Millionaire's Woman

by Helen Brooks

  ‘I know you’re not asleep,’ he whispered, and moved away to leave space between them. She turned over, smiling as she faced him, and he brushed a stray lock of hair back from her forehead. ‘We’ve never woken up together before, Katie.’

  ‘I was just thinking that.’

  His eyes held hers. Seen at this range in the morning light, she could make out little flecks of silver in the dark-rimmed grey irises. ‘I’ve never done this with anyone else, either,’ he said casually.

  Kate’s eyebrows shot up. ‘You must have done!’

  He shook his head. ‘During various encounters over the years I never stayed the night.’

  ‘You’re forgetting Dawn.’

  ‘As if either of us could ever do that!’ he retorted. ‘Just for the record, when we were married Dawn and I didn’t sleep together.’

  Kate stared in disbelief. ‘If she was expecting your child you must have done some time!’

  ‘Before the wedding our few encounters were brief and to the point,’ he said with brutal frankness. ‘Dawn’s room was over the garage block at the pub. It had a separate entrance via a fire escape. She began asking me up there for coffee after her shift at the bar, but at first I politely declined. Then one night I felt so damn miserable I caved in. But I never stayed until her father closed the pub, let alone the night.’

  Kate eyed him curiously. ‘And after you were married?’

  Jack’s mouth turned down. ‘The bride felt so ill at the register office she couldn’t cope with the meal her mother had organised. Only Dad and her parents were there, so as soon as the knot was tied the newlyweds went straight to the flat in Gloucester Road and Dawn went to bed. I spent the afternoon doing paperwork, and my wedding night watching television on the sofa in the sitting room. Next day I bought a bed for the spare room and slept there from then on.’

  ‘Was she unwell all the time then?’

  ‘Pretty much. Her mother was a godsend. She came in every day, did laundry and housework and left meals for me. I went back to the flat in time for dinner every evening, but I ate alone because Dawn couldn’t stand the sight of food. I sat with her afterwards, but—’ He paused, rubbing his chin. ‘To be blunt, conversation was an uphill struggle at the best of times, so we just sat staring at the television, or I made paperwork an excuse and escaped to the spare room. Then one night she woke in pain, and I rushed her off to hospital. You know the rest.’ Jack kissed Kate’s nose and slid out of bed. ‘I’m hungry. Stay there and I’ll bring you some breakfast.’

  ‘Certainly not, I’ll come down!’

  Jack pushed her gently against the pillows. ‘Rest for a bit, you look tired. I’ll throw Bran out and then bring up a tray. Humour me, Kate.’ He pulled up the blinds, collected some clothes and went into the bathroom. When he emerged in a heavy sweater and workmanlike cords, he was a little heavy around the eyes but otherwise looked none the worse for his disturbed night.

  ‘Ten minutes,’ he promised.

  When the door closed behind him Kate made a dash for the bathroom. Longing to take a shower, she contented herself with washing her face and rubbing toothpaste over her teeth with her finger. She rinsed with cold water, borrowed Jack’s comb then tidied the bed. She got into it and leaned back against stacked pillows as she noted every detail of the masculine room, which held no clutter of any kind other than a few books on the bedside tables. Except for the two antique chests, Jack had obviously bought his bedroom furniture from the same source as everything else in the house.

  Jack arrived soon afterwards with a tray he set down on the low chest at the foot of the bed. He handed her a glass of orange juice, then gave her a fork and a linen napkin and put a large serving plate between them on the bed.

  ‘Heavens, Jack,’ she said, eyeing the pile of toast surrounding a big mound of scrambled eggs. ‘I can’t eat all this.’

  ‘Good, because half of it is for me. No room for individual plates on the tray. Don’t worry,’ he said, grinning. ‘I’ve got my own fork.’

  Kate chuckled, and asked about the furniture when Jack sat beside her with the plate between them.

  ‘The firm concentrates on quality rather than mass production and made everything individually to my specifications. After their coverage in the article the orders came flooding in, so we’re all happy,’ said Jack. ‘I believe in patronising local tradesmen. Come on, eat up,’ he added, ‘you’re lagging behind.’

