by Nina Croft
Her grandmother had gone through three other husbands in the time Lexi had lived with her—though lived was hardly the right word; she’d spent most of her time at boarding school—but Daniel was the first she had really disliked. Two had ignored her, one had been kind, and then there was Daniel. The creep.
Josh had been great over dinner; he hadn’t been the least intimidated by either his surroundings or her family. She had a good feel for people and their motivations, and she suspected Josh genuinely didn’t give a crap what people thought of him, which would make him hard to intimidate.
She turned her attention from the streets outside to his hands on the steering wheel. They were big hands, with long fingers, and they held the wheel easily.
Her gaze flicked to the glove compartment with its whole box of condoms. Did he have a girlfriend? She presumed he must have. A man like him was hardly likely to have been celibate for five years. Unlike herself—though she’d had her fantasies of Josh to keep her company. And her vibrator.
She couldn’t imagine Josh fantasizing about her.
Her gaze wandered to the glove compartment again.
He was going to ask for an annulment. And somehow she had to persuade him otherwise.
An idea flashed through her mind—revisiting her earlier thought about consummating the marriage. She dismissed it before it could take hold, but it slid back into her brain and refused to be pushed out. He was her husband after all. And she had been faithful to him for five years.
Maybe…
When she’d jumped him in the office, she would swear he’d liked it. So he didn’t find her a total turn-off.
She couldn’t believe she was considering this. She was a goddamn virgin. What were her chances of seducing a gorgeous hunk like her husband?
If she repeated the word “husband” enough times, she’d feel less like a manipulative little bitch for even considering what she was considering, and more like a wronged wife pursuing her conjugal rights.
He was the one in the wrong here. He’d agreed to this marriage. He had no right to back out now just because it was inconvenient. And why did he want to anyway? Why now? He’d been happy enough to stay in the background for five years. A horrible thought crossed her mind, and she blurted out the words before she thought better of it. “Do you want to marry someone else?”
His eyes darted from the road to her, a frown between his eyes. “Christ, no.”
He sounded horrified, as though he had as low an opinion of marriage as she did. Maybe even lower.
What had made him that way? She was quite aware of where her own aversion had come from. Her grandmother had hardly provided her with a good example—all of her marriages before Daniel had ended acrimoniously. Lexi had grown up determined she would never marry. And she’d worked too hard to get control of her life to hand it over to some man.
“Do you have a girlfriend?”
“No.”
“Boyfriend?”
“No.” This time she could hear a faint thread of amusement in his voice. “Why the inquisition?”
She gave a casual shrug. “Just wondering.” At least she wouldn’t be stepping on anyone’s toes. Was she really considering this?
I mean seriously, Lexi?
She had no presumptions that she was beautiful. She wasn’t ugly; she was okay, but not a super model or anything, and she’d bet Josh could get anyone he wanted. Why would he go for her?
But he did kiss me back.
The memory of that kiss had her nipples tightening and heat pooling in her belly. She wiped her palms down her side and cleared her throat. “Where are we going?” They’d been driving for ten minutes, and she had no clue where. Though they were heading vaguely back toward her place.
“We need to have that talk. Where do you suggest?”
She thought for a moment, her mind racing furiously. “You could take me home, and we could walk on the Heath. It will be quiet.” And she’d be close to home if everything went badly wrong. Which she suspected it might.
He gave a brief nod, and she sat back and tried to relax.
The journey took twenty minutes and she gave him directions toward the end, driving past her house and round the back to a side street from where they could enter the Heath.
Josh climbed out of the car, shrugged out of his suit jacket and tossed it on the backseat. He came around, but Lexi was already clambering out of her seat.
He nodded toward her feet. “You can walk in those?”
“Oh yes. I can walk in anything. I’ve had a lot of practice. I’ve always hated being short.”
He gazed down at her, a long way down. “You’re still short.”
Grr. “Gee, thanks.”
She led the way to a small gate that led onto the Heath. There were a few dog-walkers, but Lexi guided him away from the main paths and toward her favorite place.
“Did you know the Heath is the biggest area of undeveloped land in London?” she said.
“I’d never really thought about it.”
“Well, it is.”
He walked fast and despite her claims she could walk in anything, her heels were sinking in the grass. The sun was going down, but the night was still warm. Reaching up she pulled the clasp from her hair and ran her hands through it, releasing some of her tension.
It had been a stressful day. She heaved a huge sigh, then peeked sideways. He’d rolled up his sleeves, showing strong, tanned forearms, and the edge of the black ink of a tattoo. Did he have more? He’d never had tattoos in her fantasies, but she wasn’t averse to the idea.
His expression was distant, as though unaware of her presence, and he moved with the lithe grace of a predator. He’d obviously looked after himself since he’d left the army. There didn’t appear to be an ounce of spare fat on him. She sucked in her belly as a wave of inadequacy washed over her. Self-doubt had been a constant companion in her teen years. She’d thought the negative emotion banished, but here it was again.
The truth was, no way was she going to try and seduce him. Because she’d fail, and then everything would be an even bigger disaster than it was right now. And maybe he’d even hate her. And she didn’t want that.
