Last Man She'd Love

by Summerita Rhayne

  He was close enough that she could inhale the intoxicating evocative masculine fragrance he wore. The perfume business certainly knew how to tap a women’s keys. If their product combined with the potent aura of raw masculinity tamed into civilized veneer, that was.

  Unbidden, the feel of his kiss, the memory of his strong hard body next to her stole into her mind. He reached out to steady her and she wondered if she had been going to swoon at his sight. No. That wouldn’t do. She was the woman of substance, honed by the twenty first century.

  He spoke, and she was even sensitive to the deep tenor of his voice, because shivers raced down her spine. ‘You look...different.’

  She stiffened, as the words sank in, glad that she’d given herself the piece of cautionary advice. Not beautiful or pretty or sexy.

  Different.

  ‘You look just the same,’ she snapped back.

  He laughed, deeply and openly. ‘Thank you, Ms. Cool Perry. Yes, I always manage to steal the show. It’s a drawback, but what can one do? It’s just unavoidable.’

  ‘And juvenile, to brag about your looks.’

  ‘Why are you so miffed? I attempted to compliment you. You really look different.’

  ‘For one, you’re implying that I look drab at other times.’ She counted it off on her fingers. ‘Second, different hardly means anything positive. For all your flirting, you’re sadly off in giving compliments.’ She shouldn’t have given in to the temptation to say that. But she did. Now he’d think she was dying to hear him praise her –

  ‘And you, love, are so off at reading them.’

  Her thought processes stalled. Love. Had he really called her that? She shouldn’t go falling into a faint. He was a practiced lover. Endearments probably fell off his lips like – like ripe jamuns falling off the trees...

  ‘Meaning?’ she challenged.

  ‘Meaning you don’t need to fish for compliments.’

  Which was what she had been doing. Feeling mortified that she’d already given away too much, she turned away. Color stole into her cheeks.

  Rattled by her own reactions, her gaze focused unseeing on the crowd, she didn’t notice the warm way Guy looked at her.

  Guy couldn’t believe he’d called her ‘love’. The term fell from his lips without his consent. It rattled him as well. His way of talking to women included such praise as ‘you look good or ‘it suits you.’ Meaningless, though well meant, lovely, gorgeous, like a siren.

  Different. The word made him laugh at his own stupidity. What he wanted to say was she looked sexy as hell, more precious than rubies, ethereal like a goddess who didn’t belong to the earth. He would never say what he wanted and far less do what he wanted which was to take her away from this party, kiss her in turn with tenderness and passion and take her to his bed.

  She might go away. All too soon.

  She had to, he told himself.

  Of course she would. They’d been brought close by weird circumstances. Soon they’d be back at the office. Where things were sane and ideas like engagement and rings and marriage far away.

  Ring. A ring for Lyna.

  He turned away from her. Only to walk smack into a group.

  ‘Time for dance,’ they chanted. A group of men and women surrounded them and inexorably closed around them, till he and Lyna were in the center.

  ‘I hurt my foot playing cricket with the kids,’ he said.

  Lyna looked at him and he realized he had said something wrong. Her eyes sparkled. Her chin tilted up. ‘Well, I have three left feet. Who’s brave enough to dance with me? Jashith obviously isn’t.’

  Someone volunteered and soon a medium height man in a Jodhpuri coat was leading her onto the dance floor.

  ‘You look flabbergasted, bro,’ a friend told him. ‘You should have thought up a better excuse. And she doesn’t even dance so bad.’

  ‘Jashith, you should have danced with her. What’s a little toe treading when you promised to spend your life taking care of her?’ A woman chided him.

  ‘You were mistaken. She’s rocking the floor!’

  Sure enough, Lyna who’d refused to step with him at the anniversary they had attended, now was taking twirls between two men, first with one then another.

  He watched, mouth falling open as she gyrated to the beat of the music, slim waist undulating. Her footwork was hesitant but slim arms curved in a rhythmic movement, one ending up on the shoulder of her escort. He slid his arm around her waist and swept her off her feet and into a spin. People grouped around them and applauded loudly.

  The other man took this as a challenge and took her back, to execute a round. Lyna’s feet became uncoordinated, but it was forgotten as he pulled her against him, her back to him and clasping her waist, went into as smooth a spin as the other man.

