So far, I had only seen glimpses.
I too tried to hide any gremlins from my past. Some things were better left unsaid. We were still getting to know each other.
I could hear him now, next door in the en-suite bathroom. The faucet had just been turned off. I pictured him in my mind’s eye; water trickling from his lightly tanned chest, his biceps flexed deliciously as he dries himself, his strong, muscular thighs, the ripples of his stomach and his wet, almost-black hair—wayward and mussed-up—framing the even features of his handsome face.
I thought of our lovemaking, just ten minutes earlier, and a shiver of lust shimmied through my body. I could not get enough of him. He possessed my psyche. I had never needed anybody as I needed him. But I tried to keep myself cool, calm and collected, even though I was on fire inside. He mustn’t know the apprehension that envelops me—the fear that I could be flung back again into the desert, abandoned with no water—on my own once more. And when I said “on my own” I didn’t mean literally so. Because you can be with a mate and still feel like an island—as I felt with my ex-husband Saul. I had blamed myself for my frigidity, my inability to reach orgasm through sex which, if I remembered correctly, happened in my early twenties, after I’d split up with my first boyfriend, Brad.
I had thought I was a lost cause until I met Alexandre. He intrinsically understood me (and my body). Maybe that was why I was hooked on him. Sexually. Mentally. But I tried to keep that to myself. Nothing like a needy woman to scare a man away. And one as hot as Alexandre? I had to hold onto my independence, my self-possession.
Or I feared I could have lost him for good.
My fiancé sauntered into the bedroom and fixed his eyes on me, running them along my naked body with approval. I could not believe he was actually mine. My fiancé. How I relished those words.
I willed him with my gaze to come back to bed, just for ten minutes, but I knew that his drive and ambition rarely let him lose restraint. He had a plane to catch—a business trip was waiting; clients hanging in limbo with baited breath for a decision to be made, a deal to be signed. I’d learned that Alexandre was a ruthless negotiator, a tough cookie when it came to business–nobody got to be as successful as he was by accident.
I drank him in. A white towel hung around his washboard abs. Beads of water gathered on his buffed-up chest. His green eyes were gazing at me.
“Come with me, Pearl,” he said, his French accent full and rich.
“I told you, I really can’t.”
“I’d love to show you my favorite haunts in London, take you to the theatre, a walk along the South Bank by the River Thames.”
He moved over to the bed and sat beside me, fondling my chin with his long fingers. He tilted my head back a touch and pressed his lips to mine. His tongue explored my mouth, the tip of it gently probing, running along my lips. He held my head in his hands and teased my tongue with his. I felt the electricity of it—tingles shot between my thighs. I groaned. My sound made his kiss more intense, hungrier. The towel moved—his huge erection flexing against it. I rested my hand there and felt how stiff it was. Always ready for me, even with just a kiss or at the sight of my naked body. Nobody had ever desired me this way.
“Why are you tormenting me like this?” he whispered. “You know I don’t like us being apart.”
“I can’t just leave Anthony alone—he’s come all the way from San Francisco especially to visit. Besides, I told you, I have that important meeting this morning.”
“It’s just work, it can be postponed.”
“No, it can’t. Samuel Myers has flown in from LA. You can’t start up a company for me, Alexandre, and then expect it to run itself. HookedUp Enterprises needs me more than ever right now—it’s my baby.”
“So têtue,” he teased, his French accent rumblingly deep.
“What does that mean?”
“Stubborn.”
I laughed. “I know you, Alexandre Chevalier. You told me once yourself that the last thing you wanted was a woman to be hanging onto your ‘every word, your every movement’ –that’s what you said. You’d get bored of me if I didn’t have my own projects, my own life.”
“Perhaps, but sometimes I think you push it, Pearl. Like the wedding, for instance. Why are you making us wait until December? It’s absurd—we could get married as soon as I get back from London.” He grazed his tongue along my lips and kissed me again.
“I told you. I’ve always dreamed of a winter wedding,” I whispered.
“The ice princess.”
