A Sip of You (The Epicurean Series)

by Grace, Sorcha

  “I’m yours, Catherine,” he said quietly. “I don’t want anyone else.”

  Suddenly I felt possessive of him. Very possessive. His gorgeous eyes, now liquid and all but silver; the toned and muscled body I knew was under his clothes; the face that looked almost Photoshopped. All of that was mine. And I wanted him to know it.

  I reached up and stripped off his tie. I tossed it on the ground beside my wet suit. It was probably a five hundred dollar tie, but I didn’t care. Next was his shirt. I flicked the buttons open and slid my hands inside. My fingers roved over his sculpted chest and shoulders, enjoying all the hard ridges and planes he worked so hard to tone.

  I glanced up at his face, and saw he watched me intently. He was exercising restraint, allowing me to have my way with him. He was letting me take control, but he clearly knew that at any moment he could touch me, and I’d melt and forget about everything but the pleasure. Before that could happen, I put my hands between my legs and grabbed his slim leather belt, unfastening it and then the button of his trousers. His cock was hard and waiting, and with a slight urging down of his zipper and a push of fabric, I held it in my hands.

  I slid my fingers down, enjoying the length of him and the way the veins pulsed with need for me. I angled my hips and spread my legs. My folds were slick and I wanted him to see. William’s hands tensed on my legs, and his hardness jumped in my hand.

  “You’re killing me right now,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  Something about the sound of his voice, the raw emotion in it, was my undoing. I was still angry at him for leaving me today and hurt about all he wouldn’t share with me, but this was something he would share. He would share his body—fully and completely. In these moments, he was mine. He needed me. And I needed him.

  I slid forward, guiding his cock where I wanted it, but he stopped me and motioned me to stand. I did so, slowly and with my legs trembling in anticipation. I wondered what he had in mind, but he merely motioned for me to turn around. His hands slid to my inner thighs and pushed them apart so I straddled him again. Then he pulled me down so my back was against his chest. I could feel his hardness pressing against me. “Ride me like this.” His direction came out rough and raw.

  Of all the ways we’d come together, this one was new. My breath caught in my throat as a wave of arousal hit me hard. His hands on my hips guided me, sliding my ass along his abs until he settled me over his cock, his tip hot and hard and pulsing at my entrance. Slowly, I took him in, enjoying the feel of every solid inch of him sliding into me. I was so achingly full that I gasped, but still there was more of him. When I was fully seated on him, I cried out with pleasure. I was ready to come from just the feel of him filling me, and my legs were twitching and trembling. I wasn’t sure how long I could go like this, but William’s strong hands held me by the hips and guided my movements.

  “You don’t know what you’re doing to me,” he murmured. “God, don’t stop.”

  He helped move my hips up then down as I took him, and one of his hands moved up my abdomen to my chest. I had to lean back to keep my balance, which had the added effect of pushing my breasts into his hand. He cupped them, stroked them, and then brushed his palm over my sensitive nipples. “Deeper,” he urged me as his hand circled one nipple then the other, making them harden and heat.

  “I don’t think I can,” I breathed, concentrating on my balance and now so close to orgasm I could hardly speak.

  “Deeper, Catherine,” he said, nudging my legs farther apart. I rose up and then slid down again, taking him so deep I didn’t think I could stretch any farther. My legs were noticeably shaking now. I could feel every ridge, every swollen inch of him inside of me. I could feel my sex tightening and gripping him so hard, but before I could come around that glorious cock, William murmured, “Not yet,” in my ear.

  “No, no, I can’t, I can’t wait,” I protested. I was riding him and my body was poised and oh so ready to let go.

  “Not yet,” he rasped again in my ear.

  The orgasm that was right there slipped just out of reach. I couldn’t go over the edge. Not without his consent. I groaned and rode him faster and harder, frantic with desire.

