He looked at me expressionlessly. ‘What do you think happened to her?’
I shook my head.
‘God, I really hate Valentine’s Day. First you have to send out for overpriced flowers, and then you have to take them out to restaurants where you are cajoled into the set menu that you would never choose ordinarily, and then the couple sitting at the table next to you starts arguing.’
‘Ah,’ I said, trying not to smile.
‘And this year I was one half of that arguing couple.’
‘Oh dear! I’m sorry to hear that.’
A ping went off and I walked over to the oven and looked in through the glass doors. The cake looked fabulous. I switched off the oven and, donning thick mitts, opened the door and brought my cake out. Ivan came over and stood beside me looking at it. I heard his breathing deep and quick and felt his powerful body almost vibrating with tension. My pulse started leaping.
‘Impressive,’ he said. ‘I’m surprised you managed to find all the ingredients in my kitchen.’
I moved slightly away and forced myself to smile. ‘Almost. I went down to the corner shop for the butter, and Ralph lent me the weighing scales.’
His body became peculiarly still. ‘Ralph?’ he queried softly. There was menace in his voice.
‘Yeah. He had a real posh, double-barrel last name, but he lives at the end of the corridor.’
He frowned. ‘I’ve been living here for years and I’ve never seen my neighbor.’
‘You should meet him. He’s really nice.’
He lifted his glass and took a sip, but there was a new tension about him.
‘In exchange I promised him some cake.’
‘How civil,’ he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
‘What’s the matter with you?’
‘And when did you plan to take the cake over?’
I flushed bright red. I couldn’t explain. No matter what I said, champagne and cake would look bad.
‘Oh my. Have I interrupted a late night cake eating date?’
‘It was not like that. I was just being friendly.’
‘Friendly?’ he snapped.
‘I was being neighborly. He was good enough to bring the scales over,’ I explained.
‘He came here,’ he growled, suddenly aggressive.
‘Well, yes. He helped me to carry it over.’
His eyes moved to the scales. ‘What? That heavy thing there?’
I felt my face grow hot again. ‘Don’t you judge everybody by your standards, Mister,’ I hit back angrily.
‘What’s wrong with this story, Tawny?’
‘All right,’ I conceded. ‘He did try to hit on me, but I set him straight. I told him I was still mourning Robert, but we could be friends and he was totally fine with it.’
He laughed, a brutal, cutting sound. ‘I can’t decide if you’re dangerously naïve or a total idiot.’
‘Just because I’m a country girl, doesn’t mean I’m illiterate or stupid,’ I said with as much dignity as I could muster. I felt crushed by his assumption that I was stupid and naïve, and disappointed that again we were at loggerheads over something totally innocent. I would have turned away and stalked out of the room if he had not caught my arm and spun me around. My heart jumped.
He pulled me towards him. ‘Let me tell you something about men, country Princess. We don’t befriend attractive women. Never.’
‘Just let go of my arm, please. I want to go to bed,’ I said through gritted teeth. I had been looking forward to having champagne and cake with Ralph. He was the first man who offered me the hand of friendship ever since I came to England, and now Ivan had completely spoilt it.
‘I’ll be damned if I left my date because I didn’t want you to spend Valentine’s night on your own, and you go off to bed in a huff because you don’t like the sound of the truth.’
I looked up at him, the warmth from his hand seeping into mine, and something in my stomach suddenly fluttered. Jesus, his eyes really were insanely beautiful. Like liquid silver. They poured over my face hungrily. Something dangerous whispered in my blood.
He’s your stepson, Tawny.
The air was suddenly deadly silent. I could hear myself think.
Hell to the no. He’s your freaking stepson.
I blinked. ‘Do you want to have some cake?’ I asked jerkily.
‘Cake? Yeah, I want cake,’ he whispered hoarsely.
I stared up at his lips as they moved in their sensuous dance of making words. Something bloomed between us. I wanted more. Much more. Unconsciously, I licked my lips and, from the way his eyes flared, it was clear that it was actually an invitation, pure and basic. A female calling to her male.
