Bad Business

by JC Harroway

  His eyes darken, fresh arousal slashing his already savage expression. ‘They are, and I am. But are you sure? Because once I’m back inside you, we won’t be moving for a while. I intend to spend every day you have left doing this, if you’ll let me.’

  The reminder that my days are numbered douses my high, like the sun ducking behind a storm cloud.

  ‘I’m certain. In fact, from now on, take anything I say at face value, because I want that stark honesty we shared last night. I want to be that brave woman who isn’t afraid to say what she wants. To chase what she wants. I know you can take it.’

  ‘Fuck, yes, I can.’ He groans, his eyes dropping half closed with arousal. ‘Try me now. Ask me. Tell me. Let that woman free.’

  My breath catches, the rush electrifying every nerve right to my fingers and toes. His gift, his safety net exhilarating. ‘Go down on me.’

  I bite my lip, a part of my brain blanking at the bold request.

  His jaw clenches and his eyes rake down my body to the place where he’s grinding his cock against the heat between my legs. ‘My pleasure.’ He sits back on his heels and slides my bikini bottoms off then he takes my hand, as if he’s inviting me to waltz.

  ‘Sit up.’

  I obey, so turned on by this freedom, I’d do anything he asks in that moment, just as I know he’d do the same for me. He lies down beside me and guides me to straddle him, his hands on my buttocks until I’m astride his face. He even reaches for a pillow and shoves it under his head, getting comfy.

  My body combusts; why is that so sexy?

  I grip the back of the lounger, my thighs quaking, so acute is the excitement building. I look down, but Ryan is focussed on my sex, his thumbs parting me, and then his mouth covers my clit and he groans, his eyes darting to mine, watching me fall apart above him.

  It’s the hottest thing I’ve ever experienced, the sun on my back, his face between my thighs, his nods and grunts encouraging every cry, every gasp, every involuntary thrust of my hips over his mouth. The bites of pleasure are enough to drive me over the edge, so when he pushes first one and then two and finally a third finger inside me, I arch my back and my hands grip the lounger with cracking force.

  ‘Ryan...’ His name has become my favourite chant. I wanted to come full of his delicious cock, but I’m not going to make it. This is too good. And I’m fully invested in his plan—to spend the rest of our time together chasing this high.

  He’s groaning, his eye contact searing, stripping me bare, so for a perfect moment I’m freer than ever before, just me, naked, exposed, taking what I want without hesitation, apology or concession.

  My climax sends my body rigid, the air forced from my lungs on a protracted wail I can’t hold inside, each spasm stronger than the last. When it’s over, and I collapse next to Ryan, his arms holding me and his kisses bringing me back into my body, my brain stutters back to life.

  My first thought?

  Shit, I’m in deep trouble.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Ryan

  I HOLD HER TIGHT, willing the gallop of my heart to subside. My chest burns as I try to suck in calming breaths. But she’s everywhere. Her scent, the warmth of her sun-kissed skin, the tickle of her hair, which is splayed over the pillow next to me, strands even clinging to the scruff on my chin.

  What the hell is happening to me? Perhaps I’m having some sort of cardiac event. I grip her tighter, my pulse easing at the knowledge that if I do die, there’s no one better to have on hand.

  Ever since she told me about her sister, opened up about her teenaged self, ever since she probed my dark places with the care and gentleness she must give to her patients, that pressure, the concrete block shifting inside me, has built. Is this what I’ve avoided all these years? The sprouting, alien feeling of a deeper connection? A bond with the real Grace, one who has hang-ups, but also has the balls to put herself out there emotionally, time after time, where I’m a snarling emotional hermit, protecting himself at all costs?

  We’ve both dealt with crap in our lives, but our reactions couldn’t be more different—hers to care and help people, to improve herself and demand everything from life, and mine...? To acquire all the trappings of wealth, but to hide from real, honest, human connection. Am I truly that spineless? That terrified of being alone?

  I ignore the lust still pounding through my blood as I hold a languid Grace, and probe my memories for the last time I felt this way.