  When the plate was empty Jack got up and filled two mugs, then returned to his place on the bed.

  ‘I made the coffee while Bran was out doing the necessary, then decanted it into Molly’s insulated jug. I like my coffee red-hot.’

  ‘I remember,’ said Kate, sipping cautiously.

  Jack leaned back at the foot of the bed, eyeing her in wry amusement. ‘I’ve thought of having you in this bed right from the moment we met up again, Kate, but never in quite these circumstances.’

  ‘I bet,’ she said dryly, and smiled. ‘But this is nice, just the same, Jack.’

  ‘It is,’ he agreed. ‘Friendship with you isn’t really such hard work.’

  ‘Even after the fright I gave you last night?’

  He frowned. ‘What happens when you sleepwalk in Park Crescent?’

  ‘I haven’t so far.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  Kate drank some of her coffee. ‘For obvious reasons I’m always barefoot when I wander. If my feet are clean when I wake up I’m in the clear. And, contrary to belief, sleepwalkers don’t drift round like ghosts; they knock things over and bump into furniture. So if everything’s in its place I know I’ve stayed in bed all night. Besides,’ she added, ‘even if I found the key and unbolted the front door in my sleep I’d wake up pretty quickly when the alarm went off.’

  ‘True.’ Jack looked relieved. ‘You’ve had that kind of security everywhere you’ve lived?’

  Kate nodded soberly. ‘Robert installed it in their place, and I had it done in Anna’s flat when I moved there. David’s loft was already like a fortress, so no problem, but I did the necessary when I went to live alone in Notting Hill, and again before I moved into Park Crescent.’

  Jack looked thoughtful as he finished his coffee. ‘You might not get out of the actual house there, but those stairs are hellish steep. You could fall and break something—like your neck.’

  Kate shook her head. ‘There were stairs in the Sutton household, but I stayed in one piece.’

  ‘How often did it happen there?’

  Her eyes dropped. ‘More than I liked. As you can appreciate, it was a bad time for me when I was first living with them in London. But it only happened once after I moved into Anna’s flat.’

  ‘Did she know about it beforehand?’

  ‘Of course. I had to tell her that when I applied to share. But Anna wasn’t fazed. Her brother was captain of the first eleven at his school and used to walk in his sleep before important cricket matches. He’d get out of bed in the dormitory with his bat, and shape up to an invisible wicket.’

  Jack grinned. ‘That must have been fun for his mates.’

  ‘Apparently they just bowled a few balls to him and he went back to bed.’

  ‘You’re making that up!’

  ‘I’m not. Nick Travers told me that himself.’

  Jack chuckled as he put their mugs on the tray, then shot her a questioning look. ‘Are you having lunch with the Maitlands today?’

  Kate shook her head. ‘I’m having supper with them during the week instead.’

  He looked at her speculatively. ‘And you’ve finished your painting, so what are you going to do today?’

  She shrugged. ‘Nothing much.’

  ‘Then you can do that here with me, Kate.’

  ‘I’ll have to if the floodwater hasn’t gone down,’ she reminded him.

  ‘So you will,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘Until I’m sure it’s safe for you to drive, you’re my captive. We can share leftovers for lunch.’ He smiled. ‘It’s a fin
e day, so we could take Bran for a walk first to work up an appetite.’

  ‘All right, you’ve persuaded me.’ Kate had intended to say yes right from the start, but Jack didn’t have to know that. ‘May I have a shower, please?’

  ‘Of course. I’ll make more coffee when you come down.’

  Kate hurried to the pretty spare room, gathered up the sheets and removed the covers from the duvet and pillows and folded everything into a neat pile. After her shower she put on Jack’s sweatshirt in preference to her thin camisole, pulled on her boots, used a lipstick, dragged a comb through her hair and hurried down to the kitchen with the bundle of laundry.

  Bran came to meet her in such joyous welcome she scratched his ears and dropped a kiss on his head.

  ‘How about me?’ asked Jack.

  Kate grinned. ‘You want me to scratch your ears?’

  ‘I meant the kiss.’

  ‘OK. Bend down, then.’

  Jack bent his head and Kate stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.

  ‘Is that the best you can do?’ he demanded.

