But right at the edge of it, she heard words again, words from Red she could barely believe. As consciousness faded, she didn’t question, she simply smiled.
Red stared down at the woman beside him in his bed, and his heart lifted with joy at the sight of her. He was also vaguely aware that his cock was beginning to stir again, but it was his finer feelings that held sway for the moment, over lust.
She was a miracle. Supreme. Irreplaceable. The perfect submissive, yet as proud as a lioness. The perfect masochist, even while she fought the pain itself and wrestled it into submission.
I love you, Vicki.
He remember thinking those words as they’d fucked over the back of the armchair, with her swooning beneath him. He’d told himself they were just crazy orgasm words, heard in his mind rather than uttered by his lips. He wasn’t sure that he’d even absorbed their meaning, because he’d been as close as a man can come to swooning himself at that moment. But he meant them now, and he hoped she’d believed him when he’d repeated them in the darkness. That was, if she’d even heard his voice in the moments before sleep had claimed her.
He wanted Vicki completely now. And he wanted her forever. He’d never expected this to happen. Since Alexandra’s death, he’d given up on there being another woman he wanted to live with, and to marry. And he’d certainly dismissed out of hand the sweet dream of what he hadn’t had with his late wife. Which was a perfect love combined with a perfect sexual relationship that encompassed his exotic preferences.
But now he knew such a thing could exist.
He touched Vicki’s tousled hair, lifting it back from her face. She didn’t stir. She was deeply asleep, lying facedown and bare as innocence, her flushed cheek pressed tenderly against the pillow, not even a sheet covering her gorgeous form. The compulsion to wake her and begin everything again was excruciating, but she was clearly exhausted, not only by the rituals of punishment but by the intense frenzy of the lovemaking that had followed it.
Their wild, almost animal coupling over the back of the chair had been only the first of many. They’d fucked furiously, flying at each other in position after position. She’d cursed and groaned when he’d taken her on her back, but the pain of her beaten behind had only seemed to fire her up to new heights of hunger and intensity.
But then she’d ridden him gloriously, sitting astride his rampant cock and wringing his everything from him with a magnificent naked dominance that matched anything he might have dished out with his belt.
Finally, not so very long ago, they’d coupled side by side, and face-to-face, in a slow, gentle, easy and blissful rocking together of their hips.
There’d been very little talk. There hadn’t seemed to be a need for it. Their bodies had been speaking eloquent volumes. It was only at the last instant that he’d been compelled to declare himself.
But there would have to be a proper conversation soon, and it wasn’t going to be an easy one. Perfect love demanded perfect honesty, and in recent weeks he’d been living a lie. Worse, for these precious hours here at the hotel, he’d still deceived her.
Can you still love me when you know that I’m F. W. Shanley, my darling?
He knew she loved Red, even if she hadn’t yet said the words. She didn’t have to say them. He could feel her love. He could read it in eyes and in her body.
And he had to believe that she would forgive him the subterfuge and understand his foibles. She was an intelligent woman and generous of spirit. He knew she would never hold a grudge for being temporarily hoodwinked.
As she sighed in her sleep, and her exquisite mouth curved in a smile, Red could no longer fight the urge to kiss her. He leaned over her, savoring the sweet perfume of her skin and the anticipation of gently prizing her out of dreams and into his arms—when the phone at the side of the bed rang.
Red stifled a curse and considered ignoring the call or perhaps even wrenching the cord out of the wall, but his employees at reception would not be interrupting him unless it was an extreme emergency. They were far too competent and well trained for that.
With a sigh of reluctance, he turned from his sleeping love and reached for the receiver.
“Vicki?”
The sound of her own name drew Vicki up out of a deep, refreshing sleep. Exhaustion and a profound sense of relaxation had completely wiped her out, and she couldn’t even remember nodding off, except for the comforting awareness of having Red’s body close beside her, and the vague recollection of something unbelievably wonderful.
She blinked and looked up straight into his eyes. He was leaning over her, kneeling on the bed, fully dressed, even to a boxy black leather jacket.
His face was grave, and his broad brow puckered as if he were worried.
“What is it?” she asked, still sleepy but full of growing disquiet. As she attempted to sit up, the lingering ache in her bottom made her flinch. It was slighter now but still made its presence felt.
Red took her hand. “I have to go, Vicki. I’m sorry. Something’s come up. It’s an emergency.”
Warm and comforting, his large tanned hand encircled her paler one, cherishing it. Sleep still befuddled her, but the picture of his skin against hers was somehow settling.
“Um…yes…of course…” She glanced back up again and caught a parade of confused emotions—all as jumbled as her own—marching across his face. Regret. Worry. Frustration. And something deeper, more fugitive, but intensely thrilling. “Is there anything I can do?”
His fingers tightened. “No, not really. Just don’t be angry with me for leaving you in the lurch like this.” He shook his dark head suddenly, as if trying to rid himself of some unseen burden. “I don’t know how long I’ll be, but I’ll be in contact and I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“Okay. Right…” She wished she could find better words, but somehow what she was feeling was so immense and so confused that she couldn’t frame it. Why was something crucial and beautiful being snatched away from her as soon as she’d discovered it? But the anger was directed at herself for even feeling it—because the look in Red’s eyes told her there was a good reason for his sudden departure, one that was deeply serious.