It was a stupid idea. Just another fantasy. And she needed to get real here and deal with the problem, because if she didn’t sort it out, things could get in a huge mess, very quickly.
She sighed again, and he turned to her. “Something wrong?”
“Lots of things.” Then she shrugged. “And it’s been a long day.” She waved to a huge oak tree up ahead. “We’ll sit and talk there.”
She sank to the grass and stretched her legs out in front of her, tracing the run in her stocking while he settled beside her, his back against the broad trunk, knees bent, forearms resting on them. “It’s amazing—we’re in the middle of London and there’s nobody around.”
“You’ve never been here before?”
“No.”
“The gates close at ten. But I have a key—Tom is a grounds man here—he gave me one.”
“Tom?”
“He lives in my house.”
“You live with a guy?”
He sounded…outraged. But she was probably mistaken. Why would he care? Still, she hurried to put him straight. “Not live with like that—he’s a friend. I met him on the Heath one day, and he told me he’d been thrown out of his flat when they found he had a dog. I said he could stay at my place. He looks after the garden.”
She breathed deeply and let the atmosphere soothe her as it always did. Night was falling, though it never got totally dark here, with light filtering in from the city beyond. She shifted slightly so she could see his face. “So talk.”
…
She’d loosened her hair, and it hung about her shoulders in a mass of dark red curls. Her lipstick had long since gone, leaving her lips naturally pink and full. His mind filled with the memory of how they tasted of honey and lemons and spice.
His gaze lowered to the V of her wrap around
dress, the black framing the creamy swell of her breasts, the material thin enough so he could see the points of her nipples.
Don’t go there.
Her knees were drawn up under her and she shifted, giving him the briefest glimpse of the pale skin of her thighs.
Or there.
But she was wearing stockings—so not playing fair—and his dick jerked in his pants.
Not good news.
Something about her made his mind shift to sex. Or maybe it was that everything made him think about sex at the moment. Perhaps they should have gone to a crowded bar after all.
And what was she thinking of coming to a deserted place like this with what was, after all, almost a virtual stranger? A man who had married her for money—hardly a recommendation of upstanding character.
While he watched, she ran one fingertip up the run in her stocking, and his traitorous dick twitched again. Shit, he was getting hard and she hadn’t even touched him. Time to get this conversation done so they could get the hell out of here. He might want sex, but sex with this woman would be a mistake of huge proportions. Massive. She wasn’t the no-strings type. In fact, she was nothing but strings, and if he wasn’t careful she’d have him tied up so tight in those strings, they’d strangle the life out of him.
He cleared his throat. “I want an annulment.”
She’d been studying the ground, but now she looked up, her eyes glowing gold in the dim light. “And I need to stay married.”
“It can be a quiet annulment. No one will know.”
“I somehow doubt that. It would be a matter of record, there for anyone who looked. And believe me, they will look.”
He wanted to ask why, but at the same time he didn’t want to get embroiled in her problems, in her life, which he was guessing was a whole lot of mess. And he didn’t do mess. He’d taken responsibility for another person once. It hadn’t turned out well, and he planned never to repeat the experience. Since he was seventeen, he’d worked hard to keep his own life nice and tidy and ordered.
A small hand rested on his thigh, and a shudder ran through him.
“Please, Josh.” Her voice was soft and pleading. “I’ll stay out of your life. You won’t even know I exist. We’ve managed this long. Just six more months. You don’t have to stay around—I’ll tell everyone you have an overseas assignment. Then, when you come back, we can get a nice quiet divorce.”
He hardly heard the words. He was fighting his own response to her closeness. That’s all it was. She was close, and he was suffering the effects of five years of abstinence. And for some strange reason, here was the one woman his crazy conscience seemed to believe he was allowed to touch. The hand shifted on his thigh, and the blood pooled in his groin. He suddenly became aware they were alone in the deepening darkness, hidden from the world. He didn’t want to be aware of that. She’d edged a little closer so her arm brushed his, and if he glanced sideways his gaze snagged on the swell of her breasts.
He’d been fighting his awareness of her all evening. Actually, longer than that. Since she’d pulled that stunt in her office and leaped into his arms. Kissed him. Stuck her tongue in his mouth.
He was in trouble, his dick already hard and raring to go.
No. Dammit.
He was stronger than this.
“Josh?”
He realized he hadn’t answered her, and she was looking at him expectantly. But his brain wasn’t working, and he didn’t want to open his mouth and say something he would later regret. He brushed off her hand and pushed himself to his feet. He needed to walk away, but he couldn’t leave her here. Reluctantly he turned and held out a hand.
“I’ll think about it,” he muttered. It wasn’t true. He’d already thought as much as he was willing to. He wanted free of her before he got further tangled up in her problems. But he wasn’t sure he could face her expression if he told her that right now. She looked so…hopeful.
She put her hand in his, and he pulled her to her feet and then dropped it abruptly.
“Let me explain what’s at stake,” she said. “Then you can decide.”
