He had resisted coming down to see for himself for at least—oh, half an hour or so, fighting down the restless need he had to see Gabriella again.
She looked beautiful, Rufus acknowledged irritably, even as he saw by the stack of paintings and false potted plants that she must have been working for some time.
Her hair, that glorious abundance of ebony curls, was hidden beneath a purple scarf, and her eyes glowed the same colour, framed by lashes long and sweeping. There was an almost luminous glow to her creamy cheeks, just the slightest smudge of dirt on her nose, and her purple tee shirt clung lovingly to the curve of her breasts, and also allowed a glimpse of bare midriff above the low-waisted denims that showed off the long length of her legs.
He had deliberately taken Holly out for most of the weekend, half as a need to get completely away from Gabriella, the other half, he had recognized disgustedly, a need to punish her for not having the same physical need for him as he was undoubtedly developing for her.
A need that was, after only a few days of living together, driving him insane.
Quietly.
Achingly.
Completely insane!
And now she was here at Gresham’s, too, looking more desirable than ever even without the sophistication of make-up and smart clothes.
‘I prefer the real thing, too,’ he said, challenge in his voice. ‘It’s a pity it’s often so hard to find.’
‘Keep looking, Rufus,’ she derided. ‘I’m sure you’ll find it one day!’
‘Maybe I don’t want to find it,’ he came back dismissively.
She shrugged. ‘Your choice.’
Yes, it was, and after Angela he had known only too well what artifice was. Gabriella’s mother had only confirmed his opinion of women! Now Gabriella used her desirability in exactly the same way.
And still he wanted her!
He grimaced self-derisively. ‘One of the staff mentioned you were here and I thought you would probably want to come upstairs to the senior management dining-room for your lunch?’
Gabriella looked up at him and frowned, not quite trusting the invitation. After all, he hadn’t exactly shown any consideration for her welfare over the weekend, now, had he?
Her brow cleared as she found the answer, her smile derisive. ‘Do you think your staff will expect you to put on a show of newly married bliss, too, Rufus?’ she taunted, knowing that there couldn’t be a Gresham’s employee who wasn’t aware of the fact that the two of them had been married last Friday.
The newspapers on Saturday morning, as Rufus had expected, had been full of the story, several of the tabloids actually having their photograph on the front page, one screaming that headline, GRESHAM HEIRS MARRY, just as he had predicted, too. The reporter—obviously also male—hadn’t recognized the colour of her dress as buttermilk, either!
But they had been a one-day wonder, thank goodness, with yet another government scandal taking over the headlines in the Sunday newspapers.
His mouth tightened. ‘I’m sure that my staff, as you put it, are too discreet to comment on our marriage at all!’ Although he had received several good wishes and congratulations himself this morning when he’d walked through the store.
‘It is a little hard to believe, isn’t it?’ Gabriella came back with dry dismissal.
Rufus wondered if she knew how arousing this constant need she had to fight with him actually was, as it kept alive the constant flame of sexual awareness between them. Probably not. She wouldn’t be doing it otherwise!
He gave an impatient sigh. ‘I made the suggestion about lunch, Gabriella, because I think it would appear odd if you didn’t eat in the same place as your husband.’
Her grin was of pure malevolence. ‘That must be a little hard for you to accept, Rufus!’
‘Not at all,’ he came back smoothly. ‘But you might want to—freshen up, a little,’ he drawled mockingly, ‘before joining the rest of us upstairs.’
Gabriella waited until he had strolled away before sticking her tongue out at his broad back. A childish gesture, maybe, but it made her feel—
‘I’m sure if we gave it some thought we could find a better use for your tongue, Gabriella,’ he drawled huskily without turning, lifting up one of the surrounding sheets before disappearing back out into the main store.
—like an idiot! Gabriella acknowledged frustratedly.
She sat down heavily on the bottom step of the ladder, breathing deeply, knowing she had definitely lost that round!
