He stepped off the ladder, holding the book out to her. “Frankly, I don’t know what’s wrong with a little Sir Walter Sco—”
She cut off his words with a kiss. She didn’t know what happened. One minute they were talking the classics, and the next she was grabbing his face and kissing him. She’d acted completely on impulse. And instinct.
At first, his arms remained unresponsive, but he quickly recovered from his shock at her inexplicable behavior, dropping the book to the floor with a thwack, and wrapping his arms around her waist.
He pulled her into the alcove behind the ladder, his fingers fisted in her hair, pulling her head back, and running his lips down the column of her throat. “God, Sarah. How I’ve missed you. Your smell, your taste.” He moaned, claiming her mouth again, his lips branding her.
Her hands knotted in his hair, drinking in the taste of him, nibbling his lower lip, until she finally retreated, gasping for breath. “Come to my room. Now.”
“So much for taking it slow,” he said with a wicked grin.
“You said I could determine the pace, right?” She ran her hands down his neck, inside the collar of his shirt.
“Yes.” He shivered when her fingers touched his bare skin.
“Well, I’ve decided to pick up the pace a bit.” She unbuttoned one button then another, pressing kisses onto his exposed skin with each button she popped open.
“A bit?” he asked skeptically. “The velocity at which you’re moving now is making me dizzy.”
“I hope that’s not the only thing making you dizzy.”
“Sarah.” He drew in a ragged breath. “What about the others . . ?”
“It’s early. They’ll be at the table for several more hours,” she murmured between kisses. “Send in a few more bottles of wine. That should take care of it.” She had reached his navel.
“Dear God, Sarah. If you don’t cease this instant, there won’t be time to get to your room.” His hands were on her shoulders as he gently pushed her away. “I’ll be up in about fifteen minutes.” He re-buttoned his shirt as he spoke. “I’ll need that time to compose myself. I certainly can’t be seen in this condition,” his added, his meaning obvious.
“My room is on the left, at the end of the hall.” Breathless, she kissed his chest once more before he could finish buttoning his shirt.
Sarah hadn’t planned on seducing anyone during her stay in England, so she didn’t have any lacy lingerie to slip into. Remembering Oxford, she put on the same robe she wore that night . . . and nothing else. Hopefully he would remember, too, since the robe itself was about as enticing as a flannel nightgown.
She was anxious. Why did it seem longer than the promised fifteen minutes? Had he changed his mind? Decided that her sudden unpredictability was more than he’d bargained for?
There was a knock on her door so soft she thought she’d imagined it. She hurried over and opened it. He stood there looking so . . . delectable. She grabbed the front of his shirt, and tugged him through the door.
His eyes opened wide in surprise. Then his hands found her face, pulling her lips up to meet his, molding her body to the length of his, as he leaned against the now-closed door.
His slid his hands down to her waist, untying the sash, slipping his hands inside her robe. His breath left him in a soft hiss when he encountered the bare skin underneath.
He smiled against her lips. “I have rather fond memories of this robe.” So alluring in a simple white cotton robe. He swallowed hard when he imagined her in a lacy bit of nothing. He’d have to see what he could do to fulfill that little fantasy later.
She sighed when his hands found the bare skin at her waist. He pressed her hips to his, kissing her along her collarbone to her shoulder. She wanted to remove his shirt, but her arms were useless, like they’d melted into nothingness. She reveled in his touch, his kisses, his warmth, his desire. The robe glided to the floor, pooling at her feet.
“Oh God,” he breathed as his scorching eyes blazed a trail along her skin. “You are so beautiful. Sweet Sarah, my love.” He picked her up, carrying her to bed, her legs wrapped around his waist.
“You know, I see a lot of myself in Christen . . . well, apart from the fencing skills.” He chuckled.
Lying in bed, bodies intertwined, they listened to the great house settle as the occupants drifted to their rooms. Alex reclined on one elbow, playing with a lock of her hair, brushing it along her collarbone.
“That’s not surprising.”
“The part about the fencing?”
“No, the part about seeing a lot of yourself in Christen . . . at least physically.” She hesitated before making her confession. “After all,” she said, smiling sheepishly, “you were my muse. Although mere words failed to adequately capture your devastating good looks and irresistible sex appeal.”
He pulled back, surprised. “Really? Huh.” He ignored her effusive compliments.
“You’re not upset?”
“Why should I be? I’m flattered, actually.”
She shrugged. Before she could articulate a response, he pulled her face around to look at him, his hand cradling her neck. His eyes were troubled. She tensed in reaction to his knitted brow.
“Sarah, at the risk of scaring you off . . .”
Her tension increased ten-fold. He drew in a deep breath, as if preparing to take a plunge into deep water.
He’d waited too long to tell her, and could wait no longer. It didn’t matter whether she could return the sentiment or not. “I love you. I think I’ve loved you from the instant we met, your hand covered in beer, your eyes snapping with indignation.” He chuckled softly.