I traced my fingers along his cheekbone and smiled. Let him think I’m the ice princess. Let him think I’m cool. He can’t know that my insides are made of marshmallow, that my need for him is more than life itself.
“You’ll be late,” I warned, running my fingers through his thick, soft hair.
“What I like though, is when I fuck you I make you melt,” he murmured, his hands trailing down my back along my spine. “I love your dimples, these adorable dimples in your back, just here . . . and here.” He made circular motions around my little dips and then ran the tips of his fingers farther south, cupping my buttocks in his large hands.
Those fingers lightly, so very lightly, touched the apex of my thighs, then lifting me off the mattress, pulling me towards him, he said, “So wet. Even when all I do is kiss you. Funny how you and I get each other so worked up—you’ve made me rock hard, chérie.”
“Yes . . . isn’t it funny?” We both laughed.
“Shit, damn it! You’re so tempting, Pearl. Damn my meeting.” He nipped my lower lip softly between his minty teeth.
The tease . . . I was used to this. He kept me in check—always leaving me begging for more, my heart racing. I throbbed with desire, aching for his return—even before he had departed. Or even when he was right beside me, I was on red alert, ready for sex at a moment’s notice. Alexandre said he liked it this way. My resolve needed to stay intact, though. I needed to stay strong. I could not lose myself in him one hundred percent.
Or he would have swallowed me whole.
I studied him. It was not just sex that had me in his hold. It was the way he was inside; his kindness, generosity, his sense of humor, the love he had for me—even his damn French pride that made him a touch possessive and jealous. Not too much, no, but just enough to make me feel desired and treasured. All this made up a complex personality—a character I was still trying to work out.
He walked over to his closet and opened the door. That same closet where, just three months ago, I had hidden myself behind rows of hand-tailored suits and racks of silk ties, where I childishly played hide and seek. A tremor filled my body now, remembering that sexually-charged moment. Alexandre had caught me and then tied my legs to the bedposts with two ice-blue silk ties, splaying my thighs apart. I thought he was going to play bondage and he did. His style. Sweet, but terrifying, because I couldn’t imagine what would happen next. I had nothing to fear; he “beat” me with a Kingfisher feather and tied my wrists together behind my head with the priceless Art Deco pearl choker he’d bought me in Paris. The excitement tipped me over the edge – the trepidation, the lust, the sensitivity . . . all mixed together in a delicious cocktail of sex. A cocktail that had turned me into an alcoholic of love. A drink that I needed every day just to function at my best.
I was addicted to him.
I watched him now. Six feet, three inches of pure, virile male. What was it that made me want him to take charge in the bedroom? To overpower me? I loved being beneath him, strong and dominant as he was. On top of me, pushing me to my limits, making me scream his name when I came. He had control over me sexually and he knew it—I couldn’t let him also dominate my life. He was testing me. I could sense it. Testing me to see how strong I could be. He made it clear that he wanted an equal. I had to match him; I could not let myself sink into oblivion. He once told me he was attracted to me for my maturity and that he was into “women not girls” –I needed to act my age, keep my comp
osure. It was a battle I fought every day. I still felt like a vulnerable child inside and sometimes found myself acting like a teenager with her first love. Passion is a powerful thing—hard to control.
“What’s it to be today? T-shirt and jeans, or a suit?” I asked him.
He pulled on a pair of boxer briefs over his tight, perfectly formed butt. My eyes then focused on that fine smooth hairline that went from his abs down to his groin. He still had a semi-erection bulking out his underwear. He looked at me. “I don’t know, what do you think?”
“Both are sexy. The second you put a suit on I want you to fuck me, though—you fully clothed with just your cock free. You could take me up against the wall. I love it when I’m naked and you’re dressed in one of your chic, tailored suits. I love it when you slam me from behind.” I bit my lip. “Hard as a rock. Just thinking about it makes me so—”
“Stop tormenting me, baby, or I’ll have to put you over my knee and spank you.” He winked at me.
“That’ll be the day.”
“You know I could never do that, Pearl, not even in jest.”