Which was one of the reasons she deliberately delayed going upstairs to the executive dining-room for half an hour, taking Rufus’s advice and tidying herself up first, removing the scarf from her hair before brushing it silkily about her shoulders, giving her face a quick wash, and brushing the worst of the dust from her clothes.
Besides, the longer she delayed, the more chance she had of Rufus having eaten his lunch and already returned to his own office.
No such luck, she realized the moment she entered the dining-room and saw Rufus seated at a table with what she presumed were several of his department managers.
The seat beside him having been left conspicuously empty…
For her, presumably.
As his wife.
Hmm…
‘Sorry I was delayed, darling,’ she told him huskily as she kissed him lingeringly on the lips before sitting in the chair next to him, her expression deliberately bland as he studied her with his pale green eyes between narrowed lids.
‘That’s okay—darling,’ he came back just as deliberately. ‘I know how busy you are.’
She gave him a provocative smile. ‘But not so busy I don’t have time to have lunch with my husband. Aren’t you going to introduce me, Rufus?’ She looked pointedly at the other people seated at the table, five of them, and all of them studying her with avid interest.
Rufus made the necessary introductions, pretty sure that Gabriella wouldn’t remember half the names by the time they had finished eating.
He was also aware that Gabriella was enjoying playing with him.
On the basis that she thought she had him at a disadvantage in front of his managers?
He turned slightly in his seat so that the length of his thigh came to rest against hers, the slight instinctive movement she gave away from that touch showing him that she wasn’t as coolly immune to him as she liked to pretend she was.
‘Mmm, you smell lovely, darling,’ he breathed throatily as he brushed her lips with his.
Gabriella drew back, eyeing him uncertainly now. ‘I didn’t know you were partial to eau-de-dust, darling,’ she muttered warily now as yet another ploy to hit out at Rufus seemed to be backfiring on her.
Rufus moved back slightly, his smile taunting as he gazed down at her. ‘You always smell good to me, Gabriella,’ he assured her as he lifted the weight of her hair to nuzzle against her ear.
A move she definitely wasn’t expecting! Somehow Rufus had never come over to her as a man who would be demonstrably affectionate in public—in fact, she’d thought he’d be the opposite.
Especially with a woman he would rather not even have as his wife—
‘I should stop while you’re not ahead, Gabriella,’ he took the opportunity to rasp warningly against her ear before straightening in his seat, looking for all the world as if he were pleased to have her sitting beside him.
So much for her decision on Friday night to remain cool whenever she was with him, she berated herself as she distractedly ordered a chicken salad for her lunch, definitely feeling hot and flustered.
And not just from their verbal sparring, either. Her lips still tingled from his unexpected kiss, and her earlobe felt highly sensitized, too, just from the brush of his warm breath.
Cool? She was so physically aware of him she felt hot all over!
Which wasn’t conducive to her having an appetite to actually eat her chicken salad when it arrived, especially as Rufus kept the long length of his thigh pressed against her leg
all through the meal, seemingly unaware of the contact himself as he talked business with his managers.
She would have moved away from him if she could, but other than getting far too near to the man sitting on her other side—something that would look decidedly odd in a newly married woman—she had no choice but to suffer that crippling closeness.
Rufus’s gaze was full of laughter as he turned to look at her. ‘Not eating your salad, darling?’ he chided softly as she pushed the plate away with almost as much food on it as when she’d started. ‘You really have no need to diet; you’re thin enough already.’
Her lack of appetite had nothing to do with dieting—and he knew it didn’t.
She gave him a saccharin-sweet smile. ‘I don’t seem to have any appetite for food, Rufus—I think I must be in love!’
Rufus met the challenge in her eyes as he moved to drape an arm over the slenderness of her shoulders. ‘Perhaps we should have gone away on a long, long honeymoon now rather than delaying it until the summer?’ he drawled huskily.
Honeymoon? Days and nights alone with Rufus? She didn’t think so!
That suggestion certainly had her defences up, Rufus recognized, Gabriella’s shoulders feeling extremely tense beneath his arm.
