by Trish Morey
Working with Franco was a different matter.
He seemed to be everywhere in the small space, his long arms never far away or his big feet taking up the floor, and there was no way that two bodies sharing the task wouldn’t brush, contact or otherwise collide with each other along the way.
For a woman hovering on the cusp of one of the most important decisions in her life, it was proof positive that she hadn’t lost her ability to make a decision based on sound, sensible criteria. Not when a brush of fabric against fabric, or skin against skin, sent her senses humming and her skin tingling all the way to her bones. Not when the touches seemed not always to be accidental—and they were the most shimmying, tingly contacts of all, when she would look up and see him watching her and feel the heat all the way down to her toes.
Somehow some part of her stayed focused enough to concentrate on the job. Somehow they managed to establish a routine. He passed her the bottle from the freezer, the lees trapped in the frozen neck of the bottle, and she flipped the crown seal releasing the frozen plug of lees into the keg-shaped disgorging booth, before dosaging the wine with the sweet liqueur. After which Franco corked it and twisted on the muselet, the metal cage that held down the cork under pressure. They had to work quickly. The tricky bit was not letting the pressurised contents shoot out after the crown seal blew off or after the wine had been dosaged, but Holly was a pro at this job and she didn’t lose a drop.
They worked through the order, an evergrowing stash of cartons building up, cartons filled with bottles that could wait until they got home to label.
They worked and brushed and touched and got in each other’s way and exchanged heated glances and somehow made it through the order and another dozen until there was only one more box to be done.
‘Last dozen,’ he said, pulling the first of the dozen from the neck freezer and wiping it free of the solution before handing it to her.
She took it from him and grabbed her bottle top remover, snapping off the lid and the frozen lees into the disgorging bin and covering the opening with her thumb before she dosaged. ‘We’ll be done in no time at this rate.’
‘We make a good team.’
A moment’s hesitation before she handed back the bottle for corking. His fingers brushed hers as he took the bottle and she tingled. ‘You’re not bad at this,’ she said, feeling flushed with success at getting through the job so quickly, feeling emboldened by the clandestine and not so clandestine touches along the way. ‘For a Chatsfield, I mean.’
‘You’re not so bad yourself,’ he said, bottle positioned ready to be corked.
‘You mean, I’m not bad for an intransigent, uncooperative, stubborn woman?’
He hesitated, his hand poised ready to press the lever. ‘Did I really say that?’
‘You really did.’
He had the nerve to smile and the heat under her skin had nothing to do with the fire in the pot-bellied stove as it burned all the way to her toes. ‘What the hell was I thinking?’ He pushed down on the press and the cork pushed into the tight neck of the bottle and stuck fast. She sucked in air, trying her hardest not to make a sound.
And she knew she’d never cork another bottle without thinking of this man and sex.
She watched, her cheeks on fire, as he twisted the muselet tight with the applicator as expertly as she would have.
God, but he had gorgeous hands. Talented, long-fingered hands. If she played her cards right, those long-fingered hands could soon be on her.
She sucked in air in a whoosh.
How could she play her cards right when she didn’t know how this game worked? Seduction was a stranger to her, foreign and unknown and not to be trusted.
He swung around to pass her another bottle and brushed against her shirt and her breasts tightened and tingled and told her that seduction would take care of itself.
Thank God for instinct, she thought as she took it, disgorged and dosaged, grateful to have something real to concentrate on as she passed it back. Something concrete.
Ten more bottles, counting down.
They didn’t talk. There was no need. The not so accidental brushes of skin and cloth did the talking. And with every bottle the tension built until the air fairly crackled around them.
And then there was one.
CHAPTER NINE
FRANCO PASSED THE bottle to her reverently, his grey eyes the colour of the clouds that had scudded across the same storm-tossed sky the day he’d arrived, ripe with intent, ready to unleash their load.
She swallowed, her throat suddenly tight and dry, took the bottle from his hands and could feel those eyes on her back, through the layers of her clothes, warm upon her skin. The bottle opener slipped from her shaking hands and clattered to the floor
He picked it up, coming up so close that she couldn’t breathe, his eyes not leaving hers. ‘You dropped something,’ he murmured, so close to her face that she could feel his warm breath on her cheek. Her tongue flicked out to see if he tasted as good as she remembered.
He didn’t taste as good.
He tasted better.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered as their hands connected around the shaft of the opener, their eyes connected on another level. Vaguely she was aware they hadn’t finished, that there was one bottle in her hand left to disgorge, a bottle opener poised.
Just one more bottle.
It would only take a second.
But the hand curling around her neck, the fingers sliding through her hair, demanded her attention. His lips demanded her focus.
And if she could just get this bottle out of the way, then her hands would be free, like his. Right now she wished her hands were free to slide around his neck and up his chest.
Then his fingers in her hair drew her towards him and his lips came closer, and dammit, she needed her hands to be free.
It would only take a second.
