“It’s not okay. For God’s sake, Isabella, you could be pregnant.”
“No, it’s fine,” she reassured him. “I’m on the pill, have been for years. I take it every day, so there’s really no risk. Well, maybe like zero point zero one per cent or something minuscule, but that’s the case even with a condom,” she reminded him. “You don’t need to worry.”
“You brought the pill with you?”
“I keep it in my handbag,” she said, her lips lifting in a half smile. “And if you always use a condom then I presume we don’t have to worry about anything else. So relax.”
Relax?
He was mollified, but not relaxed. The familiar sense of guilt was squirming through him, making him want to bail on this situation, to walk away from her quickly, just as he’d foreshadowed. That was his usual way of doing things. Pick up a woman in a bar, take her to some nondescript hotel to have sex, then leave. Sometimes, he didn’t even make it to the hotel – the back of his limo or a night club restroom had sufficed, on occasion.
A cloying sense of suffocation was spreading, as the realisation that they were still trapped together fired in his gut. He took a step back, his eyes sweeping her face, her body, committing both to memory. Already he was regretting what they’d done, furious with himself for not having been stronger. But regrets were useless – they served no purpose. What was done was done.
“Wow.” She stared at him, a frown on her face, a look in her features that was perplexed and breath taking. Guilt rumbled through him, and yet one side of his mouth notched upwards, a smile trying to escape.
He lifted a dark brow, watchful, waiting. She shook her head a little, then reached down, grabbing his sweater from the floor and pulling it on over her head, so her hair was wild and unkempt, her lips clean of lipstick but a dark pink regardless.
“Wow,” she said again, with a small shake of her head as she side stepped him and moved back into the kitchen. His mouth went dry as he stared after her, the sight of her in his sweater – falling midway down her thighs – driving desire through him.
He tried to remember his regrets, but already his body was awash with memories, pushing him forward, drawing him to her, so he followed her into the kitchen.
“Now I need a wine,” she muttered. “Or a cigarette,” she joked, with a small shrug.
“You smoke?”
“God, no. I wasn’t serious. I just…” She blinked up at him, bemusement rich in her eyes. “I didn’t expect that.”
Despite the dark emotions crushing through him, he laughed. “You were pretty clear about what you wanted.”
Pink spread through her cheeks. “Oh, I know,” she waved a hand through the air, pulling open the fridge and removing a bottle of wine. He watched as she returned to the table, topping up their glasses, lifting both and bringing his over. “I wanted to have sex with you.” She spoke slowly, as though still making sense of things in her own mind. “I just didn’t expect it would be so…”
He was silent, watchful, retrieving the wine from her hands, waiting for her to continue.
“I mean…wow.”
He got the gist, and had never been one to take a victory lap, so didn’t prompt her for more.
“You have had sex before,” he reminded her drolly, sipping his wine.
“But not like that.”
“Against a wall?”
She batted his response away with a half-smile, half-flicker of her eyes. “The wall wasn’t what I meant.”
She took a large gulp of wine then padded across to the bench on the other side of the room, propping her back against it, her bare legs drawing his gaze. Regret fanned his gut. Not regret at what he’d done, now, but regret that it had been so hasty. He wanted to kiss every inch of her. Starting with her toes, moving up to her elegantly curved ankles, her slender calves, the back of her knees, her thighs, the silky flesh that would be at the top of them; he wanted to kiss her beautiful sex until she was speechless with desire, begging him to make love to her once more. He wanted to savour the moment of sleeping with Isabella Moss, not rush it as frantic desire had required of him.
“With Andrew it was –,” she shook her head. “You don’t want to hear about that.”
He surprised himself by disagreeing with her. “Go on.” He moved back to the scene of their togetherness, scooping up his boxer briefs and pulling them on, before coming to stand in front of her. Close enough to touch, so he was once again challenging himself with keeping his distance. It was harder now that he’d tasted her, harder to resist when he’d felt the promise of her sensual perfection.
“It was never like that.” Her eyes clouded.
“You’re still close to him?”
She furrowed her brow, jerking her gaze to his face. “Not at all. What makes you say that?”
“You look as though you’re betraying him right now.”
“Oh.” She bit down on her lip. “I don’t want to do him a disservice,” she explained softly. “We were going out for a few years, it doesn’t seem fair to talk about our sex life with you.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
She sucked in a raspy breath. “I was just going to say that our relationship was more…platonic. It lacked…a certain…chemistry.”
“A chemistry that you feel with me?”
She nodded quickly. “Exactly. That was – honestly – mind-blowing.”
His chest swelled to three times its usual size. He’d never needed to be told he was good in bed before. He didn’t need it now, but he sure as hell liked hearing it from her. He pushed aside the unusual response, focussing on her statement.
“Why did you break up?”
She sighed heavily, sipping her wine. “We weren’t well-suited.”
“No?”
A wry grimace shifted her features. “I thought we were, at first.” She sipped her wine then replaced the glass, moving towards the sink and sliding in the plug, before sloshing in some detergent and water. “We met when I was at uni. He was a guest lecturer. Very smart, funny, handsome.” She lifted her shoulders. “He has political aspirations – his dad’s a federal government minister, his grandfather was a Supreme Court judge.”