  Slowly, as though he wasn’t equally as close—but I could feel exactly how close he was and I knew he couldn’t hold back for much longer—his hands slid down my body until one rested on my hip and the other cupped my sex, just above where we were joined. His finger touched our hot, wet union and came away slick. Then he parted my folds and found my clit. I shuddered as he caressed me, while his cock filled me from behind. I couldn’t think. I could only feel the waves of ecstasy radiating through me with every hard stroke. William’s finger circled my clit until I was moaning and begging him. My words didn’t even make sense. I was beyond pleasure now. The pool, the cool breeze, the sounds of the cool California night were gone. There was only William and me, and the universe of his filling me, bringing me closer and closer to a climax I knew would shatter me.

  My hands went to my breasts, plucking at my nipples, and my head fell back against his shoulder as I took him viciously. He was slicked with sweat, his muscles tense with restraint. “Oh God, Catherine,” he finally moaned. “Come for me.” His finger pressed harder against my engorged clit, and his cock swelled even more as the first gush of semen pushed against my walls.

  My body responded instantly, shaking violently as wave after shuddering wave crashed through me. I could make no sound at all—I could only feel, only take what he gave me, take more and more of him as I clutched him over and over again. And then it was over, and I was so weak I all but collapsed. William’s strong arms caught me, and he turned me around, holding me against him, stroking my hair, and shushing me.

  God, I loved him so much. My heart was still thundering in my ears as I clung to him, relishing in the warmth of my bare skin pressed against his. I felt complete in his arms and never wanted to leave them. Part of me wanted to tell him, right now, how I felt. But part of me didn’t want to break the silence of the moment, which was somehow perfect as we held each other tightly, so many things between us unsaid but not unfelt. He needed me. And I needed him.

  We stayed like that for a few more minutes and then finally, William spoke. He whispered against my ear, “Do you still doubt I’m yours? You own me, Catherine.”

  And then he kissed me, lifted me up, and carried me inside.

  Seven

  I opened my eyes and knew without even turning my head that William wasn’t in bed with me. There was just the cold expanse of crisp 600-thread count Italian sheets on either side of me and barely an indentation of where William had been the night before. Exhausted after my swim and our poolside sex, I’d pretty much passed right out after carried me upstairs and tucked me in. The last thing I remembered was him undressing, crawling under the covers, and then spooning my naked body with his. His arms had pulled me tight against him, wrapping me in a delicious warm embrace as I drifted off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  I had no idea when he’d gotten up. I fumbled for my phone and peered at the time. A little after 8:30. Great. I was all by myself in William’s giant bed. Again. What a way to start another day at the glorious Casa di Rosabela. I wanted to wake up in his arms like I did at The Peninsula and spend the morning talking and laughing and exploring each other.

  I sat, but I knew William wasn’t in the master suite. I could usually sense him—when he was near, all the little hairs on my arm prickled. My arms felt absolutely nothing, but I looked around for him anyway.

  Empty.

  William’s words from the night before came back to me. He’d assured me we were safe. He’d told me the security team was here. Obviously he viewed this new Wyatt, whoever or whatever it was, as a threat he took seriously. Equally obvious, he didn’t want to talk to me about said threat because he thought I’d be safer that way. Or maybe he thought the less I knew the less I’d worry. Yeah, right. Worry was practically my middle name. What he didn’t seem to understan
d was I worried about him. And about us. I didn’t care about safe nearly as much as I cared about him—I owned him. Just thinking about what he had whispered in my ear last night made my pulse race. I wasn’t sure that a man like William could ever give himself completely to a woman, but I wanted to believe him. Desperately. God, I loved him.

  I flopped back down and closed my eyes. I could almost hear my yoga instructor’s soothing voice as I slowly inhaled and exhaled a few deep, cleansing breaths through my nose, trying to expel any negative thoughts. But it wasn’t working.

  I took another deep breath. I had to stay cool. I couldn’t let Cat the Dramatic win the day, so I’d try to think positive. William probably got up for his usual before-dawn workout and was downstairs, doing something to stave off the mysterious crisis that brought us here. Or maybe he was out tending to his grapes and he didn’t wake me up because he was just being considerate. I could give him a break.