The bottle cap and the lees shot into the booth. She covered the top with her thumb. Swung the bottle—she really could do this in her sleep—and dosaged the bottle the very same second his mouth met hers and she sighed into his kiss, and of the two incidents, the kiss was the more compelling, his lips opening, inviting hers to follow his lead, and she was all too willing to follow. Until wine under pressure sprayed from the bottle and by the time Holly remembered she should have covered the top, they were showered with the freshly dosaged wine. And they were both shocked and sticky and laughing as he took the fizzing bottle from her hand and parked it safely away on the bench where it could do no more harm.
Her heart was thudding a million miles an hour, blood fizzing and under pressure in her veins like the wine in the bottle when he stopped laughing and put his hands to his lips and tasted and frowned. ‘It needs something,’ he said before he took her face in his hands and sampled her lips, his tongue sweeping their width. ‘Perfect,’ he declared, and pulled her hard against him.
She went willingly. He tasted of the wine and of the liqueur they used to replace the sweetness; he tasted of warm skin and hot breath, and of grape juice, fermented and strong, on his hot lips and his even hotter mouth.
She tasted pressure, hot and hard, and she liked it.
She felt herself pushed up against the bench top and she revelled in it, his chest hard against hers, knowing there was nowhere else to go, nowhere to run, even if she had half a mind to.
She wasn’t running anywhere.
Not while he made her feel this way, tossed and tumbled on a sea of sensation, while his hands were in her hair, on her shoulders and her back and pressing him to her. Pressing her so close she could feel his hot hard length at her belly while his tongue worked magic in her mouth.
It was as shocking as it was compelling and she whimpered into his mouth, grinding her hips against him in spite of a fear borne of the ages, a fear of the unknown, while her actions were purely driven by need, needing to be closer, ever closer, and he obliged by grabbing her behind in his hands as his mouth plundered hers.
/> And then he used those hands to lift her and sit her on top of the timber slab and pull her legs around him.
His face was level with her breasts, and he cupped their fullness, and all he wanted to do was bury his head in those breasts, without the layers overladen.
‘You’re all wet and sticky,’ he said. ‘We should get you out of these wet clothes.’
He could rip them off now, he thought. He ached to discover the woman he’d suspected had been lurking below all the time, but travelling in a car tomorrow with a woman in shredded clothes or returning her to her grandfather that way was so not a good look.
He put his hands to the hem of her polo top instead, resigned to going the slow way.
He peeled it from her, his lips never leaving hers until the last possible moment when he reefed it over her head.
And then he gazed, his eyes wide open.
He hadn’t really thought about it, but if he had, he would have imagined her underwear to be as dreary as her outerwear. Serviceable. Probably coloured in beige or khaki. No doubt with a Purman Wine logo emblazoned somewhere thereon.
If he had thought along those lines, he would have been wrong.
Very wrong.
Because instead of dreary, his eyes feasted on the extraordinary.
It wasn’t really a bra. Not in the strict engineering sense of the word. Rather it was more of a confection—of creamy satin and black floral lace woven with a pink ribbon and tied in the middle in a little pink bow—and all cradling creamy smooth-skinned mounds of flesh beneath.
‘Oh. My. God,’ he said.
‘Do you like it?’ she asked, her teeth chewing her lip.
He glanced up at her with disbelief. ‘I love it,’ he growled, skimming his hands up the curves of her bare sides until his thumbs grazed the undersides of her breasts. Breath hissed through her teeth and he looked up to her face and saw what looked like ecstasy mixed with fear, but why should she look tense? How could she possibly imagine he wouldn’t like what he saw?
His hands cupped her breasts and she shuddered. He pulled her closer, and pressed his lips to the skin of each mound and she gasped and then he pulled her head down and sucked her into his kiss.
‘Please tell me you’re wearing matching underwear,’ he said when he could bear to tear his mouth away.
‘I always wear matching underwear.’
His hardness twitched. God, and he’d never once suspected.
She was all kinds of surprise package. What other surprises was little Ms Holly Purman hiding?
He could hardly wait to find out.
Though this was hardly the place.
They were both sticky with wine and the timber bench was cold and there wasn’t so much as a sofa, and while the fire was warming it was lacking the obligatory rug of seduction and it wasn’t what he wanted right now.
Because he could do her on that bench top—and, oh, God, how he wanted to do her on that bench top right now—but it would get uncomfortable very fast.
He didn’t want it getting uncomfortable any time soon.
He wanted somewhere entirely more comfortable.
‘Is there a bed anywhere in this place?’ he murmured between kisses, his hands riding up her thighs, thumbs aiming straight for paradise.
‘There’s a guest suite,’ she said, her breath too choppy for one entire sentence, ‘in the house.’ Another breath. ‘I’ve got a key.’
And the angels in his head sang a hallelujah chorus. He wrapped her sweater around her shoulders and collected her in his arms. ‘Then what the hell are we doing here?’
The suite was perfect. Self-contained, spacious and, best of all, featuring a massive bed. It would do nicely.
But for now he bypassed the bed, kicking open the door to the en suite bathroom instead. Sticky had been fun for a while, but they’d moved beyond fun and now things were getting serious.
He put her gently down on her feet and snapped on the shower and water poured from a rainforest showerhead, the room soon fogging with steam.