  It’s dark in there, the vulnerable place in my head, certainly not as brilliantly white lit as being here in this moment with this dauntless woman. But where I would normally dodge those vicious talons designed to make me feel twelve years old again, I want to challenge, to test their power.

  Do I, for the first time ever, want more? To try to be close to what Grace deserves, whatever the hell that looks like?

  No, I can never be that. Even Grace couldn’t make her long-term relationship work. What hope would someone like me have? This is all I know. And the timing sucks—I couldn’t possibly face two major life adjustments at once... Back in London, Grandma has to be my main focus.

  I release a long sigh, resolved to ignore the clamour in my head every time I think about the countdown of days left and just enjoy this and all the moments. That’s where my instincts lead. But are they instincts, or merely habits?

  She shifts against me, her fingers tracing patterns on my chest. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fantastic.’ Physically. But my head...? It’s fucked seven ways to Sunday. I kiss her, because I know that will ease the worst of this burn in my chest and the warning siren deafening me. I know she can shift the concrete a fraction so I can breathe. ‘There’s nothing better than watching you own your feelings. You make me crazy—’

  Words fail me, so I kiss her again and again, succumbing to my physical needs, which are easier to embrace than the doubts and questions meeting her has thrown up.

  I pull back at last. ‘Do you want to spend the night on the Blarney? It has everything we need,’ I ask, the idea materialising from that dark place. ‘I want to be selfish, to keep you all to myself for as long as I can.’

  She laughs then, pushing at my shoulders so she can level those bright intelligent eyes on me. ‘I could be on board with that, excuse the pun.’

  ‘Good,’ I say, my head already time-travelling to the end of the week, when we’ll go our separate ways. Will that be enough time to gorge on Grace? Will I have exorcised this foreign craving? Be all cured of the hold she seems to have over me?

  ‘What about whales? They might capsize the boat while we’re asleep?’ She sits up, gorgeously dishevelled, eyes wide.

  ‘It’s too shallow here for whales.’ I palm her waist, her warm, soft skin like silk. ‘And I have a perfect solution—we won’t sleep.’

  ‘I hadn’t thought of that—I like the way your mind works.’ She licks her lips, a devious smile tugging at her perfect mouth as she shoves the waistband of my swim shorts down over my hips. I help her to remove them and then roll on top of her, my hands stroking the hair from her still-flushed face. My body aches, the need to plunge inside the tight warmth that awaits me driving me to distraction, but still I hesitate.

  ‘You’re the bravest person I know.’ My heart thuds against her ribs and I pray she can’t tell how fast it’s beating. ‘I can’t stop thinking about a teenaged you—I want to go back in time, be that boy you wanted and tell you it will be okay.’ God knows where this is coming from, but I’ve never spoken truer words.

  Grace’s brow pinches in a tiny frown. ‘Ryan...’ Unlike moments earlier when she screamed it, my name is a whisper on her lips, almost a question laced with longing. She presses her mouth to mine, her thighs spreading so I sink closer, my cock scalded by the wet heat between her legs.

  I focus on this, us, mentally rearing back from that place that makes me restless.


  I have no answers for her unspoken questions, no solution to her longings except the physical. Grace was bold enough to embrace her first one-night stand, but I’ve never had a serious relationship. And it’s stood me in good stead up to now.

  I tilt my hips back, the head of my cock sliding to her slick entrance to distract us from the intimate abyss. The doubts filling my head have no place, because I wasn’t good enough for a girl like seventeen-year-old Grace then, and I’m seriously lacking for the woman she is now. What do I know about feelings and relationships and commitment?

  I push inside her, the streak of pleasure making me groan. This is different from the night I spent in her bed. I know things about this Grace, the knowledge leaving me tense and uncertain, when I’ve always relied on absolutes.

  Grace shifts her hips, bites her lip, sighs. ‘Can we sleep here, on deck? I want to watch the sunset and rise.’

  ‘We can do anything you want,’ I say through gritted teeth. Because I want to give her everything I can, as shallow as I know it will be.

