The old man leaned in towards Josh and lowered his voice. “She never loses her temper. She usually gets all icy and freezes your balls off with something she says.” He removed his cap and scratched his head. “I’ve known her since she was a wee girl, and I’ve never seen her angry.”
“Welcome to my world—in it she’s mad all the time.”
“Archie McPherson,” Caroline shouted. “I’m going to count to three, and if you aren’t up here by then there’s going to be trouble. One.”
The two men looked up the staircase.
Josh shook his head in wonder. “I’m not sure what she thinks she’s going to do to us.”
“Aye.” Archie sounded bewildered.
“Two!” Caroline’s voice rose an octave.
Archie shuffled his feet. “Well, I can see you have everything in hand here. I’d best be getting on. I’m guessing Donaldson knows about the cuffs.”
“That’s where I got them.”
A slow, wicked smile lit up Archie’s face. “Tell Caroline I dropped by and I’m glad she’s well.” He put his hat back on his head. “And tell her not to forget about the boiler that went kablooey.” With a laugh, he opened the door.
“Three!” Caroline screamed. “That’s it, Archie McPherson. You are on my list. You are number two on my list.”
“Good luck, son.” Archie slipped out the door.
Josh sauntered back into the kitchen to finish his breakfast, only to discover Mitch had already eaten it.
Josh swatted him on the back of the head. “Don’t you have somewhere to go?”
“Nope.” Mitch reached for the coffee again.
“Someone needs to deal with the wedding planner now that Caroline is indisposed.”
Mitch’s eyes lit up. “Now that you mention it, the delectable Millicent could probably use a hand.” He put the coffee pot back in its stand. “Don’t you just love an English accent?”
Josh smiled knowingly. “I’m partial to Scottish, myself.”
“I need to use the bathroom,” Caroline shouted. “If you don’t release me, there will be an accident.”
“Okay, I’m out of here.” Mitch headed for the front door. “Don’t worry about the wedding. I’ll deal with Millicent. I’ll tell her Caroline is tied up at the moment.” With a grin, he put on his sunglasses and left.
“I can’t hold it much longer. Josh, get your backside up here right now.”
With a chuckle, Josh trotted up the stairs to his fiancée.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Caroline sat on the sofa facing Josh, and fumed. He’d graciously allowed her to use the facilities and get dressed. Before he let her leave the bedroom she’d had to swear a vow, hand held high, that she wouldn’t run. Now she was on house arrest and currently engaged in a staring contest with the insane American she’d promised to marry.
“Could you at least put a shirt on?” Caroline snapped.
Josh looked down at his bare abs. “What? I thought you liked my chest. I thought you wanted to, and I’m quoting here, lick it like an ice lolly.”
She felt her face burn. “That was before.”
“Before what?”
“Before I realised how much of a bully you are. It’s a decidedly unattractive quality in a man.”
He smiled like he knew better.
“You can’t keep me here as a prisoner.” Although Caroline sounded convinced, inside she wasn’t so sure. “This is my town. I have responsibilities here. A life here.”
Josh ran a hand over his face, sighed and then leaned forward to perch his elbows on his knees. He took a deep breath before pinning her with those stunning blue eyes of his.
“I might have said some things yesterday that I regret.”
“Really? You think?” Caroline wasn’t ready to let go of her anger quite yet. The man had chained her to a bed! That might be entertaining in a romance novel, but in real life, not so much.
“I’m trying to apologise here, Caroline.” His tone said he was running out of patience with her.
“Is that what you’re trying to do? It wasn’t clear.”
His jaw clenched tightly before he took another deep breath. “I’m worried about you. Worried about your safety. Worried that your trusting nature will lead you to give time to people who don’t deserve it.” He hung his head before looking at her again. “I’m worried you’ll get hurt.”