Then he took her face in his hands and pressed his lips against hers and she trembled anew. His reaction to seeing her in just her bra had warmed her from the inside out, an instant confidence booster, but she’d never been naked with a man before and she’d imagined they’d make love in a bed, covered up and with the lights out. But the lights were on and even the steam didn’t hide a lot and the boost in her confidence was waning and she was once again apprehensive and afraid.
Was he intending to make love standing up in the shower?
And her oh-so-clever plan seemed more like a blundering mess.
She was so unskilled. So unpractised.
So uncertain as to what was expected of her. And it wasn’t that she was worried so much about it being earth-shattering or even good the first time, because this wasn’t so much about impressing Franco but more about getting the monkey off her back—the monkey that was riding shotgun on her shoulder now and that she wanted to be rid of—but still she didn’t want to make a complete fool of herself in the process.
‘You’re trembling,’ he said.
‘I’m cold,’ she lied.
He growled. ‘I know how to warm you up.’
He did.
He sucked her into a kiss so deep she thought she’d drown, a kiss that made her forget for a moment that she was afraid, because he made her feel so good, he made this feel so right. Hands skimmed down her back, down to her waist and over her behind where his big hands lingered and then squeezed.
Dear God, she was drowning, but in sensation.
His hands were between them, at the buttons and fly of her trousers while his mouth worked some kind of magic on her neck, flicking tongue and hot mouth working in concert to lull her into thinking this would be easy—conspiring to make her forget how to think.
She didn’t want to think. She wanted to feel.
He was all of everything and he was the master and right now she was his student. But he was hers too, hers to explore with hungry hands and seeking fingers. She tugged at his shirt, wanting it off, wanting to explore that perfect chest she’d seen that first night in the cottage. She fiddled with buttons until they were undone and he assisted by shrugging it off, and for just a moment she was happy, her hands filled with the feel of him, the sculpted chest and smooth olive skin, roughened with hair she curled her fingers in.
Until that wasn’t enough and she wanted more.
The steam swirled around them, beckoning.
The heat built between them.
And Holly dared venture south, one hand tentatively exploring, testing to see if that hardness she’d felt pressed against her was as good as it felt.
Franco growled into her mouth and anticipation bloomed hot and heavy in her flesh.
Her fingers curled over the bulge of his hard length and she gave thanks that what she’d heard about big feet was true. She was already anticipating how that might feel inside her.
She could not wait to find out.
Boots were kicked off in a rush, two pairs of trousers slid to the floor and were kicked away and Holly used her toes to peel off her socks.
‘Oh, my God, Holly,’ he said, holding her at arm’s length, his eyes searing her flesh all the way down and all the way up again.
She might have said the same thing if only she’d been able to unglue her tongue from the roof of her mouth. He could have been one of those statues you saw in the museums, an ancient god carved in stone. If not for the long scar on one side above his hip, he was perfection. And she might have asked but there was one other big difference between Franco and all those ancient statues that she could tell, even hidden under a band of black elastic.
And then even that was gone.
She swallowed, afraid to look, desperate to look.
He made it easy. He put his hand behind her head and pulled the tie from her hair, fluffing out the sticky strands in his hands. Her head leaned towards his hand. ‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘Much be
tter. I like your hair down. It frames your eyes and your mouth.’
His hands were behind her then, the hooks of her bra flicked expertly undone. He put his hands to her shoulders and eased the straps down, peeling it away from her breasts.
He sucked in air and her nipples tightened to bullets, but as to which one came first, she couldn’t possibly tell. Then with a sweep of his hands the scrap of matching fabric that was her panties was gone too.
‘Magnificent,’ he said, and Holly was glad she had decided that it should be tonight with this man, because this man, with his knowledge of the world, with his film-star good looks and sexy accent, would make her first time something special, something to remember on the long nights to come after he was gone.
He drew her into the steaming water and that was another revelation. He squirted bath gel in his hands and surprised her by using it on her, slippery fingers on slippery skin, and everywhere he touched was alive and wanting.
He squirted gel into her hands to use on him, and she relished the chance to explore his body this way, mapping him with her hands, finding the places that made him growl, discovering the places that made him grab her wrist and made her wait.
She loved discovering those places most of all.
‘What’s this?’ she said, curious as her fingers traced the long ridge of scar tissue at his side.
‘Nothing,’ he said, his hand at her wrist, pulling it away.
She didn’t have time to wonder. Because now that the gel had done its work and the wine was gone from their skin and the stickiness from their hair, he used his tongue and mouth on her clean skin. She gasped when he backed her against the shower wall and blistered a trail of kisses down her throat to her breasts. She sighed as she closed her eyes and gave herself up to pleasure. She had never known the simple pleasure of a man taking her nipple in his mouth, a hot tongue circling that tight bud. She had never known of the link between nipples and that aching place between her thighs. She had never imagined the erotic pleasure of a man’s tongue at her belly or how her legs could seem so restless and wanting to part.
No, needing to part.
And then his head dipped even lower and her head hit the wall behind her.