  She grips my face so she can kiss me—my lips, my cheeks, even the tip of my nose—and then looks deep into my eyes. ‘Stop holding back, Ryan.’ Her voice is low, a sexy demand, but her stare carries that insightful caring I want to shield myself against.

  I press inside her to the hilt and then bury my face against the side of her neck while I try to get a handle on the rage of feelings bombarding me.

  The boulder in my chest expands. I yank my head away and roll us so she’s on top, sprawled over my chest, her squeal of surprised laughter morphing into a groan as I thrust up into her from underneath.

  I want her too shattered to look at me that way. Too debauched to notice I’m reeling on the edge of previously uncharted territory. Too spent to say more than ‘yes’ when I take her again and again until I’ve exhausted my demons.

  ‘Yes.’ She pushes back, sitting up over my hips and rocking in time with my thrusts.

  I grip her hips, moving her to the rhythm I want, shutting out everything but her naked, honest desire. ‘Ride me harder. You feel too good.’ I cup her breasts, rolling my thumbs over her nipples so she clenches me tighter as she throws her head back. I need her so much, need to come so badly, for a second I’m worried I won’t get there. Worried that the weight crushing my chest has spoiled even this for me. But then she calls my name once more, and I join her in the free-fall, one certainty in my head.

  I’ll never forget this moment, this holiday, this woman.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Grace

  THE SUN SITS low on the horizon by the time we sail back into the lagoon the next evening. Ryan heads for the Lailai’s jetty and moors the Blarney while I watch the preparations taking place on the beach. The staff are busy laying the final touches to a makeshift altar decorated with tropical flowers near the water’s edge. A carpeted walkway lined with lit torches and a handful of chairs faces the ocean. It’s hard to imagine a more exquisite location to share vows.

  I sense Ryan behind me at the top of the gangplank. ‘The French couple—Evie and Remy. They’re getting married tonight.’ My heart flutters at the romance of their nuptials, even though my joy is dampened by the last traces of my own personal regret. Regret I can finally let go. There’s no doubt that I did the right thing by halting my own wedding and coming here alone. What seemed monumental in that West End bar over margaritas with Brooke and Neve—the pact, the challenge I set myself—now seems so simple. Because I found the kind of passion I crave.

  But the chills cooling me on this tropical evening remind me that, just like bleached coral washed up on the shore, I can’t keep what I found. Not with Ryan, who isn’t long-term-partner material. Longing swells in my throat. Trying to make us work, back in London, would shunt me back where I began, fooling myself I had something real and enduring.

  I can’t force Ryan to be something he’s not and I can’t settle like that again.

  ‘Let’s go wish the groom good luck,’ I say, the impulse bittersweet.

  Ryan grunts, grabbing his backpack, his face that of a man about to sit in the dentist’s chair.

  ‘Oh, come on. Surely you can appreciate how romantic this is. And, at the very least, it’s good for business,’ I say, recalling the photos of similar weddings I saw on the resort website when selecting this as our honeymoon destination.

  After our magical night on the Blarney, I felt as if we’d moved closer together, but it seems he’s in no mood to be teased. If only I could dissect his thoughts and feelings and find the slightest chink in his armour, a place to anchor my hope.

  He takes my hand with only a cursory shrug of acknowledgement as we head for the beach. I lean into his side, keen to prolong the bubble of existence we’ve shared in the past twenty-four hours. It’s there still, our deeper connection. I feel it in his stares and the grip of his hand.

  Confessing the enormity of his childhood abandonment was a big step for him, and I’m humbled that he shared his secret with me. And now he might lose his beloved grandma, too.

  He’ll be alone. But he doesn’t have to be.

  I squeeze his fingers, walk a little slower, prolonging the moment when I have to drop his hand. Because deeper connection or not, it’s temporary.

  He’s not mine to hold or fix or console. He’s an island. Rocky and invincible on the surface, but afraid of the attrition and erosion of the waves that pound his defences.