The wind went out of Caroline. He was worried? She couldn’t remember the last time someone was concerned about her. For as long as she could remember, it was her job to look out for everyone else. “You don’t need to worry, Josh. I really can take care of myself. Honestly. I’m thirty-one. I’m not a child.”
“Don’t you think I know that? But this is a different world you’re in now, baby.” The muscles in his shoulders clenched and unclenched, causing a chain reaction in Caroline’s stomach. For someone who was always so easy-going, he oozed tension. “I’ve had a long time to get used to being a celebrity. It started slowly for me—getting recognised locally, then nationally, now globally. I’ve had time to develop strategies to cope. I’ve also had time to get to know what that world is like. To recognise the danger in it.” The concern in his eyes made her heart beat faster. “But you have only had a couple of weeks.”
Caroline leaned forward on the sofa. “I keep telling you. That’s your life. Not mine. I don’t need time to get used to it.”
“Yeah. It’s my life. It’s got nothing to do with you.” He snorted. “So how come the photographers are hounding you? Why are magazines running spreads on what you wear? Why did thousands apply to be your assistant?” He let out a long breath. “I wish it were different. I really do. But you’re in this along with me now. My fans want to know all about you. The paparazzi want to take your picture. People want to use you to get to me. That’s your reality.”
Caroline wanted to argue that he was wrong. She wanted to believe she was separate from everything his celebrity brought about, but she was only fooling herself. There was no separation. As soon as she’d agreed to marry him, she’d kissed her privacy goodbye. The knowledge came crashing down on her. She studied the ugly faded carpet her grandfather had picked out decades earlier, as she chewed on her bottom lip. No matter which way she looked at it, the situation didn’t change.
“I can’t keep working at the centre, can I?”
Josh pulled his chair forward so that he was within touching distance. He reached for her hand, his hold strong and sure. “I’m sorry, baby.”
Caroline looked around her living room. The photos of her as a child smiled back at her. The walls of books she’d poured herself into seemed to close in around her.
“Everything has to change, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah.” His voice was soft. He threaded his fingers with hers.
Caroline looked up into his eyes. There was genuine compassion in them. “I don’t like it.”
He chuckled lightly. “Who does? I know you didn’t ask for this. I chased fame. I knew what I was getting into right from the start. I’m sorry that it’s part of being with me. I can’t change that now.”
“Would you want to change it?”
“If it kept you safe, then yeah.”
They sat in silence for a moment as Josh rubbed circles in the centre of her palm with his thumb. Caroline didn’t know what to say. Really, what could she say? Her life was about to change forever.
Josh took a deep breath. His smile was small and sad. “I was scared, baby.” His voice was barely a whisper. “I can’t remember ever feeling like that before. I don’t want anything to happen to you, and my world can be crazy. I need to be able to keep you safe. And to do that, I need you to work with me. Will you do that? For me?”
The last barriers Caroline held against the man crumbled. “You sound so serious. I didn’t think you took anything seriously.”
“Some things are worth getting serious about. This is one of them.”
Caroline felt a surge in her chest
. Her heart was swelling. There was so much more to this man than most people saw. And the more she saw, the more she lo—liked. The more she liked.
“Okay, Josh. I can work with you on this.”
The smile he gave her was dazzling. He trailed a fingertip along her jaw.
“That means a lot to me, baby. Can we agree that you’ll take your bodyguard with you no matter where you go?”
Caroline didn’t like that one bit. She swallowed a sigh. “Fine. If it makes you happy, we can agree on that.”
“Oh, yeah. It makes me happy.” He brushed his thumb over her bottom lip, and a tingling sensation travelled throughout her body. “And you’ll remember to take your phone with you when you leave the house?”
She did sigh this time. “Yes. I’ll take the phone.” She thought about it. “Maybe I can get a cord and hang it around my neck. You know, like old people do with their glasses.”
He brought her hand to his mouth and smiled against her palm. “Yeah, you can do that. I don’t care what you do as long as it’s with you. You had to use my stalker’s phone to call for help. There are so many ways that could have gone wrong. What if he was dangerous? What if he didn’t have a phone? Maybe a cord won’t work. Maybe we should superglue it to you.”