He dragged in a great, wrenching breath, as if he were in real pain. “I have to go now. Right now. I have a plane to catch.”
With that, he grabbed her in his arms, crushing her tightly and pressing his lips down hard on hers. A hunger flowed through his mouth to hers, and yet, at the same time she knew it wasn’t a kiss of sex. It was more, so much more, and infinitely deeper.
As suddenly as he’d caught hold of her, he released her and leapt off the bed, backing away as if he couldn’t tear his eyes from hers.
At the door he halted. For just a moment.
“When I come back, we’ll talk. We’ll talk about everything that’s important. There are things you need to know…but…well, they’re the sort of things we need to speak of face-to-face.”
Then he was gone, and the last thing Vicki saw of him were his beautiful lips, framed by that roguish black beard, and on them she saw the shape of “I love you.”
By the time day had fully dawned, Vicki was ready to leave the Ivory Pavilion too. There was no point in staying. At one time, she might have relished the perverse and luxurious atmosphere of the unusual hotel and the idea that she could finally participate in the activities she’d fantasized about for so long. She might have indulged her erotic curiosity with people like Maria and Robert, or even Lukas and Clover.
But now, without Red, none of it had any meaning for her. He was the only man she wanted to play with. The only master she had any inclination to submit herself to, however temporarily.
She loved him and he was the man she wanted to be with.
However, the more fully awake she became, the more the questions about her erstwhile lover surfaced.
He’d left his clothes and most of his belongings behind, and when she’d phoned down to reception to appraise them of the fact and ask about transpo
rt, they’d said, “No problem…we’ll deal with them,” without turning a hair. Obviously he was a regular here. He couldn’t have become a King of the Pervs without that. But there’d been an odd note in the receptionist’s voice, almost one of awe. Since when did bohemian photographers command that kind of reaction in five-star hotels? Unless they were Mario Testino, of course, or someone even more exalted?
The second thing, more puzzling even than the clothes, was that Red had left his spectacles behind on the bedside table.
In the drowsy haze of her first waking, it hadn’t dawned on Vicki that he wasn’t wearing them. It was his eyes she’d wanted to look into, not the glass lenses she was accustomed to viewing them through.
But still, what was the story?
She’d studied the spectacles. She tried them on. There was no discernable difference between wearing them and not wearing them.
Why are you wearing plain glass lenses, Red? You’re hiding a secret from me. What the hell is it?
The last question…well, that might be derived only from her semi-slumberous state as she’d lain back in bed, stunned, after Red had left.
She could have sworn she’d heard the sound of a helicopter landing and taking off outside on the great expanse of immaculate lawn to one side of the main hotel building.
What kind of emergency would prompt F. W. Shanley to put his own private transport at the disposal of his employees? A car, maybe… There was one downstairs waiting for her. But a helicopter?
The mad notion that had been lurking in the back of Vicki’s mind for a while now—and bugging her when she very least expected it—surfaced once again.
“That’s ridiculous, Vick. Don’t even think it,” she told herself, shaking her head. “Now get your act together. It’s time to go back to normal life.”
But the notion lingered. Then grew less and less mad. She started to laugh.
Chapter Seven
But life wasn’t normal anymore. It had been changed completely. Transmuted by a man with peculiar fiery eyes, who might or might not need glasses.
Toying with the idea of fetching herself a coffee, Vicki stared out her open office door at the room beyond, not really seeing the rows of cubicles and their occupants. It was a good job that this week had been spent mainly on routine issues, because if she’d had to make any seriously critical decisions since leaving the Ivory Pavilion, she’d have screwed them up right royally.
Red was continents away but constantly in her heart and her thoughts. Writing a report or checking figures, she fantasized that if she just turned her head, she’d find him there, standing beside her, looking over her shoulder with that wicked, plaguing grin on his face.
Or perhaps instead, looking beautiful, stern and intense, his eyes gleaming.
The day-to-day ephemera of her job now bored her intensely, and as she continued to gaze out across the open-plan office, she kept imagining a mischievous, wonderful, provocative presence, and the snap, snap, snapping of a high-end camera. Laughing and grinning, sprinkling a bit of fun and diversion into repetitive office procedures. Doing on a smaller scale for others what he’d done so transformatively for her.
Soon she’d see him again. The thought made her heart bound so hard that out of pure reflex, she clutched her hand to her chest.
True to his word, he’d called her, and her heart had thumped just the same way then. Their conversations had been brief and precious but had not touched on feelings. What she felt for Red was too huge and too complex to convey across distance via the medium of a mobile phone connection. But still just to talk to him had calmed her.
At least now she knew the reason for his hasty departure. Gut instinct had told her she wasn’t the reason for it, but fragile with love, she’d still feared so.
But it turned out that an old friend of Red’s, someone close to him from his schooldays, had been in dire trouble after a disastrous business misadventure. The man had been so devastated that he’d attempted to take his own life. He’d failed, but alone, in an ICU somewhere in Southeast Asia, he’d asked for Red…and Red had answered that desperate plea.