  Everyone clapped again. Now the other man moved, but before he could more than strike a pose with Lyna, he found a hand tapping his shoulder, more peremptory than polite.

  Without quite knowing when he had moved, Jashith found himself cutting onto the guy and hauling Lyna into his arms.

  She was flushed and breathless. Her hands moved to his shoulders as he drew her close. People began to chant ‘Jashith! Jashith! Let’s see what you can do!’

  The music changed. A salsa based song came up. He bent over her in a sensual salsa pose and she arched back. He straightened and she came up, stepping onto his foot.

  ‘It’s healed very fast!’ she jibed.

  His wide dark gaze smiled guilelessly. ‘So it has.’

  He jerked her around, preparing for a slow dragging walk and she hit his ankle. Her hem hid it and no one noticed. The walk went off well, their audience cheering as their eyes locked and never batted once through the saunter. He turned her one way and then the next and she carried off creditably. A spin went off well, but disoriented by the dizzying circle, she did the next steps jabbing wildly around, hitting his feet and toes, at one point stepping with the point of her heel.

  Guy tried to calm her down. ‘Quite well…ah…this is it, I think.’ As the music rose in its last note, he lifted her and placed her in a recap of their first step, this time bending far in one knee as she arched back and planting a kiss squarely on her lips.

  The couples cheering them went mad, clapping loudly. He went off the floor and many pounded his back. ‘Good one!’ ‘Jashith, feet healed super quickly, eh?’ ‘What did you apply? Let me know the prescription!’ All sorts of darts hit him, along with good natured back slapping. ‘Didn’t get your toes tender, did you?’ A last one came in as they cleared the circle of onlookers.

  ‘Much do they know,’ Jashith said softly.

  ‘I’m not apologizing,’ Lyna, who knew the truth, whispered, under the cover of her smile as she accompanied him away from the floor. ‘Let me tell you, the way you barged in on that nice man and I, was super rude, to say the least! If it was meant as a sort of compliment to have you playing the jealous fiancé –’

  ‘It wasn’t for you. It was for him. I don’t want the whole Nenthi saying my fiancée fractured my guest’s ankles!’

  She gasped. ‘How dare you! I know I don’t dance. You don’t know how much I practiced – from morning till afternoon, every damn day – and now you say –’ She made an inarticulate sound and walked off in the direction of the house.

  Guy sat down in the chair nearby. He had to get her back. But first there was something he had to do.

  Lyna stalked off the party premises and into the house. She’d forgotten about Vinay. As she walked rapidly down a random corridor, as fast as her high heels would allow, she heard two steps of footsteps and the sound of laughter. It made her relax, her anger abating. Smiling and curious, she opened the door to the room. It wasn’t one she had visited before and looked like a sitting room with a portion of it left vacant, maybe earlier used to practice some music as a piano and a harp were placed against one wall. Ornate lamps and pedestal figures graced the corners. A chandelier in the centre provided the only lighting
. For a minute, she stood watching them, their faces lit up, their movements in perfect tandem to the song filtering in from outside. As she watched, her shoulders sagged, her eyes beginning to mist. She turned away, blinking rapidly.

  Vinay caught sight of her and stopped her. ‘Wait, Lyna! You found us. Awesum!’ He hurried over, pulling Priti by her hand.

  Somehow Lyna nodded and smiled through the introduction and the chitchat with them. Such uncomplicated love…she was a fool to feel jealous of them. But the radiance she had seen in their faces made her feel something was missing in her life.

  Ridiculous. She didn’t have anything with Guy. He annoyed her, teased her without reason…made her wish things she should be way too sensible to hope for.

  ‘We’d better go. Someone is coming.’ Vinay whisked Priti out from the other end, shutting the door behind them.

  Lyna prepared to leave the room. But she had taken only a few steps when Guy pushed open the door.

  ‘Hiding from more dances? Or sulking?’ His lazy voice with its crisp edge resounded in the room.

  ‘More insults about my dancing? Why didn’t you stay away when you had the chance? I didn’t ask you to come to the floor and if you did because of your guests, that’s no fault of mine. In fact –’ She stopped, losing track of what she was angry about.

