and tights and started to pull them down, excitement lit me up on the inside. Dorian sank to his knees and my mind threatened to go blank.
‘What picture?’ He dragged his teeth over my hipbones.
‘The selfies in the newspaper. The regular one and the …’ I forced myself to say it. ‘The kissing one. Credit was for –’ I gasped. He tongued my bare mound. I hadn’t worn panties because of wearing tights and a skirt. Both of which were now down around the middle of my thighs.
Dorian leaned back and studied me. Grunted. He parted my labia with his thumbs and blew softly over the tender, wet flesh he’d exposed. ‘Those stupid fucking pictures in the newspaper,’ he said, sounding thoroughly distracted.
‘Yes,’ I said, meaning yes to both the pictures and what he was doing. In my mind I was willing him – hard enough to make the spot between my eyes ache – to put his mouth on me.
‘She took them. We’d been told we were going home early. It’s the only reason I looked happy. I guess that predatory … woman saw her chance and took it. She knew I wasn’t there with her like that, but she took the pictures and sent them to the newspaper. I guess it was her chance to drive a knife into my side since I didn’t want to be there with her. If you’re wondering, Clover … I never touched her.’
He put his mouth over my mound. His tongue slithered between my outer lips and found my clit. A joyous burst of pleasure leaped inside me, but I grabbed the side of his head and stilled him.
I remembered the kiss. ‘But she was kissing you.’
‘Yes, she kissed me. She caught me off guard. I guess they printed it because it was cheap news.’ He laughed. ‘But I never touched her,’ he said again.
‘Then why were you there with her?’
He stopped licking and tilted his head back to look at me. ‘The truth?’
‘The truth,’ I said, stroking his hard stubbled chin.
‘I was hurt. I was lost. I thought running off to this thing would help. That putting distance between us could help me get my head on straight. You know, I had wanted to take you and I thought … I thought maybe if I went back to the way things were before you I’d be able to forget us. Since you clearly weren’t going to bend.’
I drew in a shivery sigh and watched him war with himself.
‘And I have to admit it, Clover. Part of me, for a brief moment, figured: fuck it. You didn’t want me, maybe I should go and be with someone who did. To shake you out of my system.’
‘Did it work?’ I asked, my throat tight. I had set it off. I felt that if he said yes I couldn’t cry about it.
‘Does it look like it worked?’ he asked. He grinned at me and my knees almost buckled. I loved him. I loved him and I couldn’t hide from that any more.
‘No.’
‘And Clover?’ His mouth had returned to me, his big strong hands curling possessively around my hips.
‘Yes?’ I gasped. Then laughing: ‘Yes, yes!’
He chuckled. ‘You’re not leaving this room until you come for me.’
‘Oh,’ I said and then my words turned to a low hum as he suckled at my clitoris. Spreading my own wetness around my pussy, adding his own.
He raised his head, shoved me back and I stumbled a little, laughing, crying out. My back hit a huge shelving unit and I clutched the irregular edges of paper files. I pressed my ass against the uneven surface. Dorian pushed his face back between my legs and my heart nearly stopped. His tongue was tentative at first, snaking out to find me. He licked at me softly and then, growing bolder, lapped at me in earnest. His big hands gripped my thighs. It wasn’t until he held me that way that I realised again how very large he was. How much bigger than me he truly was.
The smell of dust and paper filled my head like the finest perfume. I struggled for air but not from dust, from the desire to drop to the ground and drag his big body down on top of me.
He didn’t let me go, though. He grew more eager the more he ate me out. He grunted and I laughed softly. I stopped laughing when he speared my drenched slit with the tip of his hot tongue. He fucked me like that for a minute and gripped my upper thighs so tight I felt certain I’d wear his fingerprints for days.
That thought alone almost had me coming. Instead I shivered in that silver zone. Like twilight sleep. Not quite coming, but not losing the spectacular sensations.
My body pulsed with pleasure.
Dorian shoved me harder against the shelves and I gasped. Those manila folders bit at my ass and I flexed my hips to drive myself forward against his willing mouth.
‘You taste so good,’ he said, pausing to lick my inner thighs.
Feet on the marble steps. Barely audible but somehow we both heard it.
‘Guys?’ Marilyn coming to find me.
I tried to pull back but Dorian held me tight, his nearly painful grip making my insides flex tight.
‘No.’ He whispered it against my hipbone. ‘You don’t get let go until you come for me. So if that means she finds me with my tongue buried in your pussy, so be it.’
‘Guys?’ She was getting closer.
I tried to remember if I’d locked the door. Or if it automatically locked behind me in this area of the Rotunda.
He shoved a finger into me and my mind went utterly blank. He curled it to my G spot and I said his name. It escaped me on one fast breath. He sucked me hard and shoved another finger into me.