Not without a second thought. You wanted to stay, didn’t you?
If Red had the same feelings she did, it would have been a tough, tough decision, but still he’d quashed his own desires after that micropause and done what any right-thinking person would do.
In their brief phone conversations she and Red had talked mainly of inconsequential things. Kept it light. But even those casual words had produced some startling results that made her smile even now. Instances of cause and effect that only confirmed her growing suspicions.
On a chilly evening, Vicki had complained of feeling cold, and a couple of hours later, a delivery service from an exclusive store had brought her a package containing a selection of exquisitely soft and huggable cashmere comforters, a pair of sheepskin bedroom bootees and bottle of twenty-five-year-old Hebridean single malt whisky.
After a sexy inquiry from Red about the state of her bottom, and her admission that it was still a teeny bit sore, another package had arrived. This time from an almost legendary Swiss firm that sold custom-made, hand-mixed cosmetics and beauty preparations. Inside a beautiful Swarovksi crystal jar she’d found a rich and divinely scented skin balm that had luxuriously soothed away the last of her aches. A flagon of matching bath essence had accompanied the luscious ointment…and tucked into the box was a packet of paracetemol.
But it was this morning, in the early hours, just when she was struggling out of sleep, that Red’s words had really set her reeling.
“I’ll be with you today, Vicki. I don’t know what time, but I promise you I’ll see you soon. And then we’ll talk properly.”
Still monitoring the thud, thud, thud of her heart with her fingertips, Vicki took a small sip from the bottle of water on her desk. Were these real palpitations she was feeling? It almost seemed that way. She frowned at the pile of files beside the bottle. How the hell could she concentrate on their contents with all the wild yet somehow increasingly credible-seeming notions that kept surfacing in her mind? She was going crazy, and she knew that even if she opened a file, the figures would dance and muddle up and refuse to make any sense.
Maybe I should feign illness, go home and take the rest of day off? I’m not actually achieving anything here.
But a voice inside her, the one that was privy to the most bizarre of truths, said, No, stay.
Yes, a coffee would help. Decision made. And at least fetching some would be a distraction. Rising from her chair and smoothing down her skirt, she went out into the main office, heading for the communal coffee-making facilities. But when she reached the table where the kettles, jars and cups stood, she found it surrounded by her colleagues, an ad hoc hub of seething, buzzing excitement.
“What’s going on?” she asked Lisa, who was always at the center of office gossip. A pang of guilt nagged her. When and how much she was going to tell her friend about what had happened with Red Webster? Lisa had been a good pal, and always supportive, so she owed it to her to at least tell her some of the story.
But if Lisa was curious, she seemed to have other concerns for the moment. Her eyes were alight with excitement and she was almost bubbling, like a lot of the mainly female gathering around the coffee.
“You won’t believe this, but Shanley’s coming!” She grabbed Vicki by the arm, almost jumping up and down. “It’s the man himself, the Lord High Almighty F. W. Shanley III. He never visits his new acquisitions in person—never ever—but young Mr. Wickham’s secretary just buzzed down to Belinda and told her his limousine is expected any minute. Come on!” She began to pull Vicki towards the door to the landing that overlooked the building’s spacious inner atrium-cum-entrance hall, a couple of floors down. “We’ll have a perfect view of him arriving from here.”
Vicki clutched at her heart again, expecting to feel the rocking of the carousel whirling inside her chest.
“You okay, Vick?” Lisa’s eyes
narrowed, her excitement momentarily forgotten. “Not getting collywobbles at thought of seeing our new celebrity boss?”
I’ll be with you today, Vicki…
“Something like that.” She attempted a bright smile and, overtaking Lisa, almost ran to the balcony, not caring what anyone thought of her.
Down below, the company’s directors and bigwigs had all gathered like a greeting party for the royal visit, and there was much tie straightening and fidgeting going on. Almost unconsciously, Vicki tugged her suit jacket straight and smoothed down her skirt, then she pressed up close to the wooden rail, half leaning over, straining, straining, straining to see.
There was a thud as the outer doors were thrown open by the commissionaire, then the inner doors swung open too. A tall, dark-clad figure strode through the doorway followed by an extended retinue of assistants and flunkeys laden with smart phones, attaché cases and document folders. Time seemed to warp and flow, and what normally would have taken only moments seemed to stretch out in a slow almost balletic way that allowed Vicki to see it all in perfect detail.
F. W. Shanley III, lord of all he surveyed, was a tall man, vigorous and powerful, clean-shaven and with short, crisply cut black hair. He walked like a god, his long dark overcoat swirling around him and open to reveal what, even from two floors above, appeared to be a breathtakingly superb suit. His eyes were concealed behind dark glasses and, even though he nodded and smiled and exchanged a few fleeting handshakes and words of greeting with the reception party, he didn’t once break stride as he crossed the atrium, then disappeared out of view in the direction of the bank of elevators.
“You know…I could swear he looks familiar,” said Lisa, her brow puckered. “Don’t you think so?”
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