  He came in. ‘In fact, what? I hardly knew, the cool and calm girl I usually see at the office, could flare up so much. Or does the anger hide something?’ His eyes narrowed, tone dropped a notch to lazily suggestive. ‘Anger is often prelude to attraction, you know.’

  ‘Don’t flatter yourself! If this was a cartoon show, you’d see steam coming from my ears!’

  She turned away but he came nearer, catching hold of her arm. His tone dropped to a more serious note. ‘Lyna, wait. Okay, I owe you an apology. I shouldn’t have teased you about the dance.’

  She stayed silent, her eyes glaring at him, her breath coming in quickly. How could she tell him? What had hurt was his refusal to dance with her. His excuse that he’d hurt his foot. Everyone had seen through it. She’d seen the disbelieving looks. They had danced the last time and it had ended in a kiss. How stupid of her to expect that he’d look forward to this time too. He hadn’t even had the time to come and see her practice.

  ‘Now that you know the steps so well, how about we have another go at it?’

  ‘Don’t patronize me!’ Her eyes shot sparks at him.

  ‘Patronize? That’s fun. How did you get such an idea? I’m trying to improve your mood…’

  ‘Why don’t you leave then? That would improve it no end!’

  He didn’t answer and she fell silent, though his frown didn’t make her back down. She matched him look for look. Unexpectedly, he relaxed and even laughed. ‘Okay, if that will make you feel better, I’ll leave. Just one twirl and I’d go.’

  ‘If you think, I’ll dance with you again…’

  ‘I do. In fact, I’ve been meaning to ask you. How did you know it was one thing I can’t resist?’

  His arms came around her, but not quite touching her. Anger was a prelude to desire, he had said, no, attraction. He’d got it wrong. But his nearness was making her anger ebb and replace it with the sneaky sensuality of his magnetism. ‘You’re hallucinating,’ she snapped. ‘I wouldn’t dream of doing anything to please you.’

  He laughed and let his arms go around her, one at the waist, the other at her back. ‘You’re right. Too much of pleasing becomes boring. This prince likes to persuade.’

  His velvet voice made her toes curl. Whether the ‘prince’ liked it or not, he was adept at it. His arms, solid and warm, the forearms bare against her waist, invited her against the warmth of his hard, muscled chest. Her breath suspended as she argued with herself the idiocy of giving in to him.

  ‘Jashith,’ she murmured, because his embrace had become purposeful. ‘It’s fine. I accept your apology.’

  ‘Good,’ he murmured back. His arm propelled her still closer. ‘I can kiss you with a clear conscience.’

  ‘That wasn’t – you need not.’ In her mind, the memory of their last kiss arose. How it held her, made her body melt. Could she risk going there again?

  Her gaze locked with his. She read the dark purpose and something unfurled inside her. ‘The last time,’ she whispered as his head bent near. ‘Have you forgotten how it went?’

  ‘No. Have you?’

  ‘It’s not wise.’

  ‘No. I’m not wise now. I wasn’t wise then. But I remember I enjoyed it. Almost as much as I’m going to enjoy this.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Guess.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  He obliterated the distance between them. The fire that was simmering since he’d drawn her close, became a blaze of need. His arms wrapped more tightly around her, his lips touched hers and she was conscious of a reckless disregard as the doubts melted away in the heat of his nearness. His mouth explored hers and she returned the exploration. Every bit of contact hiked the temperature a notch higher.

  Moments later, he lifted his head, dark eyes smoldering. ‘I was wrong. This is way better than last time.’

  She reached out to touch his mouth, tracing the contours. ‘Can it be exceeded by anything?’ His madness had infected her.

  ‘Let’s see.’

  His lips touched hers again, this time the contact deeper and more intimate. It evoked a rush of answering need. Her body moved against his. He groaned, his hands moving downwards instinctively to cup her buttocks, bringing their bodies in intimate contact that shocked while it incited. She began to kiss him back, openly, with a deep hunger and it began to express in the primeval movement of her body against the hardness of his. She heard his harsh, indrawn breath and her mind became hazy, driven only by sensation. His hands moved to mold her breasts and she was the one who gasped. Through the lined fabric, the contact was hot, his hands sending an escalating signal of desire that made control slip and sexual wanting blaze to a raging need. She couldn’t think of anything and wondered crazily if he would take her there. Shockingly, she realized she wasn’t feeling scandalized by the idea but excited.