  ‘Bran didn’t complain.’

  Jack snatched the bundle from her, dumped it on the floor and pulled her into his arms to kiss her squarely on her protesting mouth, while the dog frisked round them, obviously thinking it was some kind of game. ‘I like that kind of kiss,’ Jack informed her as he let her go.

  ‘I’ll make a note of it,’ Kate said breathlessly, and tore a sheet from the roll of kitchen paper. ‘Here, lose the lipstick. That shade just isn’t you.’

  Jack grinned and scrubbed at his mouth. ‘Come and sit down. I’ve made coffee.’

  ‘I’ll deal with this lot first. Where’s your washing machine?’

  ‘Leave it. Molly will do it.’

  ‘Certainly not, I will,’ Kate said firmly. ‘And if you show me where you keep your spare bed linen I’ll make the bed, too.’

  ‘You never used to be so bossy,’ he complained, and took the laundry into the boot room, which was fitted with every conceivable aid for washing, drying and ironing, along with a refrigerator and vast freezer, and floor to ceiling cupboards for food storage.

  Kate smiled as she saw the small folding stepladder near the tall cupboards. ‘That’s for Molly, I assume. This is very impressive, Jack, but why a boot room?’

  ‘This end of the house contained the actual living quarters for the mill owner, with a scullery here where the boots were cleaned by the boy employed for the job.’

  Once the washing machine was in action Jack insisted Kate had some coffee before she put clean linen on the spare bed.

  He perched on the corner of the table, one foot swinging. ‘In fact, I’ve got a better idea. I’ve started the fire in the living room and even tidied up a bit, so you can lie on the sofa there and read the Sunday papers with Bran while I do the bed.’

  She smiled warmly. ‘An offer I can’t refuse! Thank you, Jack.’

  In the morning sunshine, with flames leaping in the fireplace and two brand-new paperback novels placed beside the Sunday papers on the rosewood table, the living room looked very inviting. Bran deserted Kate instantly to lie on the rug in front of the fire, and she added more logs, bent to stroke the dog, and then curled up in a corner of the sofa. She read a few headlines in the papers but, unable to resist any longer, picked up one of the books, a thriller she’d intended to buy the moment it was out in the bookshops.

  The story was riveting from the first page. But almost at once the warmth of the fire combined with her disturbed night to add weight to her eyelids and soon she put the book down and lay back against the new cushions. She stirred to the touch of familiar lips on hers and her mouth curved in response as her eyes opened on a look in Jack’s which turned her heart over. He stretched out beside her and caught her close, and Kate felt his heart hammer against her as his mouth crushed hers in a kiss that went on and on until neither could breathe and his lips left hers to cover her face and throat with kisses as he slid his hands up her ribs. He pushed the sweatshirt up until his lips found her breasts and she gave a low, gasping moan as he held her in an embrace that threatened to crush her ribs.

  ‘When I woke up this morning,’ he said hoarsely, ‘I wanted this so much I could barely breathe.’

  ‘I wanted it too,’ she said huskily, and buried her face against his neck.

  ‘I wish I’d known that.’ He turned her face up to his. ‘Tell me about your dream last night. What sent you running headlong down the stairs?’

  ‘As usual I was looking for you, but never finding you.’ She put a hand to his cheek. ‘I didn’t need much persuasion to sleep in your bed. I wanted to break my dream.’

  Jack sat up and pulled her up with him in the crook of his arm. ‘If I helped with that I think I deserve a reward.’

  ‘You want me to put on lunch?’

  ‘I’m hungry for you, not lunch. Come back to bed with me.’

  ‘How about Bran?’

  ‘He can stay in his own bed.’ Jack got up and held out his hand, a look of such blazing relief in his eyes when she grasped it, she hugged him close when he pulled her to her feet.

  I want this so much, Kate thought as they went upstairs together. I need it to make up for all those times when I searched for Jack in my dreams and could never find him.

  ‘If I were the hero in a romance,’ Jack said huskily, ‘I would have swept you up and carried you up to bed, but it’s a fair trip from the living room up the stairs. But,’ he added, picking her up once they reached the top corridor, ‘I can manage it from here.’