“And from the moment we kissed goodbye that night at Rutherford to this moment, a day has not gone by that I didn’t think about you, miss you, hope that you were happy . . . even if it meant you weren’t mine.”
Sarah stared at him, her eyes wide with wonder and shimmering with tears. She’d never expected to hear those three words.
She let them sink in. She’d fallen in love with him during that short week a year ago. Had loved him all along; and loved him still more now; knew it with the certainty with which she knew she needed to breathe.
She grazed her fingers across his lips. He shivered. “Alex. I love you.” She wrapped her hand around his neck, drawing his mouth down to hers.
“Sarah . . . aside from the tabloid article, what precipitated your . . . um . . .”
“Cowardly retreat?”
“Yes, well, retreat. There had to be more to it than that, although I confess, seeing your photo like that for the first time can be somewhat disconcerting.”
“Alex . . .”
“I want to know . . . so in the future, I can avoid doing whatever it was that I did.” He wore that boyish grin she loved so much.
As they walked along the moonlit gravel path of their favorite garden, she thought about how to respond to his question. “What if I told you it was nothing you did?”
“I’d still want to know what it was that made you throw a wobbly that resulted in a miserable twelve-month separation.” He stopped and turned her to face him, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
She swallowed hard. Then took a deep breath. “When Adrian and I were married, we traveled in loftier social circles. Later, when we separated then, divorced, the dirty laundry associated with it became quite public, subjecting me, not him,” she said, laughing contemptuously, “to ridicule and catty remarks.”
She dropped to a garden bench to finish. “I swore I would never allow myself that kind of public scrutiny again. When I saw our picture, my picture, in the tabloid along with the article calling me the other woman, I panicked.” Tell him everything, she admonished herself. “But that’s not the only reason.”
“What’s the other reason?” His voice was flat, his brow knitted.
“There was an article in the International Herald that morning.” She pulled her knees under her chin, wrapping her arms around them.
“No. It was just a story about how Adrian had saved a Saudi Prince’s sight and about his upcoming wedding.”
“And, what, you were regretting your divorce, you were jealous?”
“No.”
“Then you need to explain, because I’m feeling a little uneasy.” He frowned, deep in thought. “Sarah, I need to know . . . if there is still something there, because I don’t do anything by halves, and apparently that includes love. If you don’t feel the same way I do, please tell me now so I know what to expect.”
“First, I love you in a way I never thought possible. In a way I never loved, nor ever could love Adrian. Second, there is nothing there. I haven’t seen or heard from Adrian since our divorce was final a year-and-a-half ago.”
She paused, afraid that what she was going to say wasn’t going to make him feel much better. “Something you don’t know about my marriage to Adrian . . . we’d only dated a few short weeks before he asked me to marry him. This impetuous behavior was completely out of character for me, and look where it ended . . .” she trailed off.
It dawned on him, “And you saw our relationship as a potential repeat performance.” He frowned again.
“What I thought was . . . I don’t know what I thought. My reaction was idiotic. I was just trying to protect my heart. I couldn’t take another life-altering disappointment, and I couldn’t face the potential for an exposé on our failed relationship if it didn’t work out.”
She stood up, touched her hand to his face. “There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t regret hurting you . . . regret the lost time . . . time that we’ll never get back . . .” She sniffed as a tear rolled down her cheek.
He captured the tear with his thumb. “Okay. I’m sorry I dredged it up.” He wrapped his arm around her and hugged her to his chest, holding her there for a few more sniffles. He tilted her chin up and kissed her lips, a soft whisper of a touch.
What began as a tender kiss, blossomed into something very different. Ardent. Intense. “I guess we’ll just have to make up for lost time,” he groaned against her lips, as he pulled her into the perfumed shadows.
Chapter 7
This was it. The day Sarah had been dreading. The day she’d have to watch Alex kiss Brooke in the pivotal scene in the library; the scene where Christen acknowledges his feelings for Amelia. Another parallel, however faintly drawn, between the fictional relationship and the real life relationship: the library. And to think some people find libraries boring.
After the events of the past week, all the passionate nights they’d spent together, it was going to be torture. Part of her wanted to avoid the scene, but the other part of her, the part that won, wanted to be there, to ensure that Brooke didn’t take advantage of the situation.
It was clear she’d had her eye on Alex from the beginning, and despite his rebuffs, her advances grew more calculated by the day.
Sarah sat in her customary seat next to Michael, although lately she’d surreptitiously put a little more space between them. She tried to act nonchalant as Michael called ‘action.’
The scene began with Cat confronting Christen about his feelings for Amelia, encouraging him to tell her. He argued that he had no such feelings, and he didn’t know what she was talking about. Unbeknownst to them both, Amelia was curled up in a chair, where she tried to hide when she heard them enter the library, clearly having an argument. She doesn’t know the argument is about her, until she hears her name.
Cat: “Oh, Christen, it’s as plain as the nose on your aristocratic face. Admit it. You’re in love with Amelia.”
Christen: “I most certainly am not. What nonsense. Besides, she positively detests me.”
Cat, with a smile: “Why would you say that? You’re very loveable–when you want to be.”