He covered my pussy with his mouth, the heat of him invading me. I felt him draw on me and the all-encompassing pressure made my knees weak. ‘Just imagine what they’d think, Clover. Just imagine. If they found us this way.’
I gasped as he licked me with his broad flat tongue.
‘Just think –’
When he nudged me with his tongue I came undone. I shoved the heel of my hand in my mouth so Marilyn wouldn’t hear me come.
Part Four: Happily Ever After …?
Chapter Thirty-One
I stuck my head out of the door of the suite just as Marilyn was fumbling for her list of security codes to enter.
‘Hey, there. What’s up?’
She blinked. ‘Oh! Clover, I was getting worried because Ed showed up and then I saw Mario and I wondered who –’ She really studied me, then I watched her cheeks flush. ‘I just wanted to make sure everything was … um …’
‘Everything is fine,
’ I said. ‘There’s a … crack!’ I said as if I’d just won a game show. ‘There’s a crack in the ceiling that Dor– Mr Martin wanted to show me so I can see if we need to attend to it …’ She was smiling. ‘To the crack,’ I finished weakly.
‘Well, after you attend to that crack we have a minor emergency.’
‘What’s that?’
‘The painting for the dedication room is too wide to get through the archway.’
‘What?’
‘It’s about two feet longer than the dimensions given to us. Mario and the boys have it propped in the foyer to be taken in when we figure it out.’
‘I, um … OK. I’ll be down in just a few minutes.’
Marilyn outright laughed at me. ‘Yeah, OK. You deal with that crack. I’ll tell Ed and Mario you’ll be down shortly.’
I hurried back to Dorian. I had a head full of kissing and fucking. A chance to catch up on the time that had slipped away from us. It had taken a myriad things – seeing him with Natalie, and the date with Matt, and Dorian’s own drunken message of affection – for me to unclench my soul and admit my feelings.
He was standing, fully dressed, hip propped against a filing cabinet.
‘Hi,’ I said, my heart suddenly lodged in my throat.
‘Hi,’ he said.
‘I … that was Marilyn. Minor emergency,’ I said. ‘It can wait.’
I reached for him. To touch his face or his broad shoulders or his chest. Anything, really. Any place I could touch him would make me happy and soothe the ache that had been steadily growing in me for what felt like ever.
He smirked at me. ‘You tell the boss this? It can wait?’ He was teasing me.
I reached for him again and he caught my wrist, turned my hand over and placed a kiss on my palm. ‘I need to talk to you.’
My heart dropped. It must have showed on my face because he swept some hair off my brow and kissed my palm again.
‘This isn’t a movie, Clover. I can’t convince you why you should choose me. I can’t do some great unveiling of my character that you haven’t seen. It’s not up to me to sway you. I can only be who I am – the man you’ve seen, spent time with – and tell you I love you. It’s up to you to choose me. If you want. I hope you do.’
I was confused and it also must have showed. He framed my face and kissed me tenderly. His mouth was soft and warm and tasted of me. I sucked his tongue gently when he thrust it past my lips. His hands held me close, cradling me at the waist for a too short moment. Then he pulled back.
‘But –’
Dorian shook his head. ‘I don’t want you to decide right now. I want you to think. I want you to … know. For certain. Because if I can’t have you all the way, I guess we have nothing left to talk about. I can’t have just half your heart. Not you. With you I want the whole thing.’
‘I –’
He was walking away from me and I felt like I was splitting open. Like my insides were going to tumble out to lie at my feet.
‘I’ll call you soon. Or better yet, scratch that, you think and you call me.’ He pulled the door open but turned to look at me. ‘And by the way, this isn’t a punishment. I’m not exerting some will over you. I just want you to know … to be sure. And I –’ he looked at his feet for a moment ‘– I need to be sure. That you understand who I am, what I am and that you still want me.’
He was gone.
I was very confused and more than a little stunned. The word ‘why’ came out far too late.
But then I got it. I’d rejected him. Turned my back on him. Pushed him away. I had taken the pain his father had inflicted and doubled, maybe tripled it. He’d offered me himself, beyond just the physical, and I’d rejected him.
Not because of him, but because of my own fear and my own damn father. I’d let my preconceived notion of class structure and money screw up the realest thing I’d ever experienced. I’d hurt him more than I realised. More than I’d ever imagined.
I gave myself a few minutes to deal with the fallout. My body was still beating a heavy, satisfied rhythm from him having his hands on me, his mouth on me. I had to go downstairs now and act like a normal person. A person who cared that the painting for the dedication area was too large. A person with a plan to fix the situation. A person who was wrapping up a really big job and for the most part doing well at it.
Not a woman who found herself suddenly painfully aware that she’d hurt someone she loved. It was shock enough to admit to myself that I loved him, but twice as startling to realise how forcefully I’d tried to push him away.
