by Orla Bailey
“Now we can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
“Hard way, please.” I’m facetious to the end.
What flashes across his features tells me he knows that already. “Hard way it is, then.”
Instantly my feet leave the floor and I’m hauled across the counter onto my stomach. His strength astounds me. My limbs flail to restore balance but he captures my other hand and lashes it to the first before I even realise he’s done it. His dexterity and speed is phenomenal.
“What are you doing?” It’s a silly question. I know exactly what he’s doing. He’s ending this impasse. And all I know is the way it makes me feel: wanted, cared about, worth something to somebody.
“This noxious mess has both of us worn threadbare. I’m going to do what we both need to make us feel a whole lot better.”
Uncertain of exactly what that comprises, I’m having reservations.
“Shouldn’t we talk about it first?” I appear as sweetly reasonable as it’s possible to be when squashed, belly down, over a kitchen counter.
He’s not buying it. “We’ll talk a whole lot more productively once we’ve got this out of the way. Understand?”
“I understand you hate me.” I’ve said it so much lately it trips lightly off my tongue.
He lifts my chin with his thumb and fore-finger until I look him straight in the eye. “I don’t hate you.”
I can’t respond. I suppose I’m too stunned to hear, coming from his own lips, what everyone’s been telling me. But that doesn’t mean he loves me either. Raw hurt comes tumbling from my lips. “Then why did you leave me tonight? Why did you go to her?”
His shoulders sag on an outward breath. “Perhaps we ought to discuss it first.”
It’s the moment of truth I can’t put off any longer. The one where he finally admits his powerful feelings for Amanda that won’t go away, despite the pleasant little interlude he’s enjoyed with me. The point he reveals his enduring devotion to the one woman he now knows he truly can’t live without. The one he trusts. Amanda.
Tears brim as he hauls me to my feet. He guides me through to the sitting room and settles me on the sofa, sitting down beside me. My tied hands twist together in my lap, a symbol of how I’ll never be free of these tangled feelings. I stare down at them.
“I want to see you naked,” he says softly. My eyes fly to his and he holds them bound to his. “I need to reclaim you. It overwhelms me, consumes me, every moment.”
To be rendered even more defenceless around Jack is frightening but if he needs this from me in order for us to get past this, I can do it. I nod, trembling with a mixture of nervous apprehension and excitement.
He slips one of my hands free and pulls the sweatshirt sleeve from one arm. Leaving the noose around one wrist, he draws the whole thing off and tosses it to the back of the sofa.
He reaches down to slip my shoes from my feet. His thumbs caress my bare soles until I shiver all over. This is a head-fuck. Is he punishing me or rewarding me?
“You have such pretty feet.” He lifts my legs over his thighs, turning me to face him, planting soft kisses over my insteps and toes. His hot, wet mouth slips over each big toe sucking it into his mouth, scraping his teeth gently across the pads beneath. Working his way along each toe in turn, he reaches the littlest, by which time chills of excitement are blooming between my thighs. I rock myself against the hard resistance of the double-stitched seams of my jeans.
“Not happening that way, baby.” He opens the fastener and unzips my jeans. He taps me on the behind until I lift, allowing him to ease the tight fabric down over my hips and thighs.
He looks at my underwear with faint amusement.
“So?” I blush, remembering the ice queen knickers.
“Every damn thing is sexy on you. We can leave those on for now.”
I yearn for Jack this way but am I only prolonging our final agony? I want his body inside mine so badly I reach for him.
“No.” His smile fades in an instant. He’s quite emphatic.
I’m chastened and disappointed but a flutter of pleasure thrills me too. He wants control. Part of why I love Jack is that he is tough and uncompromising, even with me. It makes me feel safe and protected. Is that why I so completely unravel when he’s not here beside me?
He reaches round to unhook my bra letting it slide down my arms as his eyes drift easily over my breasts. His breathing speeds up. Yet he makes no attempt to touch me beyond disposing of the garment and binding my wrists back together again. “Do you trust me?”