He brought a hand to my hair and fisted it. Pulling me back, he covered my neck with his hand. His skin practically burned me. There was something dark and desperate about the gesture. My pulse raced wildly under his fingertips.
‘Oh, fuck it,’ he swore suddenly and before I knew it, his muscles flexed, my body slammed into his, and his mouth crashed onto mine.
Oh, badass!
His tongue pushed into my mouth and the sudden explosion of lust between us was unbelievable. Never in my wildest dreams. Fireworks went off in my core. The passion was like wildfire that threatened to consume me.
‘I’m sorry I questioned your intelligence, but you’re fucking driving me crazy here,’ he growled, and swept his mouth along my jaw while his hand trailed down my neck and captured my breast. He rubbed his palm over the sensitized tips. Heaven.
‘Don’t you want this, Tawny?’ His voice rang too raw, too hungry. This couldn’t be the same man I knew. His eyes burned into me. No sarcasm or distaste there at all.
God help me. ‘Yes,’ I gasped. My entire body felt like a twisting, wanting mess.
He pulled back and looked into my face. His eyes were heavy lidded, the pupils dilated to huge black pools.
He was unbuttoning my top when the doorbell rang. Both of us froze. For a moment he looked down at me, and there was an expression of disbelief in his face. Then he left me and strode to the door and yanked it open.
From where I stood I could see Ralph standing with a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket, and two flute glasses. My stomach churned.
‘Sorry, have I come at a bad time?’ Ralph said.
‘Get lost,’ Ivan replied, his voice remote and cold.
I shivered.
‘Right. Got it,’ Ralph said.
I pinched my eyes shut. Oh damn.
Ivan closed the door and came within a few feet of me. A furious stranger with desolate eyes glared at me. His lips curled in a sneer. ‘Any dick would do. Huh?’
‘It wasn’t like that,’ I whispered, cringing at the horrible bitterness in his tone.
‘Go to bed, Tawny.’
‘Wait,’ I called, but he was already across the dining room and in the corridor. I heard his bedroom close with a slam that made me jump. If he had slapped me I could not have felt worse. He had treated me like a whore.
I swallowed the stone in my throat. The tears that welled into my eyes were hot and bitter, like poison.
‘Oh dear God.’ What have I gotten myself into?
Lord Greystoke
Fuck her.
Fuck this bullshit.
What a horny fucking slut!
I was so furious I wanted to punch a hole in the wall. Damn her to hell. I couldn’t believe that I fell for her shit. My hands clenched into tight fists. I could feel my fury burning like molten lava in my guts, but my cock was so hard it was like a piece of fucking wood stuffed into my trousers.
I strode over to the bed and sat down. I undid the button on my trousers and ripped the zip down. Little cheating bitch. I slid my trousers down to my knees and my cock was thrusting out of my underpants. Grabbing the material, I yanked them down roughly, closed my eyes and, loosely fisting the base of my shaft, started moving the throbbing mass of muscles in slow, pleasurable strokes.
The doo
r suddenly opens and she is standing there, her hair flowing down her shoulders and back like a golden river, and her eyes huge and unfuckingbelievably gorgeous. She looks like a goddess.
‘What the fuck do you want?’ I snarl.
She smiles sulkily, pulls her skirt up to her waist and shows me her naked pussy. ‘Look at what you have done to me,’ she complains in a wheedling voice. ‘I am dripping. Dripping all over the floor. I want you to put your cock in it.’
‘Come here now and let me see,’ I say sternly.
She comes forward, her skirt hitched up to expose her pussy, and stands right in front of my face.
‘Look at how ready I am,’ she mewls.
I see that she is absolutely right. I don’t think I have ever seen a woman so fucking wet. It is dripping down her thighs.
‘Don’t you want to put your dick into my hot, tight pussy?’ she asks eagerly.
‘Talk dirty to me first,’ I say.
‘Oh, Daddy, pound your little slut pussy. Make your whore cum,’ she says rubbing her slippery clit.
‘What a nasty girl you are.’