Add to all this the fact that he still had hope for us … It hurt my head.
I locked up the suite and took the marble steps slowly. When I passed the nook in the wall where he’d last taken me, I touched it. We’d made this old, beautiful structure ours. It had been the backdrop for our love story. The question was, would we ever get to tell it? I’d gone from convinced I did not belong in his world to afraid I didn’t deserve him.
‘Stupid girl,’ I said to myself and then I put on my big-girl expression and went to face my crew.
* * *
The rest of the day had dragged. We’d ended up having to take the painting up to the second level and lower it over the balcony into the dedication area. It had been a team effort and any other day, when my head wasn’t full of being in love with a man I’d hurt, I’d have enjoyed every moment of it. I’d miss the Rotunda team and I’d heartily recommend any and all of them. There had been a lot of hard work and laughter getting that damn painting where it needed to be. In the end it had been perfect, the extra two feet filling the space even better than the original size. I should have complained to the artist but decided to look at it as extra painting for our money.
When I pulled up outside the townhouse, I noticed my spot was taken. Normally, I’d grumble. But today I was worried about much bigger things than having to walk an extra few feet in the early-evening drizzle.
I’d almost called Dorian about a thousand times since he left. But I hadn’t. Standing there, I almost called him again but locked my phone before hitting the send button.
‘He wants you to be sure. Respect him enough to actually take some time to think. Not that you need to think. You’ve been thinking all along. Too much, in fact.’
I walked slowly through the rain recalling the feel of his hand on me. He was haunting my mind, occupying my soul. I had been occupied mentally for the entire drive home. My head in the clouds, I went inside the townhouse.
‘Hey, there.’
I cried out and then surprised myself by bursting into tears. I’d barely made it through the front door when my mother rose from the sofa and smiled at me. What is it about seeing one’s mother that turns on the waterworks?
Maybe it’s because, for most of us, when we see our mothers, we feel young and vulnerable.
‘Mom …’ I wrapped myself around her and was vaguely aware of Brani and Gram making clicking, tsking noises in the background. I hadn’t seen my mother in nearly a year and her hug felt like coming home.
‘I heard you’ve been having a hard time of things,’ she said in my ear. ‘You never said in your emails.’
‘I didn’t want to bother you. I wanted to be str–’ My voice broke on that part.
‘You never bother me with the details of your life, Clover. And you’re always strong. Sometimes –’ she patted me as she hugged me ‘– you’re too strong. If you don’t bend some, you’ll surely break.’
She pulled back to look at me and held my shoulders in her thin but strong hands. She smiled at me. ‘But it looks to me like maybe today you decided to bend. Did something happen today, baby?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Well, God, Kim, let her in so she can sit down and tell us,’ Gram said in the background.
‘I’ll get some wine,’ Brani said.
I wiped my eyes. My mother leaned in for one more hug. ‘They’re worried about you,’ she whispered. ‘They called me last week. I
t just took me a while to wrangle some time off. But here I am. And you’re going to sit down with your mother and spill the beans.’
Together we wandered into the living room where I dropped my bag and pulled my boots off. Brani passed out wine and my mother tucked herself on the sofa close to me. ‘Now spill.’
So I spilled, making sure to leave out some of the racier bits. But I don’t think anyone was fooled at all.
It took hours. We consumed two pizzas, cupcakes Brani had brought from a local bakery and copious amounts of wine.
‘I think you know what you need to do,’ Brani said.
My mother nodded. She smiled at me and I felt calmer. I was surrounded by a bunch of wonderful women. Nosy, buttinsky, telling-me-what-to-do women … thank God.
‘What do I need to do?’
Nothing seemed big enough to me when I took the situation and turned the tables. If he had dismissed me simply because of my ‘station in life’ there would have been an uproar. Anger and outrage at him looking down on the average-income person.
Was what I’d done any different really?
‘You need to be the man,’ Gram said, nodding.
I almost choked on a sip of wine. ‘Excuse me?’
‘What she means is, you need to flip those chick-flick movies on their heads,’ Brani said.
I blinked. ‘Look, you two are together all the time. You speak this … weird language that you both understand. Some of us don’t.’
My mother sat back and crossed her legs. She grinned. ‘I understand what they mean.’
‘Do you? Then will one of you inform me? Please.’
She took my hand and kissed it. We weren’t together often but I loved my mother and she loved me. It resonated when we were together. Apparently it was obvious too because I caught Gram smiling in that way that only grandmothers seem to have.
‘You need to make the big dramatic gesture. You need to woo him.’
I put my head down and rubbed my eyes, not caring at this point if I smeared my make-up. I held my wine glass out and Brani refilled it without a word – which was rare for her. Brani wasn’t big on silence.
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