She reached for their plates, and he didn’t interrupt her only because he was fascinated by the way his sweater moved over her thighs as she shifted her arms.
“And?”
He prompted, when she didn’t say anything for a while.
But her face was tight, and despite the lightness of her tone, he felt the pain coursing through her, the tension that had turned her back ramrod straight.
“It would never have worked between us,” she said after a moment, her smile brittle, dismissive. “We were engaged,” she said slowly, as if dipping back in time. “But he said he’d only go through with the wedding if I gave up my YouTube channel.”
“Why?” His voice was deep, a rumble of disapproval moving through him. Surely no man in this day and age expected his wife to sit home all day, waiting for the lord and master to return?
She slid him a side-long glance, but he saw the hurt in her eyes. “Cooking shows are a frivolous waste of my intelligence,” she parroted in an imitation of a male voice. “Apparently I should have been doing something more sensible with my life.”
He could see that the decree had insulted Isabella but he couldn’t help laughing. “He sounds like a pain in the ass.” She half-smirked as she turned back to the sink, washing their bowls and placing them on the side. As she reached for the empty saucepan, he found it impossible to resist her any longer. He came to stand at her back, his hands finding the long hem of his sweater, inching it up her thighs a little. He felt her sudden intake of breath and smiled.
“He was okay,” she said, unevenly, as he pushed forward a little. “Ambitious, though.”
“Why would your YouTube success have damaged his political aspirations?”
“I’m not serious enough,” she said, the words husky, pushed from her lips as he bro
ught a hand around her front, brushing his fingers over her sex.
“Only a man with a monumentally fragile ego would have acted in such a way,” he said easily, the truth of that so obvious to him it demanded her acceptance. “You’re better off without him.”
“Yes,” she said on a rushed breath, as he cupped his other arm around her waist and pulled her back a little, wedging her legs apart with his knee.
Keeping his fingers on her sex, he pushed his pants down to his ankles and thrust into her from behind, burying himself so deep at this angle, brushing her clit as he drove into her hard and fast at first, then slow and languorously, wanting to prolong their pleasure. Her soapy hands came out of the water, bracing on the bench as he moved, his body owning hers, claiming it, making her his. He didn’t think about anything beyond this moment, and how good it felt to pleasure her; he didn’t think about what would happen next, nor about her idiot ex-boyfriend. He didn’t think; Gabe was only capable of feeling, and those feelings were threatening to overwhelm him.
“Am I dreaming?” The question was throaty, her voice raw from hours of screaming, the kind of cries she’d never known before, guttural noises that were dragged from the depths of her soul, enacted on her in a way that was wild and feral, that rang through the kitchen first, then the landing, where they’d made love on the floor, and finally in his bedroom, just next door to hers, huge and gothic, like something from a dark fairy tale, all ancient and forbidden, with ghosts lurking everywhere she looked. That only made the sex better, though, as though there was a primal element of fantasy in the very act of coming together. She stretched in his huge bed, no idea what time it was, and beyond caring.
Her body felt well-used, well-loved, well-everything.
She pushed up onto her elbow, regarding him thoughtfully, and not for the first time, felt a rush of relief. Relief that she was here, safe in his house, in his hands, his bed, but relief also that it was only temporary. There was such a darkness to Gabe, a swirling pit of darkness that she feared she would be swallowed by it whole if she weren’t careful.
Even now, his face was rigid, his eyes haunted as he stared up at the ceiling, his body – so beautiful and mesmerising – still, no longer shifting with the movements of sensual need.
She wasn’t intimidated by his darkness though. She understood it was separate to her, a facet of his being that was lodged deep within him, something that would remain when she’d left, that she had no power to shake. It wasn’t an anger with her, nor was it a rejection of her. It was, simply, him.
She lifted a finger and traced it over his nose, down to the tip, before finding the furrow above his lip and pressing into it. He turned slowly to face her, his eyes flickering from her brow to her chin, then landing on her eyes.
“Why are you like this?” She asked gently, almost certain he wouldn’t answer, but curious enough to pose the question regardless.
“Like what?” A gruff growl showed how closed off he was to her gentle line of enquiry.
She sighed, but accepted his refusal, understanding and respecting that he had boundaries he wasn’t prepared to have breached.
“So great in bed?” She teased.
His eyes flashed with surprise; he’d realised, then, what she was nudging at, but he let it go, as did she, inching closer to him, until she could rest her head in the crook of his arm. He smelled intoxicatingly male, musty and citrussy, so little sparks of need flew through her bloodstream, and she smiled like the cat who’d got the cream at the pleasure they’d already enjoyed.
“It takes two to tango.”
He had lost all concept of time. At some point, Isabella had fallen asleep, and he’d lain there, staring up at the ceiling, trying not to think, just existing in the moment, his body humming with pleasure after the way they’d spent the evening. But not thinking was an impossible task, and eventually he’d shifted her from his arm, gently placing her head on a pillow before pushing out of bed and dragging on a pair of jeans.