I hold up the restraints. “I wouldn’t stay if I didn’t.”
“You didn’t stay,” he reminds me.
“I’m staying now.”
“Because I have you tied down?”
“Because I want to but it scares me.”
“I know, baby, but I’m in control now.”
“What do you mean?”
“You put yourself at risk on Saturday when you lied to me about picking up your friend and went off alone.”
“It was –” I try to remind him of Amanda’s non-existent party ruse.
“Shush.” He puts his fingers over my lips. “You listen to me now. If you hadn’t told me that lie, whatever the reason for it, none of this would have happened. There is never a good enough reason for you to lie to me or go off without your phone so no-one is able to contact you. If what you’re telling me is true, you put yourself in extreme danger with that bastard, whatever the reason you got there.” His eyes are dark hollows; his mouth grim, as he remembers. “You were naked. His hands were all over you. And they shouldn’t have been. You were alone with him and I might not have got to you when I did.”
“I’m sorry, Jack. So sorry.” I know I’m not to blame for everything that happened but I did lie to him. That much is true. And I was very, very stupid, trusting the one person I know I shouldn’t have.
“You’re never going to lie to me again.” His hand reaches for my breast. He cups it gently and my nipple firms beneath his touch. He discovers it, pinching softly enough to make me moan.
“This is meant to be a reprimand, Tabitha.” His tone would be censorious if not so tinged with animal desire.
“I’m getting mixed messages,” I gasp.
His lips resist a desire to curve. “You’re too smart for your own good, you know that?”
“I can’t help wanting you. You can’t help wanting me.” He can’t kid me about what’s happening to the part of his anatomy I feel beneath my thighs.
He laughs softly. “You’ll be doing something about that, later. Let’s lose these now, shall we?” He hooks his fore-fingers into my underwear and works them down, pulling on alternate sides until they’re removed completely. I’m lain back along the sofa, my arms raised above my head as his eyes and hands meticulously reacquaint themselves with every dip and curve of my body.
“You got drunk on Sunday night when I wasn’t there to protect you.” He speaks between the soft, teasing explorations of his lips over my skin as I undulate beneath him.
“That’s why I got drunk,” I protest weakly.
“No sass, kitten.”
I shut up as he shifts into position over me.
“Better.” He blows a gentle breeze of cool air over my heated flesh. Teasingly he lets it drift down between my thighs and I raise my hips up to direct the flow to where I most desire it and moan. “There’s no knowing what might have happened.”
“I was at Belvedere, wasn’t I? And you’d been drinking too.”
“I can handle it.”
“I won’t ever get wasted again. I promise.”
He rolls his eyes at such fabrication but I’m ready to promise anything with his fingers hovering between my thighs. Does this mean we have a future? He slips through my wet silk to torment me mercilessly yet he never lets my responses go too far.
“When I went out this evening, I meant you to stay at Belvedere.” He nibbles behind my ear, his breath marking me.
“I know you did,” I complain, without malice, turning my head aside to make room. “While you went out with her. That was pretty mean.”
He sighs. “Only you, Tabitha could march into my office and get my agreement to return to Belvedere when I’d decided to stay away for both our sakes. And when I concede, you produce every weapon in your arsenal to push me away again.”
“You should have stayed.”
“My instructions were meant to keep you out of trouble while I was gone. Yet despite everything that’s happened to you, you still risk leaving alone in the middle of the night. Will you never learn?”
“I’m twenty-two. I took a taxi.”
“You were twenty-two and took a taxi on Saturday night, and how did that turn out for you? You proposed this new deal to keep us both happy.”
My eyes drift closed. It’s hard to think straight while he’s caressing me but he isn’t getting away with that one. “It’s not my fault you made a deal that wasn’t worth a damn.” I brace myself as he freezes, stony-faced.
And relaxes. “I can see I’m going to have to be much more specific in my expectations from now on.”