  With those thoughts, I took a quick shower, put my wet hair into a ponytail, pulled on a pair of jeans, a tank top with a T-shirt layered over it, and a pair of flip flops, and then headed downstairs for coffee and to find William. On my way, I glanced out the front windows and noted the Porsche was parked out front, but all but one of the big black SUVs the security team used were gone. Okay, something was up. “Oh no,” I muttered as I tried not to panic.

  When I walked into the kitchen, I expected to see Fernanda. I stopped and stared instead at a man and a woman I’d never seen before, both in black pants and starched white shirts and looking very professional. It jarred me, having people I didn’t even know in the house with me while I’d been sleeping.

  “Good morning, Miss Kelly,” the man said. “I’m Sam, and this is Nancy.”

  “Um, good morning. Where’s Fernanda?”

  “She has the day off, Miss Kelly,” Nancy, a woman with her dark hair pulled into a tight bun, told me a little too cheerfully.

  “And William?” My cheeks burned when I said his name. Was Nancy the one who’d changed the sheets after the night with the honey? Did Sam know about the kinky stuff William and I had done? Handcuffs, sex by the pool... I wanted to turn around, run back upstairs, and bury myself under the bed covers. With William. As it was, I couldn’t make eye contact with either of them.

  “Mr. Lambourne is fine,” Sam said. His hair was long, grey, and pulled into a ponytail. I hated ponytails on older men.

  “What do you mean fine? Where is he? If he’s out in the vineyard, you can just point me in the right direction and I’ll walk out and meet him.”

  Sam kept looking at me, his face expressionless as he answered, “He had some business, but he’ll be in touch soon.”

  For a minute I was too stunned to speak as I processed what Sam just said. William couldn’t possibly have done it to me again, but it was obvious that he had. Sam and Nancy were trying to play it cool and act like it was no big deal, but William wasn’t here. He left me on my own again, this time without telling me and without waking me up to say goodbye. And that was a huge fucking deal in my book. “Some business? Where is he exactly?” I sputtered at Sam. I was about to lose it and I didn’t care if they knew.

  “Mr. Lambourne is fine and will be in touch with you soon,” Sam said again.

  “Is there something I can get you?” Nancy chimed in. “Coffee?”

  I ignored chipper Nancy. William had left and that fucking hurt. I thought we were so past the waking up alone, leaving without saying goodbye or even a note stage, especially after the last two nights. Then the niggling thoughts began—he was never going to let me in. He was never going to be what I needed him to be, starting with honest. How could I possibly keep trusting him like he asked when he obviously didn’t trust me? I could feel the tears starting to well up in my eyes. “Great,” I said. “Just great.” Then I turned around and stormed out.

  I ended up out by the pool again. I’d gone upstairs first and grabbed my laptop thinking I’d try to do some work to calm down. I was parked on my lounger for about five minutes before Sam appeared and set out a carafe of coffee along with a tray of cups and pitchers on the table.

  “Nancy is bringing you some fruit and yogurt,” he told me. “Is there anything else?”

  “Nope.” I glared at him. I wasn’t in the mood to be polite and I hadn’t even asked for coffee or breakfast. I surveyed the three little pitchers of milk marked skim, 1%, and 2%, the selection of sugar and its various substitutes, and the half dozen little cups of coffee flavorings I could add. There wasn’t much else I could want for.

  Except William.

  And explanations.

  But I wasn’t going to get those, so I supposed I would have to content myself with coffee.

  Yesterday work had distracted me, so I fired up my laptop again and worked for a while on the Fresh Market pictures of asparagus and cherries for the Fresh for Spring campaign. The shots were good, but they needed to be edited, retouched, and refinished. I lost myself in my work for an hour or so, but I was too distracted to really focus. I kept checking my phone, hoping for some word from William, but there was nothing.

  Then my phone buzzed, indicating I had a voicemail. I couldn’t push the buttons fast enough. It was from a number I didn’t recognize, but maybe William had called from another number.

  “Hi Catherine, this is Emmy Schmidt.”

