A Week to be Wild

by JC Harroway

  She shrugged her bag onto her shoulder and closed the door behind her, reaching for the jacket. ‘I’ll borrow the jacket—but only because I didn’t plan on any wild adventures when I packed.’

  Fuck, that smoky voice of hers reverberated through him—another slug of lust. She marched ahead down the corridor, in an excellent move that gave him full access to the view of her denim-clad curves swaying as she walked.

  When they were sitting in his Mercedes S-Class side by side, as he navigated the lanes of the Oxfordshire countryside, he glanced over at her striking profile.

  ‘Nervous?’

  She stared out of the window, as if formulating her answer, then sighed. ‘Yes.’

  Her hand rested in her lap. He gripped the wheel to stop himself reaching for it, uncertain of her mood.

  ‘I’ve been before. You’ll love it. And it’s perfectly safe.’

  She turned on him, eyes blazing. ‘Is it? How do you know that?’

  She really was nervous. Perhaps he should have fed her first. Or organised a punt on the river. But he’d wanted to wow her—give her a trip she’d never forget, one she’d embrace when she planned his charity’s marketing. But impressing her, it seemed, was no easy feat. And Able-Active wasn’t named Able-Relaxing.

  ‘I’d never let you get hurt, if that’s what you’re worried about.’

  She looked away, her pouty lips pursed. ‘You can’t guarantee that. People get hurt all the time.’

  His need to know more about her personally solidified.

  ‘Have you been hurt?’

  He recalled the irregular silvery scars he’d spotted on her hip last night. Scars she’d tried to hide. He’d interpreted her reaction to the helicopter as first-time nerves. Assumed her caution was just a personality trait not in keeping with the driven and professional businesswoman. But perhaps there was more to her reticence.

  ‘I—I was in a motorbike accident. Three years ago.’

  Her gaze returned to the hedgerows and the fields of gold and green beyond, which reflected the first rays of the sunrise lighting the horizon.

  His throat thickened. ‘I’m sorry about that.’

  He should have asked about the scars, but it had been obvious she didn’t want to talk about them, didn’t want to talk at all, and he’d been overcome with the sight of her naked and her husky command that he fuck her.

  ‘Were you badly hurt?’ His ribs pinched, stalling his breath.

  She shook her head, shoulders sagging a little. ‘Just some superficial cuts and grazes. I was lucky.’

  He breathed again, more determined than ever to get to know her while showing her a good time. But perhaps he shouldn’t push this. If she’d had a traumatic experience in the past, the last thing he wanted was to force her to relive it.

  He pulled off the road, steering the car down a bumpy lane that opened up to a gravel courtyard and some converted stables. Killing the engine, he turned to face her.

  ‘We’re here. Look, we don’t have to do this. We can get a feel for things, watch a few balloons go up, meet the owner. He’s a friend of mine. If you’re worried, we don’t have to fly. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.’

  But I’d love to put a grin of exhilaration on your beautiful face.

  Her dark eyes held him hostage. ‘I want to do it.’ She looked down to her clasped hands in her lap. ‘I... I just...’

  Vulnerability poured from her in waves. He ached to hold her. To kiss the frown lines from between her brows. To abandon his plans for the week and hole up with her in his Oxfordshire estate, wining and dining her, peeling back her layers, exploring every facet of her fascinating personality.

  He held out his hand, palm up, over the centre console between them.

  She glanced down and then back up at him, throat moving on a swallow. Slowly, as if she thought his palm might be electrified, she placed her hand in his.

  His chest expanded, a surge of oxygen energising him as it always did when he brokered a difficult business deal.

  ‘Let’s just have a look around. If you want to go up, we can. If you don’t, we’ll just watch a few balloons take off and then go and meet Jack early.’

  She scrunched her brow. ‘Jack?’

  ‘My cousin. He’s an architect and property developer. He’s visiting the hotel building site I want to show you today.’

  She nodded, clearly reaching a decision. ‘No. I want to go up.’

  He grinned. She was so determined. So possessed. Completely hardcore. However much she downplayed her accident, it must have shaken her up. It would shake anyone. And yet she was still willing to buy into his grandiose scheme to show her a good time and his vision for his outdoor adventure charity.

  He squeezed her fingers. ‘Let’s do this.’

  * * *

  ‘It’s amazing!’ She clung to him.

  He wanted to keep her prisoner in this basket for ever. Her arm was snaked around his waist, her hand under his jacket forcing a fist into his chest to massage his heart until the blood sang through his arteries.

  He positioned his body behind her, his arms either side of her, holding the lip of the basket in front of them, his chin on her shoulder, seeing what she saw.

  ‘Having fun?’

  Her hair tickled his cheek and he pressed a kiss to the soft skin of her neck. Fuck, when she bestowed that rare and beatific smile on him, he felt like a king.

  She laughed—a throaty sound that shot straight to his balls.

  ‘I wouldn’t go that far.’

  Her heart pounded so hard and fast, he could feel it thrum through his chest where he was pressed against her back.