I observed him as he pulled out a pair of jeans, and a black T-shirt from the rack in the closet. “Jeans it is, then,” he said assertively, “or I’ll never get to London on time.”
“Bastard,” I said with a grin.
“It’s not as if I haven’t asked you to come with me. It’s not too late to change your mind.”
“No, I’m staying.”
“Sure? Last call . . . ”
“I’m sure,” I said, already regretful.
I slipped out of bed and joined him. “I’ll miss you.” I placed my arms around his warm, strong torso and held myself close. Breathed in his faint smell of lavender, hand-picked from his fields in Provence—crushed into heavenly oil—and the famous wish-I-could-bottle Alexandre smell—his natural odor that had me completely intoxicated.
As if on cue, Rex bounded into the bedroom, excited from his morning walk. He often barged in on our intimate moments. His black Labrador-mutt tail spun around like a windmill; his tight muscles rivaling his master’s.
“Oh Rex, how I’ll miss you my boy,” Alexandre said, bending down to hug his dog. “Look after him for me, Pearl. Don’t let Anthony spoil him with too many treats. I’m late, have to rush. See you in a couple of days.” He embraced us in a family trio and then looked into my eyes and said, “I love you, Pearl. You’re my everything—my light, my future. Take care now.” He planted another kiss on my lips and made his way down the corridor, to the elevator, where his ready-packed case was waiting. I didn’t follow, as I was still naked. Anthony was staying in one of the guest rooms—God forbid my brother should see me with no clothes on.
ALEXANDRE
“JESUS CHRIST, PEARL,” I groaned as I dragged myself off her; loath to break up yet another incredible session of lovemaking. Fucking? Lovemaking? Both words described what we did best. Really, sex was designed for us. Us together, anyway. With Pearl it was always delicious. Intense. Physically the best I’d ever had. Yes, and that even included Hélène.
I was still hard. “I could go on doing this all day long,” I said, pressing a kiss to her lips and letting my eyes celebrate her lithe, curvaceous body, still slightly tanned from summer. She moaned sleepily and took in a long, satisfied breath, her orgasm still lingering.
But I had to catch a plane to London and was already late, so I tore myself away from her side and went to have a shower. I’d hoped that Pearl would come with me to London, show her the sights, eat in my favorite restaurants. I wished she could just generally hang out with me on business trips, but she was a career girl and had her own plans, her own agenda. The fact that Hookedup Enterprises was a toddler learning to walk made Pearl relentlessly busy.
Her brother Anthony was coming to stay for a few nights so I was happy, in that respect, to leave them to their family reunion.
When I sauntered back into the room and saw her lying on the bed like a classical French painter’s odalisque, I stood still and absorbed my view. I never tired of observing Pearl. She had the sort of beauty that was difficult to put into words. Some women can look hard, chiseled, with a look of ambition cut into their jawbone. Pearl’s face struck me as always being so gentle, even though defined. Her nose neat and straight, her cheekbones sweeping up into her perfectly shaped head, which was crowned with a thick mane of blonde hair, cut in wavy layers. But it was her eyes that had me mesmerized. Clear and blue, yet the blue would change from a deep ultramarine that almost looked black sometimes, to an almost translucent sky color. Her eyes spoke of innocence and vulnerability: the eyes of a child.
“It’s not too late to change your mind, you know. About coming to London with me,” I cajoled. She was half asleep. I sat on the edge of the bed and whispered a kiss on her shoulder.
Pearl’s eyelids fluttered, and I stroked the length of her smooth back tracing the curve down into her dip and up again over her peachy round buttocks. I could have stared at that ass all day long.
She groaned languidly and parted her legs a touch. Her eyes flicked open and she smiled lazily. Just touching her soft, silky skin and looking at her beautiful face got me hard again. I wanted to fuck her endlessly. Over and over. I leaned down to kiss her, my tongue parting her full lips, and she responded as her tongue met mine. Slowly, teasingly. I groaned into her mouth—an erotic sound of carnal need vibrated through me. I held her jaw with my hands and deepened the kiss, hungry for more, waiting for her to plead for me to ravage her again. Damn that plane, I was feeling uncontrollably horny. Insatiable. I couldn’t get enough of her and felt edgy at the thought of leaving her for just a couple of days. We needed the physical closeness, the frenzied power of orgasms that always hit us simultaneously, that united us.