Christen: “Are you blind? We can barely speak two civil words to one another—”
Cat: “I spent a long, cold night in the woods with her, remember?”
Christen winces at the memory.
Cat: “Trust me, she doesn’t detest you. In truth, I think it is quite the opposite.” She walks over and stands on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “Tell her . . . soon.” Cat exits the library.
Amelia remains frozen in her chair, hoping that Christen will follow, leaving her to make her escape. Unfortunately, she hiccups, a nervous reaction she’s had since a little girl.
Christen, voice severe: “Who’s there? Show yourself this instant.”
Amelia hiccups again then, hesitantly reveals her presence, her eyes wide with shock and embarrassment.
Christen, steps back in shock: “Amelia.”
Amelia hiccups again: “Christen . . . I’m so sorry (hiccup) . . . it wasn’t my intention to eavesdrop (hiccup). . . I’ll just be going . . . ” In a rare moment of chagrin, she attempts to walk past him.
Christen, grabbing her shoulders, stopping her, looks into her face only inches from her mouth: “How much did you hear?”
Amelia: “Everything. (hiccup) I heard everything.” Hiccup.
Christen, in frustration: “Confound it. Could you please stop hiccupping?”
Amelia: “Sorry.” (Hiccup)
Christen, first in exasperation: “Oh, blast.” Then murmurs: “Perhaps I can cure those.” He takes her face in his hands and lowers his lips to hers. They kiss. She wraps her arms around his neck, and he pulls her closer.
Sarah’s hands gripped the arms of the chair so tight she expected to hear a snap–either the chair or her hand breaking. Hasn’t this gone on long enough? She wanted to yell ‘cut!’ Alex still kissed Brooke. What the hell was Michael waiting for anyway?
“Cut! Print.”
Thank God. She could breathe again. She hoped that was the only take, but of course she knew better than that. Michael liked to get shots from a variety of angles.
“Okay, let’s shoot the scene from Amelia’s perspective.” Michael turned to Sarah. “I think that went well, but we’ll get a few more takes so the editor has several to choose from.”
Sarah closed her eyes and groaned. Out loud.
“Sarah, you okay?” Michael asked with concern.
Sarah could feel Alex’s eyes on her.
“Yes. It’s just a headache.” She grimaced.
“Maybe you should take something and go lie down. These lights can be brutal,” Michael said indicating the lights surrounding the set.
“No,” came her emphatic response. As much as she hated watching it, she hated not watching even more. “I’ll be fine. Maybe I just need some caffeine.”
“Could someone get Sarah a diet coke?”
With a tequila chaser, she thought. “Thanks,” she said lamely.
She scanned the room for Alex, finding him in the makeup chair. She longed to tell the make-up artist to erase the amused expression from his face.
“Ooh. I hated watching you kiss her today. The green-eyed monster almost tore through my chest to rip out Brooke’s throat.”
Sarah’s evening pursuits had changed drastically in the past week. Instead of just reading a romance novel, she lived her very own romance with Alex joining her every night after the house fell quiet. He’d even moved some of his personal items to her room, while still maintaining a plausible presence in his own.
They both agreed they should keep this to themselves, at least until the filming was completed, afraid that their relationship might provoke discord among the cast and crew.
She could think of one cast member she’d like to provoke. But the movie was more important than her immature desire to rub this in Brooke’s face.
She’d told Ann and Becca, but swore them to secrecy. She could have sworn she’d heard Ann’s shriek of elation all the way across the Atlantic.
Alex stayed with her until morning now, waiting until she gave him the all clear, via text message, before he’d quietly exit her room and saunter nonchalantly down the stairs.
“If it’s an
y consolation, I didn’t enjoy it one bit. Her kisses are too wet.” He shuddered.
“Maybe that’s because she drools,” Sarah said snidely.
He chuckled. “Sarah, you’ve nothing to worry about. What can I do to calm the green-eyed monster before she rears her ugly head again?”
“Take me to bed and tell me you love me.”
“Since we’re already in bed, how about I tell you how much I love you.”
“That will do . . . for now.” She snuggled closer, her face buried in his neck, breathing his wonderful spicy, citrusy scent.
“‘I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I don’t know of any other way of loving but this,
in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.’”
His voice was husky with emotion.
His recitation left her breathless. She buried her face in his chest so he couldn’t see the tears welling in her eyes. “That was beautiful,” she breathed. “Did you write that?”
He laughed softly, wrapping his arms around her. “No, I only recite great lines, I don’t write them. It’s from a sonnet by Pablo Neruda, the Nobel prize-winning poet.”
“Is there more?” she asked eagerly. She never tired of listening to his silken voice.
He chuckled again. “Greedy girl. Is there no end to your thirst for words?”
She blushed. He looked down into her face, brushing her reddened cheek with the back of his hand. “Let me see,” he said, thoughtful for a moment. “Ah, this one is perfect:
‘I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.’” As he spoke the words, he acted upon them, tenderly kissing her lips, her throat, her hair.
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