His shoulders stiffened. “Don’t you get it? I don’t want to know what’s at stake. It’s not my business, and I don’t want it to be.”
A hurt look flashed across her face, followed by disappointment, but both were gone in a second. She was good at hiding her feelings. No doubt she’d had to be, with that family of hers. “I’m sorry. I won’t bother you with my problems. But you agreed to this.”
“I said I’d think about it.” The words came out harsher than he wanted, but she was messing with his head. He’d had the craziest urge to hold her close until the hurt went away. To kiss her until she forgot whatever her problems were. But that wasn’t who he was.
She bit her lip and took a step back from him. Her ankle gave in those ridiculous shoes, and she fell backward. He reached for her instinctively, and then his arms were around her. As he hauled her closer, her softness pressed into him, and he accepted defeat.
Not of the war, but maybe of this one small skirmish.
Because he had to kiss her again.
That was all—just to taste her, feel her. The need was overwhelming, clawing at him. Afterward, they’d go back, and tomorrow he would tell her he’d set the paperwork in motion for the annulment. Because she was trouble.
All that flashed through his mind in the seconds it took for her to wrap her hands around his shoulders and raise her head. For a moment, he stared down into her huge eyes as they blinked up at him, filled with longing. For him.
Never underestimate how much of a turn-on it is to be wanted.
And he gave in, lowered his head, and took her lips with his.
There was nothing tentative about her kiss. Her lips parted for him, and he pushed his tongue inside as his hands slid down her back and gripped her ass, hauling her even closer and lifting her so her feet left the ground. He backed her up until she hit the trunk of the oak tree, then he kissed her some more.
Hot, wet kisses, with an edge of desperation, their tongues stroking, caressing. His dick was rock hard now, and his balls ached viciously. How had it gotten so hot, so fast? She wasn’t his type, but with her breasts squashed against his chest and her stomach pressed against his cock, his body didn’t agree.
A little longer. Then he’d walk away.
His hands slid down her thighs and under the skirt, then up again, pausing as his palms hit bare flesh at the top of her stockings, and his breath hitched in his throat. He went still for a moment.
I am so fucked.
As he stopped kissing her, her small teeth bit into his lower lip in protest. He tried to push himself away. Really he did, but instead, his hands continued their course, back to her ass, cupping her through the silky material of her panties. Then he lifted her up.
“Wrap your legs around me,” he whispered against her lips, waiting for her to come to her senses and push him away. Instead her legs clasped his hips, pressing her sex into him, rubbing up against him, and it felt so fucking good. He dug his fingers into the soft flesh of her ass, urging her closer until he thought he might come right there, in his pants, and embarrass himself. Still, he couldn’t stop. She felt too damn good. Her hands were in his hair, holding his mouth to hers, but he needed more.
Just a little more.
Then he’d call a halt.
There was too much material between them. He needed her hot little pussy bare, needed to know if she was as turned on as he was.
He braced his legs, putting most of the weight on his good one, then pulled slightly away, breaking the kiss, and a mewl of protest escaped her. Turning her, he lowered her to the grass, coming down on one knee between her sprawled legs. The dress was still pushed up, the pale skin of her thighs gleamed in the dim light, and he could see the black silk of her panties. His mouth went dry and his cock pulsed, almost painful now.
Her eyes were half-closed, her lips slightly parted, her breasts rising and falling with he
r shallow breaths.
Last chance to back out, buddy.
He ignored the little voice and studied her for a moment. The dress tied at the waist, and he tugged on the knot at her side, every second waiting for her to object. She stared up at him, blinking, but remained silent, and he reached down slowly and parted the material. Beneath it she wore a black silk and lace bra and matching panties. Her breasts were full and her waist narrow above the curve of her hips, her skin flawless and creamy. He trailed a hand down over the swell of one breast, her breath catching as he scraped over the prominent nipple.
He rubbed it and her hips pushed upward. Then he lowered himself over her, bit down on the taut peak through the lace of her bra, and sucked hard.
She let out a gasp and he glanced up.
Her eyes were wide, startled. But he guessed she wasn’t going to do the sensible thing. Still, something made him give her one last chance. Because he’d passed sensible way back. Probably the moment their lips touched.
“Are you sure?” he asked, and held his breath because if she said no, he didn’t think he’d survive the disappointment.
He’d yearned for this feeling since he’d made that vow to get laid. Now it was here, the heat boiling inside him with her every touch. Hell, every time she looked at him.
She held his gaze then reached out a hand and trailed her fingers down over the bulge in his pants. Hell, yeah. He’d take that as a yes. Fire shot through him, sizzling along his nerves, heating his blood. His eyes closed for a second, he gritted his teeth then placed his hand over hers and tugged it away.
“Not a good idea, honey.” He was going to last all of about five seconds once he got inside her, which meant he had to make sure she came first. “Relax,” he murmured. “Let me take care of you.”
He trailed a finger down her flat stomach, then over the silk covering her mound, and between her thighs. He traced the seam of her sex through the silk and she shifted restlessly. Her lower lip was caught between her teeth, and he studied her expression as his finger slid beneath the silk and pushed slowly inside.