  ‘Too much!’ Guy said thickly, breaking contact. ‘We’re playing with fire.’ He stopped and met her gaze. ‘It’s hard to stay away from you now.’ No sarcasm or mockery. Only guttural naked need.

  Her breath caught. He’d pushed the ball to her court. What did she want? In his arms, dazed by the hot longing he made her feel, it would be easy to say yes and throw sense to the winds. Now...

  Outside there were noises and in the interruption, the moment slipped. Guy planted himself in front of her, so she could right up her dupatta a scant second before Kalyani and Savika walked in.

  ‘Oh there you are! We’ve been looking all over for you two. It’s time to cut the cake,’ Kalyani insisted.

  Savika took a look at them and ushered Kalyani out, who moved reluctantly back through the door. ‘Come soon!’ She winked and followed her sister out.

  ‘Why don’t they eat the cake by themselves?’ Guy said, in the semblance of a growl.

  ‘I think Savika saw through us,’ Lyna said, giggling as the comic aspect of being caught out hit her.

  ‘Imagine Kalyani looking into all the rooms to find us!’ Guy began to chuckle. ‘I wonder if she started at the ground floor.’

  ‘You’re as juvenile as Shrey,’ she admonished and contradicted her own statement by saying on a rising note, ‘I thought she looked a little bothered.’

  ‘She said she wanted to lose weight.’ Guy chuckled. ‘I must ask her if she stuck to her resolution of avoiding the elevator.’

  ‘Did it include the storerooms?’

  The vision of Kalyani in her finery traipsing through the musty storerooms on the third floor looking for them, set them off. They were shaking with it, Lyna clutching his arm as Savika opened the door again.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, hurry up. Why didn’t you? Shivesh has overturned the cake!’


  ‘What?’

  ‘Just as Kalyani and I went out, Shrey and Shivesh got into some wrestling hold and Shivesh crashed into the cake.’

  They rushed outside to see the spectacle of the boy, his head hanging, chin as low as the ground, cream still clinging in spots to his face and his shirt, while Kalyani and Mahesh ranted at him in turns. In between, Kalyani ranted at Mahesh. Behind them on the satin covered table, the demolished cake spread out like a tired soldier. The pink white and yellow icing denoting three tiers now lay in horizontal cascade.

  ‘Shrey pushed me!’ The tortured kid announced at last, pointing a finger at his gleeful older brother, who was immediately put under the scanner too.

  ‘Kalyani, go inside and tell them to clear it up.’ At last, Guy got it through her and she left. Silence fell immediately. The guests who had gathered to watch, dispersed to eat dinner and Guy took Shivesh away to a cluster of chairs, Shrey and Lyna following them.

  The kid looked tearful but defiant. He stared with baleful gaze and tear stained cheeks at Guy. ‘It’s just cake,’ he croaked.

  ‘Yes, just cake,’ Guy said, without any inflection in his voice. But somehow made the kid looked repentant for the first time.

  ‘He’s always getting into things,’ Shrey said loudly. ‘Didn’t he hit you with his bat?’

  Guy directed a quelling look at him. He subsided, but Lyna turned an interested gaze on him and he was encouraged to expound. ‘He was waving it about, in all directions. He nearly hit me on the head. Then he brought it down like he’s seen players do on TV and instead smacked Uncle Guy’s ankle.’ In his haste, he said ‘uncle’ making Guy and Lyna smile. Quick to witness the lightness of their expression, Shrey said with jubilance. ‘He said a word that Mummy told me never to repeat.’

  ‘But he keeps saying it when she’s not there!’ Shivesh said, sighting a chance for retribution.

  Shery gave him a scowl but continued with relish. ‘His joint swelled up like - like a pakora! See it now if you don’t believe me...’

  ‘Definitely not. I’m in party wear, little Sherlock. Now stop blaming each other and learn to behave like gentlemen next time you’re at a party. Sports must be enjoyed on the field, not amidst your guests.’