Caroline trembled at the sensation of his lips against her palm. She swallowed hard. It had become increasingly difficult to follow the conversation. Josh studied her, a small smile on his lips that told her he knew exactly what affect he had on her.
“Enough,” Caroline grumbled, but it sounded half-hearted. Her mind was on other things. “I said I’ll take the phone with me. But we decide everything regarding my safety together. You can’t go all caveman and order me around.”
He pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist. “You order me around.”
“That’s how it should be.”
Josh barked out a laugh. “I don’t think I’ll win this argument.”
Caroline didn’t comment on that. Mainly because he was right. “And no more handcuffs.”
“But I kind of like the idea of you handcuffed to our bed and at my mercy.” His voice lowered. “The things I could do to your helpless body. The sounds you would make. I definitely think we should keep the handcuffs.”
Caroline shifted in her seat to assuage the ache between her legs at the thought of being at Josh’s mercy. Josh raised an eyebrow at her wriggling. Annoying man.
His face softened. “Are we okay? Do you still want to marry me?”
Caroline’s stomach clenched. He was gorgeous. All angles and planes. Muscled perfection with full lips and glittering blue eyes. She wanted to lose herself in his eyes. She wanted to have him wrapped around her. The urge to hide in him was almost overwhelming. The need to give herself to Josh, to let him carry her for a while, was one she’d never felt before. What would it be like to let someone else take care of things for a little while? Could she trust him not to hurt her?
She looked into his beautiful eyes and saw an uncertainty there that shocked her. Under his carefree, cocky attitude, Josh was perhaps as vulnerable as she was.
“Do you still want to marry me?” She was almost scared of the answer.
He stared at her for a minute before a slow grin lit his face. His eyes sparkled with mischief. It took her breath away. “Hell yes, I want to marry you.”
He yanked on her hand. She flew off the sofa to land in his lap.
Caroline felt relief from his answer buoy her spirits. She tried not to think too hard about the nausea she’d felt when she’d feared things would end between them.
“You would probably be better off with someone who is used to the whole celebrity thing.” She briefly wondered why she was trying to talk him out of his commitment.
“Probably”—he grinned wickedly—“but where’s the fun in that?”
“Yes, but—”
“No buts. I’m done talking. Now we get to the good part about fighting.” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “It’s time to make up.”
Before Caroline could utter a word of protest, not that she could think of any, Josh threaded his hand in the back of her hair and pulled her mouth to his. The touch of his lips against hers was perfect. His kiss was powerful and gentle at the same time. She opened her lips for him, moving closer into his embrace. His arms tightened around her and his kiss became more demanding. It felt like there was something more to it. It was as though all his worries about her were in the kiss. There was a desperation in his touch that melted her defences. He was telling her that he cared about her safety. That he cared about her. He was kissing her like she belonged to him. And it was wonderful.
Josh loved the way Caroline went molten in his arms. He ran his hands over her soft curves and tried to forget what could have happened to her. Tried to put thoughts of her being hurt out of his mind. She let out a tiny sigh of pleasure as his tongue languidly caressed hers. If anything had happened to her, he didn’t know what he would do. There would be no holding him back. There would be no need to worry about his career, because he would trample over it to get to the people who hurt his fiancée. It was all that mattered.
She was all the mattered.
Josh didn’t want to look too closely at what that meant. He didn’t want any more talking, examining, analysing. He only wanted to feel. To touch Caroline and to reassure himself that everything was fine. That she was fine.
He trailed his lips across her jaw and down the column of her throat. She moved her head to give him access. Her fingernails bit into his shoulders as she held on tightly. He doubted that she even knew she was marking him, but he loved the sensation. He gently bit the curve where her neck met her shoulder, and she moaned, pulling him closer to her.