  As soon as I heard the woman’s voice, my heart sank. It wasn’t William. And did I even know an Emmy Schmidt? I kept listening.

  “I work for Hutch Morrison, executive chef at Morrison Hotel. I’d like to set up a meeting with you and Mr. Morrison at your earliest convenience.”

  Hutch Morrison? I didn’t know him, but I remembered Beckett talking about Morrison Hotel. It was one of the hottest restaurants in Chicago right now.

  Emmy Schmidt rattled off her contact information and asked me to call her. I jotted down the number, but I kind of wanted to know more about this guy before I committed to a meeting. I called Beckett, but it went straight to voicemail. “Hey, Beckett, it’s Cat. I just got a call from the PR person for Hutch Morrison. She wants to set up a meeting. Do you know anything about him? Any idea what this could be about? Call or text me when you get a chance. Bye.”

  I couldn’t sit around the pool any longer. The chair William and I had done it on last night was pushed back into place in front of a small coffee table near the outdoor fireplace. Every time I looked at it… Fuck it. I was going inside. I had a mission.

  I started in the living room and worked my way through a media room and finally to William’s study. I wasn’t exactly looking for anything specific, but just for something, anything really, that might clue me in to what the hell was going on, William’s privacy be damned.

  I couldn’t get over how much different this house was from William’s penthouse in Chicago. Everything here was warm and inviting, textured and bursting with color. I found framed photos of William and his family all through the house, along with souvenirs he’d obviously collected on his travels. And the art, which was everywhere, was spectacular. The house, like the penthouse, could have been a museum, but whereas his penthouse felt like a museum, this place felt like William’s home.

  In his study, I found more photos as well as several framed pictures of celebrities, all signed to William. The one from Michael Jordan seemed to occupy the center spot, though Walter Payton and Dick Butkus were prominently displayed as well.

  I imagined William as a kid, treasuring these mementos of his heroes. I sat at his desk and opened the drawers. I rifled through them and found a bunch of papers but nothing terribly exciting or damning as far I could tell. No dossiers on other women George might have found for him to date.

  There were framed pictures on the bookshelves behind his desk: one of his family a few years before the crash and a more recent one of him and his aunt, uncle, and his three cousins. And then I spotted another one. In a corner, almost hidden behind the family photographs, was a framed shot of a group of kids, several in co
llege sweatshirts. It didn’t take me long to find William in the picture. He looked young, maybe nineteen or twenty, and little thinner, but just as handsome. Standing beside him was someone else I recognized—Anya Pierce.

  She too looked younger, but still beautiful. She was probably more beautiful now because she’d attained an aura of sophistication. In the picture, there was no trace of that. She was looking at William, who looked out at the camera. She had eyes only for him. Anyone could see that.

  So there was a history there. And there was attraction, at least on her side. I didn’t want to think about the two of them together, and I wondered if William was with her right now. That would explain all the secrecy. He left me stranded at his house while he was off with his old girlfriend, conducting important “business.” Business, my ass. Maybe he was the commitment-phobe I had originally thought he was after all, and I was just the idiot who fell for his little game. I didn’t want to believe it, but I really didn’t know what to think right now.

  I felt like my throat was closing and I couldn’t breathe. I needed to get out of here. Now.

  I walked out of the front door and arrowed toward the nearest field of grapes; I wasn’t going to wait for William’s promised grand tour of his vineyard after all.

  I hadn’t strayed far from the house when I noticed I wasn’t alone. A big, muscular guy with a shaved head and a military look was following me from a distance. Maybe I was imagining things.

  I wandered a bit further, trying to clear my head and burn off some of my nervous energy. I headed toward the olive grove. I saw William’s hand in the order of the trees, which were planted in perfect rows, beautifully cultivated, and pruned. I felt as though I could see William everywhere on the estate. His heart was here, I was certain of it. But where was he? I could feel the tears welling in my eyes again, but I wiped them away, irritated at my own emotional outburst.

  The burly military guy was definitely still following me. I cut down a row of grapes and backtracked, flanking him.