  Kate gave a breathless laugh as he strode the short distance to his room. Once inside he kicked the door shut, kissed her until she was even more breathless, and laid her on the bed.

  ‘I’ve never stopped loving you, Kate,’ he said, leaning over her. ‘You may find that hard to believe, but it’s the truth.’

  ‘Is it, Jack?’ she said quietly. ‘There were long years when my feelings for you were more like hate.’

  ‘I don’t blame you.’ He stretched out beside her and held her close, his cheek on her hair. ‘I don’t blame Elizabeth, either.’

  Kate stiffened and turned in his arms. ‘Liz? What do you mean?’

  ‘She never told you, then.’

  ‘Told me what?’

  ‘I went to London to see you the minute my divorce was final. Your sister had already moved to a different house by then, but I persuaded the new owners to let me have the Suttons’ forwarding address and went straight there.’ Jack laid his forehead against hers, eyes closed.

  ‘What happened, Jack?’

  ‘Elizabeth wouldn’t let me through the door. She said you had a new job and had moved out to share a flat.’ His mouth twisted. ‘No matter how hard I pleaded she wouldn’t give me your telephone number or tell me where you lived. She said you wanted nothing more to do with me, ever, and slammed the door in my face.’

  Kate burrowed closer. ‘Oh, Jack—she never told me.’

  ‘It was at that point I gave up on relationships. Eventually I heard you were living with some banker in Docklands.’ Jack kissed her fiercely. ‘I wanted to kill him.’

  Kate’s eyes flashed. ‘Now you know how I felt about Dawn—and you.’

  ‘You wanted to kill me?’

  ‘Yes. Very slowly.’

  ‘Do you still want to kill me?’ he asked, and took her earlobe between his teeth. ‘Because if you don’t let me make love to you very soon you’ll get your wish.’

  Kate gave a smothered laugh. ‘That’s the last thing I want, Jack.’

  He pulled her closer. ‘What do you want then, my darling?’

  Instead of words Kate gave him a slow, explicit smile which won her a kiss she responded to with such fervour he lifted her from the bed and stood her on her feet to undress her with unsteady hands, fighting to go slowly rather than tear off her clothes. When she was naked to the waist he began kissing his way down her throat to her breasts, lingering on nipples that rose erect and har
d in response to his lips and tongue. But when he reached for her zip she shook her head.

  ‘You too,’ she ordered, and Jack began pulling off his clothes. But, before he could get naked, Kate had undressed herself and burrowed under the covers. She turned them back a little and held out her arms. ‘Hold me, please.’

  Jack dived under the quilt, exerting every iota of will-power he possessed to keep from pulling her beneath him and taking swift, desperate possession of her in the way he’d wanted since he first set eyes on her again. He drew in a deep, shuddering breath and closed his eyes as he kissed her gently, teasing her tongue with his and nibbling gently on her bottom lip. He pressed kisses all over her face while his hands stroked and smoothed, and gained his reward when he felt the tense, slender body begin to relax.

  ‘No rush,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘I want to enjoy every little inch of you.’

  Kate felt as though every bone in her body was slowly melting as Jack kissed her and caressed her with a languorous lack of haste that made her impatient at last for the heat and hunger she’d seen in his eyes before she dived into bed. But at last his caresses grew more urgent, his lips and tongue and grazing teeth sending fiery sensation from the tips of her breasts to the part which melted in hot liquid response deep down inside her. She thrust her hips against him and felt a surge of triumph as his breath caught and his muscles grew taught under the hands she dug into his shoulders. She gave a husky little moan as his caressing fingers slid between her thighs to find the small, hidden bud that rose, tumescent, to the caresses which sent her wild with almost unbearable pleasure, and in answer to her gasped, broken pleading he nudged her thighs apart with his knee. He raised his head and their eyes met and held as he took slow, sure possession of her at last. They stayed as still as their rapid breathing allowed for a moment, then began to move together, savouring every last nuance of sensation as he slid home and withdrew, then repeated the process a little faster and harder each time, their mutual fire stoked higher and higher with every stroke until the rhythm of their loving rose to frenzy and at last the climax engulfed them in heart-stopping release.