‘I’m not a girl. I’m your stepmother. Fucking me is forbidden.’ She licks her lips lasciviously. ‘It’s taboo.’ She shakes her head from side to side. ‘Not allowed. Bad. Filthy.’
‘You need to have your mouth washed out with my cum.’
‘Yes, yes, I want to feel your cock in my mouth right now,’ she gasps desperately and gets immediately to her knees. My entire cock disappears into her mouth before I know it. Her cheeks suck inwards. What a fucking whore. Her mouth is warm and wet, but it is not enough. I need something better. I need to punish her.
‘Actually, I think I’ll fuck you in the ass,’ I say, and pull out from the depths of her throat.
She looks at my dick, glistening with her saliva and her eyes become enormous.
‘Oh, you’re so big. It’ll hurt me so much, but I still want it,’ she says and gets on her hands and knees. She twists her neck to look at me.
‘Fuck my ass. Stretch it good,’ she begs.
I don’t use any lubricant. I just plunge straight into the lying, two-timing bitch’s ass. She screams …
… and I shot my load. It jetted out of me in streams of white like I hadn’t come for ages. I fell back on the bed, alone, my right hand still curled around my dick. Fuck. I needed a whole new strategy to deal with her.
A completely different strategy.
CHAPTER 15
Tawny Maxwell
I slept badly, my night filled with weird dreams. In one, I had sex with Ivan and when I woke up my whole body was tingling. In another, I was in Barrington Manor with Robert. Not only was he still alive, he looked as he had before he became really ill. We were sitting in the rose arbor at the edge of the vegetable garden and I was trying to tell him something, but he said, ‘I can’t hear you, my darling. You’ll have to stop that dog from barking first.’
I looked in the direction he was looking and there was Chloe on all fours. She was naked but for a dog collar, and barking her head off. She had a long pink tail, which stood up and away from her body, and she was waving it really hard. Weird.
Consequently, I could not wake up in time to go for my run, and I was in the kitchen cutting a slice of cake while waiting for the coffee machine to heat up when Ivan walked in.
Last night was etched in my mind, but it was almost as if what happened between us, the hunger, the crazy kiss, was just one of my weird dreams. The passionate man from last night was firmly locked away in a deep dungeon. There was only the suave businessman Robert introduced me to that very first night. Cold-eyed and totally unreachable, he stood in the middle of the kitchen and addressed me.
‘Good morning.’
‘Morning,’ I said, and lifted my hand in an awkward wave.
‘Do please sit down,’ he said, waving his hand towards the island stools.
‘Formal,’ I commented, and popped myself on the stool furthest from him.
‘Well, yes. I’ve decided what I want to do with you.’
‘Very dramatic,’ I said lightly, but already I didn’t like the sound of his voice.
He cleared his throat. ‘The simple fact is; the terms of Robert’s will mean should your stepchildren manage to arrange for your demise, or your incapacitation, his fortune is basically up for grabs. However, if you are married, your husband will inherit everything, and if you have children of your own that puts even more layers between them and your inheritance. At that point it would be pointless to eliminate you.’
He looked at me with raised eyebrows.
‘The marriage would only be a temporary arrangement. At twenty-one you will be able to set up trusts of your own and put in stipulations so your stepchildren are completely eliminated from being in positions of rightful heirs.’
I tilted my head to one side and considered him with narrowed eyes. What he just said sounded like three gallons of crazy in a two-gallon bucket.
‘Let me get this right. Are you actually suggesting I get into a sham marriage to keep my stepchildren away from my fortune?’
‘Yes. That is exactly what I am suggesting,’ he said blandly.
I laughed, humorless and short. ‘And you have a man ready to marry me as well, I suppose?’
‘Yes,’ he agreed quietly.
I moved back, stunned. Good gracious me, it never crossed my mind that he already had a candidate lined up and waiting for the job as well. No doubt he expected me to marry some employee of his or servant who would be compensated with my money for this ridiculous charade.
‘And do I know this accommodating man?’ My voice was low even though I was furious.
‘You’re looking at him.’
Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit. ‘You?’ I uttered incredulously. ‘You hate my guts.’