  Could he ever overcome those fears and be open to more than a few nights of stolen passion? Could I wait on the slim chance he might, one day, change his mind? Or is delaying the inevitable just another form of settling for something I know in my soul isn’t right for me?

  At sea, on the Blarney, it was easier to live in the moment and not think about the clock ticking. Easier to deny the depth of feelings building inside me, changing me, making me want impossible things. Easier to believe that Ryan and I could part in a few days, with a ‘thanks for the memories,’ the new and improved Grace swapping her bikini for scrubs without a backward glance. But I’d be lying to myself, and I’ve given up that pastime.

  I’m not ready to face the end with him, but I know I want more than he’s capable of, some day. A partner for life. Marriage. My happy ever after.

  With a heavy heart, I head for the wedding party, trailing a reluctant Ryan.

  I must be gripping his hand too tightly, or perhaps he’s still protecting us from resort gossip, because he drops my hand and leans in, his voice low for my ears only, his message dimming my smile for Remy, the groom.

  ‘This will be the final wedding to take place on the island. Next week, the builders move in, refurbishments begin and a whole new website launches.’

  His words aren’t spoken with malice, but they feel like a slap or an unwanted secret—a drunken uncle no one invited who sneaked into the ceremony to shout, ‘I object.’

  I look up, my forehead scrunching as I try to gauge his meaning from his tense expression and shifting stare, but then I’m engulfed by Remy’s hug, laughing while he adorns my neck with a salusalu, a Fijian lei of delicately scented tropical flowers, followed by a very European kiss for each cheek.

  ‘Please, you must come. Both of you. Evie will be delighted.’ Remy turns, offering Ryan a garland from the scented stack draped over his arm. Dressed in cream linen shorts and a white shirt open at the neck, he’s as low-key as a groom can be, but also perfect.

  ‘I’d love to,’ I say, my eyes darting to a distracted Ryan, whose cryptic statement quashed all the lovely feel-good hormones Evie and Remy’s sunset wedding induced. But why shouldn’t I be gooey? It’s a wedding. Even the hardest cynic would find it impossible not to share a fraction of the joy and excitement on Remy’s face as he waits for his bride.

  My heart plummets at the irony.

  A hardened cynic like Ryan. A man who, with good reason, doesn’t believe in lov
e and marriage and keeps the risk of pain at bay by avoiding relationships.

  ‘Excuse me.’ Ryan leaves, summoned by Taito, who loiters under the palms, while I offer sincere congratulations to Remy.

  I watch Ryan’s retreat, trying to recall the look on his face as he kissed me awake this morning with the sun rising on the horizon, just as I’d wanted.

  ‘I feel like you’re in my blood,’ he whispered, his lips feathering mine, and I gasped past the stricture in my throat as he pushed inside me and we started another day in paradise as lovers.

  Where has that Ryan gone? I haven’t asked anything more of him, knowing what a huge step admitting feelings is for someone so anti-commitment. And even though his sentiment, spoken at a moment of physical intimacy, can’t be trusted, his eyes shone with the vulnerability of opening up on an emotional level.

  But now? He’s gone. Reverted to the man I first met. Secretive. Closed off. Scornful.

  Doubts swirl, making me feel sick. I clutch my elbows, crossing my arms over my waist.

  Two other couples arrive, greet Remy and take their seats. I look down at my cut-off shorts and strappy top, wishing I had time to change into a sundress. But my casual outfit seems somehow appropriate here among the natural beauty and simplicity of the location.

  I take a seat as Remy and the celebrant take their positions at the altar, a gnawing discomfort in my chest. Not for my own happy ending, which was an illusion I created by mentally cutting and pasting Ryan’s head into my couple’s photo, but for the absolute certainty that I want this, what Evie and Remy have, in my future. And Ryan, the man to bring me back to life, and long-term relationships are mutually exclusive.

  As Ryan slides into the seat beside me, I turn a bright smile on him to hide the reality-check downer I’ve been plunged into. I ache to touch him, to reconnect the way we did on the Blarney, but the look on his face—tense, maybe even angry—keeps my hands in my lap and my heart in my throat.