My eyes scanned down to her hand flopped by her side, and I took it, feeling her engagement ring between my fingers, mollified that if other men looked at her, at least they’d know she belonged to someone else. To me.
“You’d better go or you’ll miss your plane,” she told me, and I flinched.
“Why are you tormenting me like this? You know I don’t like us being apart?”
“I can’t just leave Anthony alone,” she murmured sleepily.
“Why not? He wouldn’t care; he’d have the run of the place, get the staff darting around for him—he’d love it. I don’t know why you’re going so out of your way for him. He treats you like . . . ” I trailed off—no need, I decided, to point out her brother’s failings.
“He’s been making more effort lately. That’s why he’s coming to visit. Anyway, there’s another reason I can’t go to London: I’ve got that important meeting with Samuel Myers, you know.”
“Sam Myers . . . the big, fat, Hollywood fish who smokes too many Cuban cigars and calls everyone honey.”
Pearl’s lips curved into a smile. “I know, he’s like a walking cliché from some bad B movie. I want to pitch my buddy movie to him. But I don’t want male leads. I want to see a woman playing at least one of those parts, maybe both if I can swing it. I’m so fed up of seeing actresses playing just the love interest.”
I squeezed her hand. “Well let’s hope he goes for it. I’m proud of you, Pearl, I really am. You’re doing a great job of getting HookedUp Enterprises on its feet.”
My eyes shifted back to the curves of my fiancée’s divine body. I wanted to suggest that another great project would be for her to do a workout video for women over the age of thirty-five; show them that females don’t have to be in their twenties to be in great shape. With Pearl herself as the exercise guru—she was a good model for beauty and health. But I never mentioned age to Pearl because I knew that was a soft spot for her; I didn’t want to draw attention to the fifteen-year age gap between us, mainly because I never even thought about it myself. Except on occasions like this, when she blew me away with how young she looked, and it annoyed me that people pigeonholed anybody by a number.
She took my hand and kissed
it. Soon, I thought, I’d be wearing a wedding ring there. “You’ll be late,” she warned me again.
“Such a cool customer, aren’t you? Sending me off like this when all I want to do is get right back into bed with you.” I ran the top of my finger around the dimples in the small of her back again, tracing it over the mound of her behind and into that luscious valley between her legs—a place where I’d spent so many wonderful hours of ecstasy and where I intended to visit for the rest of my life.
“What I like, though,” I murmured, my cock rock-hard again, “is when the ice-princess part of you melts.” And I whispered in her ear, my fingers deep inside her, “when I fuck the cool-customer nonsense out of you and you lose all self-control. When you whimper and beg me, and scream my name when you come.” I eased my fingers out of her again. Let her feel what she’d be missing—have her longing for my return. “Have fun in your meeting, chérie. I’ll be keeping tabs on you—just in case you get tempted by sexy Sam.”
She laughed and pushed me off the bed. I walked over to my closet and got dressed, slinging on a T-shirt and jeans—I was really late—and when I turned around, Rex had somehow managed to sneak his way onto the bed. Pearl and I had nicknamed him her “French lover.” I knew he’d be trying to usurp my place when I was gone.
I said goodbye to the pair of them and felt a rush of inexplicable adrenaline coil through my stomach. Leaving my little family behind made me feel nauseous, partly because when I got to London I knew who was waiting for me:
Laura.
Like tenacious ivy entwined around an oak tree, Laura just couldn’t let me go.
ANTHONY
PEARL
ANTHONY WAS IN his element. He arrived late last night and couldn’t believe that Alexandre’s chauffeur was there to meet him at the airport. He told me that he was moving in (joke). Or was it? I suspected Anthony could get used to this lifestyle. Not to mention his boy-crush on Alexandre.
Hooked Up: Book 2 Page 16