  ‘I can’t believe how beautiful it is up here.’ She rested her head back against his shoulder, a small shudder leaving her.

  If he’d orchestrated a huge romantic gesture, he couldn’t have anticipated a more perfect reaction from her. She softened against him, her body heavy, pressing back, covering him from thigh to shoulder. Every time the burner fired and the balloon lurched gracefully higher she laughed, or caught her breath and pressed closer—as if she trusted him over the sturdy basket and the balloon’s skilled operator.

  The only way to improve on this morning would have been for them to have woken side by side, slaking his need to constantly taste her, feel her, be inside her.

  What the actual fuck was happening to him? He barely knew her, but already he wanted more of her.

  ‘Tell me something...’ His lips traced her earlobe, catching the small gold earring dangling there. Would she play the game they’d started over dinner last night? Would her personal admissions soften like her body?

  She sighed—a soft escape of air. ‘I’m a trained yoga instructor, although I haven’t taught for many years.’

  He groaned, his imagination running wild. ‘Fuck, could you be any hotter? I don’t suppose there’s any chance of a naked demonstration of the Downward-facing Dog?’

  ‘Pervert!’

  Her chuckle warmed his blood, lifting him higher than the balloon could ever carry him.

  ‘You tell me something.’

  Her words echoed his and he grinned. She relaxed deeper into his chest. Her delicious scent tickled his nose.

  He took a deep breath. ‘I was a game developer in my teens. A real bona fide computer nerd.’

  And he’d had the dodgy haircut to prove it—a detail she didn’t need to know.

  ‘I guessed. The T-shirt yesterday kinda gave you away.’

  He loved it that she was so observant—that she saw him.

  They watched the horizon in strangely comfortable silence, with only the birds for company. He’d just pointed out the spires of Oxford in the distance when his phone vibrated in his pocket.

  His stomach dropped. He’d given Molly strict instructions to forward all calls but one to Je
remy in his absence. That meant he couldn’t ignore this call—no matter how rude it seemed to answer, or how badly timed.

  He stepped back enough to fish the device from his pocket, keeping one arm banded around Libby’s waist.

  ‘Mother.’

  A pause. Acid surged into the back of his throat.

  ‘Zander? Is that you?’

  Hairs prickled on his neck. He knew that wobble in her voice. Dreaded it. Eight in the morning and she’d likely drunk so much she couldn’t remember who she was calling. Or she’d suffered one of her ‘spells’, during which she could barely function, shutting herself away for days on end.

  ‘Where’s Clive?’

  His mother’s second husband protected Alex from the worst of his mother’s issues—something he was grateful for and felt guilty about in equal measure.

  ‘Golf. I just wanted to say I’ll see you Saturday, at the wedding...’ Her voice trailed off but the line stayed connected.

  Fuck.

  ‘Mother? Maman?’

  He’d have to go to her. What if she’d drunk herself into a coma? What if she’d taken something?

  Firing a text to Clive, he swore under his breath.

  Releasing Libby, he turned and spoke to the pilot.

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  Libby touched his arm, dragging him back to the present, away from a past that refused to lessen its hold on him no matter what he did.

  ‘I need to visit my mother. She’s...unwell.’

  Still grieving for Jenny, all these years later. Reminding them of their loss with her bouts of depression and her periods of drinking too much. Fanning the flames of his guilt for his own shortcomings.

  He could have been a better brother. A better son. It might not have saved Jenny—he wasn’t to blame for her death after all—but it might have made all their lives a little easier. Salvaged his parents’ marriage. Made Jenny’s short life happier.

  The balloon began its descent, taking the atmosphere with it. Libby paled, as if her own fears, her own demons, had resurfaced with his ill-timed family interruption.

  ‘It’s not serious.’ He gripped her cold fingers. ‘I just need to make sure she’s okay, wait with her until her husband gets home.’

  Or organise another stay at the rehab facility where his mother practically had her own room, she’d been there so many times.

  Libby nodded, her fingers squeezing his in a display of affection that seemed to shock them both. He gripped them, reluctant to let go of the tenuous trust they’d established.

  ‘I’ll arrange a car to take you back to the hotel.’

  He’d have to cancel seeing Jack, and Libby’s tour of his state-of-the-art respite complex.

  His spirits plummeted to the ground with the soft landing of the balloon, his thoughts traversing well-worn pathways of self-doubt. Would he ever be good enough to compensate for Jenny’s death?

  * * *

  Libby pulled the black velvet ring box from her purse and wrapped her fingers around it, enjoying the familiar comfort of it filling her palm. She still carried it everywhere, even after three years. She didn’t need to open the lid. The contents—an exquisite princess-cut diamond solitaire—were a symbol of her life before the motorbike accident that had killed her fiancé a week before their wedding.

  The ring itself, whilst precious, represented a happier time of her life. A carefree time when she’d believed anything was possible and life with Callum had stretched before her in an adventure akin to those Alex planned for his clients. The adventures he insisted on showing her.