“Does that mean you’re not going to leave me?”
“We’re not out of the woods yet.” He’s deadly serious. He can change on a dime.
“But?” Please let there be a but.
“But –”
I finally process his earlier words and see the answer in his eyes. “You believe me!” I’m ecstatic. I throw my tied wrists over his head and hang on tight, bending my elbows until I’m pressed up to him as tightly as I can be. I kiss him, long, slow and deep until his breathing changes; his tension mounts.
He separates us slowly. “I didn’t say that,” he says with a cautious note, placing his hands lightly on my bare hips and letting his thumbs caress in slow, teasing circles. “If I am to believe you, it means you were drugged and held against your will. You were in serious danger. And that means someone out there is a very real threat to you. Why the hell do you think I didn’t want you leaving the apartment tonight?”
I begin to understand that Jack wasn’t being unreasonable. Or petty. Or vengeful.
“You already believed me.” It’s all I care about.
He stares. “I don’t know what to make of it yet and I don’t like any of this. But, yes, I believe you, Tabitha. I don’t believe you maliciously lie to me. I just don’t know if I can bear to think someone tried to hurt you that way. I’m not sure which is worse: the pain of betrayal or knowing you were intentionally targeted. Perhaps because of me.” He sighs, resting his forehead against mine. “Actually, I do know which is worse.”
Jack brushes the hair back from my face as his blue eyes stare deeply into mine. He may finally accept I didn’t willingly betray him but Amanda’s involvement is a different matter.
“Did Amanda let something slip when you were with her tonight?” I’m still confused. He took her to dinner. He stayed with her until nearly midnight. Since then he’s been with me. The thought that intimacy with her might be the only thing that prompted Jack to believe me, is devastating. Did he fuck the truth out of her? Is he trying the same with me? Can truth be worth any price?
His eyes narrow at the expressions which fleet across my face as if he is trying to read them. “I still don’t have your trust, do I, even though you expect mine?” He toughens before my eyes, pulls my arms from round his neck and places them between us. “You risked your safety again tonight, believing some evil bastard out there wants to hurt you. Don’t you yet realise, if anything happens to you it will kill me?”
Whatever feelings he has for Amanda, he still cares about me. I break down. “Do you still want me?”
“Of course I do.” He gathers me up in his arms and I bury my head into his shoulder. “Don’t cry, kitten. We’re together now.”
“Are we?” I try not to snivel as he carries me through to the bedroom. “I thought I was banished from your bed.”
“This is your bed,” he reminds me.
Nothing makes sense but this. He lays me down, gently untying my wrists. No need for restraints, he already possesses me.
Numb with relief, it takes a while to recall his earlier words. “Why do you think I don’t trust you?” I ask him.
He shoots me a wry look. “Exactly how many different ways did you picture me fucking Amanda tonight?”
Chapter Seven
“That’s exactly what you imagined, isn’t it?” Jack accuses.
“Imagined?”
“You’ve decided I’m capable of having a deeply intimate relationship with you whilst fucking Amanda on the side.”
“I wouldn’t exactly put it like that.”
His voice crystallizes. “How would you put it?”
“Maybe it’s the other way around.” My voice is little more than a whisper. “I’m the bit on the side.”
He grabs my hand and I try to wrest it away but he tightens his hold. “For God’s sake, Tabitha. What about any of this, makes you think I want Amanda?” He looks angry.
Emotions are running high but he can go to hell. My own repressed anger finally bubbles to the surface. “You told me you were going to marry her,” I yell and struggle for ownership of my arm. I’m jealous he once cared about her enough to want to. During those same long years I was suffering, daily, the tortures of the damned, he was imagining a future with her.
He releases me. “That is true.” His voice is quieter now he’s been confronted with the facts.
“You must have loved her and you still do.” I don’t even try to wipe away the tears spilling down my cheek. He attempts to do it for me but I turn aside. I don’t want his pity.