He shifted slightly. ‘Hate is a bit intense.’
‘Well,’ I breathed. ‘We certainly don’t love each other.’
He looked at me as if I didn’t have the sense that God gave a goose. ‘What’s love got to do with it?’
‘Do go on,’ I said dryly, still unable to quite believe he was being serious.
‘Quite frankly, I don’t see why not. You seemed to manage very well once before without love.’
The cocky bastard. I shot venom from my eyes. ‘This is exactly why we should never get married. I’d end up poisoning you and going to prison.’
‘The truth does tend to hurt,’ he observed.
‘The truth? You wouldn’t know the truth if it hit you where the good Lord split you.’
He grinned suddenly, which just made me even madder.
‘And while we’re at it,’ I cried hotly. ‘You don’t know the first thing about my marriage to Robert. You might need to take a seat for that. Actually, you might need to take a whole bench to yourself to sit and listen without judging,’
He raised both his hands, palms facing me. ‘Fair enough. I take that remark back, but if you keep the high emotions out of this scenario you’ll quickly appreciate the fact that I’m the best option and this is the best solution to your troubles.’
I opened my mouth to let off another tirade, but he raised his hands again.
‘Hear me out. The marriage ceremony itself will be quick and less painful than a trip to the dentist, and in about two years’ time we’ll get divorced. You’ll get your inheritance back under your control, I’ll sail off into the sunset, and we never need meet again.’
I looked at him suspiciously. ‘What do you get out of it?’
‘Just the sex really.’
‘What?’ I exploded.
‘Where’s that famous sense of Southern humor gone?’
‘It got chewed to bits when you unveiled your grand plan.’
‘It’s a good plan, Tawny. Strictly speaking we don’t even have to live together after a reasonable amount of time.’
I scowled. Why would he want to put himself out to the extent of marrying me, when it was per
fectly obvious that he didn’t even like me? In his eyes I was a gold digger. Aha! Correction: I used to be a gold digger. I wasn’t anymore. As a matter of fact, I was now the rich American widow. Easy prey for all kinds of avaricious men. Perhaps even men with titles and no fortune.
I leaned forward. ‘And how much of my inheritance do you get to keep when we divorce?’
His eyes were suddenly freezing chips of ice, and I realized that I probably shouldn’t have put it quite so crudely. There was still a small, unlikely chance he was doing all this to help me. To be fair I should have given him the benefit of the doubt.
‘I’ll get my lawyer to draw up a pre-nup where neither party benefits from the other, and have a draft sent to your lawyers. Any other objections?’
Another very obvious objection occurred to me, but I didn’t voice it. I didn’t even look at him suspiciously. What if he was in cahoots with my step-children? They kill me, he inherits the whole thing, and they split it among the four of them. Nice plan.
‘I’d like a bit of time to think over this new scheme of yours.’
‘Be my guest. Believe me I’ll be more than glad if you could come up with a strategy that is less involving.’
After Ivan left the apartment, I cut a large slice of cake and sat down to eat it while I thought about Ivan’s surreal and totally unexpected proposal. No matter which way I looked at it, it simply didn’t feel right even to pretend to marry Ivan. Not when I had only just buried Robert.
Poor Robert would have been horrified to see the situation I was in. He wanted me to be independent. Yet here I was, Barrington closed up, all the staff laid off, and me stuck in Ivan’s apartment and at his mercy while his stepchildren plotted God knows what to get their hands on my money.
I thought again about Robert saying to me, ‘Trust me, my darling Tawny. I have thought long and hard about this. I promise you my plan is a sound one.’ His illness must have ravaged him more than I thought. As far as I could see there was no plan to speak of, and he left such a large loophole for them to exploit.
I tried to imagine his reaction to me marrying Ivan. The thought made me sigh. Yet what choices did I have right now? I had no access to the money. If I tried to go it alone I would just make it even easier for them to knock me off. Perhaps they had even meant for me to perish that day. Like Ivan, I was a hundred percent certain that they would try it again. One look into Rosalind’s mean, dead eyes told me that she was total psychopath. One hundred and ten million was a lot of money.
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