But it had occurred to him a few minutes ago that the two of them being at work only a couple of days after their wedding must look a little odd to the rest of the staff at Gresham’s…
He hadn’t quite expected this tangible response from Gabriella to the suggestion of a honeymoon, though…
‘I think I had better be getting back to work now,’ Gabriella announced lightly as she casually—but very definitely—shook off the weight of his arm. ‘It was nice to meet you, Patrick, May, Jeff, Nigel, and Jan.’ Her smile encompassed all of them as she stood up.
Rufus was amazed that she had remembered all the managers’ names after all. Not only that, but she had looked at each of them in turn as she’d said their name.
‘I’ll come down with you,’ Rufus said firmly as he stood up beside her.
She shot him a startled glance. ‘Don’t let me break up your meeting.’
‘It was over, anyway,’ Rufus dismissed with a shrug, his arm about the slenderness of her waist as he guided her through the dining-room.
In fact, he couldn’t even remember what had been discussed!
This woman, he realized, totally addled his mental faculties.
And totally heightened his physical ones.
‘Everyone is staring,’ she muttered uncomfortably.
Rufus smiled at one of the staring before answering her. ‘The men are just looking at me enviously.’
‘And I suppose the women are looking at me the same way?’ she came back tartly.
He turned to give her a wolfish grin. ‘Maybe.’
They probably were, Gabriella acknowledged impatiently. Rufus, with that deep blond hair, rugged good looks, and a natural sexual appeal, was by far the most handsome and charismatic man in the room. And the fact that he was the owner of the whole building probably didn’t hurt, either.
Although there was one part of the building he didn’t have control over, she remembered with satisfaction. Even when this sham of a marriage was over she would still have the restaurant Gabriella’s.
‘What are you smiling so smugly about?’ Rufus prompted suspiciously.
She looked at him with deceptively innocent eyes. ‘I was just wondering what your senior staff would say about their oh-so-proper boss if they knew that immediately after our wedding you couldn’t even wait to get out of the lift before starting to rip my clothes off!’ she taunted.
‘Like this lift, you mean?’ he retorted as the doors to his private lift opened with a swish.
Ah. Perhaps this wasn’t the time—or the place—for her to have used that particular incident to mock him!
She grimaced. ‘I think I’ll just walk down, after all. It’s only two floors.’
Rufus gave a husky laugh. ‘Scared of a replay, Gabriella?’
‘I need the exercise,’ she told him determinedly.
Rufus looked at her, frowning. That was certainly not true. She really was much thinner than she had been five years ago, with the slenderness only making the pert shape of her breasts more prominent. Breasts he was sure were completely naked beneath her purple tee shirt!
He had been well aware of this fact as he’d tried to talk sales and displays with his managers, her breasts actually brushing against his arm once as Gabriella had leant forward to pick up the salt pot.
‘In that case, so do I.’ He nodded.
She blinked her uncertainty. ‘Rufus—’
‘Just walk down the damn stairs, Gabriella,’ he rasped. ‘What is so difficult about that?’
There was nothing difficult about walking down the stairs, it was the intent in those glittering green eyes that bothered her!
‘Don’t you have any work to do?’ she said tartly.
He shrugged. ‘Nothing that can’t wait.’
Gabriella was fast getting to the stage where she couldn’t wait. The close proximity with Rufus for the last hour had heightened all her senses, and made her totally aware of his every movement, of the taut leanness of his body, of a need for that mocking mouth to possess hers.
This physical attraction and fascination she had for Rufus were unlike anything she had ever known, and were totally beyond her control.
And they shouldn’t be!
She knew Rufus’s opinion of her only too well—she should do, he reminded her of it often enough! But that seemed to make no difference to this total physical awareness she had of him, her skin seeming to tingle just at the touch of his hand on her elbow as they walked down the stairs together.