“I don’t love her.”
“She says it’s her you want.”
“She’s mistaken.”
So am I if I thought he looked sorry. He looks, and sounds, more annoyed than ever that I’ve dug up the truth.
“How could you even think I want her after everything we’ve been through?”
“I saw you kissing her!”
“When?” He’s shocked I might have witnessed it. He never knew I caught them. His muscles set rigid waiting for any irrefutable evidence as I wrap the edge of the sheet around me.
“At the Commerce Ball. I saw the two of you together with your arms round each other.”
I scoot to the far side of the bed, heaving the sheet behind me. He’s sitting on the edge of it, weighting it down so I dig my nails in, yank violently and keep on pulling until I hear it rip. I’m helpless enough emotionally, I’m not going to expose my naked vulnerability to him any longer. I don’t care what he needs. I have needs too.
His frown suggests he’s struggling to attain the memory but I know better.
I assist him. “When you thought I was still in the ladies’ powder room and you were waiting outside.” I prompt his conveniently selective recall. “We hadn’t even slept together then. You were just my mentor, so I had no right to complain,” I admit. Or to care. But I did. I do.
He fixes me with a look of incredulity at my outburst. “Amanda was probably just being friendly.”
“Like a fox.”
“She’d been drinking Champagne. We’re old friends. It would have meant nothing to her.”
“It meant plenty.”
“You’ve been fretting over that all this time?”
I want to slap the patronisingly incredulous look from his face. “Her hands were all over you,” I exaggerate. “Her mouth was on yours.” I can still see the look of triumph she gave me, over his shoulder and her words to me when she followed me into the bathroom earlier. I’m battling to rip the last of the sheet from beneath him whilst keeping a shred of self-respect. Both fights I’m losing. He’s not making it any easier as he won’t budge an inch to accommodate me, but what do I expect? “Your mouth was on hers too!” As soon as it tears free I stumble backwards.
He gives a derisory laugh, standing, and has the effrontery to look exasperated
with me. “My mouth on hers, as you so crudely put it, was a simple embrace between old friends. There was nothing in it.” He’s had time to construct his feeble excuse. “My hands on her were probably to keep things in perspective. I was putting her away from me, if you must know. The place was crawling with photographers. Remember?” He pauses. Frowns. “Is that why you kissed Gunn? In reprisal?” He takes a cautionary step towards me.
I retreat, holding out a hand to stop him, nearly losing control of the ridiculously small piece of torn cotton. I got nowhere near half the sheet and isn’t that just typical. “He. Kissed. Me. I didn’t get any say in the matter. Amanda arranged that too. Can’t you see what she’s been doing from the start? And don’t turn this around and make out it’s all in my head. That wasn’t the only time I caught the two of you acting like secret lovers after you were stuck with me.”
Jack defies my boundaries. He marches over and despite the flats of my hands pressing against his chest to hold him off, he pulls me tight against him and wraps his arms around me to keep me in place. I might as well be in a metal clamp for all I can move. He whips away the scant cotton separating us and after a brief angry scuffle I save my energy.
“I’m not stuck with you. I want to be with you. I went to Lassec to bring you back when you ran, remember? Why the hell would I bother if it was Amanda I wanted?”
“You brought me back so you wouldn’t be made to look a fool. You were caught kissing me by the paparazzi too, remember?” And that was putting it mildly. My skin burns even now just remembering what he did to me up against that wall. “Ravishing your floozie on the side. You’d already created a freak-show, making me wear that scarlet whore’s gown when you knew the dress code was strictly black and white. But you fell into your own trap and you needed to stop them outing you as another poor sucker who got taken in by the hooker’s wiles.”
He snorts. “I don’t think so. I exercised damage limitation to protect you, after you got photographed kissing that boy, Gunn. It wasn’t the dress, it was the way you behaved wearing it that caused the problem. That dress was a media coup. I had to act fast to save your rear end from social and professional disaster.”