“I need you.”
“Yes.” Her answer a shuddering whisper.
Josh ran his hand down her back to the edge of her pink dress and found the bare skin of her thigh. Her skin was like silk that rippled under his touch. His mouth moved back to hers as he trailed his hand along her thigh to the curve of her behind. Caroline pressed her breasts against his chest. She moaned into his mouth. Josh grasped her tighter. The dress had to go.
He reached for the zip at the back of her neck and tugged. Caroline pulled away from him. He stilled. One hand on the zip, another on the curve of her behind. Caroline’s breath was laboured. Her pulse was beating a tattoo at the bottom of her throat. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, drowsy with the same passion he felt. She placed a palm on each of his cheeks and stared into his eyes. Josh was afraid to move. Afraid to shatter the moment. He couldn’t name what he saw in her eyes as she looked at him. The depth of it made him feel awe. After the longest time, she nodded as though making a decision. An important decision. He held his breath. She smiled softly.
“Take me upstairs, Josh,” she whispered.
Josh felt something within him shift. He clenched his jaw and closed his eyes briefly. Everything fell into place and nothing had ever felt more right.
He grasped her hips and placed her on her bare feet before him. He brushed her lips gently with his and then stroked his hand through her hair. Her hand folded into his. Without saying another word, Josh led her out of the living room and up the stairs to her bedroom.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
There was no doubt in Caroline’s mind that she had fallen in love with Josh McInnes. She wasn’t sure when it had happened, but as she’d looked into his eyes, she’d known without a doubt that she had. She’d nodded to herself as she accepted the knowledge as truth. This man. Her man. She’d waited her whole life to love someone completely. And he was the one.
She watched his back muscles move as he led her up the stairs. His jeans clung to his backside, making her mouth water at the sight. She had never wanted anything more than to be in Josh’s arms. Than to belong to him completely.
As he gently led her through her open doorway to her bed, she expected to feel nervous. The sum of her experience with men was so small as to be negligible. But she didn
’t feel anxious or afraid. She felt sure. This was what she wanted. It was going to happen anyway—their wedding was days away and Josh had been clear that he wanted children. But it felt right to Caroline that she wasn’t going to make love to Josh because it was part of her agreement. She was doing it because she loved him.
“I kind of wish I’d left the door now. I keep expecting that any minute, someone will wander into your house and ruin this.” His smile was cheeky, but his gaze was hot and seductive. It made her quiver.
“You’re the only one with a key.”
He traced a finger down her cheek. “Are you sure about this? I can wait.” He paused. “If I have to.”
She smiled. Poor, suffering man. Yeah, right. “I’m sure. I want this.”
“Last chance to change your mind,” he teased.
“You can’t get out of it that easily.”
His eyes darkened with a passion that smouldered. “I don’t want out, baby.”
With one step, he closed the distance between them. His fingers wound around the back of her neck. He angled her head. And then his mouth plundered hers. She hooked her hands into his jeans and hung on tightly. The room swayed around her. His scent, masculine and spicy, filled her senses. He tasted like a cross between chocolate and coffee. For someone who never liked coffee, it could make a convert out of her. She pushed herself up on tiptoes to get closer. Josh’s palm flattened at the small of her back, crushing her against him.
After an eternity, his mouth left hers. They were both panting. Out of breath from passion and need.
“Turn around.” His hands were on her hips, turning her before the words had left his mouth.
Caroline was unsteady as she put her back to him. Softly, he swept her hair away from her neck, and she heard the zip of her dress as it slowly lowered. All of her clothes were at the castle waiting to be burned. All she had was this dress and the lavender lace lingerie set beneath it.
“So soft,” he whispered.
He trailed his lips down her neck and across her shoulder, before returning to her spine. She heard him lower to his knees as he slowly removed her dress. His kisses followed the path of the dress until it crumpled at her feet on the floor.
Goody Two Shoes (Invertary Book 2) Page 26