She was breathing hard, and not from the exertion of descending the stairs. Her face felt flushed and feverish, as every nerve, every inch of her sang with a desire that she could feel rapidly escalating out of control.
Rufus could sense Gabriella’s increasing tension as he maintained that firm grip on her elbow, giving her a sideways glance as he wondered at the reason for it.
Her eyes were glowing, her cheeks were flushed, and her nipples were pressing against her tee shirt in full arousal.
Dear God…!
He waited only long enough for them to enter the precarious privacy of the restaurant before pulling her into his arms and claiming her full, pouting mouth, while Gabriella met the fierceness of his kiss with a hunger of her own.
Her hands were everywhere, under his jacket, moving restlessly across his back before returning to unbutton his shirt, her fingers against his heated flesh now, and her nails digging into him in a caress that only increased the throb of his desire.
Rufus wanted to devour her, and he gave in to that need as he pushed her tee shirt out of the way, wrenching his mouth from hers as he bent his head to take one of her nipples into his mouth.
Gabriella groaned with pleasure, her fingers entangled in his thick blond hair as she held Rufus against her, the flick of his tongue against her taut nipple sending her into shuddering paroxysms of pleasure.
‘Not here, Rufus,’ she groaned as he opened the button on her denims and slowly began to slide the zip down. ‘There are people in the bookshop…!’ she protested weakly as her insides melted when she felt his hand hot against her abdomen.
His lips released her as he moved up to look down at her. ‘I have to!’ he told her achingly. ‘I have to, Gabriella!’ he repeated with a fierce ache, kissing her as he manoeuvred her against the wall, one of his hands capturing her breast and teasing the nipple as his other hand slipped downwards, beneath her panties.
Gabriella was lost the moment his fingers touched her, parted her, and found the roused centre of her, caressing, stroking, and filling her with heat.
Wave after wave of pleasure gripped her, shaking her foundations as she clung to Rufus’s shoulders for support, and she bit her bottom lip in an effort not to cry out as her release went on and on, co
nvulsing around him.
‘Yes, Gabriella! God, yes…!’ Rufus raised his head to encourage throatily as she flamed in his arms, totally enjoying the feel of her pleasure, the taste of her, her head now arched back as she gave in to the pulsing pleasure.
His arms moved about her as, those quaking emotions finally quietening to a low throb, her legs gave way beneath her. Her face was flushed, her eyes dark and unfocused, and her hair a wild cascade of ebony curls that he longed to bury his face in.
‘Gabriella—’
‘I can hear someone!’ Gabriella gasped in panic as she tensed, that wild release still making her tremble, her senses heightened to feel, colour, and sound.
And, even if Rufus wasn’t aware of it, she could hear the purposeful click of someone’s shoes on the marble walkway as they headed through the book section in this direction.
She pulled away from him, not daring to even look at Rufus as she straightened her tee shirt and buttoned up her denims with shaking fingers.
She couldn’t believe what had just happened between them, the utter madness of what they had just done.
They were in the middle of Gresham’s, for goodness’ sake!
Anyone looking at them, at Rufus’s tousled blond hair, the colour high against his cheekbones, the fullness of his arousal—and no doubt her own disorderly appearance—would know exactly what they had just been doing!
She had just managed to make some sort of semblance of order to her clothing, and Rufus had buttoned his shirt and straightened his tie, when the sheet was pushed aside and Rufus’s secretary entered, her expression politely enquiring.
If she sensed or saw anything amiss she didn’t show it by so much as the blink of an eyelid, although her smile was slightly apologetic. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, Mr Gresham, but the deputy manager of the New York store has been on the telephone. He needs you to call him back urgently.’ She directed that apologetic smile at Gabriella, too, now.
Gabriella felt decidedly uncomfortable, guessing that the other woman knew exactly what she had interrupted!
Mortifying!
Although Rufus, to give him his due, looked totally unconcerned. ‘I’ll be there in a few minutes, Stacy,’ he dismissed.
Wife By Contract, Mistress By Demand Page 7