  Libby placed the box back inside her bag without opening it. Normally she stared at the ring’s beauty as if it were a talisman to ward off the image of Callum dying in her arms on the hard, unforgiving asphalt. When she thought of him, the ring helped her to remember him alive and vibrant, with excitement lighting his eyes as he’d proposed. But today her handsome fiancé’s face was a little harder to recall, his image blurry, as if photographed out of focus.

  She pulled out her phone, firing a text to Alex. She barely knew him outside the physical intimacies they’d shared and their brief working relationship. But the defeated slump to his shoulders as he’d walked away earlier had stirred something in her. Feelings she’d thought long-ago abolished. Dangerous feelings that teetered too close to the edge of caring.

  Hope your mother is okay. Thanks for the ride today. I can see why Able-Active clients will love it.

  She opened her laptop, picking up on the work she’d begun last night and continued that morning when sleep had had no use for her.

  On the surface, the marketing strategy for Able-Active presented little challenge for Libby. Secure corporate sponsorship, launch a national campaign to publicise the charity to a clearly targeted audience and streamline the charity’s website and social media presence with an online sign-up form.

  But Alex’s passion for the work had spilled over, infecting her. It meant so much to him on a personal level. She wanted to do the best job she could. Make it the success he hoped for.

  Her phone buzzed. Alex.

  Thank you. She’s fine. I’m sorry I had to rush out on you.

  His answer left her strangely hollow. The ache that had begun when he’d been buried deep inside her last night intensified. The game of getting-to-know-you they’d started was frustratingly incomplete. Game-playing with Alex fed something in her she hadn’t known was starving.

  Her fingers hovered above the screen of her phone, desire and denial warring for control.

  What do you want?

  She was playing with fire. But the flames flushed her body with energy. Irresistible. Her days here were limited. How much harm could one week do? And she could be called home at any second, their time together cut short, if Sonya’s baby decided to put in an early appearance.

  He took several minutes before his reply, as if the answer wouldn’t come. Minutes in which Libby was certain she’d lost him. That he no longer wanted to play.

  I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to undo your hair and wrap it around my hand. I don’t want to make you come. What do you want?

  His reply brought a smile to her lips. He’d fully embraced the rules, turning them against her. Clever man.

  With trembling fingers and clenched thighs, Libby fired a response that had her breathing fast.

  I want you to stay away.

  She dropped the phone and rushed to the en-suite bathroom. She had no idea where he was or how long it would take him to get here. But she knew he’d come.

  She took a quick shower, taking extra care to fasten her hair securely into a severe French pleat, no strand left free. It seemed he had a penchant for her hair. His hints and requests were glimpses into his desire to see it wild and free, which only intensified her need to push him until he couldn’t help but undo her hard work.

  She slipped on fresh underwear and her favourite comfortable jeans and sweater. She’d barely had time to slick some gloss onto her lips and wave a mascara wand over her lashes before there was a knock at the door.

  He’d aged. Wearing the same charcoal-grey T-shirt and jeans he’d worn that morning, he slouched in her doorway, one muscular arm braced on the doorframe. His intense stare was hooded, his mouth tight, and whilst his hunger electrified the air that separated them, something was different. He was different.

  She opened the door wider, inviting him in and battling the urge to hold him until the lines around his eyes disappeared. But she couldn’t step that close to the edge. This was all she could offer...all she could accept. This game—short-lived, finite and slaking only a mutual physical need.

  The door closed behind him and he followed her into the room.

  She turned, begging him with her eyes not to break the spell, not to break the rules. ‘What do you want?’ she said, her voice a whisper. />
  He stared. Endless seconds in which she felt stripped bare by the intensity in his haunted eyes.

  ‘I want to be buried inside you.’

  Stark, honest, hard to deny. But deny she must. For her own sanity.

  Without comment, or even acknowledgment, she stripped out of her sweater and jeans, careful not to disrupt her hair. His eyes widened at the lacy underwear she’d donned, but he stood stock-still, waiting and watching.

  She approached him as a cat might approach a dog: with slinking bravado, narrowed eyes and muscles coiled tight, ready to flee if he decided to show off his superior strength.

  When she was inches away she sank down, catching him by surprise. Her knees hit the carpet at his feet. She unclasped his belt buckle and made quick work of the button fly of his jeans. When she lifted her eyes to his smouldering stare she caught her breath. How had she ever thought she could control this vibrant, fearless, worldly man?

  Every muscle in his body seemed to strain, and raw power poured from his dark eyes and clenched jaw. His biceps bulged at the sleeves of his T-shirt as he fisted his hands at his sides.

  Uncertain how much time she’d have, she tugged the jeans and underwear down over his hips, her mouth watering at the sight and scent of him.

  Leaning forward, she touched her tongue to his steely tip.

  ‘Wait.’

  Her gaze flicked up. Would he stop her? Had she imagined the excitement flashing in his dark eyes? Perhaps his brooding mood had left him reluctant to play her game. Obey her rules.

  Slowly his hands cradled her face, fingers burrowing into her hair. She pressed her lips together as one by one he tugged the hairgrips free, until her hair spilled down her bare back. He stroked it back from her face, gentle hands fingering the strands with a reverence that made her itch.