In the kitchen downstairs, memories were everywhere. He finished washing the dishes, images of the ways they’d made love flooding him as he worked. Pouring himself a scotch, he decided to read some papers in his office. Somehow, that felt safer than having stayed in his bed, his bedroom, where Isabella was now soundly sleeping, her naked body beautiful and soft beneath his sheets.
More thoughts he worked hard to push aside, focussing on the documents before him. As the sun began to rise over the valley, he pressed back in his chair and slept – just for an hour, just long enough for dreams of Christmasses past to torment him some more.
9
“THERE YOU ARE.” She smiled as she walked into his office, coffee cups in hand. His eyes lifted from his papers reluctantly, a familiar frown on his handsome face as he regarded her slowly.
Her heart, which had been skittering wildly in her breast since she’d woken up that morning, stilled, then kerthunked. He did not look happy to see her. Uncertainty tugged at her chest.
“Were you looking for me?” His frown deepened.
“Only to deliver this.” She placed a coffee cup on the edge of his desk, then stepped backwards, wishing she wasn’t so conscious of his hyper-masculinity, even as hormones flooded her body, exploding through her veins.
He nodded once. Dismissively? Butterflies burst through her belly, and not the good kind. She was wracked with nerves all of a sudden.
The night before had been incredible. Mind-blowing. Hands down the best sex she’d ever had. It had redefined something inside of her. Oh, it wasn’t as though she was a fantasist and thought that sex equalled the beginning of some kind of deeply meaningful relationship or anything, but it still had the power to alter a person, and she felt that on a soul-deep level.
Apparently, Gabe didn’t.
“Anyway,” she blinked, taking a step backwards, carefully keeping the hurt from her features. The last thing she wanted was for Gabe to worry about her, when he’d made his feelings perfectly clear. “I’ll leave you to it.”
“Grazie.”
She turned quickly, making her way to the door. Before crossing the threshold though, his voice arrested her.
“Are you okay, cara?”
It was a tiny indication that he cared, that on some level he wanted reassurance, and so she smiled brightly and nodded. “I’m fine.” She studied his face for a moment and then tilted her head to the side. “Are you?”
He was quiet and she held her breath, feeling as though he might be about to confide something to her. But then he simply nodded and sipped his coffee. “Of course. I’ll see you later.”
It was a definite dismissal, and it didn’t occur to Isabella to fight it. It was proof that nothing had changed for him – nothing whatsoever. They’d had sex, sure, but she was still just an unwanted guest in his home, a woman he’d rather be rid of than not. A shiver ran the length of her spine, reminding her of the night she’d been stranded outside, and she left his office as quickly as she could, seeking warmth and the oblivion of her thoughts.
Work provided that for both of them. While Gabe spent most of the day in his office, Isabella took to the kitchen, setting her phone up on a makeshift tripod and recording an episode of her baking a Christmas pudding. She didn’t need to create new content while she was travelling – there were more than enough videos queued and ready to go – but this was something Isabella had always done, and having the ability to pull together a casual film clip was fun and distracting. It was almost dark by the time the pudding was finished and she’d sliced into it, serving it with homemade custard and Brandy sauce, then edited the video into a five minute YouTube clip.
She was contemplating dinner when Gabe entered the kitchen, his eyes locking to hers as he stepped through the door, so her heart began to accelerate, and her skin flushed to the roots of her hair.
“Hi.” Her voice was high-pitched. She swallowed to bring moisture back to her mouth.
He nodded once, a hand casually thrown into his pocket,
the coffee cup from the morning in his other.
“Let me take that.” She walked towards him, her nervousness increasing with every step, her stomach flipping and flopping awkwardly.
“I’ve got it.” But he didn’t move. He stayed where he was and as though he were a celestial body with his own gravitational pull, she was drawn to him almost against her will, managing to stop only when she was almost touching him.
“How was your day?”
She blinked up, not sure what she’d expected him to say, but it wasn’t that.
“Um, good. I made a video.”
A single dark brow lifted so her lips quirked in an unexpected smile.
“Not that kind of video,” she said with a roll of her eyes, pressing her palm to his chest and pushing gently.
He caught her wrist, holding it where it was, his eyes continuing to bore into hers.
“No?”
“No.” She shook her head slowly. “A cooking video.” Isabella cast a glance over her shoulder. “Of a pudding.”
Something flexed in his eyes. “A Christmas pudding?”
“What else, at this time of year?”
A muscle jerked low in his jaw and he released her hand, taking a small step backwards before moving to the sink. She watched with consternation as he washed his mug, then hers, and a few other things that she’d left on the bench.
“You don’t have to do that,” she said, belatedly, wondering at his obvious change in demeanour.
“It’s fine. I’m here.”
She watched him for a moment, then said softly, “I thought I’d make a potato bake and salmon for dinner. I saw you have some fillets in the freezer and I’ve got a caper sauce recipe I’ve been meaning to try.” Her brain began to tick furiously and she continued with breathless enthusiasm, “In fact, there’s more than enough salmon for me to turn some into gravlax for Christmas morning. Presuming I’m still here which I guess I will be,” she finished in a rush, looking towards the window and the blizzard swirling beyond the glass.
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